Ralph Waldo Emerson, a New England writer, nurtured the pride that
Americans took in their emerging culture. He led a group focused on
transcendentalism-a philosophical and literary movement that emphasized living a
simple life and celebrating the truth found in nature and in personal emotion and
imagination. Emerson gave this European philosophy a uniquely American spin: he
said that every individual is capable of discovering this higher truth on his or her own,
through intuition. Unlike the Puritans, the transcendentalists believed that people were
inherently good and should follow their own beliefs, however different these beliefs
may be from the norm.
Central Idea
1-2 Sentence Summary