Sayings of Socrates 43

He showed equal ability in both directions, in persuading and dissuading men. 

Thus, after conversing with Theaetetus about knowledge, he sent him away, as Plato says, fired with a divine impulse; but when Euthyphro had indicted his father for manslaughter, Socrates, after some conversation with him upon piety, diverted him from his purpose. 

Lysis, again, he turned, by exhortation, into a most virtuous character. For he had the skill to draw his arguments from facts. And when his son Lamprocles was violently angry with his mother, Socrates made him feel ashamed of himself, as I believe Xenophon has told us. 

When Plato's brother Glaucon was desirous of entering upon politics, Socrates dissuaded him, as Xenophon relates, because of his want of experience; but on the contrary he encouraged Charmides to take up politics because he had a gift that way.

—Diogenes Laërtius, Lives of the Eminent Philosophers 2.29

IMAGE: Jose Aparicio Ingalda, Socrates Teaching a Young Man (1811) 

Musonius Rufus, Lectures 16.2

“Now then, take this case. If a father who is not a physician and not experienced in matters of health or sickness should prescribe for his invalid son something which was harmful and injurious, and the son was aware of that fact, surely in not following his father's prescription he is not disobeying and is not disobedient, is he? It would not seem so.

“Or again, suppose the father himself were ill and should demand wine and food which he ought not to have, and which probably would aggravate his illness if he took it, and his son, realizing this, would not give it to him, surely he is not disobeying his father, is he? Certainly, one cannot think so.”

Far too often we assume a tension between what others ask us to do and what we want to do, between obedience and self-expression, between following authority and following ourselves.

It is only my own ignorance, however, that has ever made me think that these aspects need to be in opposition to one another. Our obligations to Nature are always in harmony, whether we discern them from outside of us or from inside of us.

Whatever the source of the duty may be, what inherently makes it a duty is that it is in the service of what is right.

Where could there ever be a responsibility to do myself harm? How might I possibly be required to permit another to come to harm? If I correctly understand what is beneficial to all who share in human nature, I will not let myself be confused by any supposed conflicts of interest.

“I feel bad that I treated you unfairly, but the boss said I had to do it.” The wishes of my boss, whatever his status or title, do not take any precedence over justice.

“I’m sorry I didn’t show you the respect you deserve, but I had to follow my conscience.” If I was actually following an informed conscience, then that would have included giving everyone proper respect.

And an informed conscience is really the key, isn’t it? If I am certain I am following virtue, then I am also being obedient to the all of the right people, in all of the best ways.

If I am not certain about what I should be doing, then it might be best to follow the guidance of someone else who has already given every indication of understanding.

In either case, one and same duty is being served.

I have no obligation to take poison as a medicine, whoever might tell me to do so, and I have no obligation to give anyone at all something that will do him harm. No one is ever dishonored by pursuing the good.

Written in 3/2000

Tao Te Ching 68

He who in Tao's wars has skill
Assumes no martial port;
He who fights with most good will
To rage makes no resort.
He who vanquishes yet still
Keeps from his foes apart;
He whose behests men most fulfill
Yet humbly plies his art.  

Thus we say, 'He never contends,
And therein is his might.'
Thus we say, 'Men's wills he bends,
That they with him unite.'
Thus we say, 'Like Heaven's his ends,
No sage of old more bright.'

St. Francis Kneeling

Francisco de Zurbaran, St. Francis Kneeling (1639)

Musonius Rufus, Lectures 16.1

Lecture 16: Must one obey one’s parents under all circumstances?

A certain young man who wished to study philosophy, but was forbidden by his father to do so, put this question to him "Tell me, Musonius, must one obey one's parents in all things, or are there some circumstances under which one need not heed them?"

And Musonius replied, "That everyone should obey his mother and father seems a good thing, and I certainly recommend it. However, let us see what this matter of obedience is, or rather, first, what is the nature of disobedience, and let us consider who the disobedient person is, if in this way we may better understand what the nature of obedience is.”

The customs of the ages will come and go, but back when I was a child, in those glorious yet cringeworthy 1970’s, there still seemed to be a general consensus that if your parents told you to do something, you would have the good sense to go ahead and do it.

Maybe it was just from a fear of the painful consequences, and maybe we sometimes cheated a bit when they weren’t looking, but we knew not to mess too much with Mom and Dad.

Before you think I am waxing nostalgic, I remind you that I am hardly a fan of any blind obedience to authority. I once got myself into hot water when a friend’s mother scolded me for doing something foolish, and she then asked me the usual question from back then: “If all your friends jumped off a cliff, would you do it too?”

I was sadly always a smartass. “I don’t really know. Would it be different if you told me to do it?” There was the point when the one mom called the other mom, and the dads dealt out the appropriate punishments. Ah, good times!

