Page:Thoreau - His Home, Friends and Books (1902).djvu/218

192 best education. In other words, he made himself forerunner of the elective system of the present. Again, he recognized and revolted from the sordid mercantile tendencies of the times; he tested and defied the narrow customs regarding conduct of life for a college-bred man. In nature and in poetry were his sources of inspiration, they should become his business, so he solved the problem of profession by becoming a naturalist and poet-philosopher. The problem of income required, as he understood the real purpose of life, only the primal creed of simplicity, the elimination of useless acquired tastes. To meet the needs of man exacted no excessive labor, only a healthy industry. He was puzzled by the question of government, its duplicity and injustice; he solved the dilemma by advocating individual conscience and refusal to support an unjust state which overturned its very foundation-stone of liberty.

One might easily expand these problems of experimental modernity and their solutions by Thoreau until he had framed for himself a program of life which seemed to embody the essential tenets of true philosophy. With this he would face life and death. Its dogmas he has expressed so forcefully that they are of vital importance to the present generation. Though sometimes his acts seemed