Page:Familiar letters of Henry David Thoreau.djvu/277

 JET. So.} TO HARRISON BLAKE. 253

est to me, whether performed on foot, or by a Pacific railroad. It is not illustrated by a thought ; it is not warmed by a sentiment ; there is nothing in it which one should lay down his life for., nor even his gloves, hardly which one should take up a newspaper for. It is perfectly heathenish, a filibustering to ward heaven by the great western route. No ; they may go their way to their manifest destiny, which I trust is not mine. May my seventy- six dollars, whenever I get them, help to carry me in the other direction ! I see them on their winding way, but no music is wafted from their host, only the rattling of change in their pockets. I would rather be a captive knight, and let them all pass by, than be free only to go whither they are bound. What end do they propose to themselves beyond Japan ? What aims more lofty have they than the prairie dogs?

As it respects these things, I have not changed an opinion one iota from the first. As the stars looked to me when I was a shepherd in Assyria, they look to me now, a New-Englander. The higher the mountain on which you stand, the less change in the prospect from year to year, from age to age. Above a certain height there is no change. I am a Switzer on the edge of the glacier, with his advantages and disadvantages,