Even during his lifetime, Emerson was called the Sage of Concord. He was probably amused by this but undoubtedly also found the sobriquet somewhat embarrassing. For it is in the nature of the sage to be humble and to realize that sage-hood is never fully attained. It is a process, not an achievement. Intended as an honorific recognizing his status as a widely known and highly esteemed purveyor of philosophical wisdom, in Emerson’s case the label is justified.
Emerson’s readers have had a hard time pinning him down. What was he? Poet? Philosopher? Public intellectual? Scholar? Essayist? Mystic? Those who have written about him over the years have typically emphasized one aspect or another in trying to get a handle on him. (His friend Henry James Sr. actually described him as a “man without a handle.”)1 But “sage” is not just one more descriptor to add to the list. Rather, the notion of the sage encompasses all the other aspects of his life and writing.
We think of the sage as a wise and virtuous person. Greek and Roman philosophy depicted the sage as an ideal figure, which means that no living person is ever a fully realized example. The notion serves an aspirational purpose, encouraging us to strive toward achieving the model. It is based on a type of ethics that emphasizes virtue over conduct. Modern ethics has much to do with rules and duties. Virtue ethics, on the other hand, focuses on developing character rather than following rules. Although virtue implies doing good, it also means living well.
For the ancients, the goal in life is to achieve eudaimonia, commonly referred to as “happiness” but more accurately defined as “flourishing,” according to classical scholar Julia Annas.2 Eudaimonia is not a state of feeling but a way of living. What is good for us to do is that which is conducive to human flourishing or living virtuously. The sage, in this view, is someone who has cultivated the art of living well. The epitome of the sage varied with the different schools of philosophy. But most agreed that a sage exhibited equanimity of soul, authenticity of character, simplicity in lifestyle, and detachment or indifference in regard to the messy details of everyday life.3 This is essentially what Emerson means by self-reliance, an inner freedom coming from a sense of personal wholeness or integrity.
The sage was not categorically different from other people. He or she was an example of what everyone might aspire to and a model for individual self-improvement. The different philosophical schools—Stoicism, Epicureanism, and those of Plato and Aristotle—each offered theories of how to accomplish this in a disciplined way, by means of spiritual exercises.
Classical thinkers believed there were essentially two ways the virtuous or self-reliant person could be developed. “One conception of the sage is that of the person living according to an ideal which transcends the everyday,” Annas writes, “rising above it and regarding ordinary life, its concerns and troubles, as petty and fleeting.” In this view, the sage exhibits tranquility and calmness, untroubled by the cares that concern most people as he or she has risen above them. Epicurus writes that those who follow his path, eschewing “the pleasures of the profligates and those that consist in sensuality,” will not “be disturbed waking or asleep” but “shall live like a god among men.” 4
In the second way, the sage is seen as a “person whose ideal virtue is displayed not in rising above the everyday but precisely in staying at that level and dealing with it,” Annas continues. “This is arguably the more challenging notion, since instead of contrasting the ideal and the practical it tries to bring them into relation, showing how ideal virtue can be found in actual practical, goal-directed activity.”5 The Stoics are example of this path. Although they are often viewed as indifferent to the world, they were not without emotions or desires. They believed the problems that disturb us are caused by our attachment to things we feel we can’t live without. While it is rational that we should prefer some things, like good health, to other things, such as making money, they are “indifferent” so far as happiness is concerned.
The Stoic sage views everyday life from a “higher platform,” as Emerson would say, that is, from the perspective of divine Reason. In thinking of ourselves as part of a larger whole, we loosen the grip of everyday concerns. Rather than avoiding life, the Stoic takes an active part in it. “The Stoics are not tempted by the ideal of detachment from practical life in order to study transcendent objects,” Annas says. Rather, they “see the life detached from everyday practical concerns, devoted to a transcendent ideal, as selfish and self-indulgent.”6 For the Stoics, virtue meant living life well: mindfully, focusing on that which promotes eudaimonia, or human flourishing.
Emerson was well acquainted with the classic schools of ancient philosophy. He was especially drawn to Stoicism, frequently mentioning it and Stoic philosophers, including Epictetus, Cicero, Seneca, and Marcus Aurelius, in his journal, addresses, and essays. Stoicism is a thread that runs through much of Emerson’s writing. Key essays, such as “Experience” and “Fate,” exhibit considerable Stoic influence.
