Source identified
Read & copy the quotation
“Whoso would be a man must be a nonconformist.”
- Source
- Self-Reliance
- Date
- 1841
Meaning of “Whoso would be a man must be a…”
Emerson argues that mature character requires enough independence to resist conformity when conviction points elsewhere.
Where does it come from?
Essays, First Series, essay II, “Self-Reliance,” Project Gutenberg #2944. “Whoso would be a man must be a nonconformist” follows Emerson’s claim that society conspires against the manhood of its members through conformity. The represented Gutenberg witness prints a comma after “man,” while the frozen catalog quotation omits that punctuation; the wording is otherwise the same. It remains Transcendentalist moral rhetoric about self-trust and independence rather than a universal instruction to reject social norms or expertise.
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