Each season is but an infinitesimal point.
It no sooner comes than it is gone.
It has no duration …
Each annual phenomenon is a reminiscence and prompting.
I cannot count one.
I know not the first letter
of the alphabet.
(avesong)
Already we begin to anticipate spring, and this is an important difference between this time and a month ago. We begin to say that the day is springlike. February 2, 1854
The novelty is in us, and it is also in nature. The mirage is constant . . . a constantly varying mirage, answering to the condition of our perceptive faculties and our fluctuating imaginations. February 9, 1852
A dry, powdery snow about one inch deep, from which, as I walk toward the sun, this perfectly clear, bright afternoon, at 3.30 o’clock, the colors of the rainbow are reflected from a myriad fine facets. February 13, 1859
It is inspiriting to feel the increased heat of the sun reflected from the snow. There is a slight mist above the fields, through which the crowing of cocks sounds spring-like. February 23, 1856
I am reminded of spring by the quality of the air. The cock-crowing and even the telegraph harp prophesy it, even though the ground is for the most part covered by snow. February 24, 1852
Stopping in a sunny and sheltered place on a hillock in the woods, — for it is raw in the wind, — I hear the hasty, shuffling, as if frightened, note of a robin from a dense birch wood . . . This sound reminds me of rainy, misty April days in past years. March 8, 1855
When I get two thirds up the hill, I look round and am for the hundredth time surprised by the landscape of the river valley and the horizon with its distant blue scalloped rim. It is a spring landscape, and as impossible a fortnight ago as the song of birds. March 18, 1858
There is the difference between winter and spring. The bared face of the pond sparkles with joy. March 20, 1853
I am waked by my genius, surprised to find myself expecting the dawn in so serene and joyful and expectant a mood. March 22, 1853
Uncanoonuc, well seen from this hill, whereon you camped for a night in your youth, which you have never revisited, still as blue and ethereal to your eyes as is your memory of it. March 31, 1853
I am waked by my genius, surprised to find myself expecting the dawn in so serene and joyful and expectant a mood. March 22, 1853
Uncanoonuc, well seen from this hill, whereon you camped for a night in your youth, which you have never revisited, still as blue and ethereal to your eyes as is your memory of it. March 31, 1853
Each day's feast in Nature's year is a surprise to us and adapted to our appetite and spirits. She has arranged such an order of feasts as never tires. March 28, 1859
Sitting on the rail over the brook, I hear something which reminds me of the song of the robin in rainy days in past springs. April 2, 1854
The wind is southeasterly. This is methinks the first hazy day, and the sough of the wind in the pines sounds warmer, whispering of summer. April 3, 1854
This susurrus carries me forward some months toward summer -- to those still warm summer noons when . . . the fishes retreat from the shallows into the cooler depths, and the cows stand up to their bellies in the river. The reminiscence comes over me like a summer's dream. April 6, 1854
If you yield for a moment to the impressions of sense, you hear some bird giving expression to its happiness. April 15, 1859
Almost did without a fire this morning. Coming out, I find it very warm, warmer than yesterday or any day yet. It is a reminiscence of past summers. April 18, 1855
There is a season for everything, and we do not notice a given phenomenon except at that season. April 24, 1859
And we are enabled to apprehend at all what is sublime and noble only by the perpetual instilling and drenching of the reality that surrounds us. Walden, Where I lived and what I lived for
In any weather, at any hour of the day or night, I have been anxious to improve the nick of time, and notch it on my stick too; to stand on the meeting of two eternities, the past and future, which is precisely the present moment; to toe that line. Walden, Economy
How full of reminiscence is any fragrance! May 7, 1852
We remember autumn to best advantage in the spring; the finest aroma of it reaches us then. May 10, 1852
Our past experience is a never-failing capital which can never be alienated, of which each kindred future event reminds us. If you would have the song of the sparrow inspire you a thousand years hence, let your life be in harmony with its strain to-day. May 12, 1857
The sessile-leaved bellwort, with three or four delicate pale-green leaves with reflexed edges, on a tender-looking stalk, the single modest-colored flower gracefully drooping, neat, with a fugacious, richly spiced fragrance, facing the ground, the dry leaves, as if unworthy to face the heavens. It is a beautiful sight, a pleasing discovery, the first of the season, -- growing in a little straggling company, in damp woods or swamps. When you turn up the drooping flower, its petals make a perfect geometrical figure, a six-pointed star. May 16, 1852
Standing in the meadow near the early aspen at the island, I hear the first fluttering of leaves, - a peculiar sound, at first unaccountable to me. May 17, 1860
The world can never be more beautiful than now. May 18, 1852
The foliage of the young maples . . . has become, since the rain commenced, several shades darker, changing from its tender and lighter green. May 19, 1853
With what unobserved secure dispatch nature advances! The amelanchiers have bloomed . . . shed their blossoms and show minute green fruit. There is not an instant's pause! May 19, 1854
All nature is a new impression every instant. May 23, 1841
