- desperationnounChapter 1 →
A state of hopelessness in which a person feels trapped and acts recklessly or numbly because they see no way out of their situation.
“The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation.”
- deliberatelyadverbChapter 1 →
With full, careful intention and awareness, doing nothing by accident or habit — the opposite of sleepwalking through life.
“I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life.”
- frontverbChapter 1 →
To face something directly and squarely, without flinching or turning away from it.
“I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life.”
- paltryadjectiveChapter 3 →
Ridiculously small or worthless; not deserving serious attention or effort.
“Most men have learned to read to serve a paltry convenience, as they have learned to cipher in order to keep accounts.”
- cipherverbChapter 3 →
To do arithmetic; to calculate numbers, especially for practical bookkeeping purposes.
“Most men have learned to read to serve a paltry convenience, as they have learned to cipher in order to keep accounts.”
- taskverbChapter 3 →
To make heavy demands on someone's abilities; to stretch or challenge a person's capacity to the limit.
- rodsnounChapter 4 →
An old unit of length equal to about 5.5 yards or roughly 5 metres, used here to measure distance along the railroad.
“The Fitchburg Railroad touches the pond about a hundred rods south of where I dwell.”
- causewaynounChapter 4 →
A raised road or path built across low, wet, or flooded ground, here the raised rail embankment Thoreau walks along to reach the village.
“I usually go to the village along its causeway, and am, as it were, related to society by this link.”
- oppressedadjectiveChapter 5 →
Weighed down or burdened by a heavy feeling, here the crushing psychological weight of loneliness.
“I have never felt lonesome, or in the least oppressed by a sense of solitude, but once.”
- solitudenounChapter 5 →
The state of being completely alone, valued here not as loneliness but as a rich, self-sufficient condition that sharpens the mind and senses.
- illiterateadjectiveChapter 6 →
Unable to read or write; here used to describe someone with no formal book learning, yet possibly still possessing natural genius.
“He suggested that there might be men of genius in the lowest grades of life, however permanently humble and illiterate.”
- singularadjectiveChapter 7 →
Remarkable and unlike anything else; standing out as unique or extraordinary rather than ordinary.
“It was a singular experience that long acquaintance which I cultivated with beans.”
- threshingverbChapter 7 →
Beating harvested grain stalks to separate the edible seeds from the husks and straw.
“what with planting, and hoeing, and harvesting, and threshing, and picking over and selling them.”
- molestedverbChapter 8 →
Bothered, harassed, or interfered with; here meaning pestered or troubled by unwanted attention or authority.
“I was never molested by any person but those who represented the State.”
- partakesverbChapter 9 →
Takes on a share of a quality; participates in or shares the nature of something else.
“Lying between the earth and the heavens, it partakes of the color of both.”
- squeamishadjectiveChapter 10 →
Easily made uncomfortable or offended by rough, crude, or unpleasant things; overly delicate in one's sensibilities.
“I am not squeamish in such cases when manners are concerned.”
- ratedverbChapter 10 →
Counted or reckoned something as having a particular value; considered it to be worth a certain amount.
“he had rated it as a gain in coming to America, that here you could get tea, and coffee, and meat every day.”
- posteritynounChapter 10 →
All future generations descended from a person; one's children, grandchildren, and all who come after them.
“not to rise in this world, he nor his posterity.”
- reverenceverbChapter 11 →
To regard something with deep respect and a sense of its sacred or profound importance.
“I found in myself, and still find, an instinct toward a higher, or, as it is named, spiritual life… and I reverence them both.”
- primitiveadjectiveChapter 11 →
Belonging to an early, raw, and instinct-driven stage of human existence, before civilization's refinements; here describing a wild, animal-like impulse within a person.
“another toward a primitive rank and savage one, and I reverence them both.”
- moilingadjectiveChapter 11 →
Drudging away at exhausting, dirty, thankless labor; toiling without reward or dignity.
“Why do you stay here and live this mean moiling life, when a glorious existence is possible to you?”
- unearthlyadjectiveChapter 12 →
Strange and eerie in a way that seems to belong to another world entirely, beyond normal human or natural experience.
“The loon said this with a long-drawn unearthly howl, probably more like a wolf than any bird.”
- vivaciousadjectiveChapter 14 →
Full of vigorous, lively energy; here describing a plant that keeps growing with stubborn vitality long after the people who planted it are gone.
“Still grows the vivacious lilac a generation after the door and lintel and the sill are gone.”
- lintelnounChapter 14 →
The horizontal beam or stone laid across the top of a doorway or window opening to support the wall above it.
“Still grows the vivacious lilac a generation after the door and lintel and the sill are gone.”
- sillnounChapter 14 →
The flat horizontal piece of timber or stone at the very bottom of a door or window frame, here a remnant of a long-demolished house.
“a generation after the door and lintel and the sill are gone, unfolding its sweet-scented flowers each spring.”
- musingadjectiveChapter 14 →
Quietly lost in thought and reflection; describing a person who wanders in a dreamy, contemplative state.
“to be plucked by the musing traveller; planted and tended by hands long since gone.”
- eternitynounChapter 2 →
Time without beginning or end; the infinite dimension that Thoreau contrasts with the shallow, fleeting current of ordinary clock-time.
“Its thin current slides away, but eternity remains.”
WaldenNon-fiction by Henry David Thoreau