Interpretation A

A JOURNAL

OF POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY

Winter 1991-92 117 Kenneth Dorter Joseph

Volume 19 Freedom Virtue

Number 2

and

Constraints in Prometheus Bound

137

Cropsey

and

Knowledge: On Plato's Protagoras

157

Michael Davis

Politics
and

and

Poetry: Aristotle's Politics, Books VII

VIII

169

Marie A. Martin

Misunderstanding

Understanding Hume's Moral Philosophy: An Essay on s Place in Moral Philosophy, by Nicholas Capaldi
and
Hume'

185

Hugh Gillis
Translator

Kojeve-Fessard Documents

201

Glenn N. Schram

The Place

of

Leo Strauss in

Liberal Education

Book Review

217

Will

Morrisey

Questions Locke

Concerning

the Law of

Nature, by John

Interpretation
Editor-in-Chief General Editors Hilail Gildin, Dept.
of

Philosophy, Queens College

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Interpretation
Winter 1991-92

X.

Volume 19

Number 2

Kenneth Dorter
Joseph

Freedom Virtue

and

Constraints in Prometheus Bound

117

Cropsey

and

Knowledge: On Plato's Protagoras

137

Michael Davis

Politics
and

and

Poetry: Aristotle's Politics, Books VII

157
and

VIII

Marie A. Martin

Misunderstanding

Understanding Hume's Moral Philosophy: An Essay on Hume's Place in Moral Philosophy, by Nicholas Capaldi

169

Hugh Gillis
Translator

Kojeve-Fessard Documents

185

Glenn N. Schram
Book Review Will

The Place

of

Leo Strauss in

Liberal Education

201

Morrisey

Questions

Concerning

the Law of Nature,

by

John

Locke

217

Copyright 1992

interpretation

ISSN 0020-9635

Freedom

and

Constraints in Prometheus Bound

Kenneth Dorter

University

of Guelph

"Cypris,

you are no god.

You

are

something

stronger

than a god

if that

be"

can

Euripides.1

When

we

think of
a

Prometheus,
wound

stretched out above

us, his
not

arms spread apart

and nailed

down,

who sacrificed

gaping himself to
Aeschylus'

in his side, it is hard

to think of this god,

save

that are alien to

humankind from divine punishment, in terms conception. Every age has reinterpreted the myth in
renewal

accordance with

its

own

values, a

that

is

not

only inevitable but

of

in de

accordance
manded vantage

with

the

implications
of

Aeschylus'

of
itself.2

treatment

the story

by

the implications
Aeschylus'

the myth

Nevertheless,
is
not read

this

has the disad

enough. are con

that
ages

own

penetrating
simple
versus

account

carefully
which

Later

treat the

myth as

allegory, the terms of

stantly rewritten: martyrdom the heroic creative individual instrument

tyranny,

enlightenment versus

ignorance,
we might

versus paternalistic conformity. us

Today

easily treat it ironically. The techne given to

eventual

for

our survival

becomes the

of our technological
of

self-destruction:

Zeus merely turns

gift converges
myth as a cultural

Prometheus'

treachery into "the cunning

Prometheus'

reason"; these uses of the

Zeus'

with

counter-gift of

Pandora. None
ease

of

archetype

is inappropriate. But the

by

which we make

the story into a

voice and our

symbol of what we minds to the

already know closes our ears to subtlety and insight of his thought. In
the relationship between

Aeschylus'

Aeschylus'

hands the

myth

is less

about

oppression and

heroism than

about

the

relationship between will and nature, less about about freedom and fate. The details of his play have
seductive

domination
more

and resistance

than

to teach us than the

simplicity

of

its

archetypes.

In the

middle of the

play the

following
than

exchange occurs:

Prometheus: Craft is far

weaker

necessity.

Chorus: Who then is the

Chorus: Is Zeus
Prometheus:

steersman of necessity?

Prometheus: The triple-formed Fates

weaker

and the

remembering Furies.

than these?
cannot escape what

Yes, for he, too,

is fated. (514-18)

This

notion

of

metheus.

It is

not a

necessity and fate is rarely deus ex machina, but

mentioned rather

in

reflections

on

Pro
un-

the

key

Aeschylus'

to

interpretation, Winter

1991-92, Vol. 19, No. 2

118*

Interpretation
of

derstanding
beings.

the meaning of

relationship between Prometheus and Zeus. Ultimately their antagonism points beyond themselves and beyond human
the

Unnoticed beside the

in less
obvious ways case of

portrayal of

Zeus

as cruel and tyrannical portrayed

is the fact that

Prometheus too is

in

a not

entirely

flattering
of of

light. In the
Epimetheus'

Zeus the negativity is

straightforward.

slow-witted
survival

bungling

which neglected

Gone is the story to reserve any instrument

for humankind. Gone too is the deception

and

by

which

Prometheus Instead

tricked Zeus into choosing bones

tion of the gods, and

fat instead

of meat as

the

sacrificial por of

thereby infuriated Zeus

we are given a

against

humanity.3

bungling
As

and

humiliation
he

deliberately

murderous

Zeus:

soon as

ascended to the throne that was

his father's, straightaway he

assigned to the several gods their several privileges and portioned out the power,

but to the unhappy breed

out and create a new.

of mankind

he

gave no

heed, intending

to blot the race

(23035)
Aeschylus'

On the

level it may have been intention to reflect on the rule of Pisistratus, who was tyrant from 561-527, two years before Aes birth or, more likely, that of his son Hippias who continued the tyr
most obvious
chylus'

that makes

anny for the next sixteen its immediate

The
negative elements are not

years
referent

but Aeschylus

gives the

theme a universality

comparatively

unimportant.

in the

characterization of

Prometheus,

on

the other

only less straightforward, but are easier to miss because our sympathy for his situation leads us to look at him less critically than he may deserve. In presentation he is no mere victim or martyr. That qual is not to be response to his courage witnesses. absent, sure, as the ity

hand,

Aeschylus'

chorus'

In the
Zeus'

central choral ode

him for his

rule

preceding the entrance of Io, they rebuke Zeus and sing of the importance of foolhardy honoring (526-60). After Io's departure they again counsel obedience, say

immediately
of

defiance

ing,

"Wise

are

the worshippers
and

Adrasteia"

of after

(936). But

immediately

after

this

Hermes arrives,
Hermes'

the

chorus,
of

threats in the name

sends

watching Prometheus stand up to abandon their prudent docility. When Zeus,

Hermes
speech:

them
can

"How

away for their own safety they reply, with their final you bid us practice baseness? We will bear along with him
all

what we must on more

bear. I have learned to hate

treachery"

traitors: there is

no

disease I

spit

than

(1063-70).
an element

But if
you

martyrdom

is

in

Prometheus'

character, it is woven to

gether with

less

attractive traits.

When Hermes

says to

him, "No
as

one could

bear

in

success"

(979),

we might

be inclined to dismiss this

the prejudiced

Freedom
view of an enemy. would-be

and

Constraints in Prometheus Bound

already
pay,
anticipated

-119

But the

sentiment was
what you
haughty"

by

his friend

and

ally, Oceanus: "this is

talked so high and
since

Prometheus, for

that tongue of

yours which

for ourselves,
understandable

Aeschylus

gives us

(320-21). It is easy enough to judge ample evidence. We might set aside, as

in the circumstances,

Prometheus'

insulting

manner
Zeus'

toward Her

the end of the play the latter arrives to convey threats, and complains that "You mock me like a (985). But his treatment of Hermes

mes,

when at

child"

is only an extreme form of his treatment of others generally. Wherever he himself has power over others he lords it over
cousins, the
star and
used

them. With his

Oceanids, they his audience. His very

at

he is

least cordial, but it is

powerlessness,
over

always clear that

he is the
to his

and

their answering pity, is

come

as

a means
words:

of

holding
of

sway

them.

They

in

answer

opening

"Bright light
the

and swift-winged

winds,

springs of the

rivers,
of

numberless, laughter
circle of the sun:
gods"

sea's

waves, earth, mother of all, and the all-seeing

call upon you to see what

arrive

I,

god,

suffer at

the

hands

(88-92). After the Oceanids

their sorrow

alight on earth and plete:

for him, he hear

advises: what

and, having heard his story, express "But do not sorrow for my present suffering;
you
mine"

is to come, that
Prometheus'

beg

you alight and

join

your sorrow with

may know the whole com (273-77). Their rela

tionship
the

will consist

primarily

of

explanations and complaints and

Oceanids'

pained,"

sympathy and praise. When the Oceanids say, "My heart is (247Prometheus replies, "Yes, to my friends I am pitiable to
see"

78). His final words, like his opening ones, light to all, you see me, how I suffer, how

are:

"O

Sky

unjustly"

circling brings the (1092-93). The tactic of

that

working

on

his

visitors'

metheus advise will win a of

Io, "To tear from the

uses

make wail and audience

pity is deliberate, Aeschylus shows us. He has Pro lament for one's ill fortune, when one

is

worthwhile"

well

(637-79). In the

absence

his relationship with his cousins. The one character in the play toward whom he is in a formally subordinate position, the well-meaning Oceanus, who is his paternal grandfather and mater
power, he

his

weakness

to control

nal

uncle,"

he

will not allow

to

be

Oceanus'

present.

first

words are:

come on a

long journey
you

to visit you

misfortunes;

know that. I think that it is

no one

My heart is kinship makes

.

sore
me

for

your so.
.

feel them
.

Besides,
me

apart
can

from kinship, there is

I hold in higher say that

you

estimation.

Tell

how I

help

you,

and you will never

have any friend

more

loyal to

you than

Oceanus.

(286-99)
puts

It is

touching

speech, but it

Prometheus in his

debt,

and

Prometheus

replies with anger:

What do I

see?

Have you, too,

come to gape

in
. .

wonder at
.

this great

display, my

torture?

Was it to feast

your eyes upon

120

Interpretation
suffering
and

the spectacle of my

join

in pity for my

pain?

(300-305) blame,
with me!

I envy you, that

you stand clear of

and yet shared and

dared in everything
no

(332-33)

In fact Oceanus has

cede with

intention

Zeus

Prometheus'

on

of standing clear of danger, but wants to inter behalf. Prometheus will not allow it, however:

Oceanus: Tell me,

therein?

what

danger do

you see

for

me

in

loyalty

to you,

and courage

Prometheus: I

see

only

useless effort and a

silly

good nature.

Oceanus: Suffer
one

me

then to

be

sick of this

sickness, for it is a profitable thing, if

is wise, to

seem

foolish.
to be my fault.

Prometheus: This

shall seem

Oceanus:

Clearly

your words send me

your

home
me

again.

Prometheus: Yes, lest

doings for

bring

you enmity.

(383-90)

This last
question
nus'

Prometheus'

speech puts

behavior in

a nobler

light, but

we must

the purity of the sentiment, for he expresses no such worries for Ocea daughters. When he invites them to join him he already knows the tor
that will
all

ments

known
to

thereby be inflicted before exactly (skethros),

on

them at the end of the

be"

all

that shall

"I have play (101-2). His first words

Oceanus

showed an annoyance which

pearance of solicitude.
manages own

By

to transform

Oceanus'

he only gradually tames into the ap him away for his own safety, Prometheus sending generosity toward him into a generosity of his his
position of subordination

toward

Oceanus,

a reversal of

into

one of

superiority.

If he dominates the Oceanids through pity and rises above Oceanus by an inversion of generosity, his condescension shows its unadulterated form in his relationship to Io, the one figure in the play who is his complete inferior. He vaunts his superiority over her in at least three ways. First, by teasing her (and
the chorus of
about

Oceanids) into begging him for information

will

about

himself

and

her fate. He
of

later

admit

that

he

welcomes such questions:

thing
more

this is still obscure

or

difficult

ask me again and when

learn

clearly:

"If any I have

pun

leisure than I

wish"

(816-18). But

Io

asks

why he is

being

ished he becomes coy

and

hesitant:
moment ceased

Prometheus: I have just this

sorrows.

from the lamentable tale

of

my

Io: Will

you then grant me this

favor?
asking for: I
will tell you all.

Prometheus: Io: Tell

who

Say

what you are

it

was that nailed you to the cliff. plan was the plan of

Prometheus: The Hephaestos. Io: And

what was

Zeus,

and

the

hand the hand

of

the offense of which this

is the

punishment?

Freedom
Prometheus: It is
enough

and

Constraints in Prometheus Bound

-121

that I have told you a clear story so far.

me what

Io: In addition, then, indicate to Prometheus: Better for Io: I Io:

you not

date
I

shall

be the limit

of

my

wanderings.

to know this than know it.

me what must endure.

beg

you,

do

not

hide from
I

Prometheus: It is

not that

grudge you

this favor.

Why

then

delay

to tell me all?
no

Prometheus: It is

grudging, but I hesitate to break thought for me than pleases

your spirit.

Io: Do

not

have

more

me myself.
.

Prometheus: Since

you are so

eager, I must speak

(613-30)

Io: Your prophesy has now Prometheus: Then also do

Io: Do
not offer me a

passed the
not seek

limits

of understanding.

to leam your trials.

boon

and then withhold

it.
. .

Prometheus: I

offer you

then one of two stories.

Choose that I tell

you

clearly Chorus: Grant her

either what remains

for

you or the one that shall

deliver

me.

one and grant me the other you

Prometheus: Since

have

so much eagerness

will not refuse

(775-86)

The disingenuous disclaimer, that he cannot bring himself to tell Io what awaits like a her lest he break her spirit, would itself be enough to break one's spirit
fortune teller
tell you
who gasps

in horror

at

her

crystal

ball

and

says, "I'd better

not

this; I don't delight in encouraging he tells the too

soon,"

you."

want to upset and

In fact Prometheus takes

evident

soon: wait

till you

savoring Io's terror at what awaits her. "You groan chorus with regard to Io's fate, "you are full of fear too (696-97). And to Io herself: hear besides what is to
be"

"Are

you

come?"

crying and lamenting: (743-44).

not

what will you

do

when you

hear

of

the evils to

her anguish, but he denies her the sympathy which he himself so openly values, and which he had himself encouraged her to solicit (637-39). When she takes his advice, and

Third,

only does he

seem

to enjoy and

encourage

wails and

laments that

she might as well throw

herself from

a cliff

if the future

such suffering for her, she has reason to expect some sympathy from him. What he says to her is, "You would ill bear my trials, then, for whom fate

holds

death"

reserves no

(752-53).

Why

is Prometheus
martyred

portrayed so ambiguously?

On

one

hand
us.

as

humanity's

On the other, benefactor, by before his his ungracious toward peers, insen seniors, shamelessly self-pitying sitive and condescending toward the helpless? One reason (another will be sug
the tyrant who would

have destroyed

gested

later) is

that the characterization discourages us

as a
or as

ply

and

moral and

martyr, exclusively intellectual nature, impelled

"the type

of

the

from viewing him sim highest perfection of

truest
motives to

by

the

purest and

the

122
best

Interpretation
ends"

Prometheus'

and noblest

(Shelley, Preface

to Prometheus Unbound).
regal victim of

arrogance suggests to us not

injustice,
court"

one who sees

merely a victim of injustice, but a himself as the equal of any king and
Zeus'

who can

"hold

in

even the most adverse circumstances.

tween near-equals which will end, not with

with

The play depicts a contest be overthrow but nevertheless

his

compromise.

Prometheus'

Zeus'

of
opposite

near-equality with Zeus lies not merely in his secret knowledge vulnerability, but in a range of forces which Prometheus represents, Zeus. The polarity is Prometheus "gave honors to man beyond what
controlled

in kind to those

by

signalled
was

in the

first

scene.

just \pera

dikes]", remarks Hephaestus at line 30. But a little later he adds, "No one, save (63). There is an implicit contrast Prometheus, can justly [endikos] blame
me"

between

rival standards of

justice. Each

will

be

seen

to have a different

basis.

Unlike the Oresteia, however, the contrast will not be between folk and civic justice, but between justice grounded in nature and justice imposed by force.
Prometheus'

opening

words

invoked the
swift-

elements

aether, air, water, earth,

of

fire: "Bright light [aither] and winged winds, springs berless laughter of the sea's waves, earth, mother of all,
circle of ments.

the rivers, num

all-seeing Throughout the play he is associated with the natural ele He is the fire-bearer whose only immortal visitors are Ocean and the
the
sun."5

and the

Oceanids. Although his

Earth (Gaia, who was although her names are Prometheus
Zeus

mother

Zeus'

is Themis (justice) he twice addresses her as mother), and insists: "Themis, Gaia, she is but one
(211). But according to Hesiod Themis was part of a general contrast between

many"

Gaia's daughter (Theogony 132-35). This is

and as

the representatives and champions of the natural and

Unlike Prometheus, Zeus is nowhere in the play associated with nature gods, but rather with the untraditional gods, Strength (Kratos) and Force (Bia), and with Hermes, the instrument of his commands.

arbitrary

powers respectively.

The (the

contrast

is

strengthened

by

Oceanids, Io, his

with

mother

connecting Prometheus with the female element and grandmother Oceanus is dismissed) and

Zeus

the male. Their relationship as counterparts

of the characteristics attributed

is

reflected

in the fact
are also at

that "most

to Zeus

tributed to Prometheus himself

play."6

by

the Chorus or

by by

Prometheus

other characters

in the

Zeus'

realm

is that
which a

of

the arbitrary. "Zeus alone

customs

the customs

by

"His justice is
laws"

Zeus rules, thing he keeps

is truly that have no law to

standard"

free"

(50). "New

are

them"

(149-50).

by

his

own

(189-90),
does
is the

"a despot's

private

(404). But force begets isolation. "This is

nature of a

a sickness rooted and not trust

inherent in the
friends"
Zeus'

tyranny: that he that holds it

a sense

his

(226-67). If Prometheus is bound in

also

that

antithesis to

freedom, he is

bound in

different

sense of

that is the antithesis to

Zeus'

isolation. Where the tyrant forges the bonds

unfreedom, nature forges

the bonds of kinship. The mistrust of Zeus inspired

by

power

is

answered

by

Freedom
the

and

Constraints in Prometheus Bound

Hephaestus'

123

first speech contains by kinship. the words, "I have not the heart to bind by force a god who is my kin. Yet there is constraint upon (14-16). "Our kinship has strange he adds later (39). Not a word about feelings of kinship and loyalty toward his father, Zeus. Oceanus says in his opening speech, "My heart is sore for your misfortunes. I think it is kinship makes me feel them (290-91). He is
. . .
me" so"

loyalty

to Prometheus

inspired

power,"

...

Prometheus'

paternal grandfather and maternal uncle.

But he is
position all

Zeus'

brother

and seems

to

feel

no

fraternal

loyalty

toward

Zeus'

in the dispute.
traitors: there is

When the Oceanids say at the end, "1 have learned to hate no disease I spit on more than (1068-70), it is
treachery"
metheus'

treachery

toward Zeus that

of

they have in

mind.

ironically not Pro They are denouncing

when

instead the possibility advises them to flee.

betraying

their

loyalty

to

Prometheus,

Hermes

IB

The

weapons made available to

Prometheus

by

his ties to itself is

nature are of strength.

two

kinds,
of

the

first

implying

Zeus'

weakness, the second

Zeus'

Prometheus'

In

general

way the limitation of

to the unhappy

the contest between Zeus

...

and

at the very heart by nature Prometheus. When Zeus "portioned out the
power of mankind

power,

breed

he

gave no

heed, intending

to
I"

blot the

race out and create a new.

can

Against these

plans none stood save

(230-36). But how

stowed upon

the comparatively
enable us

meager gifts which

Prometheus be

humankind

to withstand the destructive powers of Zeus?

If he

wishes

to blot us out, how can rudimentary techne protect us? His powers
us out

evidently are limited to those conferred upon him by nature. To blot means, for Zeus, to refuse to rescue us from our helplessness against the
pitability
powers.7

inhos-

of our environment:

severity

of

weather, scarcity
supernatural

of

food,

predations

of animals.

Annihilatory

"miracles"

of a

order are

beyond his

limitation by nature goes beyond the fact of nature's setting limits to his powers; he cannot overcome a potentially fatal weakness in his own nature. One deity, Aphrodite, will prove too strong even for Zeus. Love will provide
the means both for
Zeus' Prometheus'

Zeus'

deliverance "against
reveals

Zeus'

will"

(771),s

and

for

own
Zeus'

downfall,

as

Prometheus

in his final

speech

to Io (823-76).

love for Io, and Hera's jealous love of Zeus, were the beginning of Io's ordeal. When Zeus heals her with a gentle touch, the encounter will impregnate her
with

Epaphus. After five

generations

the line is about to be wiped out, as

advances of

fifty
plan shall

women

flee to Argos from the incestuous

their

kin. God
Zeus'

(theos) forbids
(if the

this union and the women murder the men

in bed. But

god was Zeus) is crucially compromised: "one among these and from her love (himeros) beguile from killing her bedfellow
. . .

girls

seed

124
shall

Interpretation
free."

The advent spring a man renowned for archery, and he shall set me of Heracles thus depends on two cited acts of love overmastering prudence. Even Zeus, who hears this prediction, will be unable to resist healing his be

loved Io, as the unnamed maiden (Hypermnestra) will later be overcome by love for her incestuous pursuer. Beyond that, Zeus will succumb to a third,
uncited, instance
of

fathering
mortal,

Heracles'

of

imprudent lust. Not only will his passion for Io lead to his ancestor Epaphos, but his subsequent passion for another father Heracles himself.
incest-

Alcmene,
upon

will

In

describing

the

murders,

Prometheus says, "Even

the
connection

so

may love
means of

enemies"

come, too,

my

drawing
Zeus'

between the

his deliverance (764-68).

vealed

and

the means of
. . .

downfall: "He

shall make a marriage

that shall hurt him.

She

shall

bear him Zeus

a son mightier

than his
to

father"

Prometheus'

power over exchange

resides

in his

knowledge,
this
Zeus'

be

re

in

for his freedom, that the

of

goddess of whom

is fated is
extramari

Thetis. Knowledge
tal lust

this is

Prometheus'

greatest

strength,
Zeus'

as

metheus'

As his name, Forethought, implies, Pro strength lies not only in the knowledge of danger, but in his intelligence and knowledge generally. Zeus, on the other hand, is empty-

is his

greatest vulnerability.

minded regard

(kenophron; 762). If arbitrary force

for
what we might call

seeks

to impose its will without

the natural order,

intelligence is its contrary,

bringing about success by discerning and acting upon the possibilities offered by the nature of things. Consequently, just as nature is ultimately stronger than arbitrary force, so too is intelligence. "Not by strength or overmastering force (214the fates allowed the conquerors to conquer but by guile (doldi) 15). rule can be broken only by "a device of (palama; 166-67).
only"

Zeus'

subtlety"

It may be true that Thetis is destined to bear a son mightier than his father, but his might is not the only factor: Zeus "shall need me show the new plan
.

.to

(bouleum') whereby he may be

Implicit in
change

spoiled of

his throne

and

his

power"

(170-72).

all this

is

a cyclical view of

history. Whenever the

reins of power

hands it

must

be the
not

work

of

intelligence

rather

than brute
of

force.
plan

Kronos deposed Uranos

that he castrate Uranos

because he

was stronger

but because in
power

Gaias

during
of

intercourse. But

once

Kronos

aban

doned subtlety in favor

brute force:

When first the I then

the
with the

gods

began their angry

and

quarrel

best

counsel tried to win

Titans,

son of

Uranos

Earth,
crafty
schemes

but failed.
and

They

would

have

none of

in their [I]t

savage arrogance of spirit would

thought
. . .

they
my

lord it easily join

Zeus'

by force
side:

seemed

best

to take

mother and

he

was as

willing

as we were:

Freedom
thanks to my plans the
of

and

Constraints in Prometheus Bound

125

dark

receptacle

Tartarus

conceals the ancient

Kronos. (201-22)

Now Zeus, too, becomes

reluctant

brutality. It is
says

a universal pattern:

favor Forethought, and resorts to "Every ruler is harsh whose rule is

to

mere

new,"

Hephaestus (35).