These expressions of the face of Nature are as constant and sure to recur as those of the eyes of maidens, from year to year, — sure to be repeated as long as time lasts. May 27, 1859
The fact that a rare and beautiful flower which we never saw . . . may be found in our immediate neighborhood, is very suggestive . . . The boundaries of the actual are no more fixed and rigid than the elasticity of our imaginations. May 31, 1853
It is remarkable how, as you are leaving a mountain and looking back at it from time to time, it gradually gathers up its slopes and spurs to itself into a regular whole, and makes a new and total impression. June 4, 1858
Each season is but an infinitesimal point. It no sooner comes than it is gone. It has no duration. It simply gives a tone and hue to my thought. Each annual phenomenon is a reminiscence and prompting. Our thoughts and sentiments answer to the revolutions of the seasons, as two cog-wheels fit into each other. We are conversant with only one point of contact at a time, from which we receive a prompting and impulse and instantly pass to a new season or point of contact. A year is made up of a certain series and number of sensations and thoughts which have their language in nature. Now I am ice, now I am sorrel. Each experience reduces itself to a mood of the mind. June 6, 1857
No one, to my knowledge, has observed the minute differences in the seasons. A book of the seasons, each page of which should be written in its own season and out-of-doors, or in its own locality wherever it may be. June 11, 1851
Sometimes we are clarified and calmed healthily, as never before in our lives. We become like a still lake of purest crystal. All the world goes by us and is reflected in our deeps. And without effort our depths are revealed to ourselves. June 22, 1851
My genius makes distinctions which my understanding cannot, and which my senses do not report. June 23, 1851
Now, a quarter after nine, as I walk along the river-bank, long after starlight, and perhaps an hour or more after sunset, I see some of those high-pillared clouds of the day, in the southwest, still reflecting a downy light from the regions of day, they are so high. It is a pleasing reminiscence of the day in the midst of the deepening shadows of the night. July 12, 1852
If I take the same walk by moonlight an hour later or earlier in the evening, it is as good as a different one. July 14, 1851
Beyond the bridge there is a goldenrod partially blossomed. I hear a cricket, too, under the blackberry vines, singing as in the fall. Yesterday it was spring, and to-morrow it will be autumn. Where is the summer then? July 19, 1851
The sun is now warm on my back, and when I turn round I shade my face with my hands. July 21, 1853
Late rose now in prime.
The memory of roses
along the river.
I turn round, and there shines the moon. July 27, 1852
After midsummer we have a belated feeling and are forward to see in each sight and hear in each sound some presage of the fall, just as in middle age man anticipates the end of life. July 30, 1852
Do not all flowers that blossom after mid-July remind us of the fall? July 30, 1852
I hear the distant sound of a flail, and thoughts of autumn occupy my mind, and the memory of past years. July 31, 1856
I hear the steady (not intermittent) shrilling of apparently the alder cricket, clear, loud, and autumnal, a season sound. Hear it, but see it not. It reminds me of past autumns and the lapse of time, suggests a pleasing, thoughtful melancholy, like the sound of the flail. August 18, 1856
Nature rests no longer at her culminating point than at any other. If you are not out at the right instant, the summer may go by and you not see it. August 19, 1851
A man must attend to Nature closely for many years to know when, as well as where, to look for his objects, since he must always anticipate her a little. Young men have not learned the phases of Nature; they do not know what constitutes a year, or that one year is like another. I would know when in the year to expect certain thoughts and moods, as the sports man knows when to look for plover. September 24, 1859
I perceive in various places, in low ground, this afternoon, the sour scent of cinnamon ferns decaying. It is an agreeable phenomenon, reminding me of the season and of past years. October 2, 1859
The common notes of the chickadee, so rarely heard for a long time, and also one phebe strain from it, amid the Leaning Hemlocks, remind me of pleasant winter days, when they are more commonly seen. October 6, 1856
When I turn round half-way up Fair Haven Hill, by the orchard wall, and look northwest, I am surprised for the thousandth time at the beauty of the landscape. October 7, 1857
The chickadee, sounding all alone, now that birds are getting scarce, reminds me of the winter, in which it almost alone is heard. October 10, 1851
The faint suppressed warbling of the robins sounds like a reminiscence of the spring. October 10, 1853
The swamp amelanchier is leafing again . . . an anticipation of the spring . . . an evidence of warmth and genialness. Its buds are annually awakened by the October sun as if it were spring. The shad-bush is leafing again by the sunny swamp-side. It is like a youthful or poetic thought in old age . . . In my latter years, let me have some shad-bush thoughts. October 13, 1859
Paddling slowly back, we enjoy at length very perfect reflections in the still water. The blue of the sky, and indeed all tints, are deepened in the reflection. October 14, 1858
It is surprising how any reminiscence of a different season of the year affects us. You only need to make a faithful record of an average summer day's experience and summer mood, and read it in the winter, and it will carry you back to more than that summer day alone could show. October 26, 1853
