The duty of the scholar is at once infinitely free, infinitely important and infinitely practical. Emerson calls for the scholar, The American Scholar, to discard much of what concerns modern scholarship and the masses, and to focus upon the cultivation and practice of that which is most high. The scholar should take refuge in the good and great for company, the scholar's infinite work being to manifest the ultimate in practical experience.
As more and more scholars commit themselves to true scholarship as described above, it will become easier and easier for interested and talented people to find the supportive resources that allow for their gradual growth. Perhaps this gradual growth will fill our ever numerous American institutions with bright virtue. Our country has become the leader, since Emerson’s time, in infrastructure, industry, and military strength. It is through the cultivation of the American Scholar that our inner wealth and spiritual strength can answer the call to true leadership, enduring positive influence. Establishing American Scholarship in this its highest form has become more and more crucial. In Emerson’s time the role of America in the affairs of the world was still relatively insignificant. But now, through Hollywood and through Washington, America and its whims are foremost in the global mind. As more American Scholars plant themselves firmly in the current educational system, answering only to that which is highest in nature, the past, humanity, and themselves, the more America can become worthy of its growing role in the world. It is upon the growth of American Scholastics that the establishment of a lasting peace and global harmony hinges. If many across the globe are looking with more and more interest toward the inklings of Americans it is now crucial that we cultivate a resonance with that which is highest. The talented and interested people of America will subsequently gravitate toward the true American Scholars. Thus Emerson’s ideals of cultivating Man in the farm, Man in the office, Man in roles of leadership can begin to come to fruition. Bright virtue will manifest in the actions of more and more people who recognize the significance of their practical actions and the value of their humanity. Unlike the farmer, the businessman, the politician, the true Man/Woman will recognize that which is most virtuous in nature, which is most resonate through the past, the beauty of human action, and the vastness of the self, just as the American Scholar, Man thinking has done. It is in this way that the American for better or worse the leader of the modern world will also recognize that which is beautiful in the vast foreign peoples of the world, the vast foreign traditions of the world, and the vast natural beauty of the world, allowing these to flourish. The American scholar has the ability to temper the arrogance of the modern mind through embodiment of that which is infinitely wiser than the fickle pursuits of the day. The narrow modern view that recognizes no other systems of the past, no other wisdom of the natural, ancient or foreign, will gradually be widened through the embodiment of the highest aesthetic sense in the American Scholar, Man/Woman thinking. In a society that lives more and more in mental worlds such as television, movies and computers, mental activity, in some form, is increasingly the dominant action of the era. It is in this sense, the importance of mental activity as Man thinking, that Emerson created a work of the highest patriotism. Emerson wrote out of concern that his fellow countrymen would seek to further the virtue of transcendent Nature, History, and Practicality. The truest Patriots of today will also recognize the need for the cultivation and practice of these virtues, the embodiment of the ideals of the American Scholar.
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