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Gifts by Ralph Waldo Emerson

Intro

Gifts is one of a total of eight essays included in the second series of essays written by the U.S. essayist, lecturer, philosopher and abolitionsit Ralph Waldo Emerson. In this essay, Emerson critically examines the material culture of gift-giving. In addition, Emerson explores the question of what are appropriate forms of gifts and how they should be received.

Summary

The essay discussed in this entry, like other essays from the first and second series, begins with a poem that has the same name as the essay. It reads as follows:

Gifts

Gifts of one who loved me,-

‘T was high time they came

When he ceased to love me

Time they stopped for shame

The poem emphasizes the addresser’s motivation behind giving a gift to the addressee, or the persona. This motivation expires, similar to a cause-effect relationship with the expiration of love.

Essay

1^st Paragraph

Emerson begins his essay with the thesis “that the world is in a state of bankruptcy”. However, he relativizes this thesis, which is not his ("It is said [...]") and attributes the problem to the selection of a gift, not to the general act of giving a gift. In the remainder of the paragraph, Emerson gives examples of appropriate gifts (“fit presents”), namely flowers and fruits, and discusses their meaning, which is to be sent by the addressee to the recipient.

2^nd Paragraph

In the second paragraph Emerson establishes a connection between the necessity to give, the needs of the recipient, and the overall value of a gift. In addition to a mere satisfaction of basic needs (i.e., hunger, thirst, etc.), Emerson cites the correlation between the gift and the character of the recipient, which should be considered when selecting a gift. In this context, Emerson describes common practices, such as giving “rings and other jewels”, as barbaric and classifies them as excuses for gifts. These are only appropriate “for kings and, rich men who represent kings,” and should be seen more as a kind of ransom or symbolic act of atonement. In the case of common people, therefore, gifts should represent “a portion of thyself.”

3^rd Paragraph

In this section, Emerson addresses, respectively, the role of the recipient of a gift and the acceptance of gifts. According to Emerson, it is not part of a man’s duties to receive gifts. Furthermore, the acceptance of gifts in any case creates a certain relationship of dependence. This leads to the recipient developing needs that go beyond the actual gift.

4^th Paragraph

Emerson further elaborates on the problem of the donee here. Thus, gifts can trigger both positive and negative emotions in the recipient. According to Emerson, these can be caused, on the one hand, by reflecting the sender's ignorance of the character of the recipient. On the other hand, over-enthusiasm about a gift may be an indication that the gift is valued to a greater degree than the originator of the gift. Therefore, gifts should consist less in something to which both sides have equal access, but rather reflect the mutual appreciation, respectively the knowledge of the other.

5^th Paragraph

According to Emerson, the difficulty of gift-giving, as well as the proper appreciation of being given a gift, lies in the incongruity between a gift and the person receiving it. Likewise, the gratitude of a generous person for a gift always leaves a certain compulsion to repay that gratitude in return. In this respect, the act of giving is “trivial and selfish” because it is associated with the expectation of gratitude. Rectitude alone produces an egalitarian distribution of gifts and gratitude.

6^th Paragraph

In the last paragraph, Emerson calls love “the genius (The term will be further defined in a later section of the article based on historical context) and [the] god of gifts,” which need not be determined by man. Further, he points out that we should not expect gifts from others and that, moreover, they can neither be bought nor sold.

Insight

The first sentence of the essay, especially the phrase that “the world is in a state of bankruptcy,” suggests that Emerson is addressing an economic problem here. On the other hand, an economic interpretation of the first sentence, in view of Emerson's further remarks, does not seem to be very useful, since these rather point to a moral problem. This, in Emerson's estimation, affects all the population to some extent. It involves choosing the right gift to give to others on different occasions throughout the year. The controversial aspect of gift-giving, according to Emerson, is that, on the one hand, it is satisfying to be generous to others, but on the other hand, it is also very vexatious. In other words, gifts in this sense can be seen as a kind of dichotomous social convention. On one side of this dichotomy lies the obligation to choose a suitable gift for a given occasion, which is appropriate in size, monetary value, form of presentation, but also in terms of the preferences of the person receiving the gift and the occasion. On the other hand, gift giving, according to Emerson, satisfies the need of the giver to show magnanimity ("[...] it is always so pleasant to generous [...]").

Like many other social phenomena, the act of giving is inherently reciprocal. In this way, the person receiving the gift is not only presented with a gift that fulfills certain requirements, but the obligation to repay this generosity is also imposed on this person. Euphemistically, this social phenomenon can be described as a kind of vicious circle, which ends only with the end of a relationship of any kind or with the death of one of the people involved. Objectively, this process, which could also be observed within cultures not related to Western value systems, can be seen as a mechanism for maintaining power relationships. Thus, with reference to Emerson's essay, when selecting a gift, it is not only decisive which gift is most likely to satisfy the wishes of the person receiving the gift, but also the extent to which it underlines the giver's own status.

