He spends so much time working that he has no time to pursue reading or any other artistic endeavors, just like most hard working people.

He is proud that he knows the cost of his home and has built every meter of it, and he bemoans ornament and over decoration, but most people are willing to pay a convenience to not be bothered with more labor than they can bear. Better to pay rent and have company than be isolated

He is very skeptical of all the “great” things humanity has built. He sees monuments as a waste of time, especially the Great Pyramids, and I suppose that’s one way to look at it, especially considering how much suffering and misery were laid upon the backs of the humans who actually lifted those stones. Yet as a species is it not remarkable that we are inclined to erect such structures purely on faith? Yes, hammering stone into ornament may be a waste from a practical point of view, but do all things have to be practical? How incredible is it that our ideas, our imaginations can exist as stone and monument?

And he frees the ox and horse from labor and carries the timber with his own muscles, but he has become only a laborer with no dream. What is the point of living if all one should do is lift a heavy load, dig a cellar, grow the potato, and shovel the snow? Is a person no better than the ox? Is the mind of a human filled with no more than what is in the mind of a fish?

He believes the student would be better mining the ore that makes up his pen knife than studying metallurgy with a professor, and he is right that this sort of first-hand knowledge would prevent the student from cutting his finger, but is the mind to only be filled with the things that the hand can touch and by put to use? Are not the moons of Neptune as wondrous as the slushy water upon a half frozen lake in New England?

Thoreau’s vision is very narrow and he sees only what is right in front of him. He lacks a certain imagination, he is insensitive to the desire of people who want to look good simply because to wear a fine suit feels good. Not all people who dress up or get a good education do so at the expense of someone who can’t or won’t; life isn’t always about other people.

I’m starting over because I want to deal with this book at a deeper, more philosophical level and make sure I’m giving it a fair shake.

I still stand by my position that he is very privileged to be able to “get away” from society. That might seem an odd sort of privilege since he was living in abject poverty, but think about how difficult that would be for us to give up our responsibilities and go live in the woods? Much is made of the parable that Jesus taught about the man who gives up everything to follow him – many people think that that is fundamentally an easy thing to do, but it is very, very hard to just give up our lives, even if they are good lives and go with God.

He is not wrong to show how a simple life can be more fulfilling – I agree with him – but his disdain for society, a disdain that he hints at stemming from his townspeople not accepting him as part of their inner circle, is a little too harsh. Is man really so much the worse to live in a house he does not own made from materials that come from a factory? Are man’s activities that take place in the home so far from the “natural good man” that he is worse off than the “savage”? Thoreau may live closer to God in nature, but his use of the word savage betrays his sense of kinship with his fellow man. He seems to see savages everywhere, not just in the American Indian, but especially there he does not possess the empathetic spirit that comes from people who have spent many hours in their homes thinking about how their action might negatively affect others. A man who has to get his meat on the hunt will have no time to worry if he is hurting anyone’s feelings, yet the man who lives in comfort is well aware how lucky he is and (should) attempt to extend that privilege to everyone.

In this he lacks a portion of empathy for his fellow individual man while at the same time he does love humanity writ large.