Walden Man and the Natural World Quotes Page 3
(Essay.Paragraph)
| Quote #7 My Muse may be excused if she is silent henceforth. How can you expect the birds to sing when their groves are cut down? (Ponds.23) |
A Muse is the person or thing that inspires a poet's work. So, Thoreau bemoans the fact that many of the woods around Walden Pond have been chopped up, because there's nothing left for a poet to celebrate. We should conserve nature not only for ecological reasons, but for literary ones as well.
| Quote #8 Grow wild according to thy nature, like these sedges and brakes, which will never become English hay. (Baker Farm.8) |
Thoreau's nature is "wild," not the kind of domesticated nature you might find in a farm or a park – or a petting zoo.
| Quote #9 The hare in its extremity cries like a child. I warn you, mothers, that my sympathies do not always make the usual phil-anthropic distinctions. (Higher Laws.3) |
Like many vegetarians, Thoreau won't eat meat because he feels that animals experience pain and suffering just as humans do.