In the first paragraph of the essay Emerson cites, as examples for common gifts, flowers, and fruits. Accordingly, flowers are characterized by the fact that they “contrast with […] ordinary nature.” From this point of view, one of the characteristics that determine the value of a gift is that it is exceptional. Emerson points here to the value neutrality of nature, whose task it is not to ensnare or court people, even though, this is exemplified to people by society (“Men use to tell us that we love flattery […]”). However, even assuming that the value of a given object can be interpreted differently depending on the underlying society, these patterns of interpretation are still traditional forms of perceiving reality. Breaking through these traditions of perception appears to be a very complex challenge, to say the least, against the background of a society that is supposedly increasingly oriented towards materialism. This orientation can be observed in the overwhelming amount of advertisements, that people come across, both, in the actual world as well as in the digital space. On the other hand, the question can be asked whether certain forms of materialistic appreciation, which move within the aforementioned interpretive margins, are actually problematic.

Other forms of accepted gifts are fruits, as mentioned earlier. These, according to Emerson, when presented as gifts, represent the pinnacle of material appreciation (“[…] they are the flower of commodities, and admit of fantastic values being attached to them.”). Even in modern times, within large parts of Western civilizations, so-called fruit baskets represent suitable gifts for different occasions. Often, the fruits contained are specimens that do not grow naturally within the respective latitudes and are therefore only made available via long transport routes. Emerson describes this problem in his essay as follows: “If a man should send to me to come a hundred miles to visit him, and should set before me a basket of fine summer-fruit, I should think that there was some proportion between the labor and the reward.” With regard to this quote, it must be taken into account, that over the course of the nineteenth century (particularly at its beginning and end), the United States underwent a transformation from a primarily agrarian to an urban society. Thus, it can be assumed that at the time Emerson wrote this essay, most of the U.S. population no longer had immediate access to natural products, such as fruits. The decisive factor for Emerson in this context, however, seems to be less the material aspect, as in the case of flowers, but rather that the fruits symbolize something that goes beyond this aspect. This aspect is characterized by the fact that the gift is not simply a collection of a wide variety of fruits, but also a certain amount of work, which is hidden behind the presentation of the fruit. This becomes, if it was provided by the gift-giving person himself, a part of the gift and expresses, beyond the object, the appreciation towards the person who received the gift.

At the beginning of the second paragraph, Emerson virtually introduces an orientation for the selection of and occasion for a gift. Accordingly, both result from people's everyday needs. Likewise, this form of giving does not require the search for an appropriate gift that both flatters the person receiving the gift and, on the other hand, emphasizes the status of the giver. In this respect, no day of the year is given greater importance than another. This egalitarian approach to the human and natural environment is characteristic of Emerson's literary work and is found in the essay Art and the poem The Rhodora, among others. A question that arises especially when reflecting on the example given by Emerson in Gifts (“[…] if the man at the door have no shoes, you have not to consider whether you could procure him a paint-box.”) is to what extent this dissolves the dependency relationship within the dichotomy of give and take. This would only become obsolete under the assumption that actual altruism exists. From an idealistic perspective, however, a self-regulating balance could be assumed whose decisive momentum is not the granting and retribution of favors, but necessities that can arise equally in every human being, e.g. hunger and thirst. Emerson also points out that such gifts, which are not of the choice of the giver, but which in turn meet the needs of the supplicant, amount to a heroic gesture, but at the same time cannot always be convenient to the giver. On the other hand, the assessment of one's own needs, which are served by another person in return, can also be not entirely unproblematic. A hedonist, for example, who at all times strives for the satisfaction of his psychological and physical needs, might regard things as necessary which could not be fulfilled or, as Emerson also notes, could only be fulfilled by others with inconvenience.

Emerson sees another form of suitable gifts in those objects which, on the one hand, reflect knowledge about the character of the counterpart and, on the other hand, express the product of one's own effort. But here, too, he criticizes the attitude within society, which in this respect is superficial and focused on the representation of supposed wealth ("[...] a false state of property [...]"). Here, the question can be asked whether the increasing industrialization, which was more or less in its infancy in the middle of the 19th century and which in the 21st century finds its extension in the digitalization of everyday life, deprives people of their ability to experience their fellow human beings on a spiritual level and not to define their character on the basis of material goods. Another aspect that can be addressed in this context is the role of time, both in Emerson's time and within (post-) modern society. In his essay The Poet, Emerson criticizes, among other things, that innovations such as “the factory-village and the railway” would be seen as cuts in the poem written by nature. However, it seems presumptuous at this point to accuse Emerson of lacking foresight for the consequences of industrialization and modern transportation for the environment. Nevertheless, Emerson overlooks an important aspect in this context, namely that of time savings, which is especially touted by producers of modern technologies. At this point, it remains to be seen whether such technologies are a real enrichment for the accomplishment of everyday tasks or whether they merely contribute to increasing the complexity of everyday life. But here Emerson is correct that things like “rings and other jewels are not gifts, but apologies for gifts.” To get to know the other person and to fathom his character requires time, which seems to be available to an ever-decreasing extent since the emergence of the essay. If this time is not taken up, the only way out is a material object as an excuse.

