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RALPH WALDO EMERSON (1803-1882)

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Originally appearing in Volume V09, Page 335 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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RALPH See also:WALDO See also:EMERSON (1803-1882)  , See also:American poet and essayist, was See also:born in See also:Boston, See also:Massachusetts, on the 25th of May 1803 . Seven of his ancestors were ministers of New See also:England churches . Among them were some of those men of See also:mark who made the backbone of the American See also:character: the sturdy Puritan, See also:Peter Bulkeley, sometime See also:rector of Odell in See also:Bedfordshire, and afterward pastor of the See also:church in the See also:wilderness at See also:Concord, New See also:Hampshire; the zealous evangelist, See also:Father See also:Samuel See also:Moody of Agamenticus in See also:Maine, who pursued graceless sinners even into the alehouse; See also:Joseph See also:Emerson of See also:Malden, " a heroic See also:scholar," who prayed every See also:night that no descendant of his might ever be See also:rich; and See also:William Emerson of Concord, See also:Mass., the patriot preacher, who died while serving in the See also:army of the Revolution . Sprung from such stock, Emerson inherited qualities of self-reliance, love of See also:liberty, strenuous virtue, 'sincerity, sobriety and fearless See also:loyalty to ideals . The See also:form of his ideals was modified by the metamorphic glow of See also:Transcendentalism which passed through the region of Boston in the second See also:quarter of the l9th See also:century . But the spirit in which Emerson conceived the See also:laws of See also:life, reverenced them and lived them out, was the Puritan spirit, elevated, enlarged and beautified by the poetic temperament . His father was the Rev . William Emerson, See also:minister of the First Church (Unitarian) in Boston . See also:Ralph See also:Waldo was the See also:fourth See also:child in a See also:family of eight, of whom at least three gave See also:evidence of extraordinary See also:mental See also:powers . He was brought up in an See also:atmosphere of hard See also:work, of moral discipline, and (after his father's See also:death in 1811) of that wholesome self-See also:sacrifice which is a See also:condition of life for those who are poor in See also:money and rich in spirit . His aunt, See also:Miss See also:Mary Moody Emerson, a brilliant old maid, an See also:eccentric See also:saint, was a potent See also:factor in his See also:education . Loving him, believing in his powers, passionately desiring for him a successful career, but clinging with both hands to the old forms of faith from which he floated away, this solitary, intense woman did as much as any one to form, by See also:action and reaction, the mind and character of the See also:young Emerson .

In 1817 he entered Harvard See also:

College, and graduated in 1821 . In scholarship he ranked about the See also:middle of his class . In literature and See also:oratory he was more distinguished, receiving a Boylston See also:prize for declamation, and two See also:Bowdoin prizes for See also:dissertations, the first See also:essay being on " The Character of See also:Socrates " and the second on " The See also:Present See also:State of Ethical See also:Philosophy "—both rather dull, formal, didactic productions . He was fond of See also:reading and of See also:writing See also:verse, and was chosen as the poet for class-See also:day . His cheerful serenity of manner, his tranquil mirthfulness, and the steady See also:charm of his See also:personality made him a favourite with his See also:fellows, in spite of a certain reserve . His See also:literary See also:taste was conventional, including the See also:standard See also:British writers, with a preference for See also:Shakespeare among the poets, See also:Berkeley among the philosophers, and See also:Montaigne (in See also:Cotton's See also:translation) among the essayists . His particular admiration among the college professors was the stately rhetorician, See also:Edward See also:Everett; and this predilection had much to do with his See also:early ambition to be a See also:professor of See also:rhetoric and elocution . Immediately after See also:graduation he became an assistant in his See also:brother William's school for young ladies in Boston, and continued teaching, with much inward reluctance and discomfort, for three years . The routine was distasteful; he despised the superficial details which claimed so much of his See also:time . The bonds of conventionalism were silently dissolving in the rising glow of his poetic nature . See also:Independence, sincerity, reality, See also:grew more and more necessary to him . His aunt urged him to seek retirement, self, reliance, friendship with nature; to be no longer " the nursling of surrounding circumstances," but to prepare a See also:celestial See also:abode for the muse .

