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Thoreau's Reading in English Literature
by

Maurice J. Tallefson
W'“"‘u.m

A Thesis submitted to the graduate faculty of
Michigan State College in partial fulfillment.

of the requirements for the degree of Master

of Arts.

1936

,.

THESIS

 

II
III
IV

VI
VII
VIII

Contents
page
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . l
Thoreau's reading in English Literature . 10
Early English Literature . . . . . . . . . 12
The Time of Chaucer . . . . . . . . . . . 14
Literature of the Renaissance Period . . . 22

Elizabethan Literature . . . . . . . . . . 24

Seventeenth Century Literature . . . . . . 46
Eighteenth Century Literature . . . . . . 67
Nineteenth Century Literature . . . . . . 81
Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96
Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103

Introduction

In Walden Thoreau wrote, “Even the college-bred
and so-called liberally educated men here and else-
where have really little or no acquaintance with the
English classics.“ \Thoreau himself knew the English
classics well, and he was also familiar with many of
the works of obscure and little known English writers.
But this knowledge and appreciation, although inspired
at Harvard College, was primarily deve10ped through
his own initiative during such spare time as the pre-
scribed studies allowed.’ 'An English youth, Henry
Headley, pupil of Dr. Parr, and graduate of Oxford
in 1786, had preceded Thoreau in this study of posts
that had become obsolete; and it was perhaps Headley's
volume 'Select Beauties of Ancient English Poetry,
with Remarks by the late Henry Headley,‘ published
long after his death, that served Thoreau as a guide
to Quarles and the Fletchers, Daniel, Drummond, Dray-
ton, Habington, and Raleigh, . . . posts that few
Americans had heard of in 1835.'2 A survey of Thoreau's

reading reveals many other English writers than those

 

1. walden, p. 118. (Ehpreau's Complete lorks,
5 Vols., Houghton, Mifflin and 00., Boston, 1929).
2. F. B. Sanborn, Familiar Letters 9; Thoreau, p. 65.

named by his biographer, Sanborn. The pages of his
writings abound with allusions, references and quo-
tations. (It is obvious that he read and enjoyed
English poets and essayists long after he left Har-
vard.’

iThroughout his life Thoreau had unusual oppor-
tunities for study and reading. Although his personal
library was limited, he had almost unlimited access
to desirable books. The Harvard Library at Cambridge
and the Public Library at Boston were at his disposal,
and his Journals reveal that he visited them often.
Emerson, in his Journals, says that the president of
Harvard College allowed him the freedom of the library
and the privilege of drawing books. Thoreau lived
with Emerson for two years and at all times had the
unlimited use of his library; There were many other
fine libraries in Concord, Alcott's perhaps being next
in importance to Emerson's. Thoreau loved books, and
neither his reserve nor his ascetic nature could keep
him from them. He was torn between this need of
books and the bother of getting them. He says: “When
I have Just been there on this errand [to secure books
from the libraries of Cambridge and Boston], it seems

too great a price to pay even for access to the works

 

of Homer or Chaucer or Linnaeus."*

Thoreau's reading of obscure English authors
while at Harvard was in itself a revolt against
academic procedure. In the broad sense of the word
Thoreau was a scholar, but certainly an undisciplined
one. His reading was never concentrated for long
upon one writer or period. In 1840, three years after
his graduation from college, he wrote in a letter to
his sister: “Blessed is the man who can have his
library at hand, and oft peruse the books without
fear of a taskmaster! He is far enough from harmful
idleness who can call in and dismiss these friends
when he pleases.'4 However, this lack of discipline
did not often result in the perusal of worthless '
books, for his reading was not entirely without
principle or method, but was founded on quite definite
wants and ideals. "We do not learn much,“ he wrote,
“from learned books, but from true, sincere, human
books."5 For example, he disliked and never read
novels because 'tgey have so little real life and

thought in them." Newspapers, for the same reason,'

irked him. “I do not know," he writes, "but it is

 

5. Winter, p. 518.
4. Letters, p. 31.
5. A Week 23 the Concord and‘Merrimack Rivers, p. 101.
6. Ibid., p. 72.

7
too much to read one newspaper a week.“ Yet, being

alone one night, far from books, he sat "reading by

the light of the fire the scraps of newspapers in

which some party had wrapped their luncheon“.8 Al-

though Thoreau wrote for and read periodicals occasionally,

he valued them little more than newspapers. In his

Journal for 1855 he wrote: “What venerable cobweb

is that which has hitherto escaped the broom, whose

spider is invisible, but the 'North American Review'?"9
{It would be false to state that Thoreau's think-

ing and style of writing were primarily influenced

by his reading in English literature, even though

this contention has been made by early critics.€

Although his interest in English literature was 1hr

spired early and continued throughout his life, it

was not necessarily the greatest influence in his career.

At Harvard College he became adept at reading Greek

and formed a lasting appreciation for the classics,

his favorites being “Homer, Aeschylus, Virgil, and

the poets of the Greek Anthology."10 During his visit

to Staten Island shortly after graduating from college

he translated The Prometheus figugd of Aeschylus and

portions of Pindar. His versions are today included

 

. Miscellanies, p. 471.

A Week, p. 194.

Early Spring ig;Massachusetts, p. 205.
0. H. S. Salt, Henry Thoreau, p. 95.

Home

in his Complete WOZEE- Although he knew translations
of the classics, his Journals reveal that he repeatedly
read and preferred the originals, even to the last
year of his life. 'For what are the classics," he
wrote, 'but the noblest recorded thoughts of man?"11
Certainly a reader of Thoreau cannot fail to be im-
pressed by his sincere reverence for the ancient
writers of Greece. When he is writing of them his
very language transcends the ordinary, as when he
speaks of .the elaborate beauty and finish, and the
life-long literary labors of the ancients . . . ~-
works as refined, as solidly done, and as beautiful
as the morning itself.'12

The influence of Oriental literature on the life
of Thoreau has only recently been evaluated. Arthur
Christy, an instructor at Columbia University, pub-
lished in 1952 a very thorough study called The
Orient ig_American Transcendentaligm, which treats
primarily the influence of the East on Emerson, Thor-
eau and Alcott. Mr. Christy's book leaves little to
be done in the study of Thoreau and Oriental literature,
for it not only reveals his reading, but it evaluates

the Oriental influence and conclusively shows that

this reading, more than any other influence, dominated

 

11. Walden, p. 112.
12. Ibid., p. 115.

his life and philosOphy. There is no record of Thor—
eau's having read in this field at Harvard College,
but by 1841 he had built up an interest in what was
to him a strange new philosophy. The fact that 1841
also marked the beginning of his two-year stay at
Emerson's is important, for through Emerson Thoreau
first became influenced by, and had access to, the
Igggg, the Bhagavat 9;}; and many other Oriental
classics mentioned in his Journals. During the remain-
ing years of his life he read and accumulated many
books on Oriental literature “with such zeal that he
is said to have had the best library of such books
in the country.“13

There is a recently published story, entitled
ghg_Transmigration g; the ggyen Bgahmans, which Thor-
eau translated from the French of Langlois' Harivansa,

-———IZ_—_

and which is not included in.his Complete Eggkg.
Many other indications of his intensive study of
Oriental literatures and of the extent of their in-
fluence on his thinking are to be found in his
writings.

A survey of Thoreau's reading reveals many interests

other than those so far mentioned. His knowledge of

natural science was both empirical and scientific.

 

15. H. 8. Salt, _p. cit., p. 95.
14. Arthur Christy, in The Orient in American Transcen-

dentalism, mentions this work.

For the most part he made his own discoveries and con-
clusions and verified them by reference to authorities.
These he found in error more often than himself. A
survey of his Complete Eggkg reveals a long list of
references and texts which he undoubtedly knew well.
Also, he was inclined to read books of travel and
exploration for the purpose of discovering some new
knowledge or interpretation of natural phenomena.
However, although he refers fairly often to such
works in connection with natural science, he occasionally
makes a comment such as, “ I read one or two shallow
books of travel in the intervals of my work, till that
employment made me ashamed of myself.“15 Obviously
he enjoyed such reading, yet a Puritanical sense of
duty prevented him from admitting it, even to himself.
Only a year before he died he wrote, “I also read the
New Yerk Tribune; but then I am reading Herodotus and
Strabo, and Blodget's Climatology, and 'Six Years in
the Desert of North America' as hard as I can to
counterbalance it.“16

Another and wholly different branch of reading
to which Thoreau devoted a considerable portion of
his time was that which concerned the early history

of New England. He mentions often the records of

 

15. Walden, p. 111.
16. Letters, p. 579.

the Massachusetts and other state Historical Societies,
the histories of the Jesuit missionaries, and the
early New England chroniclers. These early writers
held a fascination for him. In his Journal for 1855
he wrote: “What a strong and hearty, but reckless,
hit-or—miss style had some of the early writers of
New England, like Josselyn and William Wood, and
others elsewhere in those days.“17 The early history
of Concord and its vicinity was an Open book to him,
and it was not learned by accredited references, but
from old records, account books, land abstracts,--
in fact, from any unusual source he could uncover.
Although Thoreau's reading in early New England
historical materials, and his use of them, should make
an interesting study, the subject has not been treated.
One might be led to believe, because of Thoreau's
apparently close relationship to the Transcenden-
talists in Concord and because of his probable knowledge
of.other writers of his time, that he was well ac-
quainted with contemporary American literature. This
can be neither proved nor disproved from his writings.
If he did read and know these writers well, he con-
sidered only a very few worthy of mention. Except
for his published letters and a few quotations in‘A

Week we have none of his Opinions on this literature.

 

17. Walden, p. 111

His knowledge of the writings of Emerson, Alcott, Fuller,
and Channing has been definitely established through
other sources than his letters and works, and he himself
writes of Whitman and reveals that he enjoyed his

Leaves gglggggg. But what of Hawthorne, Lowell, Whittier,
Poe, Longfellow, Bryant and many others? He knew
Hawthorne and had met Longfellow, and undoubtedly knew
of them all, but the extent of his reading and his
Opinions is not known. It is strange, but not in-
explicable, that the literature surrounding Thoreau
should be least spoken of, for after all, his reading,
like his life, was primarily guided by personal likes
and dislikes.

Thoreau's reading, it can be seen, was broad and
varied; yet the scope of this reading has not yet been
fully presented. He was familiar also with some
Italian, French, Spanish, German, and Swedish literature.
His knowledge of these literatures will be revealed
in connection with the detailed, chronological study
of his reading in English literature.

10

Thoreau's Reading in English Literature
I

Thoreau's reading in English literature has
never been completely surveyed and analyzed. His
chief biographers, Salt and Sanborn, reveal his
interest ir1it, and name a few of the writers he
preferred, but in no way have they made a definite
attempt to show its extent. It is the purpose here
to reveal as accurately and as completely as possible
what Thoreau read in English literature. For the
most part this information was gained by making a
complete survey of Thoreau's works. Some information,
however, which could not be found in his Complete
Egrkg, has been taken from biographical and critical
sources. In all cases, though, where a choice
existed, Thoreau's own statements have been given
precedence.

It would be almost impossible, because of the
lack of sufficient evidence, to present this reading
in accordance with the years in Thoreau's life;
though such a procedure might prove more interesting.

Instead, the authors he read have been arranged

11

chronologically, and have been grouped as accurately
as possible into periods. The latter procedure is
the most logical, for it reveals the extent of his
reading in each period of English literature. How-
ever, whenever the date of Thoreau's reading of a
certain literary work is known, that information is

also included._

12

II
Early English Literature: 449-1550

Thoreau reveals a fair, but not extensive,
knowledge of English literature before the time of
Chaucer. In his Complete £22k; only two references
appear which definitely reveal some of the literature
read; however, some of his comments, which are found
in a discussion of Chaucer, indicate a fairly broad
knowledge of this period. For example, he says:

“He will know how to appreciate Chaucer best who has
come down to him the natural way, through the meagre
pastures of Saxon and ante-Chaucerian poetryfl!1
Since Thoreau admired and read Chaucer a great deal,
it can perhaps be assumed that this procedure was
his own.

In his Journal for 1861 (a year before his
death), he wrote: “You can't read any genuine history,
as that of . . . the Venerable Bede, without perceiv-
ing that our interest depends not on the subject, but

2
on the man.“ This is his only mention of the Venerable

 

1. AWeek, p. 595.
2. Spripg, p. 175.

15

Beds. Earlier, in‘A'flppk, he wrote, “We read in the
history of the Saxons that Edwin of Northumbria
'caused stakes to be fixed in the highways where he
had seen a clear spring.!“5 This might be the Apglg:
Sagpp_Qhronicle, for it is not probable that the
Venerable Beds and the unknown author of the “history
of the Saxons“ are the same; moreover, there is a
space of at least fifteen years between the two
references, which would place the reading of the
history during, or shortly after, his stay in college.
After the Venerable Bede, only Roger Bacon is
mentioned, and then but incidentally in a discussion
of Chaucer. “The fame of Roger Bacon,“ he wrote,
“came down from the preceding century."4 It is
impossible from this lone reference to judge his
knowledge and reading of this early scientific
experimenter. Yet, if the work was available, it

would have been in accordance with Thoreau's nature

and interests to read the Opus Maju .

 

:5. g Week, p. 165.
4. Ibid., p. 596.

 

 

14

III
The Time of Chaucer: 1550-1450

Thoreau's great admiration for Chaucer is best
expressed in the following excerpt from A ;W_e_e_k_:

“There is no wisdom that can take the place of
humanity, and we find that in Chaucer. We can ex-
pand at last in his breadth, and we think that we
could have been the man's acquaintance. He was
worthy to be a citizen of England, while Petrarch
and Boccaccio lived in Italy, and Tell and Tamerlane
in Switzerland and in Asia, and Bruce in Scotland,
and Wickliffe and Gower and Edward the Third and John
of Gaunt and the Black Prince were his own country-
men as well as contemporaries; all stout and stirring
names. The fame of Roger Bacon came down from the
preceding century, and the name of Dante still
possessed the influence of a living presence. On
the whole, Chaucer impresses us as greater than his
reputation and not a little like Homer and Shakes-
peare, for he would have held up his head in their

company.“

 

1. Ibid., p. 596.

15

No other single passage in Thoreau's writings
reveals as much general knowledge of literary and
historical figures as is contained in this paragraph.
That he knew Chaucer well is self-evident. That he
knew something of the general literary and historical
relationship of this fine early poet is equally
evident and important, for it is not easy without
some reading and background to speak so spontaneously
of a man and his age. Moreover, Thoreau was far
from superficial in his writing and study and was not
in the habit of commenting profoundly on unfamiliar
subjects.