History

appears as a series of

cycles, a

perennial

polarity
possi

between intelligence

and

force.

Only

the

intelligence that

recognizes
new.

the

bilities inherent in the

nature of

things can create something

Brute force is

merely repressive, prolonging what has been accomplished but bringing noth ing truly new into being. The first immediately passes over into the second in
order

to perpetuate itself as

long

as possible.

The

second withers

into

an

empty

shell that

falls before

tion (Kronos against

occur

first, Uranos, Zeus against Kronos)

a resurgence of the

whether or a

in the form
renewal, the

of a revolu

such as would

if Zeus

accepts

Prometheus
The

as

an

ally

against

phantom

heavenly
forms
of

counterpart of

Achilles.9

Aeschylus'

philosophical not

is

evident

from

our own

experience,

accuracy of only in politics but in

arts and sciences

presentation all

human haps

creativity.

The

creative rebels

in the

in turn become

the intolerant conservatives

another reason are made

and reactionaries once character of

they

triumph.

This is

per

that even in the

Prometheus the

seeds of mega

lomania

evident,
of

Zeus) but
were

also

in that

not only in his treatment of his enemies (Hermes, his friends (Oceanus, the Oceanids, Io). We sense that ever to

Prometheus himself

hold

power

his

yoke would not

be light,

and

Hermes'

that

prediction, "No one could bear you in

of

success,"

is

not unfounded.

The

inseparability

the natures of Prometheus and Zeus is especially evident

assimilates
of

in two passages, one of which metheus to Zeus. In the middle

"techne"

Zeus to Prometheus, the

other

Pro

the play Prometheus refers to

Zeus'

power as

(514),

the term

everywhere else associated with

Prometheus

himself;

and

in recounting his

gifts

to

humanity

Prometheus

reveals

that he pursued the

enlightenment: with

repressive

strategy of Zeus rather than his own tendency toward Forethought took away our foresight (of doom) and replaced it
(blind

blindness

hope)

(250-2). 10

IV

The

interplay

between the

natural and

the arbitrary, between intelligence and

force, is only
of

Aeschylus'

one side of

complex

the story of how Prometheus

rescued mortals

play of forces. An interpretation is also implicitly an interpreta

mentions

tion of the nature of humanity. As has just been noted, Prometheus two gifts
which

he bestowed
.

on

human beings.

(1) "I

caused mortals to cease

. .

foreseeing
52).

doom

placed

in them blind

hopes"

(Tuphlas

elpidas;

250-

(2)

"Besides this I

gave them

fire

and

from it they
In the

shall

learn many
the myth

crafts"

(254-56).
unclear what

It is

is

doom."

meant

by "foreseeing

version of

126
which when

Interpretation
Socrates
recounts

in the Gorgias,
and what

mortals

knew in

advance

the

moment

they

would

die

(523d),

the present passage is often interpreted

meant
would

in that

light. But if that

hopes,"

were

is

rather

than a simple erasure of

refer

(d-e)? Doom

(moron) may

to

here, why foreknowledge, as it is in the Gorgias death, but in the present context that seems
cure

the

be "blind

to mean not the moment of death

would

but

the

fact

of

death.

"Foreseeing

doom"

then refer to
are called

(Humans But

something like despair at our finitude and ephemerality. ephemeroi [creatures of a day, ephemeral] at 83, 255, 547.)
a

only to that. Later Prometheus mentions

perhaps not

third

gift:

I found

mortals witless

(nepious)
ears

and gave

them the use of their wits

. . .

(ennous)
eyes

and
saw

made them masters of their minds

(phrenon)
not

Humans

at

first had

but

to no purpose;

they had

but did
and

hear. Like the

all

dragged through their

confusion.

long

lives

handled

dreams they things in bewilderment and

shapes of

(443-49)
rather

Prometheus teaches them to build houses

them about seasons
urement of
and

than

live in

caves.

He teaches

the planting of crops; about astronomy and the meas

time;

calculation and

writing; the
the

horses for the

carriages of

the

rich;

harnessing of farm animals and of building of ships (450-68). When the

heal himself, Prometheus
the mineral
replies

chorus compares

him to

doctor

who cannot

that the greatest gift

arts of

he

gave

to humans was medicine. He also taught us the

and revealed

divination

and of

sacrifice,

riches

of

the earth

(476-503). The
understanding,

powers

he has
in the

given

to humans are the

powers of nature and

not

the powers of force. The arts are a kind of

knowledge,

not a

kind do

of coercion.

Only

references

to gold and silver, and to the privi

leged rich in their

we perhaps

("the crowning pride of the rich person's luxury") hear intimations of a politics that may involve artificial values, a
carriages

reappearance at the

human level

of

the transition

These intimations become

races she will encounter

fully

explicit when

from creativity to repression. Prometheus tells Io of the three

in her future travels.

of

Keep
with

he tells her: far

not

"they

are an armed

people, armed

away from the Scythians, the bow that strikes from

iron,"

away."

And beware

"the Chalybes hate

who work with

approach."

gentle,

nor people whom a stranger

dare

She

must go

"for they are to "the

Amazons,
just

(709-24). Prometheus has only human beings the crafts, but by the time Io makes this future jour ney-in the vicinity of the river Violence (Hubristes) they will already have been turned to the service of warfare. This double edge of techne was adum
who

the race of women

men"

given

brated in the opening scene,

punished

as we witnessed the champion of

techne

being

by

means of

the techne

(47)

of

Hephaestus."

In

pre-Promethean a

days there

was no

history
We

neither progress nor cycles

merely

dreamlike

marginal existence.

cannot

doubt that

post-Promethean

existence

is for

us an

improvement,

since

the alternative

was annihilation.

But

Freedom
the
as

and

Constraints in Prometheus Bound

127

interplay
among

gods.

between creativity The life of the

and repression appears as much

gods

is

an alternation
and we can

among mortals between the violence of

see

repression and of

the violence of rebellion,

Prometheus'

already

the

emergence
wake.

the former among mortals, making the latter inevitable in its

of
all

The

beneficiaries

guile,
power, is
power

whether

divine

or

human,
from

will

discover that

its power, like

metheus

that corrupts. But

that corruption will

fire.'2

emerge renewed

life, like

the

Phoenix,

that other symbol of

Aeschylus'

If the Pro

story is a liberation but of the

never gives

political

myth, in

hands it is

not a myth of

pendulum.

to

humanity

Perhaps this is why one techne that Prometheus is that of politics (cf. Conacher, p. 51). There are no
and renewals need not no

definitive liberations but only renewals, anyone but their instigator. Kronos was better than Kronos. There is
no reason

be

liberating
Zeus

for
no

better than Uranos; Zeus is here

to expect more

from

a son of

and

Thetis,

or, for that matter, from Prometheus himself

Aeschylus'

should

he

ever achieve

such power.

characterization makes

this all too clear.

What
world

attitude

toward life does this

travel

recommend?

Judging by
be
sea of

the hate-filled
symbolized and

that Io

will

Prometheus'

description

through, of Io's future

the

lives
as

of all of us might

by
Io

"A wintry

ruin."

agony

replies,
What
good

is life to

me

then?

Why

do I

not throw myself at once

all

from
It

some rough

crag, to strike the ground and win a quittance of

to die once for all than suffer all one's days.

my

troubles?

would

be better

(747-51)
life
will somehow

But he

she

does

not

do

so.

She
she

seems

to believe that
what

be

worth

living

after all.

Perhaps

illustrates
doom

Prometheus
us

stopped us

from

pain and apparent sionment with

foreseeing futility of life,

by

placing in

means by saying that blind hopes. Despite the

and

the repetitive cycles of political disillu

some

how

worth while. would

liberators turned oppressors, we continue to hope that it is hope must be blind. The evidence is against it
it take to
the
vindicate answer

What
out

these

hopes, hopes
a

which,

being false? Is by focusing

a

to be

found in

that may be blind with here-and-now commitment to

only

on what

is

at

hand, learns

live

without reliance on

hope
such as

life

such as was advocated

by

Epicurus in the

ancient

world, or one

Camus

advocated

in

ours?

Is it to be found in the
a

epochal events of

historical renewal, however ephemeral,

within

historicism

which

the

conditions and values

that spawn a particular historical culture

locates meaning in its

finite

span?

Or in

some

form

of

the eternity of the

pattern of

transcendence, perhaps in the contemplation of fate which remains constant through all these

cycles, or, deeper still,

perhaps

everything Unbound and Prometheus the Firebearer) are lost, and, with them, answers. On the basis of his only surviving trilogy, the Oresteia, it is tempting to conclude that Aeschylus may have finally portrayed a breaking of the old
Aeschylus'

else that exists?

in the underlying ground of that pattern and of The remaining plays of the trilogy (Prometheus

128

Interpretation
patterns,
as a an ultimate reconciliation of the perennial
dichotomies.13

cyclical
can

It

be taken

foreshadowing
once

of

this that the

chorus

tells
no
.

Prometheus, "I
less in
.

am

of good
Zeus."

hope that
thus"

freed

of

these

bonds

you will

be
.

power

than

things to be

But the reply is ambiguous: "Not (508-12).

yet

has fate

determined these

There
It is

are tensions

one of the most

a

in the play which make such a solution questionable, for powerful forces in the play is never brought into the equation.
given several names
"love."

force that is

here,

and which corresponds

of

to our

generalized concept of

At the
as

beginning
his love

the play Kratos

twice

identifies

Prometheus'

"flaw"

of

humanity

(philanthropou

(Strength) 11,

28). Prometheus later concurs, attributing his suffering to his "excessive love of (ten lian philoteta broton; 122) the adjective an apparent acknowl
mortals"

edgement of error.

The

chorus uses neither philia nor philotes

much"

but sebomai,
and

"revere": "you

revered mortals
will

too
act

(544). Just

Zeus'

as

love for Io

later for Thetis

cause

him to him to

Prometheus'

against

self-interest,
to

love his

(philia) for humanity

own nature.

causes

go

too

far,

forget himself,

to

betray

"The

gods

named

thought,"

Kratos tells

him;

wrongly when they called you Fore "you yourself need Forethought to extricate yourself
you
yourself,"

from this
advise

contrivance"

(85-87). "Know

Oceanos feels
boasted
about

compelled

to

him (311). Prometheus himself,

who earlier

of complete

fore

knowledge (101-2), seems to have deceived himself quence of his actions, and even to regret them now:

the

future

conse

Willingly,
In

willingly, I

erred14

nor will

deny it.
on

helping humanity
yet

I brought my troubles
with such

me;

but
I

I did

not

think that

tortures

should

be

wasted on these

airy

cliffs.

(269-71)

In case the terms used for love are eros (eroti: 591), desire (himeros: 649, cf. 865), Cypris (650, 864 an epithet of Aphrodite), longing (pothos: 654), marriage (gamos: 648, 738, 764). This variety of terms and connotations
creates a

Zeus'

bridge between the

the

weaknesses exhibited

by

Zeus

and

Prometheus.

They

converge within

cluster of meanings

from

eros

to philia.

metheus'

weakness, can in fact have erotic connotations. In

and

Philia, Pro Homer, Euripides,

seems

Herodotus,
equivalent common

Aristophanes there (see

are

places

where phileo

virtually
also a

to

ero

term

for "to

Liddell-Scott-Jones, phileo, kiss"). My point is not that

paragraph
Prometheus'

3; it is
philia

for hu
range

manity had anything erotic about it, but that one can conceive of the between philia and eros as a single continuum. Our own awareness of a

conti even

nuity from
though

friendship
no

to romance to eros was not unknown to the

Greeks,
of

they had

distinct

word

for the

middle

term. Plato speaks

how

Freedom

and

Constraints in Prometheus Bound

129

may become transformed into passion, and Aristotle of how eros friendship.15 No Greek term is as general as our may become transformed into

friendship
"love,"

and this

these passages.

Zeus'

may partly explain the variety of love for Io is not mere lust, for in the
a gentle

Aeschylus'

terminology in
he
confines

end

his
no

impregnation
chaste, the

of

her to

healing

touch (848-49). And while there

are

is

indication that humans

Prometheus'

feelings for humankind

their chastisement of
of

anything
excessive
whom

other

than

chorus

juxtaposes

his

regard

for

with

their recollection

his courtship

of

Hesione,

he

also won

with gifts

(544-60).
and

If Zeus
dite,16

Prometheus

are

both

made vulnerable

by

the power of Aphro

and

she appears as a third, almost unacknowledged force together with Zeus Prometheus (the three of whom foreshadow Plato's tripartite soul: desire,
reason).

ambition,

Born from the foam

Uranos'

of

semen-filled genitals

ing into the sea, when he was Gaia, Aphrodite also symbolizes
up
of

castrated one of of

by

Kronos

during

plung intercourse with

the

major

themes of the play: the rising

the son against the

"father"

the

gods.

The

earlier simple opposition

between Prometheus

and

Zeus,

as representa

tive of nature and will, must now be refined. Aphrodite no longer can be sub
sumed within the power of

Prometheus,

even though she augmented out

his

power

by limiting
assertion

that of

power as well.

Zeus, for it turns If Zeus and Prometheus

and

that she undermines

Prometheus'

represent

the alternative forms of

self-

brute force

intellect The
to

Aphrodite
obsession

represents

their mutual antith

esis,

obsession with an

other."

concerned about another person about our self.

an extent

may be described as the being that threatens our intrinsic concern

not

about"

"Being
refers

concerned
Zeus'

does

implications. It

as

much

to

selfish

obsession with

necessarily have Io

altruistic

as to

his

(perhaps penitent) curing sense of "other

of

her. The fact that

not make

directed"

does

love is self-effacing in the it benevolent. Self-sacrifice can go

such

together with injustice to others as easily as self-destructive behavior can go

with

destructive behavior toward

others.

We may
on

neglect our own

best interests

Zeus'

without

him to

assaults on

replacing them with her similar to those himself

since she will

someone else's.

Io,

even

love for Thetis may lead though they would be de

than his

structive to constant

bear

a son mightier

father. What is

in love is the
to

preoccupation with an

other,

at

the price of diminished the

preoccupation

attentiveness

self-interest.

It is

secondary
or

matter whether

turns out to be beneficial or

harmful,

whether

the

jeopardy

to our
and

self-

interest becomes

actual

damage. Against

all

reason,

intelligence,

fore

thought, Prometheus puts the needs of humanity before his own well being. Against what is needed to maintain his control over Prometheus, Zeus will put
the needs of Io before his own.

To ism

our post-Socratic,

Christianized
an

ears

it

seems paradoxical

to

regard altru except

as a negative
mortal

form,

irrationality

and self-betrayal.
praises

Nevertheless,

for the

Io (613),

no one

in the play

Prometheus for his sacrifice,

130

Interpretation
gratitude

and even she seems to contemplate the edge of a cliff with more she

than

does Prometheus. The for those

sacrifice

who can
you?"

can mortals spare

why he do nothing for him. "What drop of your suffering asks Kratos (83-84). The chorus of Oceanids agree:
others cannot understand

would make such a

"Do

you

not see

how

you

have

erred?"

(261-62); "Do

not

benefit

mortals

beyond
What he

what

"Kindness that
succor went too

is appropriate, uncaring about your own (507-8); cannot be requited, tell me, where is the help in that, my friend? in creatures of a (545-47). Prometheus himself admits that
day?"

far (lian: 122). In

passion we are passive,

of others

to act upon us. In the play's world of power

permitting the interests politics, a love by which

we allow others power over us

comes a

dangerous

and

irrational for

(whether pity, lust, or simply tenderness) be weakness. It is the same ground that gives

rise to

Thrasymachus'

contemptuous

dismissal

of

justice

as a

foolish

and servile

concern with what

is

good

others

(Republic 1.343c).
to

From
of the of

our

Socratic heritage

we are accustomed

thinking
no

that reason
no

leads
Idea

to altruism, but in the

world of

Prometheus Bound is

justice-itself,

good,

by

the contemplation of which we might overcome the standpoint

individuality. There is only the self and the other, mediated in one way kinship, in another by love. The play ends with the visit of Hermes as
emissary.

by

Zeus'

Hermes is

not

only the

messenger of

the gods, but

will not

also

the god who

world

"sanctifies"

lying,

cheating,
as

and stealing. ours about

We

find in this

the
ra

same

presuppositions and

in

the relationship among altruism,

tionality,
ence to

holiness. Justice here means, primarily,

self-interested obedi

Zeus the

king,

tempered only

by

the

weaker obligations of

kinship. The
the
the chorus
even

latter

are

quickly

sacrificed

former,

as

the examples of

if they come into too open a Hephaestus and Oceanus show.

conflict with

Only

ultimately embraces familial choice is not completely

of

loyalty

against

fear

of

the

tyrant, but

this

"irrational,"

these

bonds

you will

be

no

for they are "of good hope that once freed less in power than (508-10). Reason or
Zeus"

intelligence here
than

by

means achieving one's ends by the power brute force. It does not render comprehensible the

of

thought rather

sacrifice of one's

own ends.

1079). If
not

That is simply irrational, error (hemartes: 262) or unreason (anoias: think of justice as altruism, the possibility of justice resides here in the power of thought (as in Plato) but in the power of irrational love, not
we of

Prometheus but Aphrodite. This possibility very different possibilities.

In her
passion.

justice coexists, however,

may become the
with

with

extreme
Zeus'

form Aphrodite, the indiscretions are not

lust for
you,"

irrational,
committed

madness of serenity:

"Olympian"

"Zeus is

stricken with

Io is told in recurring
you"

night

visions; "he

is

afire to consummate

the union of

Cypris

with

ment at

the

hand

of

Hera,

and with the connivance of

(649-51). Io's punish Zeus himself (663-72),

that Zeus must

whom she

resisted,

echoes the

kind

of passionate

frenzy

have

experienced

in his

obsession with

her.

By

means of

"the gadfly, the

ghost of

Freedom
earth-born
possession:
Argos"

and

Constraints in Prometheus Bound

is driven to

131

(567-68),

she

a madness suggestive of erotic

Eleleu,
It

eleleu

creeps on me

again, the

twitching
me on

spasm,
me

the mind-destroying madness,

and

burning

up

the gadfly's sting goads

steel point and

by

no

fire tempered

my heart in its fear knocks on my breast. There's a dazing whirl in my eyes as I run
out of

my

course

by

the madness

driven,

crazy frenzy; my tongue ungoverned babbles, the words in a muddy flow strike
the
on

the waves of the mischief I

without aim or sense.

hate, (877-86)

strike wild

VI

Aphrodite,
who

the

irrational, may be described in

from
within

the same terms as the gadfly,

me"

"comes

even

the depths to hound

(573). Her

subterranean

nature

is

echoed

by

the play

itself,

where

her

presence when

is

always

felt

without used

her

ever

being

seen or even

mentioned, except
power

her

epithet

Cypris is

to refer to sexual love. But her

is the

power that

has brought Pro

in the
would

metheus,

Zeus,
of

and even

Io

all

to their fate.
and

The

reconciliation

between Zeus
would

Prometheus that

one anticipates

final play
perhaps

the

trilogy

be

a reconciliation of self-interest. with

Zeus

share

his

power

equally

Prometheus, wedding intelligence

him. He

to

force,

and

neutralizing the antithesis whose tension gave rise to the cycles of him
and now threaten
would

power that preceded

impregnable rule; Prometheus The

class warfare

benefit force

tual equal; and the rest of the gods would

would benefit by having an vir by being recognised as benefit by having enlightened rulers.
Zeus'

between

repressive

and creative

intelligence

would

be

sublated

into

perpetual amity.

But
is

what will
with

happen

when next

Zeus becomes inflamed

with

passion, or

Prometheus

counterpart

pity (oiktoi: 241)? Or when they are inflamed by hatred, which to love as Ares is consort to Aphrodite. "Why are you pitying in
asks

vain?"

Kratos
the

Hephaistos.
most

"Why

is it that
Zeus'

you

do

not

whom

gods

hate

of all

(echthiston)
(stugetos)"

since

it

was

hate (stugeis) a god your honor that

with

he betrayed to
she
with

mortals?"

(36-8). Io "set

heart

on

fire

love

and now

is

driven

by

Hera's hate
stugnos:

(590-92). Prometheus is filled

enemies.

hatred (echthos,

975ff.) for his

And
all

even

the gentle

and compassionate chorus

has "learned to hate (misein)

traitors"

(1068).

Throughout the play,

which

and especially near the end, are references to hatred balance those to love. Many of the instances have nothing to do with the

132

Interpretation

enmity between Prometheus and Zeus and would not be dispelled by its concil iation. The races of humans that Io will pass through are already full of hatred. hates sailors (echthroxenos nautaisi: Salmydessos, "the rocky jaw of the 727). The Gorgons hate mortals (brotostugeis: 799). Io hates (stugnes: 886) the
sea,"

waves of ruin

that

wash over

her. The

power of

Aphrodite is inseparable from

that of her

illegitimate consort, Ares, god of war, her counterpart in passion. We may find an image of the indestructibility of passion in the continuous
Prometheus'

nocturnal regeneration of

liver

the seat of the passions, as the

Zeus'
eagle.18

Greeks believed image is

seems contained

after

it is

daily

devoured

by

still more vivid

in

a remarkable reminiscence

merely

a colorful

but irrelevant
mentioned

by Prometheus, which digression (353-74). Along with

absent since

at

first first

Typho

and

Zeus, Hephaestus is
role

in it. He has been

a provocative one.

the

scene, but his

in the drama is

Strictly

speaking, his
and a

presence was not

could

have
of

nailed

necessary at all, since Strength and Force (Kratos Prometheus to the cliff without his help. But he is
a god who works

Bia)
of

kind

double

Prometheus,
who,

through

through

force,

although

crippled, defeated
and

ingenuity by means of guile

and craft rather than

the powerful

warrior god

Ares (cf.

Odyssey 8.266ff);

who, like

pity (14ff). The two of them, Prometheus and time together, Hephaestus tells us (39). There is according
techne to
of

Prometheus, is prone to Hephaestus, used to spend their

even an alternate

tradition

to which not Prometheus the potter,

humanity."

Hephaestus is
a

similar

but Hephaestus the smith, gave to Prometheus, but not in the matter

defiance. Hephaestus is hubris. It both

Prometheus'

ator god without sides:

was

he is a cre conciliatory version of Prometheus Hephaestus who recognised the justice of both

injustice toward Zeus (pera dikes:

mempsaito:

30)

Zeus'

and

injus

tice toward Prometheus (endikos

fication
we

of the possibility of rapprochement interpret Hephaestus in this way, then the

63). He may be seen between Prometheus

combined

as a personi and of

Zeus. If
and

force

Zeus

Hephaestus
some

against the subterranean power of

of

Aphroditic

passion would give us

a

idea

how

much

stability

we

might expect

from is the

Zeus-Prometheus

alliance of

force

and reason.

The
ster

central character

in

Prometheus'

reminiscence
writes:

subterranean mon

Typho,
But

about whom

Hesiod

heaven, huge Earth bore the Tartarus [the deepest Underworld], by the aid of golden Aphrodite. Strength was with his hands in all that he did and the feet of the strong god were untiring. From his shoulders grew an hundred heads of a
when youngest child

Zeus had driven the Titans from Typho

of the

love

of

snake, a

fearful dragon, in his

were
. .

his

eyes

marvellous

glared.

And there

dark, flickering tongues, and from under the brows of heads flashed fire, and fire burned from his heads as he voices in all his dreadful heads which uttered every kind of
with

sound unspeakable.

And truly
come

thing

past

help
it.
. .

would

have happened

on

that

day,
them

and

he

would

have

to

reign over mortals and

immortals, had
and

not the
of

father

of men and gods

been

quick to perceive

And through the two

heat took hold

on the

dark-blue sea, through the thunder

lightning,

and

Freedom

and

Constraints in Prometheus Bound

winds and

133

through the fire from the monster, and the scorching thunderbolt.
. . .

