Self-Reliance by Ralph Waldo Emerson

Page 17

If you think about the current state of what we call society, you'll see the need for these ethics. The human race's heart and muscles seem to be tiring. We've become timid, depressed whimperers.

We are afraid of truth,
afraid of fate,
afraid of death,
and afraid of each other.

These times don't produce any great and perfect people. We want men and women who will renew life and society, but we see that most people can't make ends meet, can't satisfy their own desires, have an ambition all out of proportion to their practical capability, and spend all day and night leaning and begging. Our housekeeping is poor, our arts, our occupations, our marriages, our religion we haven't chosen, but society has chosen for us. We shun the rugged battle of fate, where strength is born.

Failure

If our young men fail in their first business they lose all heart. If a young merchant fails, people say he is ruined. If the greatest genius studies at one of our colleges and isn't installed into an office within one year afterwards in Cambridge or Palo Alto, it seems to his friends and to himself that he's justified in being disheartened and complaining the rest of his life.

A sturdy lad from Vermont or Idaho—who in turn tries all the professions, who flips burgers, drives a truck, sells encyclopedias, runs a day-care, preaches, edits a newspaper, goes to Congress, buys real estate, and so on, in successive years, and always lands on his feet like a cat—is worth a hundred of these city dolls. He walks in step with his age and feels no shame in not "studying a profession," because he's not postponing his life, he's living it now. He's got not one chance, but a hundred chances.

The Power of Self-Trust

Get a guru in here to tell people this: That they're not leaning willow trees, but can and must detach themselves. That with a little self-trust, new powers will appear. That a human being is the word of God made into flesh, born to heal nations, and that the moment he acts from himself, tossing the laws, the books, idols and customs out the window, we stop pitying him and start to thank and admire him. That teacher will restore the life of man to splendor and go down in history.

Greater self-reliance will cause a revolution in every part of human life: in our jobs and relationships; in our religion, education, goals, and lifestyles; in our businesses, possessions, and visions of the future.

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