AS I CAME home through the woods with my string of fish, trailing my
pole, it being now quite dark, I caught a glimpse of a woodchuck
stealing across my path, and felt a strange thrill of savage
delight, and was strongly tempted to seize and devour him raw; not
that I was hungry then, except for that wildness which he represented.
Once or twice, however, while I lived at the pond, I found myself
ranging the woods, like a half-starved hound, with a strange
abandonment, seeking some kind of venison which I might devour, and no
morsel could have been too savage for me. The wildest scenes had
become unaccountably familiar. I found in myself, and still find, an
instinct toward a higher, or, as it is named, spiritual life, as do
most men, and another toward a primitive rank and savage one, and I
reverence them both. I love the wild not less than the good. The
wildness and adventure that are in fishing still recommended it to me.
I like sometimes to take rank hold on life and spend my day more as
the animals do. Perhaps I have owed to this employment and to hunting,
when quite young, my closest acquaintance with Nature. They early
introduce us to and detain us in scenery with which otherwise, at that
age, we should have little acquaintance. Fishermen, hunters,
woodchoppers, and others, spending their lives in the fields and
woods, in a peculiar sense a part of Nature themselves, are often in a
more favorable mood for observing her, in the intervals of their
pursuits, than philosophers or poets even, who approach her with
expectation. She is not afraid to exhibit herself to them. The
traveller on the prairie is naturally a hunter, on the head waters
of the Missouri and Columbia a trapper, and at the Falls of St. Mary a
fisherman. He who is only a traveller learns things at second-hand and
by the halves, and is poor authority. We are most interested when
science reports what those men already know practically or
instinctively, for that alone is a true humanity, or account of
human experience.
They mistake who assert that the Yankee has few amusements,
because he has not so many public holidays, and men and boys do not
play so many games as they do in England, for here the more
primitive but solitary amusements of hunting, fishing, and the like
have not yet given place to the former. Almost every New England boy
among my contemporaries shouldered a fowling-piece between the ages of
ten and fourteen; and his hunting and fishing grounds were not
limited, like the preserves of an English nobleman, but were more
boundless even than those of a savage. No wonder, then, that he did
not oftener stay to play on the common. But already a change is taking
place, owing, not to an increased humanity, but to an increased
scarcity of game, for perhaps the hunter is the greatest friend of the
animals hunted, not excepting the Humane Society.
Moreover, when at the pond, I wished sometimes to add fish to my
fare for variety. I have actually fished from the same kind of
necessity that the first fishers did. Whatever humanity I might
conjure up against it was all factitious, and concerned my
philosophy more than my feelings. I speak of fishing only now, for I
had long felt differently about fowling, and sold my gun before I went
to the woods. Not that I am less humane than others, but I did not
perceive that my feelings were much affected. I did not pity the
fishes nor the worms. This was habit. As for fowling, during the
last years that I carried a gun my excuse was that I was studying
ornithology, and sought only new or rare birds. But I confess that I
am now inclined to think that there is a finer way of studying
ornithology than this. It requires so much closer attention to the
habits of the birds, that, if for that reason only, I have been
willing to omit the gun. Yet notwithstanding the objection on the
score of humanity, I am compelled to doubt if equally valuable
sports are ever substituted for these; and when some of my friends
have asked me anxiously about their boys, whether they should let them
hunt, I have answered, yes- remembering that it was one of the best
parts of my education- make them hunters, though sportsmen only at
first, if possible, mighty hunters at last, so that they shall not
find game large enough for them in this or any vegetable wilderness-
hunters as well as fishers of men. Thus far I am of the opinion of
Chaucer's nun, who
"yave not of the text a pulled hen
That saith that hunters ben not holy men."
There is a period in the history of the individual, as of the race,
when the hunters are the "best men,- as the Algonquins called them. We
cannot but pity the boy who has never fired a gun; he is no more
humane, while his education has been sadly neglected. This was my
answer with respect to those youths who were bent on this pursuit,
trusting that they would soon outgrow it. No humane being, past the
thoughtless age of boyhood, will wantonly murder any creature which
holds its life by the same tenure that he does. The hare in its
extremity cries like a child. I warn you, mothers, that my
sympathies do not always make the usual philanthropic distinctions.
Such is oftenest the young man's introduction to the forest, and the
most original part of himself. He goes thither at first as a hunter
and fisher, until at last, if he has the seeds of a better life in
him, he distinguishes his proper objects, as a poet or naturalist it
may be, and leaves the gun and fish-pole behind. The mass of men are
still and always young in this respect. In some countries a hunting
parson is no uncommon sight. Such a one might make a good shepherd's
dog, but is far from being the Good Shepherd. I have been surprised to
consider that the only obvious employment, except wood-chopping,
ice-cutting, or the like business, which ever to my knowledge detained
at Walden Pond for a whole half-day any of my fellow-citizens, whether
fathers or children of the town, with just one exception, was fishing.