On another page of §,!ppk Thoreau names some
works of Chaucer. He writes: “But in justification
of our praise, we must refer to his works themselves;
to the prologue to the Canterbury Tales, the account
of Gentilesse, the Flower and the Leaf, the stories
of Griselda, Virginia, Ariadne, and Blanche the
Duchesse, and much more of less distinguished merit.“2
There can be little doubt in this case that he read
these works, for in other parts of his Complete Eppkp
he often refers to them and quotes parts of them.

The thought and beauty of Chaucer's poetry are

often woven into Thoreau's descriptions. His boat,

 

2. Ibid., p. 599.

l .54 . nu.‘

 

‘LI.'1. .1.

 

16

floating on the Concord river in the quiet of the
evening, “was like that which Chaucer describes in
his Dream.“ And at another time in describing his
trip on the Merrimack he wrote: “Thus we 'sayled
by thought and pleasaunce,‘ as Chaucer says."4 In
his essay on Walking he again mentions Chaucer in
connection with his daily life. He says: "I walk
out into nature such as the old prOphets and poets,
Menu, Moses, Homer, Chaucer, walked in.“5 Even his
friend Mrs. Emerson did not escape a Chaucerian
reference, for in a letter written to her in 1845
he said: “You have helped to keep my life 'on
loft', as Chaucer says of Griselda, and in a better
sense.“6 There are many other similar allusions to
Chaucer, and in no case do they reveal anything but

respect and admiration.

In Thoreau's essay, The Lgndlord, he gives as

 

much space to a quotation from Chaucer as he does at
any one time to any other major English writer. It
is as follows:

“The great poets have not been ungrateful to their

landlords. Mine host of the Tabard Inn, in the

 

. Ibid., p. 557.
Ibid., p. 552.
Excursions, p. 214.
Letters, p. 76.

 

03010503

17

Prologue to the Canterbury Tales, was an honor to
his profession:-—

'A semely man our Hosts was, with alle,

For to haxlbeen a marshal in an halle.

A large man he was, with eyen steps;

A fairer burgeis was ther non in chepe:

Bold of his speche, and wise, and well ytaught,

And of manhood him lacked rights naught.

Eke thereto was he right a merry man,

And after souper plaien he began,

And spoke of mirthe amonges other thinges,

Whan that we hidden made our reckonings.‘

“He is the true house-bond, and centre of the
company,--of greater fellowship and practical social
talent than any. He it is that proposes that each
shall tell a tale to while away the time to Canter-
bury, and leads them himself, and concludes with
his own tale;_-;

'Now, by my fader's soule that is ded;

But ye be wery, smiteth of my hed:

Hold up your handes withouten more speche..'“7

The preceding selection is only one of several
which might be cited to reveal a profound reading of

Chaucer. Thoreau's reasons for liking him are

 

7. Excursions, p. 159.

18

similar to those that any scholar might give today.
“We admire Chaucer for his sturdy English wit,"8

he says. Although Thoreau's own writings are lack-
ing in humor or wit, he admired it in others. On
another page he says, "Chaucer had eminently the
habits of a literary man and a scholar."9 He admired
the active, robust type of person who could strike

a balance between scholarly activity and a physically
active life. The following statement, however,
reveals that in Chaucer which Thoreau undoubtedly
valued most. “He was as simple as Wordsworth,“ he
wrote, “in preferring his homely but vigorous Saxon
tongue, when it was neglected by the court, and had
not yet attained the dignity of a literature, and
rendered a similar service to his country to that
which Dante rendered to Italy.“10 And then, to

strengthen this explanation of Chaucer's use of the

vernacular, he quotes from The lgstament 9: Love:

 

“Let then clerkes enditen in Latin for they
have the propertie of science, and the knowinge
in that facultie, and lette Frenchmen in their
Frenche also enditen their queinte termes, for it

is kyndely to their mouthes, and let us shewe our

 

 

 

Hmm
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19

fantasies in soche wordes as we 1erneden of our
dames tongs.“11

Thoreau was familiar also with other writers of
this period in English literature, but in no way does
his reading of them compare to his knowledge of
Chaucer. Wyclif was mentioned by Thoreau in the quo-
tation given above,12 but he is not mentioned again
in any other part of his works. Gower, however, is
quoted at least twice, and referred to in several
places. The following verse appears in.§,prk:

“And Idahel, as saith the boke,

Firsts made nette, fishes take.

Of huntyng eke he fond the chace,

Whiche news is knows in many place;

A tent of cloths, with cords and stake,

He sette up first, and did it make.“15

Lydgate is quoted once and referred to but
once. This quotation is found on the page with
Gower's, and is as follows:

“Jason first sayled, in story it is tolde,

Toward Colchos, to wynne the flees of golds,

Ceres the Goddess fond first the tilthe of lands;

0 o . c o o e O o O O 0 o e O

 

11. Ibid., p. 595.
12. Page l4.
15. _A_ Week, p. 57.

 

20

Also, Aristsns fond first the usage

Of mylke, and cruddis, and of honey swote;

Peryodes, for grete avauntage,

From flyntss smote fuyre, darying in the roots.“14

The lone reference to Lydgate tells as much as
is necessary. It is one of the few cases where
Thoreau confines himself to a strictly critical
opinion. He wrote that “Lydgate's 'Story of Thebes',
intended for a Canterbury tale, is a specimen of
most unprogressive, unmusical verse.”15

Thoreau's reading of the early French poet and
chronicler, Froissart, is as important as any reading
except that of Chaucer in this period. His biographer
1 Salt tells us, “He loved to study Froissart and the
old fashioned chronicles,"16 and Thoreau himself in
A Yankee gp Canada, speaking of Quebec, wrote that
he “thought it would be a good place to read Froissart's
Chronicles. It was such a reminiscence of the Middle
Ages as Scott's novels.“l7

It is well to mention here the possibility that
Thoreau read Dante, Petrarch and Boccaccio. In his

18
essay on Carlyle he mentions Dante in connection

 

14. Ibid., p. 57.

15. Spring, p. 282.

16. H. S. Salt, _p. p;p., p. 96.
17. Excursions, p. 25.

18. Miscellanigg, p. 551.

 

s. . Calm": Igvsfl..i‘

21

with other great writers, and in another volume he
writes of “the mystic lore of the wilderness which
Spenser and Dante had just begun to read.“19 Only
one reference to Petrarch and Boccaccio can be found,
and it tells us only that “Petrarch and Boccaccio
lived in Italy.“20 This is interesting, but is cer-

tainly not the type of evidence upon which conclusions

can be drawn.

 

19. Maine Woods, p. 255.
20. A Week, p. 596.

22

IV
Literature of the Renaissance Period: 1450-1558

A careful survey of Thoreau's Complete Works
fails to reveal or indicate a knowledge of the
literature of the Renaissance period in English
literature. Yet it is exactly what might be expected,
for, with a few exceptions, there is little in this
period that would interest Thoreau. It was not a
Renaissance period as far as England was concerned,
for England's flowering age came almost a century
later. Moreover, it is doubtful if Thoreau had
access to the works of many writers of this pre-
Shakespearian age. The histories of English literature
which were current in his time cover this period very
sketchily. A good example of these histories, and
one which Thoreau might have used, is Thomas Arnold's
AIManual p; Epglish Literature. Thoreau‘s failure,
then, to read the literature of this period should
not be to his discredit, but should be taken as ins
dicati've of the time in which he lived.

There is one allusion, however, which, if

 

25

interpreted literally, might be taken to indicate a
knowledge, and possible reading, of Sir Thomas More's
Hippie. In speaking of a philosOphy he says, "But
it is thought UtOpian.“1 The use of this term, how-
ever, is very seldom indicative of a knowledge of
More's work, for the adjective UtOpian has its own
meaning and place in a vocabulary.

Thoreau knew at least one book of the Italian

Renaissance-~the Autobiogpaphy p; Benvenuto Cellini.

 

In Walden he writes: “Benvenuto Cellini tells us

in his Memoirs, that, after a certain terrible dream
or vision which he had during his confinement in the
castle of St. Angelo a resplendent light appeared
over the shadow of his head at morning and evening,
whether he was in Italy or France, and it was
particularly conspicuous when the grass was moist
with dew.“

It is also interesting to find that Thoreau
knew and probably read Rabelais. He speaks of him
once in a description of a native of Cape Cod: “His
style of conversation was coarse and plain enough to
have suited Rabelais. He would have made a good
Panurge, or rather, he was a sober Silenus and we

5
were the boys Chromis and Mansilus.“

 

l. Walden, p. 121.
2. Walden, p. 224.
5. Cape Cod, p. 91.

24

V
The Elizabethan Literature: 1558-1625

It is natural that Thoreau should reveal a
more extensive reading in the Elizabethan period
than in any preceding it, for the Elizabethan is
the first truly productive age in English litera-
ture. However, it will be seen later that it was
really the post-Elizabethan period that interested
him most. In all, Thoreau was familiar with some
fifteen English writers of the Elizabethan period,
and perhaps with others whom he fails to mention.
With a few exceptions they are presented in the
following pages in their chronological order.

In Walden he wrote: “I should be proud to
have for the motto of my cabin these lines of Spenser
which one of my visitors inscribed on a yellow wal-
nut leaf for a card:--

“Arrived there, the little house they fill,

Ne looks for intertainment where none was;

Rest is their feast, and all things at their will:

1
The noblest mind the best contentment has.“

 

l. Walden, p. 158.

25

In _A_ [93; he has as a chapter head the following

lines from Spenser:
“The Boteman strayt

Held on his course with stayed stedfastnesse,

Ne never shroucke, ne never sought to boyt

His tryed armes for toyelsome wearinesse;

But with his cares did sweeps the watry wildernesse.“2

Thoreau's appreciation Of Spenser must be judged
from these two excerpts, for in no place does he men-
tion the poet critically, as he does Chaucer and
others. However, it cannot be expected that he should
give his Opinion freely on all writers, for he was
not a typical scholar or critic. Nevertheless, we
can be quite certain that he had a fair reading knowledge
Of Spenser and almost as certain that he admired him.

It is not easy to decide whether or not Thoreau
read Sidney's Arcadia, for his references are limited
and vague. In one place he wrote: “I have not read
Of any Arcadian life which surpasses the actual luxury
and serenity Of these New England dwellings.“3 This
might be taken to include all reading of an Arcadian
sort, or it might allude to Sidney's work. As in the
case Of UtOpian, the word Arcadian might be taken to
have the import of an adjective only. Again, in

 

2. _A_Week, p. 556.
5. Ibid., p. 256.

 

 

26

Walden, he writes: “In Arcadia, when I was there I
did not see any hammering stone.“4 This reference
to Arcadia is tOO general to have much value as
evidence.

In 1841 Margaret Fuller, in a letter to Thoreau
in which she had criticized and rejected some poems,
wrote: “Let me know whether you go to the lonely
hut, and write to me about Shakespeare, if you read
him there. I have many thoughts about him, which I
have never yet been led to express.“5 It is probable
that some time before, Thoreau had discussed Shakes-
peare with this interesting friend, for he had known
Shakespeare and Margaret Fuller some time before
this date. In his Journal for 1840 he says: “The
Greeks had no transcendent geniuses like Milton and
Shakespeare,flwhose merit alone posterity could fully
appreciate“;0 and before 1840, during his college
years and after, he must have read and enjoyed some
Of the plays and sonnets.

There are only two occasions in Thoreau's writ-
ings when he uses expressions from Shakespeare. In
Walden he quotes the familiar line, “The evil that

7
men do lives after them,“ and in his Journal for

 

. Walden, p. 65.

F. B. Sanborn, Henry Thoreau, p. 172.
Winter, p. 279.

Welden, p. 75.

-q5»one

27

1852 he writes: “This suggests the prOpriety of
Shakespeare's expression 'the region cloud', region
meaning these upper regions relatively to the earth.“8
Although this does not necessarily indicate a meagre
reading, it is of little assistance in determining

its extent.

Thoreau was always intensely interested in the
lives of the writers he read, and often it seems that
this interest overshadowed his respect for their works.
His comment in the Journal for 1857 on the lack of
knowledge concerning Shakespeare's life is interesting:
“Shakespeare has left us his fancies and imaginings,
but the truth of his life, with its becoming circum-
stances, we know nothing about. The writer is re-
ported, the liver not at all. Shakespeare's house!
how hollow it is! NO man can conceive of Shakespeare
in that house. We want the basis Of fact, of an
actual life, to complete our Shakespeare as much as
a statue wants its pedestal. A poet's life, with
this broad actual basis, would be as superior tO
Shakespeare's, as a lichen, with its base or thallus,
is superior, in the order of being, tO'a fungus.“9

Thoreau's criticism is not always consistent,

and at times it is Obscure, as if he wrote but a

 

8. Summer, p. 80.
9. Autumn, p. 161.

28

part Of an Opinion and completed it mentally. Uns
doubtedly some recent Oriental philosophy upon which
he was brooding caused him to write that “Homer and
Shakespeare and Marvell and Wordsworth are but the
rustling Of leaves and crackling Of twigs in the
forest, and there is not yet the sound of any bird,“10
for in another place he tells us that “Beside the
vast and cosmogonal philosOphy of the Bhagvat Gita,
even our Shakespeare seems sometimes youthfully green
and practical merely.“11 Not only Oriental philosOphy,
but even experiences of daily life he valued above
Shakespeare. “The Iliad and Shakespeare,“ he writes,
“are tame to him, who hears the rude but homely inp
cidsnts Of the road from every traveler.“12

In 1861 Thomas Cholmondeley, who was one of
Thoreau's few intimate friends, wrote to him from
Shrewsbury, England, saying in the conclusion to his
letter: “We have been lately astonished by a foreign
Hamlet, a supposed impossibility; but Mr. Fletcher
does real wonders. No doubt he_will visit America,
and then you may see the best actor in the world.

