In an 1841 essay, American transcendentalist philosopher and essayist Ralph Waldo Emerson delivered a stirring call for each individual to avoid conformity and false consistency and to follow their own instincts and ideas. It contains one of Emerson's most famous quotations: "A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers and divines.? Self-Reli...