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Snyder, Helena A.
Thoreau's philosophy of life: with special consideration of the influence of Hindoo philosophy — o.O., 1902

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https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.52538#0062
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strain of music exhibits to me. The field of my life becomes
a boundless plain glorious to tread, with no death or disap-
pointment at the end of it. All meanness and trivialness dis-
appear.* * * §
c. Lifts Above the Limits of Personality.
In this vision of the All-pervading Spirit and our essen-
tial oneness with it, all consciousness of individuality is lost;
“ No particulars survive this expansion. Persons do not
survive it. In the light of this strain, there is no thou or I.
We are actually lifted above ourselves. ”f
It is momentary release from the confinement of the indi-
vidual, absorption in the All;
“ As I hear, I realize and see clearly what at other times
I only dimly remember. I get the value of the earth’s extent
and the sky’s depth. It gives me the freedom of all bodies, of all
nature. I leave my body in a trance and accompany the
zephyr and the fragrance.
d. Effects Oneness with the Universal.
Indeed, for Thoreau, who gave himself so fully to be per-
meated by music, who yielded himself so entirely to its sway,
the vision was indeed a “ trance,” a condition of ecstasy such
as was attained by the Mystics of the Middle Ages through
contemplation of the Divine :
“ The strain of the Aeolian harp and of the wood thrush
are the truest and loftiest preachers that I now know left upon
the earth. They lift us up in spite of ourselves. They in-
toxicate and charm us. When was that strain mixed into
which the world was dropped ? I would be drunk, drunk,
dead drunk to this world with it forever. The contact of sound
with the human ear whose hearing is pure is equivalent to
ecstasy.’f

* Winter, p. 181.
t Winter, p. 181.
f Winter, 78-9.
§ Winter, p. 78-9.
 
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