| idealist | visionary |
|---|---|
| utopian | romanticist |
| fantasist | fantasizer |
| fantast | pipe-dreamer |
| romancer | castle-builder |
What is a simple definition of transcendentalism?
Transcendentalism is a very formal word that describes a very simple idea. People, men and women equally, have knowledge about themselves and the world around them that "transcends" or goes beyond what they can see, hear, taste, touch or feel.
What is modern transcendentalism?
Transcendentalism is a literary and philosophical movement based on the idea that a spiritual reality transcends the empirical and scientific. This movement, also known as the American renaissance, lasted from 1840 to 1860. It focused on the ideals of nature non conformity and individualism.
What is the root meaning of transcendentalism?
Transcendentalism comes from the Latin word transcendere, which means to "climb over or beyond." Founders of the American transcendentalism movement were indeed trying to "climb beyond" traditional empirical thinking, favoring instead a person's intuition and natural spirituality.
What are some examples of transcendentalism?
An example of transcendentalism is the belief that man is at this best when he is independent, and not a part of organized religion or politics. An example of transcendentalism is the quote "a man in debt is so far a slave" by Ralph Waldo Emerson.
Does transcendentalism still exist today?
Transcendentalism still exist today in many different ways. You may not even realize it because it blends and comes so easily to us in our everyday lives. We have found evidence of the influence of transcendentalist ideas in popular songs, commercials, and even video games.
What are the basic beliefs of transcendentalism?
Transcendentalists advocated the idea of a personal knowledge of God, believing that no intermediary was needed for spiritual insight. They embraced idealism, focusing on nature and opposing materialism.
What are the 5 elements of transcendentalism?
The 5 Characteristics of TranscendentalismSimplistic Living. ... Self-Reliance. ... Importance of Nature. ... Spirituality. ... Spirituality. ... Simplistic Living. ... Self-Reliance.
Is transcendentalism a religion?
Transcendentalism is not a religion per se; it is more like a collection of philosophical and theological thought, an intellectual and a spiritual movement that emphasizes the goodness of nature and the independence of humanity. However, during the 1830s, they became an organized group.
What led to transcendentalism?
Clearly, Emerson and Parker both envisioned true religion as a personal rather than an institutional connection with the divine. A third reason for the rise of Transcendentalism was the increasing interest in and availability of foreign literature and philosophy after 1800.
What are 3 characteristics of transcendentalism?
Transcendentalists believed in numerous values, however they can all be condensed into three basic, essential values: individualism, idealism, and the divinity of nature.
Who is a modern transcendentalist?
In the 1830s, the philosophy of Transcendentalism arose in New England. Some of its most famous adherents, including Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau, are still regarded as leading American thinkers today.
What are the 5 characteristics of Transcendentalism?
The 5 Characteristics of TranscendentalismSimplistic Living. ... Self-Reliance. ... Importance of Nature. ... Spirituality. ... Spirituality. ... Simplistic Living. ... Self-Reliance.
What is New England Transcendentalism?
Transcendentalism is a philosophical movement that developed in the late 1820s and 1830s in New England. A core belief is in the inherent goodness of people and nature, and while society and its institutions have corrupted the purity of the individual, people are at their best when truly "self-reliant" and independent.
What is Transcendentalism in American literature?
Transcendentalism is a 19th-century movement of writers and philosophers in New England who were loosely bound together by adherence to an idealistic system of thought based on a belief in the essential unity of all creation, the innate goodness of humanity, and the supremacy of insight over logic and experience for ...
What is Transcendentalism?
Transcendentalism is a 19th-century movement of writers and philosophers in New England who were loosely bound together by adherence to an idealist...
Which authors were attracted to Transcendentalism?
Transcendentalism attracted such diverse and highly individualistic figures as Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, Margaret Fuller, Orestes B...
What inspired Transcendentalism?
The 19th-century Transcendentalism movement was inspired by German transcendentalism, Platonism and Neoplatonism, the Indian and Chinese scriptures...
What is transcendentalism based on?