I don’t mean to be flippant, yet I can’t help but struggle, decades later, with many of the same problems. Somehow, they put people “in charge”, for whatever reason or by whatever means, and they give them power over others in whatever way, and there is still this thoughtless assumption that we must all obey them without question.

I do commit myself to a respect for my betters, and I do dedicate myself to an obedience to what is right and good. Working that out is not always easy. How am I to distinguish between the person and the principle, between loyalty and truth?

After many years as a Yankee, I eventually found myself in Dixie. I did not know the customs, but a fellow of the old school set me straight about one important point.

“I notice people often address one another as sir or ma’am. Is there a rule for that?”

“Yes, sir, there is. You speak to anyone older, wiser, or better than you as sir or ma’am. Do not let anyone tell you otherwise. You can never be a Southern gentleman without those rules.”

“By those standards, I would probably have to refer to most anyone as sir or ma’am, barring children or criminals.”

“Well done, sir, you’re learning!”

The world has been changing, of course, and those rules are no longer socially required in the South. I will go out on a limb, however, and suggest that they are still morally required everywhere.

So many of us have lost a sense of respect and decency. That is a crying shame.

Now does this mean I must follow any commands from those supposedly older, wiser, or better?

How does that relate to the dictates of my own conscience?

Is it acceptable for me to merely follow all orders? They execute people for doing that.

Is it better for me to follow my own sense of right and wrong? The execute people for doing that too.

When asked where his loyalties lay, Robert E. Lee spoke both with both firmness and with subtlety:

I shall never bear arms against the Union, but it may be necessary for me to carry a musket in the defense of my native state, Virginia, in which case I shall not prove recreant to my duty.

There is an intersection of the duty to my superiors and the duty to myself; it is a complementarity, and not a contradiction.

Written in 3/2000

Allegories of the Virtues

Luca Giordano, Allegory of Prudence / Allegory of Fortitude / Allegory of Temperance / Allegory of Justice (1685)

The Wisdom of Solomon 6:12-20

[12] Wisdom is radiant and unfading,
and she is easily discerned by those who love her,
and is found by those who seek her.
[13] She hastens to make herself known to those who desire her.
[14] He who rises early to seek her will have no difficulty,
for he will find her sitting at his gates.
[15] To fix one's thought on her is perfect understanding,
and he who is vigilant on her account will
soon be free from care,
[16] because she goes about seeking those worthy of her,
and she graciously appears to them in their paths,
and meets them in every thought.
[17] The beginning of wisdom is the most sincere
desire for instruction,
and concern for instruction is love of her,
[18] and love of her is the keeping of her laws,
and giving heed to her laws is assurance of immortality,
[19] and immortality brings one near to God;
[20] so the desire for wisdom leads to a kingdom.

IMAGE: Luca Giordano, Allegory of Divine Wisdom (1685)

 

Boethius, The Consolation of Philosophy 5.8

Then said I, “Again am I plunged in yet more doubt and difficulty.”

“What are they,” she asked, “though I have already my idea of what your trouble consists?”

“There seems to me,” I said, “to be such incompatibility between the existence of God's universal foreknowledge and that of any freedom of judgment. For if God foresees all things and cannot in anything be mistaken, that, which His Providence sees will happen, must result.

“Wherefore if it knows beforehand not only men's deeds but even their designs and wishes, there will be no freedom of judgment. For there can neither be any deed done, nor wish formed, except such as the infallible Providence of God has foreseen. For if matters could ever so be turned that they resulted otherwise than was foreseen of Providence, this foreknowledge would cease to be sure. But, rather than knowledge, it is opinion which is uncertain; and that, I deem, is not applicable to God.”

—from Book 5, Prose 3

This is another one of those spots in the text where people are prone to jump ship; the topic may seem too abstract, the concepts involved too confusing. It’s the sort of problem, like a tree falling in the forest, or going back in time to kill your father, or the sound of one hand clapping, that just makes the head hurt.

My own experience suggests to me, however, that my confusion and frustration does not necessarily mean a question is either irrelevant or unsolvable. Sometimes it simply indicates that I am not being clear in defining the terms involved, or I am seeing a contradiction where none needs to be present, or I am failing to ground the theory in concrete practice. Oftentimes I am all twisted up on all three.

If I start by asking about the dilemma of causal compatibility between Divine omniscience and human autonomy, I am already in over my head. Let me begin with something more immediate and direct, to help me understand why any of this even matters, and to give me some indication of how I can make sense of it.

It is important to me to know that the world has a sense of order and purpose to it, and it is at the same time important to me to know that I am in control of my own choices. It would be disconcerting to live in a universe where nothing makes sense, but it would also be discouraging to live in a universe where I am just a machine with no control over my own life.

Philosophers will sometimes swing between extreme models of what they call determinism and freedom, and yet I find that no one is ever quite satisfied with having one at the exclusion of the other.

