The sad surprise of remembering our past lives

May 24 

Saturday. 

Our most glorious experiences are a kind of regret. Our regret is so sublime that we may mistake it for triumph. It is the painful, plaintively sad surprise of our Genius remembering our past lives and contemplating what is possible.

It is a regret so divine and inspiring, so genuine, based on so true and distinct a contrast, that it surpasses our proudest boasts and the fairest expectations. 

My most sacred and memorable life is commonly on awaking in the morning. I frequently awake with an atmosphere about me as if my unremembered dreams had been divine, as if my spirit had journeyed to its native place, and, in the act of reentering its native body, had diffused an elysian fragrance around. 

The Genius says: 

"Ah! That is what you were! That is what you may yet be!” 

It is glorious for us to be able to regret even such an existence. 

A sane and growing man revolutionizes every day. What institutions of man can survive a morning experience? 

A single night's sleep, if we have indeed slumbered and forgotten anything and grown in our sleep, puts them behind us like the river Lethe. It is no unusual thing for him to see the kingdoms of this world pass.

It is remarkable that men commonly never refer to, never hint at, any crowning experiences when the common laws of their being were unsettled and the divine and eternal laws prevailed in them. Their lives are not revolutionary; they never recognize any other than the local and temporal authorities.

H. D Thoreau, Journal, May 24, 1851

A kind of regret . . . the painful, plaintively sad surprise of our Genius remembering our past lives and contemplating what is possible. See  August 18, 1851 ("It plainly makes men sad to think. Hence pensiveness is akin to sadness"); October 26, 1851 ("I awoke this morning to infinite regret.");  August 18, 1856 ("I hear the steady (not intermittent) shrilling of apparently the alder cricket. . .It reminds me of past autumns and the lapse of time, suggests a pleasing, thoughtful melancholy, like the sound of the flail."): August 20, 1858 ( There is more shadow in the landscape than a week ago, methinks, and the creak of the cricket sounds cool and steady. The grass and foliage and landscape generally are of a more thought-inspiring color, suggest what some perchance would call a pleasing melancholy.") See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, Reminiscence and Prompting

My most sacred and memorable life is commonly on awaking in the morning.  March 17, 1852 (“I am conscious of having, in my sleep, transcended the limits of the individual . . . There is a moment in the dawn . . . when we see things more truly than at any other time.”); November 23, 1852 ("I had a thought in a dream last night which surprised me by its strangeness, as if it were based on an experience in a previous state of existence, and could not be entertained by my waking self. Both the thought and the language were equally novel to me, but I at once perceived it to be true and to coincide with my experience in this state. );  Walden (“Morning is when I am awake and there is a dawn in me.”); October 29, 1857 ("Such early morning thoughts as I speak of . . . are a sort of permanent dream in my mind . . . we cannot tell what we have dreamed from what we have actually experienced."); April 1, 1860 (“I am surprised that my affirmations or utterances come to me ready-made, - not fore-thought, - so that I occasionally awake in the night simply to let fall ripe a statement which I had never consciously considered before, and as surprising and novel and agreeable to me as anything can be. As if we only thought by sympathy with the universal mind, which thought while we were asleep”)

May 24. See A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, May 24 

The sad surprise of

remembering our past lives –

glorious regret.

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

This morning the ground is white with snow

November 23

This morning the ground is white with snow, and it still snows. 

There is something genial even in the first snow, and Nature seems to relent a little of her November harshness.The beauty and purity of new-fallen snow, lying just as it fell, on the twigs and leaves all the country over. 

You must go forth early to see the snow on the twigs. 

Now, a few hours later, the twigs and leaves are all bare, and the snow half melted on the ground. Sportsmen have already been out with their dogs, improving this first snow to track their game. 

Having descended the Cliff, I go along to the Andromeda Ponds. 

The air is full of low, heavy mist, almost rain. The pines, in this atmosphere and contrasted with the snow, are suddenly many degrees darker, and the oaks redder. 

The andromeda a warm reddish brown with an edging of yellowish sedge or coarse grass about the swamp, and red rustling shrub oak hills with a white ground rising around.

