When Henry David Thoreau, transcendentalist and friend of Emerson, retreated to Walden Pond in Concord, Massachusetts, he stripped himself of every unnecessary object and distraction and chose to live deliberately. He sought to examine the nature of Life itself, something so dear, precious, imminent and yet so often elusive to so many.

There may be no time more in need of the teachings of Thoreau’s Walden than today.  In the age of instant information and big data we are bombarded with enormous amounts of facts, figures and stories from every corner of the world, both pertinent and superfluous, and left to our own devices to process the information.  We become so tied to our screens and so enmeshed in the flow that we risk mistaking the virtual for the real. And our lives remain stubbornly, undeniably real, however we may wish to represent them virtually.  Thoreau would counsel a pause and advise a closer examination, never blinking at the sacrifices necessary, never blinking in the face of Life itself, and never confusing the atoms of data or the molecules of information for the elements of knowledge and wisdom. (Summary by Michael Hogan)

On the Duty of Civil Disobedience was first published in 1849 as Resistance To Civil Government. The central idea is that individuals should not permit government to overrule their consciences, and that there is a duty to refuse to acquiesce when governments seek to make them agents of injustice. Originally motivated by disgust with slavery and the Mexican-American War, the essay became popular during the Sixties as a justification for demonstrations against the Vietnam War.