H.D. Thoreau on "Liberal Education"

"We seem to have forgotten that the expression "a liberal education" originally meant among the Romans one worthy of free men; while the learning of trades and professions by which to get your livelihood merely, was considered worthy of slaves only. But taking a hint from the word, I would go a step further and say, that it is not the man of wealth and leisure simply, though devoted to art, or science, or literature, who, in a true sense, is liberally educated, but only the earnest and free man."


"The Last Days of John Brown" was originally published in The Liberator on July 27, 1860. The version of the essay that appears here comes from Miscellanies by Henry David Thoreau (Houghton, Mifflin and Company, 1893)