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Analyzing The Maxim 'The Night Thoreau Spent In Jail'

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How does the maxim "Nothing is at last sacred but the integrety of you own mind" by Emerson relate to The Night Thoreau Spent in Jail? First of all, this quote is says that nothing can help you but your mind. If you have the knowledge than you shouldn't be afraid to speak out and follow your own path instead of conforming to what society thinks and believes. Only you can have the strength to reach your full potential and doing what you believe is right. This quote reminds me of Thoreau, of how he never conformed to what society believes. Thoreau went to Walden for the purpose of strengthening his own mind and following his own beliefs. Why should you do what everyone tells you? Well you should not because you are yourself and not society which …show more content…

I think that the man was doing the right thing by going out and following his owns ways. The teacher could have been wrong and by listening to the teacher he has conformed to society and what they think instead of thinking about his own ideas and how he really feels about the topic. This would lead them all into the wrong path. If you keep doing the wrong thing you can never reach the peak in knowledge ,which is supposed to help a person strive to be unique and break out from that bubble of conformity. Why should people always the the same thing instead of keeping an open mind and expressing how they feel not how everyone feels and that topic? Henry wanting to teach his students and show them how to express their ideas was derived from his path because Deacon ball refused to let him teach his own ways and forced the students to learn from books which the institution passed out. The maxim " An institution is the lengthened shadow of a man" by Emerson is similar to this example and the original quote since the books start out by conforming to an "institution" but Thoreau wanted to break free of the conformity and ventured out to seek the " integrity" of his own mind and developed a new path, that is the path of

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