Commonly they did not think that they were lucky, or well paid for
their time, unless they got a long string of fish, though they had the
opportunity of seeing the pond all the while. They might go there a
thousand times before the sediment of fishing would sink to the bottom
and leave their purpose pure; but no doubt such a clarifying process
would be going on all the while. The Governor and his Council
faintly remember the pond, for they went a-fishing there when they
were boys; but now they are too old and dignified to go a-fishing, and
so they know it no more forever. Yet even they expect to go to
heaven at last. If the legislature regards it, it is chiefly to
regulate the number of books to be used there; but they know nothing
about the book of hooks with which to angle for the pond itself,
impaling the legislature for a bait. Thus, even in civilized
communities, the embryo man passes through the hunter stage of
development.
I have found repeatedly, of late years, that I cannot fish without
falling a little in self-respect. I have tried it again and again. I
have skill at it, and, like many of my fellows, a certain instinct for
it, which revives from time to time, but always when I have done I
feel that it would have been better if I had not fished. I think
that I do not mistake. It is a faint intimation, yet so are the
first streaks of morning. There is unquestionably this instinct in
me which belongs to the lower orders of creation; yet with every
year I am less a fisherman, though without more humanity or even
wisdom; at present I am no fisherman at all. But I see that if I
were to live in a wilderness I should again be tempted to become a
fisher and hunter in earnest. Beside, there is something essentially
unclean about this diet and all flesh, and I began to see where
housework commences, and whence the endeavor, which costs so much,
to wear a tidy and respectable appearance each day, to keep the
house sweet and free from all ill odors and sights. Having been my own
butcher and scullion and cook, as well as the gentleman for whom the
dishes were served up, I can speak from an unusually complete
experience. The practical objection to animal food in my case was
its uncleanness; and besides, when I had caught and cleaned and cooked
and eaten my fish, they seemed not to have fed me essentially. It
was insignificant and unnecessary, and cost more than it came to. A
little bread or a few potatoes would have done as well, with less
trouble and filth. Like many of my contemporaries, I had rarely for
many years used animal food, or tea, or coffee, etc.; not so much
because of any ill effects which I had traced to them, as because they
were not agreeable to my imagination. The repugnance to animal food is
not the effect of experience, but is an instinct. It appeared more
beautiful to live low and fare hard in many respects; and though I
never did so, I went far enough to please my imagination. I believe
that every man who has ever been earnest to preserve his higher or
poetic faculties in the best condition has been particularly
inclined to abstain from animal food, and from much food of any
kind. It is a significant fact, stated by entomologists- I find it
in Kirby and Spence- that "some insects in their perfect state, though
furnished with organs of feeding, make no use of them"; and they lay
it down as "a general rule, that almost all insects in this state
eat much less than in that of larvae. The voracious caterpillar when
transformed into a butterfly... and the gluttonous maggot when
become a fly" content themselves with a drop or two of honey or some
other sweet liquid. The abdomen under the wings of the butterfly
stir represents the larva. This is the tidbit which tempts his
insectivorous fate. The gross feeder is a man in the larva state;
and there are whole nations in that condition, nations without fancy
or imagination, whose vast abdomens betray them.
It is hard to provide and cook so simple and clean a diet as will
not offend the imagination; but this, I think, is to be fed when we
feed the body; they should both sit down at the same table. Yet
perhaps this may be done. The fruits eaten temperately need not make
us ashamed of our appetites, nor interrupt the worthiest pursuits. But
put an extra condiment into your dish, and it will poison you. It is
not worth the while to live by rich cookery. Most men would feel shame
if caught preparing with their own hands precisely such a dinner,
whether of animal or vegetable food, as is every day prepared for them
by others. Yet till this is otherwise we are not civilized, and, if
gentlemen and ladies, are not true men and women. This certainly
suggests what change is to be made. It may be vain to ask why the
imagination will not be reconciled to flesh and fat. I am satisfied
that it is not. Is it not a reproach that man is a carnivorous animal?
True, he can and does live, in a great measure, by preying on other
animals; but this is a miserable way- as any one who will go to
snaring rabbits, or slaughtering lambs, may learn- and he will be
regarded as a benefactor of his race who shall teach man to confine
himself to a more innocent and wholesome diet. Whatever my own
practice may be, I have no doubt that it is a part of the destiny of
the human race, in its gradual improvement, to leave off eating
animals, as surely as the savage tribes have left off eating each
other when they came in contact with the more civilized.
