Well, it immediately occurs to me that my last paragraph is off. Rather than the statesman "effecting a balance" in his political practice between the humane ethic of Christianity and the relatively inhumane ethic of paganism, it is instead the case that the statesman in his political practice must entirely grab hold of pagan Machtpolitik--in full view of the correlative truth of Christian idealism. And it is that, I'm afraid, that strikes me as just about right.
I've not read MacIntyre myself--and while we ofttimes disagree as to what precisely is the Straussian project--I take it that, in describing MacIntyre's project as broadly Straussian, you mean that he seeks to revitalize a classical perspective.
There is, to my mind, nothing more essential to the Straussian project than the notion that philosophy, classically (and by Strauss's lights, properly) conceived, is--principally, if not entirely--a theoretical, as opposed to a practical, undertaking. Modern philosophy can more or less be defined as the attempt to turn contemplative philosophy into the basis of a sweeping reform of civilization. For Strauss, the consequences for both philosophy and civilization of this distortion of philosophy's true nature would be deleterious.
Well, speaking of virtue or virtù, and coming on the heels of our last go-round concerning "the tyrannical teaching" of the classics, I recently re-read Thoughts on Machiavelli and this has whetted my appetite for a survey of the Florentine's texts themselves--in translation, of course. I've made a fitful start with The Art of War.
Perhaps I'll say more about my incipient attraction to Machiavelli and the tyrannical teaching in time to come. For now, please allow me to quote Bernard Crick (from his introduction to a Penguin Classics edition of the Discourses):
Here we have--what? A decision to take between two conflicting moralities? [I.e. the heavenly or ideal morality of Christianity, and the earthly or pragmatic morality of Machiavellism] Or simply two conflicting moralities? I follow Sir Isaiah Berlin in thinking the latter to be true, and that this is Machiavelli's terrible originality. He never denies that what Christians call good, is in fact good: 'humility, kindness, scruples, unworldliness, faith in God, sanctity...' But there is also the morality of the pagan world: virtù, citizenship, heroism, public achievement, and the preservation and the cultural enrichment of the city-state. (pp. 64-5)
This paradox of two heterogeneous moralities--one, ideal or heavenly; the other, pragmatic or earthly--neither of which can or ought to be disregarded, and between which the statesman in his political practice (and the citizen, too, in his ordinary practice) must somehow effect a balance, strikes me, from my perch of deepening middle age, as being just about right.
Can't resist sharing this with you, CK. Hope you won't mind my putting this here, rather than the OT. It's to do with Donald Trump's ancestry.
If our future President [Mr.Trump] is more willing to go on the unrelenting attack rather than take a beating lying down, it may owe to Viking heritage on his mother's side.
His mother, a Scottish immigrant, hailed from the highlander Clan MacLeod on the Isle of Lewis, one of the Outer Hebrides islands off the western shore of Scotland that was raided and settled by Vikings during the 9th through 13th centuries, when it belonged to the Norse Kingdom of the Isles. In fact, the MacLeods ruled Lewis from the end of the Viking heyday through the early modern era, when they were eclipsed by the Mackenzies in the 17th C.
Genetic evidence points to their Norse invader lineage…
Heh heh. Just in case anyone's interested, here's the link:
Well, I haven't forgotten you, CK--not that you care--or lost interest in having occasional disputations with you. I've just been feeling a little demotivated the past several weeks. However, I think I may be getting my second wind. I'm just waiting for you to render an at least once in a blue moon comment on current affairs.
Well, it immediately occurs to me that my last paragraph is off. Rather than the statesman "effecting a balance" in his political practice between the humane ethic of Christianity and the relatively inhumane ethic of paganism, it is instead the case that the statesman in his political practice must entirely grab hold of pagan Machtpolitik--in full view of the correlative truth of Christian idealism. And it is that, I'm afraid, that strikes me as just about right.
I've not read MacIntyre myself--and while we ofttimes disagree as to what precisely is the Straussian project--I take it that, in describing MacIntyre's project as broadly Straussian, you mean that he seeks to revitalize a classical perspective.
There is, to my mind, nothing more essential to the Straussian project than the notion that philosophy, classically (and by Strauss's lights, properly) conceived, is--principally, if not entirely--a theoretical, as opposed to a practical, undertaking. Modern philosophy can more or less be defined as the attempt to turn contemplative philosophy into the basis of a sweeping reform of civilization. For Strauss, the consequences for both philosophy and civilization of this distortion of philosophy's true nature would be deleterious.
Well, speaking of virtue or virtù, and coming on the heels of our last go-round concerning "the tyrannical teaching" of the classics, I recently re-read Thoughts on Machiavelli and this has whetted my appetite for a survey of the Florentine's texts themselves--in translation, of course. I've made a fitful start with The Art of War.
Perhaps I'll say more about my incipient attraction to Machiavelli and the tyrannical teaching in time to come. For now, please allow me to quote Bernard Crick (from his introduction to a Penguin Classics edition of the Discourses):
This paradox of two heterogeneous moralities--one, ideal or heavenly; the other, pragmatic or earthly--neither of which can or ought to be disregarded, and between which the statesman in his political practice (and the citizen, too, in his ordinary practice) must somehow effect a balance, strikes me, from my perch of deepening middle age, as being just about right.
Can't resist sharing this with you, CK. Hope you won't mind my putting this here, rather than the OT. It's to do with Donald Trump's ancestry.
Heh heh. Just in case anyone's interested, here's the link:
http://akinokure.blogspot.com/2015/09/donald-trump-descended-from-vikings.html
Well, I haven't forgotten you, CK--not that you care--or lost interest in having occasional disputations with you. I've just been feeling a little demotivated the past several weeks. However, I think I may be getting my second wind. I'm just waiting for you to render an at least once in a blue moon comment on current affairs.
Best wishes