O'Donnell- Emerson and Thoreau

Henry David Thoreau's "Civil Disobedience" admits that not all men are truly good. However, it seems to posit that most men know right from wrong and can make good, courageous decisions. Thoreau also seems to believe that any man who blindly follows some absent, faceless, ominous entity (the American government, or moreover the American military) will be brainwashed in the end. Thoreau writes, "Visit the Navy Yard, and behold a marine, such a man as an American government can make, or such as it can make a man with its black art--a mere shadow and reminiscence of humanity, a man laid out alive and standing, and already, as one may say, buried under arms with funeral accompaniment..."

Thoreau believes that when the majority comes together that man is wiser and more perfect. It seems that, to this author, the needs of the many are perfect, while the needs of the individual can be uninformed or selfish. The author writes, "But improvement is slow, because the few are not as materially wiser or better than the many." Basically, it is as if this author believes that the ideal state of man is in his majority group.

Thoreau also seems to think that there are certain elements that prevent man from reaching his idealized form. For example, he believes that money makes men corrupt. He writes, "Absolutely speaking, the more money, the less virtue; for money comes between a man and his objects, and obtains them for him." Thoreau believes that men should, essentially, be poor or live a modest life. "The best thing a man can do for his culture when he is rich is to endeavor to carry out those schemes which he entertained when he was poor," wrote the author. Another element  that the author believes is key to human happiness and perfectibility is being independent of the State. He wrote that reliance on the government makes it difficult to be free from fear and dependent on their tyrannical demands. As a response to this issue, Thoreau writes, "You must hire or squat somewhere, and raise a small crop, and eat that soon. You must live within yourself, and depend upon yourself always tucked up and ready for a start, and not have many affairs."

Like Thoreau, Ralph Waldo Emerson believed that perfection is possible. Emerson used the world around him to show his readers that this perfection is already apparent in nature. In this text, nature is considered to be everything that does not exist within an individual. "Strictly speaking, therefore, all that is separate from us, all which Philosophy distinguishes as the NOT ME, that is, both nature and art, all other men and my own body, must be ranked under this name, NATURE," writes the author. In the chapter, "Beauty," Emerson posits that, through nature, man can experience his higher self. As a form of healing, he writes, "To the body and mind which have been cramped by noxious work or company, nature is medicinal and restores their tone...In eternal calm he finds himself."

Emerson also suggest that experiencing nature will make a man more heroic and courageous, qualities that would clearly define the ideal mean. He also says that spending time in nature will increase human intellect. He writes, "There is still another aspect under which the beauty of the world may be viewed, namely, as it becomes an object of the intellect. In the chapter, "Idealism," Emerson suggests that nature is the ideal form of anything created. If nature is, therefore ideal and perfect, man can perfect himself through experiencing nature. He writes, "God never jests with us, and will not compromise the end of nature, by permitting any inconsequence in its procession. Any distrust of the permanence of laws, would paralyze the faculties of man. Their permanence is sacredly respected, and his faith therein is perfect."

Both writers believe that man is somewhat perfectable, but in very different, very obvious ways. Clearly, Thoreau's paper is much more political, and believes that man should not be ruled blindly, and the perfect state of man is really man inside of a majority. His beliefs relate to Emerson in that I think Thoreau would agree that nature is perfection, and that man should be allowed to connect with it and be ruled by it.