Thoreau on American Destiny

I believe that climate does react on man. An English traveler tells us that in America Nature has outlined her works on a larger scale, and has painted with brighter colors than the Old World:

"The heavens of America appear infinitely higher, the sky is bluer, the air is fresher, the cold is intenser, the moon looks larger, the stars are brighter, the thunder is louder, the lightning is vivider, the wind is stronger, the rain is heavier, the mountains are higher, the rivers longer, the forests bigger, the plains broader."

As there is something in the mountain-air that feeds the spirit and inspires, I believe man will grow to greater perfection intellectually as well as physically under these influences.

I trust that Americans shall be more imaginative:

• our thoughts will be clearer, fresher, and more ethereal, as our sky;

• our understanding more comprehensive and broader, like our plains;

• our intellect generally on a grander scale, like our thunder and lightning, rivers, mountains and forests.

Else to what end does the world go on, and why was America discovered?

H.D Thoreau, Walking (1861)
(see Journal, February 2, 1852)