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Vesselina Runkwitz, “The Metaphysical Correspondence between Nature and Spirit in the Visions of
the American Transcendentalists Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau”, TRANS- [Online],
12 | 2011, Online since 08 July 2011, connection on 09 October 2024. URL: http://
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The Metaphysical Correspondence between Nature and Spirit in the Visions of t... 1
Introduction
1 Man’s attempt to solve the riddle of his existence – of the surrounding world and his
inner states by means of his mental activity – is rooted in his very nature and has been
a strong desire for centuries. With the awakening of the conscious mind, this
endeavour led him into the spheres of philosophy and religion. Each person creates his
own philosophy and belief to match his own character and personal experiences. Thus
it is the individual’s inner response that determines his way of living and thinking.
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different spiritual streams and liberal ideas of the Enlightenment, which revolutionized
and provided new impetus to the the spirit and thought of the time.
3 This essay will explore the visions of the main representatives of transcendentalism,
Ralph Waldo Emerson and his companion Henry David Thoreau. In order to understand
which fundamental ideas underlie their theory, it will first be first necessary to gain an
insight into the specific historical context of the movement and into the origins of the
term “transcendental”. The essay will further discuss Emerson’s “intuitional
philosophy”, which is based on the belief that spiritual truth may be conceived
intuitively and directly from God. Subsequently, Emerson’s mystical spiritual
experience of nature will be considered and his concept of the “Over Soul” will be
discussed with reference to the idealistic view of the German poet Johann Wolfgang von
Goethe, as illustrated by one of the latter’s poems. Finally, this work will examine how
Thoreau saw man’s relation to nature and what his transcendental vision of the
correspondence between spirit and nature was.
4 When Goddard described the 18th century as an ’age of prose and reason‘, 1 he was
primarily referring to the rigid Calvinistic dogmatism and its anti-emotional attitude,
which dominated the spirit of North America at the time. Although New England had
won political freedom with the Declaration of Independence in 1776, America was still
strongly bound to the intellectual, cultural and religious convictions of her mother
colony 50 years later.
5 Calvinism emerged in the late 16th century as a rejection of the prevailing lax moral
standards, the lavishness and extravagance of the Church, and the infinite starvation of
the epoch. The reformatory religious doctrine established by the clergymen Johannes
Calvin was later adopted by the Puritans, who rejected the authority of the Church and
sought to overcome the social demoralization of their time2. The Puritans derived their
name from the translation of the Greek term ’catharus‘, meaning ‘pure‘. They argued in
favour of a purification of the Church from sin and immorality. The main thesis of
Calvinism centred on the assumption of an absolute predestination of the human being
to eternal life or eternal death according to God’s will. Furthermore, it held to the
conviction that man’s nature was sinful and depraved since the fall from grace. They
therefore saw the human being as incapable of finding redemption by means of his own
will and effort. He was required to undertake a moral regeneration through rigorous
self-discipline and devoutness. Since the human being was supposed to be spiritually
blinded, he could recognize the will of God only by a strenuous study of the Holy
Scripture. The Calvinists called for an emotionless, rational interpretation of the Bible
by authorized clergymen. Believers were compelled to adhere to particular analytic
requirements and were therefore not able to attain dialectic knowledge of diverse
biblical readings3. At the end of the 18th century, a ’spiritual deadness’ 4 prevailed in
North America, due to the objectified, sceptical perspective, which condemned all
enthusiasm.
