- Lived:
- 1803–1882 · Boston and Concord, Massachusetts
- Tradition:
- American Transcendentalism — the New World's first home-grown philosophical movement
- The Big Idea:
- One universal soul lives in every human being, and it speaks to you directly — through intuition and through nature — so stop imitating other people and other centuries, and trust the voice within.
- In their words:
- "Trust thyself: every heart vibrates to that iron string."
- If you remember one thing:
- Self-reliance is not ego. Emerson tells you to trust yourself because he believes something vast is speaking through you — and conformity is how you drown it out.