Transcendentalism, 19th-century movement of writers and philosophers in New England who were loosely bound together by adherence to an idealistic system of thought based on belief in the essential unity of all creation, the innate goodness of humanity, and the supremacy of insight over logic and experience.
Where did Transcendentalism originate?
Eclectic and cosmopolitan in its sources and part of the Romantic movement, New England Transcendentalism originated in the area around Concord, Massachusetts, and from 1830 to 1855 represented a battle between the younger and older generations and the emergence of a new national culture based on native materials.
Who were the transcendentalists?
Other important transcendentalists were Henry David Thoreau, Margaret Fuller, Lydia Maria Child, Amos Bronson Alcott, Frederic Henry Hedge, Elizabeth Palmer Peabody, and Theodore Parker. Stimulated by English and German Romanticism, the Biblical criticism of Herder and Schleiermacher, and the skepticism of Hume, the transcendentalists operated with the sense that a new era was at hand. They were critics of their contemporary society for its unthinking conformity, and urged that each person find, in Emerson’s words, “an original relation to the universe” (O, 3). Emerson and Thoreau sought this relation in solitude amidst nature, and in their writing. By the 1840s they, along with other transcendentalists, were engaged in the social experiments of Brook Farm, Fruitlands, and Walden; and, by the 1850s in an increasingly urgent critique of American slavery.
What is transcendentalism? What are its origins?
What we now know as transcendentalism first arose among the liberal New England Congregationalists, who departed from orthodox Calvinism in two respects: they believed in the importance and efficacy of human striving, as opposed to the bleaker Puritan picture of complete and inescapable human depravity; and they emphasized the unity rather than the “Trinity” of God (hence the term “Unitarian,” originally a term of abuse that they came to adopt.) Most of the Unitarians held that Jesus was in some way inferior to God the Father but still greater than human beings; a few followed the English Unitarian Joseph Priestley (1733–1804) in holding that Jesus was thoroughly human, although endowed with special authority. The Unitarians’ leading preacher, William Ellery Channing (1780–1842), portrayed orthodox Congregationalism as a religion of fear, and maintained that Jesus saved human beings from sin, not just from punishment. His sermon “Unitarian Christianity” (1819) denounced “the conspiracy of ages against the liberty of Christians” (P, 336) and helped give the Unitarian movement its name. In “Likeness to God” (1828) he proposed that human beings “partake” of Divinity and that they may achieve “a growing likeness to the Supreme Being” (T, 4).
How does Emerson keep his distance from the transcendentalists?
Emerson keeps his distance from the transcendentalists in his essay by speaking always of what “they” say or do, despite the fact that he was regarded then and is regarded now as the leading transcendentalist. He notes with some disdain that the transcendentalists are “’not good members of society,” that they do not work for “the abolition of the slave-trade” (though both these charges have been leveled at him). He closes the essay nevertheless with a defense of the transcendentalist critique of a society pervaded by “a spirit of cowardly compromise and seeming, which intimates a frightful skepticism, a life without love, and an activity without an aim” (O, 106). This critique is Emerson’s own in such writings as “Self-Reliance,” and “The American Scholar”; and it finds a powerful and original restatement in the “Economy” chapter of Thoreau’s Walden.
Who was the founder of the Transcendental Club?
Hedge organized what eventually became known as the Transcendental Club, by suggesting to Emerson in 1836 that they form a discussion group for disaffected young Unitarian clergy. The group included George Ripley and Bronson Alcott, had some 30 meetings in four years, and was a sponsor of The Dial and Brook Farm.
What was James Marsh's contribution to transcendentalism?
James Marsh (1794–1842), a graduate of Andover and the president of the University of Vermont, was equally important for the emerging philosophy of transcendentalism. Marsh was convinced that German philosophy held the key to a reformed theology. His American edition of Coleridge’s Aids to Reflection (1829) introduced Coleridge’s version—much indebted to Schelling—of Kantian terminology, terminology that runs throughout Emerson’s early work. In Nature, for example, Emerson writes: “The Imagination may be defined to be, the use which the Reason makes of the material world” (O, 25).
