American Transcendentalism

Paper Summary:

This study attempts to understand the early 19th century movement in New England called transcendentalism, according to Henry Thoreau and Ralph Waldo Emerson, prominent American philosophers, essayists, and poets. The paper maintains that transcendentalists saw the necessity of following the examples of great leaders, writers, philosophers, and others, to show what an individual can become through thinking and action. The paper relates that transcendentalists also believed that one must have faith in intuition, for no church or creed can communicate truth and that true reform comes from within.

From the Paper:

"Transcendentalism was born against the Unitarian church. It questioned the established cultural forms, reintegrated spirit and matter and tried to turn their ideas into concrete action. Transcendentalists viewed knowledge and cultural forms not as perpetual truths but as temporary constructions, and insisted that all such constructions be open to the tests of continuing experience. Emerson briefly summarizes the transcendental understanding with his famous quote, "We will walk on our own feet; we will work with our own hands; we will speak our own minds..." He later explains the concept of self-reliance in transcendental thinking in one of his essays, Self-Reliance."

Sample of Sources Used:

• Emerson, Ralph Waldo. Selected Essays, Lectures, and Poems of Ralph Waldo Emerson. Ed. Robert E. Spiller. New York: Washington Square Press Inc., 1965.

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