John Winthrop and Ralph Waldo Emerson, Research Paper Example

Introduction

About a century ago, such scholar as Nietzsche disregarded the principles of modern “factualism”. Later on, Weber established the end of the era of generalists. One cannot but state extreme specialization and narrowly focused technical work to have changed certain visions into straightforward realities. Concerning this essay, it is mainly aimed at analyzing the sociological speculations of two outstanding thinkers John Withrop and Ralph Waldo Emerson that, in view of widely-acknowledged scholars, reflect the state of public opinion even though they date back over two centuries; to be precise, the focus lies in comparing and contrasting the utopian visions of the two aforementioned thinkers, making emphasis on what utopia meant for these two authors and the way it was supposed to be achieved. Moreover, the paper is focused on interpreting and coming to terms with the pivotal social movements of Puritanism as well as transcendentalism; speaking about the peculiarities of social theories, it is necessary to take a view of recognized changes in vast domains of social life and culture; the research will emphasize the main reconstructions of social and cultural theories due to historical events. The essay is also targeted on finding out whether it is rationally to throw out all the concepts and methods of the past and acknowledge the appropriateness of new theoretical assumptions.

Puritanism

Puritanism was found by English Protestant leaders with the purpose of providing original unification of spiritual life, church and social life. Due to the fact that puritans in Britain were prohibited to attend the church, they had to move to New England and maintain their power over the continent. After establishment of their colony, the local authorities began to implement laws regulating human behavior in terms of drunkenness, swearing and gambling. This way, they hoped that the colony would build a new and reliable role model. In view of many scholars, although Puritan ambition to create the ideal model of society, based upon the establishment of a covenant with God, was initially rather promising, they did not firmly follow what they stated.

The promotion of Puritanism in New England took the form of active involvement of citizens. Children were obliged to learn alphabet with corresponding religion-related rhymes to each letter. They were brought up in the best tradition of using knowledge to obtain upper knowledge, which was God. The principles of laziness in Bible stimulated all people to quality work. Men worked very hard and at their best in everything, whereas women were actively engaged in household. On this level, the social role model was also very clear: fathers had to serve as the epitome of ideal men who can handle all work and earn enough money for the family (fathers as examples to their sons), whereas mothers taught their daughters the handicrafts like sewing, knitting as well as keeping the house clean. The overall family model was linked to Bible treatment of the family, where father was the keeper of the family and where he could be dominant over his wife. Although wives had more workload, they knew that God would be pleased with them and men realized their role of family keepers.

According to the Puritans, Native Americans could only be saved through moral and religious conversion that could transform their lives for the better. But if to observe this issue from the Native American perspective, we would definitely notice that the practices of Puritans were extremely intimidating and they significantly damaged the authentic American culture. And, respectively, such change would only mean the total revision of moral and family values among Indians who could sacrifice their traditions, culture, religion and language, beginning to live in European style. Some scientists even speculate that Puritans were intended to use their practices in order to strengthen their control over the densely inhabited area. Through the establishment of a colony and through the implementation of their Puritanism, they wanted the native population to accept all their obligations and to feel positive about their colonization. The Puritans did not have the moral right to mix religion with politics. The creation of colony implied the use of power and control for social order. Nowhere in the Bible has one seen such things. And this is one more evidence to state that Puritans failed to build their “City Upon a Hill” or their ideal society. They failed to realize the Bible itself and the words of Jesus. None of the Puritans denied himself, none of them was peaceful and none was intended to help, caring exclusively about personal desires.

John Winthrop’s Construct of Ideal Community

John Winthrop defines Puritans as individuals who are united by the Christ’s love, creating the fellow membership of Jesus Christ. This way, Puritans were thought to live their lives to become the role models for the entire society, so that each individual had the opportunity to resemble their moral principles and behavioral patterns. In order to strengthen their influence, they were called to create the idea society that could be managed by civil and ecclesiastical government. Additionally, Winthrop stated that Puritans were intended to improve the lives and welfare of people so that they could do service for the Lord. Under the power of holy ordinances, they were aimed at finding the salvation, promoting work and social benefits; yet, quite a confusing thing about the activity of Puritans was that all of them wanted to put into practice the duty of love, neglecting the freedom of many citizens in New England, which was jeopardized because of severe colonization policies. But after the adoption of the Blue Laws of Connecticut, people were mostly concerned with obeying the law, rather than Puritan ideology. Although this law contained the direct reference to the Bible verse, the rules were regarded to be extremely rude. Basically, everyone who was found to be engaged in gambling, worshiping and swearing, was destined to die, because he did not follow the God’s will. But if to pay attention to this point from the same perspective, the colonization, supported by Puritans, was also a sin as any control over people requires unequal treatment and imposing of different laws. This way, Puritan laws were not offered to consideration, but were obligatory to be considered.

