Ralph Waldo Emerson was an American essayist, philosopher, and poet who played a key role in the transcendentalist movement of the early 19th century. His work has had a lasting impact on American literature and culture, and his ideas continue to be widely studied and debated today.
One of the key themes in Emerson's work is the concept of self-reliance. In his essay "Self-Reliance," Emerson argues that individuals should trust their own judgment and intuition rather than relying on the opinions of others. He believes that this is the only way to truly live a fulfilling and authentic life. This idea is closely linked to his belief in the inherent goodness of the individual, and his faith in the human capacity for self-improvement.
Another important theme in Emerson's work is the idea of the "oversoul." This is the belief that there is a unifying force or spirit that connects all living things, and that this force is what gives meaning and purpose to our lives. Emerson writes about this concept in his essay "The Oversoul," arguing that it is through our connection to the oversoul that we can find true happiness and fulfillment.
Emerson was also a strong advocate for the power of nature and the importance of experiencing it firsthand. In his essay "Nature," he argues that nature is not only beautiful but also a source of spiritual and intellectual inspiration. He encourages readers to spend time in nature in order to connect with the oversoul and gain a deeper understanding of the world and their place in it.
In addition to his essays and poetry, Emerson was also a influential public speaker, delivering lectures on a wide range of topics including literature, philosophy, and politics. His speeches, which were often filled with wit and wisdom, were widely popular and helped to spread his ideas to a wider audience.
Overall, the works of Ralph Waldo Emerson continue to be widely read and debated today, and his ideas have had a lasting impact on American literature and culture. His emphasis on self-reliance, the oversoul, and the power of nature have inspired generations of readers to think deeply about their own lives and the world around them.
Works Volume 1
For we do not listen with the best regard to the verses of a man who is only a poet, nor to his problems if he is only an algebraist; but if a man is at once acquainted with the geometric foundations of things and with their festal splendor, his poetry is exact and his arithmetic musical. The use of history is to give value to the present hour and its duty. Zoologists may deny that horse-hairs in the water change to worms, but I find that whatever is old corrupts, and the past turns to snakes. Man flatters himself that his command over Nature must increase. Such are the days, — the earth is the cup, the sky is the cover, of the immense bounty of Nature which is offered us for our daily aliment; but what a force of illusion begins life with us and attends us to the end! Cannot we let the morning be? The angels assume flesh, and repeatedly become visible. Yes, we have a pretty artillery of tools now in our social arrangements: we ride four times as fast as our fathers did; travel, grind, weave, forge, plant, till and excavate better. In college terms, and in years that followed, the young graduate, when the Commencement anniversary returned, though he were in a swamp, would see a festive light and find the air faintly echoing with plausive academic thunders.
Can any-body remember when the times were not hard, and money not scarce? The sky is the varnish or glory with which the Artist has washed the whole work, — the verge or confines of matter and spirit. This thousand-handed art has introduced a new element into the state. There is no king, rich man, fairy or demon who possesses such power as that. But the treasures which Nature spent it-self to amass, — the secular, refined, composite anatomy of man, which all strata go to form, which the prior races, from infusory and saurian, existed to ripen; the surrounding plastic natures; the earth with its foods; the intellectual, temperamenting air; the sea with its invitations; the heaven deep with worlds; and the answering brain and nervous structure replying to these; the eye that looketh into the deeps, which again look back to the eye, abyss to abyss; — these, not like a glass bead, or the coins or carpets, are given immeasurably to all. I remember well the foreign scholar who made a week of my youth happy by his visit.
Emerson works Crossword Clue Answers, Crossword Solver
It was the deep to-day which all men scorn; the rich poverty which men hate; the populous, all-loving solitude which men quit for the tattle of towns. The chain of Western railroads from Chicago to the Pacific has planted cities and civilization in less time than it costs to bring an orchard into bearing. It is the depth at which we live and not at all the surface extension that imports. The greatest meliorator of the world is selfish, huckstering Trade. The sympathy of eye and hand by which an Indian or a practised slinger hits his mark with a stone, or a wood-chopper or a carpenter swings his axe to a hair-line on his log, are examples; and there is no sense or organ which is not capable of exquisite performance. One of the illusions is that the present hour is not the critical, decisive hour. No sooner is the electric telegraph devised than gutta-percha, the very material it requires, is found.
Who is he that does not always find himself doing something less than his best task? You collect data from many machines, but having a single location where the data comes together and identifying troublemakers quickly would be more efficient. That is good which commends to me my country, my climate, my means and materials, my associates. They need one easy-to-use tool that can remove the complexity of condition monitoring and focus squarely on the problems that need to be addressed. The weaver becomes a web, the machinist a machine. That interpreter shall guide us from a menial and eleemosynary existence into riches and stability. Art and power will go on as they have done, — will make day out of night, time out of space, and space out of time.
One more view remains. Things have an ugly look still. He is now in great spirits; thinks he shall reach it yet; thinks he shall bottle the wave. A song is no song unless the circumstance is free and fine. If you do not use the tools, they use you.
But he has not pushed his study of days into such inquiry and analysis as they invite. Retrieved 4 June 2020. Of course we resort to the enumeration of his arts and inventions as a measure of the worth of man. In-progress Block The In-progress block includes a complete list of courses for which you are currently registered. It is a fine fable for the advantage of character over talent, the Greek legend of the strife of Jove and Phoebus.
The Hindoos represent Maia, the illusory energy of Vishnu, as one of his principal attributes. Czar Alexander was more expansive, and wished to call the Pacific my ocean; and the Americans were obliged to resist his attempts to make it a close sea. The aeronaut is provided with gun-cotton, the very fuel he wants for his balloon. These passing fifteen minutes, men think, are time, not eternity; are low and subaltern, are but hope or memory; that is, the way to or the way from welfare, but not welfare. Let us try another gauge. The world is always equal to itself, and every man in moments of deeper thought is apprised that he is repeating the experiences of the people in the streets of Thebes or Byzantium. Those only can sleep who do not care to sleep; and those only write or speak best who do not too much respect the writing or the speaking.
It already walks about the field like a man, and will do anything required of it. The world has no such landscape, the aeons of history no such hour, the future no equal second opportunity. Now that the machine is so perfect, the engineer is nobody. They are majestically dressed, as if every god brought a thread to the skyey web. How excellent are the mechanical aids we have applied to the human body, as in dentistry, in vaccination, in the rhinoplastic treatment; in the beautiful aid of ether, like a finer sleep; and in the boldest promiser of all, — the transfusion of the blood, — which, in Paris, it was claimed, enables a man to change his blood as often as his linen! Their merit was not to reverence the old, but to honor the present moment; and we falsely make them excuses of the very habit which they hated and defied. A poor Indian chief of the Six Nations of New York made a wiser reply than any philosopher, to some one complaining that he had not enough time.
