A Yankee in Canada, with Anti-slavery and reform papers.Thoreau, Henry David
History
A Yankee in Canada, with Anti-slavery and reform papers.
Thoreau, Henry David
Brown, John, 1800-1859; Québec (Province) -- Description and travel; Slavery -- United States
And, finally, by the use of thick envelopes retaining the heat, and
other contrivances, “the power of steam caused by sunshine may react at
will, and thus be rendered perpetual, no matter how often or how long
the sunshine may be interrupted.”
Here is power enough, one would think, to accomplish somewhat. These are
the Powers below. O ye millwrights, ye engineers, ye operatives and
speculators of every class, never again complain of a want of power: it
is the grossest form of infidelity. The question is, not how we shall
execute, but what. Let us not use in a niggardly manner what is thus
generously offered.
Consider what revolutions are to be effected in agriculture. First, in
the new country a machine is to move along, taking out trees and stones
to any required depth, and piling them up in convenient heaps; then the
same machine, “with a little alteration,” is to plane the ground
perfectly, till there shall be no hills nor valleys, making the
requisite canals, ditches, and roads as it goes along. The same machine,
“with some other little alterations,” is then to sift the ground
thoroughly, supply fertile soil from other places if wanted, and plant
it; and finally the same machine, “with a little addition,” is to reap
and gather in the crop, thresh and grind it, or press it to oil, or
prepare it any way for final use. For the description of these machines
we are referred to “Etzler’s Mechanical System,” pages 11 to 27. We
should be pleased to see that “Mechanical System.” We have great faith
in it. But we cannot stop for applications now.
Who knows but by accumulating the power until the end of the present
century, using meanwhile only the smallest allowance, reserving all that
blows, all that shines, all that ebbs and flows, all that dashes, we may
have got such a reserved accumulated power as to run the earth off its
track into a new orbit, some summer, and so change the tedious
vicissitude of the seasons? Or, perchance, coming generations will not
abide the dissolution of the globe, but, availing themselves of future
inventions in aerial locomotion, and the navigation of space, the entire
race may migrate from the earth, to settle some vacant and more western
planet, it may be still healthy, perchance unearthy, not composed of
dirt and stones, whose primary strata only are strewn, and where no
weeds are sown. It took but little art, a simple application of natural
laws, a canoe, a paddle, and a sail of matting, to people the isles of
the Pacific, and a little more will people the shining isles of space.
Do we not see in the firmament the lights carried along the shore by
night, as Columbus did? Let us not despair nor mutiny.
“The dwellings also ought to be very different from what is known, if
the full benefit of our means is to be enjoyed. They are to be of a
structure for which we have no name yet. They are to be neither palaces,
nor temples, nor cities, but a combination of all, superior to whatever
is known.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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