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Ralph Waldo Emerson
Waldo Emerson was Ralph Waldo Emerson’s son. He died at the age of five in 1842, lost to scarlet fever. In a long poem written to his memory, “Threnody,” Emerson called Waldo “the hyacinthine boy” who “did adorn / the world whereinto he was born.” Emerson discusses the boy’s death in a short but rich passage of “Experience,” in which he shows that the implications of his theory of individual experience is that calamities like the loss of a child cannot really affect someone. Losing a child is not much different than losing a piece of property, Emerson claims. With this, Emerson echoes the ancient Stoics, suggesting that the tragedy is an inconvenience but does not affect the state of one’s soul. Waldo haunts “Experience” in other places, too, particularly when Emerson denounces the capacity of doctors and scientists to understand human nature and also when Emerson considers the phenomenon of people who die young and do not fulfill their full potential.
Waldo Emerson Quotes in Experience
The Experience quotes below are all either spoken by Waldo Emerson or refer to Waldo Emerson. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
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Experience
Quotes
The lords of life, the lords of life,—
I saw them pass,
In their own guise,
Like and unlike,
Portly and grim,
Use and Surprise,
Surface and Dream,
Succession swift, and spectral Wrong,
Temperament without a tongue,
And the inventor of the game
Omnipresent without name;—
Some to see, some to be guessed,
They marched from east to west:
Little man, least of all,
Among the legs of his guardians tall,
Walked about with puzzled look:—
Him by the hand dear nature took;
Dearest nature, strong and kind,
Whispered, “Darling, never mind!
To-morrow they will wear another face,
The founder thou! these are thy race!”
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There are moods in which we court suffering, in the hope that there, at least, we shall find reality, sharp peaks and edges of truth. But it turns out to be scene-painting and counterfeit. The only thing grief has taught me, is how shallow it is. […] Souls never touch their objects. An innavigable sea washes with silent waves between us and the things we aim at and converse with. Grief too will make us idealists. In the death of my son, now more than two years ago, I seem to have lost a beautiful estate,—no more. I cannot get it nearer to me. […] It does not touch me: some thing which I fancied was a part of me, which could not be torn away without tearing me, nor enlarged without enriching me, falls off from me, and leaves no scar. It was caducous. I grieve that grief can teach me nothing, nor carry me one step into real nature. […] Nothing is left us now but death.
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Get the entire Experience LitChart as a printable PDF.
Waldo Emerson Quotes in Experience
The Experience quotes below are all either spoken by Waldo Emerson or refer to Waldo Emerson. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
Experience
Quotes
The lords of life, the lords of life,—
I saw them pass,
In their own guise,
Like and unlike,
Portly and grim,
Use and Surprise,
Surface and Dream,
Succession swift, and spectral Wrong,
Temperament without a tongue,
And the inventor of the game
Omnipresent without name;—
Some to see, some to be guessed,
They marched from east to west:
Little man, least of all,
Among the legs of his guardians tall,
Walked about with puzzled look:—
Him by the hand dear nature took;
Dearest nature, strong and kind,
Whispered, “Darling, never mind!
To-morrow they will wear another face,
The founder thou! these are thy race!”
Related Characters:
Related Themes:
Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
There are moods in which we court suffering, in the hope that there, at least, we shall find reality, sharp peaks and edges of truth. But it turns out to be scene-painting and counterfeit. The only thing grief has taught me, is how shallow it is. […] Souls never touch their objects. An innavigable sea washes with silent waves between us and the things we aim at and converse with. Grief too will make us idealists. In the death of my son, now more than two years ago, I seem to have lost a beautiful estate,—no more. I cannot get it nearer to me. […] It does not touch me: some thing which I fancied was a part of me, which could not be torn away without tearing me, nor enlarged without enriching me, falls off from me, and leaves no scar. It was caducous. I grieve that grief can teach me nothing, nor carry me one step into real nature. […] Nothing is left us now but death.
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