Editor’s note: First in a three-part series of essays on Buddhism.

I sit at my desk with Emerson’s essays – first series – on my right-hand side. The volume is over a hundred years old.

A cool drizzle rains down on my winter thoughts. Intellectual vogues come and go – certainly – but Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882) maintains his eloquence and distinction despite the odds. His writing seems to stand the “test of time,” to use an old saying.

Emerson was an American Prometheus with all the attributes of real, unaffected genius; an “American” in the best sense of the word. That should be reason enough to remember his story.

But for me the narrative is richer and more subtle and complex. It is linked to Buddhism, human conscience, and America’s place in a troubled world.

Buddhism has begun to take root now in the states, and its flower has spread in wonderful, albeit, unexpected ways. Who was this Buddha? And what does it have to do with Emerson, or me, or you, for that matter?

It’s a story of global proportion.

It is said that a young warrior-prince lived in the eastern territories of India (560-480 B.C.E.), and that this prince had every worldly appetite and desire satisfied by his royal family. It was a sheltered life, no doubt, but one without neglect. The sacred scriptures say that Siddhartha went on a chariot ride outside the city walls and saw three things that changed his life for good: a beggar, a corpse, and a diseased person. The scripture, like all good writing, takes its poignancy from the shared fact of our own suffering. (In other words, Siddhartha – although a special being – suffered just like us.)

The text tells us that these three sights altered Siddhartha’s view of the world and gave him his first “spiritual pangs.” In addition, Siddhartha saw a “mendicant” (the fourth sight), or wandering holy man. This final sight branded him with the desire for truth. The name “Buddha” literally means “the awakened one.”

We know that Siddhartha left the royal life and wandered forth in the jungles of northern India. He studied with many yogis and spiritual adepts but always moved beyond their teaching. Thus was he driven on to find truth alone, a deeper experience, and finally a vision of the universe that unfolded like the slow flowers of eventide.

Anyone who has read Emerson knows that his theology was an extension of a supposed “Christian” philosophy. It is in places strangely un-Christian and he paid a price for this at the Harvard of his day – that great bastion of liberal intellects, a place where new theory and interpretation was seen as rather “irreligious.” The strange thing, however, is how the great man’s thought is quintessentially Buddhist.

“The lesson is forcibly taught by these observations that our life might be much easier and simpler than we make it; that the world might be a happier place than it is; that there is no need of struggles, convulsions, and despairs, of the wringing of the hands and the gnashing of the teeth; that we miscreate our own evils.”

The connection is apparent: both Buddha and Emerson were great proponents and authors of early “psychology.” They each in their own way described the circle of basic consciousness and what it means or implies about human life. For both of them the mind was a fortune teller – whether or not an objective reality exists; the mind holds the key to unlocking the door of individual destiny.

Although not an actual professed Buddhist, Ralph Emerson (and his famous sidekick H.D. Thoreau) read widely and deeply in the sacred texts of India. Both were well-known for appreciating the Bhagavad Gita at a time when few respected the so-called “backward” idolatries of the subcontinent. This terrible xenophobia began to change by the beginning of the 20th century – thanks in part to thinkers like Emerson and Thoreau.

It is debatable today whether many people understand the significance of this Indian-American transfusion – the mingling of different, but often familiar, philosophies. Did Emerson believe in Christ? Sure he did; but not the static, indifferent Christ of dogma. He believed in the “human potentialities” unleashed by deep reverence. (On this count both Buddhism and Emerson are optimistic.)

“Reverence for what?” you might ask. It is a respect for shared life and experience. Emerson was a genius, if for no other reason than he saw the predicament of humanity and described its essential poetry. And he developed an inspired vision of man at peace in the world. I think his heart would break to see what we have done.

Justin Maseychik of Northport teaches Buddhism and comparative religion at Thomas College in Waterville. He may be reached at maseychik@thomas.edu.