The American Scholar by Emerson

The American Scholar by Ralph Waldo Emerson In the essay the American Scholar, Emerson portrays the scholar as a person who learns from three main things. These things by which a scholar is educated are by nature, by books (the past) and by action. Emerson uses nature as a comparison to the human mind where he states, “There is never a beginning, there is never an end to the inexplicable continuity of this web of …

…scholar without the heroic mind.”(299) Emerson wants the scholar to learn but question everything. “The true scholar grudges every opportunity of action past by, as a loss of power.”(300) Emerson also places a value on action. “The final value of action…is, that it is a resource.”(301) Through action man has transformed himself into Man Thinking. “The mind now thinks; now acts; and each fit reproduces the other…he has always the resource to live.”(301)