The Sanctity of Nature

Walden is Henry David Thoreau’s tribute to eulogy to the beauty and the wisdom of nature. In the various writings of Walden Thoreau explains the value of the simplicity of nature as well as the sanctity that was being abused in by the rise of towns and society as a whole. He feels that humans have turned away from Nature and have begun to live the complex and stressful life that the city demands.

In Spring Thoreau attempts to convey the necessity of respecting and appreciating nature. The tone of His writing his almost desperate as urges the reader to open their eyes to the natural beauty that surrounds them. He states that “villages life would stagnate if it were not for the unexplored forests and meadows.” The majority of the people in Thoreau’s time, much like those of today, were most likely wrapped up in the ways of the city. The only trees they were interested were those they believed money to grow on. The forests and meadows were only seen for their economical purposes and not a haven.

But Thoreau sees nature very differently from his fellow man. He respects it. What’s more, he understands that Nature is a necessity – something that all mankind needs. He calls it a “tonic” for the wonderful aesthetic comfort it could bring. He saw nature as something that was a part of humanity, not something to be governed. Every aspect of the wilderness contained personality and depth. For example, in The Ponds, he describes the beauty of a lake saying that it “is the landscape’s most beautiful and expressive feature. It is Earth’s eye; looking into which the beholder measures the depth of his own nature.” Thoreau sees not only the beauty of the lake, but also the way in which a man could be sized up by it.

There is a sense of urgency in Thoreau’s voice as he urges humanity to see Nature as it truly was meant to be seen. He says “we must” and “we need” instead of “perhaps” or “we should.” In order to be complete, Thoreau believed that Nature and man had to co-exist. He believed it was necessary for us to take from Nature it’s “inexhaustible vigor.” He saw the power of the wilderness. He knew there was raw energy in his woods and lake and he wished to harness it so that he could understand it. In the cities, men were harnessing electricity and searching for ways to build new and powerful machines. Thoreau saw power as well. The power of a thunderstorm, the ferocity of a raging wind. As he walked along the shore he witnessed the skeletons of ships and understood the cruelty of the sea.

Thoreau is also aware of the cycles of nature. He calls it the “wilderness with its living and decaying trees. He knows and understands that nature has cycles, just like the life of a human being. The trees that are old and sick must die for the sake of the new ones that will take their place and grow from the nutrients their dead leaves and branches bestow on the earth. There is no unnecessary odes to Nature perfection, but rather an account of what Nature can teach those who are willing to listen. Living in the city and journeying into the wilderness gave Walden a chance watch the cycles of nature and humanity side by side. He saw that Nature always renewed itself while humanity continued to self-implode through economics and societal greed.

When Thoreau is out at the pond or walking in the woods, he sees things clearer. He understands that he has shortcomings and is ready to “witness [his] own limits. When he traipses upon some new and untouched piece of pasture or rocky crag he appreciates it for the chance he has to see it, knowing that the material world could easily one day swallow up that little piece of heaven as well.

Thoreau continues his argument for nature in What I lived For as he gives a more personal and intimate account of his time at Walden pond. He states that he went to the woods because he wished “to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach.” Living in the city, Thoreau knew he was missing something. Most likely he had been well educated, and had enough financial stability to live comfortably. But there was something missing – something that could be learned from Nature itself. As he points out in Economy that “the improvement of ages have had but little influence on the essential laws of man’s existence as out skeletons, probably are no to be distinguished from those of our ancestors.” He sees that man has only complicated what they believe to be the necessities of life by introducing issues of money and debt. Thoreau believes life to be so much more and wishes to see it from a natural and unfiltered view.

He believes that if he can just “drive life into a corner and reduce its lowest terms” he will be able to live a more satisfying life.

Thoreau view of city life was that it was all overdone and shallow. Over and over again throughout Walden he points out that he preferred the simplistic beauty of nature to civilization. As he states in Economy “I would rather sit on a pumpkin and have it all to myself, than be crowded on a velvet cushion.”

Thoreau also never intended to be partial towards Nature. In fact, when he set out he state that, “if it proved to be mean, why then to get the whole and genuine meanness of it, and publish its meanness to the world; or if it were sublime, to know it by experience, and be able to give a true account of it in my next excursion.” Thoreau was not some raving environmentalist who ties himself to a tree in protest of man’s treatment of Mother Earth. Rather, he was someone who wanted to simply understand a part of the world that did not exist within walls. He never intended to fall in love with the woods and meadows. Most likely, he never intended to stay at Walden pond for two years. He simply put himself in the hands of Nature and let it teach him what it wanted him to learn.

