The American Scholar; Self-Reliance. Compensation

Ralph Waldo Emerson poet essayist and philosopher was born in Boston May 25 1803. He was the second of five sons of the Rev. William Emerson minister of the First (Congregational) Church in Boston. His mother was Ruth Haskins a woman of strong character and superior mental abilities. He had a minister for an ancestor for eight generations back either on the paternal or the maternal side. Thus he inherited his spiritual and intellectual tendencies from a long line of distinguished progenitors. His aunt Mary Moody Emerson a woman of rare intellectual attainments was one of his early companions and exerted a remarkable influence over his development.. Emerson began his studies at the public grammar school at the age of eight and four years later he attended the Latin School. In 1817 he entered Harvard. He was not distinguished for proficiency in the studies of the curriculum but he was superior to most of his classmates in his knowledge of general literature. He was especially interested in the study of Greek and history and much of his time was spent in the library. He graduated in 1821.. For five years after leaving college Emerson taught school. In 1823 he began to study for the ministry under Dr. Channing. He was approbated to preach in 1826 by the Middlesex Association of Ministers but owing to ill health he did not enter immediately upon his public duties but spent the following winter in Florida. On his return from the South he preached in New Bedford Northampton Concord and Boston. On March n 1829 he was ordained as a colleague of the Rev. Henry Ware minister of the Second (Congregational Unitarian) Church in Boston. Eighteen months later Dr. Ware resigned and the pastoral duties fell upon Emerson.. In September 1829 he was married to Miss Ellen Louisa Tucker. Their married life was brief as Mrs. Emerson died of consumption in February 1832.. Emerson soon became troubled with doubts regarding his duties as a minister and as sincerity was always his guiding star he felt it his duty to proclaim these doubts to his congregation. Accordingly in September 1832 he delivered a sermon on the Lords Supper in which he stated his scruples against administering that rite. As he and his congregation differed radically in these views he resigned his pastorate and retired from public preaching.. In 1833 he visited Europe for the first time. There he met Coleridge Wordsworth and Carlyle and formed with the lastnamed a lifelong friendship which resulted in their famous correspondence.. In the winter of 1833-34 he returned to the United States and began his career as a lecturer. At this period of his life he lived with Dr. Ripley in the Old Manse afterwards made famous by Hawthorne. The first lectures he delivered were Water and The Relation of Man to the Globe. These were followed by three lectures on his European tour.. In 1834 he began his series of biographical lectures on Michael Angelo Milton Luther George Fox and Edmund Burke. Those on Michael Angelo and George Fox were published later in the North American Review.. In September 1835 he was married to Miss Lydia Jackson of Plymouth Mass. They went to live in the plain square wooden house in Concord which was Emersons home for the rest of his life.. During the next three winters Emerson delivered three courses of lectures in Boston: ten on English literature in 1835; twelve on the philosophy of history in 1836; and ten on human culture in 1837.. In 1836 he wrote the Concord Hymn for the dedication ceremonies at the monument raised in honor of the Concord fight. It is one of the most beautiful poems he has written.. In 1836 his first volume Nature — a philosophic essay full of poetic thoughts — was published anonymously. It was quite different from anything Emerson had written before and it did not meet with a favorable reception.