If one listens to the faintest but constant suggestions of his
genius, which are certainly true, he sees not to what extremes, or
even insanity, it may lead him; and yet that way, as he grows more
resolute and faithful, his road lies. The faintest assured objection
which one healthy man feels will at length prevail over the
arguments and customs of mankind. No man ever followed his genius till
it misled him. Though the result were bodily weakness, yet perhaps
no one can say that the consequences were to be regretted, for these
were a life in conformity to higher principles. If the day and the
night are such that you greet them with joy, and life emits a
fragrance like flowers and sweet-scented herbs, is more elastic,
more starry, more immortal- that is your success. All nature is your
congratulation, and you have cause momentarily to bless yourself.
The greatest gains and values are farthest from being appreciated.
We easily come to doubt if they exist. We soon forget them. They are
the highest reality. Perhaps the facts most astounding and most real
are never communicated by man to man. The true harvest of my daily
life is somewhat as intangible and indescribable as the tints of
morning or evening. It is a little star-dust caught, a segment of
the rainbow which I have clutched.
Yet, for my part, I was never unusually squeamish; I could sometimes
eat a fried rat with a good relish, if it were necessary. I am glad to
have drunk water so long, for the same reason that I prefer the
natural sky to an opium-eater's heaven. I would fain keep sober
always; and there are infinite degrees of drunkenness. I believe
that water is the only drink for a wise man; wine is not so noble a
liquor; and think of dashing the hopes of a morning with a cup of warm
coffee, or of an evening with a dish of tea! Ah, how low I fall when I
am tempted by them! Even music may be intoxicating. Such apparently
slight causes destroyed Greece and Rome, and will destroy England
and America. Of all ebriosity, who does not prefer to be intoxicated
by the air he breathes? I have found it to be the most serious
objection to coarse labors long continued, that they compelled me to
eat and drink coarsely also. But to tell the truth, I find myself at
present somewhat less particular in these respects. I carry less
religion to the table, ask no blessing; not because I am wiser than
I was, but, I am obliged to confess, because, however much it is to be
regretted, with years I have grown more coarse and indifferent.
Perhaps these questions are entertained only in youth, as most believe
of poetry. My practice is "nowhere," my opinion is here.
Nevertheless I am far from regarding myself as one of those privileged
ones to whom the Ved refers when it says, that "he who has true
faith in the Omnipresent Supreme Being may eat all that exists,"
that is, is not bound to inquire what is his food, or who prepares it;
and even in their case it is to be observed, as a Hindoo commentator
has remarked, that the Vedant limits this privilege to "the time of
distress."
Who has not sometimes derived an inexpressible satisfaction from his
food in which appetite had no share? I have been thrilled to think
that I owed a mental perception to the commonly gross sense of
taste, that I have been inspired through the palate, that some berries
which I had eaten on a hillside had fed my genius. "The soul not being
mistress of herself," says Thseng-tseu, "one looks, and one does not
see; one listens, and one does not hear; one eats, and one does not
know the savor of food." He who distinguishes the true savor of his
food can never be a glutton; he who does not cannot be otherwise. A
puritan may go to his brown-bread crust with as gross an appetite as
ever an alderman to his turtle. Not that food which entereth into
the mouth defileth a man, but the appetite with which it is eaten.
It is neither the quality nor the quantity, but the devotion to
sensual savors; when that which is eaten is not a viand to sustain our
animal, or inspire our spiritual life, but food for the worms that
possess us. If the hunter has a taste for mud-turtles, muskrats, and
other such savage tidbits, the fine lady indulges a taste for jelly
made of a calf's foot, or for sardines from over the sea, and they are
even. He goes to the mill-pond, she to her preserve-pot. The wonder is
how they, how you and I, can live this slimy, beastly life, eating and
drinking.
Our whole life is startlingly moral. There is never an instant's
truce between virtue and vice. Goodness is the only investment that
never fails. In the music of the harp which trembles round the world
it is the insisting on this which thrills us. The harp is the
travelling patterer for the Universe's Insurance Company, recommending
its laws, and our little goodness is all the assessment that we pay.
Though the youth at last grows indifferent, the laws of the universe
are not indifferent, but are forever on the side of the most
sensitive. Listen to every zephyr for some reproof, for it is surely
there, and he is unfortunate who does not hear it. We cannot touch a
string or move a stop but the charming moral transfixes us. Many an
irksome noise, go a long way off, is heard as music, a proud, sweet
satire on the meanness of our lives.
