Self-reliance
Type Work and Year of Publication
......."Self-Reliance" is an essay that urges readers to trust their own intuition and common n rather than automatically following popular opinion and conforming to the will of the majority. "Self-Reliance" was published in 1841 in a collection entitled Essays. In 1844, Emerson published a cond collection, Essays: Second Series. Conquently, in 1847, he changed the title of the first collection to Essays: First Series.
Themes
Trust Your Own Inner Voice
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.......Emerson urges his readers to retain the outspokenness of a small child who freely speaks his mind. A child he has not yet been corrupted by adults who tell him to do otherwi. He also urges readers to avoid envying or imitating others viewed as models of perfection; instead, he says, readersshould take pride in their own individuality and never b
e afraid to express their own original ideas. In addition, he says, they should refu to conform to the ways of the popular culture and its shallow ideals; rather they should live up to their own ideals, even if doing so reaps themcriticism and denunciation.
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Avoid Consistency as an End in Itlf
Being consistent is not always wi. An idea or regimen to which you stubbornly cling can become outmoded tomorrow.
Point of View
Emerson us first-, cond-, and third-person point of view. In the opening paragraph of the essay, he first writes in the first person, telling readers about an experience of his. Then, after only three ntences, he switches to cond person, as if he is advising a listener sitting acrossthe table from him. Later, in the paragraph, he switches to third person as he prents an exhortation about humankind in general. Following is the first part of the essay, in which Emerson us all three points of view–first person in black, cond person in red, and third person in blue:
I read the other day some vers written by an eminent painter which were original and not conventional. The soul always hears an admonition in such lines, let the subject be what it may. The ntiment they instil[Emerson's spelling of instill] is of more value than any thought they may contain. To believe your own thought, to believe that what is true for you in your private heart is true for all men,—that is genius. Speak your latent conviction, and it shall be the universal n; for the inmost in due time becomes the outmost,初恋50次插曲—and our first thought is rendered back to us by the trumpets of the Last Judgment.Familiar as the voice of the mind is to each, the highest merit we ascribe to Mos, Plato, and Milton is, that they t at naught books and traditions, and spoke not what men but what they thought. A man should learn to detect and watch that gleam of light which flashes across his mind from within, more than the lustre of the firmament of bards and sages. Yet he dismiss without notice his thought, becau it is his.
Style Among the most notable characteristics of Emerson’s writing style are the: (1) thorough development of his thesis through examples, repetition, and reinforcement; (2) c
oinage of memorable statements of principle, or aphorisms; (3) frequent references (allusions) to historical and literaryfigures, such as Socrates, Galileo, Copernicus, Napoleon, Shakespeare, Franklin, Dante, and Scipio (ancient Roman general who defeated Hannibal), who embody qualities Emerson discuss; (4) frequent u of figurative language to make a point, such as “An institution is the lengthened shadow ofone man” (metaphor) and “They who made England, Italy, or Greece venerable in the imagination did so by sticking fast where they were, like an axis of the earth” (simile).
Promotion of American Creativity
Becau Emerson eschewed imitation (as noted under Theme), he urged Americans to avoid mimicking art and ideas from abroad. He writes: 公共英语证书Our hous are built with foreign taste; our shelves are garnished with foreign ornaments; our opinions, our tastes, our faculties, lean, and follow the Past and Why need we copy the Doric or the Gothic model? Beauty, convenience, grandeur of thought,and quaint expression are as near to us as to any, and if the American artist will study with hope and love the preci th
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ing to be done by him, considering the climate, the soil, the length of the day, the wants of the people, the habit and form of the government, he will create a hou inwhich all the will find themlves fitted, and taste and ntiment will be satisfied also.
Emerson and Transcendentalism
.......Emerson believed every human being has inborn knowledge that enables him to recognize and understand moral truth without benefit of knowledge obtained through the physical ns. Using this inborn knowledge, a gift of God, an individual can make a moral decision without relying on informationgained through everyday living, education, and experimentation. One may liken this inborn knowledge to conscience or intuition.
.......Emerson and others who believed that this inborn knowledge rved as a moral guiding force were known as transcendentalists—that is, they believed that this inner knowledge was a higher, transcendent form of knowledge than that which came through the ns. Becau Emerson and his fellow transcendentalists trusted their own inner light as a moral guiding force, they were possd of a fierce spirit oflf-reliance. They
were individualists; they liked to make decisions for themlves. If the government adopted a policy or a law that offended their consciences, they generally reacted strongly.
.......Transcendentalism, as Emerson’s moral philosophy was called, did not originate with him or his fellow transcendentalists in New England but with the German philosopher Emanuel Kant. He ud the German word fortranscendental to refer to intuitive or innate knowledge—knowledge that isa priori rather than a posteriori生活大爆炸第3季.
Epigraph netmanAn ancient Latin quotation precedes the essay: 6级考试流程Ne te quaesiveris extra(Do not look outside of yourlf for the truth.) The Roman satirist and poet Aulus Persius Flaccus (AD 34-63)—usually referred to simply asPersius简体转繁体—动画片美女与野兽wrote tho words in Book 1, line 7, of his Satires. The quotation is an apt introductory aphorism for Emerson's essay, for it sums up the central idea of "Self-Reliance" and the transcendental philosophy behind it: that one should rely on his own inner voice—his own intuition and instinct—to make important decisions and put his life on a righteous path. In other words, the quotation say
s, rely on yourlf. Emerson follows the Latin quotation with an English quotation from the epilogue of a ver drama by playwrights Franics Beaumont and John Fletcher, contemporaries of Shakespeare. That quotation, which begins with the words Man is his own star, reinforces the view expresd in the Latin quotation.
