Publisher's Synopsis
"Thoreau was a man of his own kind. Many things may be said of him, favorable and unfa-vorable, but this must surely be said first, -that, taken for all in all, he was like nobody else. Taken for all in all, be it remarked. Other men have des-pised common sense; other men have chosen to be poor, and, as between physical comfort and better things, have made light of physical com-fort; other men, whether to their credit or discred-it, have held and expressed a contemptuous opin-ion of their neighbors and all their neighbors' do-ings; others, a smaller number, believing in an ab-solute goodness and in a wisdom transcending human knowledge, have distrusted the world as evil, accounting its influence degrading, its pru-dence no better than cowardice, its wisdom a kind of folly, its morality a compromise, its reli-gion a bargain, its possessions a defilement and a hindrance, and so judging of the world, have striven at all cost to live above it and apart. And some, no doubt, have loved Nature as a mistress, fleeing to her from less congenial company, and devoting a lifetime to the observation and enjoy-ment of her ways.
