...them in such essays as "Self-Reliance" ("Trust thyself: every heart vibrates to that iron string") and "The American Scholar" ("We have listened too long to the courtly muses of Europe"). Whitman sent them as a barbaric yawp over the rooftops of the world. Thoreau spoke them in the quotation...

...intent of the essay disclosed, that "We have listened too long to the courtly muses of Europe" and thus "The spirit of the American freeman is already suspected to be timid, imitative, tame" (W 1: 114). But of course and silently, it is the European idolizing of the past and its importation...

...have recalled Emerson's famous words to the American scholar, dating from 1837, but still pertinent: "We have listened too long to the courtly muses of Europe" ("The American Scholar," I, 113). And in searching for an honest American style, Emerson's essay "Self-Reliance"...

...from Europe. Certainly, this interpretation might be easy to come by, given the following passages: We have listened too long to the courtly muses of...breathe thick and fat. The scholar is decent, indolent, and complaisant. See already the tragic consequence. The mind of this country taught to aim at low...

...materialistic values of the marketplace and their corroding effect on prospective poets and writers. "Public and private avarice make the air we breathe thick and fat," he observed. "Young men of the fairest promise ... are hindered from action by the disgust which the...

...contributions of the past, all the hopes of the foture. He must be a university of knowledges. ... We have listened too long to the courtly muses of...freeman is already suspected to be timid, imitative, tame.—The scholar is decent, indolent, complaisant— The mind of this country, tanght to aim at...

..."greatness." In both cases, the main cause was an overemphasis on commerce and economic prosperity. "Public and private avarice make the air we breathe thick and fat," Emerson told his young charges. "The mind of this country, taught to aim at low objects, eats upon...

...a thousand years.1 And near the end: Mr. President and CJentlemen, this confidence in the unearthed might of man belongs, by all motives, by all prophecy,...listened too long to the courtly muses of Europe. The sprit of the American freeman is already suspected to be timid, imitative, and tame. (p. 70) But if...

...challenge, echoes two of Emerson's famous declarations. In "The American Scholar," Emerson complained: "We have listened too long to the courtly muses of...already suspected to be timid, imitative, tame."^ In "The Poet," Emerson expanded his complaint: "We do not, with sufficient plainness, or sufficient...

...challenge, echoes two of Emerson's famous declarations. In "The American Scholar," Emerson complained: "We have listened too long to the courtly muses of...freeman is already suspected to be timid, imitative, tame."3 In "The Poet," Emerson expanded his complaint: "We do not, with sufficient plainness, or sufficient...