In Self-Reliance, Emerson states that when we "Accept the place the diving Providence has found for you; the society of your contemporaries, the connection of events. Great men have always done so and confided themselves childlike to the genius of their age...". This statement fits well into the overall theme of the essay which is that men are better off relying on themselves than on society. He believes that society's desire is to conform people and not allow them to be who they are truly meant to be. Emerson also believed that by trusting in yourself, you can achieve greatness.
             Emerson states his theme early on in Self-Reliance when he states that "envy is ignorance; that imitation is suicide". In society, everywhere we look we can see people wanting a nice car or jewelry that someone else has and when they try to get it they are just conforming to what others think they should be. Emerson goes on to say that people should trust themselves because God lives within them. By doing what God has appointed for us to do we can reach fulfillment. This is our task in this life, working as hard we can to achieve happiness once we have finished our obligation
             Emerson believes that society works to prevent man from reaching his potential. It does this by making us ashamed to express ourselves and the "divine idea which each of us represents". He realizes that man cannot reach fulfillment in doing what he is not destined to succeed at and that doing this will only bring more sorrow and searching for the truth. Society also encourages thinking like everyone else. It ridiculed people who challenged the dominate idea in society at the time, only to have history prove it wrong. Society cannot be trusted to give the right answers when people can listen to the voice of God inside them to find out the truth for themselves.
             Transcendentalists believed that God lived within every person and that by meditating away from soc...