The American Scholar
Delivered to the Phi Beta Kappa Society at Harvard on August 31, 1837, dubbed by Oliver Wendell Holmes as America's 'Intellectual Declaration of Independence'.
Full Transcript
Mr. President and Gentlemen: I greet you on the recompense of another year. The scholar is the delegated intellect. In the right state, he is Man Thinking. In the degenerate state, when he tends to become a mere thinker, or still worse, the parrot of other men’s thinking, he is viewed as a victim of routine.
Books are the best of things, well used; abused, among the worst. What is the right use? What is the one end which all means go to effect? They are for nothing but to inspire.
I had better never see a book than to be warped by its attraction clean out of my own orbit, and made a satellite instead of a system. The one thing in the world, of value, is the active soul.
Free should the scholar be—free and brave. Free even to the definition of freedom, “without any hindrance that does not arise out of his own constitution.” Brave; for fear is a thing which a scholar by his very function puts behind him.
Defining Key Excerpts
"Man Thinking must not be subdued by his instruments. Books are for the scholar's idle times."
"Free should the scholar be—free and brave."
Bring this Speech to your Wall
Get this historic speech professionally typeset, printed on structured canvas, and delivered in a solid wood frame.