Henry David Thoreau And Transcendentalism

Henry David Thoreau was an American essayist, poet, and practical philosopher. He was best known for his beliefs in Transcendentalism and civil disobedience, he was also a dedicated abolitionist. He attended Harvard College (now Harvard University) and graduated in 1837. Once out of college Thoreau befriended Ralph Waldo Emerson who was also an American essayist, lecturer, and poet who led the Transcendentalist movement in the mid-19th century. Emerson was a mentor to Thoreau, he became Emerson’s caretaker in his home. Emerson was the one who gave him the lands where he would produce his greatest work- The Walden.

In Thoreau’s first chapter of his Walden he speaks on the economy and his two year project at Walden Pond near Concord, Massachusetts. The point of his experiment was
He states that likes company just as much as the next person but he knows that his house isn't very large so he usually moves his guests outside his door to the pine forest. His hosting style is not conventional by any means. When feeding the people who visit them he is more concerned with giving his guests with spiritual sustenance over material and if there isn't enough food to feed everyone they all go without. But even with these conditions his guests still came! Thoreau stated that he had more “friends” living on the Walden than he did when he lived in town.

Though not everything was completely easy at Walden Pond, at one point in time he had a run in with the law. After spending a night in jail after refusing to pay poll tax Thoreau developed one of his most influential essays, “Civil Disobedience”. He believed in acting on your individual conscience, not blindly following the law and government policy. "The only obligation which I have a right to assume is to do at any time what I think right." (American Transcendentalism Web, n.d.) “Civil Disobedience” inspired many protests around the