<p>Here in one volume are both the <em>Essays: First Series </em>and <em>Essays: Second Series </em>from one of the most influential philosophers in American history.</p> <p>Although Ralph Waldo Emerson perhaps America’s most famous philosopher did not wish to be referred to as a transcendentalist he is nevertheless considered the founder of this major movement of nineteenth-century American thought. Emerson was influenced by a liberal religious training; theological study; personal contact with the Romanticists Coleridge Carlyle and Wordsworth; and a strong indigenous sense of individualism and self-reliance. Emerson’s best work was done between 1836 and 1860 a period which includes his famous <em>Essays</em>.</p> <p>These essays contain his most important writing and radiate with sensitivity and wonder. Here Emerson’s prose shows him to be both a vigorous thinker and a profound mystic a man of exquisite feeling combined with stern moral fiber. His strong love of retirement from life contemplation of the sublime and the mystic his self-reliance and his strong character left their stamp not only on such writers as Thoreau Whitman and Emily Dickinson but also on the American character at large.</p> <p>This collection includes the following:</p> <p>First Series:</p> <ol start='1'> <li>History</li> <li>Self-Reliance</li> <li>Compensation</li> <li>Spiritual Laws</li> <li>Love</li> <li>Friendship</li> <li>Prudence</li> <li>Heroism</li> <li>The Over-Soul</li> <li>Circles</li> <li>Intellect</li> <li>Art</li> </ol> <p> </p> <p>Second Series:</p> <ol start='1'> <li>The Poet</li> <li>Experience</li> <li>Character</li> <li>Manners</li> <li>Gifts</li> <li>Nature</li> <li>Politics</li> <li>Nominalist and Realist</li> </ol>