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Ralph Waldo Emerson’s “Self-Reliance” – Excerpt

“Ne te quaesiveris extra.” (”Seek no one besides yourself.”)
“Man is his own star; and the soul that can
Render an honest and a perfect man,
Commands all light, all influence, all fate;
Nothing to him falls early or too late.
Our acts our angels are, or good or ill,
Our fatal shadows that walk by us still.”

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. Not for nothing one face, one character, one fact makes much impression on him, and another none. It is not without preestablished harmony, this sculpture in the memory. The eye was placed where one ray should fall, that it might testify of that particular ray. Bravely let him speak the utmost syllable of his confession. We but half express ourselves, and are ashamed of that divine idea which each of us represents. It may be safely trusted as proportionate and of good issues, so it be faithfully imparted, but God will not have his work made manifest by cowards. It needs a divine man to exhibit any thing divine. A man is relieved and gay when he has put his heart into his work and done his best; but what he has said or done otherwise, shall give him no peace. It is a deliverance which does not deliver. In the attempt his genius deserts him; no muse befriends; no invention, no hope.

Trust thyself: every heart vibrates to that iron string. Accept the place the divine Providence has found for you; the society of your contemporaries, the connection of events. Great men have always done so and confided themselves childlike to the genius of their age, betraying their perception that the Eternal was stirring at their heart, working through their hands, predominating in all their being. And we are now men, and must accept in the highest mind the same transcendent destiny; and not pinched in a corner, not cowards fleeing before a revolution, but redeemers and benefactors, pious aspirants to be noble clay plastic under the Almighty effort, let us advance and advance on Chaos and the Dark. …

These are the voices which we hear in solitude, but they grow faint and inaudible as we enter into the world. Society everywhere is in conspiracy against the manhood of every one of its members. Society is a joint-stock company in which the members agree for the better securing of his bread to each shareholder, to surrender the liberty and culture of the eater, The virtue in most request is conformity. Self-reliance is its aversion. It loves not realities and creators, but names and customs.

Whoso would be a man must be a nonconformist. He who would gather immortal palms must not be hindered by the name of goodness, but must explore if it be goodness. Nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of our own mind. Absolve you to yourself, and you shall have the suffrage of the world. …

A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers and divines. With consistency a great soul has simply nothing to do. He may as well concern himself with his shadow on the wall. Out upon your guarded lips! Sew them up with packthread, do. Else, if you would be a man, speak what you think today in words as hard as cannon balls, and tomorrow speak what tomorrow thinks in hard words again, though it contradict every thing you said today. Ah, then, exclaim the aged ladies, you shall be sure to be misunderstood. Misunderstood! It is a right fool’s word. Is it so bad then to be misunderstood? Pythagoras was misunderstood, and Socrates, and Jesus, and Luther, and Copernicus, and Galileo, and Newton, and every pure and wise spirit that ever took flesh. To be great is to be misunderstood.

Discussion Questions

1. Discuss the meaning of the verse preceding the essay.
2. Looking at the entire essay, what does Emerson mean by self-reliance? Objectively summarize Emerson’s major points.
3. Interpret the first sentence. What does every person realize at some moment of his or her education?
4. “The eye was placed where one ray should fall, that it might testify of that particular ray.” Interpret.
5. What does Emerson mean by the “divine idea which each of us represents”?
6. Explain the significance of the “iron string.” Why do you think Emerson used iron and not silken, golden, or silver string?
7. Define transcendentalism.
8. “Society everywhere is in conspiracy against the manhood of every one of its members.” Interpret.
9. “The virtue in most request is conformity. Self-reliance is its aversion.” Explain.
10. Interpret the metaphor, “A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesman and philosophers and divines.”
11. Discuss the use of the simile, “words as hard as cannon balls.”
12. Respond to the essay. Write a paragraph expressing your reactions to the essay.

Vocabulary

manifest
contemporary (noun)
predominate
transcendent
benefactor
conformity
aversion
suffrage
inaudible

Dashiell Hammett

Mystery writer Dashiell Hammett was born on this day in 1894. The three film adaptations of his most famous story, The Maltese Falcon, became staples of the film noir genre. His romantic relationship with Lillian Hellman, a well-known playwright, inspired The Thin Man, a story featuring heroine Nora Charles. The film adaptation of this novel was so successful that it spawned multiple sequels. Hammett was the founding father of the “hard-boiled” mystery, a subgenre characterized by its gritty characters and depictions of events.

Emerson Pyramids

Here are the two pyramids chosen by my students as best graphically representing Emerson’s hierarchy of ideas.

Across the Universe

Listen to the Song

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John Lennon

Philip Norman. Ecco 2008, Hardcover, 864 pages, $3.99

Words are flowing out like endless rain into a paper cup, They slither while they pass they slip away across the universe Pools of sorrow, waves of joy are drifting through my opened mind, Possessing and caressing me Jai guru de va om Nothing’s gonna change my world Nothing’s gonna change my world Nothing’s gonna change my world Nothing’s gonna change my world
Nothing’s gonna change my world
Nothing’s gonna change my world
Nothing’s gonna change my world
Nothing’s gonna change my world

Images of broken light which dance before me like a million eyes,
They call me on and on across the universe,
Thoughts meander like a restless wind inside a letter box they
Tumble blindly as they make their way
Across the universe
Jai guru deva om
Nothing’s gonna change my world
Nothing’s gonna change my world
Nothing’s gonna change my world
Nothing’s gonna change my world

Sounds of laughter, shades of earth are ringing
Through my open ears inciting and inviting me
Limitless undying love which shines around me like a
Million suns and calls me on and on
Across the universe
Jai guru deva om
Nothing’s gonna change my world
Nothing’s gonna change my world
Nothing’s gonna change my world
Nothing’s gonna change my world

Jai guru deva [Repeat to fade]

Background

The following is mostly lifted from a great Beatles page called The Beatles Bible. Check it out for more information.

