Transcendental Ideas: Definitionsm
Towards a Definition
of Transcendentalism: A Few Comments
Henry David Gray, from Emerson:
A Statement of N. E. Transcendentalism as Expressed in the Philosophy of
Its Chief Exponent, 1917
1. "The spirit of the time is in every
form a protest against usage and a search for principles." - Emerson in
the opening number of The Dial.
2. "I was given to understand that whatever
was unintelligible would be certainly Transcendental." - Charles Dickens
in American Notes
3. "I should have told them at once that
I was a transcendentalist. That would have been the shortest way of telling
them that they would not understand my explanations." - Thoreau, Journal,
V:4
4. "The word Transcendentalism, as used
at the present day, has two applications. One of which is popular and indefinite,
the other, philosophical and precise. In the former sense it describes
man, rather than opinions, since it is freely extended to those who hold
opinions, not only diverse from each other, but directly opposed." - Noah
Porter, 1842
5. Transcendentalism is the recognition
in man of the capacity of knowing truth intuitively, or of attaining a
scientific knowledge of an order of existence transcending the reach of
the senses, and of which we can have no sensible experience." - J. A. Saxton,
Dial II: 90
6. "Literally a passing beyond all media
in the approach to the Deity, Transcendentalism contained an effort to
establish, mainly by the discipline of the intuitive faculty, direct intercourse
between the soul and God." - Charles J. Woodbury in Talks with Ralph Waldo
Emerson
7. "Transcendentalism was not ...
speculative, but essentially practical and reformatory." - John Orr in
"The Transcendentalism of New England," International Review, XIII:
390
8. "Transcendentalism was a distinct philosophical
system. Practically it was an assertion of the inalienable worth of man;
theoretically it was an assertion of the immanence of divinity in instinct,
the transference of supernatural attributes to the natural constitution
of mankind. ... Transcendentalism is usually spoken of as a philosophy.
It is more justly regarded as a gospel. As a philosophy it is ... so far
from uniform, that it may rather be considered several systems than one.
... Transcendentalism was ... an enthusiasm, a wave of sentiment, a breath
of mind." - O. B. Frothingham in Transcendentalism in New England,
1876
9. "The problem of transcendental philosophy
is no less than this, to revise the experience of mankind and try its teachings
by the nature of mankind, to test ethics by conscience, science by reason;
to try the creeds of the churches, the constitution of the states, by the
constitution of the universe." - Theodore Parker in Works VI: 37
10. "We feel it to be a solemn duty to
warn our readers, and in our measure, the public, against this German atheism,
which the spirit of darkness is employing ministers of the gospel to smuggle
in among us under false pretenses." Princeton Review XII: 71
11. "Protestantism ends in Transcendentalism."
- Orestes Brownson in Works, 209
12. "The fundamentals of Transcendentalism
are to be felt as sentiments, or grasped by the imagination as poetical
wholes, rather than set down in propositions." - Cabot, A Memoir of
Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1887, I: 248
13. "First and foremost, it can only be
rightly conceived as an intellectual, aesthetic, and spiritual ferment,
not a strictly reasoned doctrine. It was a renaissance of conscious, living
faith in the power of reason, in the reality of spiritual insight, in the
privilege, beauty, and glory of life." - Frances Tiffany, "Transcendentalism:
The New England Renaissance," Unitarian Review, XXXI: 111.
14. "The Transcendentalist adopts the
whole connection of spiritual doctrine. ... If there is anything grand
or daring in human thought or virtue, any reliance on the vast, the unknown;
any presentiment, any extravagance of faith, the spiritualist adopts it
as most in nature. The oriental mind has always tended to this largeness.
Buddhism is an expression of it. The Buddhist ... is a Transcendentalist.
... Shall we say then that Transcendentalism is the Saturnalia or excess
of Faith; the presentiment of a faith proper to man in his integrity, excessive
only when his imperfect obedience hinders the satisfaction of his wish?"
- Ralph Waldo Emerson's lecture on "The Transcendentalist," Works
I: 317-320
15. "(Transcendentalism was) a blending
of Platonic metaphysics and the Puritan spirit, of a philosophy and a character
... taking place at a definite time, in a specially fertilized soil, under
particular conditions." - H. C. Goddard, Studies in New England Transcendentalism,
1908.
16. "If I were a Bostonian, I think I
would be a Transcendentalist." - Charles Dickens in American Notes
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