Walden The Heaven Below Essay Research Paper free essay sample

Walden: The Heaven Below Essay, Research Paper The Heaven Below Henry David Thoreau # 8217 ; s clip spent at Walden Pond led him to a complex, multiplex apprehension of nature itself, every bit good as the nature of adult male. Thoreau # 8217 ; s clip on Walden Pond, nevertheless, led him to an every bit luxuriant and intricate consciousness of religious truths. As Thoreau writes in # 8220 ; The Pond in Winter # 8221 ; chapter of Walden, # 8220 ; Heaven is under our pess every bit good as over our caputs # 8221 ; ( 283 ) . Although apparently placed rather coolly at the terminal of the paragraph, this statement is a cardinal into the understanding of Thoreau # 8217 ; s find. As a doctrine that asserts the primacy of the subtle and intangible over the stuff and empirical, the really definition of Transcendentalism implies that one must lift above the sludge and quag of the earthly in order to derive true apprehension of the religious. In fact, the root verb of this genre, which characterizes Thoreau # 8217 ; s authorship, is transcend, which means to lift above and travel beyond bounds. Having understood these basic constructs, it is merely logical for one to expect Thoreau # 8217 ; s eyes to be cast skyward in his attempt to detect some religious truth. Of class, at several points during his narrative of his visit at Walden Pond, Thoreau, whether or non deliberately, obliges the anticipant reader. However, in a lone sentence, Thoreau manages to appeal to the reader # 8217 ; s safe givens every bit good as baffle him or her with a new, critical, unanticipated theory: # 8220 ; Heaven is under our pess every bit good as above our heads. # 8221 ; This is surely a startling thought for a reader knowing in logic and religious tradition. By the appellation of # 8220 ; up # 8221 ; as a positive way and # 8220 ; down # 8221 ; as a negative way, the powers that be someplace along the manner besides located heaven above the Earth and snake pit below the Earth. Thoreau, in one fell slide, tears this thought to tear up. The arrangement of Eden below our pess displaces the reader. But his statement is non even a simple renunciation of a cultural phenomenon. For Thoreau, Eden is above, but he asserts that Eden can besides be found below our pess. It is of import to observe here that Thoreau # 8217 ; s Eden is non needfully the Heaven of Judeo-christian divinity. Simply put, Thoreau # 8217 ; s Eden is a topographic point of intense self-awareness and satisfaction. Still, no affair what Thoreau thinks of Eden, his thought is a extremist 1. Throughout Walden, the reader takes notice of the topographic points where Thoreau finds peace or apprehension. # 8220 ; The Pond in Winter # 8221 ; is such a topographic point. Is the reader to presume that the repose of # 8220 ; the quiet parlour of the fishes, pervaded by a softened visible radiation as through a window of land glass # 8221 ; ( 283 ) is Thoreau # 8217 ; s motive for reasoning that a heaven exists below our pess if we merely choose to see it? Somehow, the account of his statement seems excessively simplistic, although this may be due to the reader’s ain inventive defects which hinder his or her vision of Thoreau’s observation. Then rises the possibility that uncertainty and obfuscation are portion of Thoreau # 8217 ; s program for the reader. Thoreau # 8217 ; s word pick is notable here. By playing on the phrase # 8220 ; above our caputs, # 8221 ; Thoreau implies a dual significance. Yes, heaven is literally above our caputs, but Eden is besides a cryptic construct and worlds are incapable of understanding it. Heaven, like his allegation, is full of concealed meaning.Thoreau # 8217 ; s interplay between surfaces and deepnesss is important in trying to bring out this implicit in significance. As he writes in the # 8220 ; Where I Lived and What I Lived For # 8221 ; chapter of Walden, # 8220 ; I perceive that we dwellers of New England live this average life because our vision does non perforate the surface of things. We think that that is what appears to be # 8221 ; ( 96 ) . Thoreau states in this transition that visual aspects are lead oning ; truth, or at least a way to it, can merely be found thr ough active sight, a impression besides put away by Ralph Waldo Emerson in his essay entitled # 8220 ; Nature. # 8221 ; Emerson uses his thought of a # 8220 ; transparent orb # 8221 ; to exemplify and body the act of dynamic sight and observation. Much like Thoreau, Emerson describes a province of self-awareness so acute that the ego blends into the milieus and leads one into the frame of head required to indisputably see and take portion in his or her milieus. The metabolism would besides let one to witness the forces behind and under nature. Although Emerson did non truly mention to this heightened self-awareness as Eden, it is possible to see it in Thoreau # 8217 ; s reading, given his ain thought of Eden. Emerson # 8217 ; s thoughts of nature as the Ussher, transforming theoretical constructs existent merely in the head into touchable, definite affair come into drama here. The Eden below our pess is, so, touchable and able to be felt and experienced physically. The joy of the experience is what Thoreau believed to be another heaven.Thus, the religious truths gained by Thoreau are non confined to Walden Pond. Thoreau seems to be stating his readers to travel out and happen topographic points of their ain which inspire and impel them to alter their lives and to see and see the joys of nature. The peace and joy found in such a procedure, Thoreau argues, are every bit satisfying as being in Eden. So heaven itself is non confined to a topographic point far off, unachievable in life. Living, or genuinely life is besides a Eden, one that can be found throughout nature, above every bit good as below. 337