Emerson, Greenough, and the transcendental esthetic

Abstract

The New England transcendentalists have not generally been considered first and foremost as the founders and champions of an esthetic philosophy in America. They were ministers, most of them, ostensibly concerned more with man's prospects of salvation than with the contemplation of Beauty. Nevertheless, any serious study of New England transcendentalism must take into account the fact that it involved two distinct subspecies of transcendentalists: the transcendental ministers, who were not primarily estheticians, and the transcendental poets, who were. A serious study of New England transcendentalism must deal, furthermore, with the intimate ties by which these two subgroups were related, almost as one, despite their major differences.