I love this work. The more time I spend in the government, the more it seems to cheat me out of its promises and glory that it instilled in my head as a younger man. I feel more and more like HDT every day.
Big contradiciton between the two titles this essay is known by, “Resistance to Civil Government” and “Civil Disobedience”.
-Is there any true place in the entire essay that advocates peaceful and effective means to resisting the government and the evil things they do? (Other than not paying one poll tax?) I don't think there really is. I think that people like MLK Jr. and Ghandi took from this work what they needed and used it for themselves.
It is interesting to contrast the then and now of the political spectrum that HDT fought for and the fact that what he was then is considered the exact opposite of what it is today.
“If the injustice is part of the necessary friction of the machine of government, let it go, let it go: perchance it will wear smooth, ---certainly the machine will wear out. If the injustice has a spring, or a pulley, or a rope, or a crank, exclusively for itself, then perhaps you may consider whether the remedy will not be worse than the evil; but if it is of such a nature that it requires you to be the agent of injustice to another, then, I say, break the law.”
“Witness the present [Iraq] war, the work of comparatively a few individuals using the standing government which they have.”
What makes this more than just a simple hissy fit because he spent a night in jail?
He is proud of the experience he has received to be able to speak the things he speaks, it was the kick in the pants he needed to put these words on page that influenced some of the most famous rebels of our time. He is simply a person who speaks eloquently about the things he feels cheated on,
He pulls on the thoughts and ideas of many great thinkers.... Christ, Confucius..... even using Copernicus and Luther (265), with some almost verbatim quotes from Emerson..... to make his essay a legitimate, much needed part of our American history.
He knows that everyone that read this is not going to up and go against the state, he knows that it is a hard thing to do when you have no way of coming back from the decision of resistance that you have made. You can see this on 268 because he knows that you can't do it if you aren't willing to give it all for the purpose.
I believe he knew that this would affect the thoughts of many to come. He knew this was something worthy of fame, I really do.
Thursday, October 8, 2009
Emerson - “Self-Reliance”
“As men's prayers are a disease of the will, so are their creeds a disease of the intellect.”
“Their mind being whole, their eye is as yet unconquered, and when we look in their faces, we are disconcerted. Infancy conforms to nobody; all conform to it, so that one babe commonly makes four or five out of the adults who prattle and play to it.”
“Society everywhere is in conspiracy against the manhood of every one of its members.”
Lethe – Forgetfullness, Concealment
Lethal
Aletheia – Un-Forgetfullness, Un-concealment “truth” (Beginning to sound like a Sexson Children's Literature class.... Aletheiometer ;)
The myth, fable of the sot.
When great pressure is put upon you, you go out and become a sot.
“...,let us advance and advance on Chaos and the Dark.”
The sense of obliteration is a feeling we both welcome and fear.
“It seems to be a rule of wisdom never to rely on your memory alone, scarcely even in acts of pure memory, but bring the past for judgment into the thousand-eyed present, and live ever in a new day.”
“A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers and divines.”
What If we were to change it to, “A foolish consistency is the fear of little minds,...” does it make his words more clear or does it change it all together.
Walked in here on a whim. Reading Emerson on a whim. Walking around in a whim. We would never have to think, worry, about our first act, we would just do it.
“Their mind being whole, their eye is as yet unconquered, and when we look in their faces, we are disconcerted. Infancy conforms to nobody; all conform to it, so that one babe commonly makes four or five out of the adults who prattle and play to it.”
“Society everywhere is in conspiracy against the manhood of every one of its members.”
Lethe – Forgetfullness, Concealment
Lethal
Aletheia – Un-Forgetfullness, Un-concealment “truth” (Beginning to sound like a Sexson Children's Literature class.... Aletheiometer ;)
The myth, fable of the sot.
When great pressure is put upon you, you go out and become a sot.
“...,let us advance and advance on Chaos and the Dark.”
The sense of obliteration is a feeling we both welcome and fear.
“It seems to be a rule of wisdom never to rely on your memory alone, scarcely even in acts of pure memory, but bring the past for judgment into the thousand-eyed present, and live ever in a new day.”
“A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers and divines.”
What If we were to change it to, “A foolish consistency is the fear of little minds,...” does it make his words more clear or does it change it all together.
Walked in here on a whim. Reading Emerson on a whim. Walking around in a whim. We would never have to think, worry, about our first act, we would just do it.
Brownson vs. Ripley
Orestes Brownson - “The Laboring Classes”
In a very different direction than Ripley – he wants a drastic, bloody, destructive revolution rather than a peaceful, communitarion union that will come around slowly like Brook Farm.
