From the Archive: Emerson and Self-Reliance (2000)

Billy Schraufnagel

September 21, 2000

English 277a, Schirmeister

Response # 1

This passage in “Self-Reliance” addresses I think one of the most critical questions facing the privileged and capable, yet also impressionable, youth, both during Emerson’s time and our own. I have been given the dangerous freedom to think and act as my philosophy dictates, yet what will that philosophy be? How must I choose the actions that will construct my life, and by implication, my society? If my actions are informed by my philosophy, my philosophy must be informed by something as well, as we are not born with philosophy. The two sources for motivating action are external and internal, and we must resist external motivation for our actions. In other words, the self-reliant man follows his own guide, and is not persuaded by other individuals or societal values.

Emerson’s ideal actions, then, are internally motivated. Two sources he identifies in the essay are “the voices which we hear in solitude” and “Whim.” The former corresponds to a classic tradition of philosophy: the Stoic, the hermit, Martin Luther, Cartesian deduction, and romanticism to name a few. This argument says the logic of the mind is most pure when isolated, free to work upon itself. From a religious point of view (detectable in Emerson), the mind of every man contains the wisdom of God. The introduction to “Self Reliance” proclaims it boldly: “to believe that what is true for you in your private heart is true for all men, that is genius” (147). Emerson’s other motivating force, “Whim,” is the capacity of the individual to respond to spontaneous impulses. “When my genius calls me,” Emerson writes, nothing may interfere. The greatest actions are born from a strong responsiveness and devotion to whim.

Does this sentiment leave room for the public self? It depends on what is meant by “public self.” It certainly does not obligate the service to others. Any notion of “moral duty” is true only so far as one has a duty to obey his individual truth and individual impulses. Emerson in fact frowns upon the irresponsible “doctrine of love,” as he calls it– the combination of pity, guilt, and public coercion that drives philanthropists and others to “good deeds.” These actions are based in the well-being of others, not the well-being of the self. If, by following your own intuition, you help others follow theirs, that may be a happy consequence of your self-reliance, but your goals should never be rooted in others.

This brings me to the underlying view Emerson presents throughout the essay. He is concerned with the emergence of genius. To him, the history and progress of humanity has been most greatly advanced by a small number of great minds: “all history resolves itself very easily into the biography of a few stout and earnest persons” (155). These are the individuals who have lived their lives according to Emerson’s method (or so he believes), and they have done more public good than all the “miscellaneous popular charities” ever assembled. These are the geniuses who inspire other geniuses. If every person could truly follow his inner voices, then those private selves would necessarily project themselves onto the public sphere.

Emerson’s final call to action then, is to be self-reliant and develop your own personal truth, a personal logic. In writing, “we cannot spend the day in explanation,” he implies the act of explanation, the act of justification, is itself a corruption of the individual soul. The best articulation of one’s whim is to act upon the whim, to respond to the call of genius. This example sparks an inner desire in others to be self-reliant, as opposed to a growing dependence on philanthropy or aid.