I really like the theme in "The American Scholar," of "live life" rather than follow others. It seems as though following other can often times become far too easy. When one begins to live life apart from following others they can then begin to experience what the world has to offer. I also noticed that being active and creative becomes a part of that as well. What of the first ideas that I noticed was roles which include, the Liberal Arts. I see Emerson's idea that we have to become the functions that we serve. The metaphor he used was the difference between a farmer and a man farming, which is the second is individual.
The second thing that I noticed with this was the section on Estates. There were four sub-points in this section, the first being nature, the second mind of the past, the third action, and the forth duties. The idea of nature was expanded by including the connection between the spiritual world and the natural world. Emerson also connects this in with the ages of human history. Which include, classical-child, romantic-youth, and philosophical- adult. This made sense to me because as we get older we do become more philosophical about life.
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