The Core Principles of Transcendentalism: Emerson and Thoreau

Transcendentalism: Philosophy and Literature

As much a religion as a philosophy, Transcendentalism provided a system of beliefs that adequately reflected the prevailing thoughts and opinions of Americans. The Transcendentalist movement created a romantic philosophy that would become a rallying point for America’s greatest thinkers, artists, and poets, who were already intent upon finding a way to express the essential spirit of the American experience.

Historical Trends of the Early 19th Century

The framers of the U.S. Constitution in 1787 had crafted a new experiment on the world’s political stage. The political faith that ‘all men are created equal’, as expressed in the Declaration of Independence, was only an ideal. Thomas Jefferson pointed the nation toward the lodestar of social equality by embracing the slogan: ‘Equal opportunity for all and special privileges for none.’

Emerson’s *Nature* and ‘Self-Reliance’

In his essay, Circles, Ralph Waldo Emerson observes that when God lets loose a great thinker on this planet, ‘then all things are at risk’. The great thinker is what Emerson called a ‘representative man’, an individual who manages to embody in his own person a universal aspect of spirit. Such has been Emerson’s influence on American culture that he himself is widely regarded as a representative man. One reason for Emerson’s popularity was that he was not only an author but also an extremely active and successful speaker, delivering about 1,500 lectures during his career.

Emerson’s lectures were the bases for many of his essays. The former Unitarian minister preached on themes such as:

• Self-reliance
• Self-unknowledge
• Nonconformity

Emerson spoke eloquently about the spiritual matters that were troubling Americans in the 19th century.

Thoreau’s Theory of Living

In 1845, wanting to write his first book, Henry David Thoreau ventured off to the woods and built a cabin near Walden Pond on a parcel of land owned by Emerson. He later wrote about his experiences in Walden, or Life in the Woods (1854), which has become the definitive text of Transcendentalism and one of the most famous works in American Literature.