In Emerson’s essay Clubs, he takes an awfully long time to get to the point; lots of lead up and preparation for not much of a payoff. The essay is about society and conversation, topics that he has dealt with quite thoroughly in the first essay of the book (Society and Solitude).

He begins this essay by reminding us that we need a balance between thinking (solitude) and the world (society):

So thought is the native air of the mind, yet pure it is a poison to our mixed constitution, and soon burns up the bonehouse of man, unless tempered with affection and coarse practice in the material world.

Emerson asks us to think about what the best days in our memory are and answers that very likely they are “those in which we met a companion who was truly such.”

“Conversation is the laboratory and workshop of the student.” In conversation we try out our ideas, share our experiences, teach someone else something new, learn something new ourselves. But the best conversation is hard to find, and so, enters the club. A club with carefully chosen members provides ample opportunity for the best kind of conversation. A good club should not limit members by social standing, but should have a variety of minds all willing to talk about any topic. These topics of conversation are not to be the latest celebrity gossip or other trifles, you can get that anywhere. Conversation should be about deeper, more important things, the kind of things Emerson writes about in his essays–life, truth, God, nature, science, art, culture, etc.

And of course, a good club will have dinner with their conversation. The meal need not be fancy, simple and hearty is just fine. The point of food is to put everyone in a good and leisurely mood. The food is a means, the conversation is the end. And if the conversation is good and worthy, no one is going to remember the food, or if they do, it will be remembered as tasty because the conversation provided its flavor and spice.

But, as good as a club is, it is not the ultimate place to seek conversation:

Discourse, when it rises highest and searches deepest, when it lifts us into that mood out of which thoughts come that remain as stars in our firmament, is between two.

While the essay itself is rather lightweight for Emerson, he is a master of great sentences. I hate to call them soundbites, perhaps aphorisms is a better choice. Here are a few for you delectation:

‘Tis certain that money does not more burn in a boy’s pocket than a piece of news burns in our memory until we can tell it.

Nothing seems so cheap as the benefit of conversation; nothing is more rare.

In fact the only sin which we never forgive in each other is difference of opinion.

Conversation is the vent of character as well as of thought.

We need range and alternation of topics and variety of minds.

Wisdom is like electricity. There is no permanently wise man, but men capable of wisdom who, being put into certain company, or other favorable conditions, become wise for a short time, as glasses rubbed acquire electric power for a while.

Next week’s Emerson: Courage