"Self-Reliance": Passages for Textual Analysis

Pages 182 to 185: Emerson's numbered list, beginning  "1. In what prayers do men allow themselves ... and ending with "bullet point" #4 on page 185. (At least I think it end on page 185, it's a legitimate question as to exactly where this section ends!).

Pages 186 ("Society is a wave") until the end of the essay.

Missing Epigraphs to "Self-Reliance"

For whatever reason, the editors of Great Conversations I omitted the Latin saying and the two pieces of poetry that preface Emerson's essay "Self-Reliance" in other editions.  I offer them below. Whoever can give us a translation of the Latin at our meeting on Monday gets a prize.

"Ne te quaesiveris extra."

"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."
           Epilogue to Beaumont and Fletcher's Honest Man's Fortune

Cast the bantling on the rocks,
Suckle him with the she-wolf's teat;
Wintered with the hawk and fox,
Power and speed be hands and feet.

Where's Waldo?

Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882)

According to the chronology of Ralph Waldo Emerson's life contained in the Library of America edition of his Essays and Lectures, Emerson decided in his junior year at Harvard that he wanted to be known as "Waldo," not "Ralph." Hence the title of the present "Author of the Month" post.

"Where's Waldo?" It's a good question, just as last month we might have asked "Where's Blaise?" How do we situate the "greats." We learn in school that Emerson was (a) a minister, (b) the first American intellectual of international caliber, (c) an American Romantic (Romanticist?), (d) a Transcendentalist.  In these two latter capacities he influenced Henry David Thoreau and the great son of Huntington, Walt Whitman, among many others.

We also know he published a number of essays that became famous, such as "Nature," "Compensation," and this month's selection, "Self-Reliance." Emerson is a disciple of Montaigne in that regard. I believe, however, that Emerson deserves to be received as a preacher delivering an inspiring sermon, as he was at one time at the Unitarian Second Church in Boston.

I would recommend that you seek out a sound recording of "Self-Reliance" and give it a listen. It just might afford a different take on Emerson's deep thoughts and beautiful language. If you find Waldo, tell us where.