Intellect Summary and Analysis

In this essay, Emerson asserts that there is an intuitive, instinctive consciousness in man that mirrors the ceaseless action of the universal mind; reflection upon the workings of this universal mind yield insights and truths that permit intellectual and spiritual advancement. This viewpoint prefigures the dawn of the phenomonological movement in modern philosophy by a half-century. Emerson expresses it succinctly: "The making a fact the subject of thought raises it." In other words, one must allow the instinctive river of consciousness to flow unimpeded but also maintain an aware, rational mind to be able to understand the meaning of "experience." When we can withdraw from the onrushing stream of stimulation and events in the world for only a few moments, Emerson says, the truth is revealed as "a certain wandering light appears and is the distinction, the principle, we wanted."