But

when

Zeus had
with

conquered

him
was

blazing [by burning him with

hurled down,
of

the

thunderbolt]
cast

and

lashed him
huge

strokes,
.

Typho
.

a maimed

wreck, so that the

earth groaned.

And in the bitterness

his

anger

Zeus

him into

wide

Tartarus.

(Theogony 820-68)
and pitied

Prometheus has
recalls

seen the

destroyed Typho

him (his fatal

passion).

He

Typho's failed
now a

assault on

Zeus,

and adds:

sprawling

mass

useless pressed above

he

lies, hard by

the narrow
roots of

down beneath the

seaway Aetna: high

him

on the mountain peak the smith works at the anvil.

Hephaestos

Yet

one

day

there shall burst out rivers of

with savage of

fire, devouring

Sicily

of the

jaws the fertile, level plains fair fruits; such boiling wrath

with weapons of

fire-breathing

surf, a

fiery
(365-74)20

unapproachable torrent shall

though

Zeus'

lightning

Typho vomit, left him but a cinder.

Sitting

on their

mountaintops, Zeus plying his

undermined reason

rule and

Hephaestus his inge

nuity, will eventually be beneath them. There is no

by

the primitive raging passion buried

to believe that

having

Prometheus

rather than

Hephaestus for his ally

strength or

would put

Zeus in

a more secure position.

But "not
conquer

by
but

by

only"

guile

overmastering force the fates allowed the conquerors to (214-15). Passion alone can never triumph entirely
although

over reason

and

discipline,

it may
gets

subvert

their stability and alliance. But if Pro

of

metheus'

pity for Typho

much about

the better

him,

with whom will

he ally himself
Enlighten

this time?

However
ment

the Prometheia may seem to be a

trilogy
the

about

ideals,

the triumph of sweetness and light over harshness and igno

evokes

rance, it continually

the autonomy
rational

and power of

irrational. Just

as

the tenuous perfection of Plato's

"rule

destabilized

by

the

irrationality
ff.),
so put

of eros and

quickly become desire (Republic Books 8 and 9,

of

the

best"

will

beginning
view

with might

545d

too the seeds of the destruction of any Utopian

the

that

be

forward in Prometheus

Firebearer

are

already

visi

ble in Prometheus Bound. Driven

by

unenlightenable

passions,

by

primordial

irrationality,
still

the wheel of creative insight and brutal

expect otherwise

repression cannot stand

for long. To

is blind hope.

NOTES

David Grene.

1. Hippolytus 359-60. This translation, and most of those from Prometheus Bound, Occasionally I modify his translation or use my own.

are

by

134

Interpretation
day there was a variety of versions of the Prometheus myth (Second Letter sweeping history of the way it was transformed by later ages, see Hans Blumenberg, Myth, translated by R.M. Wallace (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1985), especially Parts
a present

2. Even in Plato's 31 lb). For Work

on

I1I-V. In the For

a

interpretation I

shall assume

that Prometheus Bound was

written

by

Aeschylus.

discussion

of

the evidence for and against the play's authenticity,

see

D.J. Conacher, Aes

chylus'

Prometheus Bound: A Literary Commentary (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1980), Appendix 1. More recently C.J. Herington has reaffirmed his earlier book-length defense of its [Austin: University of Texas Press, 1970]) in Aes authenticity (The Author of 'Prometheus chylus (New Haven: Yale pp. 160 ff. Press, 1986), University
Bound'

should

3. Here Prometheus simply says, "I taught of the smoothness of the vitals and what color they have to pleasure the gods. It was I who burned thighs wrapped in fat and the long shank
...

bone

and set mortals on the road

to this murky
what gives

craft"

(493-98). The implication is that the

sacrifi

cial portions were

determined
mother,

by

the gods pleasure, rather than

by

trick.
and

4.

Prometheus'

Themis,

was, like

Oceanus,
Oceanus'

an

father, Iapetus,
5. In
a

was

the offspring of Oceanus and

sister

offspring of Uranos Tethys. sky

would

Gaia. His
to

four

element scheme aither

the

fiery

element of the

be

assimilated

fire,
This

and

the sun would repeat the fire element in another

form,

or else

be treated

as a separate

deity. However, sometimes aether was treated as a fifth element, intermediate between air and fire. might be the most natural, although not the usual, way to read the present passage. 6. Conacher, p. 39, nil. Cf. J.C. Hogan, A Commentary on the Complete Greek Tragedies: 7. Once
acher notices

Aeschylus (Chicago:

University of Chicago Press, 1984), p. 290. humanity has been given techne in general, the latter
that the order in which
Prometheus'

becomes

self-sustaining.

Con

gifts are mentioned

response

"suggests Such
(p.

an

sequence,

as

if

each new art were

discovered in
more

to the new needs of a

met.

evolutionary higher level of

. .

civilization,

once

the needs at the

lower,

normally descriptive of man's own ingenuity 8. This is a significant departure from Hesiod, Prometheus
was

pressing level had been in meeting each new

who emphasizes

a sequence

is

challenge"

49;

cf. p.

83).
of
of

that

Heracles'

deliverance glory

"not

without

the

will of

Olympian Zeus it

who reigns on
before"

high,

that the

Heracles the Theban-born

might

be

yet greater than

was

(Theogony 529-31,

Evelyn-

White translation; in some later passages I modify his translation slightly). Moreover, in Hesiod the deliverance refers only to the slaying of the eagle. Aeschylus here seems to be the first to make Heracles release Prometheus from his chains (cf. Conacher, p. 19). 9. Achilles is the
married

son

to whom

Thetis

gave

birth

when she married

the

mortal

Peleus. Had
son.

she

Zeus,
of

the son

destined to be
examples

stronger

than his

father

would

have been

Zeus'

10. For these two

am

indebted to Rebecca
attributes"

Comay

and

Sam Ajzenstat

respectively.

Because
metheus

the dynamic reciprocity between guile and

exclusive claims on the as

force,

the fact that "neither Zeus nor Pro that

an allegorical

has

two

does

not prove

interpretation

is misguided,
11

Conacher
is

argues

(p. 41). Conacher is surely right to

resist the reduction of so

play to allegory alone, but there is an important allegorical dimension to it. in more specific ways: "Prometheus is bound for and with his own device, the yoke; he is the victim of his own disposition; punished for having taught the healing art to men he is himself sick of a rebellious hatred for the (Barbara Hughes Fowler, "The
subtle and complex a
.

The

irony

reinforced

gods."

Imagery
183).

of

the 'Prometheus

Bound,'"

American Journal of Philology, 78

[1957]

173-84

12. Cf. Blumenberg: "Where

technical skill and his capacity

eventually after all This cycle, too, is seen in the perspective of an organic background metaphor: Fire has its vegetative periodicity, its world seasons. How impressive is the idea of fire's self-creation is shown (p. 300). by the worldwide distribution of cults of fire 13. Some 64 lines of Prometheus Unbound remain in fragments, from which one can see that
renewal"

it

would

[humanity] needs and uses fire, where he attributes part of his to it, there arises, as with other things, the suspicion that have to use itself up, become weaker, degenerate, and require renewal.
for
culture

its

subject was

the

freeing of Prometheus by
certainty

Heracles.
of

Firebearer,

not even the complete

its

Virtually nothing remains of Prometheus the having existed, although not many critics seri

ously doubt this.

Freedom
The possibility

and

Constraints in Prometheus Bound

1 35

of a reconciliation of

the dichotomies may explain the

prominence of medical

imagery, for Greek

medicine was often conceived

"limit,"

in terms

of reconciliation

of opposites

(see

Fowler). Related to this is the theme of which is pointed out by Hogan (p. 276). 14. hekon hekon hemarton. Grene's "I knew when I softens it too much. 15. Plato, Phaedrus, 255a-e; Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 8.4.1 157a6-16. The symmetry is
transgressed"

not surprising.
mutual utility. ship.

For the

unerotic

For the less

sober

Aristotle, eros is an inferior species of friendship, based only on Plato, on the other hand, eros is the most potent form of friend
the only divine terms.
"revere,"

16. Since
her

Aphrodite, in her epithet Cypris, is

used

name

among the

various

terms

for

love that have been

shall use name

(eroti,

at

591

functions
is

as a simple noun rather

than the name of a god),

synecdochally for the

obsession with

whole range of

17.

Prometheus'

humanity
"be in

called sebei

(544),

translated

above as

but
the

having
heart,

"worship"

connotations as

strong

as

awe of and

18. In the

wake of the more recent anatomical misconception which ascribes this

function to
the liver

some modem versions of

the story (such as

Shelley's)

make the

heart

rather than

the object of the eagle's feast.

Prometheus Unbound (fragment 193 [Nauck], line 10) the eagle present passage could be made consistent with that by taking panemeros (1024) in the sense of "all instead of but the fragment survives only in a (possibly unreliable) Latin translation in Cicero. Whether the fragment is accurate or not, Aes

According

Aeschylus'

to

comes

only every third day. The

day"

"daily,"

chylus'

audience would at this point

us

probably

assume

the ritual to be a
as

daily

one, since

Hesiod tells

that

"by
day"

night the

liver

grew as much again

everyway

the

long

winged

bird devoured in the Hephaestos famed

whole

(Theogony

523-25).

19. Cf. the

"Homeric"

Hymn to Hephaestus: "Sing, dwell in

caves

clear-voiced

Muse,

of

for inventions. With bright-eyed Athene he taught

people who

people glorious crafts

throughout the world,

now

before

used to

in the

mountains

like

wild

beasts. But

that

they have
own

learned

crafts

through Hephaestos the famed worker, easily

they live

a peaceful

life in their

houses the

Be gracious, Hephaestos, and grant me success and (Evelyn-White translation, slightly modified). Also cf. Plato's Statesman 274c: We "fire by Prometheus, the arts by Hephaestos and his co-artisan
whole year round.
[Athena]."

prosperity"

were given

20. In

a variant of

Hesiod's version, Zeus buries Typho

under mount

Aetna instead

of

throwing

him into Tartarus.

Virtue

and

Knowledge: On Plato's Protagoras

Joseph
The

Cropsey
of Chicago

University

Given the dialectical surprising that

character of

the Platonic writings

individually, it is

not of

the Platonic corpus as a whole consists as

largely

as

it does

engagements with one or another alternative to the understandings of

Plato/

Socrates. It belongs to the

elements

genius of

Plato that he

constructed a universe out of

a

that exist in

a condition of mutual

(dialectical) tension, in
of

tacit,

however

limited,

concession to

the cosmology

Stress.

Expecting

always the

triumphant
never so

Socratic finale, even if in the form of aporia and achieved through many baited deferences, we come nevertheless to appreciate the seri
Plato
scanned the world of available wisdom, and the care

ousness with which

that

he took to draw from Parmenides, for example, what that thinker kept in reserve against a rigid theory of Ideas, and from Protagoras, that chanticleer
sophist, the
wisdom that might

lie in his

version of

the adage Virtue is Knowl

edge.

Plato's sifting of Protagoras runs through Protagoras and Theaetetus, the former dialogue addressing the climactic question of the coming to be of good among men, the latter the companion question, What is knowledge. If is knowledge, as Socrates must forever insist, then why is virtue not transmissible just as knowledge is transmissible in the act of teaching? And if
and evil virtue virtue cannot which

be

"taught,"

somehow

what

becomes

of

the

moral

pedagogy

the best

political constitution stands or

men

falls? Protagoras

on the

by bringing
into the "a

of good

among

(if

not

by teaching,

then

how?) is

a spacious portal

Platonic
friend,"

edifice.
made

The dialogue is
a chance

to begin with an encounter between

Socrates'

Socrates

and

which

meeting that occasions he has just departed. Since the dialogue

"now"

recounting

discussion from

itself, i.e.,

that very
some

discussion,
else

ended with Socrates remarking that

he is already late for

business

volunteering to repeat the entire proceedings makes it as clear to us as it needs to be that, if he had indeed any affairs elsewhere, they must have been the opposite of pressing. His approach to Pro
tagoras had been at the instance of another, but the to have been more entirely his
own.

where, the fact that he is

impulse to leave him

seems

We may

speculate that at the time when

forthcoming

This essay was prepared book on Plato.

with

the generous

help

of the

Earhart Foundation,

and

is

part of a

interpretation, Winter

1991-92, Vol. 19, No. 2

138

Interpretation
with

Socrates terminated it

the

fabrication

of another

demand
or

on

his attention,

the conversation had been squeezed

dry

of

further benefit

interest.

because

As Socrates tells the story, he goes to Protagoras, who is visiting Athens, a self-centered young bumbler named Hippocrates wishes to attach
as a pupil and considers that an

himself to Protagoras
would

introduction

by

Socrates

be helpful in gaining him admission to the Protagorean circle. With a patience that thrives best in fiction, Socrates allows himself to be awakened by Hippocrates
around
all

so

long

in

advance of

the bed in

order

to

find

dawn that the young man has to feel his way place to seat himself. Declaring to Socrates, of

people, that Protagoras

was

the only wise man, and that

he, Hippocrates,

aspired to

be

wise

in the

same

mode, he

gives

Socrates
that

an

inquiry
without

into the mercenary

ways of

the sophists. Of course

opening for some he cannot do this The

revelation

referring to the sophists as such and

would end can on

by

name.

to

Hippocrates that he
a

blush

his face that

by standing before the Greeks as a sophist raises be seen by the light of the barely breaking dawn.

More
youth

passes as

to the

spiritual perils of

The

wind of

Protagoras, Socrates alerting the himself to poorly understood mentors. trusting blow disparagement continues to against the sophists as the two
they
make

their way toward

reach

the door of Callias's

house,
for the

where

Protagoras is lodging. Their knock is deprivation in

no

answered

by

an emasculated servant whose

expression of

his

contempt

sophists

he takes Socrates

and

way inhibits the Hippocrates to

be.

Apparently, and as will soon be confirmed when the conversation develops indoors, contempt for the sophists is rife in Greece; and as we have seen at the door, it extends to the lowest of the low. That Protagoras acquired the subtitle
"Sophists: dication did
Accusatory"

is understandable, ultimately misleading though that in

wonder

will prove

to be. We may well

not engender a not

better

opinion of themselves

why those virtuosi of rhetoric in the world; whether their

obloquy is
for

the unavoidable fate of those

whose concern

for the truth

But it
would

of their

arguments seems subordinated to cleverness or advantage.

us to reserve

be

well as

judgment

on the

sophists, for

as will soon perhaps

appear,

so

far

Protagoras is

representative of them while

being

the

best among them,

their principles do not seem outrageous or absurd.

to Callias's house, Socrates and Hippocrates come Protagoras in ambulatory discourse followed by a coterie telling of acolytes who form up behind him in twin columns, part before him as he reverses direction, and fall in astern once more, ears straining. The sophists Hippias and Prodicus are described in their respective peculiar postures, en
gained access

Having

upon a

scene:

lightening
Plato
will

sundry

adherents.

If there is anything

serious about the

sophists,

introduce it

gradually.

Now it is time for Socrates to proceed with the introduction of the hopeful Hippocrates to Protagoras. Since it is the purpose of Hippocrates to advance

Virtue
himself in Athenian life
latter is hear do
grateful

and

Knowledge: On Plato's Protagoras

139

for

Socrates'

by deploying what he will delicacy in leaving it

in
private or

leam from Protagoras, the up to him whether he will

company:

Hippocrates'

application

before the
of a

local

citizenries

not always

take

kindly

to the

interference

foreigner

who claims a power alert

to teach their young the arts of ambition.

Evidently, Protagoras is

to the

danger

justly
In the

appearing to corrupt the young, even if the appearance attaches un to an effort to improve them. It is out of vanity, Socrates suspects, that
of now prefers

Protagoras

that the proceedings go on before the whole

company.

course of

declaring

his

preference

for

an

open

interview, Protagoras
they
comprise an
men of

makes an

important

observation on

the

history
include

of

the sophists:

ancient esoteric order whose members

some of and

the most
more

famous
all

Greece: All but

poets,

seers,

athletes,

musicians,
and

many

of

them

teachers. Homer and Hesiod

themselves,

Simonides,

were of

the number.
of

sought to conceal their sophistry.

could not conceal their purpose

They

hoodwinked the vulgar,

powerful classes.

course,

from the

He, Protagoras,

alone proclaims superior

his sophistry from the housetops, not claiming for himself any honesty but doing so out of unwillingness to bear the humiliation of

being

caught

in it

deception he knows is bound to fail. This important in the

admitted calcula principle

tion deserves the reader's respectful attention; the that underlies

will will

"consequentialist"

play

an

part

moral

doctrine that Socrates

later develop.
suspect practice and

What
sophist,

is it that Protagoras
men"

confesses

to perpetrating as a
entire

in

which

Nothing

less than

by "educating

he

indirection implicates the

(Protagoras 317B). Because it is
gain?

brotherhood?
philan

Why

does this

thropic impulse

generate universal revulsion?

a private usurpation

of a public prerogative? and

Because it is done for

posed of

persuasively that men are en dowed but not sufficiently endowed with the arts of sociality, in which they do indeed need further cultivation. He charges no fixed fee for his instruction but
will argue

communicating in what follows. Protagoras

a profane sorcery?

Every

one of

Because it is artful, using these possibilities is dis

permits

his

pupils

to pay him

whatever

they declare

on oath not get

to be the value to the benefit of the

them of his teaching. (And why should sophistry

distinction

of

the

teaching

art and

the moneymaking art?)

Finally, Protagoras

has exactly renounced secrecy what he is. We know where our

certain,
at

and

displayed himself before the Greeks for

to

sympathies are supposed ground.

lie, but
the

we are

less
the

the moment,
would

of

their

Socrates

like Protagoras to tell Hippocrates do for him. The

general answer now

what

association

latter is seeking him. Socrates wonders how. Protagoras

would

is that it

would

improve

(perhaps
who

one should no

distinguishes himself from the herd

the
usual arts

of

sophists,

do

say again) better than purvey

while

arithmetic,

astronomy, geometry,
and

music
most

he teaches
speech
men

how best to
and

manage one's

household
the city:

how to be

effective, in
and

deed, in

the

affairs of

in brief, "the

political

art,

making

140
good

Interpretation
citizens"

(Socrates'

formulation, 319A).
not

To this

claim

Socrates

enters a

famous demurrer:
when

virtue

is

teachable. He has seen on many

occasions

that,

the issue is a technical one, the knowledge

which

of trained experts

is

respected

in the Assembly, learned

an art.

defers to

skilful people who can

be trusted to have

In

matters which

recognized art

in

calling for political judgment, however, there is no a man can become an acknowledged expert through

technical

without which can

training, i.e., through undergoing a course of formal instruction, he is unqualified to pronounce or advise. In principle, anyone
in the
affairs of

be

wise

the

city.

It is

judgment is something like

possessed without presided over supported

a natural
and

being
a

acquired;

if Socrates is saying that political gift, had by some and not by others, a in it would be a transaction
as
"training"

by

fraud

and practiced on

the dim. The likelihood of this those

most gifted with

is

by

the manifest

inability

of even

political

judgment,
dearest to

or other

virtues, to impart their endowment to the

realm as

ones nearest and

them. This is as true in the private

was unable either

in the

public.

Within the

home,
matter moral

Pericles

himself to teach

or even to

find

another who
most.

could teach the goodness

he

valued most

to the beings he cherished

The

is simply
character,

not subject to pedagogy. and

Plainly

stated, this

argument

traces

judgment

as

well, to

a source

that is not man, perhaps

nature,
patient
will

perhaps something else, but in any event a power that conveys gifts to humanity. It is to this position that Protagoras must address himself. He

do

so through one of
at

Plato's

magnificent reconstructions of

Protagorean

doctrine, beginning
Protagoras's
the

320C (another is in Theaetetus 165E-168C).

be
guided

response will

by

Socrates'

unspoken premise of

antipaideutic

his immediate understanding that etiology of virtue is the propo containing

or perhaps ruled understands this

sition

that the universe is of a certain

kind,

made or

by

What-Endows. We know that Protagoras his

because he be

gins with

lengthy
was a

statement with a zoogonic myth that traces us all, and there

the status of our virtues, back to the gods.

There The

time, he says,

when gods were

but the

mortal and

kind

was not.

gods made the animals and then charged

Prometheus

Epimetheus,

the

prospective and the

retrospective, to

assign

them their powers. Epimetheus dis

of

tributes the powers so that each kind will possess means

against annihilation
sation"

by its

natural predators.

"Balance"

(epanison)

preserving itself or "compen

is the

principle at work.

Unity
to
shape

permeates and supervenes over aggres

sive multiplicity.

Epimetheus

seems

have

stumbled on a

the One

and

the

Many

in the

of

the animal

working model of kingdom. It was left to

somehow over on their

Prometheus to

see to

the needs

of

man,

whom

Epimetheus had

looked. Prometheus
the arts
whom

provides

for

mankind

by

stealing,

behalf, fire

and of

from the gods, who apparently would not willingly they had washed their hands from the beginning.
the way, are

succor

mankind,

Who, by
Gods they

Epimetheus

and

Prometheus,

retrospect and prospect?

are

not;

godlike powers

they

seem to

be. Whose

backward-looking

Virtue
and

and

Knowledge: On Plato's Protagoras

141

forward-looking

powers are

they

then

if

not mans

himself? In the fable

that Plato's Protagoras is spinning, Epimetheus is man's

self and

looking

around

him

observing the manner of the coming to be and passing away of the

living

that comprises a bestial cycle

things, the compensatory balance of consumption and being consumed from which forethought alone can liberate him.
gods will not

What the

bestow

on

him to this

end

he

will rape

them of, and

must

he

will never cease to consider own

how far in this

world

his wellbeing

be his

farseeing

care.

Protagoras
the art and

now speaks of man as obtained

fire

sharing in the divine, referring of from heaven through a force and fraud; and
reverent of

course to

by

virtue

of this participation altars

he became

his

own close

kin aloft, setting up

without

to them and making icons of them. We observe that

arts the

the contra

band

human beings

would

have been both

unable

to honor the mean

and myopic

Olympians

with works of art and also unmoved to

do so,

since

the

possession of arts encourages

introspective

man

to see a god.

As Plato fashions
the great sophist

this skillful projection of

to

Protagoras,

the persistent

tendency

of

link

humanity

to

divinity

through techne becomes clearer, and

if

we

bear in

mind

that in the background of the discussion

is

the ever-present

issue

of teach

ability, more exactly the

teachability

of

virtue,

we can envision an

important

victory for Protagoras if he can produce the lence and teachable art-qua-excellence. His pedagogy

concurrence of divinity-qua-excelwould

then pass

divinity

from

man

to man, perfecting the philanthropy of Prometheus.

continues.

Protagoras
and and

For

all

his

art and

worship,
not

dangerous life. His he found that his

men

predators were
preservation

the

beasts,
on

solitary his fellow human beings,

man still

lived

depended

fellow
been

in

order to

deal

with

the brutes. the

losing

the war

(polemos)
new

with

joining together with his According to Protagoras, men had beasts because humanity lacked "the
his
war."

political

art, a

part of which

is (the

art

of)

Now the remedy

novel

of association

for defense
replaced

produced a

disorder: in their

proximity, the humans

the beasts as the source of danger to

mutual

life,
men

threatened to dissolve in

injury

because

and the primitive society lacked the "political

art."