The See also:

passion for spiritual leadership stirred within him . The See also:ministry seemed to offer the fairest See also:field for its See also:satisfaction . In 1825 he entered the divinity school at See also:Cambridge, to prepare himself for the Unitarian See also:pulpit . His course was much interrupted by See also:ill-See also:health . His studies were irregular, and far more philosophical and literary than theological . In See also:October 1826 he was " approbched to preach " by the See also:Middlesex Association of Ministers . The same See also:year a threatened See also:consumption compelled him to take a See also:long See also:journey in the See also:south . Returning in 1827, he continued his studies, preached as a See also:candidate in various churches, and improved in health . In 1829 he married a beautiful but delicate young woman, Miss Ellen See also:Tucker of Concord, and was installed as See also:associate minister of the Second Church (Unitarian) in Boston . The retirement of his See also:senior colleague soon See also:left him the See also:sole pastor . Emerson's early sermons were See also:simple, See also:direct, unconventional . He dealt freely with the things of the spirit .

There was a homely eleva-tion in his discourses, a natural freshness in his piety, a quiet See also:

enthusiasm in his manner, that charmed thoughtful hearers . Early in 1832 he lost his wife, a sorrow that deeply depressed him in health and See also:spirits . Following his passion for independence and sincerity, he arrived at the conviction that the See also:Lord's Supper was not intended by See also:Christ to be a permanent See also:sacrament . To him, at least, it had become an outgrown form . He was willing to continue the service only if the use of the elements should be dropped and the rite made simply an See also:act of spiritual remembrance . Setting forth these views, candidly and calmly, in a See also:sermon, he found his See also:congregation, not unnaturally, reluctant to agree with him, and therefore retired, not without some disappointment, from the See also:pastoral See also:office . He never again took See also:charge of a See also:parish; but he continued to preach, as opportunity offered, until 1847 . In fact, he was always a preacher, though of a singular See also:order . His supreme task was to befriend and See also:guide the inner life of See also:man . The strongest influences in his development kbout this time were the liberating philosophy of See also:Coleridge, the mystical visions of See also:Swedenborg, the intimate See also:poetry of See also:Wordsworth, and the stimulating essays of See also:Carlyle . On See also:Christmas Day 1832 he took passage in a sailing See also:vessel for the Mediterranean . He travelled through See also:Italy, visited See also:Paris, spent two months in See also:Scotland and' England, and saw the four men whom he most desired to see—See also:Landor, Coleridge, Carlyle and Wordsworth .

" The comfort of See also:

meeting such men of See also:genius as these," he wrote, " is that they talk sincerely." But he adds that he found all four of them, in different degrees, deficient in insight into religious truth . His visit to Carlyle, in the lonely See also:farm-See also:house at Craigenputtock, was the memorable beginning of a lifelong friendship . Emerson published Carlyle's first books in See also:America . Carlyle introduced Emerson's Essays into England . The two men were See also:bound together by a mutual respect deeper than a sympathy of tastes, and a community of spirit stronger than a similarity of opinions . Emerson was a sweet-tempered Carlyle, living in the See also:sunshine . Carlyle was a militant Emerson, moving amid thunderclouds . The things that each most admired in the other were self-reliance, directness, moral courage . A passage in Emerson's See also:Diary, written on his homeward voyage, strikes the keynote of his remaining life . "A man contains all that is needful to his See also:government within himself . . . . All real See also:good or evil that can befall him must be from himself .

