Transcendentalism (& Romanticism)
Reaction to increasing industrialization in the North -- machinery, loss of natural landscape, growing gulf between rich and poor.
1800-1829: cotton gin, sewing machine, telegraph, first American ìfactories.î
Reformist, idealistic, humanitarian, abolitionist, highly literary.
Grew out of English Romanticism:
- moral enthusiasm
- faith in the individual and intuitive perception; rejected rationalism
- presumed goodness of natural world over corruption of human-made society
Sought ìtranscendentî truths beyond human reason and senses, guided by intuition.