Plato
The
of

will not

imply

any

criticism of

Protagoras

as

being

inconsistent in saying is in the

spirit

that the

political art

is

at the same time the art of war and the ground of peace.
political condition

assimilation of

the warmaking art to the

Socrates'

own

thought as set forth at the

beginning

of the

Timaeus

where

he

calls

for

an account of which

the exploits of the best city in

its

most characteristic without

activity,

is

war

in

speech and

deed. That

peace

is impossible

politics and politics

is impossible
to Socrates.

without war seems to

have been

as evident

to

Protagoras

as

it

was

To

avert the self-destruction of our with the

kind, Zeus

consents

to share

political

wisdom

human beings. On
would

what

terms? Hermes

is to convey to

all

men,

not

to some few who

be the

experts or artisans of political

art, the

justice

and conscientiousness

that are at the core of the political art. The words

142

Interpretation
dike
and

used are

eousness
shame or

and the

latter

aidos, the former with its accompanying meaning of right a complex amalgam of respect and susceptibility to

Protagoras does
those

disgrace. Everyone, in principle, participates in the political virtues; seems to envision a democratic foundation for human existence. He he formula for prescribing a regime as best or most immediately makes provision for the capital punishment of
into
a of

not make this and

natural,

who are

for

us

to see

sharing in the decencies of common life. It is easy that if Protagoras had devised a god who had endowed all men

incapable

with equal political virtue sophist would virtue.

for the

sake of

human

preservation
as a

in society, the

have left little

enough

for himself to do

teacher of political

Conversely,
the

the justification of a pedagogy in political virtue

god

inevitably
in is
myth

implicates
a

dispensing

in the

gross

imperfection

of

the human kind

which such a

large

residue of room

for

correction persists.

Protagoras 's

standing demonstration that the image of a god who is chary of sharing with mankind his wisdom of good and evil is available outside the limits of
revelation.

Protagoras
will

considers

himself to have his

explained

listen to

anyone regardless of

profession

why the assembled citizens if he discourses sensibly on

matters governed
ence of cities

(politikes aretes) (323A1): the very exist by testifies to the distribution of the social disposition among men,
political virtue

in

effect

to the

(almost)
us,

universal presence of

it in the human kind. The

be least

observ

able practice of mankind

is

an

index to

profound truth. proves to a

at as obvious

It is

obvious to

and

it

immediately

to

Protagoras,
need a

that in making this argument

self out of an

honest

occupation as a

step away from arguing him teacher of political virtue. Who would
has
gone

he is

human
no

provider where a

divine

one

before?

Again,

Protagoras

takes his

blame

demonstration from the common practice of mankind. Whereas we one for his ugliness or deformity, because these are seen to be truly
we

involuntary,
self,
tion
and

blame injustice because it

not

we attribute

it to

the malefactor

him

and we punish

to

retribute

it

upon

the guilty but to deter a

with

repeti

to deter
a

is to train. As
acquired

we are all

imbued

sociality,
this

so we all
myth need

know it to be
do to
purge

thing

by

learning. All that the

reader of

it

of gross contradiction

is to

eliminate a supposition
or

that the imbu

ing

is the

effect of the action of

any teacher

imbuer

who

is

not

human. We

are all sociable

because
others.

we all

teach one another sociability. Of course, some

of virtue might

do it better than
notion that
will

The very best teacher

man what

be

struck

by

the

he does for
go so

nothing

else

in the

cosmos

does. Protagoras making

in fact

far

as

to claim to

be, himself,

the best

of all men at

others noble and good

(328B).

claims to have shown Socrates how it comes about that the Athe in assembly listen willingly to any man of any occupation if he address them on civic matters in a sensible way, and Protagoras can claim to have done
nians so

Protagoras

through an argument that turns on the

teachability

of virtue.

Abandoning

Virtue
myth which

and

Knowledge: On Plato's Protagoras

Socrates'

143
point,

for

straight speech

(logos), he
have

will

turn

next

to

second

is that the

good men

so much

trouble and so little success when

they

seek means

to

have their very

own sons made

virtuous, a fact that Socrates

adduces as evidence whole weight of a youngster

virtues.

that virtue cannot be taught. Protagoras insists that the

comprises an

the human environment

from the

beginning

of

his life,

forming

unremitting pressure on him in the mold of the

His parents, his teachers of music and of gymnastic, and eventually the city itself through its laws, all are ceaselessly prompting him to virtue through out his entire life, by coercion where admonition and persuasion fail. Pro
tagoras

why the relentless moral pressure of hu manity upon itself can fail. Men, whose lives should follow the paradigm of virtue everywhere recommended to them, behave instead according to a model

does

not neglect to consider

of their
cause prove

very

own

(326D1). What

could explain this willfulness?

The

same not our

that explains why a master

flautist's son, taught

element of natural

to be

a master

flautist: the

his father, need aptitude. As it were,

by

greater or

tion and

by nature, but virtue itself is by instruc habituation. This foreshadowing of Aristotle is presented by Pro
less inclination to
virtue

is

tagoras in the

medium of rational

discourse
the

rather than
when

myth,

as

he has de
account

clared,
of the

and we see

the sign of that transition

and cultivation of

he

renders

his final

distribution

civil virtues

in the language

of natural gods.

aptitude where

previously he had
that

spoken

in terms

of endowment

by

We
the

must remind ourselves

it

was out of a similar

premise, namely, that

perhaps

virtues are ours

by

reason of an endowment of some

origin,

nature,

that Socrates appeared to argue to their

incommunicability by

teaching. To this

point, the issue between Socrates

two agreeing that

and

the great sophist appears to

what

be this: the
a

it is hard to know

makes, or how to make,

human

being

good,

and

agreeing further that the

aptitude

for

virtue

is

largely by
they

"en
It in

dowment,"

which of them makes

virtues are not

the stronger argument

the one

who main

tains that the

might

teachable or the one who argues that

are?

be
part

well

to recall that this

Socrates'

long

exposition

by

Protagoras
what

was prompted

large

by

requiring Protagoras to say in

are

"makes

better."

men

We

in

a position to

formulate his

response thus:

way his instruction Pro

his young pupils more sociable, to foster whatever natu ral inclination they have toward justice and the other virtues that make a man a good associate in the city. In brief, Protagoras makes, or at least aims to make,
tagoras helps to make
of

young

men good

citizens, even if

ambitious ones.

By

the

end of

his life, in the

Socrates'

doings

as a whole will appear

to his fellow citizens as a career of

making the young into bad or honorable light,

so much
abuse shed upon

skeptical citizens.

The

sophist appears

him

by Plato, being
do

of one whose concern

it is to

civilize

the human animal, that amazing

with so much a

in

need of

his fellows if he is to live

can

capacity for good fruitful life and so

and

evil,

prone to

them if

he believes he
these truths,

so with

impunity. Not for

a single moment

unmindful of

nor

inclined to dispute them, Socrates looks

so

far

144

Interpretation
could appear

beyond them that he The

to neglect and in the end despise them, and

propounder of the true and good city.

this notwithstanding that he is made the

engagement

between the

sophist and the philosopher gives us an occasion

must choose

for wondering between being

Now

whether

in

mocked as a

country like Athens the philosopher fantast or reviled as a felon.

rejoinder.

(328D)

Socrates begins his

of speech

Politely

Protagoras's flow

to a book in

its deafness

and muteness of

but pointedly likening in regard to

the

questions, Socrates

makes an

issue,

and not

for the last time,

difference

between the

presentation of argument

in

sustained speech and

the exchange of

questions and answers

be inferred from
to

what

succinctly put. His reason for introducing this issue must follows, for no reason is given. Socrates declares himself
those various virtues to
referred one single

need clarification on one small point alone: are all

which

Protagoras had

rather parts of some one single

many names, or are they thing? However the question will be pursued, its
with

thing

bearing

on

the disjunction

of

long

speeches

and

short answers

seems

clear

enough: this matter should

tagoras's

have been taken up and disposed of early in Pro if it had been, the discourse would have taken a differ ent, better direction. Reasoning and speech should not be allowed to proceed without continuous confirmation of the steps being taken, one by one, lest the

discourse,

and

whole

inquiry

prove

in

need of redoing.

If this

explains

the

introduction less to

by

Socrates
cate that

of what

looks like

a cavil about

methods, then

it

serves

protect

him from the blame he

the

would

deserve

as a petulant quibbler and more to

indi

crucial

raised

everything Protagoras had maintained stands or falls by the answer to question, namely, Is virtue one or many, which would have been near the outset if there had been an opportunity to raise it.
maintains

In response, Protagoras

that the virtues are parts of virtue, as the

assimilation of admission

facial features
that there

are parts of

the face. Socrates presses toward the

the virtues to one another. To make his point, Socrates extracts the

thing as justice itself, holiness (hosiotes) itself, etcetera, and that, for example, justice is itself just. We would be easier in our minds if we could intervene at this point and ask how justice can be just without "participat
such a
ing"

is

in

some

entity

called

justice, i.e.,

ever

that might mean. We suspect

ent, would have sensed

would

Socrates'

in itself, what that Plato's Parmenides, if he had been pres injection of the Idea of Justice here and
without

"participating"

have

reminded

him

of certain

difficulties he

once experienced
"Idea"

when

called on to nides

precise when speaking of in an (Parme 13 IB); but Plato's Protagoras and presumably the real Protagoras is not oriented to the problems of the Ideas. Nor does he object when Socrates, taking high moral ground, asks, "Could holiness be not-just and therefore un
just?"

be

"participation"

(331 A),

"not-just"

without

that whenever

impossible for anything (for example a bird) to be Protagoras does balk, however, at the notion two things have anything in common they must have everything
as were

if it

being

"unjust."

in

common and

speak

goes so far as to say that it is like that (33 IE). Should he have taxed Socrates with same.

be the

He

not at all

just to

"injustice?"

Virtue
Socrates
purpose.
virtues moves
off on

and

Knowledge: On Plato's Protagoras

which will

145

another tack obtain

help

to reveal

his larger

Having

failed to

Protagoras's

agreement

to the unity of the

the unity of the virtues in Wisdom. His key is that to behave wrongly is to behave unwisely (332B). This granted, everything else falls into place: Since the violation of every virtue is a
will now argue

in Virtue, he

proposition

folly,

each

and all one

the virtues have one

all

and

the

same

single

opposite;

and

having
site,

but

opposite,
and

the virtues are united through that common oppo too itself has

which

is folly;
or,

folly

but

one all

opposite,

which would

be

called wisdom

as we now

see,

virtue. and

Thus,

the virtues have collapsed

united

into the

opposite of their
was of

opposite,

the virtues are

in Wisdom,

which

is

what

to

be demonstrated.
which

By
its

this conclusion, the virtues cannot be to form a whole, as the eyes,

are parts of a

"parts"

something in
and

they

participate peculiar

nose, mouth,

ears,

each with

function,

face. Of

course, Protagoras is

not

entirely

pleased.

Summarizing
almost

the state of the question

and wisdom are

(333B), Socrates
and

makes explicit

that
are

discretion (sophrosyne)

the same,

justice

and

holiness

(schedon)

the same. We have no clue to the reason for the

might

"almost,"

but

if

we must

devise one, it

develop

around the

thought that nothing can

disturb the

identity

of two virtues except

would want

their failure to share

to

fully

the same

opposite, namely, folly. We which, as between justice

pates

hesitate

at

length before

and

holiness, by failing

to contradict

deciding folly partici

sensitive argument

in it to does

whatever microscopic

degree. Unable to

resolve this
Socrates'

difficulty by
which

ourselves,
appear

we go on

to note the next step in

to bear somewhat on the vexing issue.

Socrates inquires

whether a man

moderation

acting unjustly is, in his injustice, being discreet, practicing a (sophrosyne). Protagoras says that he would be ashamed to agree to

that,
need

although the multitude

among

men

say it. Protagoras does

widespread

not

take advan

tage of this opportunity to point out how this

turpitude increases the

for

universal moral

instruction deplorable

of

the kind he provides, and

Socrates

sim

any belief of Pro in proceeding as he does: Mostly he wishes to try the argument; concomitantly, though, himself the ques tioner and his respondent will also be tried (333C). As it seems, the reader is ply
consents to take the
popular view rather than
purposes

tagoras's as his target. Socrates explains his

expected

to draw conclusions about Protagoras the

argument

and

Socrates

as well as about of clari

truth,

as

unfolds,

which

it

will now
for"

do in the direction

fying

the meaning of something

"good."

being
of

"good

as a preparation

for clarifying
with

the meaning of

The drift

the

developing

thought

is

uncovered when

Socrates

moves

rapidly (333D)

to connect acting

temperately (sophronein)
a

acting prudently (phronein)

who could
men?

and

practice of which a man might

advancing do well, which is because

thence to prudent

injustice, by
profiting.

the

locution for

Now
to

deny

that the good things are those that are profitable

prudent

(ophelima)
do
what

Ergo, it is

(i.e.,
what

right

prudence

is

virtue) to

is

profitable, because to do the profitable

good.

means

to obtain the things that are

exhibits an

Protagoras, seeing

he has been inveigled into granting,

146

Interpretation
in
which

irritability
siring
or

Socrates

perceives

dislike for further

questioning.

De

nevertheless
means

Protagoras
be for
called

to push on, he asks in a way meant to be mollifying whether by those profitable things things that are profitable to no one

things that

are profitable

in

no

way

at

all,

and whether things

like that

could

"good."

Lurking

in the

question

is the insinuated

answer

that virtues,
satisfac

example

intelligent

prevision of

the Promethean

kind,

might

bring

tions not comprehended in the pious dictum that virtue

picions

is its

own reward.

Sus

greatly aroused, Protagoras reacts with a speech long enough to leave no doubt that he has renounced the passivity of the mere respondent. He vents his view that is a complicated thing, different things are good for differ
"good"

ent

beings

under

different conditions,

and what

is

good

for this

part of man

may be bad for that, etcetera. Socrates confesses to having such a bad memory that he cannot remember what a paragraph is about by the time the speaker has
reached

the end
an

of

it. Answers

must

be

short.

Protagoras's
speech:

rejoinder

to this

absurdity is
to your
and who
Socrates'

implicit

application of

his offending

Short

speeches are

liking

and are good

you or

is to say,

for you; long ones or short ones may suit me better; I, what is good (presumably advantageous) frr me. recognizing the question of Instead, he lays it down that the
at all since
"good"

response shows no sign of

as

it is

buried in Protagoras's
will proceed an on

rejoinder.

conversation

his terms

or not

he has

no

aptitude

for

long

speeches

assertion

belied

cluding his Apology,

can

and soon

innumerable occasions, in to be belied in the present dialogue itself. What

conduct on

by his

the

reader conclude except

that, just
can

as

Protagoras had
and

implied,

men can

contend as their respective one

who

"goods"

conflict;

that when

they do

so, the

succeeds

in

facing

down his

opponent

will

prevail.

That insight,

which

draws

Socrates,
really
way, but

who

ought

only too widely distributed, informs the action of simply threatens to leave. He has an engagement anyhow and to go right now. (Not only does he not go, once he has got his
on a wisdom

as we all

know, he has

time to repeat the

whole affair verbatim

before

attending Auditors

to his urgent engagement.)

protest the

imminent
would

breakup
of

of

the meeting and take

sides.

Cal

lias,

their

host,

thinks it

be just if

each speaker spoke as on

he

wished.

Alcibiades favors

weighs

in, aggressively

course,

behalf

of

Socrates. Critias

cooperation over aggression.

Prodicus

contributes a paragraph of

hair

splitting and sententiousness. Others, unnamed, expose themselves by approv ing Prodicus. Hippias spreads himself through a farrago of ruminations on
nature and

convention, the
of

unmatched wisdom of

the present company, and

of

the

vulgarity

squabbling,

leading

through notable byways

orotundity

to a proposal that a chairman be appointed to moderate the proceedings.

plauded

Ap
Pro

by
to

all, the suggestion is vetoed

by Socrates,

who

does

not want

tagoras regulated
superior sition of

by

someone
entire

inferior

to that sage and cannot

imagine
in

anyone

him. The

scene,

which emphasizes

the irenic but

blurry

dispo

the sophists, must

have brought

enjoyment to

many

places

educated

Virtue
Greece
eminent
parties of

and

Knowledge: On Plato's Protagoras

147

Plato's day. More, though, than a witty pastiche of the foibles of sophists, it illustrates the limits of mutual accommodation where, the
"good,"

differing

over

clash

consequently

over what

is

good

for

each

respectively.

Agreement is indeed reached, but it largely favors the crates: over Protagoras's great misliking, they will proceed
question and

preference of

So

by

the method of

answer, but

taking turns, Protagoras

which

Socrates

will put the

questions, to
to his

be first to ask, and then Protagoras is bound to answer briefly.

to

Protagoras's

proemium

long

section of

the dialogue

which at

questioning (338E) marks the beginning of a first sight appears to lead the discussion in

vagrant

directions. The
then

sophist announces skillful

that, in his view,

about

the greatest part of

a man's education

is to be

(deinon)

poems,

or poetry.

If this is to

be

believed,

pretation of

Protagoras's teaching of goodness proceeds through the inter poetic texts like the one in which he hopes now to enmesh So
a piece

crates, namely,

by

Simonides
of

with which

Socrates

proves

to be famil

iar,

perhaps to the

disappointment
good.

that it is hard to become

Protagoras. Protagoras quotes, in effect, Then he quotes Simonides, again in effect, as

saying double

that Pittacus was wrong when

negative puts

he declared that it is hard to be

position of good.

good.

The

Simonides in the it is
not

hard to become
over

good and

hard to be

maintaining both that it is Protagoras prepares to gloat

Socrates from

whom

he has just
After

extracted praise

for the

poem so marred

by

manifest contradiction.

a certain amount of and

home the difference between

vance
of goodness:

being

business, Socrates drives becoming, in general and in its rele

first to the consistency of the poem and then in its bearing on the matter it is the becoming good that is hard, not the being. By this point, it has been made clear to us that the introduction by Protagoras of the poetic
not constitute a simple

theme did the

derailment
although

of

the dialogue qua

inquiry

into least
ob

goodness of place:

the human
the

beings,
or

it is true that

a shift of emphasis

has taken for the

teaching

making
of

good of or

the human beings has at

good.

moment given

way to their

being

becoming

Whether the

vious relation of

between the

difficulty

making

someone good and the

difficulty

becoming

good will emerge we cannot yet

was

sault on

apparently mindful enough of Socrates through the medium

foresee. In any case, Protagoras the central issue when he projected his as
of

poetry,

although

he

seems

to have

underestimated not anticipate

his interlocutor's
had

education

in the
would

epic

the ease
poet

with which not

Socrates

literature. He surely did humiliate his hermeneutic by

proving that the

crates of

in fact

contradicted

himself.

Protagoras is far from ready to

admit

defeat. Now

(340E) he

accuses

So

making things worse than ever when he denies that it is exceedingly hard to be virtuous. Socrates turns to Prodicus, the accomplished microscopist
of

meanings, to

confirm

that

"hard,"

in the dialect
against

of

Simonides,
was

"bad."

meant

Thus the true

complaint of good was

Simonides

Pittacus

that

Pittacus, in
bad. This

saying that to be

hard,

meant

in fact that to be

good was

148

Interpretation
repulsive sentiment

profoundly

is

saved

from

absolute of

obloquy

by

our recollec

tion that good, at

advantage or

"good

least in the understanding Thus to be virtuous or

for."

Socrates,

runs

together with

good might

being

"good"

brought losses
might

and

pain,

which are not good

arguably be bad if for any human being

own

although reward

they

be

overborne

by

the virtue that

is its

incomparable
his
own with

(as Socrates is

obliged

to maintain

in the Republic). It

might go without

saying that Socrates is not disposed to advertise any

the odious
notion

association of

he has fobbed

off on

Pittacus, however
he himself
of

much

it

might reso

nate with the peculiar

"consequentialism"

Protagoras has his badness

own no-nonsense

way
said

of goodness: when what

Simonides
as

will eventually promote. clearing up the problem of the hard he meant hard, not bad. Far

from rejoining that

by

agreeing

with

Simonides'

quoting

bad, Socrates soothes Protagoras a joke, and supporting him by him, calling "good is next verse, "Only god might have this that is, of
such,
bad"

is hard is,

privilege,"

possessing goodness. Granting that Simonides meant to depreciate the qualities of god, what
volunteers

was not a mischief-maker who was

his true intention? Socrates

the

to elucidate, and proceeds to do so in a speech that is many times

one of

longer than the

Protagoras's that had brought him to his feet in the

with

threat to leave. In passing, we wonder if his dedication to the method of crisp

exchanges

is

more a matter of tactics

circumstances than

fidelity

to some

profoundly held heuristic principle. We wonder, in other words, whether he reveals in his doing that what is truly good must chime with a (good) purpose,
or

be "good

for"

the one who

does

well.

We hesitate to draw

a general conclu

sion

that a good end

justifies

means of various

kinds, but

a situation seeks and

dominated

by

polemic,

such as

the present one in

overturn and

which

Protagoras

to outdo Si

monides, Simonides seeks to

Pittacus, Protagoras
Sparta is
said

Socrates

are

striving to
plausible

put one another

down,

to master everyone, is a

Socrates'

subject.

setting for thoughts about prevailing. lecture begins (342A) in a comic vein, and light-years from the Philosophy, he says, is most deeply and widely rooted in Crete and
where sophists are more plentiful

Lacedaemon,

than anywhere else. (This tram

pling the distinction between philosophy and sophistry can be taken as a sign that he is enjoying himself.) The cunning Dorians, jealous of the wisdom by
which

they

predominate

in Greece,

conceal their sapience

behind

facade

of

they decorate with a muscular stupidity widely imitated by dupes elsewhere who dress in the athletic Spartan fashion and sport the cauli
militarism

that

flower
their

ears

that advertise a vigorous regimen. The

see encroachment on

Spartans,

too successful in

duplicity,

sophists restrict

privacy because their city is overrun by foreign mimics. Laws are made to immigrant strangers and to inhibit the travel abroad of their own young.
at such a peak

the

of

their communion with their

Self-satisfaction is
education

that even women are puffed up about their

in Crete

and

Sparta,

and the

heights

of

philosophy

reached

in the

latter city may be discerned

by

anyone who converses with the simplest deni-

Virtue
zens and reflects on

and

Knowledge: On Plato's Protagoras

149

the

wisdom verbal

latent in

the sententiousness of their speech. In

Sparta it is known that

tan peasants fire off
military).

maxims

parsimony is the index of good education. Spar like shot from a sling (wrapping the terse in the
were

The

sages

of

Greece in

patent

laconizers

who

spoke

in

saws:

"Know

thyself."

"Nothing

excess."

And

so on. a

trudes itself that "Knowledge is

Virtue"

has

(The unsettling thought in certain punch to it.) Socrates at

an authentic

last heaves into

with

sight of the subject:

good,"

Pittacus,

sage, scored a hit

hard"

Simonides sang to make a name for himself by Pittacus: "Hard to be is wrong; "Becoming good is is overthrowing the line. How did Simonides argue for his purpose? To show this, Socrates
and
good"

his "Hard to be

composes a

discourse

addressed

by

Simonides to Pittacus (343E). Pittacus hav

ing said, it is hard to be good, Simonides objects: what is true is that it is hard to become good. It is hard but possible to become good; it is not hard but
impossible to be, i.e.,
say. remain

good, except for

support of your

god

as you

yourself,

Pittacus,
good)
compro

And, Pittacus,
his
virtue.

you

say in

belief (no

man can remain

that no
mise

man can withstand

overwhelming mishap that besets him to overwhelming mishap, properly applies,

and

Since

you speak of

you must

have in

mind those men to whom ceptional goodness

"overwhelming"

men of such ex

that if

they

are to change at all

their

being

over

whelmed means the alteration of their state

are

their change must be to bad.

balanced

on a

cusp

of

virtue,

they

can

only fall,

and

fall they

They inevitably

must.

What, Pittacus,

supports

is,

the good

man's

doing

any man in his goodness, such as it is? The answer is favored and well done, and a bad man is one whose
to

doing

is ill done. These

verses are so close

tautology

that

they demand
The
a good

to be

rescued

by
or

interpretation. What is this decisive

(mathesis). What studying the cure only
a
"well-doing"

"well-doing?"

answer

is

"learning"

(eupragia)
doctor
of could

makes

doctor?