Some interpretations of Across the Universe can be found here.

This song’s lyrics came to John Lennon in the early hours one morning at his home in Kenwood.

I was lying next to my first wife in bed and I was thinking. It started off as a negative song and she must have been going on and on about something. She’d gone to sleep and I kept hearing, ‘Words are flowing out like endless streams…’ I was a bit irritated and I went downstairs and it turned into a sort of cosmic song rather than, ‘Why are you always mouthing off at me?…The words are purely inspirational and were given to me – except for maybe one or two where I had to resolve a line or something like that. I don’t own it; it came through like that.

Part of the song’s chorus – ‘Jai guru deva, om’ – is a Sanskrit phrase which roughly translates as ‘Victory to God divine’. It was likely inspired by the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, whom The Beatles had met in August 1967. The Maharishi’s spiritual master was called Guru Dev. ‘Jai’ is a Hindi word meaning ‘long live’ or ‘victory’, and ‘om’ is a sacred syllable in the Hindu, Jain and Buddhist religions.

In 1970 John Lennon was quoted in Rolling Stone:

It’s one of the best lyrics I’ve written. In fact, it could be the best. It’s good poetry, or whatever you call it, without chewin’ it. See, the ones I like are the ones that stand as words, without melody. They don’t have to have any melody, like a poem, you can read them.

Watch a Session Video

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Waiting on a Friend

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Single by Rolling Stones
from the album Tattoo You

Watching girls go passing by
It aint the latest thing
Im just standing in a doorway
Im just trying to make some sense
Out of these girls go passing by
The tales they tell of men
Im not waiting on a lady
Im just waiting on a friend

A smile relieves a heart that grieves
Remember what I said
Im not waiting on a lady
Im just waiting on a friend
Im just waiting on a friend

Dont need a whore
I dont need no booze
Dont need a virgin priest
But I need someone I can cry to
I need someone to protect
Making love and breaking hearts
It is a game for youth
But Im not waiting on a lady
Im just waiting on a friend

“What a Wonderful World”

This song has a hopeful and optimistic tone with regard to the future, and beautifully illuminates Emerson’s idea about finding “the journey’s end in every step of the road” (from Emerson’s “Experience”).

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I see trees of green, red roses too
I see them bloom for me and you
And I think to myself what a wonderful world.

I see skies of blue and clouds of white
The bright blessed day, the dark sacred night
And I think to myself what a wonderful world.

The colors of the rainbow so pretty in the sky
Are also on the faces of people going by
I see friends shaking hands saying how do you do
They’re really saying I love you.

I hear babies crying, I watch them grow
They’ll learn much more than I’ll never know
And I think to myself what a wonderful world
Yes I think to myself what a wonderful world.

Dixie Chicks and Transcendentalism

I love this song, especially the stuff about striking out on your own, chasing a dream, and finding your place in the sun – pure transcendentalism.

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“Wide Open Spaces”

Who doesn’t know what I’m talking about
Who’s never left home, who’s never struck out
To find a dream and a life of their own
A place in the clouds, a foundation of stone

Many precede and many will follow
A young girl’s dream no longer hollow
It takes the shape of a place out west
But what it holds for her, she hasn’t yet guessed

[Chorus:]
She needs wide open spaces
Room to make her big mistakes
She needs new faces
She knows the high stakes

She traveled this road as a child
Wide eyed and grinning, she never tired
But now she won’t be coming back with the rest
If these are life’s lessons, she’ll take this test

[Repeat Chorus]
She knows the high stakes

As her folks drive away, her dad yells, “Check the oil!”
Mom stares out the window and says, “I’m leaving my girl”
She said, “It didn’t seem like that long ago”
When she stood there and let her own folks know

[Repeat Chorus]
She knows the highest stakes
She knows the highest stakes
She knows the highest stakes
She knows the highest stakes

Emerson’s First Step to Successful Living

DEVELOP SELF-RELIANCE

Be Who You Really Are

I will so trust that what is deep is holy, that I will do strongly before the sun and moon whatever inly rejoices me, and the heart appoints.
—“Self-Reliance”

Fear, Fear, and More Fear

We are afraid of truth, afraid of fortune, afraid of death, and afraid of each other.
—“Self-Reliance”

Approval Seeking: Our Psychic Plague

What I must do is all that concerns me, not what the people think.
—“Self-Reliance”

Conformity—the Roadblock to Self-Reliance

You will always find those who think they know what is your duty better than you know it. It is easy in the world to live after the world’s opinion; it is easy in solitude to live after our own; but the great man is he who in the midst of the crowd keeps with perfect sweetness the independence of solitude.
—“Self-Reliance”

The Danger of “Reactive” Nonconformity

Good and bad are but names very readily transferable to that or this; the only right is what is after my constitution, the only wrong what is against it.
—“Self-Reliance”

Conformity Drains Power

He who knows that power is inborn, that he is weak because he has looked for good out of him and elsewhere, and so perceiving, throws himself unhesitatingly on his thought, instantly rights himself, stands in the erect position, commands his limbs, works miracles.
—“Self-Reliance”

Free at Last

Nothing can bring you peace but yourself.
—“Self-Reliance”

Society’s Resistance to Self-Reliance

It is easy to see that a greater self-reliance must work a revolution in all the offices and relations of men; in their religion; in their education; in their pursuits; their modes of living; their association; in their property; in their speculative views.
—“Self-Reliance”

One Step at a Time

Nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of your own mind.
—“Self-Reliance”