The mist so low is clouds close to the ground, and the steam of the engine hugs the earth in the Cut, concealing all objects for a great distance.

I am surprised to see Fair Haven entirely skimmed over.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, November 23, 1852

This morning the ground is white with snow, and it still snows  See note to November 29, 1856 ("Begins to snow this morning and snows slowly and interruptedly with a little fine hail all day")

There is something genial even in the first snow, and Nature seems to relent a little of her November harshness. See November 8, 1853 (“Our first snow . . . The children greet it with a shout when they come out at recess.”); November 24, 1860 ("Though a slight touch, this was the first wintry scene of the season. The rabbits in the swamps enjoy it, as well as you.”) 

The pines, in this atmosphere and contrasted with the snow, are suddenly many degrees darker. See November 29, 1850 (" The pines standing in the ocean of mist, seen from the Cliffs, are trees in every stage of transition from the actual to the imaginary. As you advance, the trees gradually come out of the mist and take form before your eyes"); December 26, 1850 ("Now that the ground is covered with snow, the pine woods seen from the hilltops are not green but a dark brown, greenish-brown perhaps.")

The andromeda a warm reddish brown. See November 13, 1852 ("Andromeda is a dull reddish brown, like oak leaves."); November 24, 1857 ("Looking toward the sun, the andromeda in front of me is a very warm red brown and on either side of me, a pale silvery brown; looking from the sun, a uniform pale brown"); November 17, 1859 ("How fair and memorable this prospect when you stand opposite to the sun, these November afternoons, and look over the red andromeda swamp - a glowing, warm brown red in the Indian-summer sun,"). See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Andromeda Phenomenon

I am surprised to see Fair Haven entirely skimmed over.. See November 18, 1858 (“Am surprised to see Fair Haven Pond completely frozen over during the last four days. It will probably open again. Thus, while all the channel elsewhere is open and a mere edging of ice amid the weeds is seen, this great expansion is completely bridged over, thus early.”); November 21, 1852 ("I am surprised this afternoon to find . . . Fair Haven Pond one-third frozen or skimmed over, though commonly there is scarcely any ice to be observed along the shores."); December 5, 1853 (" Fair Haven Pond is skimmed completely over."); December 7, 1856 ("Take my first skate to Fair Haven Pond”)

The new-fallen snow

seen lying just as it fell

on the twigs and leaves.

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, First Snow

 "A book, each page written in its own season, 

out-of-doors, in its own locality."

 ~edited, assembled and rewritten by zphx ©  2009-2024

https://tinyurl.com/hdt-521123

***

Nov. 23. This morning the ground is white with snow, and it still snows. This is the first time it has been fairly white this season, though once before, many weeks ago, it was slightly whitened for ten or fifteen minutes. It was so warm and still last night at sundown that I remarked to a neighbor that it was moderating to snow. It is, in some degree, also, warmer after the first snow has come and banked up the houses and filled the crevices in the roof. Already the landscape impresses me with a greater sense of fertility. I have not worn gloves yet, though it has been finger-cold. 

There is something genial even in the first snow, and Nature seems to relent a little of her November harshness. Men, too, are disposed to give thanks for the bounties of the year all over the land, and the sound of the mortar is heard in all houses, and the odor of summer savory reaches even to poets' garrets. 

This, then, may be considered the end of the flower season for this year, though this snow will probably soon melt again. Among the flowers which may be put down as lasting thus far, as I remember, in the order of their hardiness: yarrow, tansy (these very fresh and common),  cerastium, autumnal dandelion, dandelion, and perhaps tall buttercup, etc., the last four scarce. The following seen within a fortnight: a late three-ribbed goldenrod of some kind, blue-stemmed goldenrod (these two perhaps within a week), Potentilla argentea, Aster undulatus, Ranunculus repens, Bidens connata, shepherd's-purse, etc., etc. N. B.: I have not looked for witch-hazel nor Stellaria media lately. 

I had a thought in a dream 'last night which surprised me by its strangeness, as if it were based on an experience in a previous state of existence, and could not be entertained by my waking self. Both the thought and the language were equally novel to me, but I at once perceived it to be true and to coincide with my experience in this state. 