We are conscious of an animal in us, which awakens in proportion
as our higher nature slumbers. It is reptile and sensual, and
perhaps cannot be wholly expelled; like the worms which, even in
life and health, occupy our bodies. Possibly we may withdraw from
it, but never change its nature. I fear that it may enjoy a certain
health of its own; that we may be well, yet not pure. The other day
I picked up the lower jaw of a hog, with white and sound teeth and
tusks, which suggested that there was an animal health and vigor
distinct from the spiritual. This creature succeeded by other means
than temperance and purity. "That in which men differ from brute
beasts," says Mencius, "is a thing very inconsiderable; the common
herd lose it very soon; superior men preserve it carefully." Who knows
what sort of life would result if we had attained to purity? If I knew
so wise a man as could teach me purity I would go to seek him
forthwith. "A command over our passions, and over the external
senses of the body, and good acts, are declared by the Ved to be
indispensable in the mind's approximation to God." Yet the spirit
can for the time pervade and control every member and function of
the body, and transmute what ill form is the grossest sensuality
into purity and devotion. The generative energy, which, when we are
loose, dissipates and makes us unclean, when we are continent
invigorates and inspires us. Chastity is the flowering of man; and
what are called Genius, Heroism, Holiness, and the like, are but
various fruits which succeed it. Man flows at once to God when the
channel of purity is open. By turns our purity inspires and our
impurity casts us down. He is blessed who is assured that the animal
is dying out in him day by day, and the divine being established.
Perhaps there is none but has cause for shame on account of the
inferior and brutish nature to which he is allied. I fear that we
are such gods or demigods only as fauns and satyrs, the divine
allied to beasts, the creatures of appetite, and that, to some extent,
our very life is our disgrace.
"How happy's he who hath due place assigned
To his beasts and disafforested his mind!
Can use this horse, goat, wolf, and ev'ry beast,
And is not ass himself to all the rest!
Else man not only is the herd of swine,
But he's those devils too which did incline
Them to a headlong rage, and made them worse."
All sensuality is one, though it takes many forms; all purity is
one. It is the same whether a man eat, or drink, or cohabit, or
sleep sensually. They are but one appetite, and we only need to see
a person do any one of these things to know how great a sensualist
he is. The impure can neither stand nor sit with purity. When the
reptile is attacked at one mouth of his burrow, he shows himself at
another. If you would be chaste, you must be temperate. What is
chastity? How shall a man know if he is chaste? He shall not know
it. We have heard of this virtue, but we know not what it is. We speak
conformably to the rumor which we have heard. From exertion come
wisdom and purity; from sloth ignorance and sensuality. In the student
sensuality is a sluggish habit of mind. An unclean person is
universally a slothful one, one who sits by a stove, whom the sun
shines on prostrate, who reposes without being fatigued. If you
would avoid uncleanness, and all the sins, work earnestly, though it
be at cleaning a stable. Nature is hard to be overcome, but she must
be overcome. What avails it that you are Christian, if you are not
purer than the heathen, if you deny yourself no more, if you are not
more religious? I know of many systems of religion esteemed heathenish
whose precepts fill the reader with shame, and provoke him to new
endeavors, though it be to the performance of rites merely.
I hesitate to say these things, but it is not because of the
subject- I care not how obscene my words are- but because I cannot
speak of them without betraying my impurity. We discourse freely
without shame of one form of sensuality, and are silent about another.
We are so degraded that we cannot speak simply of the necessary
functions of human nature. In earlier ages, in some countries, every
function was reverently spoken of and regulated by law. Nothing was
too trivial for the Hindoo lawgiver, however offensive it may be to
modern taste. He teaches how to eat, drink, cohabit, void excrement
and urine, and the like, elevating what is mean, and does not
falsely excuse himself by calling these things trifles.
Every man is the builder of a temple, called his body, to the god he
worships, after a style purely his own, nor can he get off by
hammering marble instead. We are all sculptors and painters, and our
material is our own flesh and blood and bones. Any nobleness begins at
once to refine a man's features, any meanness or sensuality to imbrute
them.
John Farmer sat at his door one September evening, after a hard
day's work, his mind still running on his labor more or less. Having
bathed, he sat down to re-create his intellectual man. It was a rather
cool evening, and some of his neighbors were apprehending a frost.
He had not attended to the train of his thoughts long when he heard
some one playing on a flute, and that sound harmonized with his
mood. Still he thought of his work; but the burden of his thought was,
that though this kept running in his head, and he found himself
planning and contriving it against his will, yet it concerned him very
little. It was no more than the scurf of his skin, which was
constantly shuffled off. But the notes of the flute came home to his
ears out of a different sphere from that he worked in, and suggested
work for certain faculties which slumbered in him. They gently did
away with the street, and the village, and the state in which he
lived. A voice said to him- Why do you stay here and live this mean
moiling life, when a glorious existence is possible for you? Those
same stars twinkle over other fields than these.- But how to come
out of this condition and actually migrate thither? All that he
could think of was to practise some new austerity, to let his mind
descend into his body and redeem it, and treat himself with ever
increasing respect.
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