"He who puts off impurity, thereby puts on purity." -Ralph Waldo Emerson, The Divinity School Address pg 104
I really liked this quote. I feel like this really shows what it takes to be pure and good. Instead of making that seem like a huge unconquerable task, which is how i feel most people look at it as, he makes doing whats right, easy. I think that in this quote he might be saying that man as he or she is created is pure and the things that make man impure are his or her own wrong doings, conscious bad decisions and fighting intuition. I think Emerson is saying that the natural creation of man is good and pure. If there is a man who grows up outside of civilization in nature will know what is good and will do things that are right. Also like i was saying in the beginning the way that Emerson words this particular quote there is such ease and flow. What it is telling you to do all of the sudden doesn't seem so bad. It seems like everything is right and good you just have to not be bad. Most people have a pretty strong sense of what is wrong. All you have to do to be right or good is not be bad. That is a pretty simple concept and i can really appreciate this quote.
Iris,
ReplyDeleteGreat post! I love that you not only respond to Emerson's 'meaning' here (which I think you parse nicely), but also to his style and structure (the "ease and flow" of which you write). You're right to identify the 'Romantic' impulses here that also inform Rousseau's image of the 'Noble Savage' and to point out that Emerson's belief seems to be that, left to our own devices 9and under the influence of nature) our tendency is always to the good. The bad, by contrast, seems to be something that we have to actively choose. Again, thanks for an insightful post!