There are several reasons for considering Emerson a sage, especially in Annas’s second sense of the term. For one thing, he exhibited the persona of a sage. George Santayana, though critical of Emerson’s philosophy, beautifully described the impression he made on his audiences:
Those who knew Emerson, or who stood so near to his time and to his circle that they caught some echo of his personal influence, did not judge him merely as a poet or philosopher, nor identify his efficacy with that of his writings. His friends and neighbors, the congregations he preached to in his younger days, the audiences that afterward listened to his lectures, all agreed in a veneration for his person which had nothing to do with their understanding or acceptance of his opinions. They flocked to him and listened to his word, not so much for the sake of its absolute meaning as for the atmosphere of candor, purity, and serenity that hung about it, as a sort of sacred music. They felt themselves in the presence of a rare and beautiful spirit, who was in communion with a higher world. More than the truth his teaching might express, they valued the sense it gave them of a truth that was inexpressible.7
I love this description, but I disagree with Santayana’s implication that the impression Emerson made on people was incidental to his philosophy. For one to be considered a sage, it was essential that the persona match the philosophy. In fact, his persona was a reflection of his philosophy.
Many others have similarly described Emerson as a person serene and aloof from everyday concerns. Emerson’s reputation as the Sage of Concord peaked in the years immediately following his death in 1882. The focus on Emerson’s exemplary personal character overshadowed the ideas contained in his writing. “The genteel critics diverted attention from Emerson’s writings while enshrining him as a cultural icon, leaving the impression that he was someone who demanded reverence but not necessarily careful reading,” according to American studies scholar Charles E. Mitchell.8
Emerson was not the remote figure depicted in these early accounts. Although he did view daily affairs from a higher platform, he was a devoted friend, family member, and citizen of Concord. He provided financial support to the Alcott family, enabling them to purchase a home in Concord; took in and looked after his mother and brothers; and in Concord served on the School Committee, taught in the Sunday school, and joined the Fire Company and the Social Circle.9 Although he considered much of American society selfish and superficial, he sought to elevate it, not abandon it.
The importance of the persona is that the sage is depicted, as Annas says, “in terms of doing the actions which ordinary people do, but from wisdom, thus transforming the way in which those actions are performed. The sage is the person who does what we do, but succeeds where we fail. He does it all well, in a manner that cannot be criticized in any respect.”10 Emerson had his critics, but his audiences and those who knew him best saw him as a person who exhibited the art of living life well.
My argument for considering Emerson a sage does not rest on his persona alone. There are additional reasons. The sage was an exemplar of what is called “virtue ethics.” The ancient Greeks believed that virtuous living entailed the cultivation of character. Morality was not a matter of right and wrong or of following commandments issued by a deity. It was assumed that the moral person would pursue the good, or behavior that is “according to nature.” Thus human laws were a reflection of the laws of nature. The Greeks also believed that morality was developmental. Every person had the capacity to be a virtuous person, but some were more virtuous than others because they had cultivated morality.
Emerson was born into a Unitarian family. His father, who died when Waldo was still a boy, had been a prominent minister in Boston. The Unitarians at the time were still in the process of breaking away from the Calvinist churches of the Standing Order in Massachusetts. Although they became known as Unitarians for believing that God was one “person,” not three, the primary disputes centered on the issues of original sin and election to salvation. Historian David Robinson, in his book The Unitarians and the Universalists, explains that the Calvinist viewpoint “undermined human moral exertion. The idea of the taint of Adam, communicated to all people regardless of their action or character, seemed to deny the possibility of the moral life; the idea of God’s preordained selection of a few to salvation, regardless of their character or action, seemed to undercut the motivation for it. The liberals countered therefore with a moral system that affirmed human capability, as evidenced in the moral sense.” In Apostle of Culture: Emerson as Preacher and Lecturer, Robinson notes, “Because human nature, according to the Unitarians, was not essentially corrupt, salvation came to be seen as the developing and unfolding of a potential inner virtue, rather than a wrenching inner change from corruption to righteousness.”11
Another factor accounting for the Unitarians’ break with New England Congregationalism had to do with the impact of the Great Awakening, which stressed the importance of enthusiasm in the process of conversion. Liberal Christians were rationalists and therefore suspicious of religious fervor as an evidence of faith. Charles Chauncy (1705–87) opposed the revivals of the Great Awakening because enthusiasm undermined the authority of reason. As Robinson points out, Chauncy “described ‘real religion’ as ‘a sober, calm, reasonable thing’ that ought to be judged not by the excesses of the emotions but by its moral results in the lives of [the faithful].” Chauncy judged religion by its moral results. “This stress on moralism, as it evolved into an ethic of character building and self-cultivation,” Robinson notes, “also became a touchstone of the liberal movement in theology.”12
The Unitarians’ emphasis on the moral sense, human potential, and self-development was a form of virtue ethics. The most persuasive exponent of this point of view was William Ellery Channing (1780–1842), whose Federal Street Church in Boston is where Emerson and his family attended after his father died. “We believe that all virtue has its foundation in the moral nature of man, that is, in conscience, or his sense of duty, and in the power of forming his temper and life according to conscience,” Channing asserted in his sermon “Unitarian Christianity.”13 Later, as Emerson prepared for the ministry himself, he considered Channing his mentor.
