Existentialism and Thoreau

Perhaps the only fitting ending, if one can ever be such, to a tributary work devoted at educating the masses as to Thoreau’s brilliance and rare individualism, is to conclude with a wisdom: The light which puts out our eyes is darkness to us. Thoreau, in a manner of speaking, was fortunate enough to have tasted the fruits of the labor from both perspectives, where as those of the conformists society had subconsciously submitted to blindness of freedom, thus resulting in the death of free choice and opinion. Thoreau was able to separate himself from the grips of society, adopting his own morals, ethics, and laws, resulting in an allowance for individualistic origins of belief and principle, in a sense, becoming the governor of his own government. ) This passage from Thoreau’s conclusion, upon several instances of rereading, left this author little option other than to envy a man that was able to truly understand the true realities of so many aspects that are influenced by a conforming majority; a majority which successfully blinds so many. The proper place to-day, the only place which Massachusetts has provided for her freer and less desponding spirits, is in her prisons, to be put out and locked out by the state by her own act, as they have already put themselves out by their principles. Thoreau is jailed for one night on the charge of failing to submit to government taxation, inevitably becoming the foundation for Civil Disobedience. I thought that there was no need of ice to freeze them. Thoreau perceives a fakeness of society that is attainable only through popular conformity, meaning that his immunity is supplied through his ideologies formulated only from acts performed and experiences endured, nothing of tampered societal corruption and influence. This passage mention from Thoreau’s conclusion symbolizes an almost surreal power of knowledge that can never be understood, but through experience. The chilling wisdom of this passage is so powerfully effective, in this author’s eyes, not for the poetic beauty in style, rather the true realities and sincerities that brought him to an individual, non-conformists attempt at living without illusion. This is where the existential element of Civil Disobedience is evident, being that Thoreau refused to submit government taxation, not for the purpose of rebellion for rebellion, but for moral and ethical belief and principle disagreements, thus leading to the aforementioned reference of free imprisonment being true freedom from conformity, drafted on the grounds of prior experience. Thoreau, in regard to this author’s opinion, could be viewed as a visionary tribute to the works of the brilliant poet, William Blake, being that Blake wrote in the existential manner of Thoreau, drafting from experience rather than tutelage (Referencing Songs of Innocence, Songs of Experience). The poetics in this sentence speak to me, in a sense, as if to say, breath not for needing a breath, but rather for an appreciation and understanding into the natural feeling of life that it represents; listen to the colorful wisdom’s that a sunset silently whispers in the winds, as if to pay tribute and thanks to the mere glimpse of carpe diem that the nature cycle permits, encapsulating every non-corruptible feature of life that is so often ignored and forgotten.