6 
WALDEN. 
most books, tbe or first person, is omitted; in this it 
will be retained; that, in respect to egotism, is the 
main difference. We commonly do not remember that 
it is, after all, always the first person that is speaking. 
I should not talk so much about myself if there were 
any body else whom I knew as well. Unfortunately, I 
am confined to this theme by the narrowness of my 
experience. Moreover, I, on my side, require of every 
writer, first or last, a simple and sincere account of his 
own life, and not merely what he has heard of other 
men’s lives; some such account as he would send to his 
kindred from a distant land; for if he has lived sin¬ 
cerely, it must have been in a distant land to me. Per¬ 
haps these pages are more particularly addressed to 
poor students. As for the rest of my readers, they 
will accept such portions as apply to them. I trust 
that none will stretch the seams in putting on the coat, 
for it may do good service to him whom it fits. 
I would fain say something, not so much concerning 
the Chinese and Sandwich Islanders as you who read 
these pages, who are said to live in New England; 
something about your condition, especially your outward 
condition or circumstances in this world, in this town, 
what it is, whether it is necessary that it be as bad as it 
is, whether it cannot be improved as well as not. I 
have travelled a good deal in Concord; and every where, 
in shops, and offices, and fields, the inhabitants have 
appeared to me to be doing penance in a thousand 
remarkable ways. What I have heard of Bramins 
sitting exposed to four fires and looking in the face of 
the sun; or hanging suspended, with their heads down¬ 
ward, over flames; or looking at the heavens over their 
shoulders “ until it becomes impossible for them to 
DSl 