Is it possible for things to be subject to design, to a single measure of existence, and still allow people to follow their own paths? Put that way, there is already a sneaking concern: if God runs it all, what’s left for me to run?

Couldn’t God simply choose to let us choose? Yet if God, or however we wish to name such an ultimate reality, is perfect, then He will also possess absolute power and complete knowledge, that which has no limit and beyond which there can be nothing. Surely the Divine, then, must be both omnipotent and omniscient?

This may seem quite fine, until I specifically start wondering more about God’s knowledge, and then it feels like my brain is tied up in knots.

If God knows absolutely everything, He must know what I am going to do, even before I have decided to do it. Furthermore, if God knows everything, He must know it with absolutely certainty; if He didn’t, His knowledge would hardly be perfect.

So, does this end up meaning that I really have no freedom at all? I can’t seem to say that God knows my future actions without a doubt, and then add some sort of conditions to that knowledge, that His knowledge depends on what I choose. If God knows it, surely it will happen, and it has to happen. I now worry whether God has to go, or my freedom has to go, because it’s hard to see how they can go together.

Oh dear. Do I now have to become either a Sartre or a Spinoza? Sorry, that’s a philosopher’s inside joke. Is it possible for my judgment and God's judgment to coexist?

Written in 1/2016

The Art of Peace 59

Techniques employ four qualities that reflect the nature of our world. 

Depending on the circumstance, you should be: hard as a diamond, flexible as a willow, smooth-flowing like water, or as empty as space. 

Seneca, On Peace of Mind 16.4

But when anyone shrinks back in the hour of death and looks longingly at life, we must lay hands upon him. I will never weep for a man who dies cheerfully, nor for one who dies weeping: the former wipes away my tears, the latter by his tears makes himself unworthy that any should be shed for him.

Shall I weep for Hercules because he was burned alive, or for Regulus because he was pierced by so many nails, or for Cato because he tore open his wounds a second time? All these men discovered how at the cost of a small portion of time they might obtain immortality, and by their deaths gained eternal life.

It may sound a bit harsh to our modern sensitivities, but it is never necessary to despair about loss or death. This is not because I shouldn’t care, but rather because I can learn to better distinguish what is worth caring for.

Misfortune is not an evil, and death is not an evil. Give me more or give me less, but the merit of my character is what will determine the value of the circumstances. It is natural for things to change, and it is natural for them to come and go; what will provide my life with any dignity is what I choose to do with what is given, for whatever time that I may have.

Why mourn the loss of a good man? It was his time, and he distinguished himself in wisdom and virtue. His courage in facing fear and pain is an example of greatness.

Why mourn the loss of a bad man? When push came to shove, he chose to live poorly, to compromise the greater for the sake of the lesser. I can have the deepest compassion for him, but I should not admire him.

I remind myself that how I go about dying will be the final measure of how I went about living. I will choose what becomes of it all.

Hercules was terribly mutilated from putting on a poisoned cloak, a victim of trickery, and was only relieved of his suffering when his body was consumed on his funeral pyre.

It is said that Regulus kept his word to freely return to Carthage as a prisoner, only to then be tortured to death by being locked in a barrel pierced with spikes.

Cato wished to deny Caesar the pleasure of having power over his life, and so he stabbed himself with his own sword. The wound was not fatal, however, and when he saw how his friends and attendants rushed to save his life, he pushed them aside and tore out his own bowels to make sure the job was done.

I shrink in horror when I think of these gruesome stories, yet I also think of how behind each is someone fighting to live, and to die, in conviction, integrity, and justice. Hercules, Regulus, and Cato all had fortitude when the end came.

Written in 12/2011

IMAGES:

Francisco de Zurbaran, The Death of Hercules (1634) 

Salvator Rosa, The Death of Regulus (c. 1652)

Guillaume Guillon Lethière, The Death of Cato of Utica (1795)

The Fall of Icarus

Pieter Bruegel the Elder, Landscape with the Fall of Icarus (1560)

Fragments of Parmenides 14

I shall not let you say nor think that it came from what is not; for it can neither be thought nor uttered that anything is not.  

And, if it came from nothing, what need could have made it arise later rather than sooner? 

Therefore must it either be altogether or be not at all. 

Nor will the force of truth suffer anything to arise besides itself from that which is not. 

Wherefore, justice does not loose her fetters and let anything come into being or pass away, but holds it fast.

IMAGE: Frederick Hart, Ex Nihilo, Washington National Cathedral (1984)

Seneca, On Peace of Mind 16.3

Let us praise one who deserves such constant praises, and say, "The braver you are the happier you are! You have escaped from all accidents, jealousies, diseases; you have escaped from prison; the gods have not thought you worthy of ill-fortune, but have thought that fortune no longer deserved to have any power over you."

