Contemporary Notices and Reviews of 
Walden; or, Life in the Woods
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"Review of New Books"
Peterson's Magazine (26 October 1854): 254.

The author of this volume would be called by some a modern Diogenes; but all will admit that he is a close, though somewhat eccentric observer of Nature.  Disgusted with the ordinary conventional life, he retired to the shores of Walden Pond in Massachusetts, where building himself a log hut, he lived a sort of half hermit life for two years.  The present book is a narrative of his experience during that period.  The style is graceful, the reflections often profound, the thought always robust and healthy.  On the excessive luxury of the homes the author makes war a la outrance, as a man who has lived on fifty dollars a year, we think, has a right.  The book is so out of the beaten track that it cannot fail to set people to thinking; while no one, who once picks it up, will lay it down till he has finished it.  The author, in his love of Nature, reminds us of old Isaa[k] Walton, as in other particulars he often recalls Sir Thomas Browne.  Naturalists will learn many curious facts from the volume, while the poetical admirer of Nature will linger over its pages with delight. The publishers have issued it in their usual neat style.

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