On the other hand, according to Emerson, the acceptance of gifts is also not an easy undertaking, since, as already indicated above, it creates a kind of dependency. In other words, gifts in this sense can be understood as an intervention in one's self-determination (“We wish to be self-sustained”). From such a dependency relationship, greed can arise, which drives people to demand things that go beyond their actual needs. In this respect, it may be helpful to bear in mind that in large parts of Europe and the United States, the concept of prosperity is closely linked and, almost by definition, associated with the possession of material goods. According to the theory of symbolic self-completion, for example, certain people strive to compensate for perceived inadequacies with material possessions in order to protect the integrity of their own identity. According to the assumptions of this theory, which emerged almost exactly 100 years after Emerson's death, Emerson's formulations also seem plausible: “We ask the whole. Nothing will content us. We arraign society, if it do not give us besides earth, and fire, and water, opportunity, love, reverence, and objects of veneration.” This would explain, although not conclusively, why people willingly enter the seemingly endless spiral of giving and being given gifts.

To get around this spiral, or to put it in Emersonian terms, to circumvent it (“[…] a difficult channel, which requires careful sailing, or rude boats.”), there must be something inherent in a gift that goes beyond the physical object. It requires a deep mutual understanding of the other as well as the ability to understand the being of the other, not their material offerings, as an enrichment of one's own self, as a gift. This creates a kind of natural equilibrium that makes the exchange of material goods unnecessary, since both sides would have equal access to them anyway. In this sense, it is idle and, according to Emerson, selfish to look for occasions to do other people favors, especially if they are repaid by generous gestures, which in turn may put the giver in doubt about the appropriateness of his own favor. Thus, as Emerson puts it, it is rectitude that determines the occasion and nature of the gift or favor.

Quotations

In this part of the article, selected quotes from the underlying essay will be highlighted separately and their meaning explained in more detail.

“The only gift is a portion of thyself. Thou must bleed for me.”

This quote can be considered central, as it expresses the essence of the entire essay. Accordingly, only those things constitute gifts that can be regarded as a manifestation of one's profession. Figuratively speaking, a gift must contain the lifeblood of a person to be considered a true gift in the Emersonian sense. The examples given by Emerson, following the present quotation, must be considered within the respective historical context, as they may seem alienating to the reader and, from today's perspective, in the case of the last example (“[…] the girl, [brings] a handkerchief of her own sewing.”), are not entirely unproblematic.

The second quote from the essay reads as follows:

“Brother, if Jove to thee a present make,

Take heed that from his hands thou nothing take.”

In the context of the essay, especially the corresponding paragraph within which this quote appears, this can be understood in the way that a person should use his God-given talents to make his life self-determined and not rely on the gifts of others. From a modern or non-confessional perspective, the phrase God-given can also be read as given by nature.

Another quote, which may be central to the point of the entire essay, is as follows:

“The gift, to be true, must be the flowing of the giver unto me, correspondent to my flowing unto him. When the waters are at level, then my goods pass to him, and his to me. All his is mine, all mine his.”

Particular attention should be paid here to the word true within the first line of the quotation, which lends a certain normativity to the entire statement. According to Emerson, as he also states following this quotation, it is not things of everyday use, but beautiful things, which in turn have certain characteristics. Thus, these things, for one, are not to be expected by the person receiving the gift, nor are they to be handed over by the person giving the gift with a specific intention. At this point, it is also important to get away from the idea of a gift as a physical object. Here it is helpful to imagine a conversation between two friends within which there is a spontaneous exchange of ideas that neither one nor the other person intended, but which in the end is enriching for both sides.

The last quote, which will be explored here, summarizes to some extent Emerson's intention for writing the essay. It reads:

“There are persons, from whom we always expect fairy tokens; let us not cease to expect them. This is prerogative, and not to be limited to our municipal rules. For the rest, I like to see that we cannot be bought and sold. The best of hospitality and of generosity is also not in the will, but in fate.

At the beginning of the quotation, it becomes clear that, according to Emerson, there are very well people to whom the public can direct a certain expectation. This expectation represents a certain privilege that is not subject to social rules, such as the need for occasion and appropriateness of a gift. In all other cases, Emerson considers fate the driving force that determines the nature and occasion of a gift. In other words, these are not meant to be forced, as true goodness arises from its necessity and thus cannot be seen as an intentional transaction.

