-Uses Figurative Language. Figurative language is not meant to be interpreted literally. -Uses Extended Metaphors. Compares a person’s intellectual and spiritual life to a farmer’s cultivation of a plot of ground.
Ralph Waldo Emerson was an essayist, philosopher and poet.
We can only learn, understand and profit from our own efforts and experience. We cannot rely on the work and experience of others.
Every person intuitively understands and responds to the truth of the directive to trust oneself.
A person who follows Emerson’s philosophy would put his or her own ideas, opinions and feelings before those of anyone else not out of selfishness, but because he or she values personal integrity and self-truth above all else. Therefore it is inevitable that they would do things and say things to offend others and make them feel dismissed and unimportant.
The theme of Romanticism and a search for truth is reflected in Emerson’s uncompromising dedication to the value of an individual’s convictions. He and many Romantics held an optimistic view of the world, unlike pessimistic Romantic writers, such as Nathaniel Hawthorne and Herman Melville.
- He is a neighbor of Thoreau’s.
“Self-Reliance” is full of ideas that lead to human happiness.
“Nothing can bring you peace but yourself. Nothing can bring you peace but the triumph of principles.”
In pairs- write
“Rules for Life”
“Rules for Thinking”
- Imitation is suicide; insist on yourself; believe in yourself; never imitate.
- Geniuses believe in their own ideas or convictions.
- Should you be a conformist or non-conformist?
- Should you have consistency of thought?
- Why are geniuses misunderstood?
- Whose principles should you follow? The individuals’
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