6 When, as a result of the French revolution, egalitarian ideas and humanitarian
endeavours reached New England, it lead to major divisions in religious and intellectual
beliefs. A group of liberal Christians, who were intensely influenced by those ideas,
sought to unify reason and enthusiasm in an ethical system that allowed for self-
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contained and enlightened judgement. In this system ‘moral sense‘ formed the central
element. The most significant representative of this religious insight was the Unitarian5
William Ellery Chaning (1780 – 1840), who is also regarded as the forerunner of
transcendentalism. In 1818 he wrote in his journal, ‘Unitarian Christianity‘, that the
belief in predestination tended to “pervert the moral faculty”.6 Instead, he preached
salvation through active exertion and through striving for spiritual evolution or
unfolding, which he called “self-culture”.7 The Unitarians rejected the idea of the
depravity of man, and claimed that the human being was good by nature. They
propagated a critical confrontation with theological questions in order to console the
religious crisis of their time. Believing that a scientifically based view could give firm
evidence of biblical revelation, they attached themselves to the Empiricist doctrine of
John Locke8. According to Locke, human intuitive knowledge is restricted to the
confines of deductive logic, which means that all assertion can only be deduced
through information gained by our sensory perception. As a consequence, he
considered human cognitive competence as very constrained, as it is only based on
empirical knowledge. He viewed the miracles of the Old and New Testament as
historical evidence of Divine Revelation. Consequently, this view rejected the
assumption that Divine Truth may be received directly by the human soul without any
exertion of the faculty of judgement9.
7 Since the Unitarians substituted religious experience for the process of rational
judgement, and assigned Divine Revelation to the historical figure of Jesus, they
separated Faith from its metaphysical element. Their emphasized principle of
reasoning helped overcome the bigotry of the Puritans, but on the other hand, it
suggested that religious practice in New England was doomed to freeze into dogmatism
and social materialism.10 The desire for spiritual liberation was already seeded into the
minds of Americans by the French revolution. European Enlightenment and the
democratic concept of liberty was revived on a spiritual level by the emergence of
transcendentalism. Its members criticized the stubborn adherence of the Unitarians to
the Bible as the only and direct relation to God, since they regarded it as an historical
document of a less enlightened time. They believed in the proclamation of Jesus’
doctrine, but they looked for spiritual guidance which could match the needs of an
enlightened individual. Averting themselves from historically based dogmatism, they
turned towards the inner life of the individual and towards the intuitive font of Truth.
They believed in the vocation of man to recognize Divine Revelation within himself,
beyond empirical experience.11 Nevertheless, they accepted the critically logical
method of the Unitarians and filled it with emotional content in order to transform it
into a method of spiritual intuition.12 As a result they approached the evangelical
statement of faith from a new philosophical perspective. The following statement by
the transcendentalist George Ripley could well summarize the religious standpoint of
the group: “it is to the heart or inward nature of man, in a state of purity or freedom
from subjection to the lower passions, that the presence of God is manifested”.13
8 Descending from a puritan family in which his forefathers were clergymen for
generations, Emerson studied to become a clerk and took up the ministry in 1829.14 But
even during his studies at Harvard Divinity School he showed little interest in
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existence and experiences the divine universal spirit as a force which flows through
man and nature. Due to this energy which dwells also in man, the individual is able to
experience a moment of confidence and delight in the eternal universal energy:
In the woods, too, a man casts off his years, as the snake his slough, and at what
period so ever of life is always a child. In the woods there is a perpetual youth.
Within these plantations of God, a decorum and sanctity reign, a perennial festival
is dressed, and the guest sees not how he should tire of them in a thousand years.34
18 The visionary man may immerse himself in the universe, losing his I-consciousness. He
may become a receptive “transparent eyeball” through which the “Universal Being”
transmits itself into his consciousness, and makes him sense his oneness with God:
I am standing on the bare ground, - my head bathed by the blithe air and uplifted
into the infinite space, - all mean egotism vanishes. I become a transparent eye-ball;
I am nothing; I see all; the currents of the Universal Being circulate through me; I
am part and particle of God.35
19 The enthusiastic tone and poetic illustration reveal not only Emerson’s personal
spiritual experience of immersion into the spheres of the eternal when surrounded by
nature, but also shows his strong desire to reach and inspire his addressees in the hope
that his realized vision might jump inside them like a spark and ignite. In the
contemplative removal of all ontological restrictions between subjectivity and the
absolute being by abolishment of all egotistic aspirations, the individual experiences a
sameness among nature, God and himself. The assumption that there is one universal
Spirit that dwells in all living creations forms a central element in Emerson’s religious
vision, and is the basis for the direct relation between the individual’s soul and God. In
the moment of immersion with the Universal Soul, the individual encounters the
greatest form of blessedness.
