The Aims of American Transcendentalists.

"The spirit of the time is in every form a protest against usage and a search for principles." (The Dial, Ralph Waldo Emerson) Transcendentalism, an American cultural movement formed in the early 19th century in New England, showed many ambitions. In the essays of Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau, the two most famous and influential Transcendentalists, we may see that they tried to reform the society they were born into. They discussed numerous …

…could see the problems of their time, and tried to find a solution for them. They transformed their discoveries into an accessible form in order to be able to influence a large number of people. They wanted people to reconsider their relationships with nature, their country, other people, and themselves; and consequently to live according to the moral, cultural, and political principles. After the reformation, the society could become more similar to a perfect one.