He has carried out Goethe's idea of Hamlet as given
in the 'Wilhelm Meister!; showing him forth as a

 

10. _A Week, p. 528.
11. bid., p. 149.
12. Excursiogp, p. 158.

 

H

 

29

15
fair-haired and fat man.“ From that date on Thoreau

was ill, and a year later he died, so it is doubtful
that he ever saw a presentation Of a Shakespearian
play, for neither in his letters nor in his works does
he tell us of having attended a Shakespearian, or

any other dramatic production.

It is most interesting to find that Sir Walter
Raleigh is quoted and mentioned Oftener than any
other writer that Thoreau read in the Elizabethan
Period. Although Ben Jonson and Shakespeare are
spoken of quite frequently, Sir Walter Raleigh was
unquestionably his favorite, even though he did not
consider him as remarkable a genius as the two drama-
tists. “He seems to have been fitted by his genius
for short flights Of impulsive poetry, but not for
the sustained loftiness Of Shakespeare or Milton,“14
he wrote in his Journal for 1842. And in his first
published work, 4:1223» he says: “Sir Walter Raleigh
might well be studied, if only for the excellence of
his style, for he is remarkable in the midst Of so
many masters.“15

Thoreau names some Of Raleigh's works in his

Journal for the year 1842. “He was the author of

 

15. Letters, p. 582.
14. Wintep, p. 145.

15. A Weelp, p. 106.

 

50

'Maxims Of State“, 'The Cabinet Council', and 'The
Soul's Errand',“16 he wrote. And some years later,
in pp; Lgpp LA p‘pg gpr Bpppp,17 Thoreau mentions
Raleigh's History pp pp; prlg. Also, in addition
to these works, there are occasional references to
Raleigh's miscellaneous poetry.

In his essay Paradise (29 Ag) Regained, to
clarify his Opinions on the power Of love, Thoreau
quotes Raleigh. “The souls Of men loving and fearb
ing God,“ says Raleigh, “receive influence from that
divine light itself, whereof the sun's clarity, and
that Of the stars, is by Plato called but a shadow.
Lumen est umbra Dei, Deus est Lpppp Luminis. Light
is the shadow Of God's brightness, who is the light
Of light.“18 The essay in which this quotation is
included was written in 1842, at the time when his
enthusiasm for Raleigh was first being manifested.
Later, in 1859, in an address delivered in Concord
in commemoration of John Brown he said: “The well
known verses called 'The Soul's Errand', supposed,
by some, to have been written by Sir Walter Raleigh
when he was expecting to be executed the following

day, are at least worthy of such an origin, and are
19

equally applicable to the present case.“ The

 

16. Winter, p. 145.
17. Miscellanies, p. 447.
18. Ibid., p. 504.
19. Ibid., p. 452.

51

verses were evidently quoted, but the editors of his
Complete flppkp have failed to include them. Never-
theless, the preceding passage reveals the same ins
terest in Raleigh that is so spontaneously expressed
in his early life.

In Thoreau's well-written essay NAghp App Mppp-
11 t, which is not as romantic as might be expected
from the title, he quotes the following from Raleigh:
“The stars are instruments of far greater use than
to give an Obscure light, and for men to gaze on
after sunset.“20 His deveIOpment of this theme,
'however, is meagre, for he digresses soon after this
quotation, and fails to tell us what he or Raleigh
considered the “greater use“ Of the stars to be. How-
ever, in Walden, in a discussion of man and physical
labor, he more aptly quotes from Raleigh:

“From thence our kind hard-hearted is, enduring

pain and care,
21

Approving that our bodies Of a stony nature are.“

Thoreau's fondness for the prose and poetry of
Raleigh did not prevent him from recognizing and criti-
cizing certain weaknesses. In his Journal entry for

March 16, 1842, he devotes a page and a half to com-
ments on Raleigh, and among other things says that

 

20. Excursions, p. 529.
21. Walden, p. 6.

52

“Raleigh's maxims are not true and important, but
yet are expressed with a certain magnanimity which
was natural to the man, as if this selfish policy
could easily afford to give place in him to a more
human and generous one.“22

His criticism of Raleigh, though, is best ex-
pressed in the following passage:

“Sir Walter Raleigh's faults are those of a
courtier and a soldier. In his counsels and aphorisms
we see not unfrequently the haste and rashness Of a
boy. His philosophy was not wide nor deep, but OOH?
tinually giving way to the generosity Of his nature.
What he touches he adorns by his greater humanity
and native nobleness, but he touches not the true
and original . . . He was not wise nor a seer in any
sense, but rather one of nature's nobility, the most
generous nature which can be spared to linger in
the purlieus of the court . . . His was a singularly
perverted genius, with a great inclination to originality
and freedom, and yet who never steered his own course.
Of so fair and susceptible a nature, rather than broad
or deep, that he lingered to slake his thirst at the
nearest and even somewhat turbid wells of truth and

beauty. His homage to the less fair or noble left

 

22. Spring, p. 146.

55

25
no space for homage to the all fair.“

Although Thoreau quotes Ben Jonson Often, and
shows a familiarity with his works, he does not reveal
his critical Opinion of him as he does of Shakespeare
and Raleigh. His only comment that might at all be
termed critical is found in A_prk, where he writes:
“Men have a respect for scholarship and learning
greatly out of prOportion to the use they commonly
serve. We are amused to read how Ben Jonson engaged
that the dull masks with which the Royal family and
nobility were to be entertained should be 'grounded
upon antiquity and solid learning.‘ Can there be
any greater reproach than in idle learning? Learn
to split wood at least.“24 This passage might be
interpreted in several ways, none of which would be
conclusive. However, it does reveal a knowledge of
Jonson's life, and suggests at least a dislike Of
his passion for “solid learning“. This criticism,
if it is such, does not apply to any particular work
or passage, for Thoreau quotes from Jonson without
comment.

Thoreau's entry in his Journal for March 4, 1841
Opens and closes with a quotation from Jonson, and

probably, in substance, reflects a recent reading Of

 

25. Winter, p. 145.
24. ‘A Week, p. 108.

54

his biography, or perhaps of his critical work, Timber.
This entry is comparatively short, and, because Of
its interesting content and possible relation to Jon-
son, is given here in full:

“March 4, 1841. Ben Jonson says in his epigrams,
“He makes himself a thoroughfare of vice.‘ This is
true, for by vice the substance of a man is not
changed, but all his pores and cavities and avenues
are profaned by being made the thoroughfares of vice.
The searching devil courses through and through him.
His flesh and blood and bones are cheapened. He is
all trivial, a place where three highways Of sin
meet. So is another the thoroughfare Of virtue, and
virtue circulates through all his aisles like wind,
and he is hallowed.

“We reprove each other unconsciously by our
own behavior. Our very carriage and demeanor in the
streets should be a reprimand that will go to the
conscience of every beholder. An infusion of love
from a great soul gives a color to our faults which
will discover them as lunar caustic detects impurities
in water. The best will not seem to go contrary to
others; but as if they could afford to travel the
same way, they go a parallel but higher course: Jon-

son says,--

 

55

'That to the vulgar canst thyself apply,

Treading a better path, not contrary."'25

In his essay on Walking we find Thoreau revis-
ing Jonson to suit his own taste. He writes: “Ben
Jonson exclaims,--

'How near to good is what is fair!‘
80 I would say,--

26

How near to good is what is wild!“
That wild things are good we cannot deny, but to
say of an owl that its “dismal scream is truly Ben
Jonsonian,"27 although unique, is hardly to be taken
as a reference to Jonson's goodness. Another quota-
tion from Jonson appears at about the time Thoreau
is supposed to have been jailed for non-payment Of
taxes:

“Who 'er raised
28

For wealth he has not, he is taxed, not praised.“

There are other writers in this period Of English
literature whom Thoreau might have read, but these
men, for the most part, are only briefly quoted or

referred to in some way. This is not much evidence

upon which to base a judgment Of his reading, but it

 

25. Spring, p. 55.
26. Excursions, p. 529.

27. Walden, p. 158.
28. Winter, p. 557.

 

56

at least serves as a clew to the possibility of his
having known their works, and perhaps something of
their background. In making an investigation of a
writer's reading in a certain field Of literature,

we cannot expect to find mention of all that he has
read. It must be assumed, or otherwise he would be
different from most men, that Thoreau read some

works without considering them or their authors

worthy Of note. Furthermore, it is possible, and
quite probable, that the substance or philosOphy

of many unmentioned works is reflected irihis writings,
but in such form as to hide the original sources.

It is quite true that we comment on that which pleases
us most and least, and this truth is reflected in

the writings of Thoreau. Perhaps at some time, through
a survey Of the records at the libraries in Boston

and Cambridge and elsewhere, many books will be un-
covered which he read but never mentioned.

In his Egpprsions, Thoreau wrote: “We do not
learn by inference and deduction and the application
Of mathematics to philosOphy, but by direct inter-
course and sympathy. It is with science as with
ethics, . . . we cannot know truth by contrivance
and method; the Baconian is as false as any other,

and with all the helps of machinery and the arts, the

 

57

most scientific will still be the healthiest and
friendliest man.“29 Thoreau's conception Of the
Baconian method and philOSOphy is suggested in

this statement, and his opinion of it is given

frankly. Some reading and knowledge Of Francis

Bacon must have preceded this thought, but it is
almost impossible to determine its exact nature or
extent, for there are no other references or allusions.
Bacon's importance and his relation to his age are
revealed in such histories of English literature as
Thoreau might have referred to or studied. It is
doubtful if he could have read as widely in this
literary period as he did without having had at least
a slight knowledge Of Bacon's essays and his philOSOphical
writings.

Francis Beaumont is only referred to. In A Egg;
Thoreau wrote: “That would be a rare praise, if it
were true, which was addressed to Francis Beaumont,--
“Spectators sate part in your tragedies“:50 What
he knew of Beaumont's “tragedies“, we cannot say.

In general, he read little from the dramas of this
or any other period in English literature. However,

he does quote from John Fletcher. In his Journal for

1855 he wrote: “SO Often to the luxurious and hazy

 

29: Excursions, p. 151.
50. A Week, p. 69.

58

summer in our minds, when, like Fletcher's “Martyrs
in Heaven“, we,

“estranged from all misery

As far as Heaven and Earth discoasted lie,

Swelter in quiet waves Of immortality,“
some great chagrin succeeds, some chilling cloud
comes over.“31

Of Michael Drayton, Thoreau has but one Observa-
tion. “Old Drayton,“ he wrote, “thought that a man
that lived here, and would be a post, for instance,
should have in him certain “brave, translunary
things“, and a “fine madness“ should possess his
brain. Certainly it were as well, that he might be
up to the occasion.“52 His knowledge of Drayton“s
poetic conceptions must certainly have been derived
from a reading of his poetry. His biographer Salt
refers to his reading Drayton, and also, in connection
with him, mentions the poet Daniel; however, no
reference to Daniel occurs in any Of Thoreau's writ-
ings.

Thoreau Often pondered on the inequality Of
man's economic status. In Walden, he analyzes the
cause Of the farmer's lack of wealth, and to establish

and sum up a logical series of contentions he quotes

the poet Chapman. “This is the reason“, he writes,

 

51. Summer, p. 246.
52. ‘A Week, p. 69.

59

“he is poor; and for a similar reasoriwe are all
poor in respect to a thousand savage comforts, though
surrounded by luxuries. As Chapman sings,--~
“The false society of men-~-
—~-for earthly greatness

All heavenly comforts rarefies to air.““53
Although Thoreau does not mention them, it is probable
that he knew of and had read Chapman's translations
Of Homer, for in one place he reveals that he had
read several translations Of Homer, and he names
POpe“s as being one of them.

The poet Dekker is quoted briefly in a.discussion
Of government and legislation. Invariably, in any
discussion, Thoreau resorted to the thought or state-
ment of some literary figure, so that his argument
or contention might bear more weight. “The man,“v
he wrote, “who thrusts his manners upon me does as
if he were to insist on introducing me to his cabinet
of curiosities, when I wished to see himself. It
was not in this sense that the poet Decker called
Christ “the first true gentleman that ever breathed.“
I repeat that in.this sense the most splendid court
in Christendom is provincial, having authority to
consult about Transalpine interests only, and not

the affairs of Rome. A praetor or proconsul would

b.

55. Walden, p. 56.

4O

suffice to settle the questions which absorb the
attention Of the English Parliament and the American
Congress.“54

Of all the poets in this period, it seems that
John Donne should have received as much attention
as any, yet Thoreau quotes only one line of his
poetry as a chapter head in A prk, But this cane
not be taken as a criterion of his reading, although
it does show a knowledge of Donne. The following
line is quoted:

“Summer's robe grows

Dusky, and like an oft-dyed garment shows.“55

Thoreau's Journal entry for March 16, 1852,
includes a revealing paragraph on his reading. He
had spent the day in the Harvard College Library,
seeking books on Canadian exploration and history.
However, he wandered into the English literature
section to browse and read at random. The follow-
ing reveals, in Thoreau‘s original style, the im-
pression he received:

“I saw that while we are clearing the forest
in our westward progress, we are accumulating a

forest Of books in.our rear, as wild and uneXplored

as any of nature's primitive wildernesses. The

 

54. Miscellanieg, p. 478.

55. Week, p. 556.

41

volumes Of the fifteenth, sixteenth, and seventeenth
centuries which lie so near on the shelf are rarely
Opened, are effectually forgotten, and not implied
by our literature and newspapers. When I looked in-
to Purchas“s Pilgrims, it affected me like looking
into an impassable swamp, ten feet deep with sphag-
num, where the monarchs of the forest covered with
mosses and stretched along the ground were making
haste to become peat. Those Old books suggested a
certain fertility, an Ohio soil, as if they were
making humus for new literatures to spring in. I
heard the bellowing of bull-frogs and the hum Of
mosquitoes reverberating through the thick embossed
covers when I had closed the books. Decayed litera-
ture makes the richest Of all soils.“36

The reference to Samuel Purchas“s Pilgpims is
very general. Thoreau “looked into“ this volume,
and as a result mentions it in his Journal. Un-
doubtedly he glanced at many other volumes from the
“fifteenth, sixteenth, and seventeenth centuries“,
but he failed to name them. It is possible also,
that he drew out one or two works to be read at
leisure. An entry such as this is tantalizing to

the person who would know what Thoreau read.