. . . There is a See also:

correspondence between the human soul and everything that exists in the See also:world; more properly, everything that is known to man . Instead of studying things without, the principles of them all may be penetrated into within him . . . . The purpose of life seems to be to acquaint man with himself . . . . The highest See also:revelation is that See also:God is in every man." Here is the essence of that intuitional philosophy, commonly called Transcendentalism . Emerson disclaimed See also:allegiance to that philosophy . He called it " the saturnalia, or excess of faith." His See also:practical See also:common sense recoiled from the amazing conclusions which were See also:drawn from it by many of its more eccentric See also:advocates . His independence revolted against being bound to any See also:scheme or See also:system of See also:doctrine, however nebulous . He said: " I wish to say what I feel and think to-day, with the proviso that to-morrow perhaps I shall contradict it all." But this very wish commits him to the doctrine of the inner See also:light . All through his life he navigated the Transcendental See also:sea, piloted by a clear moral sense, warned off the rocks by the saving See also:grace of See also:humour, and kept from capsizing by a good See also:ballast of New England prudence .

After his return from England in 1833 he went to live with his See also:

mother at the old See also:manse in Concord, Mass., and began his career as a lecturer in Boston . His first discourses were delivered before the Society of Natural See also:History and the See also:Mechanics' See also:Institute . They were chiefly on scientific subjects, approached in a poetic spirit . In the autumn of 1835 he married Miss See also:Lydia See also:Jackson of See also:Plymouth, having previously See also:purchased a spacious old house and See also:garden at Concord . There he spent the See also:remainder of his life, a devoted See also:husband, a See also:wise and See also:tender father, a careful house-holder, a virtuous villager, a friendly See also:neighbour, and, spite of all his disclaimers, the central and luminous figure among the Transcendentalists . The doctrine which in others seemed to produce all sorts of extravagances—communistic experiments at See also:Brook Farm and Fruitlands, weird schemes of See also:political reform, long See also:hair on men and See also:short hair on See also:women—in his sane, well-balanced nature served only to lend an ideal charm to the See also:familiar outline of a See also:plain, orderly New England life . Some mild departures from established routine he tranquilly tested and as tranquilly abandoned . He tried See also:vegetarianism for a while, but gave it up when he found that it did him no particular good . An See also:attempt to illustrate See also:household equality by having the servants sit at table with the See also:rest of the family was frustrated by the dislike of his two sensible domestics for such an inconvenient arrangement . His theory that See also:manual labour should form See also:part of the scholar's life was checked by the See also:personal See also:discovery that hard labour in the See also:fields meant poor work in the study . " The writer shall not dig," was his practical conclusion . Intellectual independence was what he chiefly desired; and this, he found, could'be attained in a manner of living not outwardly different from that of the See also:average college professor or See also:country minister .

And yet it was to this See also:

property-holding, See also:debt-paying, See also:law-abiding, well-dressed, courteous-mannered See also:citizen of Concord that the ardent and enthusiastic turned as the See also:prophet of the 'new See also:idealism . The See also:influence of other Transcendental teachers, Dr Hedge, Dr See also:Ripley, Bronson See also:Alcott, See also:Orestes See also:Brownson, See also:Theodore See also:Parker, See also:Margaret See also:Fuller, See also:Henry See also:Thoreau, See also:Jones Very, was narrow and parochial compared with that of Emerson . Something in his imperturbable, kindly presence, his angelic look, his musical See also:voice, his commanding See also:style of thought and speech, announced him as the possessor of the See also:great See also:secret which many were seeking—the secret of a freer, deeper, more harmonious life . More and more, as his fame spread, those who " would live in the spirit" came to listen to the voice, and to sit at the feet, of the See also:Sage of Concord . It was on the lecture-See also:platform that he found his See also:power and won his fame . The courses of lectures that he delivered at the Masonic See also:Temple in Boston, during the winters of 1835 and 1836, on " Great Men," " See also:English Literature," and " The Philosophy of History," were well attended and admired . They were followed by two discourses which commanded for him immediate recognition, part friendly and part hostile, as a new and potent personality . His Phi Beta Kappa oration at Harvard College in See also:August 1837, on " The American Scholar," was an eloquent See also:appeal for independence, sincerity, See also:realism, in the intellectual life of America . His address before the graduating class of the divinity school at Cambridge, in 1838, was an impassioned protest against what he called " the defects of See also:historical See also:Christianity " (its undue reliance upon the personal authority of Jesus, and its failure to explore the moral nature of man as the See also:fountain of established teaching), and a daring plea for See also:absolute selfreliance,and a new See also:inspiration of See also:religion . " In the soul," he said, " let redemption be sought . Wherever a man comes, there comes revolution . The old is for slaves .

