204 
■WALDEN* 
of the sun is fully appreciated, to sit on a stump on such 
a height as this, overlooking the pond, and study the 
dimpling circles which are incessantly inscribed on its 
otherwise invisible surface amid the reflected skies and 
trees. Over this great expanse there is no disturbance 
but it is thus at once gently smoothed away and as¬ 
suaged, as, when a vase of water is jarred, the trembling 
circles seek the shore and all is smooth again. Not a 
fish can leap or an insect fall on the pond but it is thus 
reported in circling dimples, in lines of beauty, as it 
were the constant welling up of its fountain, the gentle 
pulsing of its life, the heaving of its breast. The thrills 
of joy and thrills of pain are undistinguishable. How 
peaceful the phenomena of the lake ! Again the works 
of man shine as in the spring. Ay, every leaf and 
twig and stone and cobweb sparkles now at mid-after¬ 
noon as when covered with dew in a spring morning. 
Every motion of an oar or an insect produces a flash of 
light; and if an oar falls, how sweet the echo! 
In such a day, in September or October, Walden is a 
perfect forest mirror, set round with stones as precious 
to my eye as if fewer or rarer. Nothing so fair, so 
pure, and at the same time so large, as a lake, perchance, 
lies on the surface of the earth. Sky water. It needs 
no fence. Nations come and go without defiling it. It 
is a mirror which no stone can crack, whose quicksilver 
will never wear off, whose gilding Nature continually 
repairs; no storms, no dust, can dim its surface ever 
fresh; — a mirror in which all impurity presented to it 
sinks, swept and dusted by the sun’s hazy brush, — this 
the light dust-cloth, — which retains no breath that is 
breathed on it, but sends its own to float as clouds high 
above its surface, and be reflected in its bosom still. 
