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surroundings. Emerson confidently exemplifies transcendentalism, stating, "From the earth, as a shore, I look out into that silent sea. I seem to partake its rapid transformations: the active enchantment reaches my dust, and I dilate and conspire with the morning wind", postulating that humans and wind are one. Emerson referred to nature as the "Universal Being"; he believed that there was a spiritual sense of the natural world around him. Depicting this sense of "Universal Being", Emerson states, "The aspect of nature is devout. Like the figure of Jesus, she stands with bended head, and hands folded upon the breast. The happiest man is he who learns from nature the lesson of worship".
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Whence is it and
Whereto? Such questions can be answered with a single answer, nature's spirit is expressed through humans, "Therefore, that spirit, that is, the Supreme Being, does not build up nature around us, but puts it forth through us", states Emerson. Emerson clearly depicts that everything must be spiritual and moral, in which there should be goodness between nature and humans.
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were also an influence on
Charles Stearns Wheeler building a shanty at Flint's Pond in 1836. Considered the first Transcendentalist outdoor living experiment, Wheeler used his shanty during his summer vacations from Harvard from 1836 to 1842. Thoreau stayed at Wheeler's shanty for six weeks during
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When a person experiences true solitude, in nature, it "take him away". Society, he says, destroys wholeness, whereas "Nature, in its ministry to man, is not only the material, but is also the process and the result. All the parts incessantly work into each other's hands for the profit of man. The
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Within the essay, Emerson divides nature into four usages: Commodity, Beauty, Language, and
Discipline. These distinctions define the ways by which humans use nature for their basic needs, their desire for delight, their communication with one another, and their understanding of the world. Emerson
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In the essay
Emerson explains that to experience the wholeness with nature for which we are naturally suited, we must be separate from the flaws and distractions imposed on us by society. Emerson believed that solitude is the single mechanism through which we can be fully engaged in the world of
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According to
Emerson, there were three spiritual problems addressed about nature for humans to solve: "What is matter? Whence is it? And Whereto?" What is matter? Matter is a phenomenon, not a substance; rather, nature is something that is experienced by humans, and grows with humans' emotions.
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Emerson uses spirituality as a major theme in the essay. Emerson believed in re-imagining the divine as something large and visible, which he referred to as nature; such an idea is known as transcendentalism, in which one perceives a new God and a new body, and becomes one with his or her
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wind sows the seed; the sun evaporates the sea; the wind blows the vapor to the field; the ice, on the other side of the planet, condenses rain on this; the rain feeds the plant; the plant feeds the animal; and thus the endless circulations of the divine charity nourish man."
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Emerson defines a spiritual relationship. In nature a person finds its spirit and accepts it as the
Universal Being. He writes: "Nature is not fixed but fluid. Spirit alters, moulds, it. ... Know then that the world exists for you. For you is the phenomenon perfect."
124:, a belief system that espouses a non-traditional appreciation of nature. Transcendentalism suggests that the divine, or God, suffuses nature, and suggests that reality can be understood by studying nature. Emerson's visit to the
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nature, writing "To go into solitude, a man needs to retire as much from his chamber as from society. I am not solitary whilst I read and write, though nobody is with me. But if a man would be alone, let him look at the stars."
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the summer of 1837, and got the idea that he wanted to build his own cabin (later realized at Walden in 1845). The exact location of the
Wheeler shanty site was discovered by Jeff Craig in 2018, after a five year search effort.
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after living in a cabin on land that
Emerson owned. Their longstanding acquaintance offered Thoreau great encouragement in pursuing his desire to be a published author.
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and disparagingly referred to the beliefs as "Transcendentalist", coining the term by which the group would become known.
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and took it to heart. It eventually became an essential influence for
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was controversial to some. One review published in
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in Paris inspired a set of lectures he later delivered in Boston which were then published.
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Baym, Nina, Wayne Franklin, Philip F. Gura, and Arnold Krupat.
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440:. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2008. 825-828. Print.
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The Second Great Awakening and the Transcendentalists
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30:For the essay by Georg Christoph Tobler, see
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34:. For the essay by John Stuart Mill, see
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