 

56. Spring, p. 148.

42

In a mystical passage in Walden Thoreau mentions
an Obscure English poet of this period whom he had
read. Thomas Goffe (1591-1629), who wrote Tpp_ggpp¢
,Lpgp Shepherdess and other similar works, was as
little known in Thoreau's time as he is today. The
passage which reveals Goffe is important mainly for
its revelation Of Thoreau's mystic philosophy. God
is the subject---not the all powerful being of the
Old Testament, but the rational God Of nature. “I
have occasional visits,“ he wrote, “in the long winter
evenings, when.the snow falls fast and the wind howls
in the wood, from an Old settler and original pro-
prietor, who is reported to have dug Walden Pond,
and stoned it, and fringed it with pine woods; who
tells me stories of Old time and of new eternity;
and between us we manage to pass a cheerful evening
with social mirth and pleasant views of things, even
without apples or cider,--a most wise and humorous
friend, whom I love much, who keeps himself more
secret than ever did Goffe or Whalley; and though
he is thought to be dead, none can show where he is
buried.“37

In this period there are a few writers other
than English that Thoreau read. He quotes Du Bartas,
discusses Tasso“s Jerusalem Delivered, and alludes

to Cervantes“ Don Quixote.

 

57. Walden, p. 152.

45

Undoubtedly Thoreau became acquainted with Du
Bartas through his study of Milton, for he was
familiar not only with Milton's works, but also
with.his background. In his essay HAHQE.EEQ Mpppr
LLghp he wrote: “NO wonder that there have been
astrologers, that some have conceived that they were
personally related to particular stars. Dubartas,
as translated by Sylvester, says he'll

'not believe that the great architect

With all these fires the heavenly arches decked

Only for show, and with these glistering shields,

T'awake poor shepherds, watching in the fields.'

He'll “not believe that the least flower which

pranks

Our garden borders, or our common banks,

And the least stone, that in her warning lap

Our mother earth doth covetously wrap.

Hath some peculiar virtue of its own,

And that the glorious stars of heav'n have none.'“38

In A,Wp k Thoreau mentions Tasso, and reveals
a knowledge Of his long poem Jerusalem Delivered.

The following excerpt reveals some reading:
“If it is not a tragical life we live, then I

know not what to call it. Such a story as that of

 

58. Excursions, p. 528.

44

Jesus Christ,--the history of Jerusalem, sa$.being
a part Of the Universal History. The naked, the
embalmed, unburied dead of Jerusalem amid its desolate
hills--think of it. In Tasso's poem I trust some
things are sweetly buried. Consider the snappish
tenacity with which they preach Christianity still.
What are time and space tO.Christianity, eighteen
hundred years, and a new world?--that the humble life
Of a Jewish peasant should have force to make a New
York bishOp so bigoted. Forty-four lamps, the gift
Of kings, now burning in a place called the Holy
Sepulchre: a church-bell ringing; some unaffected
tears shed by a pilgrim on Mount Calvary within a
week.

'Jerusalem, Jerusalem, when I forget

thee, may my right hand forget her cunning.‘
'By the waters Of Babylon there we
sat down, and we wept when we remembered Zion.”39

Thoreau refers once to Cervantes, and in another
place mentions the character Sancho Panza. He evi-
dently had read some, and perhaps all, Of Lppiguixote,
for he writes: “It appears to me that the wisest
philosOphers I know are as foolish as Sancho Panza

dreaming Of his island . . . He girds himself for

 

39. A Week, p. 67.

45

his enterprise with fasting and prayer, and then,
instead of pressing forward like a light-armed
soldier, with the fewest possible hindrances, he
at once hooks on to some immovable institution, and
begins to sing and scratch gravel towards his Objects
. . . . . But if the philosOpher is as foolish as
Sancho Panza, he is also as wise, and nothing so
truly makes a thing so or sO as thinking it so.“40
The following reference to Cervantes is included
in a quotation from Carlyle, and therefore cannot
be called Thoreau's own Observation. However, it
reveals that he was aware of the Spanish writer's
important position in world literature. He quotes
Carlyle as saying: “Nor is the noblest the most
peculiar for working by prescribed laws; SOphOOles,
Shakespeare, Cervantes, and, in Richter's own age,
Goethe, how little did they innovate on the given
forms Of composition, how much in the spirit they

41
breathed into them.“

 

40. Spring, p. 506.
41. Miscellanies, p. 558.

46

VI
Seventeenth Century Literature: 1625-1700

It is Obvious that a strict division of Thoreau's
reading in English literature into periods results
in overlapping, and Often places in definite groups
writers that prOperly belong in two consecutive
periods, or in a separate transition period. For
instance, such men as Drayton, Chapman, Jonson, Dek-
ker, and Donne, who were covered in the preceding dis-
cussion, belong almost as much to the Seventeenth
Century period in English Literature. There is really
no abrupt demarcation and it is only for the sake Of
clarity and logical division that groupings such as
this are presented.

Thomas Arnold's chronological system of division
is used here, principally because his book is comp
parable to the histories Of English literature with
which Thoreau might have been familiar. However,
such divisions as Arnold makes do not always corre-
spond to those of capable present-day literary
historians. For the most part, though, this outline

47

arranged by Matthew Arnold's father will be found
reliable.

Thoreau, according to his biographers Salt and
Sanborn, read considerably in the post-Elizabethan
period Of English literature. Their statements to
this effect must be accepted, for the actual evidence
which exists in his Complete Works, although fairly
sufficient, is not as complete and revealing as might
be expected. But after all, most Of this reading was
done at college, before he had begun to make daily
Journal entries, and before his career as a writer
had seriously commenced. Undoubtedly if he had kept
a Journal while attending school he would have had
more to say about the poets and religious writers of
the Seventeenth Century period, for the later Journal
entries reveal a continuation of the reading.

In 1861, in a letter to Daniel Ricketson,
Thoreau tells us that Alcott, then superintendent Of
schools, received from the children “an unexpected
present Of a fine edition of 'Pilgrim's Progress'
and Herbert's poems, which, of course, overcame all
parties.“1 Thoreau knew Herbert's poetry, and could
appreciate Alcott's gift. Salt reveals this

appreciation of Herbert, and Thoreau himself quotes

 

1. Letters, p. 576.

48

the following lines from him inlA prk:

“Sweet day, so cool, so calm, sO bright,

The bridal Of the earth and sky,

The dew shall weep they fall tO-night,

For thou must die.“2

NO other important mention Of Herbert, except
that included in a discussion Of Quarles, occurs
in his writings.

A poem of Thomas Carew is included in.Wa1den,
but no comment on him or his poetry exists in that
Or any other published work Of Thoreau. This lone
poem, however, is complete, and although it is pre-
sented without criticism, his quoting it in full
reveals some appreciation. Certainly it can be
assumed that many other Of Carew's poems had been
read and appreciated, for the one printed in Walden
is evidently included only because of its pertinent
relation to the chapter which follows it. Inasmuch
as this poem is the only one by Thomas Carew quoted,

it is given here in full:

COMPLEMENTAL VERSES

The Pretensions of Poverty

Thou dost presume too much, poor needy wretch

To claim a station in the firmament

 

2. ‘A‘Week, p. 555.

49

Because they humble cottage, or thy tub,

Nurses some lazy or pedantic virtue

In the cheap sunshine or by shady springs,
With.roots and pot-herbs; where thy right hand,
Tearing those humane passions from the mind
Upon whose stocks fair blooming virtues flourish,
Degradeth nature, and benumbeth sense,

And Gorgon-like, turns active men to stone.

We not require the dull society

Of our necessitated temperance,

Or that unnatural stupidity

That knows nor joy nor sorrow; nor your forc'd
Above the active. This low abject brood,

That fix their seats in mediocrity,

Become your servile minds; but we advance

Such virtues only as admit excess,

Brave, bounteous acts, regal magnificence,
All-seeing prudence, magnanimity

That knows no bound, and that heroic virtue
For which antiquity hath left no name

But patterns only, such as Hercules,

Achilles, Theseus, back to thy loath'd cell;
And when thou seest the new enlightened sphere,
Study to know but what those worthies were.5

T. Carew

 

5. Walden, p. 89.

50

It is not strange that Thoreau saw fit to in-
clude this verse in Walden. Contained in its lines
are many thoughts comparable to the philosophy of
Walden. The reflections on society, ignorance,
stupidity, and the joy of “cheap sunshine“ and “shady
spring“ are meat which Thoreau digested.

In a letter to Mrs. Emerson in 1845, Thoreau
tells her Of some recent reading. If it were not
for this statement, little would be known Of his
reading of Quarles' poetry, for in his regular works
there appears only a quotation-~and that without
comment. In this letter he also mentions Herbert
and Shakespeare, and in the case Of Herbert he seems
to indicate a deeper, more profound knowledge than
he at any other time actually reveals. “I have been
reading lately,“ he writes, “what Of Quarles's
poetry I could get. He was a contemporary Of Her»
bert, and a kindred spirit. I think you would like
him. It is rare to find one who was so much Of a
poet and so little of an artist. He wrote long poems,
almost epics for length, about Jonah, Esther, Job,
Samson, and Solomon, interSpersed with meditations
after a quite original plan,--Shepherd's Oracles,

Comedies, Romances, Fancies, and Meditations,--the

 

51

quintessence Of meditations,--and Enchiridions of
Meditation all divine,--and what he calls his Morning
Muse; besides prose works as curious as the rest.
He was an unwearied Christian, and a reformer Of some
old school withal. HOpelessly quaint, as if he lived
all alone and knew nobody but his wife, Who appears
to have reverenced him. He never doubts his genius;
it is only he and his God in all the world. He uses
language sometimes as greatly as Shakespeare; and
though there is not much straight grain in him, there
is plenty of tough, crooked timber. In an age when
Herbert is revived, Quarles surely ought not to be
forgotten.“4

If only Thoreau had been as outspoken about
his reading of Cowley, Drummond, Habington and others,
there would be little difficulty in judging the ex-
tent Of his knowledge of this period in English litera-
ture. His msntion.of Herbert suggests a knowledge
which undoubtedly could have been presented as com-
pletely as is this information about Quarles' works.
There were probably any number Of writers in this

and other periods that were read widely enough to be

discussed at length. But only a quotation or a

 

4. Letters, p. 112.

52

casual reference exists by which his reading of them
can be estimated.

Besides discussing Quarles' poetry, Thoreau
quotes him in A prk. The two lines are taken from
Quarles' Christ's lpyitation pp php SppL:

“Come, come, my lovely fair, and let us try

Those rural delicacies."5

Thoreau's reading of Drummond, Habington, and
Cowley must be judged from the remarks Of his biogra-
phers. In Thoreau's Complete prkp there are many
quotations which are unacknowledged, and which are
not readily identifiable except by a specialist in
the period to which they belong. It is quite prob-
able that one Of the above posts may have been quoted,
and it is reasonable to say that Salt and Sanborn
may have recognized them among the various quotations.
However, these biographers relied primarily upon
first-hand information. Sanborn knew Thoreau, and
undoubtedly was acquainted with many Of his Concord
friends. But this in no way establishes the veracity
of Sanborn's statements regarding Thoreau's reading,
for even first-hand information is Often unconscious-
ly exaggerated or distorted. .However, according to
Sanborn, Thoreau is supposed to have read and enjoyed

the poet Habington, who influenced Cowley, and also

 

5. A Week, p. 12.

55

is said to have read the Scotch poet Drummond. Neither
Of these is mentioned by Thoreau in his writings,
though something from them might be included among

the many unacknowledged quotations.

Salt tells us that Thoreau read Cowley, and he
writes, “Those who are interested in seeking for
literary prototypes may perhaps, in this case, find
one in Abraham Cowley, a member of that school Of
gnomic posts with which Thoreau was so familiar, and
moreover, a zealous lover Of the peace and solitude
of nature.“6

The only quotation from Robert Herrick is found
in Thoreau's essay Wild Apples. In no other place
is this post mentioned or Obviously quoted, though
Thoreau probably was as familiar with him as with
many of his contemporaries.

The following is quoted:

“Wassaile the trees that they may bears

You many a plum and many a peare;

For more or less fruits they will bring

As you so give them wassailing.“7

Thoreau read and studied Milton at Harvard College,

and the respect that he gained for him there was re-

 

6. H. 8. Salt, _p. cit., p. 186.

7. Egcursions, p. 298.

54

tained throughout his life. Sanborn says, “Early in
1857 Thoreau wrote an elaborate paper, though Of no
great length, on Milton's 'L'Allegro' and 'Il Penseroso',
with many quotations.“8 This essay is not included

in his Comprte Works, but portions Of it are included
in Sanborn's biography. The thought, however, is
pompous, and void of any comment or criticism compar-
able to that Of later years. It reveals an apparent-
ly sincere enthusiasm which includes a religious
fervor not to be found in his Complete prkp. Al-
though in this early essay the adolescent approach

to a great writer can be discerned, it is upon this
foundation that he built a thorough understanding of
the works of the blind poet.

