Page:Summer - from the Journal of Henry D. Thoreau.djvu/55

Rh June 5, 1853. 5 By river to Nashawtuck. For the most part we are inclined to doubt the prevalence of gross superstition among the civilized ancients; whether the Greeks, for instance, accepted literally the mythology which we accept as matchless poetry. But we have only to be reminded of the kind of respect paid to the Sabbath as a holy day here in New England, and the fears which haunt those who break it, to see that our neighbors are the creatures of an equally gross superstition with the ancients. I am convinced that there is no very important difference between a New Englander's religion and a Roman's. We both worship in the shadow of our sins. They erect the temples for us. Jehovah has no superiority to Jupiter. The New Englander is &quot;a pagan suckled in a creed out worn.&quot; Superstition has always reigned. It is absurd to think that these farmers, dressed in their Sunday clothes, proceeding to church, differ essentially in this respect from the Roman peasantry. They have merely changed the name and number of their gods. Men were as good then as they are now, and loved one another as much or as little

To Mason's Pasture.

The world is now full of verdure and fragrance, and the air comparatively clear (not yet the constant haze of the dog-days), through