People like Emerson and Thoreau were transcendentalism.
This very controversial poem, "The Sphinx" written by Ralph Waldo Emerson, displays the religious aspects of his life, but also the mystery and sorrow of his life.
Emerson’s transcendental writing style is displayed in “Nature”.

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Emerson was a doctrinaire in transcendentalism.
Emerson was a Harvard-educated essayist and lecturer and is recognized as our first truly "American" thinker. In his most famous essay, "," he urged Americans to stop looking to Europe for inspiration and imitation and be themselves. He believed that people were naturally good and that everyone's potential was limitless. He inspired his colleagues to look into themselves, into nature, into art, and through work for answers to life's most perplexing questions. His intellectual contributions to the philosophy of transcendentalism inspired a uniquely American idealism and spirit of reform.
Ralph Waldo Emerson biography - Transcendentalism
Marsh added his own "Preliminary Essay,"underscoring the distinction between "the understanding," thatdistinctly Lockean faculty of rationalizing from the senses and"the Reason," those higher intuitions valued not only by Germanidealists but by mystics through the ages.
Soon afterward, Frederic Henry Hedge, a Unitarian ministerequally conversant with German thought, wrote for thatdenomination's journal, The Christian Examiner, a laudatoryarticle on Coleridge that Hedge claimed was "the first word, sofar as I know, which any American had uttered in respectfulrecognition of the claims of Transcendentalism." This articlemade a very great impression on Ralph Waldo Emerson, who calledit "a living leaping Logos."
Various essays by Thomas Carlyle in the Edinburgh Review were deeply appreciated by Emerson reading them in New England in 1832, and by 1833 he had set out for Europe in hopes of meeting Carlyle in Scotland, which he did.

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Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882) - Guide to …
Emerson’s essay is about Transcendentalism, the belief that every human has his own way of thinking and personal inborn knowledge to build his opinion, independent from the common beliefs of the community and he should believe in and express his opinion to be successful.
Ralph Waldo Emerson - Wikipedia
Emerson supports the idea of Transcendentalism by urging his readers to trust their own ideas, beliefs and common sense, to listen to and to trust their inner voice and to hold the popular opinion back from influencing their way of thi...
Emerson, Ralph Waldo | Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy
It contains "History," "Self-Reliance,""Compensation," "Spiritual Laws," "Love," "Friendship,""Prudence," "Heroism," "The Over-Soul," "Circles," "Intellect,"and "Art." The second series of Essays (1844) includes "ThePoet," "Manners," and "Character." In it Emerson tempered theoptimism of the first volume of essays, placing less emphasis onthe self and acknowledging the limitations of real life.
In the interval between the publication of these two volumes,Emerson wrote for The Dial, the journal of New EnglandTranscendentalism, which was founded in 1840 with Margaret Fuller(later famous as a critic and feminist) as editor.