Meditations of Henry David Thoreau: A Light in the Woods

by Henry David Thoreau, Chris Highland (Editor)

Carry Henry David Thoreau’s wisdom with you in this inspirational guide that features 60 of his most insightful quotes.

Pencil-maker, surveyor, naturalist—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862) wrote articles and essays that established him as America’s first great conservationist. As a 19th century man, Thoreau witnessed the Industrial Revolution, Westward expansion and its harbinger, the railroad, slavery, and Civil War. He stayed alert to the dynamics of human behavior, but Nature was his foremost wild laboratory for the soul.

In Meditations of Henry David Thoreau , editor Chris Highland pairs 60 Thoreau quotes with selections from other celebrated thinkers and spiritual texts. Take this pocket-size guide with you on backpacks, nature hikes, and camping trips. Let Thoreau’s words enrich your experience as you ponder the wilderness from riverbank, mountaintop, or as you relax beside your campfire.

Inside you’ll








As a preeminent social critic, Thoreau’s sense of social justice influenced Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr. May this portable sampler of Thoreau’s help you discover your own light in the woods.

Genres: Poetry, Philosophy, Nonfiction

180 pages, Paperback

First published December 1, 2002

About the author

Henry David Thoreau (born David Henry Thoreau) was an American author, naturalist, transcendentalist, tax resister, development critic, philosopher, and abolitionist who is best known for Walden, a reflection upon simple living in natural surroundings, and his essay, Civil Disobedience, an argument for individual resistance to civil government in moral opposition to an unjust state.

Thoreau's books, articles, essays, journals, and poetry total over 20 volumes. Among his lasting contributions were his writings on natural history and philosophy, where he anticipated the methods and findings of ecology and environmental history, two sources of modern day environmentalism.

In 1817, Henry David Thoreau was born in Massachusetts. He graduated from Harvard University in 1837, taught briefly, then turned to writing and lecturing. Becoming a Transcendentalist and good friend of Emerson, Thoreau lived the life of simplicity he advocated in his writings. His two-year experience in a hut in Walden, on land owned by Emerson, resulted in the classic, Walden: Life in the Woods (1854). During his sojourn there, Thoreau refused to pay a poll tax in protest of slavery and the Mexican war, for which he was jailed overnight. His activist convictions were expressed in the groundbreaking On the Duty of Civil Disobedience (1849). In a diary he noted his disapproval of attempts to convert the Algonquins "from their own superstitions to new ones." In a journal he noted dryly that it is appropriate for a church to be the ugliest building in a village, "because it is the one in which human nature stoops to the lowest and is the most disgraced." (Cited by James A. Haught in 2000 Years of Disbelief.) When Parker Pillsbury sought to talk about religion with Thoreau as he was dying from tuberculosis, Thoreau replied: "One world at a time."

Thoreau's philosophy of nonviolent resistance influenced the political thoughts and actions of such later figures as Leo Tolstoy, Mohandas K. Gandhi, and Martin Luther King, Jr. D. 1862.

More: http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/tho...

http://thoreau.eserver.org/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Da...

http://transcendentalism-legacy.tamu....

http://www.biography.com/people/henry...

Reviews

[Joe McCluney · Rating 3 out of 5]

At times Thoreau makes me feel what he feels in his own space and time, which is quite the literary achievement. At other times I read the words on the page and feel nothing at all, like one (or both) of us is trying too hard to make something click.

[Karen-Leigh · Rating 3 out of 5]

Carry Henry David Thoreau’s wisdom with you in this inspirational guide that features 60 of his most insightful quotes.

Pencil-maker, surveyor, naturalist—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862) wrote articles and essays that established him as America’s first great conservationist. As a 19th century man, Thoreau witnessed the Industrial Revolution, Westward expansion and its harbinger, the railroad, slavery, and Civil War. He stayed alert to the dynamics of human behavior, but Nature was his foremost wild laboratory for the soul.

In Meditations of Henry David Thoreau , editor Chris Highland pairs 60 Thoreau quotes with selections from other celebrated thinkers and spiritual texts. Take this pocket-size guide with you on backpacks, nature hikes, and camping trips. Let Thoreau’s words enrich your experience as you ponder the wilderness from riverbank, mountaintop, or as you relax beside your campfire.

[Jenny · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5

favourites: Winter Warmth, Tree Shelter, Out of Doors, Comforts of Life, To Be Awake is to Be Alive, The Woods Within, Nature's Prescription

"Live in each season as it passes; breathe the air, drink the drink, taste the fruit, and resign yourself to the influences of each.

Grow green with spring, yellow and ripe with autumn. (...) For all Nature is doing her best each moment to make us well. She exists for no other end. Do not resist her. With the least inclination to be well, we should not be sick."

[Joe · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was reminded of growing up in New Hampshire: the pine woods, blueberries, the waterways. The individual Thoreau bites were refreshing, but the attached quotes seemed utterly unrelated in most cases. Also odd, many quotes were referenced indirectly -- "Meister Eckhart quoted by Andrew Harvey in The Essential Mystics".

[A.B. Cole · Rating 2 out of 5]

Sadly I picked up low contrast printing of this edition.
This happens a lot with print on demand paperbacks in later runs.
The only easy to read text is on the very last page "Made in the USA Lexington KY 30 September 2013"

If I had bought this from Amazon, it would have been returned.

[Kailie Drumm · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you need me I’ll be in the woods 🌲

[Sandy Williams · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great inspiring thoughts fr Henry David Thoreau for daily Meditation.

[Chet Rodin · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love the way his mind works.

[Mie · Rating 4 out of 5]

America's first great conservationist, Henry Bavid Thoreau.

From the Essay # 33: Lost

Not til we are lost, in other words, not til we are lost in the world, do we begin to find ourselves, and realize where we are and the infinite extent of our relations.

Just a little sample of many great thoughts this little book is filled with!

[Aaron Pellegrini · Rating 4 out of 5]

A pocket reference for finding one's spirituality in nature. Interesting and insightful.

[Mckinley · Rating 3 out of 5]

Short, a few paragraphs of quotations.

[Bo · Rating 3 out of 5]

I prefer Thoreau's Journals intact, not so heavily edited.