Phoenix-squares

Go alone . Refuse the good See also:

models, even those which are sacred in the See also:imagination of men . See also:Cast conformity behind you, and acquaint men at first See also:hand with Deity." In this address Emerson laid his hand on the sensitive point of See also:Unitarianism, which rejected the divinity of Jesus, but held fast to his supreme authority . A See also:blaze of controversy sprang up at once . Conservatives attacked him; Radicals defended him . Emerson made no reply . But amid this somewhat fierce See also:illumination he went forward steadily as a public lecturer . It was not his negations that made him popular; it was the eloquence with which ..he presented the See also:positive See also:side of his doctrine . Whatever the titles of his discourses, "Literary See also:Ethics," " Man the Reformer," The Present See also:Age," " The Method of Nature," " Representative Men," " The Conduct of Life," their theme was always the same, namely, " the infinitude of the private man." Those who thought him astray on the'subject of religion listened to him with delight when he poetized the commonplaces of See also:art, politics, literature or the household . His utterance was Delphic, inspirational . There was magic in his elocution . The simplicity and symmetry of his sentences, the modulations of his thrilling voice, the radianceof his See also:fine See also:face, even his slight hesitations and pauses over his See also:manuscript, See also:lent a See also:strange charm to his speech .

For more than a See also:

generation he went about the country lecturing in cities, towns and villages, before learned See also:societies, rustic lyceums and colleges; and there was no man on the platform in America who excelled him in distinction, in authority, or in stimulating eloquence . In 1847 Emerson visited Great-See also:Britain for the second time, was welcomed by Carlyle, lectured to appreciative audiences in See also:Manchester, See also:Liverpool, See also:Edinburgh and See also:London, made many new See also:friends among the best English See also:people, paid a brief visit to Paris, and returned See also:home in See also:July 1848 . " I leave England," he wrote, " with increased respect for the Englishman . His stuff or substance seems to be the best in the world . I forgive him all his See also:pride . My respect is the more generous that I have no sympathy with him, only an admiration." The impressions of this journey were embodied in a See also:book called English Trails, published in 1856 . It might be called " English Traits and American Confessions," for nowhere does Emerson's American-ism come out more strongly . But the America that he loved and admired was the ideal, the potential America . For the actual conditions of social and political life in his own time he had a fine scorn . He was an intellectual Brahmin . His principles were democratic, his tastes aristocratic . He did not like crowds, streets, hotels—" the people who fill them oppress me with their excessive civility." Humanity was his See also:hero .

He loved man, but he was not fond of men . He had See also:

grave doubts about universal See also:suffrage . He took a sincere See also:interest in social and political reform, but towards specific "reforms" his attitude was somewhat remote and visionary . On the subject of See also:temperance he held aloof from the intemperate methods of the violent prohibitionists . He was a believer in woman's rights, but he was lukewarm towards conventions in favour of woman suffrage . Even in regard to See also:slavery he had serious hesitations about the ways of the abolitionists, and for a long time refused to be identified with them . But as the irrepressible conflict See also:drew to a See also:head Emerson's hesitation vanished . He said in 1856, " I think we must get rid of slavery, or we must get rid of freedom." With the outbreak of the See also:Civil See also:War he became an ardent and powerful See also:advocate of the cause of the See also:Union . See also:James See also:Russell See also:Lowell said, " To him more than to all other causes did the young martyrs of our Civil War owe the sustaining strength of thoughtful heroism that is so touching in every See also:record of their lives." , Emerson the essayist was a condensation of Emerson the lecturer . His See also:prose See also:works, with the exception of the slender See also:volume entitled Nature (1836), were collected and arranged from the See also:manuscripts of his lectures . His method of writing was characteristic . He planted a subject in his mind, and waited for thoughts and illustrations to come to it, as birds or See also:insects to a plant or See also:flower .