My moods are thus periodical, not two days in my year alike. October 26, 1857
[These little cheerful hemlocks] remind me of winter, the snows which are to come . . . and the chickadees that are to flit and lisp amid them. November 4, 1851
The winter is approaching. The birds are almost all gone. The note of the dee de de sounds now more distinct, prophetic of winter . November 4, 1855
We cannot see any thing until we are possessed with the idea of it, and then we can hardly see anything else. November 4, 1858
It is remarkable how little we attend to what is passing before us constantly, unless our genius directs our attention that way. November 6, 1853
The man who is bent upon his work is frequently in the best attitude to observe what is irrelevant to his work. November 18, 1851
The year looks back toward summer, and a summer smile is reflected in her face. December 1, 1852
There is a certain resonance and elasticity in the air that makes the least sound melodious as in spring. It is an anticipation, a looking through winter to spring. December 2, 1852
The crowing of cocks and other sounds remind you of spring, such is the state of the air. December 2, 1859
I have never got over my surprise that I should have been born into the most estimable place in all the world, and in the very nick of time, too. December 5, 1856
It is only necessary to behold thus the least fact or phenomenon, however familiar, from a point a hair’s breadth aside from our habitual path or routine, to be overcome, enchanted by its beauty and significance. December 11, 1855
What a reminiscence of summer, a fiery hangbird's nest dangling from an elm over the road when perhaps the thermometer is down to -20 (?), and the traveller goes beating his arms beneath it! December 22, 1859
The snow collects and is piled up in little columns like down about every twig and stem, and this is only seen in perfection, complete to the last flake, while it is snowing, as now.
What a fine and measureless joy the gods grant us thus, letting us know nothing about the day that is to dawn! This day, yesterday, was as incredible as any other miracle. December 29, 1851
I hear very distinctly from the railroad causeway the whistle of the locomotive on the Lowell road . . . It, as it were, takes me out of my body and gives me the freedom of all bodies and all nature. December 31, 1853
How completely a load of hay in the winter revives the memory of past summers! January 5, 1858
Through thin ice I see
my face in bubbles against
its undersurface.
After December all weather that is not wintry is springlike. January 8, 1860
On the face of the Cliff the crowfoot buds lie unexpanded just beneath the surface . . . informed of a spring which the world has never seen. . . It offers to my mind a little temple into which to enter and worship. May I lead my life the following year as innocently! May it be as fair and smell as sweet! I anticipate nature. It will go forth in April, this vestal now cherishing her fire, to be married to the sun. January 9, 1853
After the January thaw our thoughts cease to refer to autumn and we look forward to spring. January 9, 1860
Perhaps what most moves us in winter is some reminiscence of far-off summer . . . The cold is merely superficial; it is summer still at the core, far, far within. It is in the cawing of the crow, the crowing of the cock, the warmth of the sun on our backs. January 12, 1855
Well may the tender buds attract us at this season, no less than partridges, for they are the hope of the year, the spring rolled up. January 12, 1855
Well may the tender buds attract us at this season, no less than partridges, for they are the hope of the year, the spring rolled up. January 12, 1855
The glitter or sparkle on the surface of a snow freshly fallen when the sun comes out and you walk from it, the points of light constantly changing. January 12, 1860
I must stand still and listen with open ears . . . that the night may make its impression on me . . . The silence rings; it is musical and thrills me. A night in which the silence was audible. January 21, 1853
The wonderfully mild and pleasant weather continues . . . The sun, and cockcrowing, bare ground, etc., etc., remind me of March. January 23, 1858
The moment always spurs us. The spurs of countless moments goad us incessantly into life. January 26, 1852
Though you walk every day, you do not foresee the kind of walking you will have the next day. January 26, 1860
Though you walk every day, you do not foresee the kind of walking you will have the next day. January 26, 1860
It is so mild and moist as I saunter along by the wall east of the Hill that I remember, or anticipate, one of those warm rain-storms in the spring . . . A rain which is as serene as fair weather, suggesting fairer weather than was ever seen . . . You feel the fertilizing influence of the rain in your mind. January 27, 1858
Tonight I feel it stinging cold . . . it bites my ears and face, but the stars shine all the brighter. January 29, 1854
The wind is more southerly, and now the warmth of the sun prevails, and is felt on the back. January 31, 1854
******
Distant mountaintop
as blue to the memory
as now to the eyes.
March 31, 1853
reminiscence and prompting
The past and future –
two eternities meeting
the present moment.
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, Reminiscence and Prompting
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau
"A book, each page written in its own season,
out-of-doors, in its own locality.”
~edited, assembled and rewritten by zphx © 2009-2024
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