20 Emerson’s religious vision stands in contrast to the Christian doctrine of revelation,
according to which the soul experiences salvation from the outside. To experience awe
in the presence of nature, means to approach it with a balance between our inner and
outer senses. Therefore, it is the particular harmony between man's inner processes
and the outer world that enables the soul to elevate itself. Thus, Emerson shifts
religious significance towards the moral responsibility of the individual. He makes clear
that only he, who pays attention to his conscience, may live in harmony with his own
self and the surrounding world:
He who does a good deed is instantly ennobled. He who does a mean deed is by the
action itself contracted […] If a man dissemble, deceive, he deceives himself, and
goes out of acquaintance with his own being.36
21 Emerson saw nature’s principles of compensation incarnated in human nature as well.
Thus, he discerns that every decision, every action has its equilibrating counterpart in
the universe of causality. In this self-regulating system each action is followed by its
consequence and falls back on the actor himself. Reward and punishment are not
issued by an external divine power, but are the result of a continuously balancing
universe: ”Every act rewards itself, or in other words integrates itself. […] The causal
retribution is in the thing and is seen by the soul“.37
22 To follow the inner moral sentiment therefore meant to fulfil the Divine within himself:
the becoming one with God.
There is no other separate, ultimate resource, for God is within him, God about him,
he is a part of God himself. […] Hence, the first ground of moral obligation is this;
that the Being who ordained [obedience] is the Source, the Support and Principle of
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our existence, and it would be a kind of denying our Nature to reject that which is
agreeable to him.38
23 ‘Conscience’ was not a natural scientific construct, but was conceived as the voice of
God within the soul. “There is no other way for you to arrive at the voice of God but by
patient listening to your own conscience”39. In order to be perpetually open to its
sound, the soul must be free from material attachments and egotistic interests. The
individual should be self-sufficient, self-reliant and should be able to rest within his
own self.
24 The German poet and writer Johann Wolfgang Goethe (1749-1832) contrasted the
conceptualization of empiricism as a rational, objective, and dispassionate
investigation of nature with that of the intuitively guided and emotionally dominated
artistic genius. In the poem ‘Were the eye not like the sun’, we can identify a parallel to
Emerson’s natural attitude. Here the idea of a divine spirit dwelling in the individual is
manifested:
Wär’ nicht das Auge sonnenhaft, Were the eye not like the sun,
Die Sonne könnt’ es nie erblicken; How could my eye then see it?
Lebt’ nicht in uns des Gottes eigene Were we not endowed with God’s own
Kraft, power,
Wie könnt uns Göttliches entzücken? How could the divine delight us?
40
25 The poem implies the Kantian idea that we only come to know objects in the world
because their forms are present in us a priori.At the same time, it carries the idea
forward, representing the subject not only as the originator, but grounding the
relationship pertaining to cognition in the shared essence between man and nature. It
therefore accentuates the identity between man, nature and God.
26 As Harry Merkle remarks, Goethe assigns a particular significance to the phenomenon
of light. Describing it as the ’Urphänomen der Reinheit‘ (original phenomenon of
purity), he sees it as a visible, divine and simultaneously mystic phenomenon. Goethe’s
religious worship of light also ennobles the eye as the loftiest human sense. It is
important to note that Goethe combines platonic elements with the idea of Plotinus’41
emanation doctrine in this verse. As maintained by this theory, the genesis of the world
is a repercussion of the emanation of the Highest Being. This emanation occurred
gradually, wherein lower forms emerged from higher stages of existence. In line with
this system, the individual is part of the world soul, which implies, vice versa, that the
world soul is inherent in each individual soul.42 Furthermore, Goethe’s poem follows
Plato’s theory of perception, according to which rays are emitted by both the perceived
object and the perceiving eye, and are both related to the fire of daily light.43 By means
of the influx of divine light into the empty receiving vessel, the mind is illuminated and
the soul rejoices in partaking in the sublime. This mystical experience requires the
identity of the individual soul with the world soul.44 Aside from Goethe’s theory,
Emerson relies on Plotinus’ central ideas in the formation of his philosophy: ”Like must
know like“- or ”the same can only be known by the same”45, he states in his Journal.
