Page:Familiar letters of Henry David Thoreau.djvu/378

 352 FRIENDS AND FOLLOWERS. [1857,

worthies I have referred to. But I think that that is not altogether a recommendation ; since such an answer to these questions cannot be discov ered any more than perpetual motion, for which no reward is now offered. The noblest man it is, methinks, that knows, and by his life suggests, the most about these things. Crack away at these nuts, however, as long as you can, the very exercise will ennoble you, and you may get something better than the answer you expect.

TO B. B. WILEY (AT CHICAGO).

CONCORD, April 26, 1857.

MR. WILEY, I see that you are turning a broad furrow among the books, but I trust that some very private journal all the while holds its own through their midst. Books can only reveal us to ourselves, and as often as they do us this service we lay them aside. I should say, read Goethe s Autobiography, by all means, also Gib bon s, Hay don the Painter s, and our Franklin s of course ; perhaps also Alfieri s, Benvenuto Cellini s, and De Quincey s &quot; Confessions of an Opium-Eater,&quot; - since you like autobiography. I think you must read Coleridge again, and fur ther, skipping all his theology, i. e., if you value precise definitions and a discriminating use of language. By the way, read De Quincey s Remi niscences of Coleridge and Wordsworth.