When an See also:

idea appeared, he followed it, " as a boy might See also:hunt a butterfly"; when it was captured he pinned it in his " Thought-book." The writings of other men he used more for stimulus than for guidance . He said that books were for the scholar's idle times . " I value them," he said, " to make my See also:top spin." His favourite reading was poetry and mystical philosophy: Shakespeare, See also:Dante, See also:George See also:Herbert, See also:Goethe, Berkeley, Coleridge, Swedenborg, See also:Jakob See also:Boehme, See also:Plato, the new Platonists, and the religious books of the See also:East (in translation) . Next to these he valued books of See also:biography and See also:anecdote: See also:Plutarch, See also:Grimm, St See also:Simon, Varnhagen von Ense . He had some See also:odd dislikes, and could find nothing in See also:Aristophanes, Cervantes, See also:Shelley, See also:Scott, Miss See also:Austen, See also:Dickens . Novels he seldom read . He was a follower of none, an See also:original borrower from all . His illustrations were drawn from near and far . The See also:zodiac of Denderah; the Savoyards who carved their See also:pine-forests into toys; the naked Derar, horsed on an idea, charging a See also:troop of See also:Roman See also:cavalry; the long, austere See also:Pythagorean lustrum of silence; See also:Napoleon on the See also:deck of the " See also:Bellerophon," observing the See also:drill of the English soldiers; the See also:Egyptian doctrine that every man has two pairs of eyes; See also:Empedocles and his See also:shoe; the See also:horizontal stratification of the See also:earth; a soft See also:mushroom pushing its way through the hard ground,—all these allusions and a thousand more are found in the same volume . On his pages, See also:close beside the See also:Parthenon, the See also:Sphinx, St See also:Paul's, See also:Etna and See also:Vesuvius, you will find the See also:White Mountains, See also:Monadnock, Agiocochook, Katandin, the pickerel-See also:weed in See also:bloom, the See also:wild geese honking through the See also:sky, the chick-a-See also:dee braving the See also:snow, See also:Wall See also:Street and State Street, cotton-See also:mills, railroads and See also:Quincy See also:granite . For an abstract thinker he was strangely in love with the See also:concrete facts of life . Idealism in him assumed the form of a vivid illumination of the real .

From the pages of his teeming See also:

note-books he took the material for his lectures, arranging and rearranging it under such titles as Nature, School, Home, Genius, Beauty and See also:Manners, Self-See also:Possession, See also:Duty, The Superlative, Truth, The Anglo-Saxon, The Young American . When the lectures had served their purpose he rearranged the material in essays and published them . Thus appeared in See also:succession the following volumes: Essays (First See also:Series) (1841); Essays (Second Series) (1844); Representative Men (185o); English Traits (1856); The Conduct of Life (186o); Society and Solitude (187o); Letters and Social Aims (1876) . Besides these, many other lectures were printed in See also:separate form and in various combinations . Emerson's style is brilliant, epigrammatic, See also:gem-like; clear in sentences, obscure in paragraphs . He was a sporadic observer . He saw by flashes . He said, " I do not know what arguments mean in reference to any expression of a thought." The coherence of his writing lies in his personality . His work is fused by a steady glow of optimism . Yet he states this optimism moderately . " The genius which preserves and guides the human See also:race indicates itself by a small excess of good, a small See also:balance in See also:brute facts always favourable to the side of See also:reason." His verse, though in form inferior to his prose, was perhaps a truer expression of his genius . He said, "I am born a poet"; and again, writing to Carlyle, he called himself "See also:half a See also:bard." He had "the See also:vision," but not "the See also:faculty divine" which translates the vision into See also:music .