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tinkling rills and rivulets whose veins are filled with the blood of winter which they
are bearing off.52
31 For Thoreau, being wholly involved in nature, perceiving it with all his senses is a state
of generous interchange which can only be experienced through intuition. In order to
partake in nature this way we must let go of our thoughts because they tend to separate
us from nature: “With thinking we may be beside ourselves in a sane sense. […] We are
not wholly involved in Nature. I may be either the drift-wood in the stream, or Indra in
the sky looking down on it”53. To establish an intimate relation to nature, the human
needs to detach himself from his observant position and surrender himself to the
respect due to the very source of his being. In this state of mind the individual is able to
achieve a balanced and thoughtful happiness.54
32 In spite of various correspondences in their visions, such as the worship of nature and
the assumption of the supremacy of the mind, Emerson and Thoreau strongly diverged
from one another. While Emerson dwelt somewhere between metaphor and
metaphysics, Thoreau had little taste for metaphysics.55 Although his initial works in
the 1840’s were primarily marked by the idealistic influence of Emerson, Thoreau’s
apprehension of reality in the early 1850’s underwent a radical shift in emphasis. He
was increasingly concerned with affirming the visible, intending to depict nature in its
concrete appearance. It is thus conspicuous that through his immersion in nature he
experienced a heightened awareness of the world of matter56. This however did not
confine itself to the surface of things. Rather, by aiming at man’s concrete relationship
to wild, primeval nature, he postulated the answer to his personal quest for the
ultimate grounds of reality:
Think of our life in nature, - daily to be shown matter, to come in contact with it, -
rocks, trees, wind on our cheeks! The solid earth! the actual earth! the common
sense! Contact! Contact! Who are we? Where are we?57
33 Advocating an active contact with the natural world, Thoreau did not attribute to
nature a symbolic meaning for spiritual truth as Emerson did. Instead, he developed a
realistic perspective on the natural world. Hence he apprehended nature rather as the
truth itself, the soil of man and his concrete activity.58
Men nowhere east or west, live yet a natural life, round which the vine clings, and
which the elm willingly shadows. Man would desecrate it by his touch, and so the
beauty of the world remains veiled to him. He needs not only be spiritualized, but
naturalized, on the soil of earth.59
34 Thoreau’s uncompromising realistic view induced him to take a firm position against
the grievances caused in the course of industrialization in the nineteenth century.
Observing the continuous destruction of the natural environment by the construction
of the railroad as well as other forms of economic exploitation of nature, Thoreau
expressed his rage and his disapproval of this development as well as his grievances.
Knowing the value Thoreau placed on the relation of man to nature, it is
understandable that he came to the conclusion that this alienation from nature
entailed the alienation of man from himself60.
Conclusion
35 Considering the religious-philosophical attitude which determined spiritual life in New
England in the early nineteenth century, we can understand the revolutionary quality
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BIBLIOGRAPHY
Bercovitch, Sacvan. “Unitarian Beginnings” In: The Cambridge History of American Literature. Prose
Writing 1820- 1865. Ed. Sacvan Bercovitch. 1995. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
Bosco, Ronald A. “Ralph Waldo Emerson. A Brief Biography”. In: A Historical Guide to Ralph Waldo
Emerson. Ed.Joel Myerson. New York: Oxford University Press.
Buell, Lawrence. „Ralph Waldo Emerson“. In: Myerson, Joel/Wesley T. Mott. The American
Renaissance in New England. Detroit, Michigan: Gale Research Co., 1978.
Emerson, Ralph Waldo. The Complete Writings of Ralph Waldo Emerson, Ed. Edward W. Emerson, New
York: Wm. H. Wise&Co, 1929.
__________. Journals and Miscellaneous Notebooks of Ralph Waldo Emerson. Edit. William H.
Gilman,Cambridge: Harvard University Press. Ed. 1, 1960-1982.
Gayet, Claude. The intellectual development of Henry David Thoreau. Acta Universitalis Uppsaliensis,
Uppsala, 1981.
Goethe, Johann Wolfgang. Sämtliche Werke in 18 Bänden. Bd. 1: Sämtliche Gedichte. Zürich: Artemis.
