I think that I should not hesitate to go to Europe if H.T. consents. Bishop McC. [McCloskey] who I spoke to concerning the pilgrimage tho’t that it might be very useful to me and seemed inclined in favor of it. He said tho it would be surely necessary for me to have some money on which I could depend that in some circumstances I could not get along without it. My brothers tell me that it is impossible for them to spare anything out from the bussiness. This would not hinder me from going. We should go as far as we could go. Across the Sea we certainly could get. We do not value this life or ours at a dear rate. We trust that H.T. will go.

  I am glad to hear your voice from that populous city and the more so for the tenor of its discourse. I have but just returned from a pedestrian excursion [Thoreau’s walking tour with Ellery Channing to the Berkshires and the Catskills], some what similar to that you propose, parvis componere magna, to the Catskill mountains, over the principal mountains of this state, subsisting mainly on bread and berries, and slumbering on the mountain tops. As usually happens, I now feel a slight sense of dissipation. Still I am strongly tempted by your proposal and experience a decided schism between my outward and inward tendencies. Your method of travelling especially—to live along the road—citizens of the world, without haste or petty plans—I have often proposed this to my dreams, and still do—But the fact is, I cannot so decidedly postpone exploring the Farther Indies, which are to be reached you know by other routs and other methods of travel. I mean that I constantly return from every external enterprise with disgust to fresh faith in a kind of Brahminical Artesian, Inner Temple, life. All my experience, as yours probably, proves only this reality.

  Channing wonders how I can resist your invitation, I, a single man—unfettered—and so do I. Why—there are Roncesvalles, the cape de Finisterre, and the three kings of Cologne; Rome, Athens, & the rest—to be visited in serene untemporal hours—and all history to revive in one’s memory as he went by the way with splendors too bright for this world—I know how it is. But is not here too Roncesvalles with greater lustre? Unfortunately it may prove dull and desultory weather enough here, but better trivial days with faith than the fairest ones lighted by sunshine alone. Perchance my wanderjahre has not arrived. But you cannot wait for that. I hope you will find a companion who will enter as heartily into your schemes as I should have done.

  I remember you, as it were, with the whole Catholic church at your skirts—And the other day for a moment I think I understood your relation to that body, but the thought was gone again in a twinkling, as when a dry leaf falls from its stem over our heads, but instantly lost in the rustling mass at our feet.

  I am really sorry that the Genius will not let me go with you, but I trust that it will conduct to other adventures, and so if nothing prevents we will compare notes at last.

Yrs &c
Henry D. Thoreau.