Posted on 10/01/2001 3:52:20 PM PDT by A.J.Armitage
Please bump me when you do.
Have a quote in my notes about the transcending of history (an "eternal present" of sorts) available in the sacraments ... as well as the sacrilegious, it seems.
Good observation. I doubt she would have denied him the study of philosophy if they'd had Nietzsche, but as it was the philosophy he would have studied would've been Stoicism.
Your post brings up an interesting question: what kind of education should Caesar have? It would seem that the question would be particularly important in America, since, in theory at least, everyone takes up part of Caesar's role, but I haven't seen much discussion of it. Our education usually turns out worker bees instead. Critics of the education system usually talk about being prepared to get good jobs. That's important, of course, because you've got to eat, but that can't be all of it. Beefing up civics won't be enough either, because an educated citizen needs more than the ability to recite the three branches of government.
I had a look back at the Cicero thread just after posting this one, and something caught my eye that hadn't earlier. "Chiltown", which struck me as more utopian(in the good sense) than any of the political utopias, from Plato to Marx. I'm reading the Republic now, and in some ways it was like Socrates' first ideal city, which was rejected by his companions, in that it's a place for actual people, where the pleasures are ones that people can actually enjoy, not a happy city of unhappy men. I don't know if it's relevant to anything, it just struck me.
Perhaps relating to the two eternal destinations. Or maybe not. :-)
It was Nero who called Christians "enemies of mankind." That sounds like a pretty particularized animus to me.
Nero's anti-Christian animus is repeated often here, usually by gay activist athiests. That isn't surprising given that they and Nero speak from a common spirit.
It may be that they lack perspective on themselves. The kind of humility that comes from the liberal education you described is the kind that comes from putting yourself in perspective. Our problem in America isn't so much the pride of an individual person(although that can be a problem too, as Bill Clinton, and before him the likes of Aaron Burr, demonstrated), as it is the general lack of perspective on the part of politicians and citizens. People aren't usually exposed to thoughts and history that aren't from the recent past, if that.
You're right about the study of the classics. An educated citizen or statesman ought to know the Greek and Latin classics, plus the writings of the Founding Fathers and authors like Bastiat, and other modern classics.
That's true, but he's still really good. If you took the most libertarian aspects of Locke(the ones I picked up, of course), you'd get Bastiat. His most famous work is The Law, which is also contained in Selected Essays in Political Economy.
Bastiat is probably the most underrated writer of all time. I really wish he was more well known. He was a French economist and politician in the 19th century.
I must also confess that I have a terribly hard time reading and being interested in economics of any stripe.
So do I, actually. Bastiat's a lot more interesting than most economic writers.
I wouldn't make a very good libertarian....
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