1863

                             LIFE WITHOUT PRINCIPLE

                             by Henry David Thoreau

  AT A LYCEUM, not long since, I felt that the lecturer had chosen a
theme too foreign to himself, and so failed to interest me as much as
he might have done. He described things not in or near to his heart,
but toward his extremities and superficies. There was, in this sense,
no truly central or centralizing thought in the lecture. I would have
had him deal with his privatest experience, as the poet does. The
greatest compliment that was ever paid me was when one asked me what
I thought, and attended to my answer. I am surprised, as well as
delighted, when this happens, it is such a rare use he would make of
me, as if he were acquainted with the tool. Commonly, if men want
anything of me, it is only to know how many acres I make of their
land- since I am a surveyor- or, at most, what trivial news I have
burdened myself with. They never will go to law for my meat; they
prefer the shell. A man once came a considerable distance to ask me to
lecture on Slavery; but on conversing with him, I found that he and
his clique expected seven eighths of the lecture to be theirs, and
only one eighth mine; so I declined. I take it for granted, when I am
invited to lecture anywhere- for I have had a little experience in
that business- that there is a desire to hear what I think on some
subject, though I may be the greatest fool in the country- and not
that I should say pleasant things merely, or such as the audience will
assent to; and I resolve, accordingly, that I will give them a strong
dose of myself. They have sent for me, and engaged to pay for me, and
I am determined that they shall have me, though I bore them beyond all
precedent.

  So now I would say something similar to you, my readers. Since you
are my readers, and I have not been much of a traveller, I will not
talk about people a thousand miles off, but come as near home as I
can. As the time is short, I will leave out all the flattery, and
retain all the criticism.

  Let us consider the way in which we spend our lives.

  This world is a place of business. What an infinite bustle! I am
awaked almost every night by the panting of the locomotive. It
interrupts my dreams. There is no sabbath. It would be glorious to see
mankind at leisure for once. It is nothing but work, work, work. I
cannot easily buy a blank-book to write thoughts in; they are commonly
ruled for dollars and cents. An Irishman, seeing me making a minute in
the fields, took it for granted that I was calculating my wages. If
a man was tossed out of a window when an infant, and so made a cripple
for life, or seared out of his wits by the Indians, it is regretted
chiefly because he was thus incapacitated for business! I think that
there is nothing, not even crime, more opposed to poetry, to
philosophy, ay, to life itself, than this incessant business.

  There is a coarse and boisterous money-making fellow in the
outskirts of our town, who is going to build a bank-wall under the
hill along the edge of his meadow. The powers have put this into his
head to keep him out of mischief, and he wishes me to spend three
weeks digging there with him. The result will be that he will
perhaps get some more money to board, and leave for his heirs to spend
foolishly. If I do this, most will commend me as an industrious and
hard-working man; but if I choose to devote myself to certain labors
which yield more real profit, though but little money, they may be
inclined to look on me as an idler. Nevertheless, as I do not need the
police of meaningless labor to regulate me, and do not see anything
absolutely praiseworthy in this fellow's undertaking any more than in
many an enterprise of our own or foreign governments, however amusing
it may be to him or them, I prefer to finish my education at a
different school.

  If a man walk in the woods for love of them half of each day, he
is in danger of being regarded as a loafer; but if he spends his whole
day as a speculator, shearing off those woods and making earth bald
before her time, he is esteemed an industrious and enterprising
citizen. As if a town had no interest in its forests but to cut them
down!

  Most men would feel insulted if it were proposed to employ them in
throwing stones over a wall, and then in throwing them back, merely
that they might earn their wages. But many are no more worthily
employed now. For instance: just after sunrise, one summer morning,
I noticed one of my neighbors walking beside his team, which was
slowly drawing a heavy hewn stone swung under the axle, surrounded by
an atmosphere of industry- his day's work begun- his brow commenced to
sweat- a reproach to all sluggards and idlers- pausing abreast the
shoulders of his oxen, and half turning round with a flourish of his
merciful whip, while they gained their length on him. And I thought,
Such is the labor which the American Congress exists to protect-
honest, manly toil- honest as the day is long- that makes his bread
taste sweet, and keeps society sweet- which all men respect and have
consecrated; one of the sacred band, doing the needful but irksome
drudgery. Indeed, I felt a slight reproach, because I observed this
from a window, and was not abroad and stirring about a similar
business. The day went by, and at evening I passed the yard of another
neighbor, who keeps many servants, and spends much money foolishly,
while he adds nothing to the common stock, and there I saw the stone
of the morning lying beside a whimsical structure intended to adorn
this Lord Timothy Dexter's premises, and the dignity forthwith
departed from the teamster's labor, in my eyes. In my opinion, the sun
was made to light worthier toil than this. I may add that his employer
has since run off, in debt to a good part of the town, and, after