3 p. m. — To Cliffs and Walden. You must go forth early to see the snow on the twigs. The twigs and leaves are all bare now, and the snow half melted on the ground; where the trees are thick it has not reached the ground at all, except in the shape of water in the course of the day. But early this morning the woods presented a very different scene. The beauty and purity of new-fallen snow, lying just as it fell, on the twigs and leaves all the country over, afforded endless delight to the walker. It was a delicate and fairylike scene. But a few hours later the woods were comparatively lumpish and dirty. So, too, you must go forth very early to see a hoar frost, which is rare here; these crisped curls adorn only the forehead of the snow, are suddenly many degrees darker, and the oaks redder. But still the tops of the dead grass rise above the snow in the fields, and give the country a yellow or russet look. The wetter meadows are quite russet. 

I am surprised to see Fair Haven entirely skimmed over. 

Having descended the Cliff, I go along to the Andromeda Ponds. Sportsmen have already been out with their dogs, improving this first snow to track their game. The andromeda looks somewhat redder than before, a warm reddish brown, with an edging of yellowish sedge or coarse grass about the swamp, and red rustling shrub oak hills with a white ground rising around. These swamps, resorted to by the muskrat and ducks, most remind me of the Indian. 

The mist so low is clouds close to the ground, and the steam of the engine also hugs the earth in the Cut, concealing all objects for a great distance. 

Though the parents cannot determine whether the child shall be male or female, yet, methinks, it depends on them whether he shall be a worthy addition to the human family.

There is a moment in the dawn

March 17

I catch myself philosophizing most abstractly when first returning to consciousness in the night or morning. I make the truest observations and distinctions then, when the will is yet wholly asleep and the mind works like a machine without friction.

I am conscious of having, in my sleep, transcended the limits of the individual, and made observations and carried on conversations which in my waking hours I can neither recall nor appreciate. As if in sleep our individual fell into the infinite mind, and at the moment of awakening we found ourselves on the confines of the latter. 

On awakening we resume our enterprise, take up our bodies and become limited mind again. We meet and converse with those bodies which we have previously animated.

March 17, 2022

There is a moment in the dawn, when the darkness of the night is dissipated and before the exhalations of the day commence to rise, when we see things more truly than at any other time.


H. D. Thoreau, Journal, March 17, 1852

Infinite mind. See April 1, 1860 ("I occasionally awake in the night simply to let fall ripe a statement which I had never consciously considered before, and as surprising and novel and agreeable to me as anything can be. As if we only thought by sympathy with the universal mind, which thought while we were asleep . . .without our consciousness.”) ) May 24, 1851 ("My most sacred and memorable life is commonly on awaking in the morning. I frequently awake with an atmosphere about me as if my unremembered dreams had been divine, as if my spirit had journeyed to its native place, and, in the act of reentering its native body, had diffused an elysian fragrance around.”);  February 19, 1854  ("The mind of the universe . . .,which we share.")

There is a moment in the dawn . . . when we see things more truly.  See Walden (“Only that day dawns to which we are awake.”); Walden ("We must learn to reawaken and keep ourselves awake, by an infinite expectation of the dawn.”);  December 29, 1851 (" 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."); January 26, 1853 (“There are from time to time mornings, … when especially the world seems to begin anew . . . I look back for the era of this creation, not into the night, but to a dawn for which no man ever rose early enough.”); March 22, 1853 ("As soon as these spring mornings arrive in which the birds sing, I am sure to be an early riser.. . .expecting the dawn in so serene and joyful and expectant a mood.");  Walden (“To him whose elastic and vigorous thought keeps pace with the sun, the day is a perpetual morning. It matters not what the clocks say . . . Morning is when I am awake and there is a dawn in me.”) and A Week (Tuesday):

Ply the oars! away! away! 

In each dew-drop of the morning 

Lies the promise of a day. 

Rivers from the sunrise flow, 

Springing with the dewy morn; 

Voyageurs 'gainst time do row, 

Idle noon nor sunset know, 

Ever even with the dawn, 

March 17. See A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, March 17

After the darkness

that moment in the dawn when

we see more truly.

A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau,  There is a moment in the dawn

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 © 2009-2025

https://tinyurl.com/hdt-520317