Learning Arguing that

the
pertinent

of

the sick. And what would make a bad doctor?

doctor

who

is

a good

be

made a

bad doctor,
of

ill-doing

would as

be

some

kind

stripping away (sterethenai)

knowledge. Attractive
Socrates'

the surmise may be that this entire performance of

is nothing but a bravura travesty on the sophists performed in their garb, it is yet to be noted that he interjects in the course of his interpretation of the poem themes of his own that he undoubtedly adopts in his own name, such
as

this present one that

no one

goodness

is

knowledge,

one, that

does

evil willingly.

He brings the

rizing
where

Simonides'

intent: There is
possible.

good or

bad is indeed

no simply Then Socrates turns to

immediately following into order by summa remaining good, but becoming

and the
matter

a passage of

the

poem

he

must anatomize
wrote words

the text

delicately

in

order

to make it come right.

Simonides
who

that could be read either "I praise willingly everyone

or

does

wickedness"

no says

"I

praise everyone who

does

no wickedness will

ingly."

Socrates
no one

that the poet means the former:

wickedness willingly.

he

must mean

the

former,

because

does

The

poet writes that even the gods

150
do

Interpretation
fight
against
necessity.

not

We

are

expected,

perhaps

by

Simonides but
way to

certainly
their

by Socrates,
doings

to

conclude

that mortals must surely give

it,

and

wicked

are the sign of their subjection to

it. This

attribution of our

necessity offers us a balm for which we soon realize we might have to pay heavily: if our vice arises out of a necessity that could appear to exculpate, how can we explain our virtue without compromis
wickedness

to overwhelming

(only wickedness, not goodness is dictated by necessity!) or freedom? The difficulty seems to have occurred to Socrates; the ingenuity with which he addresses it can only be admired. He maintains (345E-346B) on ing
either reason

behalf

of

Simonides that

fine

and good man

(kalos kagathos),

thoroughly

decent man, will often contrive his own necessity. If his parents or his country happen to fail him, he will force himself (literally, necessitate himself) to praise and love his own. That is, the real harm they may have done him will not
constitute the
will
"necessity"

that would

form

"necessity"

an

would call

opposing freedom. Socrates

lead him into wickedness, but his decency that will lead him into goodness and that we Simonides knew that he had
necessity.1

gives an example:

often praised and eulogized some

We willingly but under that Simonides is for a deed is not presume he proud of, i.e., apologizing autocompointing to the necessity that is exogenous, rather than illustrating the pulsion of a decent man requiring himself to swallow his resentment of injury
tyrant
not

done him

his nearest, The wrong that we do

by

and replace

it

with praise and

love.

we

do

out of

necessity, never willingly;

but

much

that

presents

itself in

such a

way that we might excuse ourselves

sity is
that

not of

the overwhelming kind but

is

rather opposable

by by

calling it
a

neces

"necessity"

we can generate out of our own

decency. This

preserves the power of

necessity, but

is necessity irresistible and when resistible? Is it a matter of recognition, of knowledge: there is a simply irresistible necessity and it be hooves us to acknowledge it? behavior toward the tyrants shows us
when
Simonides'

wherein

this truism is problematic, for it was not

literally

impossible for him to

defy

the

him to

tyrants, to blame and not eulogize them. It would have been easy for do so. What would have been anything but easy would have been the
Has Socrates
necessity,
not

consequences.

led

us

to the conclusion that we denominate an

outer pressure a

and we accede to

it,

when we

foresee

and reject the

consequences of

cency when, or ceptable? What

resisting it, while even because, the

must a

we necessitate ourselves

to resist an inde
well are ac

anticipated pains of

behaving

through the thickets of

being know then being and becoming good?

or

human

if he is to
Is it the

make

his way
How

absolute nature of

Necessity
much the
Socrates'

and

its modes;

the good or

bad

consequences of

his

actions?

Socratic formula

that

Knowledge is Virtue has been mocking demonstration

that

enriched through
of

exposition of the poem suggests to us that

was

his interpretation he

the ode the

considerably

more than a

can outdo

sophists at their own game.

To this point,

we

have been

presented with two accounts of man's ascent to

Virtue
or

and

Knowledge: On Plato's Protagoras

on

151

falling

away from

virtue.

One turns
his

knowledge
the other
of

and

is

exemplified

by

the

good

doctor's
and

mathesis and

forgetting;

turns,

to begin with, on
external and
which

volition

necessity, but the diremption

replaced

necessity between
men

internal lets necessity be

to say,

by

considerations of

consequences,

is

knowledge,

such as

it

is,

of the

future. What

do

"willingly"

they
the Prom
when

do

out of

that self-imposed necessity that is governed

by foresight,
Socrates

ethean excellence.

A listener

who

had been
at

present with

this

conversation took place and not

who

only

its

present repetition
and

(i.e.,

the reader

has already

read

to the

end of

the dialogue

is

now

reading it for the

this

second time) will know how well the rest of the discourse deduction from gloss on Simonides.
Socrates'

will agree with

Socrates further
about

would

like to

resume the exchange with

Protagoras, but

without

use of

texts,

even poetic

ones, for it is impossible to

question

them
will

their

meaning,2

as to which the
people would and

hermeneuts, inevitably differing,

rely
on their own minds and speech.

argue endlessly.

Serious

powers,

preferring to test the truth

themselves in direct exchange of

The
not

reader of such words must pause to wonder whether the author of them

is

admonishing him to put down the book he is holding in his hands out instead some companionable interlocutors with whom, testing

and

to seek

one another

and the truth about the being and becoming of good, he might profit more than by continuing to speculate on the inscrutable intention of his present author. Something, perhaps our waking to the difference between the attributive

speaker of

those

words and

the

ostensive recorder of

them in writing,

keeps

us

at our reading.

At worst,

we will

have been induced to think.

resigns

Protagoras, importuned by
the
a

all,

himself reluctantly to him

so

a resumption of

questioning (348C). Socrates

egotist could miss

opens

by flattering

fulsomely

that

only
these
that

desperate

the odor of sarcasm. Then the still

lingering
are

question:

wisdom, temperance, courage,

justice, piety (hosiotes)

distinct

five

words

for

one

thing,

or

is there

some

being

with

its

own power

underlies each of these words and

distinguishes them

all

from

each other?

You,
in the

Protagoras,
sense that

answered

that the virtues differ from one another, the

being

parts

the

parts of

face

are parts of a whole which none of continues

them resem
virtues are

bles. Do
parts of

you still

think

so?

Protagoras

to

believe that the

rest

virtue, but he

singles out courage

from the

because

people

lacking
the

the other
reason

four

virtues are often

very

courageous.

If

we are

in doubt

about

for resurrecting this

question after

torily
push

to rest

long before,
an

our uncertainties

it had apparently been put satisfac will now be removed. Socrates will
the virtues

forward from the

the

earlier unification of of

by

their reduction to
a question that

knowledge to
agitates

intimation

the nature of that

"Protagorean"

knowledge

Theaetetus,

that other
accomplished

dialogue,

as well as

the pre

sent one.

By

the time Socrates has

integrated the discussion

human
condition.

of virtue and

his purpose, Plato will have its teachability into his conception of the

152

Interpretation
of

The thread

the argument that begins

other virtues

(349D)

with

Protagoras's distinguish
and all

ing

courage

from

is

as

follows. Virtue

good things and

belong

to the possessors of knowledge.

distinct from the merely rash, possess a in fact a skill or art. If the courageous are
wise are courageous. virtuous

its parts are very The courageous, as knowledge (e.g., horsemanship) that is
wise and et

the rash are mad, then the

Protagoras
at their

objects

(350C

seq.) that the knowledgeable

semblables

being

better

function than their ignorant Other be in

does

not

translate into the

identity
souls,
which

of wisdom and virtue:

causes are at work. men

He
the

declares that courage,

good

the virtue proper, comes to

whereas

by

nature and

nurturing

of

out of art

(techne,

is

its inferior facsimile, rashness, comes to be knowledge) or anger or frenzy. To this apt recita
makes answer

tion of the sophist's paideutic creed Socrates

subject.

by

changing the
and not pain

What is

well"

"living

(eu zen) if

not

fully?

Causing

Protagoras to

react against occasion

the

living pleasantly implication that pleasure is the

good, Plato gives himself the

of

to elaborate the

far-reaching
pleasant

hedonism is
good.

Socrates,

which

starts

with

the

innocuous thought that is better than

Even
a

so modest a proposition as

that pleasure

pain would serve as

beginning. That
Socrates'

hedonism is

not of

the garden variety

is indicated

by

his

opening it supreme in governing

anger, pleasure, pain,

question

to Protagoras (352A): How is it with you about

actions or

knowledge? Is

and often

by

is it, as most people think, pushed aside fear? Protagoras is for the hegemony be
meant

by
of

reason, enabling Socrates then to

overcome

ask what could

yet

by
so?

anyone's

being

by

pleasure.

Reason rules,

it does

not.

How

would admit
wicked.

that people sometimes seek pleasure in acts that

wickedness?

Well, everyone they know to be Also,

it
what

Wherein lies the

Not in the

pleasure of

the act but in the

ill is

of

its consequences,

which

ill

always comes

down to

pain.

ap

pears

to us now as painful, like exertion or surgery, is good in the event,

which

pleasant.

Nothing

is wrong

with pleasure except

that or

when

produces a

pain greater

than itself. Socrates apologizes

for

being

at such

length

over what

look like banalities, but when he says that his entire demonstration turns on this point (354E), we do well to take him at his word. In fact, the structure of the
argument as a whole

is now virtually in place. Knowledge is indeed decisive for good, for living well, for justly
we cannot

living by

truth that

escape, namely, that

living

Why

not agree with are

Protagoras,
in

so

far

as what

pleasantly is sweet and good. he means is that our natural

But
what

inclinations
crucial

the

soil

which our virtues grow. of

precisely is the
present

knowledge? It is the knowledge

the relative quantities of the

pleasures and pains against the quantities of might our of

future

pains and pleasures that

be their

respective consequences.
us

The

sovereign

doing

well, for
of

human beings the

amounts

salvation of

knowledge, the basis for life, is the art of measure,

of
commensura-

measurement,

comparing
et seq.).

the

art or

knowledge

tion

(metrike; 356D

Virtue
Socrates
says

and

Knowledge: On Plato's Protagoras

will consider

-153

(357B)
For

that

they
of

and so one must.

the present,

tion about the overwhelming

this art or science another time; Socrates is willing to settle the earlier ques knowledge by pleasure by remarking that it is

indeed
over

"ignorance,"

the defect of

knowledge,

that

leads do

men

into

evil:

They

fail

to commensurate the present and the future.

They

not

willingly

choose evil

virtue,

they unwittingly
under

choose the
of

lesser

pleasure or the greater pain. and

They

do this

the

influence
it

false

opinion

being

deceived

(ep-

seusthai)) about very important things. To

man were not

seek evil and avoid good

would, if a

deluded,
can

be

as

seems

to contravene human nature (358C-D).

Now Socrates

begin his

exploitation of the point made

part of

by

Protagoras
can

long

ago, the assertion that courage, a distinguishable

when all

virtue,

be

present

the others are absent

with the

thought that in turn grew out

Socrates'

of

fascination from

understand the

unity dialogue as

or

a whole

multiplicity of virtue. It will help if we make explicit the chain

us

greatly to
view

of reasonings

beginning

to end, not only for the obvious reason but more with a

to

seeing the
and

work as an example of successful

human prevision, the

preparation

setting in place of elements conducing in their order to a culmination fore seen from afar. This might exemplify the only envisioning of future in which a

human

being

can

have

perfect confidence.

It happens to be

future, in fact

the

only future, that he alone controls. Socrates brings up fear (phobos) and dread (deos): It is anticipation of bad or evil (kakos). Will anyone voluntarily pursue the dreadful, which is the same as the evil? What about the man who possesses courage, which Protagoras long
ago said

is

a virtue

distinguishable from the

others and capable of

being

present

where all

the others are absent? The brave man could not possibly seek evil,

i.e.,

the

anticipated

are alike

dreadful, for he is a man of virtue. While coward and brave in facing what they can, it happens, as Protagoras points out, that the
and the
an evil. not

brave face death in battle

premise

is that death is

cowardly do not. Protagoras's unspoken Socrates would be caught if it were true that a
or

virtuous man
evil. war

knowingly,
saves

deluded

impressed "the

by false
(kalon).

opinion,

sought

Socrates

himself

by introducing

noble"

Facing

death in

is noble, thus good, thus wittingly choiceworthy. Though the courageous and the cowardly may both know fear, the brave fears virtuously and the cow ard basely. According to conclusions reached earlier, this means that the cou
rageous

fears

knowingly

and

the coward ignorantly.

Knowingly

and

ignorantly

Of the truly dreadful. What has been proved is that courage, not un like but exactly like all the virtues, is wisdom. Protagoras resigns from the
of what?

discussion.

From the
absolutely
or

Socrates'

sidelines we notice

that

argument

depends

heavily

if

not

noble, clearly good, to outweigh death, clearly bad. Unwelcome thoughts disturb us. What if translates unclearly and the arguments that make death reputation perhaps not an evil civic into
on the power of the
"noble"

have

an origin

in the

good of

the

city?

How

much of an evil

is

bad

reputation

154

Interpretation
the good of
of
survival?

when measured against

The

art or science of comparative

us

quantities, the knowledge

tities to be
can at
compared can

commensuration, saves

only

when

the quan

be known. If the

commensuration of quantities

that

difficulties, how insuperable must those be when there is no way in the world to estimate that future which must be dis counted to the present if men are to commensurate present pleas
least be
guessed at poses
"knowingly"

ures and

future

measured against a
would rather

How is an earthly life of pleasure (very knowable) to be Dreadful Future, something that a truly courageous man die than confront, when that future is itself unknowable by us? If
pains.

it be
us

said that that

future is

not at all unknowable

by

us, it has been revealed to

by

the poets, Socrates

would

tell us to be reasonable, to think for ourselves

other

rather

than construe the poets or

writers,

whose works cannot

be

sub

jected to questioning and whose meaning will never come clear through inter pretation. If we discover some aspect of the future that must necessarily be forever dark
of the

to us, we

have in that
We have
universe. virtue as

act reached the outer

limit

of

morally

rele

vant commensuration.

reached the moral equivalent of

pi, the symbol

irrational in the
so

Just in passing,

we

may

note

that where some

thing
view

important to

the status of the deepest future must remain

uncertain

that

virtue

for us, the fact that belongs to the

virtue

is knowledge

confirms

Protagoras in his it is

class of

teachables but refutes his claim that

simply teachable. The science of

it ignores that its itself to the

seen

objects

is teachable, but it fails when include the incommensurable. Geometry reconciles

commensuration
sophists'

presence of

the irrational within

far

enough to

do

so.

Perhaps it is the

its boundaries; sophistry has not naive confidence in reason,

speech,

distinguishes them from the philosophers, whose claim is only to love wisdom, to prize the wisdom that sheds light on the limits of wisdom, and not to possess it, surely not to convey it on demand.
persuasion that

folly to conclude that if a transcendental basis for virtue not been certified by the universe, a valid immanent one is unavailable. If living and commodious living and the pursuit of wisdom in peace depend on the flourishing of cities, why disparage as merely conventional the orders and
would

It

be

supreme

has

rules that nourish the polities?

suration

And why

revolt against

the science of commen

because it teaches
noble

us not

everything, only
of

almost everything?

When

Socrates injects the

counterweight to the

into the

consideration of courage and makes

it

dreadfulness

the discussion

with

high-flying

death, he wisely refrains from perturbing reflections on the infusion of the rational uni
allows

verse with particles of

incommensurability. Rather, he

its full

weight

to
of

the system of rewards and punishments, of

scanning,

present and

future,

deeds
plain of

and

their stochastic consequences,

of what we might call

in the

end a com

rational

hedonism in the

service of goodness.

If it

serves

goodness, why

that it is hedonism? Is it thinkable that

Socrates

was a greater

benefactor
a

the city than the rationalist higher level of civility than the

who claimed to raise the one on which nature

human beings to

left them?

Virtue
The two interlocutors
positions, he

and

Knowledge: On Plato's Protagoras

Socrates
notes

-155

prepare to part.

the confusion of their

Protagoras

denying insisting that

is

that virtue is teachable but proving that it is

knowledge,

it is teachable but
to do

denying

that it is knowledge. Aporia

reigns and will continue

so unless we pursue our we

inquiry

to answer the

question,
of

what

virtue?

While

stumble,

we are victims of

the heedlessness

Epimetheus

who

left
I

us short of resources.

I,

says

etheus of the myth.

view

profit
when

by him, looking
I
am engaged and made

ahead

Socrates, prefer the Prom (promethoumenos) with a

weighed

to my whole
and

life

in these things. Has he

his

philosophizing
courage

his death

the choice of a courageous man? Is not

and spiritedness about our

the

characteristic philosophic

virtue,

the indispensable
on earth and

philosophic
wherever

temper, considering that something else, is and must necessarily be dark?

men exchange goodnatured

future,

The two

civilities,

and

Socrates departs

on the

wings of a small myth.

NOTES

1. Cf. the 2. A

place of

Simonides in Xenophon's On Tyranny.

repetition of

the well-known critique of writing in Phaedrus.

Politics

Poetry: Aristotle's Politics, Books VII and VIII

and

Michael Davis
Sarah Lawrence College

There is customarily something odd about the constitution df Aristotle's writings, the full fifth of the Nicomachean Ethics devoted to friendship (Books

VII1-IX), for
of
us

example, and the unaccountably long discussion of the elements language in the Poetics (Chapters 20-21). Book VII of the Politics prepares for the importance of education to the best political regime. Still, we do not
the extended treatment
not on of music and of

expect

is

reason, but it is

the surface

poetry in Book VIII. As it obvious.

usual

there

Book VII begins

with

the

following

claim:

Concerning
appropriate

the

inquiry

best regime, it is necessary for him who intends to make the first to determine what is the life most to be chosen. For

while

this is unclear, the best regime is also necessarily unclear. For it is appropriate that those governing themselves
what exists

(being

governed

politeuomenous) best
arista prattein),

(arista)

given

does

not

for them, fare best (do the best things happen contrary to reason. (1323al4-19)

if something

On the

surface of

it

all

looks

fairly
life,

straightforward.

Since the best

regime

is for

the sake
without

the best way of

what

determining

claim reveals a problem.

possibly know what regime is best life is best. However Aristotle's way of making the If politeuomenous is in the middle voice it means
one cannot

something like governing themselves; if passive, it means being governed. There is a related ambiguity in the expression arista prattein which can be
rendered as either
well means

faring

best
with

or

to be satisfied

acting best one's life; to do

with

doing
good

the

best things. To fare

mean

things need not

what one

that

at all.

Governing

oneself well

has to do
of

knowing

is doing;

being

governed well

implies nothing

the

sort.

I first

am grateful to
version of

the Earhart Foundation for a grant for the summer of

was written.

1986, during

which

the

this essay

interpretation,

Winter 1991-92, Vol. 19, No. 2

158
If

Interpretation
we glance

back

at the structure of

Books

I- VI of

the Politics this ambi

guity becomes

clearer.

Books I-III
The best

culminate regime

in the

account of all encompass

ing kingship,
wisest

pambasileia.

is the

rule of

the best. Rule

by

the

is clearly best insofar as it results in each citizen doing what is best for himself and for the whole city. Such a ruler, says Aristotle, is like the father of
a

family. However, precisely for this

pambasileus

reason such rule

is

not

really
well

political.

The

rules; the citizens are ruled. But the middle sense of the verb
not

politeuomai

has disappeared. To do the best things is

to the status of a permanent child.

to fare

if

one

is

thereby
their

reduced

Books

IV- VI

thus have as

underlying

theme the tension between freedom and order. The

governs the

following

question can

therefore

final two books

of

the Politics: To what extent

faring

best be
all,"

reconciled with

Aristotle first
chosen

asks

"what life

doing the best things? (bios) is so to speak (hos

much of what what

epein)

most

to

be

by living (zoe)
speak."

and then

indicates that

he

will

say

about

the best

has already been said in (exoterikoi logoi). Aristotle's "so to The task is to
at use what

he

calls

here his be

external speeches

speak"

might well said about

rendered

"so

as

to

has been

living

which

look

things

from

without

in

order

to give
not

an account
"living"

(zoe) in which is
but

speeches adequate
so as

to our experience

from

within.

The

goal

is

only

living

to

This interpretation of Aristotle's living, or life intent admittedly involves translating what are obviously secondary meanings as though they were primary. The justice of this exigetical zeal is supported by the argument which follows, however. If there are three sorts of beings, those external, those in the body and those
speak-self-conscious

(bios).1

in the soul, it is clear that all three are required for faring well (1323a23ff.). No matter how wealthy or attractive, a person in constant fear of death would live an unenviable life. Accordingly, courage is one of the goods of the soul with
out which

nothing

else can

be

altogether good.

The

virtues are

necessary

condi

tions for getting and

ute to

keeping

those external goods which are thought to contrib

happiness

and so are good

in the

sense of

being

useful

(chresimon).

This

external account

"through

deeds"

(dia
to
a

ton ergon)
end.

virtues are good makes them seem means

further

according to which Aristotle now intro

External

duces

a second

argument rooted not

in deeds

(erga) but in logos.

things are good only insofar as

some soul.

The

sign of

this

they are good for something ultimately for is that they have limits. There is no such thing as
good, but there is certainly such a thing as the useful is therefore limited by that for which it

too

much

internal

satisfaction with a

too much

food. The

good as

is

useful.

Only
And

that which is good for its own sake is without limit. Such a

good

is

not useful

but kalon

beautiful

or noble.

It is internal

goods which are

unlimited.

yet
as we will

generally it is clear,
others with respect

assert, that the best disposition

of each

thing

toward

to preeminence follows the

difference

which

it has

received

from the things

of which we assert

these themselves to be the

dispositions. So that

Politics
if the
soul

and

Poetry

159

is

more

honorable than both

possession and

body, both simply

and to

us, the best disposition of each is necessarily analogous to these. Further, these things by nature are chosen for the sake of the soul, and all those who think well
ought

to choose them, but not

soul

for the

sake of them. (1323bl3

21)

Now, if the body is

soul,
and

to the soul the

as

the goods of the

body

are to

the goods of the

if the

goods of

goods of the soul are

soul

is

not a

tool and

tools, necessarily limited, while the unlimited, then it follows that the soul is unlimited. The so has no function external to itself. It cannot be under
are,
as what

body

directed toward anything outside itself. This seems to be tle means by calling its goods kalon. But is this the human soul?
stood as

Aristo

Virtue
sense of

was

first

understood to

be

good

in the

sense of

useful, then in the

whom

kalon. Aristotle

now cites as an example

the god for

there is no

necessity and so no external goods whatsoever, and who is therefore happy and blessed "himself on account of A god, for whom there is no distinc
himself."

tion between the good

as useful and

the

kalon, is

never an

instrument. Aristotle
us." us"

had

claimed that the soul was more honorable "both

must mean
good

"to

soul."

Soul

serves

both

as subject

"To simply and to that for whom things

are

and as object

that which is good. To the extent that these two are

identical,
extent will

the good as useful will

what

be the

same as

the good as kalon. But to the

will

that

is

good

for

soul

is external, the two

as means

be

good

for

something.

Human beings differ from

gods

be different, and soul insofar as for us

which are

virtue must

be

understood as

double,

to external goods

then

in turn necessary for internal

on

satisfaction.

Virtue is

a composition of

the kalon

the one

hand,

and

the

chresimon

(or,

when understood

in the

proper

way,

the agathon) on the

other.

The

virtuous man

is the kalos k'agathos. This dou

the purpose or end of the
while at

bleness is

signaled

by

the

city itself in

which men are

regime; it is for the

sake of their

happiness,

their

faring best,

the same

time,
end one.

functions in the city, they are the means to that as tools they do the best things. In the best regime these two must be The activity which preserves the city must somehow be that for which the
as citizens who perform preserved.

city is

This is

of course easier

to say than to do.

