Nature
Last updated October 31, 2026
Ralph Waldo Emerson's first book, Nature, published anonymously in 1836, helped launch the Transcendentalist movement in New England. In this short essay he argues that nature is a source of beauty, language, discipline and spiritual insight, and that each person can find a direct relationship with the divine through it rather than through tradition. Penguin's Great Ideas series presents the essay on its own.
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