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WALDEN. 
more intimate with us and more universal than any 
other work of art. It is the work of art nearest to life 
itself. It may be translated into every language, and not 
only be read but actually breathed from all human 
lips; — not be represented on canvas or in marble only, 
but be carved out of the breath of life itself. The sym¬ 
bol of an ancient man’s thought becomes a modern 
man’s speech. Two thousand summers have imparted 
to the monuments of Grecian literature, as to her mar¬ 
bles, only a maturer golden and autumnal tint, for they 
have carried their own serene and celestial atmosphere 
into all lands to protect them against the corrosion of 
time. Books are the treasured wealth of the world 
and the fit inheritance of generations and nations. 
Books, the oldest and the best, stand naturally and, 
rightfully on the shelves of every cottage. They have 
no cause of their own to plead, but while they enlighten 
and sustain the reader his common sense will not refuse 
them. Their authors are a natural and irresistible 
aristocracy in every society, and, more than kings or 
emperors, exert an influence on mankind. When the 
illiterate and perhaps scornful trader has earned by en¬ 
terprise and industry his coveted leisure and independ¬ 
ence, and is admitted to the circles of wealth and fash¬ 
ion, he turns inevitably at last to those still higher but 
yet inaccessible circles of intellect and genius, and is 
sensible only of the imperfection of his culture and the 
vanity and insufficiency of all his riches, and further 
proves his good sense by the pains which he takes to 
secure for his children that intellectual culture whose, 
want he so keenly feels; and thus it is that he becomes 
the founder of a family. 
Those who have not learned to read the ancient 
