At the beginning of "Sunday," the dawn is described as dating from earlier than the fall of man and retaining a "heathenish integrity." This description sets the stage for Thoreau's later lengthy diatribe against established Christianity, prompted by the sight of people coming out of church on the Sabbath. Thoreau contrasts Christianity with the religion of nature. He refers to the displacement of the Indian by the English settler, and contrasts the wild life of the Indian with white man's civilization. The white man is described as "strong in community, yielding obedience to authority." Civilization lacks the "heroic spirit" and leads to the degeneration of man. The Indian — independent and aloof — preserves an integral relationship with his native gods and with nature. The sciences and arts do not affect us nearly as powerfully as more primal concerns — hunting, fishing, mythology, and fables. Mythology, "the most ancient history and biography," is explored, as is the poet's particular susceptibility to it. The ultimate passage of the works of man into nature is suggested by the canal at Billerica Falls. Thoreau urges a life embracing both spirit and matter (as nature demands) and discusses books, literature, and the fitness of poetry to treat nature and universal truth. He praises Homer and Shakespeare, dismisses the treatment of writing as a commodity, and likens writing to the river's flowing. He admires homeliness, simplicity, and a natural vigor in books. These qualities permit truthful and fresh expression even of topics that have been explored before. The brothers pitch their tent in Tyngsboro, Massachusetts, where, in contrast to the "Scythian vastness of the Billerica night," they are kept awake by raucous Irish laborers. One brother, visited by "Evil Destinies" in his dreams, is soothed by the other.
Thoreau begins "Monday" with reference to both the dawn of time and, in describing a ferryman on the river in the morning fog, to death. He alludes to the Styx (the ancient river of the underworld) and to Charon (the ferryman who transports souls across the Styx to the other world). He thus reinforces the imagery of the river as symbolic of universal history and the course of human life. In presenting the history of Tyngsboro, he again evokes the ever-present Indian and his extermination by the white settler. He pauses to reflect on "the lapse of the river and of human life" and on the permanence of the eternal despite the transitory nature of the particular, the individual. He urges seeking the larger principles of the universe as opposed to worldly wisdom, employing the imagery of seed that is present throughout the book. In questioning the value of reform, he presents society in general and the political state as institutions of the dead. Thoreau compares western with eastern religion. Eastern thought focuses on "loftier themes" than does western, and on contemplation — an element lacking in western religion — as well as action. He discusses history and its study, which should be more concerned with universals, more evocative of atmosphere, more vital than it is. History should distill and transcend facts and particulars, deal with the underlying connection between past and present, convey relevance to both the outward and inward life of man. Thoreau introduces the imagery of mountains in recalling a trip that he made to Mount Wachusett (in central Massachusetts). The distance of mountains from the daily life of men imparts to the traveler a broader perspective than is possible from the valleys below, allowing direct communication with nature and the infinite. A graveyard along the way prompts another consideration of death and life beyond death. Thoreau comments on the falseness of epitaphs, their failure to express what was important in a life, and presents the enrichment of the soil through the decay of the body as a more meaningful form of immortality than the monument over a grave. Like the previous two chapters, "Monday" concludes with a discussion of night sounds, which comprise sensual evidence of the health of the universe. He discusses music as "the sound of the universal laws promulgated." The brothers camp near Penichook (Pennichuck) Brook, on the outskirts of Nashua, New Hampshire.