Sanborn says also: “He had read all that was
best in English and in Greek poetry, but was more
familiar with the poets of Milton's time and earlier,
than with those more recent, except his own townsmen
and companions. He valued Milton above Shakespeare,
and had a special love for Aeschylus.“9 Salt cor-
roborates this statement, saying: “Among posts the
Old English writers were most to his liking; he read

and appreciated Old ballad writers, Chaucer, Spenser,

Ossian, Herbert, Cowley, Quarles, and above all others,

 

8. F. B. Sanborn, pp. cit., p. 156.
9. Ibid., p. 155.

55

10
Milton, whose 'Lycidas' was Often on his lips.“

Yet, in spite of this indubitable appreciation of
Milton, Thoreau, outside of his college essay, has
little to say about him. Occasionally he brings the
poet's name, or one of his works, into a description
or discussion, but never in a way that directly con-
cerns the thought or appreciation of the work. For
example, in a discussion Of early Massachusetts
history, after dwelling on an event of an early date,
he remarks that in reality it had not been long
since that time, for “it happened since Milton wrote
Paradise Lost.“11

Another excerpt from Thoreau's works, which in-
cludes one of the few references to Milton, is equally
important for its revelation of Thoreau's impression
of a library. “When I stand in a library;! he wrote,
“where is all the recorded wit Of the world, but
none of the recording, a mere accumulated, and not
truly cumulative treasure; where immortal works stand
side by side with anthologies which did not survive
their month, and cobweb and mildew have already
spread from these to the binding of those; and happily
I am reminded of what poetry is,--I perceive that

Shakespeare and Milton did not foresee into what

 

56

company they were to fall. Alas! that so soon the
work Of a true poet should be swept into such a
dust-hole!“12

In Cape Cod Thoreau includes his only quotation
from Milton. He and his companion.at Cape Cod were
peeking through a knot hole into an Old deserted
building on the coast. At first the darkness hindered
their sight, but soon “we Obtained the long wished
for insight. Though we thought at first that it was
a hOpeless case, after several minutes' steady exerb
cise Of the divine faculty, our prospects began to
brighten, and we were ready to exclaim with the
blind bard Of 'Paradise Lost and Regained',--

'Hail, holy light! Offspring Of Heaven first born,

Or of the eternal coeternal beam

May I express thee unblamed?"'lz5

In Walden Thoreau reveals his reading of the poet
D'Avenant, who was influenced by Hobbes, and who is
supposed to have been England's first poet laureate.
D'Avenant“s Gondibert, however, is not the most ins
spiring of poetry. At least Thoreau did not think
it so, for he found it conducive to sleep. “I .
had just lost myself;“ he wrote, “over Davenant's
“Gondibert', that winter that I labored with a

14
lethargy.“ Suddenly, however, the bells rang fire;

 

12. Ibid., p. 565.
15. Ca e Cod, p. 77.
14. alden, p. 285

57

and for a while the excitement of the blaze and the
crowd cured the feeling Of lethargy. But, “we finally
retreated without doing any mischief,-~returned to
sleep and 'Gondibert'. But as for 'Gondibert', I
would except that passage in the preface about wit
being soul's powder,--'but most of mankind are strangers
to wit, as Indians are to powder.”15

Dryden is mentioned but once in Thoreau's writ-
ings. It is difficult to venture an Opinion on his
reading of this post and dramatist, for although the
poetry might not have appealed to him, it is possible
that he read it in spite of his dislike, for so he
Often read. In A Eek he wrote: “What a contrast
between the stern and desolate poetry Of Ossian, and
that Of Chaucer, and even of Shakespeare and Milton,
much more of Dryden, and Pope, and Gray!“16

Thoreau chose to quote Marvell in his address
delivered in Concord, in 1859, in commemoration of
John Brown. This is the only time he quotes or men-
tions Marvell, and consequently it is the only time
he reveals an appreciation Of him. Thoreau said:
“Only what is true, and strong, and solemnly earnest

will recommend itself to our mood at this time. Al-

most any noble verse may be read, either as his elegy

 

15. Ibid., p. 287.
16. Ibid., p. 591.

58

or eulogy, or be made the test Of an oration On him.
Indeed, such are now discovered to be the parts Of
a universal liturgy, applicable to those rare cases
of heroes and martyrs for which ritual of no church
has provided. This is the formula established on
high,--their burial service,--to which every great
genius has contributed its stanza or line. As Mar-
vell wrote:--

“When the sword glitters o'er the judge's head,

And fear has coward churchmen silenced,

Then is the poet's time; 'tis then he draws

And single fights forsaken virtue's cause;

He, when the wheel Of empire whirleth back

And though the world's disjointed axle crack,

Sings still Of ancient rights and better times,

Seeks suffering good, arraigns successful crimes.”17

Thoreau's reading in this period was not limited
to the poets. He was familiar with some religious

philosOphers, and with other prose writers. His ob—

servation on John Aubrey's Brief Lives is interesting

 

for its revelation Of other prose writers Of this
period who were probably familiar to him, and who,
as in the case Of Thomas Fuller, were probably read
Often. “Aubrey,“ he wrote, “relates of Thomas

Fuller that his was 'a very working head, inasmuch

 

17. MLscellanies, p. 451.

59

that, walking and meditating before dinner, he would
eat up a penny loaf, not knowing that he did it. His
natural memory was very great, to which he added the
art Of memory. He would repeat to you forwards and
backwards all the signs from Ludgate to Charing
cross.' He says of Mr. John Hales, that “he loved
Canarie', and was buried 'under an altar monument
Of black marble---with a tOO long epitaph;' of Ed-
mund Halley, that he 'at sixteen could make a dial
and then, he said, he thought himself a brave fellow;'
of William Holder, who wrote a book upon his curing
one POpham who was deaf and dumb, “he was beholding
' to no author; did only consult with nature.' For
the most part, an author consults only with all who
have written before him upon a subject, and his book
is but the advice of so many.“18

Thomas Fuller is mentioned in a few instances
in Thoreau's writings, and he is quoted twice, both
times in A prk, He writes: “The very dust takes
shape and confirms some story which we hadhread. As
Fuller said, commenting on the zeal Of Camden, 'A
broken urn is a whole evidence; or an Old gate still
surviving out of which the city is run out.”19
Later he writes: “What Fuller says of masters Of

 

18.
19.

W>

Week, p. 112.
bid., p. 265.

 

H

 

60

colleges is universally applicable, that ' a little
alloy of dullness in a master Of a college makes
him fitter to manage secular affairs."‘2O
Ralph Cudworth, the Cambridge Platonist, evi-
dently influenced somewhat Thoreau's thought. His
the work which Thoreau refers to in his Journal
entry for June 24, 1840. He writes: “When I read
Cudworth I find I can tolerate all, atomists, pneu-
matologists, atheists, and theists, Plato, Aristotle,
Leucippus, Demacritus, and Pythagoras. It is the
attitude of these men more than any communication,
which charms me. It is so rare to find a man musing.
But betWeen them and their commentations there is
an endless diSpute . . . . Any sincere thought is
irresistible. It lifts us to the zenith, whither
the smallest bubble rises as surely as the largest.
“Dr. Cudworth does not consider that the be-
lief in a deity is as great a heresy as exists. Epi—
curus held that the gods were 'Of human form, yet
were so thin and subtile as that, comparatively with-
out terrestrial bodies, they might be called incorporeal;

they having not so much carnem as gpasi-carnem, nor

ppagpippp as guasi-sangpinem, a certain kind of aerial

 

so. Ibid., p. 414.

61

or ethereal flesh and blood.' This which Cudworth
pronounces 'romanticall; is plainly as goOd doctrine
as his own, as if any sincere thought were not the
best sort Of truth.“21

In this same year, 1840, a few days after the
above entry, Thoreau mentions two Obscure figures Of
this period and reveals that he has been reading,
perhaps at the time, something Of their writings.
“What are Godfrey and Gonsolve,“ he writes, “unless
we breathe a life into them, and reenact their ex-
ploits as a prelude to our own? The past is only so
heroic as we see it; it is the canvas on which our
conception Of heroism is painted, the dim prospectus
of our future field. We are dreaming of what we are
to do.“22

There is no doubt that Thoreau read Bunyan's
gALgrimLp gppgregp. During the period of the nine-
teenth century in which he lived almost any home
was likely to have a huge family pr p and an
elaborate edition Of Pilgrim's Progress on the par-
lor table. As a child he undoubtedly looked wonder-
ingly at the vivid illustrations, and at a later

time he probably read portions of it. However, there

is little in his printed writings that reveals his

21. Summer, p. 222.
22. Ibid., p. 515.

62

understanding, or his critical interpretation, of

the famous allegory. In one place he writes: ”It
would be well if all our lives were a divine tragedy
even, instead of this trivial comedy or farce. Dante,
Bunyan, and others appear to have been exercised in
their minds more than we: they were subjected to a
kind of culture such as our district schools and col-
leges do not contemplate.“25

In A Week, in a chapter devoted principally to

a discussion Of the New Tpstament and Christianity,

 

 

there is also a revealing reference to Pilgrim's
Progpess. Thoreau wrote: “The New Testament is an
invaluable book, though I confess to having been
slightly prejudiced against it in my early days by
the church and the Sabbath school, so that it seemed,
before I read it to be the yellowest book in the cata-
logue. Yet I early escaped from their meshes. It
was hard to get the commentaries out Of one's head
and taste its true flavor. I think that Pilgrim's
Progress is the best sermon which has been preached
from this text; almost all other sermons that I have

heard, or22eard Of, have been but poor imitations

of this.“

His Opinion of the New Testament makes in itself

 

25. EgpursionsL p. 241.
24. A Week, p. 72.

65

a subject for analysis and comment which may be
legitimately included in a discussion of his read-
ing of English literature. Thoreau writes: “It
would be a poor story to be prejudiced against the
Life Of Christ because this book has been edited
by Christians. In fact: I love this book rarely,
though it is a sort of castle in the air to me,
which I am permitted to dream. Having come to it
so recently and freshly, it has the greater charm,
so that I cannot find any to talk with about it .
The reading which I love best is the scriptures Of
the several nations, though it happens that I am
better acquainted with those of the Hindoos, the
Chinese, and the Persians, than Of the Hebrews,
which I have come to last. Give me one of these
bibles, and you have silenced me for a while."25
Thoreau loved and understood the ambitious, the
skilled, and the lazy fishermen who Often visited
Walden pond. He himself was a disciple Of Old Wal-
ton, and often at the dark hour of midnight floated
idly over the pond, casting his line into the mist
that was as dense as the water itself. The very essence
of Walton's philosOphy is reflected in his attitude
toward the eport, which combined scientific activity

and meditative thought. When Thoreau compared an

 

25. Ibid., p. 72.

64

angler to Walton, he usually intended it as a com-
pliment. “I can just remember,“ he writes, “an Old
brown-coated man who was the Walton of this stream."26
In another place he tells us, “He who has not hooked
the red chiven is not yet a complete angler.“27 There
is little doubt that Thoreau had read Izaak Walton's
Complete Angler.

Although Thoreau does not mention Samuel Pepys
in his writings, he does mention a contemporary,
though lesser, diarist. John Evelyn, a country
gentleman skilled in the mysteries of planting and
landscape—gardening, is the author of a LLgpy, first
published in 1818, which, among other matters, con-
tains an interesting account of the great fire of
London, of which he was an eye witness. But the
gardening, not the fire, interested Thoreau. InlA
‘prk.he writes: “We are apt to be pleased with such
books as Evelyn's Sylva, Actearium, and Kalendarium

Hortense, but they imply a relaxed nerve in a reader.

Gardening is civil and social, but it wants the vigor

and freedom of the forest and outlaw . . . A highly

cultivated man,--all whose bones can be bent! whose
28

heaven-born virtues are but good manners!“ The

unusual expressions which Evelyn used interested

 

27. Ibid., p. 28.
28. 1515., p. 55.

65

Thoreau. He writes: “Evelyn says Of the cake, which
he calls “these robust sons of the earth', '“Tis re-
ported that the very shade of this tree is so whole-
some that the sleeping Or lying under it becomes a
present remedy to paralytics, and recovers those whom
the mistaken malign influence Of the walnut-tree has
smitten.“ . . . Evelyn has collected the fine ex-
aggerations of antiquity respecting the virtues and
habits Of trees, and added some himself.“29 Later
he refers again to some unusual expressions used by
Evelyn. He writes: “He well says, “a sobbing rain“.
Evelyn's love Of his subject teaches him to use many
expressive words . . . He speaks Of pines 'pearling
out into gums“. He talks of modifying the air as
well as the soil about plants, making “the remedy

as well regional as tOpical.' . . . He speaks of a
'dewil sperge or brush' tO be used instead of a
watering-pot which 'gluts' the earth. He calls the
kitchen-garden the 'Olitory garden', In a dedi-
cation Of his 'Kalendarium Hortense“ to Cowley, he
inserts two or three good sentences or quotations,
viz., 'as the philosOpher in Seneca desired only
bread and herbs to dispute felicity with Jupiter.“

SO of Cowley's simple, retired life. “Who would not,

like you, cacher pg vie?'.'delivered from the gilded

 

29. Summer, p. 78.

66

5O
impertinences of life.'“ Thoreau quotes and refers

to Evelyn in Walden and in other writings. Evelyn's

style and subject matter pleased him, and for that

reason, undoubtedly, Thoreau refers to him so often.
John Locke is mentioned in relation to Carlyle.

He writes: “There is no writing Of Latin with Carlyle;

but as Chaucer, with all reverence to Homer, and Vir-

gil, and Messieurs the Normans, sung his poetry in

the homely Saxon tongue, and Locke has at least the

merit Of having done philOSOphy into English, so

Carlyle has done a different philosOphy still fur-

51
ther into English.“

50. Ibid., p. 81.
51. Miscellanies, p. 528.

 

67

VII
Eighteenth Century Literature: 1700-1800

Thoreau's reading in eighteenth century English
literature is poorly representative of that period.
With a few exceptions, he reveals those authors whom
we might expect him to read--writers whose interests
were comparable to his own. His comments on the men
Of this period, however, are not expecially spon-
taneous or enthusiastic. In many cases his allusions
are mere acknowledgements which reveal only that he
was quite aware of certain authors and their works.
In all, he was probably acquainted with far more
works than his writings reveal.

