Emerson prefaces "Experience" with a poem describing the solemn procession of the "lords of life" — the forces that affect all men's experience of common life. God — the "inventor of the game" — is an unnamed presence in the poem. Man walks in confusion among the lords of life. He is comforted by nature, who assures him that the lords will "wear another face" tomorrow, and that his position is, in fact, one of ascendancy over them. In the essay, Emerson explores the action of these forces on the way we live and understand our lives.
The experience of life is confusing, Emerson writes at the beginning of the essay. Gaining perspective on life while we are engaged in living is difficult. This confusion affects our perception of our place in relation to nature, and of our powers. We are unable to see beyond our material existence and to utilize the creative vigor that nature has given us, and cannot distinguish between our productive and unproductive efforts. The distance created by time's passage sometimes reveals that what we thought were unoccupied hours were actually our most fruitful periods. Only in the long view do we understand the proper value of everyday occupations and actions. In taking the short view, we lose sight of the quality and significance of our lives in the present. Moreover, everyday details so preoccupy us that little time is left for more serious considerations. Emerson writes that "the pith of each man's genius contracts itself to a very few hours." As the history of literature contains only a few original ideas that have been worked and reworked, so the history of society reveals only a very few spontaneous human actions beyond "custom and gross sense." Although we attribute great importance to the calamities of life, they actually have no lasting meaning. Grief does not bring us any closer to the people we have lost, and it does not change who we are. Emerson refers specifically to his own grief at the death of his son Waldo in 1842. Grief cannot teach us anything, nor can it bring us closer to understanding the material world. Moreover, nature does not like to be observed and prevents us from focusing too clearly on objects that might offer insight through the material.
