Answer: “The American Scholar” is a famous essay by Emerson, a great American philosopher-writer. In this essay, Emerson elaborates on his philosophical idea of One Man and regrets that the One Man has been divided into many individuals. Each of these individuals is performing a particular function in society. It has been as if the One Man has been spilled into drops, and these drops cannot be regathered into the One Whole. The result has been deplorable. Each individual has lost the vitality and originality of One Man and has turned into an automaton. Emerson regrets this state of the spirit of mankind, and thinks that it is the duty of the American Scholar to bring about a revolution, and restore humankind to the original power and vitality, and genius of One Man.

Emerson has given his idea of One Man comprising all other men in society. It is his basic philosophy that is propounded through the essay. In the world of soul of man, he conceives that the One runs, through the many and the many constitute the One Whole. He has derived this philosophy from an old fable. He says, one man is “present to all particular men only partially or through one faculty.” To have an idea of the whole man, we must take the whole society. He has given an analogy to make the idea clear. The gods, he says, divided Man into men, that he might be more helpful to himself just as the hand was divided into fingers, the better to answer its end. One Man is all men. A farmer, a professor, an engineer, a doctor, or a lawyer are all parts of One Man. Each man in a social state performs the function parcelled out to him. But in the process of division of One Man into many, there has occurred an unfortunate, incident: the original unit, One Man, has been distributed to the innumerable in such a manner, that it has been spilled into drops, and cannot be gathered. That means, One Man has been divided into too many small fragments in a society. The result is that those too many fragments cannot be regathered into One Man. The balance between one and many have been lost in such a way that it cannot now be said that the One is equal to the many and vice versa. It can be made clear by another analogy. The One Man may be thought of as a trunk, and all the other members of a society, its ramifications or branches. In course of time, as mankind has proliferated into many, the branches have lost connection with the trunk; they have been amputated from the trunk. Now each part of One Man, or an individual member of the society, is strutting like a walking monster–a good finger, a neck, a stomach, and so on but not a man. (To quote Emerson. “The old fable covers a doctrine ever new and sublime; that there is One Man-present to all particular men only partially, or through one faculty… But, unfortunately, this original unit, this fountain of power, has been so distributed to multitudes, has been so minutely subdivided and peddled out, that it is spilled into drops, and cannot be gathered. The state of society is one in which the members have suffered amputation from the trunk, and strut about so many walking monsters-a good finger, a neck, a stomach, an elbow but never a man.”)

One Man has been metamorphosed into many things. As a result, the worker in the field has forgotten the dignity of his task. A farmer in the field only sees his bushel and his cart, and nothing beyond and sinks into the farmer instead of Man or the farm. The tradesman scarcely gives an ideal worth to his works but is ridden by the routine of his craft and the soul is subject to dollars. The priest becomes a mere form; the attorney a statute book and so on.

Man has degenerated into a mere thing, a lifeless inert matter as a result of his connection being severed from One Man. Emerson has a unique conception of man. He thinks that all men constitute One Man, and One Man is divided into multitudes. In the social state in which an individual man has a particular function to do, the One Man is divided into so many individuals. Each individual is performing his function as a farmer, a professor, or an engineer, rather he combines within himself all the multifarious functions that are being done by other individuals, as some other individual is performing his duty. That is, One Man has multifarious functions. These functions are apportioned to individuals so that if we conceive of all the individuals as constituting the One Man, we have an idea of the real existence of man – One Man divided into many with different individual functions, and all men together constituting One Man. Now, each individual, to possess himself, that is, to realize his full self, must sometimes return from his own labor to embrace all the other laborers. But the matter for regret is that the original unit- One Man which is the fountain of power to the multitudes, has been distributed among them so minutely that it is spilled into drops

Emerson regrets the present state of things for man. As a result of the breaking of One Man into too many, each individual man has been shorn of his vitality, the originality, the liveliness, and vigor that produce new things and make new inventions. Human society has come to a dead stop as a result of such division of One Man into many. Machine-like, a man is performing his task as a farmer, a professor, or an engineer, without having the consciousness of the possession of life, vigor, and originality.