An Analysis of Emerson’s Nature

From Emerson’s “Nature:“ “The hunger for wealth, which reduces the planet to a garden...the ends of nature so great and cogent as to exact this immense sacrifice of men?” (180- 131). Emerson says here that the pursuit of wealth with the end of being able to think in a more comfortable environment is natural, The problem, he argues, is that people become so engrossed in getting rid of discomfort that they lose the time to think, They live their lives comfortably but no longer have any circumstances for which comfort is required for the betterment thereof. Thus, the poor have the intellect but usually lack the environment, while the rich conversely have the environment but usually lack the intellect and ideas, There seems to be no middle ground. Cities and governments are run by the rich, so as to reduce both discomfort and the flow of ideas.

Concurrently, the ideas are existent but remain hidden in the indigent masses. All life becomes meaningless and always wanting. To fully understand this argument, a detailed analysis of the devices used by Emerson is in order. His initial statement is mixed with a metaphor comparing the reduced world to a garden. This indicates that everything is so cultured and refined to make it appear beautiful, but the actual meaning extends no further. The beauty is only there to please the observer and does nothing to foster thoughts and ideas but instead subverts them. Emerson describes wealth as, among other things, an appeasement to “animal cravings." That diction indicates that he thinks, to an extent, wealth is necessary to foster purely human thoughts and ideas.

The remaining words of the sentence set a genial atmosphere. The subsequent sentences show that that atmosphere is often not established. “Headache“ and “wet feet” are marks of uncomfortableness, but not basic pains like hunger or chill, In effect, Emerson is describing that the discomfort never goes completely away, This is contrary to what the wealthy person has been told: money will make them comfortable. So they work until they have removed all “friction," Emerson asserts that it is not just a removal of friction from the physical world, but also a removal of the friction between the potential thoughts and ideas. All of the person’s time is spent making the atmosphere—attempting to get it to an impossible level—that no time is spent actually using it.

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Of course, the irony is, as Emerson puts it, “that they arrive with pains and sweat and fury nowheret” In other words, in order to get to such a high level of comfort, a person must work to a degree that is uncomfortable. Thus, not only have they lost the initial end, but also the one which they have made for themselves They are always living in a state of stupid discontent. The subsequent simile ties this all together: “They are like one who has interrupted the conversation of a company to make his speech, and now has forgotten what he went to say," When one makes a speech, his main goal initially is to present his ideas to the audience As the speech approaches, the speaker realizes the honor he has been given, and views it more as a performance, In forgetting the speech, the speaker has failed to achieve either of his ends.

He has also wasted the time of his entire audience. He is left with nothing. The final question both reifies a general abstraction of nature into some immensely powerful force and personifies it. These two devices, along with the word “sacrifice,” makes nature seem like a god. Though rhetorical, it is an open-ended question the answer to which could refute the entirety of the preceding passage. If this meaninglessness is the honest work of nature, is it not natural? If it is natural, does that mean that nature is not always inherently good? Emerson’s final question could precipitate volumes.

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