A Natural Wisdom: Gleanings from the Journals of Henry David Thoreau
Edited by Walt McLaughlin
Wood Thrush Books, 2025. 3rd Edition
124 pages, paperback
ISBN 979-8-9881716-7-6
“The fact is I am a mystic, a transcendentalist, and a natural philosopher to boot,” Thoreau wrote in his journal. This collection of excerpts, gleaned from the two-million-word journal he kept, lends credence to that claim. Expanded from previous versions published in 2000 and 2004, this edition delves deeper into the Thoreauvian worldview. There was more to the man than civil disobedience, simple living, and pithy reflections on the beauty and wonder of nature. In the new introduction to this book, the editor Walt McLaughlin sheds a little light on what Thoreau was thinking as he roamed the fields and forests of Concord and elsewhere. But the journal entries speak for themselves, outlining a philosophy that is just as relevant today as it was a century and a half ago.