Influences

Non-literary influence

The essay begins with the sentence: “It is said that the world is in a state of bankruptcy, that the world owes the world more than the world can pay, and ought to go into chancery, and be sold.” Since Emerson does not give any source for this statement, also in the further course of the essay, this statement raises different questions as well as with it, a large room for interpretation. Accordingly, the question can be asked in which respect the supposed bankruptcy of the world is expressed. The word bankruptcy can be interpreted on the one hand from the perspective of economics, as a judicially determined insolvency. And indeed, in 1837, about 7 years before Emerson published his second series of essays, there was an economic crisis in the United States, which is also known as the Panic of 1837.

The cause(s) of its outbreak as well as its exact consequences remain controversial. What is certain, however, is that in its course there were demands for territorial expansion. These were fulfilled insofar as it came to the annexation of more than half of the northern Mexican territory after the end of the U.S.-Mexican War. In addition, there was a territorial expansion of the United States toward the Pacific coast after gold was found in what is now California. However, one reason given is the Deposit Act of 1836 under President Andrew Jackson, which allowed the United States to pay debts to foreign creditors in the form of precious metals. However, this led to a dramatic decline in U.S. gold reserves. In this context, the formulation “that the world owes the world more than the world can pay,” within the above sentence, also seems plausible. Since Emerson, as mentioned above, does not cite any sources for the statement, it is left to speculation whether this statement actually refers to the economic situation of the U.S. at that time and whether this, in addition, gave Emerson reason to write this essay.

Graeco-Roman Mythology

In another paragraph of the essay, Emerson says, analogously, that desires which drift into the fantastic must be punished. However, he would like to see this task left to others. More precisely formulated, this task is to be carried out by the Furies or Erinyes. These originated in Greco-Roman mythology and represented gods of vengeance in both cultures. These have different names, depending on the underlying culture and author of the particular narrative. Although references, especially to Greek mythology, are not uncommon to Emerson's works, the choice of these deities underscores that Emerson does not want to leave it at a passing rebuke when it comes to punishment, which, as mentioned earlier, he does not want to take on himself. In the context of the essay's topic, this shows that, in Emerson's view, desires should be limited to basal needs of life. Desires that go beyond these needs can be seen as a kind of crime in the context of this essay.

Shakespearean Drama

Emerson's essay also includes a reference to a work by William Shakespeare written in the early 17th century, namely Timon of Athens. In this drama, the philanthropist Timon of Athens uses his wealth to pay off, among other things, the debts of his supposed friends. The latter try to curry Timon's favor in order to share in his wealth, until Timon dies, impoverished and secluded in a cave, due to his munificent behavior. The connection to Emerson's essay seems quite obvious within the relevant paragraph, as Emerson discusses in it what is the appropriate form of accepting a gift. In advance of this analogy, Emerson argues that gifts, which are given in the form of material goods and thus correspond to a useful rather than an ideal value, are nothing more than a usurpation of the other person, or in other words, the binding of the other person to one's own person based on a kind of fealty. In these remarks, the basic communitarian attitude, which can be found within the Transcendentalist movement, to which Emerson also belonged, also becomes clear. According to Emerson, these very goods are not the property of the individual but of the community, which in turn deprives them of the status of property and makes them useful or usable objects. Here, however, Emerson's execution that he would rather sympathize with the beneficiaries of the Greek philanthropist seems somewhat disconcerting. Although they only try to participate in what, according to Emerson, belongs to them anyway, the way to get there, regarding the aforementioned Shakespearean drama, leads through flattery, which Emerson implicitly criticizes in the first paragraph of his essay (“Men use to tell us that we love flattery […]”). The central aspect of Emerson's critique at this point, however, is that he does not even consider these useful things as gifts, but rather beautiful things whose value is immaterial (“Hence the fitness of beautiful, not useful things for gifts.”).

Buddhism

A final intertextual reference is found in the same paragraph as that to the Shakespearean drama. This leads to the Basic Principles for Lay Buddhists, also known as the Five Precepts. In a somewhat more nuanced view than Emerson's, showing gratitude to benefactors is one of the basic tenets of Buddhism, yet Buddhist monks do not explicitly thank their donors, as Emerson correctly notes. Like the reference to Timon of Athens, this reference must be seen in the overall context of the corresponding paragraph as well as the essay itself. In the context of the paragraph, this reference is consistent with Emerson's criticism that the expectation of gratitude for things that he believes belong to the public has no real meaning ("For, the expectation of gratitude is mean [...]"). The relation to the whole essay results from the fact that the material aspect of gifts is secondary, as well as the assignment of meaning regarding the occasion on which a gift is presented and rather the mutual appreciation and a deep understanding of the other should be in the foreground.

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