The Active Life

In Emerson's address, "The American Scholar," he outlines the three major ways in which he believes a scholar should be educated: "by nature, by books, and by action." He exhorts his audience to not consider themselves mere thinkers but rather "Men Thinking" (or "humans thinking", if he had lived in our linguistically inclusive world). Emerson wants the scholars of his day to nurture active souls, which see and utter absolute truth, create, and do not rely solely on past ideas in the continued search for brilliance and revelation. I found it interesting that Emerson places high importance on scholars getting out and living life, being "covetous of action" and not wasting the precious daylight studying "other men's transcripts of their readings" when they themselves "can read God directly."

Emerson writes:
"Action is with the scholar subordinate, but it is essential. Without it, he is not yet man. Without it, thought can never ripen into truth. Whilst the world hangs before the eye as a cloud of beauty, we cannot even see its beauty. Inaction is cowardice, but there can be no scholar without the heroic mind. The preamble of thought, the transition through which it passes from the unconscious to the conscious, is action. Only so much do I know, as I have lived. Instantly we know whose words are loaded with life, and whose not."

and

"If it were only for a vocabulary, the scholar would be covetous of action. Life is our dictionary. Years are well spent in country labors; in town, -- in the insight into trades and manufactures; in frank intercourse with many men and women; in science; in art; to the other end of mastering in all their facts a language by which to illustrate and embody our perceptions. I learn immediately from any speaker how much he has already lived, through the poverty or splendor of his speech."

I really tend to resonate with Emerson's insistence on the dual worth of an active and contemplative life. So often our mental image of a scholar or a writer is that of a person chained to his desk or library table, pouring over books and manuscripts: the stereotypical recluse. Yet, Emerson seems to believe that living life and interacting with people and nature are essential to the scholar's ability to perceive. In the moment in which we are living life, we are unable to know the meaning of what we are feeling and absorbing. It is only later, in contemplation, that that truth begins to take form and observation unfolds into insight. Emerson says that without action, a scholar is "not yet man" and that "the true scholar grudges every opportunity of action passed by, as a loss of power." Perhaps then, our shared humanity is only understood in our experiences and our action; only in these moments are the farmers linked to the tradesmen, and the priests, and attorneys, and mechanics, and sailors. Once scholars takes their places in "the ring to suffer and work", they begin to assume the necessary vocabulary of life lived in order to fulfill their roles as seers, thinkers, and creators.

My personal vision of how scholars, poets, or writers become thinking men and women who provide words of beauty and truth is much aligned with Emerson's. I believe that the American scholar should not only set out to study, but also to garner as many life experiences as possible. Scholars should be drooling for opportunities to travel, to challenge their world view, to meet people from every different station of life, to hold various occupations, to daily place themselves in new and stretching settings in order that their words might possess profound perspective. I also believe that in the United States we tend to narrowly define the sectors of society, or the types of people, that we can learn from. While intellectuals, experts, and historical greats encompass an invaluable base of knowledge, often the people that we least expect to learn from provide us with the most piercing words of wisdom: children, the homeless and disenfranchised, the mentally ill or disabled, etc. So, if I were writing a similar address concerning the modern American scholar, I would, like Emerson, encourage a life of action, but I would also stress a keen attention to our potential to learn from every single person that we encounter.