Emerson's Self-Reliance

There is a time in every man's education when he arrives at the conviction that envy is ignorance; that imitation is suicide; that he must take himself for better for worse as his portion; that though the wide universe is full of good, no kernel of nourishing corn can come to him but through his toil bestowed on the plot of ground which is given him to till. The power which resides in him is new in nature, and none but he knows what that is which he can do, nor does he know until he has tried. Not for nothing one face, one character, one fact, makes much impression on him, and another none. It is not without pre-established harmony, this sculpture in the memory. The eye was placed where one ray should fall, that it might testify of that particular ray. Bravely let him speak the utmost syllable of his confession.
Ralph Waldo Emerson. 1841. 2008 <http://www.youmeworks.com/selfreliance.html>.

Reflection,
Copying people is doing harm to yourself, but expressing your own radical opinions in dangerous. Hmm. The transcendentalist has to be brave to actually express his opinions to the public such as Emerson does.
If someone does manage to gather up the courage and be a lone wolf, he can discover the power that he has within himself and because he is not relying on other at all, will know that whatever revalations pop up came from his head. They are his individual thoughts and they are to be revered by him.

By a Transcendentalist,
Journal,
I chose this to be my final reading before I seclude myself tomorrow. Out of all of the texts, this one speaks the most loudly to me, even though it seems to be a contradiction (assuming the subject matter).
I know that self-revelations are not a new phenomenon. Ever since man learned to think, "I think, therefore I am" has been wired into his brain. Whenever a child thinks this for the first time, however, it is still as special as when Adam has the same pinnacle of conciousness because it came from deep within the child and not from an outside influence. Anyone who tells the child this before he is ready is trying to deprive the child of self-discovery and is taking away his future ability to discover.
Returning to the subject, I will return from my own journey of self-discovery and proudly display my findings. I shant be ashamed for nature can bring only the truth.
-John