Though raised in genteel poverty, his mother saw to it that Waldo and three of his brothers were educated at Harvard.14 By the time Emerson studied there, Harvard had become a Unitarian institution of higher learning, with a predominance of Unitarian scholars on its faculty. The curriculum was grounded in a moral philosophy promoted by intellectuals of the Scottish Enlightenment, primarily Thomas Reid (1710–96) and Dugald Stewart (1753–1828), who held that human beings were endowed with an innate moral sensibility. This meant all people had a capacity for discerning right from wrong intuitively, without divine mandates. “The difference between good and evil, or right and wrong,” historian Daniel Walker Howe points out, “is regarded as part of ‘the nature of things’ and self-evident.” Even though people were born with this capability, they did not necessarily exercise it. The moral sense needed to be developed. “Nineteenth-century Unitarians no longer thought of the good life primarily in terms of obedience to God,” Howe says; “for them the good life meant achieving a delight in virtue.”15
Another potent influence on Harvard moral philosophy was Neoplatonic philosophy, which added a spiritual dimension to the theory. Scottish moral philosophy was essentially rational, based on what was called “common sense.” Neoplatonism elevated reason beyond its analytic power of discernment (what would come to be called “understanding”) to that of Reason, with a capital R, or, in other words, the soul or mind of the universe itself. This type of Reason has to do with eternal truths and first principles. The ancient Greeks called it nous, the highest or divine intellect, “the eye of the Mind.” For Unitarians it involved not only the formation of moral character but also, more importantly, the cultivation of our higher or spiritual nature—in Channing’s words, “likeness to God.”
As a student, Emerson absorbed the rational intuitionism taught by the Harvard faculty. But he questioned one important aspect. Morality might be intuitive, but what did these intuitions rest on? What evidence do we have that they are true? To answer this question, the Unitarians turned to the philosophy of John Locke, who argued that moral intuitions are grounded in empirical reality, assured by the veracity of divine revelation.
Since the Middle Ages, theologians have made a distinction between natural religion and revealed religion. Natural religion encompasses all that can be known about God and the world by means of the unaided human reason. But, according to this view, such knowledge is incomplete; it needs to be supplemented by revealed religion, given to us through divine revelation or scripture, namely, the Christian Bible, a position called supernatural rationalism.16 Locke pointed to the miracles of Christ as evidence of the truth of the Gospels and, by extension, the authority of moral intuitions. Emerson challenged Locke’s philosophy on this point, arguing there is no reason to believe the so-called witnesses in the contradictory accounts presented in the Gospels. He eventually dispensed with the need for revealed religion altogether, grounding moral law in human consciousness and the book of nature rather than the Christian Bible and the teachings of the church.
The theory and practice of ancient virtue ethics differed among the various schools of Greek philosophy, and ancient virtue ethics is not the same as the moral philosophy that was taught at Harvard College. Yet there are important similarities. For one, both Greek virtue ethics and Harvard moral philosophy focused on developing character rather than following rules. For another, they held that the moral sense was innately human, even if in the case of nineteenth-century Unitarians specific duties and obligations were enjoined by divine revelation. Moreover, the two viewpoints are essentially aspirational, focused on living a virtuous life, rather than avoiding the consequences of failure to follow rules and commandments.17 Both were more concerned with how we ought ...
