The good old days

People seem to divide themselves into two types: 1. Optimists who see a brighter tomorrow in every technical innovation or social change and who tend to believe, at least subliminally, that Creation has a goal or purpose that lies over the next horizon, and 2. Pessimists who believe we are descended from a Golden Age and who yearn for a return to the traditional values of olden times. Neither, of course, is based on reality, and most of us recognize that in our more lucid moments. But in the interest of putting past and present in perspective, here is what John Muir wrote about his own time in Our National Parks, published in 1902. It doesn’t lend much support to the belief that the “good old days” were all that good.

“Few in these hot, dim, strenuous times are quite sane or free, choked with care like clocks full of dust, laboriously doing so much good and making so much money, or so little, they are no longer good for themselves.”

The quote is from A Passion for Nature, Donald Worster's new biography of John Muir. It's destined to be a seminal book in any search for the roots of American environmentalism. It provides a more rounded and understandable view of Muir than his own writings did, and after reading about his writing process, you can easily understand why.