II

If the happiness
relation

virtuous citizen

is

an

instrument, his
of the

of the city is between the happiness

as a whole.

purpose is something like the Aristotle is therefore forced to ask what the

individual

and

the happiness of the city

as a whole.

He

seems

to finesse the issue.

Whether the

same

happiness

must

be

asserted to

be both
say. posit

of each single
even

human

being

and of the

all would agree

city or not the same remains to that it is the same. For whoever

But

this is apparent. For

living

well

in

wealth

160

Interpretation
one

concerning
the
most

person, these

will also call

the whole

city blessed if it be wealthy,

would assert

and whoever

especially honor men to be the happiest. And if

the tyrannical

life,

these

the

someone allows

the one man

city ruling [to be happy]

to

on account of virtue,

he

will also assert

the more

excellent

(spoudaioterari) city

be the

most

happy.

(1324a5-13)
on what

All,
in

of

course, do not agree

think good

is

good

what

they

for themselves is

also good

for the city; they rather agree that for the city. What is the case
even

all cities

is that something is honored. But is

not the same as

this

is

not to overcome

the

tension between the happiness of the individual and that of the city.
wealth as good

To

pursue

to

wish

to be honored for

one's wealth.

Only
that

the latter
such a

requires a

city in

which wealth

is

celebrated.

But to the

extent

city

pursues wealth

itself, its
A
citizen

citizens

may have to

subordinate understand

their own

pursuit of wealth and so sacrifice their own good as alism can

they

it. Imperi

ship to the navy and be honored for doing something kalon, where the kalon has to do with supporting the city's overall purpose, its pursuit of wealth. But he would be in fact sacri be
expensive.

might

donate

ficing
good

his

own wealth.

Even

when

the city and

man are understood

to have a

in common, it is
real

therefore not self-evident that the two goods will not

conflict.

The

issue, however, is

not the pursuit of wealth

but

philosophy.

The life

of contemplation seems to stand as the model

for the inner life

par excellence

the

life virtually independent because it requires so little from without. Conse quently Aristotle says two inquiries must be made: (1) whether the life most to be
chosen

is

political or

that of a stranger

released

(apolelumenos) from

the

political

community

and

(2)

what regime all or

is best

regardless of whether

life in

the political community

question as

is best for

following

from

what we

only for some. He justifies the second have intentionally chosen (proeiremetha)
,

i.e.,
thing

political

thought and
or active

contemplation.

He

then specifies that the alternative

to the political external,

life is the life

released

(apoleleumenos) from every

to

such as a contemplative are

life

which some assert

be the only
(pro-

philosophic

life. These

the two ways of

life

intentionally

chosen

airoumenoi)

by

those most ambitious with regard to virtue. We need to notice

stipulated

in passing that Aristotle has political hybrid of the two If

political virtue

his

own

intentional

choice as a sort of

philosophy.

name of which

it is instrumental instrumental

is instrumental virtue, the danger is that the city in the will also come to be understood as instrumen
virtue exerts

tal. The

man with

himself solely for the

sake of what

is

the city, it understanding will define itself by its ability to extend its rule over others; the city will be come the imperialistic city, the city at war. Aristotle's examples suggest that
external to same of virtue guides

him. When the

this is the truth of all actual cities. The

stood

doubleness

of virtue can

then be under

according to the

following

proportion:

the internal

: external :: philosoph

ical

: political :: nonimperialistic :

imperialistic. As the best city

must combine

Politics
two sorts
of

and

Poetry

-161

virtue, the internal

and

external, it looks as though it has to

com

bine
city

elements of this proportion which are not

needs political virtue

obviously

compatible.

The best differ

but

must

be

nonimperialistic.

Put

somewhat

ently, its

citizens must practice political

virtue, but it

must

itself be

modeled on

philosophy.

Just

as the

city devoted to

wealth need not contain

modeled on

though it
altogether

would

philosophy be hard for it to

of the

need not contain

any

philosophers.

wealthy men, the city In fact it looks as

themselves
serves as

contain useful parts which were whole.

independent

larger

Nevertheless philosophy

the model for what Aristotle calls autotelic action:

But it is
consider,

not

necessary that the

that

active

[life] be in

relation

to others, as some

nor

thinking

alone

to be active which comes to be from acting for the

sake of the things which will

result, but much more contemplations

ends within themselves

thoughts

(dianoeseis)

which

have their

(theorias) and (autoteleis) and are

for

the sake of themselves. (1325bl7 22)

The

contemplative

life is

not passive

but

active

in the highest
characterized

sense.

Its

action mo
self-

is

not

externally directed, however; it is instead

by

internal
life

tion.

The city based

on

it

will therefore

be

active and at

the same time

contained.

Accordingly, Aristotle likens

these

two, the

contemplative

and

the best city, to the cosmos; all three are kalon. Needless to say, just as it is

hard to

place the autotelic contemplative within the autotelic

city, it is hard to

understand either of them

possible

in

their relation to the autotelic cosmos. How

is it

for

a whole

to be

made

fect

wholes

in their

own right?

up of parts which are at the same time per Aristotle's response to this question begins

to emerge in his treatment of the parts of the best regime in the remainder of

Book VII.

Ill

The best
to

regime

confront certain necessities of nature.

may be autotelic, but, as the regime of a city, it would have It would have to be situated in a place, have
And
a certain number of citizens each of a particular

have
age,

a certain size and

sex and character.

of course

there are tasks that

have to be

performed acknowl

edges that the

for any city to survive, and yet more for it to survive well. Aristotle best regime must have equipment (1325b29) which,
not a product of would

as

equip it
to

ment, is

the regime but

what

must

be

present

by

hypothesis. It is

"what The

for,"

one

pray

is

external

to the regime and makes

possible. number of parts of

the city without

which

it

cannot exist are related

the number of necessary tasks (erga). Aristotle mentions six such tasks: suste nance, arts for the production of

tools,

arms

for both internal

order and external

162

Interpretation
wealth,
and care

defense,
tageous

for the divine looks

as

and

judgment

with regard
will

to the advan

the just. It

though the parts of the city

follow

accord

ingly: fanners, artisans, soldiers, the rich, priests and Aristotle excludes artisans from citizenship on the grounds that their way of life is incompatible with virtue, which is after all the goal of the regime

deliberators. Instead

only excludes farmers on the grounds that their lives lack the leisure necessary for citizenship but indicates that what we pray for is that they will be slaves (1330a26-27). The remaining four tasks are in fact
(1328b25ff). And he
not

fulfilled
own
are

by

the same people, albeit at different times of their

lives. Those

who

property are citizens. When young they are soldiers, in middle age they deliberators, and as old men priests. Throughout the Politics, but especially in Books IV- VI, the most difficult problem has been what to do with the lower
solves the problem by praying absolutely necessary to the polis because they produce its sustenance and its tools, who make its life possible, have been transformed into tools. The demos seems to be the limit on the combination of virtue as
men

class, the demos. Here in Book VII Aristotle

them away. Those

means with virtue as end

in itself. Good farmers don't

problematic

make good men.

Aristotle,

of

course, knows how

this all is. When he suggests

admits

that freedom be held

out as a reward

for

slaves

(1330a30ff), he tacitly
argued to

that these cannot be the same as the slaves

nature.

he previously
and so

be

so

by

However, slavery for any but

to require
either unjust

these is unjust, and so the

best

regime

would seem

slavery,

imperfection in its delibera

in its
citizen

tive element, or an ineducable

generally.

demos,

and so

ignobility

body

Aristotle's

"solution"

here is obviously

no solution at all.

The demos

represents an

insurmountable

obstacle

to the coincidence of virtue as an end

address

with virtue as means.

those features of

But abolishing it in speech allows Aristotle to political life in which such a coincidence is possible. does the best
regime require? can

What

sort of citizen

People

who rule

them

selves cannot

ingly
spirit

be too malleable, but neither Aristotle describes their natures as the

(thumos). The
polis as we goes on

they be too

stubborn.

Accord free

proper mix of

thinking
have

and art with

have

seen

is

a combination of order and men

dom. Aristotle then

thumos in relation to

to

say that in Europe

an excess of

"the in

race of

thought, while in Asia the disproportion is reversed. But the Greeks, just as it is in the middle with respect to places, so it
....

participates

in both
is

and

the tribes of

Greeks
a

also

have the

same
soul

difference
an

relation

to one

another"

(1327b29-34). Thus in terms

difference in
Locate
a

inter
map,

nal

difference

explained

of geography.

city

on the

and you can read off

what more

the

character of

its

citizen

body.

Later,

and perhaps some

plausibly, he does something

old are

similar

in terms

of age

(1329a 15- 16,

1332b36-39). The What

all of

by

nature more suitable to rule clearer when

must

than the young.

this means

becomes

cal characteristics of
need external

the best city. It

and

Aristotle discusses the physi be both near the sea, since it does
since

trade,

away from the. sea,

it is to be to the

greatest

Politics
extent possible autotelic.

and

Poetry

163

This double demand

will

be physically

satisfied

by

establishing a port area separated off from the city proper (1327a30-39). Later Aristotle does something similar with respect to ownership of the land (1330a9-20). Reflecting the split between the whole and its parts, Aristotle divides the land first into
mon part

a common part and

a part which

privately

owned parts.

The

com

is then divided into

the public

treats the city's needs as a

services to the gods are used

whole

i.e.,

the

part concerned with

which serves

meeting needs of needs insofar as they

and a part

by

citizens

i.e., providing for

common messes.

Each privately

owned part

severally is then also

divided in two, with a part near the center of the city and a part on the periph ery. The goal is to make each citizen reproduce in himself the external differ
ences

whole.

in the city which might lead to differing assessments of the good of the Everyone is simultaneously from upstate and downstate. Perhaps most revealing is Aristotle's description of where the city should be
purposes of

located. For

health
will

and

defense, it is
on

to

be

on a slope.

The loca
and

tions of fortified places

vary

oligarchy
and

fortify

height

an

depending acropolis democracy

the regime.

Monarchy

aristocracy has a number of strong places. clear: You need them. While there is something to the is more kalon to defend the city with men, a city with
to ignore them, but
when
a

occupies level places, As to walls, Aristotle is quite

oldfashioned view

that it

walls can always choose

city

without walls cannot

suddenly
of exit

choose to

have them
earlier

it is

outnumbered.

Walls

are

an

artifice

fulfilling

Aristotle's

"prayer"

that the city be located in

a place

He

adds that these walls

"must be

cared

easy for in order that

That

but difficult
with respect

of access.

to the city
and

they may hold suitably both in

relation

relation

to order (or ornament

walls are

kosmon)

in

war"

to the

needs of

(1331al2 14).
most

to be both

ornamen

tal and useful points to the

(diakosmeo

1331a23)

of

the

best

city.

striking thing about the physical ordering The houses given over to the gods and

those where the rulers

although

have

common meals are

highest

on

the slope of this city,

significantly
to

not on

the top. Their location

has

double justification. in
city"

It "is sufficiently
relation

conspicuous more

both in

relation

to the position of virtue and

fortified than the neighboring parts of the being (1331a28 31). Farther down the hill is what is called a free market, which is
artisans and

purged of all merchandise and purged as well of all the nonfree members of the

city dealt

farmers. It is

where

free

men

are at

leisure,

whereas

the

commercial market
with.

further down the

slope

is the

place where necessities are

Now this
corresponds

external arrangement of

things on a slope is
of

interesting

because it

perfectly to the internal

are

which

the higher things

adornments.

taneously

a city in hierarchy higher and in which necessities are simul really Aristotle excludes the demos as most recalcitrant to this

the city itself. This is

sort of coincidence and then transforms the

accidental.

city into

a place where

It becomes

a poem

in

which

the parts seem at

first

as

nothing is haphazard as

164

Interpretation
fit
together

the events of real life but in the end

a

like

book. Aristotle has

made

city in
and on

which all

erty,

even

body
limits books

geography, age, place, prop for other things. To be sure, images really are their defining features as but have lost present, externality they the autotelic character of political life. They are like the bodies in

things external and

are

bodily

the walls of the city

Oedipus'

swollen

feet

or

Ahab's missing leg. As

all the

details

of

the

city That is,

are now

meaningful,

no private good or preference could of generalizable

be irrelevant.

when all

difference is

significance, the split

where

between contrary

the public and the private disappears. This city, to reason (paralogon

nothing

occurs

1323a 19),

where necessities are

ornaments, is the city

that one would pray for.

Now it is only in
not

a political order of

this sort that the distinction between the

good as useful and the good as

kalon

can

be

overcome.

only necessary for

symbolic of

the existence of the

city but
which

structured

If my ownership of land is in such a way that

a means walls

it is

the very

being

of the

city, then owning it is not only

to an end; it somehow embodies the end to

of

it is

a means.

When the

the city are not only necessary for protection but are also an

image

of

that

which

they

are

protecting, then

building
they

them
open

is

not

simply

a means

to an end
where

but

a celebration of the end

itself. When I

my

eyes and see not

only

things are, but in seeing

around me

where

are see also what

they

are, then the

objects

become
not

Aristotle is

only things utilized the first to have seen this

not

by

the city, but the

point.

city itself. In Plato's Laws the Athenian

be
admitted

Stranger

proposes

the

following

response to the poets who wish to

to the regime

being

founded:
we ourselves to the greatest extent possible are

Best

of

strangers,

the poets of a

tragedy
an

at once the most of the most

beautiful beautiful

and and

best. At least best life

all our regime

has

put together

imitation

which we

say really to be the truest

tragedy.

(817b)
in two ways; completely
The
as ends

The best
as means make

political order requires men

their virtue is

kalon,

it is

chresimon.

To

succeed

the

best

regime would

have to it

this double virtue one. The same activity would

some external or exoteric end. symbolic. exoteric

have

to

be both for itself

esoteric when

and

for

becomes
a

becomes
ingful Poetics

The best

regime therefore must

be

poem, making

mean

what

is dictated

sophic than

(1451b5-ll) history, he

by necessity but is otherwise meaningless. When in the Aristotle remarks that poetry is something more philo
means of an

events, this is something

make

Only
only

generally significant in a regime which is like

that, while both seem to deal with particular illusion in poetry, the very being of which is to what is on the face of it particular and insignificant.
a poem can the

tension

between

the good of the

part and

the good of the whole be resolved. To the extent that it

is

possible not

to serve the whole but in the

will

very

same action to

serves, it

be

possible

for the

man who

embody the whole one does the best things to fare the best.

Politics

and

Poetry

165

By

articulating

what

is beautiful

or noble within

the sphere of the necessary,

poetry feature

is therefore the necessary of political life. Accordingly, Aristotle considers it in some detail in the final book of the Politics.
makes political possible.
education

life

Poetic

IV

By happy
life

arguing that the

conclusion

pursuit of the necessities of

life

can

in the best
seems

regime

be

made coincident with

the pursuit of the

kalon, Book VII

to lead to the

that political virtue which is a means to

an end can

be

recon

ciled with that virtue which

and

is

an end

in itself in the

philosophical virtue.

The

good

the

means

to the good

life

consist

same activity.

Book VIII, less

on exoteric

sanguine, seems to argue that

political virtue.

esoteric philosophic virtue us

depends

If Book VII tells

that
us

building

the city's walls can

ing

for its

own

sake, Book VIII tells

that poetry and music

walls.

be satisfy cannot be under

were

stood other than as reflections on perfect poem, then

building

If the city itself

the

poetry

would not need

to be taught within the city.

The

argument about education concerns or of

first

of all whether

it is

education of

thinking
useful,
peritta).

character,

and

at virtue or at what

secondly whether it should be directed at the Aristotle calls here extraordinary or odd things (ta
to do with the useful, as Aristotle's subse

It looks
of

as though education of character means education to virtue.

Education

thinking clearly has

indicates. At ta

quent account

peritta we are

left to

wonder.

The

sequel makes

clear that while of course one

has to learn

certain

things for the sake of other the

things,
of

and so education will of

ultimate goal

necessity be to

some extent concerned with

useful, its

is

virtue understood as autotelic activity.

gives

On the level

the individual Aristotle

that activity the name schole, leisure. Educa

extent

tion to the useful

with the

is

permissible

only to the

that it is not at cross purposes

educated

says

primary goal of education, virtue. Hence the young are not to be in anything which will make them vulgar (banauson). Aristotle then that he means by a banausic or vulgar deed or art "whatever renders either
soul,
or

the

body,

thinking

of

the

free

useless

with respect

to the uses and

virtue"

actions of

(1337b8-12).2

to include the "free

sciences"

This warning against the useful goes so far as when they become too concerned with precision.

Leisure is to be the
the goal of the best

goal of education,
regime.

because virtuous, i.e., autotelic, action is Music, the model for such action, is good because he has in
mind are quite

it is

useless. examples

Aristotle's

of what

odd, however. He

quotes two passages

defending Odysseus who, disguised as a suitors and listening to a singer. Odysseus

to kill them. This
musical

from the Odyssey? In the first, the swineherd Eumaeus is beggar, is sitting at table with the
of course

is in the

midst of

activity

of

free

men at

leisure is in fact

planning disguise for

166

Interpretation
activity of a rather brutal kind. In the second quotation Odysseus He is at a banquet at the house of Alcinous in Phaeacia; the

utilitarian

himself

speaks.

song he praises, which has constituted their leisure, is an account of the Trojan War. Is that what leisure consists in, listening to songs about war? In both of
these instances leisure proves
parasitical upon which

lack

of

leisure. kalon

Contrary
lack
of

to

initial

appearances, it is
ascholia*

leisure,
from

schole,

is the

negation

of

leisure,
is
now

Music,
even

which was

introduced

as

free
in

and

and which

distinguished
what

political

activity,

requires epic

the

slavish and

ugly to be
mood

it is. This is

perhaps more manifest

poetry,

but, if Aristotle is
human is in the
soul

correct about the manner

about the

in

which musical mode can render

way

music provides a

direct

representation of what
representation

it

is

clear

that the

beauty

of a

musical

of, for example,

anger

would require

the existence of anger and so of things to get angry about. What

own sake seems always to consist

is done for its for the

in

a reflection on what

is done

sake of

something
and so

else.

The

reflection

only as a sort of (arista prattein),

supervention on action are

may be autotelic, but it exists which is heterotelic. Those fare best in leisure
reflect
un of

selfconsciously
adversity.

on

doing

apparently the best things (arista prattein) in the face

happy,

who

repeatedly takes the form of the question whether education in music requires that one learn to play an instrument. That is, is it important that one become an instrument for one's own leisure activity? On the In Book VII this
problem

hand, to play an instrument means to acknowledge necessity. On the other hand, something like acknowledging necessity is a condition for understanding
one

appreciating music. To ask how much asking how much one should acknowledge
and

one should
necessity.

play then amounts to In the midst of asking

this question Aristotle

introduces

a second

issue:

At the

same

time,

Archytus,
of

which

the things of

children should (dei) have some pastime, and the rattle of they give to children in order that, using it, they will break the household, [should] be considered to have come to be

none

beautifully. (1340b26-29)

This

rattle

(invented

by

philosopher) is

given

to

children so

they

won't

break

the things of the household. That

is,

music

keeps

us

from
The

breaking
sentence

home. It
revealing. consider

substitutes simulated motion

for

real motion.

up the itself is

The necessity for children to have some pastime and the necessity to this pastime to have come to be beautifully are expressed by one and

the same word, dei.

They

are quite

literally

the same necessity. It

is because

thinking

moving, while admittedly different, are governed by the same necessity that music and poetry can have such power. The education of Book VIII is double; it may either be directed toward the useful or the kalon, but,
and

like the
The

virtuous actions of power of music and

Book VII, it is
poetry,

nevertheless one education.

on which

the city

depends, is

their capacity

Politics
to appeal to men
stood as

and

Poetry

167

in

twofold

way.

Our

actions must
external

autotelic

and as

directed toward

goods.

simultaneously be under That the exoteric

admits of

being

read

Still,

there remains a

esoterically provides a problematic unity to this dyad. difficulty. Aristotle had begun Book VIII with the sugges
understandings of odd or

tion that there are three competing

the purpose of education;

virtue, the

useful and

ta peritta

the

is

used sparingly but in interesting ways Book II, once referring admiringly to the speeches of Socrates (1265a 12) and once not so admiringly to the way of life of Hippodamus, the first man to give
an account of

outstanding things. The expression in the Politics. It appears twice in

the best regime (1267b22). It comes up again in Book VIII in the

discussion young
on

of

how to

avoid

vulgarity in
at

education.

Aristotle indicates
then to be

that the

should not

toil too

long

those

works which are wondrous and out

standing

or odd

(ta thaumasia kai

peritta).

There

seem

connections

the one

banausic,

or

hand between philosophy and ta peritta vulgar, and ta peritta. Aristotle nudges
vulgar

and on us

the other between

to a conclusion
master

ing

that

it is

to master sciences completely as

it is to

by say instruments

and then

referring

us to the philosophers

for

which musical modes

have

which effects

precise speech (akribologia) about ( 1 34 1 b26ff) Philosophy is vulgar.

.

The best
citizen.
whole. virtue

political order can

is

one where

the good man is

happy

and

is

a good

He

fulfill his function

as part while

reaping his

satisfaction as a
means and accomplish

For that to be possible, the distinction between virtue as a as an end in itself must be slurred. Music, and finally poetry,

that end.

They

are also suited

to lots of

other

ends,

however,
they

and can corrupt as

easily There
of the

as educate.
would

Consequently
in
order

in the best

regime

need

to be regulated.

have to be (One

someone aware of

the symbolic import of the location

free

agora

for it is

not

to be relocated for apparently sensible and

utilitarian reasons.

might no

aware of

this

symbolism of

say the same of the Electoral College.) But to be longer to be enchanted by it in the same way.
notable

The last book

out

the Politics

is

for

VII

having described how the censors are by saying what the actions of the legislator
are actions which the

introduced censorship with to be educated. Aristotle began Book

having

must

be, but

never

does he The

indicate that these

education of the

legislator does for their

a reflection on

own sake.

legislators
and

would require

the connection be

tween the useful

the kalon which, in revealing the utility of the kalon

render

for

the city, would (to stretch a point)

it

ugly.

The

coincidence of

the autotelic and the useful, of the philosophic and the

of a myth.

political, in Book VII is therefore something

given

the prayerful disposal of the demos in the best regime. But there

We knew that already, is a third

peritta

sort of education mentioned

in Book VIII. Education directed toward ta

is

on

the surface of it akin to education directed at vulgar utility. At the same

as a reflection on

time,
useful

the relation between the useful and the

and autotelic and so

kalon, it is both
one

(necessary

for censorship)

in its way kalon. At

point

in Book VIII Aristotle

calls what

he is

doing

a prelude

to the tune (endo-

168
simos

Interpretation

1339al3)

of

the

speeches

that

will

follow. He thereby indicates the

coincidence of the useful and

"musical"

character of

his

own work.

The true

the kalon is

not a philosophical

politics, but perhaps

and

it is

political philosophy. same as

If the

relation

between the
the

useful

the kalon is the

the relation

between the
go a

external and

internal,

the exoteric and the esoteric, this would

mode of

long

way toward accounting for Aristotle's

writing in the Politics.

NOTES

1. See Politics 1253al5-16

and

my "Cannibalism

Nature,"

and

Metis, 4, No. 1 (1989),

perhaps what

33-

50. 2. It looks
the regime.
as though there

is

a suppressed standard of

utility here,

is

useful

for

3. With the
tions

exception of the quotation about the are

Cyclops in Book I,

all of

the previous quota

enough the

from Homer in the Politics here

are

from the Iliad, the

poem about war.

