Henry David Thoreau
- Born on July 12, 1817 in Concord Massachusetts
- Died on May 6, 1862 in Concord Massachusetts
- American philosopher, writer , tax resister, and historian
- Graduated from Harvard University
- Friends with Ralph Waldo Emerson
- Made great contributions in Transcendentalism.
After graduating from Harvard University, Thoreau did not know what path he should take, whether it is medicine, law or something else. As a young bright student, he met Ralph Waldo Emerson, therefore having contact with Transcendentalism. Emerson not only became friends with Thoreau but also he became his mentor and caretaker.
Emerson taught some of the core ideas of Transcendentalism to Thoreau, including spiritual thinking, individualism, self reliance and many others. As a caretaker of Thoreau, Emerson provided shelter and greatly influenced his writing, furthermore Emerson helped Thoreau to published his articles in The Dial, a Transcendentalist magazine. One of the greatest contribution that Emerson did for Thoreau was providing a shelter at Walden Pond, which gave him a chance on composing one of the most greatest article -- Walden.
In 1845, Thoreau built a wooden cabin at Walden Pond, which he spent living for more than two years. His free time gave him the leisure to devote and focused his mind on developing his own philosophical ideas, although he never tell people the reason why he decided to live in Walden Pond in public, but in the short story Walden he stated that he seeks for an alternative route for life. Furthermore one of the main ideas in Walden was being slaves to the tools that we use, this idea is also similar to Emerson's Self Reliance. One should never truly rely on the tools they use, or else it is going to be hard to get rid of them. Suppose we bring this concept to the present, most people would panic and feel insecure when they lose their phone or other electronic devices, in reality we never had these technologies in the past and it certainly did not make us feel unsafe. Thoreau has foresee the future that he is always afraid, a future that humanity is enslaved by technology.
In 1849, Thoreau published Civil Disobedience and question systems established by the U.S. Government. He stated that is democracy the final resolution of government and should we stop improving the system in which every single man held equal power and are being treated equally. Thoreau also admits that he has not been paying taxes in the past six years and was wondering why he should be send to prison for not paying the money that he should not be required to give to the government.
"What you get by achieving your goals is not as important as what you become by achieving your goals."— Henry David Thoreau