Thoreau probably knew Daniel Defoe only through
Robinson Crusoe, which he read, perhaps, very early
in life. Prose Of the type written by Swift and
Defoe was not to his liking. InIA prk_he writes Of
“a little flaxen-headed boy, with some tradition, or
small edition, of Robinson Crusoe in his head.“1
In another place, in the same work, he tells us,
“Joseph Wolff, the missionary, distributed copies

Of Robinson Crusoe, translated into Arabic, among

 

l. A Week, p. 507.

68

the Arabs, and they made a great sensation. 'Robinp
son Crusoe's adventures and wisdom,' says he, “were
read by Mohametans in the market-places Of Sanaa,
Hadyeda, and Loheya, and admired and believed!‘ On
reading the book, the Arabians exclaimed, 'Oh, that
Robinson Crusoe must have been a great prOphet!'“2

Thoreau briefly mentions Pope in his writings,
but he fails to indicate clearly his Opinion of
him. Of course, he knew well his translation Of
Homer, and recognized its merits. “I am convinced,“
he writes, “that if all men were to live as simply
as I then did, thieving and robbery would be unknown.
These take place only in communities where some have
got more than is sufficient while others have not
enough. The POpe's Homers would soon get prOperly
distributed.“

But later, in a discussion Of style, Thoreau
refers to POpe, and indicates some familiarity with
his style and thought. “Who cares,“ he writes, “what
a man's style is, so it is intelligible,--as intelli-
gible as his thought. Literally and really, the style
is no more than the stylus, the pen he writes with;
and it is not worth scraping and polishing, and gild-
ing, unless it will write his thoughts the better

 

., p. 60.
'5. Walden, p. 191.

 

69

for it. It is something for use, and not to look at.
The question for us is, not whether POpe had a fine
style, wrote with a peacock's feather, but whether
he uttered useful thoughts.“4
Ambrose Phillips, who, because Of his §L§ Egg:
torals, was so severely ridiculed by POpe and Gay,
is mentioned by Thoreau. In the essay ELLA Apples,
he writes: “Our posts have as yet a better right
to sing of cider than Of wine: but it behooves them
to sing better than English Phillips did, else they
will do us no credit to their muse.“5 Perhaps Thoreau
discovered this volume Of Phillips's during one of
his leisurely trips through the Harvard Library.
Samuel Johnson is referred to but twice in the
writings Of Thoreau. In A,prk he writes: “That is
a superfluous wonder, which Dr. Johnson eXpresses
at the assertion Of Sir Thomas Browne that 'his life
has been a miracle of thirty years, which to relate
were not history but a piece of poetry, and would
sound like a fable.”6 This reveals some reading,
at least. The following seems to show that Johnson's
Rasselas was a familiar work. “At length, like

Rasselas, and other inhabitants Of happy valleys, we

 

4. Miscellanies, p. 550.
5. Excursions, p. 298.
6. A Week, p. 69.

7O

resolved to scale the blue wall which bounded the
western horizon, though not without misgivings that
thereafter no visible fairyland would exist for us.“7
It would be interesting to know Thoreau's critical
Opinion of Dr. Johnson. Perhaps he did read Bos-
well“s well-known biography.

COWper is referred to only in Thoreau's corre-
epondence. In a letter to Harrison Blake in 1855
he writes about Daniel Ricketson, saying: “He loves
COWper“s Tgpk better than anything else; and there?
after perhaps, Thompson, Gray, and even Howitt.“8
A year later, in a letter to Daniel Ricketson him-
self, he writes: “You have done well to write a
lecture on COWper.“9 This is the extent Of Thoreau's
mention Of COWper. It reveals a knowledge, of course,
but in no way gives a definite critical Opinion.
However, his friendship with the wealthy Mr. Ricket-
son led to many hours Of conversation, and it is
quite probable that some of that time was spent in
discussing Cowper.

Thoreau's appreciation for Thompson is expressed
in the following statement: “There is as great an
interval between the thrasher and the wood-thrush as

10
between Thompson's 'Seasons“ and Homer.“ He loved

 

7. Epcursions, p. 155.
8. Letters, p. 259.

9. Ibid., p. 275.

-10. Summer, p. 157.

71

both.the thrasher and the wood-thrush, and admired
the two posts for their respective worth. Thoreau
quotes Thompson but once, in his essay Appppng
'Tgppg. He writes: “EurOpeans coming to America
are surprised by the brilliancy Of our autumnal
foliage. There is no account of such a phenomenon
in English poetry, because the trees acquire but
few bright colors there. The most that Thompson
says on this subject in his 'Autumn“ is contained
in the lines,--—
. 'But see the fading many-colored woods

Shade deepening over shade, the country round

Imbrown; a drowded umbrage, dusk and dun,

Of every hue, from wan declining green

TO sooty dark;“

and in the line in which he speaks of

“Autumn beaming o'er yellow woods.”11

That Thoreau read Thomas Gray is revealed only
through two allusions to his famous ELpgy. Gray him-
self is not mentioned, and no Opinion Of his work is
given. In a description of a hamlet grave-yard in
Maine, Thoreau writes Of “a few graves even, sur-
rounded by a wooden paling, where already the rude

forefathers of a hamlet lie, and a thousand years

hence, perchance, some post will write his “Elegy

 

ll. Egcursions, p. 249.

72

12
in a Country Churchyard.'“ In his Journal for 1859

he writes: “Consider the infinite promise of a man,
so that the sight of his roof at a distance suggests
an idyl or a pastoral, or Of his grave, an Elegy in
a Country Churchyard.“15

Thoreau refers to Burns as he does to Gray. Not
once does he make a comment which reveals an appreci-
ation of him. Burns was not widely read at Thoreau's
time, and it is doubtful if he knew him very well.
In his essay on Carlyle he writes: “Notwithstanding
the very genuine, admirable, and loyal tributes to
Burns, Schiller, Goethe, and others Carlyle is not
a critic of poetry.“14 Later he writes Of the “stream
Of inspiration which . . . is in Shakespeare, Or-
pheus, in Burns, Arethuse,“ and tells us that we
would not have Carlyle “write always as in the chap-
ter on Burns.“15 It is strange that all his mention
Of Burns is to be found in this essay. It almost
seems that his knowledge of Burns was limited to what
he had learned from Carlyle. But it must be remembered
that Thoreau wrote this essay during the latter half
Of his years at Harvard College. In another place

he again mentions Burns, this time along with other

renowned men. He writes: “Mahomet, Dante, Cromwell,

12. Maine Woods, p. 19.
15. Egpursions, p. 61.
14. Miscellanies, p. 540.
15. Ibid., p. 550.

 

75

Voltaire, Johnson, Burns, Goethe, Richter, Schiller,
Mirabeau, . . . could any Of these have been spared?“16

Thoreau was as susceptible to the supposed trans—
lations of Ossian as any other literary man Of his
time. Macpherson's translation was read by many, and
taken by most at its face value. Altogether, Thoreau
devotes more space to Macpherson's work than he does
to any other writer except Chaucer. His Opinions,
Observations, and interpretations are sincere and
Often unusually profound. His comments on Ossian
in,A‘prk might be lifted bodily to form a complete
and rather long essay, and in his other works the
scattered comments might be blended into a second essay
Of almost equal length. Thoreau's sincere appreciation
certainly would have been severely shaken had he for
a moment suspected the authenticity of this eccen-
tric, weakly founded literary hoax. The following
paragraphs are typical of his discussion:

”The genuine remains Of Ossian, or those ancient
poems which bear his name, though Of less fame and
extent, are, in many respects, Of the same stamp with
the Iliad itself. He asserts the dignity of the
bard no less than Homer, and in his era, we hear of
no other priest than he. It will not avail to call

him a heathen, because he personifies the sun and

 

16. Ibid., p. 551.

74

addresses it; and what if his heroes did worship the
ghosts of their fathers, 'their thin, airy, and in-
substantial forms'? We worship but the ghosts Of our
fathers in more substantial form. We cannot but
reSpect the vigorous faith of those heathen, who
sternly believed somewhat, and are inclined to say
to the critics, who are offended by their super-
stitious rites, Don't interrupt these men's prayers.
As if we knew more about life and a God, than the
heathen and ancients! Does English theology contain
the recent discoveries?

“Ossian reminds us Of the most refined and rud-
est eras, Of Homer, Pindar, Isaiah, and the American
Indian. In his poetry, as in Homer's, only the
simplest and most enduring features of humanity are
seen, such essential parts of a man as Stonehenge
exhibits of a temple; we see the circles Of stone,
and the upright shaft alone. The phenomena of life
acquire almost an unreal and gigantic size seen
through his mists. Like all Older and grander
poetry, it is distinguished by the few elements in
the lives of its heroes. They stand on the heath,
between the stars and the earth, shrunk tO the bones
and sinews. The earth is a boundless plain for their
deeds. They lead such a simple,idry, and everlast-

ing life, as hardly needs depart with the flesh, but

 

75

is transmitted entire from age to age. There are
but few Objects to distract their eight, and their
life is as unincumbered as the course of the stars
they gaze at

“The wrathful kings, on cairns apart,

Look forward from behind their.shields,

And mark the wandering stars,

That brilliant westward move.”17

In another place, in full faith, he tells us
that “Chaucer's is the first name after that misty
weather in which Ossian lived.“18

Thoreau quotes considerably from Ossian, and
invariably precedes or follows the excerpt with some
critical or philosOphical comment. For example, in
his essay Life Without Epinciple, he writes: “Nations!
What are nations? Tartars and Huns, and Chinamen!
Like insects, they swarm. The historian strives in
vain to make them memorable. It is for want of men
that there are so many men. It is individuals that
pOpulate the world. Any man thinking may say with
the Spirit Of Lodin,--

“I look down from my height on nations,

And they become ashes before me;--

Calm is my dwelling in the clouds;

19
Pleasant are the great fields Of my rest.'“

 

17. ,A Week, p. 566.
18. Ibid., p. 595.
19. Miscellanies, p. 475.

l£,~.l rr

 

".W..p-lyulu‘

76

In another essay, Night and Mppnlight, he quotes
Ossian for the conclusion, and it cannot be said that
the selection lacks fitness or power. He writes:
“When Ossian, in his address to the sun, exclaims,--

'Where has darkness its dwelling?

Where is the cavernous home Of the stars,

When thou quickly followest their steps,

Pursuing them like a hunter in the sky,--

Thou climbing the lofty hills,

They descending On barren mountains?“
who does not in his thought accompany the stars to
their “cavernous home', 'descending' with them “on
barren mountains“?“2O

Thoreau refers once to Gilbert White, a natural-
ist writer of this period, who was noted for his
unique Naturalist's Calendar. He writes: “I am
pleased to find that in Gilbert White's day, at least,
the laborers in that part Of England where he lived
enjoyed certain rights of common in the royal forests,
so called, Where they cut their turf and other fuel,
etc., though no large wood, and Obtained materials
for broom-making, etc., when other labor fgiled. It

is no longer so, according to the editor.“

William Gilpin, who wrote a series of books on

 

20. Excursions, p. 552.
21. Spring, p. 215.

77

the picturesque, is often referred to in Thoreau's
works. Thoreau's use of and reference to the works
of Gilpin is very clearly analyzed in Mr. W. D.
Templeman“s article “Thoreau, Moralist of the Pic-
turesque“, which appeared in a recent issue of the
gpblications p; the Modern Language Association.22
However, some mention of the works of this writer is
apprOpriate here. In a letter to Daniel Ricketson
written in 1855 he lists all the books of Gilpin
which he has read or with which he is somewhat familiar.
The following is taken from this letter: “On my way
through Boston I inquired for Gilpin's works at
Little, Brown & CO.'s, Munros's, Ticknor's, and
Burnham's. They have not got them. They told me at
Little, Brown & CO.'s that his works (not complete),
in twelve vols., 8vO, were imported and sold in this
country five or six years ago for about fifteen dollars.
Their terms for importing are ten per cent on the
cost. I cOpied from the “London Catalogue Of Books,
1846-51“, at their shop, the following list of Gil-
pin“s works:--

Gilpin (Wm.), Dialogues on Various Subjects

Essays on Picturesque Subjects

 

EXposition Of the New Testament

 

Forest Scenery, by Sir T. D. Lauder

 

 

22. W. D. Templeman, “Thoreau, Moralist Of the Pic-
turesque“, _P. M. L. A., XLVII, 864-889.

78

Lectures on the Catechism

 

Lives of the Reformers

 

Sermons Illustrative and Practical

Sermons to Country Congregations

 

Tour in Cambridge

 

Tour of the River Wye

 

Gilpin (W. 8.?) Hints on Landscape Gardening

“Beside these, I remember to have read one volume
on Prints; his Southern Tour; Lakes Of Cumberland;
Highlands of Scotland and West of England.“23

In Cape Cod Thoreau quotes Gilpin in a descrip-
tion of the Atlantic. “Today,“ he writes, “it was
the Purple Sea, an epithet which I should not before
have accepted. There were distinct patches of the
color of a purple grape with the bloom rubbed Off.
But first and last the sea is of all colors. Well
writes Gilpin concerning 'the brilliant hues which
are continually playing on the surface of a quiet
ocean,“ and this was not too turbulent at a distance
from the shore. “Beautiful,' says he, “no doubt in
a high degree are those glimmering tints which Often
invest the tops of mountains; but they are mere
coruscations compared with these marine colors, which

are continually varying and shifting into each other
in all the vivid splendor Of the rainbow, though the

 

25. Letters, p. 265.

79

24
space often of several 1eagues.'“

Three other English writers Of this period are
casually referred to. William Paley, who is remembered
for his Epinciples pp Mppal and Politich PhilosOphy,
is mentioned in Thoreau's essay on QAELLHQLpobedience;25
Adam Smith, the political economist, is referred to
in Walden;26 and in a letter dated 1857, the well-
known historian, Gibbon, is recommended to a reader.27
These writers are mentioned but once each in Thoreau's
Complete Works.

