american inheritance
...own future rather than adopt the English way of living. Transcendentalism was an attempt to create a wholly American philosophy and religion. Emerson, a Transcendentalist, wished to reject the traditions of Europe and create America’s own mythologies. This was a giant step in the idea that America was now beginning to imagine their own destiny, rather than inherit one. Transcendentalism came out with new ideas such as the “over-soul”. This was the idea that there is one supreme “soul” which everyone is consumed in and affected by. The Romantics who were very American began to create their own principles, breaking away from those of the Age of Reason. The Age of Reason believed that natural rights required institutions to give them form and to be real and exercised. The Romantics while not totally rejecting this idea believed that natural rights came directly to man through nature and in order to experience these rights, one must get away from institutions. Natty Bummpo and the novels of Cooper create...