In his two volumes of verse (Poems, 1846; May Day and other Pieces, 1867) there are many passages of beautiful insight and profound feeling, some lines of surprising splendour, and a few poems, like " The Rhodora," " The Snowstormu ,o, See also:

Ode to Beauty," " See also:Terminus," " The Concord Ode," and the marvellous " See also:Threnody " on the death of his first-born boy, of beauty unmarred and penetrating truth . But the See also:total value of his poetical work is discounted by the imperfection of metrical form, the presence of incongruous images, the pre-dominance of the intellectual over the emotional See also:element, and the lack of flow . It is the material of poetry not thoroughly worked out . But .the genius from which it came—the See also:swift faculty of See also:perception, the lofty imagination, the idealizing spirit enamoured of reality—was the secret source of all Emerson's greatness as a See also:speaker and as a writer . Whatever See also:verdict time may pass upon the bulk of his poetry, Emerson himself must be recognized as an original and true poet of a high order . His latter years were passed in peaceful See also:honour at Concord . In 1866 Harvard College conferred upon him the degree of LL.D., and in 1867 he was elected an overseer . In 187o he delivered a course of lectures before the university on " The Natural History of the See also:Intellect." In 1872 his house was burned down, and was rebuilt by popular subscription . In the same year he went on his third See also:foreign journey, going as far as See also:Egypt . About this time began a failure in his powers, especially in his memory . But his character remained serene and unshaken in dignity . Steadily, tranquilly, cheerfully, he finished the voyage of life .

" I See also:

trim myself to the See also:storm of time, I man the See also:rudder, See also:reef the See also:sail, Obey the voice at See also:eve obeyed at See also:prime: ' Lowly faithful, banish fear, Right onward drive unharmed; The See also:port, well See also:worth the cruise, is near, And every See also:wave is charmed.' " Emerson died on the 27th of See also:April 1882, and his See also:body was laid to rest in the peaceful See also:cemetery of Sleepy Hollow, in a See also:grove on the edge of the See also:village of Concord . AuTxoRITIEs.—Emerson's See also:Complete Works, See also:Riverside edition, edited by J . E . See also:Cabot (If vols., Boston, 1883–1884) ; another edition (London, 5 vols., 1906), by G . See also:Sampson, in See also:Bohn's " See also:Libraries "; The Correspondence of See also:Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson, edited by See also:Charles See also:Eliot See also:Norton (Boston, 1883); George See also:Willis See also:Cooke, Ralph Waldo Emerson: His Life, Writings and Philosophy (Boston, 1881) ; See also:Alexander See also:Ireland, Ralph Waldo Emerson: His Life, Genius and Writings (London, 1882) ; A . Bronson Alcott, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Philosopher and Seer (Boston, 1882) ; Moncure See also:Daniel See also:Conway, Emerson at Home and Abroad (Boston, 1882) ; See also:Joel See also:Benton, Emerson as a Poet (New See also:York, 1883) ; F . B . Sanborn (editor), The Genius and Character of Emerson : Lectures at the Concord School of Philosophy (Boston, 1885); See also:Oliver Wendell See also:Holmes, Ralph Waldo Emerson (" American Men of Letters " series) (Boston, 1885) ; James See also:Elliott Cabot, A Memoir of Ralph Waldo Emerson, 2 vols . (the authorized biography) (Boston, 1887) ; Edward Waldo Emerson, Emerson in Concord (Boston, 1889) ; See also:Richard See also:Garnett, Life of Ralph Waldo Emerson (London, 1888) ; G . E . Woodberry, Ralph Waldo Emerson (1907) . See also:Critical estimates are also to be found in See also:Matthew See also:Arnold's Discourses in America, See also:John See also:Morley's Critical Miscellanies, Henry James's Partial Portraits, Lowell's My Study Windows, See also:Birrell's Obiter Dicta (2nd series), See also:Stedman's Poets of America, Whipple's American Literature, &c .

There is a Bibliography of Ralph Waldo Emerson, by G . W . Cooke (Boston, 1908) .

End of Article: RALPH WALDO EMERSON (1803-1882)
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