Gray, H. David. Emerson. A Statement Of New England Transcendentalism As Expressed In The Philosophy
Of Its Chief Exponent. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1917.
Goddard, H. Clarke. Studies In New England Transcendentalism. New York: Hillary House Publishers,
1960.
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Harrison, John Smith. The Techers of Emerson. California: Sturgis&Walton Company, 1910.
McIntosh, James. Thoreau as a romantic naturalist. His shifting stance toward nature.Cornell
University Press. London, 1974.
Merkle, Harry. Die künstlichen Blinden. Blinde Figuren in Texten sehender Autoren. Würzburg:
Königshausen & Neumann, 2000.
Neuser, Wilhelm. „Calvins Theologie“. In: Religion in Geschichte und Gegenwart. Handwörterbuch für
Theologie und Religionswissenschaft. Hrsg. Hans D. Betz. 4 Aufl. Bd. 2. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck
Verlag, 1999.
Raeithel, Gert. Geschichte der Nordamerikanischen Kultur. Vom Puritanismus zum Bürgerkrieg 1600-
1860. Bd. 1. Weinheim: Quadriga Verlag.
Richardson, Robert D. Emerson: The Mind on Fire. University of California Press. California, 1995.
Rose, Anne C. Transcendentalism as a Social Movement 1830- 1850. New Haven: Yale University Press,
1981.
Thoreau, Henry David. Walden: Or, life in the Woods. Houghton Mifflin Company. New York, 1995.
__________. The heart of Thoreau’s Journals, Edit. Odell Shepard. Dover Publications. New York,
1961
NOTES
1. Goddard, H. Clarke. 1960. Studies In New England Transcendentalism. New York: Hillary House
Publishers. p. 13.
2. Raeithel, Gert. Geschichte der Nordamerikanischen Kultur. Vom Puritanismus zum Bürgerkrieg 1600-
1860. Bd.1 Weinheim: Quadriga Verlag. p. 31.
3. Ibid. P. 31-33.
4. Goddard, p. 20.
5. Due to their rejection of the Trinity and their belief in the unity of God, Jesus and the Holy
Spirit, this liberal Christian movement was named Unitarianism. They regarded Jesus as a
mediator between man and God, but without seeing him as God himself. (Bercovitch, Sacvan.
“Unitarian Beginnings” In: The Cambridge History of American Literature. Prose Writing 1820- 1865. Ed.
Sacvan Bercovitch. 1995. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. p. 334).
6. Ibid p. 335.
7. Ibid p. 335.
8. Raeithel, p. 186.
9. Bercovitch,p. 336.
10. The tolerant religious view of the Unitarians was much favoured among Americans at the
beginning of industrialization, mainly due to their positive attitude toward material prosperity,
which contrasted with the puritan discarding of economic wealth. Because of an immense
increase of adherents from wealthy social circles and fewer from the indigent, the commercial
side began to dominate the intellectual one (Bercovitch, p. 335, 337-338).
11. Bercovitch, p. 337 - 338.
12. Goddard, p. 31-33.
13. Quotation is retrieved from Rose, Anne C. 1981. Transcendentalism as a Social Movement 1830-
1850. New Haven: Yale University Press.p.41.
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14. Bosco, Ronald A. “Ralph Waldo Emerson. A Brief Biography”. In: A Historical Guide to Ralph
Waldo Emerson. Ed. Joel Myerson. New York: Oxford University Press.” p.11.
15. Instead he dedicated himself to the study of classical, modern, scientific and philosophical
writings. His leisure time he spent with long promenades in nature and by writing extensive
letters dealing with theological and philosophical topics to his aunt Mary Moody Emerson. Ibid.
p.11.
16. As Emerson states: “His early reading was Milton, Young, Akenside, Samuel Clarke, Jonathan
Edwards and always the Bible. Later Plato, Plotinus, Marcus Antonius, Stewart, Coleridge, Cousin,
Herder, Locke, Mme de Stael, Channing, Mackintosh, Byron” (quotation according to Goddard,
1960,p. 63).