What are the transcendentalists?
Transcendentalists desire to ground their religion and philosophy in principles based upon the German Romanticism of Johann Gottfried Herder and Friedrich Schleiermacher. Transcendentalism merged "English and German Romanticism, the Biblical criticism of Herder and Schleiermacher, the skepticism of Hume ", and the transcendental philosophy of Immanuel Kant (and of German Idealism more generally), interpreting Kant's a priori categories as a priori knowledge. Early transcendentalists were largely unacquainted with German philosophy in the original and relied primarily on the writings of Thomas Carlyle, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Victor Cousin, Germaine de Staël, and other English and French commentators for their knowledge of it. The transcendental movement can be described as an American outgrowth of English Romanticism.
What is transcendentalism in philosophy?
Transcendentalism emphasizes subjective intuition over objective empiricism. Adherents believe that individuals are capable of generating completely original insights with little attention and deference to past masters. It arose as a reaction, to protest against the general state of intellectualism and spirituality at the time.
How is transcendentalism related to Unitarianism?
Transcendentalism is closely related to Unitarianism, the dominant religious movement in Boston in the early nineteenth century. It started to develop after Unitarianism took hold at Harvard University, following the elections of Henry Ware as the Hollis Professor of Divinity in 1805 and of John Thornton Kirkland as President in 1810. Transcendentalism was not a rejection of Unitarianism; rather, it developed as an organic consequence of the Unitarian emphasis on free conscience and the value of intellectual reason. The transcendentalists were not content with the sobriety, mildness, and calm rationalism of Unitarianism. Instead, they longed for a more intense spiritual experience. Thus, transcendentalism was not born as a counter-movement to Unitarianism, but as a parallel movement to the very ideas introduced by the Unitarians.
What are the influences of transcendentalism?
Transcendentalism emerged from "English and German Romanticism, the Biblical criticism of Johann Gottfried Herder and Friedrich Schleiermacher, the skepticism of David Hume ", and the transcendental philosophy of Immanuel Kant and German Idealism. Miller and Versluis regard Emanuel Swedenborg and Jakob Böhme as pervasive influences on transcendentalism. It was also strongly influenced by Hindu texts on philosophy of the mind and spirituality, especially the Upanishads .
What is the transcendentalist view of nature?
Transcendentalists have a deep gratitude and appreciation for nature, not only for aesthetic purposes, but also as a tool to observe and understand the structured inner workings of the natural world. Emerson emphasizes the Transcendental beliefs in the holistic power of the natural landscape in Nature:
What is the conservation of an undisturbed natural world?
The conservation of an undisturbed natural world is also extremely important to the Transcendentalists. The idealism that is a core belief of Transcendentalism results in an inherent skepticism of capitalism, westward expansion, and industrialization.
What is the transcendence of the spirit?
Notably, the transcendence of the spirit, most often evoked by the poet's prosaic voice, is said to endow in the reader a sense of purpose. This is the underlying theme in the majority of transcendentalist essays and papers—all of which are centered on subjects which assert a love for individual expression.
Why does the transcendentalist believe his ideas to be self-transcendent?
The transcendentalist believes his ideas to be self-transcendent only because he finds that in fact they do bear fruits. There are passages in his Concord diary in which he refers to the itinerant transcendentalist in no very sympathetic manner. But then he was a transcendentalist and an intellectual anarch.
Is "transcendentalist" a synonym for "enthusiast"?
The word "Transcendentalist" ceased to be a synonym for " enthusiast."
Is Carlyle a transcendentalist?
Carlyle is described as a 'transcendentalist'—a kind of qualified equivalent to intuitionist. THE LIFE OF SIR JAMES FITZJAMES STEPHEN, BART., K.C.S.I. SIR LESLIE STEPHEN. Proof seems to him, as it did to the contemporary Transcendentalist philosophers, an impertinence. THE AMERICAN MIND BLISS PERRY.
What is transcendentalism?