Brownson wants us to ask ourselves if we are really that much better off by putting ourselves into the slavery of “the man”. He thinks we need to take a step back and do the labor for ourselves.
The Russian Revolution – On the tail end of World War 1, the reds rose up and attempted to abolish hereditary property. Brownson's believes come to light.
A very prophetic work. Amazingly accurate and knowing as to what would need to be done or happen when his thoughts came to light.
Ripley - “Brook Farm”
This very quickly became a plea for funds.... the economy of a union position does seem interesting though.
The fact there becomes more people in one area, you just cause more problems. Walden pond becomes a much more beautiful place when you are living by yourself and doing what you want, instead of whatever is good for the collective whole.
Promise lots of liberty while taking so much freedom.
Nathaniel Hawthorne did live there for the first year of the commune.
They talk about how this system is built to take away competitiveness, but we all know (as did Emerson) that there is always going to be competition.
Emerson and his farmer friend knew that good work would discontinue if the worker were not directly benefited.
- After reading the two, I think that Brownson actually knows more about the “unchanging laws of human nature” that Ripley does, even though Ripley is the one that talks about it. I believe that one of the only actual unchanging laws is that there will always be discourse, or abrasiveness, between any type of party. Thus, it is only human nature to destroy, rather than to live in peace. Brownson comes across as the one to live by, at least in these two readings.
***Walden Pond – July 4th, 1845!!***
In a very different direction than Ripley – he wants a drastic, bloody, destructive revolution rather than a peaceful, communitarion union that will come around slowly like Brook Farm.
Brownson wants us to ask ourselves if we are really that much better off by putting ourselves into the slavery of “the man”. He thinks we need to take a step back and do the labor for ourselves.
The Russian Revolution – On the tail end of World War 1, the reds rose up and attempted to abolish hereditary property. Brownson's believes come to light.
A very prophetic work. Amazingly accurate and knowing as to what would need to be done or happen when his thoughts came to light.
Ripley - “Brook Farm”
This very quickly became a plea for funds.... the economy of a union position does seem interesting though.
The fact there becomes more people in one area, you just cause more problems. Walden pond becomes a much more beautiful place when you are living by yourself and doing what you want, instead of whatever is good for the collective whole.
Promise lots of liberty while taking so much freedom.
Nathaniel Hawthorne did live there for the first year of the commune.
They talk about how this system is built to take away competitiveness, but we all know (as did Emerson) that there is always going to be competition.
Emerson and his farmer friend knew that good work would discontinue if the worker were not directly benefited.
- After reading the two, I think that Brownson actually knows more about the “unchanging laws of human nature” that Ripley does, even though Ripley is the one that talks about it. I believe that one of the only actual unchanging laws is that there will always be discourse, or abrasiveness, between any type of party. Thus, it is only human nature to destroy, rather than to live in peace. Brownson comes across as the one to live by, at least in these two readings.
***Walden Pond – July 4th, 1845!!***
Margaret Fuller Day!
Recollection of Mystical Experiences – She can not go back to having no point in life. She knew that she had great power, now she knows where its going.... how to use it.
Her original mystical experience happened after she left church, touched by God in nature, rather than in the presence of man.
Great Lawsuit – Can not move forward with society, societies gain, growth comes from the development, thinking of individual minds...
How can society move forward if it is holding the the development of half the society (i.e. the feminine mind)?
“Were this done, and a slight temporary fermentation allowed to subside, we believe that the Divine would ascend into nature to a height unknown in the history of past ages, and nature, thus instructed, would regulate the spheres not only so as to avoid collision, but to bring forth ravishing harmony.”
“No, because the position I early was enabled to take, was one of self-reliance.”
I think that he “Self-reliant, self-dependent” religion is a very modern idea. She has to be alone, she knows that the experience and relationship with God is all upon her and her alone, and the thought of by reaching into the all with herself she feels completed.
Even Fuller was criticized, in her day, for being more of a talker in her day than an activist.
American Literature
Calling for a type of independent thinking as a whole, not thoughts and books that imitate English thinking.... copying things that Emerson was saying, and that she was saying in prior works about thinking independently, and putting it towards literature.
Utopia – Emerson? Thoreau? Fuller (perfect ravishing harmony with the sexes without collision)?
Died on a boat 100 yards out to sea with her maybe husband and infant child. He was an Italian Revolutionary supporter.... she was a New York Times correspondent at the time.
