Friday, January 9, 2015

Self Reliant Sourcing

“There is a time in every man's education when he arrives at the conviction that envy is ignorance; that imitation is suicide; that he must take himself for better, for worse, as his portion; that though the wide universe is full of good, no kernel of nourishing corn can come to him but through his toil bestowed on that plot of ground which is given to him to till. The power which resides in him is new in nature, and none but he knows what that is which he can do, nor does he know until he has tried.” 

Ralph Waldo Emerson was a transcendentalist in the mid 19th century. He wrote "Self-Reliance" to teach people about the transcendental idea of self-reliance. Emerson wrote the essay about his beliefs during the mid 19th century. We know this is a trustworthy source because it was written during the early transcendentalism movement by a transcendentalist himself. Ideas of the Mexican and Indian War and the end of slavery were brewing at the time this essay was written. Emerson, being against slavery and war, wanted people to think for themselves, and stand up for moral decisions. This document teaches us that Transcendentalists wanted to instill trust in oneself, and personal belief. We are limited to seeing the whole of Transcendentalism by this excerpt because there were other main ideas of Transcendentalism that can be found in writings by Henry David Thoreau. Transcendentalists also believed in simple living and living deliberately. Ralph Waldo Emerson believed that everyone should accept themselves for who they are, not copy or be jealous of the lives of others. In this excerpt he states, "... envy is ignorance... imitation is suicide... he must take himself  for better, for worse, as his portion." Emerson uses powerful metaphors to persuade the readers to believe his ideas. 
  • Waldo Emerson, Ralph. "Self-Reliance Quotes." By Ralph Waldo Emerson. Accessed January 9, 2015. http://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/1758578-self-reliance.


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