Nov. 14, 1855. Last night I heard Emerson give a Lecture. I pity the Reporter who attempts to give it to the world. I began to listen with a determination to remember it in order, but it was without method order or system. It was like a beam of light moving in the undulatory waves meeting with occasional meteors in its path. It was exceedingly uplifting. It surprised me that there was not only no commonplace thought, but there was no commonplace expression. If he quotes, he quoted from what we had not read, if he told an anecdote it was one that had not reached us . . . .
Ralph Waldo Emerson spoke in the Great Hall of the Atheneum – where Maria Mitchell was librarian. The Great Hall was a gathering place for authors, philosophers, scientists, women’s and slaves’ rights supporters, and others from all over the country who came to lecture and share with those on Nantucket. I find it somewhat humorous concerning her frustration with his presentation and the “astronomical” way she describes it. Emerson, a proponent and father of Transcendentalism, would have “run” in similar circles to Maria and the Mitchells and Transcendentalism’s focus on Nature would have been appealing to the scientific and nature-focused Mitchell family. Maria was well familiar with many of Transcendentalisms’ followers and members – Elizabeth Peabody, Margaret Fuller among them.
JNLF
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