Nature pg.

219-Ralph Waldo Emerson

Emerson uses Imagery (use of language to evoke a
picture or concrete sensation of a person, place, or
an experience) to discuss the joy that humans really
experience when they look at the natural world
around them.
Emerson believes that most people lose this sense of
wonder and delight as they age.
Those adults who never lose this sense of wonder,
remain youthful all their lives.
Humans and plants are part of the same natural
world, and our delight in nature comes from this
relationship.
Beauty and grandeur are not only in nature, but also
our perception and response to it.

Nature
What do adults lack that keeps them from seeing nature as
children do?
- In the woods, is perpetual youth.
- In the woods, we return to reason and faith.
- Children are still impressed with nature, with its beauty,
gifts, and wonder. Man ignores the stars, as they are out
every night. Man sees the sun in his eyes, but it shines into
the eye and the heart of a child.
-Few adult persons can see naturechildhood=simplicity=innocence=youth
** The currents of the Universal Being circulate through
me; I am part or particle of God. explain

Nature wears the colors of the spirit.

-Nature can reflect how youre feeling! there is a
kind of contempt of the landscape felt by him
who has just lost by death a dear friend. The sky
is less grand as it shuts down over less worth in
the population.
-If youre happy, nature can seem perfumed and
glittery. If youre sad, that same spot can seem
melancholy and sad.
-Its all in how you feel that day. Its your
perception.
Nature is a setting that fits equally well a comic
or a mourning piece.

Self Reliance pg. 224 Emerson

* Emerson makes a persuasive argument for
nonconformity and self-sufficiency, finds sanctity
in the individual mind, and calls upon us to
express ourselves strongly.
* Only WE know the best course of action for
OURSELVES.
* Each individual must find the divine presence at
work within.
* Only through NONCONFORMITY do people
become fully human.

Self-Reliance
Envy is ignorance; imitation is suicide
-man must accept himself for better or for worse.
-though the universe is good, you have to WORK for
what you want (till the land youre given)
-we but half express ourselveswe deny our true
gifts/ideas, etc.
Whoso would be a man must be a non-conformist
-nothing is sacred but the integrity of your own mind.
-speak what you think now in hard words, tomorrow,
speak what tomorrow thinks in hard words again!
(though it may contradict everything you say today)
-consistency is bad-you might as well be a shadow on
the wall!

To be great is to be misunderstood
-is it so bad to be misunderstood?
-Pythagoras, Socrates, Jesus, Galileo, etc. were all
misunderstood! Its okay! Your ideas might not be
popular, well received, or understood at first, but
neither were these people!
Emerson promoted individualism in EVERY WAY!
Individual thoughts, individual work, individual
perceptions, etc.
**Trust thyself: Every heart vibrates to that iron
string.explain**

Still transcending Civil Disobedience and Letter

from Birmingham Jail
1. Thoreaus essay begins with a paradox. How can a
government be best which governs not at all?
*Thoreau states the government can respect the rights of the
individual conscience. It can trust its citizens to do what they
believe is right. Today, many people feel that government
should interfere less than it does in individuals lives and
businesses.
*The government itself, which is the only mode the people
have chosen to execute their will, is equally liable to be
abused and perverted before the people can act through it.
*It does not keep the country free. It does not settle the West.
It does not educate. The character inherent in the American
people has done all that has been accomplished; and it
would have done somewhat more, if the government had
not sometimes got in its way.

2. What is Thoreau saying about people who passively

accept government actions with which they dont agree?

*To annotate, Thoreau believes most people go

through their lives without thinking seriously about
the morality of their lives.
*He thinks they blindly follow rules and blindly
condemn people like him who disrupt societys
status quo.
*He is angry that his neighbors support the
government that jailed him for an act of conscience.
*People could refuse pay certain taxes and thus not
receive government benefits-but still be honest,
kind, and patriotic citizens.

3. Thoreau spends the night in jail instead of paying a tax.

What does he believe his tax money will go towards and
therefore chooses a night in jail?

He refuses to pay a poll tax which was collected in order to let one
vote.
Witness the present Mexican war, the work of comparatively a few
individuals using the standing government as their tool; for, in the
outset, the people would not have consented to this measure.
Thoreau believes the Mexican war is an effort to expand our territory
south and therefore expand our slavery.
For tomorrow: Thoreaus view on slavery
His primary act of civil disobedience in his own life
His opinion on the right to rebel against ones government
What is the appropriate way to respond to unjust laws
What he learned from his night in jail
Refuses to sit on another mans shoulders
State he imagines at the end of the essay

4. What does Dr. King define as an unjust law?

An unjust law is not law at all

An unjust law is a code that is out of harmony with the
moral law
Its a code inflicted upon a minority which that minority
had no part in enacting or creating because they did
not have the unhampered right to vote.
One who breaks an unjust law must do it openly,
lovingly, and with a willingness to accept the penalty.
An individual who breaks a law that conscience tells him
is unjust, and willingly accepts the penalty by staying in
jail to arouse the conscience of the community over tis
injustice, is in reality expressing the very highest
respect for the law.

5. Please list 3 parallels between Dr. Kings

letter and Thoreaus essay.
-Both believe in civil disobedience or peaceful protest
-Spend the night in jail
-Jailed because they are fighting against slavery
-Voicing concern about their conscience
-Mention voting and government creating laws that
the majority of citizens do not believe in!

Characteristics of Transcendentalism
Thoreau:
Believes the man in prison is an honest man. Thoreau believes
in the goodness of man. He is being honest about his crime,
why wouldnt the other prisoner?
Thoreau criticizes his neighbors for being passive, or a part of a
swarm or mass, they need to be individuals!
Notice he did not feel imprisoned in jail. His body is in prison,
but his thoughts and imagination are free. Unlike his fellow
citizens, physical confinement does not worry him. He even
looks out the window and imagines the town of Concord as a
medieval town.
There will never be a really free and enlightened State, until
the State comes to recognize the individual as a higher and
independent power, from which all its own power and
authority are derived, and treats him accordingly.