Emerson passage

• Blog – Pick one or two lines that really speak to you and explain them.

“Our age is retrospective. It builds the sepulchers of the fathers. It writes biographies, histories, and criticism. The foregoing generations beheld God and nature face to face; we, through their eyes.”

I thought that these words from the introduction are a meaningful assertion about society and how people would rater critique the lives of others than go out and live their own lives. It seems to me that Emerson is asserting the opposite of what we see in modern America. Nowadays we see parents living through their kids. Conversely Emerson saw a generation living through their forefathers. It would seem that the fear of judgment has caused Emerson’s generation to all but resign to the position of judgment themselves. Emerson’s is a generation of analysis, not of action. I seems ironic, yet appropriate, that Emerson’s writing is not centered around a call to action, but rather a call to observation. This passage is also beautifully worded and uses words rarely found outside of scripture (sepulchers being the primary example). I think the personification of the age is particularly striking with use of phrases like “It Builds”, and (it Writes).