Predictably

from the Odyssey, the peace poem. 4. This may have something to do with the increased frequency with which Aristotle uses double negations to describe what he is doing in Book VIII, e.g. 1337b5, 16,20; 1339a27; 1340b22.
quotations

Misunderstanding
Philosophy:
An

and

Understanding

Hume's Moral

by

Essay on Hume's Place in Moral Philosophy, Nicholas Capaldi

Marie A. Martin
Clemson

University

As Socrates

pointed out

long

ago, people do

not seek

the truth if

they be

lieve that they already possess it. This insight of Socrates provides an answer to an important question regarding the moral sentiment theory of the Scottish

Moralists, for this theory seems to capture whatever insights are contained in Kantianism, Utilitarianism, Aristotelianism, or any of their various contempo
rary permutations,
with all versions of sentiment yet

it

avoids the

sorts

of problems question

commonly

associated

these theories.

Thus,

the

is, why is it

that moral

theory is

never considered a serious contender

in the contemporary
about moral

moral arena?

The

answer

has to do

with what philosophers

believe they know

what what

theory, which, in most cases, amounts to know about Hume's version of it. A good deal of
sentiment

they believe they

most philosophers
knows"

believe they know about indeed, what they believe "everyone Hume's moral theory is simply false. Thus, any attempts on the part of con temporary proponents of the moral sentiment theory to discuss or debate its
merits

become, instead,
"knows"

attempts are

to disabuse the audience of their various mis

conceptions about

it. Nor

these misconceptions minor. For example, any

one who

that Hume was some sort of emotivist, or that Hume thought

'ought'

that one cannot deduce an

from

'is,'

and

or

that Hume believed that

there is

'fact-value

gap,'

is in the grip

of misconceptions on the order

of, say,

"knowing"

that Plato

was a relativist or

that Kant was a consequentialist.

philosophers can

It

seems clear

that, before contemporary

be

persuaded

to

consider must

seriously whether or not moral sentiment theory might be true, they first be convinced that they do not really know much of what they thought
about moral sentiment

they knew

theory in

general or

Hume's theory in

particu

lar. It is, then, a delight to discover that someone has taken on this task. In his book, Hume's Place in Moral Philosophy? Nicholas Capaldi takes on the received
views, offering the
most systematic and

thorough critique of them to date. than criticize the received views of

Of course, Capaldi does much Hume's moral philosophy. He also

more

offers a

historically

and

contextually

sensi-

interpretation, Winter

1991-92, Vol. 19, No. 2

170
tive

Interpretation
analysis of all

the

major aspects of

Hume's

moral theory.

Capaldi begins

by

examining the views of

of moral

the central questions

Hume's predecessors, showing how they determined involved in the moral debate of Hume's time. He explains

Hume's theory
tion between
account of

judgment, emphasizing
theory Finally, he

the

importance

of

the distinc

moral

sentiments and moral

judgments. He

offers a

thoughtful

Hume's

much misunderstood

of moral obligation and examines

its

rela

tion to the moral debate of the time.

passions and explains

Hume's theory

of

the

of the self and

its importance both for understanding Hume's conception for understanding the development of his theory of sympathy
account

from the initial Treatise

to the final version found in the

Enquiry

Con

cerning the Principles of Morals. Yet, one thing that is evident throughout the discussion
aspects of

of each of

these

Hume's theory is that Capaldi is waging

of

a constant

battle

against
re

tenaciously
veals

persistent and pervasive misunderstandings of

Hume. What this

I

is that the Socratic task

must

exposing ignorance, if not first in

order of

the order of
shall con

importance,
centrate

be first in the
on

dialectic. For this

reason

primarily

this negative, Socratic aspect of Capaldi 's book.

HUME'S PHILOSOPHICAL PROJECT

Capaldi

makes clear

that the most

fundamental

problem with standard

inter

pretations of

philosophy is their lack of attention to context, or, as he calls it, their "textual and historical Given the evidence of blindness at every conceivable level, this is an apt description. What makes
moral
myopia."

Hume's

Capaldi's

critique so

devastating is

that it reveals just how profound the contex

tual myopia of Humean interpretation

most

has been. It
Hume's

shows

how

a number of

the

widely

accepted

interpretations

of

moral

theory ignore
of

the context

of paragraphs which

in

which passages

occur, ignore the context

the sections in
which

passages
was

occur, ignore the context of the historical debate to

contributing, ignore the context of Hume's overall moral theory, and, finally, ignore the context of Hume's general philosophical project. What makes Capaldi's own interpretation so powerful is his careful attention to all of
these contexts in his delineation of Hume's moral theory.

Hume

Nowhere is this
cial

more evident than

in the

care

adequate philosophical

framework for

interpreting
of

his

he takes in providing an moral views. This is cru

because the
views

major and most a

fundamental

source of misconceptions about

Hume's overall philosophical project. misunderstanding Since its inception in the nineteenth century, the most general framework for "rationalist-empiricist" distinction. interpreting Hume's thought has been the This is not a helpful distinction for understanding Hume's philosophical proj ect. First, it forces us to conceive of Hume's philosophical project as primarily
epistemological,
whereas

Hume's

is

Hume himself

conceived of

it

as

essentially

moral.

Misunderstanding
And,
second, it
was not

and

Understanding

Hume's Moral

Philosophy

1T1

obscures the crucial

fact that Hume's has

critique of philosophical

thought

directed merely
against

against what

now come of

to be identified as

rationalism, but

the traditional conception the

'empiricist'

the

nature of philosophical

thinking
Hume
result of

that

motivated

thought

of

Locke

and

Berkeley

as well.

was not an

empiricist, he

was a

skeptic;

and

his

skepticism was not a

'following

empiricist principles to their

logical

ticism

was

the result of

his

recognition of the

His skep incoherences inherent in the

conclusions.'

traditional perspective

of philosophical

thinking.
philo

Capaldi
sophical

provides a

far

superior

framework for understanding Hume's

of

project, viz., the framework

thinking. Capaldi

Hume's 'Copernican

Revolution.'

Hume's revolutionary
philosophical

move was to suggest a radical

calls

shift of perspective
Think'

in
the

this a shift between the T

philosophical

and

'We into

Do'

perspective.
modern

The traditional

perspective,

carried over
Think'

philosophy by Descartes, is, Capaldi points out, the T or "the perspective of the egocentric, outside, disengaged ob perspective, (p. 22). From this point of view, the task of philosophy is "to scrutinize
server"

our thought process could

in the hope

of

be

applied

to

directing
the

actions"

our

uncovering principles of rationality which (p. 23). The task of philosophy so

action,

conceived

is to test both thought

against

and

including

all social practices and

institutions,
thought.'

theoretical

standards

discovered

by

'philosophical did
not

Hume's

project was to show that this traditional perspective

and could not produce

any

coherent

standards, because reason,

conceived

in

this way,

was on

both

self-destructive and

inherently
Do'

incoherent.
perspective, which, Capaldi
as

Hume,

the other

hafid,

adopted

the 'We

says, "viewed human beings both a physical world and a

fundamentally
social world

as

agents,

doers, immersed in
agents"

along

with other

(p. 23).

Rather than testing all thought and action according to theoretical standards, Hume reversed the procedure by testing all theoretical principles by the stand
ards

implicit in

our

actual

thought and practice.

Even

some

of

the more
essential

thoughtful
move was

and context-sensitive of

interpreters have

missed

Hume's

here. For instance, Norman Kemp Smith realized that Hume's project not an irrationalist attack on reason per se, yet he mistakenly took Hume's
criticism of

fundamental logical But his

claim

the traditional conception of reason to be the psycho

that

we are

constitutionally incapable

of

conforming to the theo

retical standards of reason as while

traditionally

conceived.

criticism.

Hume certainly did believe this was true, it was not the basis of What Hume attempted to illustrate was that if we thoroughly and
standards produced once of all

consistently adhered to the "there would be an end at

speculation."2

by
as

the T

Think'

perspective,
the chief part of

action,

well as

Any

method

that is supposed to produce standards of thought and

consistently applied, undermines all thought and action is radically misconceived. Hume's psychological point is not the criticism, but
action, which,
when

rather, the

explanation of

why

proponents of

the traditional perspective,

in fact,

172
do

Interpretation from
a complete paralysis of
'Nature,'

not suffer

thought and action. The answer to

of psychological

this is
vents

psychological.

in the form
to

mechanisms,

pre

them

from
term

consistent

adherence

their own

theoretical

principles.

Hume's

suggestion

that we

be

on guard whenever there

is

"any

suspicion p.

that a
em

philosophical

is

idea"

employed without

meaning

or

(EHU,
has
so

22,

phasis

added),

reflects

his

recognition

that the

reasonings"

possession of metaphysical
maneuver

"jargon, (EHU, p. 21) is

which

long

taken

all

too often merely a

that allows philosophers to escape the consistent application and

of

in

evitable

implications

their

own

theoretical principles.
a more specific answer

Thus, Capaldi's framework

provides

to what is

wrong with attempts to understand Hume within the framework. To do so is to view Hume's philosophical project
move within
perspective.

'rationalist-empiricist'

as

simply

another

the T

Think'

perspective rather than as an utter rejection of

that

An

excellent

illustration

distorts Hume's thought its

claim

can

just how thoroughly this sort of error be found in Anglo-American Positivism. Despite
of

to Humean paternity, positivism was actually a perfect example of the

sort of philosophical perspective that

Hume

rejected.

The

essence of positivist

theory

ing,

which was used as a standard

theoretically derived theory of mean for testing all thought and action. What was
was a

for Hume simply a practical terms became, for positivists,

course.

method a

for clarifying suspicious philosophical standard for evaluating the meaning of all dis
moral, social, and political discourse to the
undermine

As

critics were soon

to point out, the positivist agenda, consistently

applied,

would not

noncognitive

only realm, but

relegate all would

totally

the very practice of science

in

whose name positivism was advanced.

But in

addition to

being

an example of

the sort of philosophical perspective

Hume himself rejected, positivism is also an example of how the misunder standing of Hume's philosophical project can lead to an almost perversely dis
torted conception of his moral theory.
major

Indeed,
project.

as

Capaldi

makes

clear, the two

prevailing

misconceptions of

Hume's

moral

thought are the

legacy
(1)

of

positivist misinterpretation of

Hume's

The

misconceptions are

that

Hume's theory is a form of subjectivism, and (2) that Hume believed that there is a fact-value gap, as is evidenced by his claim that an cannot be
'ought'

derived from

'is.'

an

shall examine each of

these in turn.

SUBJECTIVISM VS. INTERSUBJECTIVISM

The
sorts.

subjectivism attributed to

Hume is generally believed to be

that

one of two

(It is

even sometimes claimed

Hume, being

either confused or

incon

sistent, held

both.)

The first

sort

is emotivism, the

noncognitivist view that

moral pronouncements

simply

express the evaluator's

feelings

or sentiments. no such

Such

expressions are neither true nor

false and, thus, there is really

Misunderstanding
thing
as moral

and

Understanding Hume's

Moral

Philosophy

173

judgment

at all.

To say that something is

virtuous

is simply to

express one's positive attitude or sentiments toward

it.
moral pronounce

The

second sort of subjectivism

is less form

extreme.

It holds that

ments report are either

the
or

feelings

or attitudes of not a

the evaluator. Inasmuch as such reports

of

true

false, it is

noncognitivism, but it is still entirely

subjectivist evaluator. positive

in the

sense that all

that is

being

reported

is the feelings

of

the

On this view, to say that something is virtuous is to report one's feeling towards it. Capaldi traces the development of these readings of
great

Hume in generally

detail

and

carefully
only

examines the passages

in Hume

which are

claimed

to support such readings. What this reveals is that the small

not

est attention subjectivist readings.

to context

shows that these passages

do

not support the

against such

reading, but also

provides

overwhelming
can at

evidence

The early emotivists, Ayer

credit:

and

Stevenson,

least be

given this much

They
far

never attributed emotivism

to Hume. On the
out

other

hand, both

"inspiration"

claimed
went so as

from Hume, and Capaldi points to claim that "Hume has most nearly
nearly The implication is that Hume
most reached

that Stevenson even

asked the questions that

here

concern

us, and has

a conclusion
was

that the present

around

writer can

accept."3

groping

for the

emotivist solution and

confused, he

would

that, if he had merely been a bit more consistent or less have discovered it. But if one looks to the moral debate of
around

Hume's time,
and sentiment

debate revolving
articulated clear

the

moral egoism advanced and

by

Hobbes

Mandeville,

the moral rationalism of Clarke

Wollaston,
developed

and

the moral

theory first
part,

by Shaftesbury

and

and elaborated

by Hutcheson,
for the
most

it becomes

that the questions that concerned Hume were,

not even was

Stevenson. Hume
(how

remotely related to the questions that concerned interested in the nature of moral distinctions (what it is

that makes something virtuous or vicious), in the nature of moral apprehension

we come

to know such moral

we of

distinctions),
from

and

in the looks

nature of moral

motivation not

(how

distinguish
the

moral

nonmoral motivation).

These

were

the concerns

emotivists.

Furthermore, if
questions.

one

at

Hume's

actual

text, it is
close to

clear that

the answers he gives to his own questions are not at all

answers

Stevenson's

to

his

For Hume

not

only

makes con

tinual

reference

to moral judgments and clearly treats them as true or

moral

false, he
fact"

also refers or not

to specific

qualities,

and claims

that the question of whether

any given (EHU, p. 289). Although later Stevenson

object

has

such qualities concerns a

"plain

matter of

emotivists and

their critics

did

attribute emotivism

to

Hume,
the

attributed the second sort of subjectivism to

Hume. On this inter

pretation, Hume is supposedly claiming that

sentiments of

moral pronouncements report

the

evaluator. reference

Although this interpretation

to
moral

at

least

acknowledges
such

Hume's frequent
ments are true or

judgments

and

his
a

claims

that

judg

false, it

can

be

maintained

only

by

highly

selective

reading

174
of

Interpretation

Hume's texts. It completely ignores the numerous passages where Hume explicitly denies that moral judgments refer to the personal sentiments of the
evaluator.

Likewise it ignores those

judgments

passages where

Hume

claims

that we can

make correct moral

even when our personal

sentiments are com

pletely contrary to such judgments. The only explanation of the degree interpretations is that their advocates
ceptions about what

of

distortion (or

evident

in these

subjectivist

approached at

Hume

with a set of precon

his

moral views must

least should) have been. And

the source of these

preconceptions can

be

traced

directly

to the general misun

derstanding
vist,"

of

Hume's
was

philosophical project.
view?

What exactly and this is

Hume's

Capaldi

suggests

the term "intersubjecti"intersubjective"

an appropriate

description. The

sense of

can

be

clarified by considering Hume's analogy to primary and secondary qualities (an analogy Hume adopts from Hutcheson). By Hutcheson's and Hume's time it had become common to interpret this distinction in a somewhat different
manner

than had Locke.

objects"

"in the
were

and

Primary qualities were qualities of objects that existed independently of human perception. Secondary qualities
"impressions."

tion. In

and thus their existence was dependent on human percep Hume's language, secondary qualities were Consider our color perceptions and color judgments. Color distinctions are,

"in the

mind,"

in Hume's terminology, founded

impressions
color that
are

upon or

determined

by

impressions. While
not

obviously

neither

true

nor

false,

it does

follow that

our

judgments

are neither

true nor false. Nor does it follow that in

judging

something is red,

we are

merely reporting
will produce

our subjective

impression. In

stead we suppose that physical objects are so constituted certain standard sighted
can use

conditions,

they

the

that, viewed under impression of red in normally

these standard conditions, I

human beings. If I

view an object under

even

my impression as a basis for the judgment that the object is red. But, in this case, I am not reporting my impression; I am using my impression

as evidence

for the judgment.

it
under

My judgment
impression

is true
of red

when

the object

is, in fact,

so constituted

that it produces the

beings
is

who view

the appropriate

in normally sighted human conditions. It is false when the object distinction between
reports of object.

not so constituted.

Our language

reflects this of

subjective experience and

judgments

fact

about

the qualities of the

When

to report our subjective experience we say that the object looks or appears red. When we wish to make a claim about the nature of the object,
we wish we

say that it is red. The same relationship holds between

moral sentiments

(impressions)

and

moral

judgments. Certain
or

objects such as actions or characters are so consti

tuted that,

under certain standard

conditions,
normal

they

produce certain sentiments

view or can use

(approbation
say,

disapprobation)

in

human beings. If I
virtuous.

consider,

a person's character under

these standard conditions, I

my

senti

ment as a

basis for the judgment that he is

But,

as

in the

case of color

Misunderstanding
judgments, I
To say that
am not ment as evidence

and

Understanding

Hume's Moral

Philosophy

175

reporting my own sentiment, but rather, using my senti for the judgment about the nature of the person's character.

someone

is

virtuous

is to say that he has

standard

certain sorts of causal

produce a sen

properties, that he has qualities that, under

timent of approbation
one possesses

conditions,

in human beings. The

question of whether or not some

these qualities

is, according

to

Hume, "a

fact."

plain matter of of

The

standard condition

moral approbation or

necessary for the production disapprobation is an impartial point

the sentiments

of

of view.

Besides, every
impossible

particular man

has

a peculiar position with regard

to others; and 'tis

were each of

we cou'd ever converse together on

any

reasonable

terms,

us to consider characters and persons, of view.

only fix

as

they

appear

from his

peculiar point

In order, therefore, to

prevent those continual contradictions, and arrive at we on some

a more stable

judgment

of

things,

view;

and

always, in

our

thoughts,

place ourselves

steady and general points of in them, whatever may be our

present

situation."

Although this
of unrealizable.

general point of view

view

is impartial, it is
has

not

ideal in the

sense

It is the

that all of us naturally have whenever we observe

no particular relation

the

actions or character of someone who

to ourselves,
action

for instance,
towards
or nation.

when we observe a stranger engaged

in

some

benevolent

another stranger or some

cruelty inflicted

on

the people of a distant age

Hume

not

only

considers

the questions of which qualities produce moral

sentiments

and what objects

have

such

qualities to

be

questions

plain matters of

fact,

he

also considers

the

question of whether or not one

concerning has a

moral obligation to

be

a plain matter of

fact.
'knows'

How
the

can

this be reconciled

with what everyone

Hume
'ought'

said about

'fact-value'

gap
'is'

and

the

impossibility

of

deducing

an

statement

from

an

statement?

The

answer reveals

the second fundamental misconcep

tion at the heart of the received view of Hume's moral philosophy. It is to this
misconception

that I

now

turn.

OBLIGATION AND THE

'IS-OUGHT'

PASSAGE

Capaldi argues,

quite

correctly, that Hume

never raises

any

question what
'is'

soever about the nature or status

'ought'

ments and moral or

of the inference between factual or statements. The usual shock with which this
of

state

claim

is

received

is

a good

indication

how little

regard

has been

paid

to the line of
'is-ought'

argument passage.

Hume is pursuing in the section containing the And this lack of attention to the context of the

so-called passage

is

further

176

Interpretation
of

indication

how little

regard

has been

paid

to the nature of the

'is-ought'

moral

debate
be

that Hume was addressing in that section. Before the

passage can

understood,

one must

first

understand

its

context. views

As I

mentioned

earlier, the contending

moral

in the debate

of

Hume's time Although

were moral

egoism,

rationalism,

and moral sentiment theory.

Hutcheson

must

be

credited with

being

the

first to

work out

the moral sentiment

theory in a systematic manner, he was at his best when criticizing rival theo ries. Hume's recognition of Hutcheson's genius in this regard is evidenced by
his adopting all of Hutcheson's major criticisms of egoism and rationalism. Hutcheson and Hume agreed that the moral egoists were correct in their
recognition that

both the

nature of moral

distinctions

and

the

nature of moral problem with

motivation could egoism was not

only be explained by appeal to sentiments. The in its form of explanation, but in the content. It
system"

misidentified

the sentiment. The "selfish

tion of human nature.

founders

on

Hutcheson, Hume,
are motivated

and

its radically misconceived no later Adam Smith all adamantly

even

denied that human beings

est.

only, or

primarily,

by

self-inter

The

selfish

thesis is so contrary to the evidence of everyday experience that

maintained

it

can

only be

cious

turns of argument, and

by the most intricate, subtle and, ultimately, falla by twisting the meaning of words beyond recogni
judgments regarding the actions and char in distant nations totally unintelligible.
prudence

tion. In addition, egoism renders all

acters of

historical

agents and people

Finally,

egoism reduces all

morality to

and, in

doing

so,

collapses the

distinction between the

The
but

moral and nonmoral realm.

This,

the moral sentiment

theorists argue, eliminates morality altogether.

second

group

of opponents

in the debate

of

Hume's time

were

the moral

rationalists.

number of somewhat

different theories

come under this

heading,
consist and

what was common

to them all was the view that moral

distinctions

in

certain sorts of

truths which are two

discoverable
versions.

by

reason alone.

Hutcheson

Hume

concentrated on

dominant

Both

versions considered virtue

to consist in
nature of

conformity to truths, but they differed in their analyses, of the these truths. The first version held that the source of moral distinc

tions

were

demonstrable
view

moral

relations.

Virtue

consisted

in conformity to in
actions.

these relations. This was the view of Samuel Clarke. The second version was

Wollaston's
tions that
as

that virtue consisted

as

in

signification of truth
are

Ac

signify things
not, are

they truly

are,

virtuous; those that signify things

'is-ought'

they
The in

are

vicious.

section of

the Treatise containing the

passage

is devoted to
ver

the criticism of moral rationalism in general and

sions

Clarke's

and

Wollaston's

particular.
a

Capaldi's treatment
few
shortcomings.

of

this section contains many strengths,

strengths

yet

it does have

Its

include his

recognition that

Hume, like Hutcheson before him,

of moral obligation and

offering
the

the

content and grammar of

'is-ought'

rejecting a certain account of the nature different account in its stead; his analysis of passage, showing how both are at

was

Misunderstanding
odds with the

and

Understanding
of

Hume's Moral

Philosophy
his detailed

111
exam

traditional interpretation
major variation of each.

that passage; and

ination
careful

of

every

rebuttals

in the traditional interpretation, along with These aspects of Capaldi's account provide over
that Hume
never raised

whelming
question. cism of

evidence

for his

negative claim

the

'is-ought'

From the

perspective of

the negative Socratic task, Capaldi's

criti

the received views on Hume's

'is-ought'

theory

of

obligation, particularly in

relation to the

passage, is one of the

major strengths of

his book. His

blow to the The

received view

shortcomings of strength of

is simply devastating. his account, although they in

actual

no

way detract
of

either

from the

his

negative

thesis or from his positive account of Hume's

theory
in
a

of

obligation, do detract from his

interpretation

'is-ought'

the
passage still not

passage.

Even though Capaldi deserves

context than

much credit

far broader
enough.

any

other

commentator, his

for examining the context is

to

broad

While he

recognizes

that Hume and Hutcheson share the same

concern, he does
mental nature of

not examine enough of

Hutcheson's

work

reveal

the

funda

that concern. In
repeats

fact, in

'is-ought'

the section containing the

passage,
moral argue

every one of Hutcheson's major arguments against rationalism, including Hutcheson's most fundamental criticism. As I will below, it is this fundamental criticism, first advanced by Hutcheson and

Hume

repeated

by

'is-ought'

mary

Hume throughout the section, that Hume is addressing in his sum paragraph. To show this will require a brief look at Hutche
rationalism.5

son's criticisms of moral

First, Hutcheson
is only
when

argues

that moral

rationalism cannot account

for

moral mo

tivation. The mere knowledge of any truth cannot this knowledge is accompanied

motivate anyone

to action;

it

by

some sentiment or

desire that
moral ra

we are moved to act.

But,

quite apart of

from this consideration, the

giving any

tionalists

are

completely incapable

explanation of what makes

something

virtuous or vicious

that does not either reduce to egoism, reduce to the

question.

moral sentiment

theory,

or

beg

Hutcheson
the
motive

argues

that, before

one can appeal

to the morality of an action as

to

perform

it,

one must

be

able

to give some independent account of

what makes give?

it morally
claim that

good.