17. Ibid. p.13.
18. Emerson observed this ritual as a profane ceremony which did not correspond to the purely
spiritual experience of incorporation of the Spirit of Jesus. (Richardson, Robert D. Emerson: The
Mind on Fire. University of California Press. California.1995. p.114).
19. Richardson, p.110.
20. The following excerpt from Emerson’s Essay “The Transcendentalist” shows how Emerson
constituted his concept of intuitive thought on the basis of Kantian philosophy: “It is well known
to most of my audience, that the Idealism of the present day acquired the name Transcendental,
from the use of that term by Immanuel Kant of Königsberg, who replied to the sceptical
philosophy of Locke […] The extraordinary profoundness and precision of that man’s thinking
have given vogue to his nomenclature, in Europe and America, to that extent, that whatever
belongs to the class of intuitive thought is popularly called at the present day Trancendental.”
(“The Transcendentalist” In: The Complete Writings of Ralph Waldo Emerson, Ed. Edward W.
Emerson, New York: Wm. H. Wise&Co.1929, p.104, in the following abbreviated as CW.).
21. „Ich nenne alle Erkenntnis transzendental, die sich nicht so wohl mit Gegenständen, sondern
mit unsern Begriffen a priori von Gegenständen überhaupt beschäftigt. Ein System solcher Begriffe
würde Transzendental-Philosophie heißen“ (Kant, Immanuel. Kritik der reinen Vernunft. Ed. Jens
Timmermann.1998. Hamburg: Felix Meiner Verlag (A13/B26) p. 83).
22. Coreth, Emerich/ Harald Schöndorf. 1983. Philosophie des 17. und 18. Jahrhunderts. Stuttgart:
Verlag W. Kohlhammer Ed. 3.p. 174-176.
23. Plato designated ‘ideas’ the non-perishable archetypical images of an invisible world
according to which our sensuously perceptible world is subordinated. The ideas do not stand for
a materialistically abstract imagination of being but for spiritual existence. Plato differentiated
between collective terms which can be abstracted from the directly experienced world,
spiritually ideal concepts which cannot be deduced from the materialistically imagined because
they are immaterial by nature. (Störig, H. Joachim. 2002. Kleine Weltgeschichte der Philosophie.
Stuttgart: Fischer Verlag, p. 181).
24. „apperceptive“- able to relate new percepts to past experience. (Oxford Dictionary of
English. Edit. Catherine Soanes, Angus Stevenson. Oxford University Press, 2005.
25. Buell, Lawrence. 1978. „Ralph Waldo Emerson“. In: Myerson, Joel/Wesley T. Mott. The
American Renaissance in New England. Detroit, Michigan: Gale Research Co. p.5.
26. Goddard, p. 33.
27. “Nature” In: The Complete Writings of Ralph Waldo Emerson, Ed. Edward W. Emerson, New York:
Wm. H. Wise&Co.1929, subsequently abbreviated as CW, p. 1.
28. Ibid. p.1.
29. Ibid, p.2.
30. Ibid. p.2.
31. Ibid. p.3.
32. Ibid, p.3.
33. Ibid. p.2.
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ABSTRACTS
Man’s attempt to solve the riddle of his existence – of the surrounding world and his inner states
by means of his mental activity – is rooted in his very nature and has been a strong desire for
centuries. With the awakening of the conscious mind, this endeavour led him into the spheres of
philosophy and religion. Each person creates his own philosophy and belief to match his own
character and personal experiences. From this point of view, we will consider the writings of
Emerson, Thoreau and Goethe, focussing on their mystical attitude towards nature.
La question qui porte sur la manière de résoudre la question de notre existence – du soi et de
notre rapport au monde – a occupé l’homme depuis ses origines. La religion et la philosophie ont
précisément pour centre cette interrogation. D’après son caractère et ses expériences
personnelles, chaque homme se crée sa propre philosophie. Ainsi du transcendentaliste Ralph
Waldo Emerson : nous voulons interroger sa vision du monde par rapport à celles d’Henri
Thoreau et de Johann Wolfgang Goethe à partir de la question de la correspondance mystique
entre l’homme et la Nature.
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