Transcendentalism is a 19th-century school of American theological and philosophical thought that combined respect for nature and self-sufficiency with elements of Unitarianism and German Romanticism. Writer Ralph Waldo Emerson was the primary practitioner of the movement, which existed loosely in Massachusetts in the early 1800s before becoming an organized group in the 1830s.
Where did transcendentalism originate?
Transcendentalism has its origins in New England of the early 1800s and the birth of Unitarianism . It was born from a debate between “New Light” theologians, who believed that religion should focus on an emotional experience, and “Old Light” opponents, who valued reason in their religious approach.
When did transcendentalism lose its influence?
As the 1850s arrived, Transcendentalism is considered to have lost some of its influence, particularly following the untimely death of Margaret Fuller in an 1850 shipwreck.
When did the Transcendentalist experiment end?
By 1847, this particular Transcendentalist experiment was finished.
What was the purpose of the letter to Hodge and Emerson?
The purpose was to follow up on correspondence between Hodge and Emerson and to talk about the state of Unitarianism and what they could do about it.
What Is Transcendentalism?
It’s all about spirituality. Transcendentalism is a philosophy that began in the mid-19th century and whose founding members included Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau . It centers around the belief that spirituality cannot be achieved through reason and rationalism, but instead through self-reflection and intuition. In other words, transcendentalists believe spirituality isn’t something you can explain; it’s something you feel. A transcendentalist would argue that going for a walk in a beautiful place would be a much more spiritual experience than reading a religious text.
What was the most shocking aspect of transcendentalism?
For most people, the most shocking aspect of transcendentalism was that it promoted individual spirituality over churches and other aspects of organized religion. Religion was the cornerstone of many people’s lives at this time, and any movement that told them it was corrupting and to give it up would have been unfathomable to many.
Why did the transcendentalist movement start?
The transcendentalism movement arose as a result of a reaction to Unitarianism as well as the Age of Reason.
What are the three main values of the transcendentalist movement?
The transcendentalist movement encompassed many beliefs, but these all fit into their three main values of individualism, idealism, and the divinity of nature.
Who felt that transcendentalism ignored the importance of community bonds?
Many people, even some transcendentalists like Margaret Fuller , felt that transcendentalism at times ignored the importance of community bonds and over-emphasized the need to rely on no one but one’s self, to the point of irresponsibility and destructiveness.
Who organized the Transcendental Club?
In September 1836, Ralph Waldo Emerson organized the first meeting of what would later be called the Transcendental Club. Together the group discussed frustrations of Unitarianism and their main beliefs, drawing on ideas from Romanticism, German philosophers, and the Hindu spiritual texts the Upanishads.
What is Emerson's most important contribution to the transcendental movement?
The day before he published his essay “Nature” he invited a group of his friends to join the “Transcendental Club” a meeting of like-minded individuals to discuss their beliefs. He continued to host club meetings, write essays, and give speeches to promote transcendentalism. Some of his most important transcendentalist essays include “The Over-Soul,” “Self-Reliance,” “The American Scholar” and “Divinity School Address.”
Origins and Character
- What we now know as transcendentalism first arose among the liberalNew England Congregationalists, who departed from orthodox Calvinismin two respects: they believed in the importance and efficacy of humanstriving, as opposed to the bleaker Puritan picture of complete andinescapable human depravity; and they emphasized the unity rather thanthe “Tri...
High Tide: The Dial, Fuller, Thoreau
- The transcendentalists had several publishing outlets: at firstThe Christian Examiner, then, after the furor over the“Divinity School Address,” The Western Messenger(1835–41) in St Louis, then the Boston Quarterly Review(1838–44). The Dial (1840–4) was a special case,for it was planned and instituted by the members of the TranscendentalClub, with Margaret Fuller (1810–50) as th…
Social and Political Critiques
- The transcendentalists operated from the start with the sense that thesociety around them was seriously deficient: a “mass” of“bugs or spawn” as Emerson put it in “The AmericanScholar”; slavedrivers of themselves, as Thoreau says inWalden. Thus the attraction of alternative life-styles:Alcott’s ill-fated Fruitlands; Brook Farm, planned and organizedby the Transcendental Clu…