Ralph Waldo Emerson

EMERSON, Ralph Waldo. b. Boston, Massachusetts, 25 May 1803; d. Concord, 27 April 1882. The brilliant son of a Congregational minister, he was educated at Boston Latin School (1812-17) and Harvard (AB 1821). After teaching for a few years, he returned to Harvard to study Divinity and Theology (1825-26). He was licensed to preach in 1826, and in 1829 he became junior pastor of the Second Unitarian Church of Boston. He married in 1829, but his wife’s death in 1831 distressed him greatly: he resigned in 1832. He visited Europe (1832-33), meeting William Wordsworth* and Thomas Carlyle*. On returning to America he moved to Concord (1834), and began a career as lecturer and writer on moral,...