Higher Laws" "Higher
tcny n<,rt IIInl J J A BENEFACTOR OF HIS RACE: THOREAU'S "HIGHER LAWS" AND THE HEROICS OF VEGETARIANISM ROBERT EPSTEIN grasped and lived by is the law which says: "Follow your own gen Berkeley, California ius"--be what you are, whether you are by your own nature hunter, or Was Thoreau a vegetarian or not? There wood chopper, or scholar. When you are several answers to this question. have become perfect you will be perfect; but only if you have If dietary practice is to be the sole learned to be, all along, what at criterion for judging, then Thoreau cannot be each manent you were. (pp 84-5) considered a vegetarian, since, by his own account, he ate fish and meat (though the Echoing Thoreau, the eminent psycholo latter rarely). gist, Carl G. Jung once wrote: Yet, despite this fact, Thoreau espoused I had to obey an inner law which a vegetarian ethic. So, his practice does was :irr\posed on me and left me no not suffice as a criterion for judging the freedanfreedom of choice. Of course I did extent of his vegetarianism. Consequently, not always obey it. How can anyone he has been criticized numerous times, e.g. live without inconsistency? (1965, by Wagenknecht, 1981, Garber, 1977, Jones, p. 356) 1954, for being inconsistent. How consistent was he in adhering to the vegetarian ideal? What we need to do in Thoreau scholarship- The question is not easy to answer. We must particularly regarding his dietary views--is ask: consistent from whose point of view? put aside our judgments of inconsistency The notion of consistency cannot always and (which frequently represent a defense against easily be objectively detennined,determined, because the areas of conflict in us) and attempt to un critic's own biases distort that which is derstand Thoreau franfrom within his own frame of ref~ence.[l] being viewed, in this case Thoreau's vegetar The question with which we ianism.
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