A. Bronson Alcott writes to his brother Junius:
A few are looking on with hopeful interest, and need the braver hope and surer hands of some one or two, whom they love and trust, to engage in the good life . . . Henry Thoreau, is interested in our simple plan of life, and might, at times, be one of our house and field mates (The Letters of A. Bronson Alcott, 114).