Who is emerson

Emerson wrote a poetic prose, ordering his essays by recurring themes and images. His poetry, on the other hand, is often called harsh and didactic. The First Series includes Emerson's famous essay, "Self-Reliance," in which the writer instructs his listener to examine his relationship with Nature and God, and to trust his own judgment above all others. His best-known addresses are The American Scholar and The Divinity School Address , which he delivered before the graduates of the Harvard Divinity School, shocking Boston's conservative clergymen with his descriptions of the divinity of man and the humanity of Jesus.

A believer in the "divine sufficiency of the individual," Emerson was a steady optimist. In spite of their skepticism, Emerson's beliefs are of central importance in the history of American culture. National Poetry Month. Materials for Teachers Teach This Poem. Poems for Kids. Poetry for Teens.

Lesson Plans. Resources for Teachers. Academy of American Poets. American Poets Magazine. The kingdom of man over nature, which cometh not with observation, — a dominion such as now is beyond his dream of God, — he shall enter without more wonder than the blind man feels who is gradually restored to perfect sight. Indeed, although Transcendentalism is sometimes perceived as a simple celebration of nature, the relationship that Emerson and other Transcendentalists suggested was considerably more complex.

In Chapter I, Emerson describes nature's elevation of man's mood, and the particular sympathy with and joy in nature that man feels. But he adds that nature by itself is not capable of producing human reaction.

It requires man's inner processes to become meaningful: "Yet it is certain that the power to produce this delight, does not reside in nature, but in man, or in a harmony of both. But beauty in nature is not ultimate. It is the herald of inward and eternal beauty, and is not alone a solid and satisfactory good.

It must therefore stand as a part and not as yet the last or highest expression of the final cause of Nature. Nature's meaning resides in its role as a medium of communication between God and man.

Emerson stresses throughout Nature that nature exists to serve man, and explains the ways in which it does so. In "Commodity," he enumerates the basic material uses of nature by man. He then goes on to point out the fact that man harnesses nature to enhance its material usefulness. In "Beauty," Emerson discusses the power of natural beauty to restore man when exhausted, to give him simple pleasure, to provide a suitable backdrop to his glorious deeds, and to stimulate his intellect, which may ultimately lead him to understand universal order.

Man's artistic expression is inspired by the perception and translation in his mind of the beauty of nature.

In "Language," Emerson details language's uses as a vehicle of thought and, ultimately, through its symbolism and the symbolism of the things it stands for, as an aid to comprehension and articulation of spiritual as well as material truth. A person effectively expresses himself, Emerson notes, in proportion to the natural vigor of his language. Nature both exists for and intensifies man's capabilities. In "Discipline," he introduces human will, which, working through the intellect, emphasizes aspects of nature that the mind requires and disregards those that the mind does not need.

Thus man imposes himself on nature, makes it what he wants it to be. Emerson writes,. Nature is thoroughly mediate. It is made to serve. It receives the dominion of man as meekly as the ass on which the Saviour rode. It offers all its kingdoms to man as the material which he may mould into what is useful. Emerson develops this idea in "Idealism," in discussing the poet's elevation of soul over matter in "subordinating nature for the purpose of expression" — giving emphasis and drawing connections as suits the message he wishes to convey.

Nature is thus "fluid," "ductile and flexible," changeable by man. Emerson asserts throughout Nature the primacy of spirit over matter. Nature's purpose is as a representation of the divine to promote human insight into the laws of the universe, and thus to bring man closer to God. Emerson writes of nature in "Spirit" as "the organ through which the universal spirit speaks to the individual, and strives to lead back the individual to it. Emerson's discussion in "Language" is based on three premises: that words — even those used to describe intellectual or spiritual states — originated in nature, in an elemental interaction between mind and matter; that not only do words represent nature, but, because nature is an expression of the divine, the natural facts that words represent are symbolic of spiritual truth; and that the whole of nature — not just individual natural facts — symbolizes the whole of spiritual truth.

The world is emblematic. Parts of speech are metaphors because the whole of nature is a metaphor of the human mind. The laws of moral nature answer to those of matter as face to face in a glass.

Because the laws of the material world correspond to higher laws in the spiritual world, man may "by degrees" comprehend the universal through his familiarity with its expression in nature. Emerson states that the symbolism of matter renders "every form significant to its hidden life and final cause.

The visible creation is the terminus or the circumference of the invisible world. In "Idealism" and "Spirit," Emerson takes a philosophical leap in asking whether nature exists separately, or whether it is only an image created in man's mind by God.

Although he says that the answer cannot be known, and that it makes no difference in man's use of nature, he suggests that idealism is preferable to viewing nature as concrete reality because it constitutes "that view which is most desirable to the mind.

But he also acknowledges that idealism is hard to accept from the commonsensical point of view — the view of those who trust in rationality over intuition.

In denying the actual existence of matter, idealism goes much farther. In various ways in Nature , Emerson appears to suggest that the natural world does, in fact, exist separately from spirit. For instance, he carefully distinguishes between man's inner qualities and his physical existence, between the "ME" and the "NOT ME," which includes one's own body. His progressive argument is marred by this seeming contradiction, and by his hesitancy to state outright that nature is an ideal, even while he discusses it as such.

He only goes so far as to say that idealism offers a satisfactory way of looking at nature. But he does not want to sidetrack his reader by attempting to prove that which cannot be proven. Emerson concludes the essay by asking his readers to open themselves to spiritual reality by trusting in intuitive reason.

He writes,. Through receptivity to intuition, we may rise above narrow common sense and transcend preoccupation with material fact per se. Previous Summary and Analysis. Next Summary and Analysis. Removing book from your Reading List will also remove any bookmarked pages associated with this title. Are you sure you want to remove bookConfirmation and any corresponding bookmarks? My Preferences My Reading List. Thoreau, Emerson, and Transcendentalism.

Emerson's "Nature" Major Themes. What Is Transcendentalism? Adam Bede has been added to your Reading List! He moved to Concord, Massachusetts, in and married Lydia Jackson in In the s Emerson gave lectures that he afterward published in essay form. Emerson became known as the central figure of his literary and philosophical group, now known as the American Transcendentalists.

These writers shared a key belief that each individual could transcend, or move beyond, the physical world of the senses into deeper spiritual experience through free will and intuition. In this school of thought, God was not remote and unknowable; believers understood God and themselves by looking into their own souls and by feeling their own connection to nature. The s were productive years for Emerson. He founded and co-edited the literary magazine The Dial , and he published two volumes of essays in and His four children, two sons and two daughters, were born in the s.

He advocated for the abolition of slavery and continued to lecture across the country throughout the s. Emerson died on April 27, , in Concord. His writings are considered major documents of 19th-century American literature, religion and thought.