Her original mystical experience happened after she left church, touched by God in nature, rather than in the presence of man.
Great Lawsuit – Can not move forward with society, societies gain, growth comes from the development, thinking of individual minds...
How can society move forward if it is holding the the development of half the society (i.e. the feminine mind)?
“Were this done, and a slight temporary fermentation allowed to subside, we believe that the Divine would ascend into nature to a height unknown in the history of past ages, and nature, thus instructed, would regulate the spheres not only so as to avoid collision, but to bring forth ravishing harmony.”
“No, because the position I early was enabled to take, was one of self-reliance.”
I think that he “Self-reliant, self-dependent” religion is a very modern idea. She has to be alone, she knows that the experience and relationship with God is all upon her and her alone, and the thought of by reaching into the all with herself she feels completed.
Even Fuller was criticized, in her day, for being more of a talker in her day than an activist.
American Literature
Calling for a type of independent thinking as a whole, not thoughts and books that imitate English thinking.... copying things that Emerson was saying, and that she was saying in prior works about thinking independently, and putting it towards literature.
Utopia – Emerson? Thoreau? Fuller (perfect ravishing harmony with the sexes without collision)?
Died on a boat 100 yards out to sea with her maybe husband and infant child. He was an Italian Revolutionary supporter.... she was a New York Times correspondent at the time.
The American Scholar - RWE
“It is one of those fables, which, out of an unknown antiquity, convey an unlooked-for wisdom, that the gods, in the beginning, divided Man into men, that he might be more helpful to himself; just as the hand was divided into fingers, the better to answer its end.
The old fable covers a doctrine ever new and sublime; that there is One Man,--present to all particular men only partially, or through one faculty; and that you must take the whole society to find the whole man. Man is not a farmer, or a professor, or an engineer, but he is all. Man is priest, and scholar, and statesman, and producer, and soldier. In the divided or social state, these functions are parceled out to individuals, each of whom aims to do his stint of the joint work, whilst each other performs his. The fable implies, that the individual, to possess himself, must sometimes return from his own labor to embrace all the other laborers. But unfortunately, this original unit, this fountain of power, has been so distributed to multitudes, has been so minutely subdivided and peddled out, that it is spilled into drops, and cannot be gathered. The state of society is one in which the members have suffered amputation from the trunk, and strut about so many walking monsters,--a good finger, a neck, a stomach, an elbow, but never a man. “
“The world is nothing, the man is all; in yourself is the law of all nature, and you know not yet how a globule of sap ascends; in yourself slumbers the whole of Reason; it is for you to know all, it is for you to dare all. “
“Success treads on every right step. For the instinct is sure, that prompts him to tell his brother what he thinks. He then learns, that in going down into the secrets of his own mind, he has descended into the secrets of all minds. He learns that he who has mastered any law in his private thoughts, is master to that extent of all men whose language he speaks, and of all into whose language his own can be translated. “
“Character is higher than intellect...A great soul will be strong to live, as well as strong to think.”
Wordsworth – “We come into the world trailing clouds of glory. “
The Transcendentalists brought the thought of us and everything coming from the perfect existence from the Romantics and on through history.
Everything is a remembrance of what we already know. We do not learn, we remember.
Emerson – He is Man Thinking.
What is Man Thinking?
It is the collaborative learning, thinking, (still individual but working towards the center) and nature and working as a whole where you are working as the hand, eye, or foot of the whole instead of the “parrot of other man's thinking”....
Make a work of art that is timeless. That is why Emerson calls for a book or piece of art that is “pure”.
Why do we rely on this? Why do we need someone to tell us how to think, what to do, even when they tell us not to do so?
I think they know it is better to walk your own path, but know that there are many who will not, so they take into their essays both of these thoughts and thus grapple with contradicting themes throughout what they are talking about.
The old fable covers a doctrine ever new and sublime; that there is One Man,--present to all particular men only partially, or through one faculty; and that you must take the whole society to find the whole man. Man is not a farmer, or a professor, or an engineer, but he is all. Man is priest, and scholar, and statesman, and producer, and soldier. In the divided or social state, these functions are parceled out to individuals, each of whom aims to do his stint of the joint work, whilst each other performs his. The fable implies, that the individual, to possess himself, must sometimes return from his own labor to embrace all the other laborers. But unfortunately, this original unit, this fountain of power, has been so distributed to multitudes, has been so minutely subdivided and peddled out, that it is spilled into drops, and cannot be gathered. The state of society is one in which the members have suffered amputation from the trunk, and strut about so many walking monsters,--a good finger, a neck, a stomach, an elbow, but never a man. “
“The world is nothing, the man is all; in yourself is the law of all nature, and you know not yet how a globule of sap ascends; in yourself slumbers the whole of Reason; it is for you to know all, it is for you to dare all. “
“Success treads on every right step. For the instinct is sure, that prompts him to tell his brother what he thinks. He then learns, that in going down into the secrets of his own mind, he has descended into the secrets of all minds. He learns that he who has mastered any law in his private thoughts, is master to that extent of all men whose language he speaks, and of all into whose language his own can be translated. “
“Character is higher than intellect...A great soul will be strong to live, as well as strong to think.”
