This was why Walden was important. Progress required that citizens yoke themselves to an immoral economy in ever more complex ways. Progress could enlist well-meaning people in any number of unethical enterprises by the subtle blandishments of daily practices and basic comforts. Thoreau, however, does not believe that we can have our cake and eat it too. The more dependent we are on the fruits of economic progress the less likely we are to think, let alone act, against the political and moral system that such an economy has created.