Social/Historical Issues - Essay Example

Along with the immense beauty of speech, Emerson has highlighted a few pointers in his article. The first issue he integrated in his introduction is that people of these days do not progress. Instead, they are satisfied with the progress their previous generations ever made. Even though there are ample opportunities to explore and exploit the surroundings and to research on them, the newest generations simply rely on elders’ works, without putting in any efforts on their behalf to further progress.

“The foregoing generation beheld God face to face; we, through their eyes. Why should not we also enjoy an original relation to the universe? … The sun shines today also. There is more wool and flax in the fields. There are new lands, new men, (and) new thoughts. Let us demand our own works and laws and worship” (Emerson). Emerson has clearly highlighted the presence of opportunities not being availed by the present generation. They are too content with old knowledge that they hardly feel the need to strive for new research.

The second issue Emerson highlighted is the people’s incapacity to appreciate nature, despite it being there in its full bloom. “To speak truly, few adult persons can see nature. Most persons do not see the sun. At least they have a very superficial seeing. The sun illuminates only the eye of the man, but shines into the eye and the heart of the child” (Emerson). People are too busy with their lives to stop and appreciate how nature and surroundings reflect his/her mood, how the nature blooms in brightness and glooms in melancholy.

People believe the beauty of nature is restrained to few seasons and times, whereas they keep forgetting “even the corpse has its own beauty” (Emerson). “There is no object so foul that intense light will not make beautiful” (Emerson). Beauty of nature is not restricted to any specific times or seasons, in fact the gloomiest of times also reflect an eerie and exciting wonder most people do not tend to appreciate. The author also highlights how visual impacts constitute beauty, increasing celebrations and memory retention affiliated with those events.

The most memorable of times are not complete without the perfect backdrop of nature including all that trod the earth. “When the bark of Columbus nears the shore of America; before it, the beach lined with savages, fleeing out of all their huts of cane, the sea behind, and the purple mountains of the Indian Archipelago around, can we separate the man from the living picture?” (Emerson). The scenario isn’t complete without the perfectly complementary backdrop of nature to accompany the incident.

Heroism is revered for its influential aura. If the nature hadn’t complimented the act, there would hardly be any uniqueness in the occurrence. Also, the author elaborates the vicious circle of the life cycle which benefits the mankind in ways it takes for granted. “All the parts (of world’s systematic processing) incessantly work into each other’s hands for the profit of man. The wind sows the seed, the sun evaporates the sea, the wind blows the vapor to the fields, the ice, on the other side of the planet, condenses rain on this, the rain feeds the plant, the plant feeds the animal, and thus the endless circulations of the divine charity nourishes man”