CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE (Resistance to Civil Government) by Henry David Thoreau was first published in 1849 but has never lost its lasting relevance and its ideas are more vitally important than ever before in today's world. It argues that people should not permit governments to overrule or numb their conscience, and that people have a duty not to allow the government to be agents of injustice. Thoreau was motivated in part by his disgust with slavery and the Mexican-American War, but his book has become a significant inspiration for all movements against evil and corruption ever since.