Considering John Winthrop’s ideas of ideal community it is worth saying that, in view of some critics, this American colonial governor was mostly regarded as a visionary utopian; all in all, the others characterized him as a societal reactionary. Nevertheless, one should take into account the fact that most apparently John Winthrop was focused on implementing the mixture of group discipline together with the personal accountability that endowed Massachusetts with the permanent success. It is important to make mention that Winthrop’s outlook could not but be impacted by “religious devotion, and superstition” (Benton 272). Obviously, John Winthrop thought that Puritans were capable of making a religious utopia; regardless of this fact, the governor as well as his fellow Puritans failed to establish an ideal community.

Transcendentalism

Transcendentalism emerges to be an American political as well as philosophical movement, which dates back to the beginning of the 19^th century; evidently, this movement was centred around American essayist and poet Ralph Waldo Emerson. It is worth saying that Emerson together with the other representatives of a new movement was aimed at criticizing the contemporary social order that they characterized as old-fashioned and inadequate. Emerson was targeted on searching for the authentic relation to the entire world amidst the nature.

As for the transcendentalists’ key principles, it is necessary to draw attention to the idea of inherent goodness of man and nature. The thing is that the proponents of this movement were aware that the societal order as well as its establishments – mainly religious beliefs and political communities – basically deteriorates the purity of the personality. Apparently, transcendentalists possess faith that individuals appear to be at their best in case they are given personal independence; consequently, in view of Emerson and Thoreau, it is only from these personalities that self-reliant society is likely to be founded.

Ralph Waldo Emerson’s Awareness of Utopian Society

Generally, Emerson rejected the Orthodox Christianity, which implied that he did not perceive the Jesus Christ as the only Savior of the world. Such perception was induced by his personal views from his teenage years. Being interested not only in theology and morality, for his part, Emerson was always looking for some sort of balance between freedom and religion. Otherwise, if the religion was the only factor to be followed, the Americans would lose the sense of social unity. Being not always sure about his religious beliefs exactly, American thinker was more inclined to the Deism and its close principles of transcendentalism as the last was often treated as the rejection from the holy Trinity. Generally, Emerson’s ideology, based on connection between human, God, and nature, predicts the recognition of the only God, not the separate Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The God is not thought to intervene in somebody’s life after the creation of the world. He is the religious judge after the human death. One more reason for his ideology was that he had strong moral principles as well as divine providence. The thing is that he supported the idea of rewards and punishments after death, but rejected the supernatural revelation. Though he did not accept the bases and doctrines of Christianity, he was inspired by the general Christian spiritual beliefs to some extent. Though Jesus Christ was seen by hi, as the great moral mentor, he was not perceived to be the promised Messiah as it would be impossible to save the world on his own. In this works he refers to himself as a Christian. He compares himself to anyone else who is acquainted with Christian principles and believed in doctrines as the religious regulations to be written so as to spiritually encourage and stimulate every person.

Apart from the aforementioned arguments that Emerson advanced over the time of his life, it is worth making mention that the idea of miracle was neglected not only in religion, but in every aspect of his life as the strong independent society should believe in realism and people should be real towards themselves. The angels, souls and invisible beings were by him under strong hesitation as he observed it to be the display of the miracle. His anticlerical idea was grounded upon the rejection of religious liberty from the side of priests. He supposed that any religion appeared to be entirely pure, especially in terms of liberty, since that way it is more safe and open to the Americans. Drawing conclusion from his works, it is obvious that he relies on the human logic and mind as they only constitute the promotional power that helps us understand the God existence, mission and intentions. Moreover, Emerson thought that a person could only perceive the God by means of the strong spiritual principles, through prayers as they are rather personal means of confession. None of the religious books, not depending on which religion it is, can depict the existence and power of religion unanimously. Each religion rejects and accepts something, but all of them are different between each other. None of the words can express the real power of God. It can only be realized with the help of human desire and clear mind. Obviously, despite all the rationality that Emerson’s arguments were characteristic of, his concept of ideal society was doomed to decay; for all that, his ideas can still be utilized in order “to counteract today’s corrosive “global Americanization”” (Habich 733).

Conclusion

To conclude, it is worth admitting that both John Winthrop and Ralph Waldo Emerson had much in common due to being targeted on forming an ideal community. Notwithstanding this fact, these two thinkers are still mostly different from the perspective of distinct dimensions of their utopian vision; the point is that Winthrop, for instance, was much concerned about elaborating an ideal community via the mechanism of abiding strict moral and religious principles, when Emerson was mostly aimed at instigating people to get rid of unthinking conformity and become aware of the significance of human striving, which was opposed to Puritan concept of human depravity. All in all, one should take into consideration the fact that neither Winthrop nor Emerson managed to succeed in implementing their utopian ideals, since it emerged to be practically impossible to set up an ideal life; in any way, the viewpoints that the discussion thinkers articulated appeared to be an integral part of modern-day socio-philosophical framework.

Works Cited

Benton, Robert. The John Winthrops and Developing Scientific Thought in New England. Early American Literature 7.3 (1973): 272-280. Print.

Habich, Robert.  Rev. of Emerson and Thoreau: Figures of Friendship, ed. John T. Lysaker and William Rossi. The New England Quarterly 83.4 (2010): 731-734. Print.