"Chastity and moral purity were qualities McCandless mulled over long and often. Indeed, one of the books found in the bus with his remains was a collection of stories that included Tolstoy's "The Kreutzer Sonata," in which the nobleman-turned-ascetic denounces "the demands of the flesh." Several such passages are starred and highlighted in the dog-eared text, the margins filled with cryptic notes printed in McCandless's distinctive hand. And in the chapter on "Higher Laws" in Thoreau's Walden, a copy of which was also discovered in the bus, McCandless circled "Chastity is the flowering of man; and what are called Genius, Heroism, Holiness, and the like, are but various fruits which succeed it."
Chapter 7. Page 65-66. Paragraph 4.
The books that McCandless read by Tolstoy and Thoreau were like bibles to him. He followed them word for word and would never go against them. McCandless believed that if he followed everything that Thoreau said, then he would live a life of simplicity and happiness. Chastity was a trait that McCandless strongly believed in and when reading this passage he thought that if he lived a chaste life then he would acquire the traits of genius, heroism, holiness, and many other great qualities as long as he followed the words of Thoreau.
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