Emerson’s Essay, Love, Essay Example

To Ralph Waldo Emerson, love is nothing less than the Divine, which has manifested itself in the soul of a person or persons.  It is a Divine beauty that shines like a fire from one’s soul, though is occasionally tainted by the material world.  The image of the Divine stirs a passion in the lover’s hearts, one that elevates the object of their love beyond the realm of the material world, beyond other people, family, friends and places.  This passion causes the world to appear new and bright.  Love is a way to attain the Divine while confined to the Earth.

Because love is an image of the Divine, it escapes normal definition by man.  The greatest works of art- created in the passion of Divine love- are great works of art precisely because they evade definition.  The love that is emanated from music, art and literature is inspired by the Divine and therefore is not subject to man’s rational, analytic understanding.  Passion is the opposite of rationalism and therefore love between people and represented in art, often seems irrational and indefinable.  Like Romeo and Juliet, their passion surpasses their rational minds, but that passion creates a story that has survived the ages.

Emerson uses the image of a fire as a metaphor for love.  Fire, likewise, escapes rational definition as to its form because its form is ever-changing, sparking, growing, burning and dying.  This divine fire of love is one that not only engulfs those directly involved in its passion, but also warms the world around them.  It is, in essence, the reflection of God in our world.