Thoreau also had no intention of staying in the wilderness. He only wanted to learn, and then return to civilization, which was in no way his enemy. In fact, when he discusses the attractions of the Hollowell Farm, he never wants objects to its existence. Rather he points out that it value does not lie in productivity but in its location. He fears that the owner will continue to expand and run its crop based on how much it can produce. Thoreau wishes that he “could pay for it to be unmolested” so that it would “yield the most abundant crop of the kind I wanted.” Thoreau had no desire to tear a farm down, but rather use it for the kind of profits that come with contemplation instead of those that require a lot of work. Not because he was lazy, but because he knew their was more to life than growing rich.

Thoreau’s deliberate desire to be free from life’s complications is a testament to self-reliance. To a Transcendentalist Thoreau was seeking a way to find coexist with the natural world despite being a part of mankind. The man who is so concerned with building a bank account can also be the man who praises the beauty of a sunset. Both are the result of self-reliance. Thoreau does not abhor money, in fact, he most likely would not have been able to live at Walden Pond without financial means of some sort. Instead, he simple puts financial stability at a lower level than his appreciation of nature. He patches his own clothes instead of buying new ones. He builds his own shack instead of getting a loan to buy one. Thoreau is rich in mind and spirit and so has gained more than a scholar. He is also debt free and self-sufficient which means he is wealthier than a city gentleman.

Every time I go to Ireland I set time aside to climb Killiney Hill, which is the tallest in Dublin County. The most recent excursion was one that started out as a simple walk but turned into something so much more wonderful. I started out early in the morning at the base of the hill. The beginning of the trek starts out in at a small iron gate on the southwestern part of the hill. You walk in and are immediately swept away into another world. The first thing you notice is how green the grass is. Not just green, but emerald; with shadows of olive, and hints of jade. There were times when it looked like a sea on a mellow day or even a field of wheat. I remember trying to think of all the different names of green so I could remember each beautiful blade of grass.

When the sun broke through the morning fog it hit the dew and made it sparkle like diamonds. I’ve never watched dew on grass before, but this time I did. I watched as they danced up the blades in a slow ballet. Sometimes one would fall to dark brown floor beneath; crashing into little splinters of light.

As you leave the base of the hill and begin to climb you enter a whole other world. Ancient rock walls line the path and gnarled trees form a green canopy over your head. The whole place breaths with age. You listen to the wind and try to understand what it is trying to say to you. Sometimes you understand, sometimes you don’t. After about five miles you break free from the trees and get a beautiful view of the sea. It changes from blue to green to grey with the dance of the clouds above. If you breathe deeply enough you can smell it over the scent of heather and lavender.

The last leg of the trek is my favorite. You turn of the path into a glorious tangle of green and climb up mossy stone steps that are cracked with age. The wind picks up as you reach the top. Howling over the naked land that is now only covered with pointed rocks.

At last you reach the pinnacle. You can see all of Dublin County and some of Wicklow county to the south. The wind is fierce up on top, but if you find a rock and bury yourself against it, it is the most glorious experience you could ever dream of.

I remember sitting up on that hill and thinking of how for the first time in a very long time I was content. I had no money to call my own, life back home was complete chaos, and I was exhausted. But I was happy. As Thoreau found the simplicity of the woods to his liking so I found the straightforwardness of Killiney to my liking.

For me, being in the city and working within the realm of church politics can often cause me to feel distant from God. Not that I feel he has abandoned me. But rather that the enjoyment I know comes with knowing his grace is somewhere off in the distance and is barred from me by the fences of humanity. But on that hill I could feel His presence saturating every fiber of my being. In being able to spend time with Him one on one in the middle of nowhere I was able to refocus my life.

When I left, I felt renewed. I felt that I had done what Thoreau had done and “driven life into a corner.” I had factored my life into the smallest possible denominator and that was simply to live simply on the strength of the Lord.

Thoreau was most likely torn in leaving Walden Pond. He knew he had never set out to stay there permanently and would one day be compelled to return to the city. He deliberately set out into the woods as I deliberately climbed Killiney Hill. He wanted to know what the “essential parts of life” were and found them in his solitude.

Nature is not something that Thoreau worshipped or thought to have some kind supernatural power. It’s power came in it’s silence and sanctity. In it’s natural ability to renew and refresh. Whenever I leave the city behind and go out into the wilderness I find my life to be simplified. There is no noise, no chaos. It’s as though God takes me away from the distractions so as to be able to speak to me without me always turning my head to worry about something else.

Mankind has forgotten what it means to be alive. Days have become shallow as people try to amass earthly stability. Thoreau was a man ahead of his time as he saw that to truly live was just that – to live. Not live vicariously, ambitiously, or lustfully. Just live. And he has taught generations through Walden that if we all just cut away the excess of extravagance, we will find happiness in understanding ourselves.