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07 - Spirit - Nature - Ralph Waldo Emerson · Logic Library

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  Chapter seven. Spirit. It is essential to a true theory of nature and
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  of man, that it should contain somewhat progressive uses that are exhausted, or
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  that may be, and facts that end in the statement cannot be all that
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  is true of this brave lodging, wherein man is harbored, and wherein all
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  his faculties find appropriate and endless exercise, And all the uses of nature admit
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  of being summed in one which yield the activity of man in infinite scope,
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  through all its kingdoms, to the suburbs and outskirts of things. It is
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  faithful to the cause whence it had its origin. It always speaks of spirit.
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  It suggests the absolute. It is a perpetual effect. It is a
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  great shadow, pointing always to the sun behind us. The aspect of nature
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  is devout, like the figure of Jesus. She stands with bended head and
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  hands folded upon the breast. The happiest man is he who learns from nature
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  the lesson of worship of that ineffable essence which we call Spirit. He that
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  thinks most will say least. We can foresee God in the course, and
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  as it were, a distant phenomena of matter. But when we try to
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  define and describe himself. Both language and thought desert us, and we are
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  as helpless as fools and savages. That essence refuses to be recorded in propositions
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  that when man has worshiped him intellectually, the noblest ministry of nature is to
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  stand as the apparition of God. It is the organ through which the universal
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  Spirit speaks to the individual and strives to lead back the individual to it.
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  When we consider spirit, we see that the views already presented do not include
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  the whole circumference of man. We must adds of related thoughts. Three problems
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  are put by nature to the mind. What is matter, whence is it?
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  And where too? The first of these questions only the ideal theory answers.
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  Idealism said matter is a phenomenon, not a substance. Idealism acquaints us
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  with a total disparity between the evidence of our own being and the evidence of
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  the world's being. The one is perfect, the other incapable of any assurance.
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  The mind is a part of the nature of things. The world's a
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  divine dream from which we may presently awake to the glories and certainties of day.
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  Idealism is a hypothesis to account for nature by other principles than those of
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  carpentry and chemistry. Yet if it only denied the existence of matter, it
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  does not satisfy the demands of the spirit. It leaves God out of me.
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  It leaves me in the splendid vlabyrinth of my own perceptions, to wander
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  without end. Then the heart resists it because it balks the affections in denying
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  substantive being to men and women. Nature is so pervaded with human life that
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  there is something of humanity in all and in every particular. But this theory
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  makes nature foreign to me, and does not account for that constant wind unity
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  which we acknowledge to it. Let it stand then, in the present state
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  of our knowledge, merely as a useful introductory hypothesis, serving to apprise us
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  of the eternal distinction between the soul and the world. But when following the
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  invisible step of thought, we come to inquire whence is matter? And where
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  too many truths arise to us out of the recesses of consciousness, we learn
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  that the highest is present to the soul of man, that the dread universal
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  lessons, which is not wisdom or love or beauty or power, but all
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  in one and each entirely is that for which all things exist, and that
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  by which they are. That spirit creates that behind nature, throughout nature.
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  Spirit is present, one and not compound. It does not act upon us
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  from without, that is, in space and time, but spiritually or through
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  ourselves. Therefore, that spirit, that is the supreme Being, does not
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  build up nature around us, but puts it forth through us, as the
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  life of the tree puts forth new branches and leaves the pores of the old,
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  as a plant upon the earth. So man breasts upon the bosom of
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  God. He is nourished by unfailing fountains, and draws at his need in
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  exhaustible power. Who can set bounce to the possibilities of man. Once inhale,
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  the upper air being admitted to behold the absolute natures of justice and truth,
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  and we learn that man has access to the entire mind of the Creator,
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  is himself the creator in the finite. This view, which admonishes me
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  where the sources of wisdom and power lie, and points to virtuous to the
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  golden key which opes the palace of eternity, carries upon its face the highest
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  certificate of truth. Because it animates me to create my own world, to
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  the purification of my soul. The world proceeds from the same spirit as the
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  body of man. It is a remoter and inferior incarnation of God, a
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  projection of God in the unconscious. But it differs from the body in one
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  important respect. It is not like that now objected to human will. Its
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  serene order is inviolable by us. It is therefore to us the present expositor
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  of the divine mind. It is a fixed point whereby we may measure our
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  departure as we degenerate. The contrast between us and our house is more evident.
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  We are as much strangers in nature as we are aliens from God.
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  We do not understand the notes of birds. The fox and the deer run
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  away from us, the bare and tiger rend us. We do not know
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  the uses of more than a few plants, as corn and the apple,
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  the potato, and the vine. Is not the landscape, every glimpse of
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  which hath a grandeur a base of hymn. Yet this may show us what
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  discord is between man and nature. For you cannot freely admire a noble landscape
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  if laborers are digging in the field hard By, the poet finds something ridiculous
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  in his delight, until he is out of the sight of men. End
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  of chapter seven.