tread, with no death or disappointment at the end of it. In the light of this strain there is no Thou nor I. It paints the landscape suddenly; it is at once another land,—the abode of poetry."
One feels in this whole essay the spirit of youth,—its confidence in itself, its haughty scorn for the conventional and customary,—a singular blending of the aristocratic and the democratic in its tone towards other men,—who are at once the dust of the earth and the superiors of the stars. Youth never forsook Thoreau; and though he moderated the peculiarities of this essay, he never quite abandoned them in his later writing.
A date was added in pencil by Thoreau to this manuscript, which, written in ink and wholly in his handwriting, was sent to Margaret Fuller, then editing "The Dial" in its first year. Its first number had appeared in July, 1840, and contained two contributions by Thoreau,—the poem "Sympathy" written a year before, and a short essay on Persius, the Stoic satirist. This much longer contribution was held by Miss Fuller until December 1, 1840, and finally refused, in these terms:
[ ix ]
