Page:Familiar letters of Henry David Thoreau.djvu/320

 296 FRIENDS AND FOLLOWERS. [1855,

you have joined the militia, after what I have heard from your lips ; but I am glad to doubt if there will be occasion for your volunteering into the line. Perhaps I am thinking of the saying that it &quot; is always darkest just before day.&quot; I believe it is only necessary that England be fully awakened to a sense of her position, in order that she may right herself, especially as the weather will soon cease to be her foe. I wish I could believe that the cause in which you are embarked is the cause of the people of England. However, I have no sympathy with the idleness that would contrast this fighting with the teach ings of the pulpit; for, perchance, more true virtue is being practiced at Sevastopol than in many years of peace. It is a pity that we seem to require a war, from time to time, to assure us that there is any manhood still left in man.

I was much pleased with [J. J. G.] Wilkin son s vigorous and telling assault on Allopathy, though he substitutes another and perhaps no stronger thy for that. Something as good on the whole conduct of the war would be of ser vice. Cannot Caiiyle supply it? We will not require him to provide the remedy. Every man to his trade. As you know, I am not in any sense a politician. You, who live in that snug and compact isle, may dream of a glorious com monwealth, but I have some doubts whether I