Wordsworth – “We come into the world trailing clouds of glory. “
The Transcendentalists brought the thought of us and everything coming from the perfect existence from the Romantics and on through history.
Everything is a remembrance of what we already know. We do not learn, we remember.
Emerson – He is Man Thinking.
What is Man Thinking?
It is the collaborative learning, thinking, (still individual but working towards the center) and nature and working as a whole where you are working as the hand, eye, or foot of the whole instead of the “parrot of other man's thinking”....
Make a work of art that is timeless. That is why Emerson calls for a book or piece of art that is “pure”.
Why do we rely on this? Why do we need someone to tell us how to think, what to do, even when they tell us not to do so?
I think they know it is better to walk your own path, but know that there are many who will not, so they take into their essays both of these thoughts and thus grapple with contradicting themes throughout what they are talking about.
Another rough timeline - This time authorial dates
1836 - “Nature”
1837 - “Am. Scholar”
1839 – The Dial Founded (by RWE)
1841 - “Self-Reliance”
1840-2 – M.Fuller Edits the Dial
1837 - “Am. Scholar”
1839 – The Dial Founded (by RWE)
1841 - “Self-Reliance”
1840-2 – M.Fuller Edits the Dial
Spring, Conclusion – HDT
Looking at pictures of the pond...
Bigger than I thought it would be
Still maintains most of the integrity that it held when HDT lived there
The water looks quite nice
People come to the pond from all over to escape the city life.....
Trains coming through on the train, even seeing the pond for a second or two must enhance their day somehow.
HDT's little cabin replica is quite small..... has a little chimney on it, and the nice woodshed from left over materials..... three chairs, little stove, desk, and bed.
Shop at Walden Pond.... the true HDT fans probably think it's downright despicable.... must be why Ben says he's never been in....must not agree to the fact that there is a shop at the pond
Ben didn't want to go ruin his thought of the pond, and yet when he did he didn't find it as too much of a ruining thing.
The development of the pond could have been a lot worse... it's a compromise that the little bit of it has been developed, but kept as low as possible....
“I left the woods for as good a reason as I went there.”
Thoreau may have been in the audience of the Emerson speech at Harvard while he was giving it. That is something we must keep in mind while we read the novel.
It seems to me that Thoreau is telling us to reach high for our goals, “build a castle in the sky”, but to ensure that it does not come crashing down around us, make sure we build a foundation around these high reaching goals by putting a foot back into the conformity for a while.
You can not move forth from the medium until you have shown that you are its master. It's the same in life as it is in art. Nature mirrors the mind.
Bigger than I thought it would be
Still maintains most of the integrity that it held when HDT lived there
The water looks quite nice
People come to the pond from all over to escape the city life.....
Trains coming through on the train, even seeing the pond for a second or two must enhance their day somehow.
HDT's little cabin replica is quite small..... has a little chimney on it, and the nice woodshed from left over materials..... three chairs, little stove, desk, and bed.
Shop at Walden Pond.... the true HDT fans probably think it's downright despicable.... must be why Ben says he's never been in....must not agree to the fact that there is a shop at the pond
Ben didn't want to go ruin his thought of the pond, and yet when he did he didn't find it as too much of a ruining thing.
The development of the pond could have been a lot worse... it's a compromise that the little bit of it has been developed, but kept as low as possible....
“I left the woods for as good a reason as I went there.”
Thoreau may have been in the audience of the Emerson speech at Harvard while he was giving it. That is something we must keep in mind while we read the novel.
It seems to me that Thoreau is telling us to reach high for our goals, “build a castle in the sky”, but to ensure that it does not come crashing down around us, make sure we build a foundation around these high reaching goals by putting a foot back into the conformity for a while.
You can not move forth from the medium until you have shown that you are its master. It's the same in life as it is in art. Nature mirrors the mind.
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