Three French writers of this period are also
referred to or named by Thoreau. Voltaire is men-
tioned among others in his essay on Carlyle. It is
his only reference to this powerful philosOpher. He
writes: “Mahomet, Dante, Cromwell, Voltaire, John-
son, Burns, Goethe, Richter, Schiller, Mirabeau,--
could any of these have been spared?"28 It seems,
however, that his acquaintance with most Of the above
writers was Obtained secondhand through Carlyle.

It would be a revelation to know for certain the
extent Of Thoreau's reading of Rousseau, for the two

differed radically and yet held much in common. How-

ever, he refers tO Rousseau but once, and in no way

 

_—

24. Cape Cod, p. 119.

25. Mipcellanies, p. 561.
26. Walden, p. 57.

27. Letters, p. 501.

28. Miscellanies, p. 551.

80

indicates any definite reading. He writes: “Read
Linnaeus at once, and come down from him as far as

you please . . . I doubt if his “PhilOSOphia Botanica“,
which Rousseau, Sprengel, and other praised so highly,
has ever been translated into English.“29 (The Swedish
naturalist, Linnaeus, is referred to time and again
throughout Thoreau's works.)

Thoreau quotes Chateaubriand once in his Complete
39335, but Offers no comment or criticism. The quota-
tion, which appears in‘A gggg, is given here.

“Chateaubriand said: 'Thers are two things
which grow stronger in the breast Of man, in prOpor-
tion as he advances in years,--the love of country
and religion. Let them be never so much forgotten
in youth, they sooner or later present themselves to
us arrayed in all their charms, and excite in the
recesses of our hearts an attachment justly due to
their beauty.‘ It may be so. But even this infirmity
Of noble minds works the gradual decay of youthful
hOpe and faith. It is the allowed infidelity of age.
There is a saying Of the Wolofs, “He who was born
first has the greatest number of Old clothes“; cone
sequently M. Chateaubriand has more Old clothes than

50
I have.“

 

29. Winter, p. 400.
50. A Week, p. 157.

81

VIII
Nineteenth Century Literature: 1800-1862

Many Of the outstanding writers of the Nineteenth
Century period were living and writing during Thor-
eau's adult life. As a result, his criticisms and
comments have the same pertinency as the comments of
a modern critic upon his own contemporaries. Other
writers who belong in the early part Of this period,
although not alive during Thoreau's active years,
still exerted a strong, almost contemporary influence,
as do Thomas Hardy and Arnold Bennett today. Al-
though Thoreau“s reading in this period, as revealed
by his writings, seems quite limited, it is probable
that in actuality he read far more.

Sir Walter Scott's Lady pp the Lake and perhaps

 

one or two of his novels were probably read early
in Thoreau's life. In his Journal for 1851, he
writes: “As in the case of King James and Roderick
Dhu, you can say,-—

'Come one, come all, this rock shall fly

From its firm base, as soon as I.“"

 

1. Autumn, p. 254.

82

In A.Yankee Ap Canada, in a description of Que-
bec, he writes: “It was such a reminiscence of the
Middle Ages as Scott's novels,“2 and in A prk he
writes that it is “no wonder that the Mythology and
Arabian Nights, and Shakespeare, and Scott's novels
entertain us, . . . for we are poets and fablers and
dramatists and novelists ourselves.“3 This seems to
be in direct contradiction to his statement, “I
never read a novel.“ Perhaps the statement was a
disguised resolution, made in later years, after
many novels had already been read.

Wordsworth is given scant attention in compari-
son with what we should expect him tO receive. In
his essay Walking he tells a story about Wordsworth
which might have been taken from De Quincey“s Reminis-
cences. He says that “when a traveler asked Words-
worth's servant to show him his master's study, she
answered, 'Here is his library, but his study is out
Of doors.”4 An impression received from reading
Wordsworth“s poetry is recorded in Thoreau's Journal
entry for June 14, 1840. The complete entry for the
day is as follows:

“June 14, 1840.

“In glory and in joy,

 

Excursions, p. 25.
A Week, p. 281.
Egcursions, p. 210.

 

#0103

 

85

Behind his plough, upon the mountain side.“
(Wordsworth)

I seemed to see the woods wave on a hundred
mountains, as I read these lines, and the distant
rustling of their leaves reached my ear.“5

At another time, while on a walking trip, Thor-
eau remarks that during inclement weather, “We read
Virgil and Wordsworth in our tent, with new pleasure
there, while waiting for clearer atmosphere, nor did
the weather prevent our appreciating the simple truth
and beauty of Peter Bell:--

“And he had lain beside his asses,

On lofty Cheviot hills:

“And he had trudged through Yorkshire dales,

Among the rocks and winding scars;

Where deep and low the hamlets lie

Beneath their little patch Of sky

And little lot of stars.”6

Thoreau probably did have a deep appreciation
and understanding Of Wordsworth, but for some inex-
plicable reason he failed to devote much time to
comment on his poetry.

Coleridge, the poet, is hardly mentioned at all,
but Coleridge the philosOpher, the interpreter Of

 

5. Summer, p. 129.
6. Excursions, p. 145.

v . , ‘5 I Easilaj‘

84

Kant, is mentioned a few times in Thoreau's works.

The influence of transcendentalist thought on Thoreau
is never more clearly brought out than when he dis-
cusses Coleridge or Carlyle. Kant, however, is never
named or referred to in any way, yet his philOSOphical
conceptions were at work on Thoreau through these two
contemporary writers. Try as he might, through Orien—
tal and natural philOSOphy, Thoreau could never side-
step the central theme Of transcendentalism. However,
his allusions to Coleridge are vague, and lack critical
sharpness. He criticises or praises without clearly
defining the idea he is considering. In Night and
Moonlight he writes:

“I think it was Dr. Chalmers who said, criticis-
ing Coleridge, that for his part he wanted ideas which
he could see all round, and not such as he must look
at away up in the heavens. Such a man, one would say,
would never look at the moon, because she never turns
her other side to us. The light which comes from
ideas which have their orbit as distant from the earth
and which is nO less cheering and enlightening to the
benighted traveler than that Of the moon and stars,
is naturally reproached or nicknamed as moonshine by
such. They are moonshine, are they? Well, then,
do your night traveling when there is no moon to light
you; but I will be thankful for the light that reached

 

.fl’.t’ )..>,I

. .. €an in 0.. hr~l.'.v 4éik\

85

me from the star Of least magnitude. Stars are lesser
or greater only as they appear to us so. I will be
thankful that I see so much as one side Of a celestial
idea, one side Of the rainbow and the sunset sky.“7
This might be a denunciation of the Coleridgean con-
ception of Kant, and of the theory of Space and form,
and the projection of this thought into life and rea-
son. At least, consciously Or unconsciously, Thoreau
had delved into conceptions Of form and ideas.

In his Journal for 1841, Thoreau quotes from a
less profound Coleridge. He writes: “Coleridge,
speaking of the love Of God, says, 'He that loves,
may be sure he was loved first.' The love wherewith
we are loved is already declared, and afloat in the
atmosphere, and our love is only the inlet Of it.

It is an inexhaustible harvest, always ripe and ready
for the sickle . . . . . We need make no beggarly
demand for it, but pay the price, and depart.“8 In
another entry, a few days later, he again quotes
Coleridge. He writes: “Coleridge says of the “ideas
spoken out everywhere in the Old and New Testaments,“
that they 'resemble the fixed stars which appear Of

the same size to the naked or the armed eye, the

magnitude of which the teleBOOpe may rather seem to

 

7. Ibid., p. 524.
8. Winter, p. 201.

 

n Ian-rilrllhlse. . . .. . . . .fi.

- . mHflJiflw.r‘ . ; iririvflghuilwwjfi

86

9
diminish than to increase.““ However, Thoreau did

not value too highly Coleridge's theology, for in a
letter of-advice to a reader he writes: “I think you
must read Coleridge again, and further, skipping all
his theology, ie., if you value precise definitions
and a discriminating use of language.“10 Perhaps
the effect of Coleridge's thought is best summed up
in these few words, which, if they refer to his prose
and the reflection of Kant, mean much: “Flight of
imagination! Coleridgean thoughts! So a man is said
to rise in his thoughts ever to fresh woods and pas-
tures new.“ll
Tennyson was first gaining recognition when

Thoreau wrote A prk, yet, surprisingly, he is quoted,
but without comment, in that volume. The quotation
is taken from his Lg yppp ShalOtt, which appeared in
1852, and which was evidently pOpular in America.
These lines are the chapter head for Tuesday:

“On either side the river lie

Long fields Of barley and Of rye,

That clothe the wold and meet the sky;

And through the fields the road runs by

12
To many towered Camelot.“

 

9. Ibid., p. 258.

10. Letters, p. 501.
11. Autumn, p. 456.
12. [A Week, p. 188.

 

I tlg‘ll..flu

. ‘4. . iyflwfiwslfifl ,_. utrafgir'ilfli‘l . .

87

Along with Locke, Dugald Stewart and Dr. Thomas
Brown are mentioned as being poor apologies for “mental
philosOphy“. These writers were recommended to his
sister's friend, in a letter written to Helen in 1858.
This was Thoreau's last year in college, and it is
quite probable that he had recently read and studied
the philosOphers himself. He writes: “One of your
young ladies wishes to study mental philOSOphy, hey?
Well, tell her that she has the very best text book
that I know of in her possession already. If she do
not believe it, then she should have beepoken another
better in another world, and not have exPected to
find one at 'Little and Wilkins“. But if she wishes
to know how poor an apology for a mental philosOphy
men have tacked together, synthetically or analytically,
these latter days,--how they have squeezed the infinite
mind into a compass that would not nonplus a surveyor
of Eastern Lands . . . . . making Imagination and
Memory to lie still in their respective apartments
like ink-stand and wafers in a lady's escritoire, .

. why let her read Looks, or Stewart, or Brown.

The fact is, mental philOSOphy is very like Poverty,
which, you know, begins at home; and indeed, when it
goes abroad, it is poverty itself.“13

William Howitt, who at the time of Thoreau was

 

15. Letters, p. 26.

 

 

...x¢:(, . n.rw.1lu‘

88
exceedingly popular, is mentioned casually in one Of
his Journal entries for 1855. He writes: “Apparently
I read Cato_and Varro from the same motives that
Virgil did, and as I read the Almanac, the “N. E.
Farmer', or 'Cultivator', or Howitt“s “Seasons'.“14

In 1857, in a letter to a Mr. B. B. Wiler at
Chicago, Thoreau advises him in his reading, and ins
cludes De Quincey, who seems to have interested him.

He writes: “I should say, read Goethe's autobiography,
by all means, also Gibbon's, Haydon the painter's,

and our Franklin of course; perhaps also A1fieri“s

Benvenuto Cellini's, and De Quincey“s 'Confessions

Of an Opium Eater“, . . . . . since you like biography.

. . . . . By the way, read De Quincey's Reminiscences
15

Of Coleridge and Wordsworth.“ A few years earlier,

in a Journal entry, he relates the following incident:
“I told Stacy the other day that there was another
volume Of De Quincey“s 'Essays', wanting to see it

in his library. “I know it,“ says he, 'but I shan't
buy any more of them, for nobody reads them.‘ I

asked what book in his library was most read. He

said, 'The Wide, Wide World“.“16 But Thoreau evidently

read much from De Quincey, despite the fact that he

 

14. Winter, p. 570.
15. Letters, p. 501.
16. Spring, p. 204.

89

very sparingly refers to him in his writings. De
Quincey's life, however, was not pleasing to Thoreau,
for he says, “This is not a noble method Of learning,
to be educated by evitable suffering, like De Quincey,
for instance.“17

Lowell and Thoreau's biographers make much Of
Thoreau's statement that in Ruskin “there is too much
for me and the Hottentots.“ This has tOO Often been
taken as a general statement Of Thoreau's Opinion Of
Ruskin, whereas in fact, as far as his written comp
ments are concerned, considerable genuine enthusiasm
is revealed. Moreover, as the following excerpt will
show, this statement refers to only one work. In a
letter, written in 1857 to his intimate friend Harrison
Blake, he wrote: “Have you ever read Ruskin's books?
If not, I would recommend you to try the second and
third volumes (not parts) Of his Modern Painters.
I am now reading the fourth, and have read most Of
his books lately. They are singularly good and encourag-
ing, though not without crudeness and bigotry. The
themes in the volumes referred to are Infinity, Beauty,
Imagination, Love of Nature, etc., . . . . . all
treated in a very living manner. I am rather surprised
by them. It is remarkable that these things should

be said with reference to painting chiefly, rather

 

17. Autumn, p. 255.

90

than literature. The “Seven Lamps Of Architecture“,
tOO, is made Of good stuff, but, as I remember, there
is too much about art in it for me and the Hottentots.
We want to know about matters and things in general.
Our house is as yet a hut.“18 This, certainly, re-
veals much reading, and cannot at all be considered

a disparaging criticism. At about the same date as
this letter, in a Journal entry, Thoreau reveals

another Opinion. He writes: “I have just read Rus-

kin's “Modern Painters'. I am disappointed in not

finding it a more out-Of-door book. . . . . He does

not describe nature as nature, but as Turner painted
19

her.“ This criticism is just, and in no way inp

dicates that he does not value Ruskin in spite of
such an Obvious fault. “After reading Ruskin on the
love of nature,“ he writes later, “I think, “Drink
deep, or taste not the Pierian Spring!“"2O

A study Of Thoreau's reading and interpretation
Of Carlyle would make a separate paper, much too long
for inclusion here. Thoreau was very enthusiastic
about Carlyle's thought during his college years and
for a while after, and at some time during these years

he wrote his long and somewhat eulogistic essay,

which is included in his CompLete Works. This essay

 

18. Letters, p. 319,
19- M3118: p. 76-
20. gp;g., p. 180.

I I FIE'IIIH‘nII I. _I

.9: .1 “ in. EB‘EE;II~ I

91

cannot be truthfully taken as the criterion of his
judgment, for it does not express the mature, some-
what hardened judgment of philosOphic writers that
Thoreau reveals in later life. However, it is re-
grettable that the “later life“, although imbued

with philOSOphic conceptions, is entirely void Of

any criticism relating to Carlyle. This coincides
with his mental, or philosOphical, break with Emerb
son--a break not in friendship, but in intellectual
agreement. Emerson, in his Journal, mentions the
difficulty he had in understanding Thoreau's re-
ticence, and is at a loss to account for it. Thoreau,
for his part, is entirely silent on the matter. Per-
haps.the silence, and the lack of any criticism Of
Carlyle, has significance. A careful study might
explain much. SO far, neither Carpenter, Christy,
nor anyone else has satisfactorily explained this break
in thought.

