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Ralph Waldo Emerson

American philosopher (1803-1882) · United States · Academics · Died at 78

Ralph Waldo Emerson is read about 2,036 times a day, in 92 languages.

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The essayist who told Americans to trust themselves and ignore the crowd - and made it stick. Emerson's lectures in the 1830s and '40s gave the country a philosophical backbone it hadn't built on its own, arguing that individual conscience mattered more than inherited doctrine.

WritersAcademicPhilosophyPoetryLiteratureUnited StatesAmericas19th Century

A life in dates

1882Died27 April 18821880“The clergy are as like as peas.”In their words5 February 1880"The Preacher", in The Index: A Weekly Paper (Feb. 5, 1880) pp. 62-3. Originally written as a parlor-lecture to some Divinity students, in

1855“I am not blind to the worth of the wonderful gift of "Leaves of Grass." I find it the most extraordinary piece of wit and wisdom that America has yet contributed.”In their words21 July 1855Letter to Walt Whitman, thanking him for a copy of Leaves of Grass (July 21, 1855)

1854“Slavery is disheartening; but Nature is not so helpless but it can rid itself of every last wrong.”In their words7 March 1854The Fugitive Slave Law, a lecture in NYC (March 7, 1854)

1841“He who is in love is wise and is becoming wiser, sees newly every time he looks at the object beloved, drawing from it with his eyes and his mind those virtues which it possesses.”In their wordsThe Method of Nature (1841), p. 25

“Yet a man may love a paradox, without losing either his wit or his honesty.”In their words"Walter Savage Landor", from The Dial, xii (1841)

“Literature is the effort of man to indemnify himself for the wrongs of his condition.”In their words"Walter Savage Landor", from The Dial, xii (1841)

1803Born25 May 1803

Also in Deutsch

Photos 8

Ralph Waldo Emerson ca1857 retouchedRalph Waldo Emerson ca1857 retouched"Allez là où il n'y a pas de chemin et laissez une trace" (Ralph Waldo Emerson)"Allez là où il n'y a pas de chemin et laissez une trace" (Ralph Waldo Emerson)1850 Emerson GloucesterLyceum GloucesterTelegraph Feb131850 Emerson GloucesterLyceum GloucesterTelegraph Feb13American essayist, poet, and ... Concord authors or the Concord School of Philosophy LCCN2009631511American essayist, poet, and ... Concord authors or the Concord School of Philosophy LCCN2009631511Biographies and stories of Abraham Lincoln (1865) (14765025865)Biographies and stories of Abraham Lincoln (1865) (14765025865)Carlyle and EmersonCarlyle and EmersonCharles Eliot Norton, 28 April 1893 (534eba6c-62d3-41dc-96c3-2a245e55e514)Charles Eliot Norton, 28 April 1893 (534eba6c-62d3-41dc-96c3-2a245e55e514)Concord Hymn extract by Ralph Waldo Emerson - Johnny Ro Veterans Memorial Park - Leominster, Massachusetts - DSC09144Concord Hymn extract by Ralph Waldo Emerson - Johnny Ro Veterans Memorial Park - Leominster, Massachusetts - DSC09144

In their own words 10

,
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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10 statements, newest first

  1. The clergy are as like as peas.

    Feb 5, 1880, "The Preacher", in The Index: A Weekly Paper (Feb. 5, 1880) pp. 62-3. Originally written as a parlor-lecture to some Divinity students, in, Own words

  2. If the colleges were better, if they ...

    1861, The Celebration of Intellect (1861), Own words

  3. I am not blind to the worth of the wonderful gift of "Leaves of Grass." I find it the most extraordinary piece of wit and wisdom that America has yet contributed.

    Jul 21, 1855, Letter to Walt Whitman, thanking him for a copy of Leaves of Grass (July 21, 1855), Own words

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Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences

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About this person

Born in 1803, Emerson started as a minister but drifted from the church and its orthodoxies, publishing "Nature" in 1836 to sketch out Transcendentalism: a vision where soul and universe were threads of the same fabric, no God standing apart. A year later his speech "The American Scholar" earned the label "intellectual Declaration of Independence" from Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr. Through the 1840s he wrote essays - "Self-Reliance", "The Over-Soul", "Experience" - first as lectures, then refined for print, all circling the same pole: the infinitude of the private man, the idea that freedom and selfhood were available to anyone willing to think past the consensus. Nietzsche called him the most gifted American; Whitman called him master. He died in 1882, having mentored Thoreau and left a mark on every writer who came after him convinced that one clear voice could matter more than the choir.

Country
United States
Category
Academics
Type
Academic
Status
deceased
Dates
Lived 1803 to 1882 · aged 78

Academics from the United States 6

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