Nature Themes

Emerson was a thought leader of the Transcendentalist movement, and his 1836 essay “Nature” was a founding document that outlines many of the movement’s tenets. The concept of unity—that all people and things are interconnected—is central to Transcendentalism, and Emerson focuses on the idea that people in his time (the early 19th century) have lost sight of this. In “Nature,” he proposes that nature, humanity, and the spiritual world are all animated and united by…

In “Nature,” Emerson stresses that while humankind used to enjoy a close, pure, harmonious connection to nature, this is no longer the case. Individuals and society as a whole have become corrupted, largely because people have become disconnected from their own intuition, spirituality, and sense of morality. But Emerson suggests that nature can heal humanity on both small and large scales. This starts on an individual level: if people spend more time in nature, it…

Much of “Nature” is about how people are disconnected from themselves and from nature, and how they must consequently spend time in nature to fix their current corrupted state. But Emerson takes his argument a step further by outlining how, exactly, he thinks people should study, interact with, and learn from nature in order to become whole again. He suggests that, when it comes to learning about (or from) nature, people rely too heavily on…