The last entry of consequence relating to Carlyle
appears in the Journal entry fOr March 18, 1842. It
appears, on the surface, to be a dismissal Of his
works. At least, as far as his writings reveal, it
“proves to be such. The entire entry is given here:

“March 18, 1842. Whatever book or sentence will
bear to be read twice, we may be sure was thought

twice. I say, this thinking of Carlyle, who writes

 

92

pictures or first impressions merely, which consequently
will only bear a first reading. As if any transient,
any new mood Of the best man deserved to detain the
world long. I should call his writing essentially
dramatic, excellent acting, entertaining especially to
those who see rather than those who hear, not to be
repeated, more than a joke, how shall he think who
hears it. He never consults the oracle, but thinks
to utter oracles himself. There is nothing in his
book for which he is not and does not feel responsible.
He does not retire behind the truth he utters, but
stands in the foreground. I wish he would just think,
and tell me what he thinks, appear to me in the
attitude of a man with his ear inclined, who comes
as silently and meekly as the morning star, which is
unconscious of the dawn it heralds; leading the way
up the steep as though alone and unobserved in its
Observing, without looking behind.“2l

Goethe is referred to by Thoreau, usually in
connection with Carlyle. In his essay he relates
that “Carlyle . . . . . corresponded with Goethe,“22
and in several places he compares the two writers.

However, it is doubtful if Thoreau was an extensive

reader of the German writer, for he says once, “I

 

21. Spring, p. 165.
22. Miscellanies, p. 517.

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95

25
am not much acquainted with the works Of Goethe.“

His impressions were primarily gained through his
study of Carlyle. Some works, however, were read.
In A Mk he writes: “Goethe's whole education and
life were those of the artist. He lacks the uncon-
sciousness Of the post. In his autobiography he
describes accurately the life of the author Of Wil-
helmMeister.“24 In another place he says that “In
his 'Italian Travels“ Goethe jogs along at a snail's
pace.“‘25 Although he apparently valued Goethe highly,
he could not refrain from making the following criti-
cism, which is one he applied to other writers, and
which in this case is applied to Goethe. He writes:
“Even Goethe wanted that universality Of genius which
could have appreciated the philOSOphy of India.“26
Walter Savage Landor is also mentioned in connec-
tion with Carlyle. Thoreau writes: “Carlyle has not
the simple Homeric health of Wordsworth, nor the de-
liberate philosOphic turn Of Coleridge, nor the
scholastic taste of Landor.“27

28
Thoreau's essay Paradise (To Be) Regained,

 

which is in its nature typical of Carlyle, was in—

 

 

 

 

25. ,A Week, p. 547.
24. Ibid., p. 548.
25. Ibid., p. 547.
26. Ibid., p. 149.

 

27. Miscellaniep, p. 545.
28. Ibid., p. 280.

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_. ..., HI. .2»...- n. .1. . . st. . ..» .. u .124. its“

 

 

Illlii

94

spired by J. A. Etzler, who at the time was known
for his essay The Paradise within the Reach 9; all

Men, without Labor, py Powers 9; Nature and Machinepy.

 

Ap Address pp all Lptelligent Men. This was part

 

one, evidently, of a series Of lecture-essays, and
it was published in London in 1842. At no other time
is Etzler mentioned or referred to.

Charles Darwin29 is referred to in a few places,
usually in explanation of natural phenomena, but in-
asmuch as his major works had not yet appeared, it
is Obvious that his thoughts could in no way disturb
Thoreau. If his books had appeared, it seems probable
that Thoreau would have been one of the first to com-
prehend them. Certainly he was far more broad-minded
than many Of his sO-called liberal contemporaries.

Thomas Cholmondeley is the last English author
to be mentioned in this final period Of English litera-
ture available to Thoreau. He was only a minor writer,
and, if it were not for his close relationship to
Thoreau, would hardly deserve mention here. But he
was Thoreau's only intimate English friend, and in
that capacity he should be remembered. It was Chol-
mondeley who sent to Thoreau the fine collection of
Oriental books which receive so much mention in his

Completg Works, and it was this same man who defended

 

29. Darwin is mentioned as follows: Walden, p. 14;
Cape Cod, p. 122; Summer, p. 61; Excursions, p. 226.

 

95

many Of the ideas which Thoreau gleaned from them.
Cholmondeley visited Thoreau twice, and remained

each time for a considerable stay. They were in—
separable, and only Blake can be said tO have been
closer as a friend. The Englishman and Thoreau corre-
sponded Often, but only Cholmondeley's letters are
printed as yet. Thoreau's are still laid away some-
where in the house on the English estate, which, in-
cidentally, is still in the same family.

Cholmondeley was born in 1825, graduated from
Oriel College at the usual age, and departed for New
Zealand, where he lived for a short while. His only
mentioned book, Ultima Epplp, is based on New Zealand
life. He returned tO England to take up residence
on the family estate. While in America, he met and
greatly admired young Channing, and he held deep respect
for Alcott. He died two years after Thoreau, in 1864.

The relationship between these two unusual per-
sons has never been revealed. It is possible that a
careful study Of Cholmondeley might reveal the source
Of much Of Thoreau's thought. But Thoreau was as
reticent about his friends as he was about his inner-
most self, and was content to veil their Opinions as

well as his own, giving credit to neither.

L.-

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Conclusion

In the preceding pages Thoreau's reading in
English literature has been presented as completely

as a careful reading Of his Complete Works and the

 

works Of his biographers and critics would allow.

Some reading that Thoreau did not directly mention

was suggested in some way or another by his writings,
but because of a lack of sufficient evidence such
reading has not been included in this thesis. A
complete record Of Thoreau's reading in English litera-
ture would be an impossibility. It has been the aim
in this work to approach, by careful analysis Of
available sources, such a record. The reading was
presented systematically according to definite periods
in English literature. The extent Of his reading

in each period, as a result, is readily discernible.
However, before his reading in the various periods

of English literature is compared, it must be remembered
that the number Of authors and the amount Of available
reading matter in each period vary greatly. Therefore,
in order to determine which periods he read most
thoroughly, the extent Of his reading in any period
must be compared with the total available reading

material of that period. The result of such a comparison

IJIIIIIIII .1]. I . . i

97

is given irithe following list, which places the
periods in the order of their importance:

Periods in English literature represented most

by Thoreau's reading:

Seventeenth Century Literature.

Nineteenth Century Literature.

The Time of Chaucer.
Periods in English literature represented fairly
well by Thoreau's reading:

Elizabethan Literature.

Eighteenth Century Literature.

Periods in English literature represented least

by Thoreau's reading:

Literature Of the Renaissance Period.
Early English Literature.

The above comparison, however, is not as reveal-
ing as it might seem at first glance. It is based
entirely upon the extent of his reading, without
thought as to his preferences for individual authors,
and without consideration of his preference for cer-
tain types of literature. A summary of his reading
in English literature would not be complete if the
authors and types Of literature he preferred were
ignored.

A careful inspection Of all of Thoreau's reading

. - “in“..wsfiiva. -...

ilrhtwg.‘ gt. wa!‘

98

in English literature reveals certain writers whom
he definitely preferred. TO comment oriand criticism
Of these writers he devotes much space. Truly, he
shows more enthusiasm for these select few than he
does for all Of the others. He quotes them Often,
and sets them up as models for comparison in his
criticisms of lesser writers. It is difficult to
name these writers in the order of Thoreau's apprecia-
tion of them. However, in the following list, such
a comparison is attempted:
English authors read and appreciated most by

Thoreau:

Chaucer

Raleigh

Quarles

Macpherson

Evelyn

Gilpin

Coleridge

Jonson

Carlyle

Milton

In previous pages Thoreau's enthusiasm for the

above writers was clearly revealed. Chaucer is un-
questionably his favorite, and Raleigh certainly must
come next in the list. Thoreau's letter to Mrs. Emer-
son left little unsaid about Quarles. Yet Macpherson's

Ossian in itself was probably preferred to any one of

Quarles' works. Thoreau's love of natural science

419's,“ I f. III-pi“...uun I4

99

accounts for his great appreciation Of the two rather
obscure writers placed next in the list. Evelyn and
Gilpin seem out of place in such company, yet Thoreau
himself might have placed them higher. The prose

Of Coleridge seems to have had a powerful influence
upon Thoreau's life. It would be prOper, perhaps,

to place the name Kant in parentheses Opposite that
of Coleridge. Thoreau reveals much reading of Jonson,
and quotes him often, but in no place Offers any
critical comment. Although his inclusion in the group
is the most doubtful, there is none other important
enough to take his place.

Carlyle and Milton, it should be noted, influenced
Thoreau mainly in his early life. Yet, they are im-
portant. They serve almost as a foundation to his
later reading in English literature. Perhaps, if
Thoreau had traveled the strict academic path of
literary appreciation, they, with Shakespeare, would
have headed the group.

In his Complete Works Thoreau reveals quite de-
finitely the types of literature he preferred. Poetry
of a quiet, philosOphic vein was to his liking. Al-
though averse to the general run of religious poetry,
he enjoyed the writings of Quarles. Mystic poetry,
such as Macpherson's Ossian, fascinated him, and

caused him to overlook deficiencies which ordinarily

100

would have incurred severe criticism. Yet he pre-
ferred, above all poetry, the solidly done verse Of
Chaucer. In A_prk Thoreau devotes many pages to a
discussion of his preferences in poetry. The poetry
Of Greek antiquity seems to have been his model for
judgment on all other poetry.

Thoreau read much in the field of English prose,
and in the strictly literary works preferred the
philosOphic or the religious philosOphic types. Also
he read enthusiastically works in the field Of natural
science and books which describe nature. Coleridge
is an excellent example Of the former type, while
Gilpin and Evelyn are the outstanding examples Of the
latter.

The novel and the drama are the two types of
literature which Thoreau neglected in his reading.

He is very outspoken about his dislike of the novel,
and his failure to mention or comment on the English
dramas is in itself an indication of a dislike Of
this type.

Although Thoreau's reading was fairly indepenr
dent in comparison with that of other literary men
of his time, it was nevertheless definitely influenced
and guided. His very early reading was guided in the
usual way at Harvard College, and his interest in

the post-Elizabethan literature came about primarily

101

through his reading of Headly“s volume Select Beauties

 

 

p§_Ancient Epglish gpetry. His reading during the
next few years was guided by Emerson, Alcott, and
others of the Transcendentalist group. From then on,
although he read independently in English literature,
his greatest interest lay in the field of Oriental
literature. The Oriental influence altered somewhat
his interpretation Of the English classics, and
caused him to seek new thought in the wonks of lesser
English writers. His love Of nature also greatly
affected his reading, and caused him to seek out un-
usual and Obscure authors.

Thoreau had an exceptional interest in the lives
of the English writers he read. Often his interest
in an author's works was increased or ruined by his
knowledge Of the author's life. He regretted the
lack of knowledge about ShakeSpeare's life, was dis-
gusted with the life of De Quincey, and gloried in
the full life of Raleigh. For Thoreau, a work did
not live unless its author lived with it.

Thoreau's reading in English literature, though,
was only a part Of a wide, unorganized program of
reading. There were other fields Of literature and
thought which greatly overshadowed any that the English
had to Offer. Yet, his reading in English literature

102

was wide, and its influence on him was great. Perhaps
he was not quite sincere when he wrote, “English
literature, from the days Of the minstrels to the

Lake poets,--Chaucer, and Spenser and Milton, and
Even Shakespeare, included, . . . . . breathes no
quite fresh and in this sense, wild strain. It is
essentially tame and civilized literature, reflect-

1
ing Greece and Rome.“

 

l. Excursions, p. 251.

105

Bibliography

Atkinson, J. Brooks, Henry Thoreau: The Cosmic Yankee,
New York (Alfred A. KnOpf), 1927.

 

Cambridge History Of American Literature, 5 vols. ,
New York (Macmillan)— 1917.

 

Cambridge Histo_y Of Epglish Literature, 14 vols.,
New York (Macmillan); 1917.

 

 

Carpenter, Frederick Ives, Emerson and Asia, Cambridge
(Harvard University Press)f_l950.

Christy, Arthur E., The Orient in American Transcen-
dentalism, New York (Columbia_ University Press), 1952.

 

Emerson, Ralph Waldo, Lectures and Biographical Sketches,
Boston (Houghton, Mifflin and CO. 7, 1895.

Higginson, Thomas Wentworth, Short Studies of American
Authors, Boston (Lee and Shepherd771880.

Lowell, James Russell, My Stud y Windows, Boston (Houghton,
Mifflin and Co.), 1926.

Perry, Bliss, The Heart Of Emerson“ s Journal, Boston
(Houghton, Mifflin and Co.),1926.

 

Salt, Henry 8., Life of Henry David Thoreau, London
(Walter Scott, Ltd. T,‘ 1896.

Sanborn, F. B. (ed.), “Familiar Letters of Thoreau",
Thoreau's Complete Works, Vol. V, 1929 edition.

Sanborn, F. B. The Life Of Henr EL Thoreau, Boston
(Houghton, Miffling and Co. 1884.

Stevenson, Robert Louis, Familiar Studies Of Men and
Books, New York (Charles Scribner's SonsY: 1905.

Templeman, W. D., “Thoreau, Moralist of the Picturesque",
E, M. L, A., XLVII, 864-889.

Thoreau, Henry David, Thoreau's Complete Works, 5 vols.,
Boston (Houghton, Mifflin and COT),1929.

Torrey, Bradford, Friends on the Shelf, Boston (Houghton
Mifflin and CO. ), 1906.

 

 

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