Salinas finds that the imagery in Emerson's essay on Nature expresses fantasies of oral relatedness to the mother. The anxiety which might accompany regression to fantasies of merger and engulfment is defended against by the emphasis on "I," an active approach to the subject, and the use of the intellect. The combination of a return to the original at-one-ness with the nurturing mother along with successful defenses against the attendant dangers imparts a sense of security to this and other works by Emerson.