I must stop thinking only of what has been given, and instead start thinking of what I can give. Life is an active, not a passive, affair.

“Well, that’s clearly a load of nonsense. I told the truth the other day, and everyone laughed at me. I spoke kind words to a friend, and he said I was a loser. I called out the boss, and then I lost my job.”

Yes, of course all of that will happen. Happenings aren’t the measure of a life; life is about doing. Did I first care for my own character? If I only love the convenience found in things, there is no real love.

Fortitude will be necessary to find peace in virtue for its own sake, and thereby to rise above the vagaries of fortune. Once I see that my conscience can be secure, all the rest can fall into place. With that kind of judgment, happiness is now able to rely upon what is inside instead of what is outside.

This passage speaks to me on two levels, and thereby addresses to the full range of circumstances I might face.

Whatever may take place, whatever others may decide to do, bravery of conscience will always be fundamentally liberating. I can leave the events beyond my power right where they are, and so focus on nurturing and grooming what is my own.

When I have managed to stay the course, I am amazed at the strength that comes from such conviction. I am then no longer a slave to things of the world, precisely because I have chosen to understand that they do not define me.

First, this will happen while I still live, in that my ability to stand for myself allows me to become ever more impervious to the actions of fortune. This is freedom.

Second, this will likewise happen if I must die, in that all the worry about pleasure and pain will now be completely behind me. This is also freedom.

Either way, I have both lived and died with some dignity. The person who can do this right, the sage or the saint, remains totally unconquerable. It is possible by casting off the chains of impressions and desires.

The man I thought the victim can now appear quite differently to me, as one who has received the greatest reward. In life and in death, he has the blessing of liberty. He should be admired instead of pitied.

Written in 12/2011

IMAGE: Francesco Rosaspina, Allegory of Fortitude

Sic Transit

George Frederick Watts, Sic Transit (1892)

What I spent, I had.

What I saved, I lost. 

What I gave, I have. 

Sayings of Heraclitus 33

And it is law, too, to obey the counsel of one. 

Seneca, On Peace of Mind 16.2

Well, but see how each of them endured his fate, and if they endured it bravely, long in your heart for courage as great as theirs; if they died in a womanish and cowardly manner, nothing was lost.

Either they deserved that you should admire their courage, or else they did not deserve that you should wish to imitate their cowardice: for what can be more shameful than that the greatest men should die so bravely as to make people cowards?

I attach ever more importance to bravery, though I find that the way I understand it is very different from the way many others describe it. I do not mean a toughness that is uncaring, or the application of a brute force of will, or a glorification of my power to take what I want. I think rather of the strength of conviction, the willingness to surrender lesser things for the sake of greater things, a foundation of character.

A brave man does not to be ten feet tall, or have muscles made of steel, or be required to repress his feelings. No, he must only commit to doing right instead of wrong. The battle he fights is in his own heart and mind, not against any external threat. If I can’t build up such habits of courage, no other quality I possess will be of any use to me.

Will this be easy? Hardly, at least at first. I will still feel fear, and I will still have nagging doubts, and sometimes my legs will buckle, and my hands will shake. I still find myself quivering or flinching at the silliest of obstacles, yet I manage by remembering that my judgment rules me, not my flesh. If I can be firm in my awareness of the good, I have it within me to take control of myself.

Odd things may go on in my head, where I may know that death should not be feared, and yet I fear the pain that will most likely accompany death. Another estimation is necessary then, perhaps a more difficult one for me, that my worth is deeper than pleasure and pain. I can then more easily bear the absence of one or the presence of the other. I begin to see that I must be wise to be brave, not some growling beast.

And perhaps something is going right in my thinking, when I am deeply moved by the moral courage of my betters, and I wish to become more like them. Their suffering was in itself neither here nor there, because everyone suffers, but what they chose to do with it, how they transformed it, is what makes them close to the gods.

The bravery was itself the victory, regardless of any other consequences. They made themselves better, and thereby happier, so let me pay homage to them by following their example. How foolish it would be of me if I watched decent folks face death for the sake of justice, and then I myself only ran away in cowardice.

When the henchmen of Mark Antony finally caught up with Cicero, Plutarch says that the old man not only died for his principles, but he held his chin and stretched out his own neck to show that he would die willingly, even as his followers covered their faces. Cassius Dio records his last words as “There is nothing proper about what you are doing, soldier, but do try to kill me properly.”

In the movies, there would surely have a been a lengthy battle scene filmed with fancy wire work, but that is not necessary for there to be bravery.

Written in 12/2011

IMAGE: S.W. Reynolds, The Death of Cicero (c. 1820)

Dweller Within

George Frederick Watts, Dweller Within (1886)

More Irish Wolfhounds

Abandoned Places 6

Nature 8