What

sort of accounts

do the

moral rationalists

Some

it is

an end proposed ends?

by

the Deity. But why, Hutcheson

asks, do

we approve

God's
points

Because, they
one means

say, God only

wills what conducive

is
to

best. But, Hutcheson

our own or

out, if

naturally

best, i.e.,

others'

interest,

then the position either reduces to egoism or admits

that

it is

benevolent

sentiment on

that makes something morally good and not

conformity to truth. If,

answer

the

other

hand,

one means

morally

best,

then the
good

begs the question, saying

good. common

no more

than what

makes

it morally

is

that

it is morally

Another

way the
was

rationalists answered

the

question of what makes

something morally good Clarke's view that virtue

to appeal to

duty

or obligation.

After

describing
notes:

consists

in conformity to relations, Hutcheson

178

Interpretation

'Tis asserted, that God who knows all these relations, &c. does guide his actions should have been first by them, since he has no wrong affection (the word
"wrong'

explained); And that in like

word

manner

these

relations

&c.

ought

(another unlucky

in morals) to determine the

about

choice of all rationals.

(/,

p.

246)
and of

Hutcheson's point, both

'ought,'

'wrong'

the use of the term

the term
what

is that they

beg

the

question.

Clarke is

supposed

to

be explaining

being wrong something morally explanation is to presuppose the very thing being explained. in the tory Hutcheson attacks Wollaston's view that virtue consists in signification
makes good or
refer

evil, but to

to it

or obliga

of

truth

on

exactly the

same grounds:

One

of

moral evil, ends

Mr. Woolaston's illustrations that significancy of falsehood is the idea in this, 'tis acting a lye. What then? Should he not first have
that every lye was such.

of

shewn what was moral evil, and

(/,

p.

271)
criticism.

Nor does Hutcheson leave any doubt

One may
see

about

the

nature of

his

that he has some other idea of moral good, previously to this

significancy

of

presupposing the

truth, by his introducing, in the very explication ideas of morality previously known: such as

of

it,

words
'obligation,'

right,'

'lye'.

...(/,

p.

269)
of

Throughout his discussion

points out

the

moral rationalists character of

Hutcheson continually

that the question-begging

their attempts to explain the

nature of moral gation or

distinctions is particularly evident in their appeal to moral obli duty. To appeal to duty or obligation in explaining what makes some
good

thing morally
its On the

moral goodness. other

is simply to say that what makes something morally This is no explanation at all.
claimed moral

good

is

hand, Hutcheson

that there

was no problem of explain

acknowledges

ing

moral

distinctions and, thus,

obligation, once one

the

existence of moral sentiments.

By

'obligation'

one can mean

that an

action and

is it

necessary to obtain "presupposes

can mean

happiness to the agent; this is the

affections,
and

'ought'

prudential
happiness."

selfish

the senses of private

Or

one

"that every spectator, or he himself upon reflection, must approve his action, and disapprove his omitting (/, p. 229). This is the moral and it presupposes moral sentiments.
it" 'ought,'

Hume begins the "Moral Distinctions

of

section
not

containing the deriv'd from

of motivation.

'is-ought'

passage,

which

is titled

Reason,"

his Book II discussion discovers truth, but

motivation.

repeating the main argument Like Hutcheson, Hume argues that

motivate us to act.

by

reason

can

never, in

sions or sentiments can motivate actions. moral

itself, Thus,
the

Only

pas

rationalism cannot account

for
and

Hume
with

next examines

specific

theories

of

Clarke

Wollaston, beginning

Wollaston. He first

repeats a number of

Hutcheson's

Misunderstanding
the morality or

and

Understanding
of of an action

Hume's Moral

Philosophy
of

179
makes

points about the absurd

implications
of

Wollaston's views, e.g., that it depend

on

immorality

the sagacity

the observers

instead

of the

intentions

virtuous and all vices

devastating
surd

criticism.

equally equally vicious. Hume then turns to Hutcheson's most After examining a number of attempts to escape the ab
points out

the agent, and it implies that

all virtues are

implications

of

Wollaston's view, Hume

that,

We may easily observe, that in all those arguments there is an evident reasoning in a circle. A person who takes possession of another's goods, and uses them as his
own, in a manner declares them to be his own; and this falsehood is the source of
the

immorality.

But is property,

or

right, or obligation, intelligible without an

antecedent morality?

(T,

p.

462n)
that Wollaston's attempts to explain
what

Like Hutcheson, Hume

makes

recognizes

something
that

virtuous

or vicious

inevitably beg

the question.
represented

For,

even

supposing Wollaston

cannot give

immorality "any

is derived from the

plausible

'falsehood'

in action,
immoral"

reason, why

such a

falsehood is

(T,

p.

462n).
next turns to
are

Hume
moral

Clarke's based

moral relations

theory. Clarke had claimed that

moral

distinctions
and

on

demonstrable

relations,

what

he

called

"eternal

immutable fitnesses

things."

and unfitnesses of

In his

criticism of

Clarke, Hutcheson had

that hold only between
'fitness'

pointed out rational

that the supposed relations

and

must

be

ones

agents,

that any of the usual senses of

would seem

to hold between things like numbers, sentences, inanimate

adds

objects,

and so on.

Hume

his

own

twist to the argument

by introducing

his

The only demonstrable relations, according to Hume, are theory resemblance, contrariety, degrees in quality, and proportion in quantity or num ber. But all these relations are applicable "not only to an irrational, but also to
of relations.

an

inanimate

object"

(T,

p.

464). Hume then

challenges

the

moral relations

theorist to specify

a relation

that applies only to rational agents and that

is

demonstrable

relation

discoverable

by

reason alone.

Capaldi

offers an excel

lent, detailed

analysis of this aspect of

Hume's argument, showing both how it

relations, and
at

decisively

proves

there

could

be

no such

the same time proves

that even if

such relations could

be

shown

to exist, the rationalists could never

demonstrate

their effect on the will.

note

But it is important to
relations view

that Hume does the

matter a

not end

his

criticism of the moral

here. He

pursues

step further

by indicating

the sort

of problems encountered when moral relation.

trying
If the

to explain

what makes a given relation a

Why
in

is it that the
animals?

relation answer

involved in incest is immoral in

is because
animals

humans, but

not

do

not

have
that

sufficient reason

to discover its to

immorality,
would

yet

"man, being

endow'd with

faculty,
a

which ought

restrain

him to his duty, the

same action

becomes

criminal,"

then, Hume claims, "I

p.

reply, that this is evidently arguing in

attempt

circle"

(T,

467). Like Wollaston's, Clarke's

to

explain

the

nature

180

Interpretation

of moral

distinctions,

what makes

something

moral or

immoral, begs
passage.
view

the ques

tion.

It is

at this point that

Hume

concludes with

the

'is-ought'

Accord

ing
his

to

Capaldi,
at

the passage is directed at the moral relations

and, more

specifically,

Clarke. Capaldi takes Hume's

main

thrust against Clarke to

be
ra

inability

to specify any demonstrable

relation

that holds only between

tional agents. The point Hume

Capaldi, is
sented

that neither
moral

can

is making in the Clarke deduce the

'is-ought'

passage, according to
supposed moral relations repre relations of science.
'ought'

by

'ought'

the

from the four demonstrable deduce the deduce the

The

problem
'is,'

is

not

how

or whether one can

moral

from

factual
it"

but how

one can

moral relation represented

by

'ought'

from these

other relations

which, Hume points out, "are entirely different

from

(T,

p.

469).

This interpretation is certainly plausible. Not only would it make sense for Hume to be making this sort of point here, but, unlike the traditional interpreta

tion, the

claim

Capaldi
as

attributes to

Hume is

consistent with

Hume's

overall

moral theory.

And,

Capaldi

points

out, the actual grammar of the, passage

received

argues more

favorably

for his interpretation than for the

an even more plausible

interpretation.

Yet I think there is

gins the passage

interpretation. When Hume be

which

with, "in every

system of

morality,

I have hitherto

met

with, I have always

remarked,"

I believe he really is referring to every

moral and relations

system view.

he has discussed Wollaston's Capaldi

system

so

far does

and
not

version

merely to Clarke's involve moral relations,

not

thus the

criticism

Hume to be making in the passage would not apply to every Hume has "met As further evidence for his interpretation Capaldi
supposes
with."

points out

that

Clarke actually

argues

in the

manner

Hume describes in the

passage, viz., establishing the

and then argue
ists'

being

turning

to our obligations.

God, referring to the affairs of men, But, in fact, both Clarke and Wollaston
of

in this

manner.

I believe that Hume's

point

is that

all

the moral

rational

attempts to explain the nature of moral

distinctions

beg

the question be
explained.
relations

cause

they employ

terms that presuppose the very

thing being
these

When Clarke
good

answers the questions of what makes who

morally

by

claiming that God,

thus

has

no

wrong affection,

guides

His

actions

by

them,
when

and

they

ought

to guide our actions, he

has, in

effect, merely
good.
of

said

that what

makes

them morally good is that

attempts

they

are

morally

Likewise,
falsehood
to know

Wollaston
evil

to

explain what makes

the signification

morally

by

claiming that
said

God,
the

our

benefactor, has

given us reason

the truth and we are

signifying
that what

lie that

he has merely
wrong.

makes

to know the truth, it morally wrong is that it is morally

we are not obliged

Finally,
or status

while

of

the

Capaldi correctly denies that Hume is discussing the nature inference from factual to moral statements, he does believe
with

that Hume is concerned

an

inference,

viz., the

inference from

the four

Misunderstanding
demonstrable
'ought.'

and

Understanding Hume's
sort of

Moral

Philosophy
whatsoever.

-181

relations of science to a supposed moral relation represented

not

by

discussing any in a very common eighteenth-century sense that has using the term to do with inference. To deduce something in this sense is to explain it nothing It is a sense used by Shaftesbury, Hutcheson, and by reference to its
'deduction'
source.6

But Hume is

inference

He is

Adam Smith, as well as by Hume in a number in this sense when referring to the moral distinctions. For instance, Hume morals from (EHU, p. 215),
moral
self-love"

of other places.

All

'deduce'

use

egoists'

explanation of

the source

of

refers
and

to the

egoists'

"deduction
egoists

of as

Smith describes the from

"those

who are

fond

of

deducing

all our sentiments

certain refinements of

self-love."7

Once it is
ployed pose

recognized

that Hume is criticizing the

form

of explanation em absurd

by

the moral rationalists, it

becomes

clear

just how
gap

that Hume is suggesting there is any

'fact-value'

or

it is to sup that there is some For Hume is

'is's,'

problem with not

deducing

moral statements

from factual

statements.

complaining that the

opposite.
or moral

'oughts'

moral rationalists explain criticism

by

using
and

but

exactly the
'oughts'

His

is that they

are

attempting to terms,

explain

terms

by

'oughts'

using

or other moral

this begs

the

question.

CONCLUSION

I have already explained why I have concentrated on the negative aspect of Capaldi's task. But I would like to conclude by briefly relating this negative
aspect to the positive aspects of radical shift spots

his

account.

Capaldi's

recognition of

Hume's

in

philosophical perspective reveals a number of

traditional blind

imposed by a misunderstanding of Hume's discussed these in the specific area of Hume's

other,
more

philosophical project. moral

I have
are of

theory.

But there

general,

areas

affected

as

well.

For instance, the treatment

Hume's theory of meaning as a form of reductive empiricism (often referred to as Hume's following empiricism to its logical conclusion) is a natural result of
the
assumption that

Hume is simply making

a new move within

the traditional
able

philosophical

framework.

a sensitive and accurate

By rejecting this assumption, Capaldi is account of Hume's view on meaning.

account of
Think'

to give

The

same

is true

of

Hume's

the self. The assumption that Hume

is working
account, in

within

the T

perspective

has led the

vast of

majority

of

Hume

commentators

to take

his Treatise, Book I, discussion

explicit claim

the self as his full

spite of

Hume's

that this account is directed toward

only
a

one aspect of

the self. In Book I Hume

is rejecting the
not

view of

the

self as
thing."

simple,

atomistic

Cartesian

ego.

The

self

is

essentially
Passions,"

"thinking
Hume

Capaldi

shows

that

it is only in Book II, "Of the

that

reveals

182

Interpretation
account of
come

his full

the

self.

The

self

is both thought
self,

and

passion, mind and

body. We
than

to

have
that

a concept of

indeed,
as

we come to

be selves, only
Hume is

through social interaction. In

more

treating
be

man

a social

being

doing
He is

insisting

he

always

considered

in

a social context. social.

insisting
for

that all selves are

essentially In

and

irreducibly

The implications
dermines the

of this view are

momentous, both for moral philosophy and

moral

social and political philosophy.

egoistic systems of

Hobbes

and

philosophy it quite obviously un his followers. But it likewise

If
moral agents are so

undermines the

Kantian

conception of a person.

virtue of their rationality,

i.e., if they

human

being

is

a moral agent.

solely in then no things, essentially thinking Utilitarianism fairs no better. The notion of
are

society
calculus
ceived.

as comprised of

distinct, individualistic
of each

entities

involving

the

'self-interest'

discrete

self

performing a hedonic is radically miscon

In

social and political

philosophy the Humean

conception of self undermines

same reason

the foundation of
mines

all social contract view of

theory for

the

that it under

Utilitarianism. The

society

as composed of atomistic

individuals

contracting foundly flawed

tract

together to realize their

conception of a self.

"self-interests"

is based

on

the same pro

Contemporary
points

Rawlsian
out,

versions of con

theory

are

equally

misguided.

As Hume

of the perception of every other object, Take away our concrete relations to the world and others, all selves. There could be nothing behind the 'veil of
of perceptions

"ourself, independent is in reality nothing (T, p. 340).

and one

takes away

ignorance'

except

bundles him the

impor

Finally,
basis for

very Capaldi's

questionable arbitrators of social or political

recognition of

legitimacy!

Hume's

shift

in

perspective gives

developing

Hume's

conception of

how

one can

(and, just

as

tant, how one cannot) achieve philosophical understanding of the social world. Capaldi argues that, on a Humean view, "social practice is an intersubjectively
shared

framework

of norms within which we

interpret

doing"

what we are

(p.

284). The

social world composed of

these practices cannot be understood either

by

the sort of reductivism

structure

found in

physical science or

by

the appeal to

hidden,

underlying

that pervades

much of social science.

They

cannot explain

the social world because

they

either

do

not account

trarily impose
philosopher

some alien

meaning

on practice.

for meaning or they arbi For Hume the task of the social
as

is

"explication,"

which

Capaldi describes

the attempt to clarify

...

"our ordinary understanding of our practice in the hope of extracting of norms which can be used to guide future (p. 282). Social
practice"

a set

under

standing and social criticism must take place within the intersubjectively shared framework of norms that determine the meaning of what we do. "Explication
seeks to mediate practice

argues, this

itself (p. 282). And, is ultimately the only conceptually coherent way to
within practice

from

as

Capaldi

understand

social and political reality.

Misunderstanding
NOTES

and

Understanding Hume's Moral Philosophy

183

page numbers of all quotations

1. Nicholas Capaldi, Hume's Place in Moral Philosophy (New York: Peter Lang, 1989). The from this book are placed in the text.

2. David Hume, Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding in Enquiries Concerning Human Understanding and concerning the Principles of Morals, with text revised and notes by P.H. Nidditch, 3d ed. (Oxford: Clarendon, 1975), p. 45. Further references to the Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding appear in parentheses in the text, abbreviated EHU and followed by the
page number.

3. The
1944). It is
ed.

quotation cited

is from CL. Stevenson's Ethics

on page

and

Language (New Haven: Yale Press,

by

Capaldi

141.

Hume, A Treatise of Human Nature, with text revised and notes by P.H. Nidditch, 2d (Oxford: Clarendon, 1978), pp. 581-82. Further references to the Treatise appear in paren theses in the text, abbreviated T and followed by the page number.
5. The
arguments
on

4. David

discussed below
the

are

from Francis Hutcheson's Illustrations

on

the

Moral

Sense, in An Essay
tions

Conduct of the Passions and Affections with Illustrations on the Moral Sense (New York: Garland, 1971). This is a facsimile of the 1728 edition. In all quota
and

Nature

from this work, I have

using
used

eliminated antiquated capitalizations and single quotes to

italics

and substituted place of

the the

modem convention of

indicate the

use-mention

distinction in

brackets

for that

purpose

in the

original

text. Further references to the Illustrations are made in

the text, abbreviated / and

followed

by

the page number.

6. This
ary.

sense

It is

worth

is described in the Oxford English Dictionary, and in Samuel Johnson's Diction noting that the full title of Johnson's Dictionary is A Dictionary of the English
Words
are

Language in

which the

Deduced from their Originals, Illustrated in their Different

'deduce.'

Significations 7. Adam

by Examples from the Best Writers. This is certainly a noninferential use of Smith, The Theory of Moral Sentiments (Indianapolis: Liberty Classics, 1976),

p.

54.

Kojeve-Fessard Documents
Translated
by

Hugh Gillis
and

Department of Fisheries

Oceans, Ottawa

TRANSLATOR'S NOTE

The three letters from Alexandre Kojeve to Gaston Fessard

"Review
appendix of

and

Kojeve's

Two Books

by

to Gabriel Marcel

presented and annotated

by

originally Gaston Fessard: Correspondance (1934-1971), Henri de Lubac, Marie Gaugier and Michel Sales
Communism"

Gaston

Fessard"

were

published as an

(Paris: Beauchesne, 1985), pp. 506-16. "Christianity and nally appeared as Christianisme et communisme in Critique,
pp.
gel:

origi nos.

3-4

(1946),
de He

308-12. Gaston Fessard, "Deux interpretes de la Jean Hyppolite

pp. et

phenomenologie

Alexandre

Kojeve,"

appeared

in Etudes (decembre,
et

1947),

368-73

and reprinted

in Gaston Fessard. Hegel, le Christianisme

I'Histoire (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1990), pp. 275-79. I would like to thank Nina Ivanoff, Kojeve's legatee, for permission to publish the
Kojeve
and cle.
material and to the editors of

Etudes (14,
permission

rue

d'Assas, 75006, Paris)

Fessard
arti

Presses Universitaires de France for 1

would also

to publish the

like to thank Michael S. Roth Paul Benoit

provided

and

Father Michael Sales,

suggestions.

S.J.,

for their

assistance.

many helpful

THREE LETTERS FROM ALEXANDRE KOJEVE TO GASTON FESSARD

1. Excerpt from

Letter from

Kojevnikoff to Gaston Fessard, June 21, 1936.

Certainly, I
thing I know
myself about man

am not

overly familiar with ancient paganism. But every it leads me to believe that it is impossible to recognize
much

in the
not

those pagans described. It doesn't matter

gods of

perhaps matter a

that I
great

do

believe in the
atheism

Olympus. But it does

I believe

deal that my
which

is

not reduced

to the negation of their existence. And

therefore takes place

is particularly important on the plane where our discussion I do not believe in the essential difference between Master and
"Greek" "Barbarian."

Slave, between
speaking, I do

citizens and not

non-citizens,
man

and
myself

Generally
place

believe that
thing"

is,

that I

am, determined once and

for

all

like any "other

by

"innate"

the natural

Cosmos, by my

position

my in the

nature,

i.e., by my

in

City, for the

simple reason

that I do

interpretation, Winter

1991-92, Vol. 19, No. 2

186
not

Interpretation
a

believe that I live in

Cosmos, [and]

that there

is

no

longer

City

where

really live. All of this leads me then to believe that I am not a pagan; and even above all because I do not want to be one, but also only because it is humanly impossible for a European of the twentieth century and
one could not

am

firmly

convinced of this

Be

that as

it may,

Examen de

conscience

any century to come. in your book (Gaston Fessard, Pax Nostra: Internationale [Paris: Grasset, 1936]. Translator's note.)
of each

time

Judeo-Christianity is
out a moment's

opposed

to paganism, I take the side

of

the

former,

with

hesitation. Even in their theological, indeed of the Judeo-Christian ideas of "mortal

sin,"

mythological

form,

"conversion,"

of absolute perfec

tion

("be

perfect as your

Father is perfect"), "Platonic

the most perfect

seem to me nearer to a true anthro

of

pology than the

short, I
would

idea"

notion of a

human

being,

than Aristotle's

affirmation that man

is

not

like

you

to agree with me

being in the (natural) Cosmos. In when I say that I am not a pagan. And

would

like to

obtain

the same agreement on the other point, on the point of

my I

"non-

Judaism."

mean

by

"Judaism"

what mind

if I

am not mistaken

you yourself

mean,

i.e.,

what a

St. Paul had in

anti-pagan

Judaism,
is
of

such as

in his Epistle to the Romans, for existed before the Christian era
outside of

example.

It is the

such as continues

to exist in the minds of certain Jews tianity. It

"election"

its

"Aufliebung"'

in Chris
of the

above all else the

"Weltanschauung"

based

on

the

idea

the

people of

Israel,

an

idea

which made a

no general term

to designate both Jew and

"barbarian"

Goy

(that

"Goy"

Halevy say that there is being something

paganism

essentially different than the Well, that Judaism is as foreign to

"aufgehoben"

of
me as

the pagans).

Greco-Roman

(although
with

as

in

me as

the latter). In any case, in parting company

Christianity, it is
because I
self.

not

to that Judaism that I

fall back into: I

deny

the incarnation of

Yahweh, but because I

of

deny deny Yahweh

etc.

Christ

not

him is

On

other

matters, the prohibitions

eating, circumcision,

all that

for

only barbaric practices. The names of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob are insignificant names for me. And as for the fundamental idea of the "elec only of a people, of the exclusive humanity of a race, I could never accept it.
me
tion"
. . .

Vanves, June 19, 1939

2.
Dear

Father,
you

Thank
(Gaston
note.).

for

having

thought of me again

Fessard,

Epreuve de force [Paris: Bloud

wouldn't

by sending et Gay,
read

me your

last book

1939]. Translator's
pleasure, for the

I have just finished it. I

say that I

it

with

Kojeve-Fessard Documents
feelings it is
raises are of a

187

completely different

sort.

But I

can

say that reading it

and

comforting.

Indeed,

as

long

as

books

of this sort are

written, published

read

in France, all is not yet lost. I do not need to tell you that I
book:
you
we of

subscribe without reservation

metaphysical

to the

political

aspect of your

know that. As for its

agree.

"superstructure,"

you also
realizes

know that

don't
the

However, it
hand"

seems to me that your

book

the very

idea

"extended

that you rejected

in theory. As for intersect

at

me, I think that two lines moving in different directions

precise point and

can

1 believe for

"Munich"

us

is precisely
would

such a point.

If

you are

with you

staying in Paris the month of July, I (for the moment I'm too busy).

be very

happy

to meet

Thanks again, and, dear

father, my

respectful and profound sympathy.

Kojeve

Vanves, June 26, 1956

Dear Father, very much for kindly sending me your last book (Gaston Fes sard, La dialectique des exercices spirituels de saint Ignace de Loyola, Volume 1: Liberte, Temps, Grace [Paris: Aubier, 1956]. Translator's note.). I started
you

Thank

reading it yesterday, it interests

me greatly.

Having
badly!

seen

the annexed

diagrams, I have

to admit I've been beaten

Speaking
matter of

seriously, your book comes at just the right time for

me.

As

fact,

am now

immersed (thanks to
understood

an

illness!

...

me

too,

you

see)

in trinitarian theology. I have

realizes the

for

long

time that that

until

theology

only

progress

ontology has
of

made since

Plato. But
of

theology Holy tainly it has been treated as a poor relation by (nonheretical!) theologians. True, they nevertheless do say some very important things, although for the most part only implicitly, about it. Now I feel your book will explain many of these
underestimated the

have

importance

the

the

recently I Spirit. Cer

the Spirit implications. For the "circular system", is nonetheless essentially (which proceeds from the Father AND the Son, of course, contrary to what the Eastern Fathers, who, in this matter, could never get beyond Plato-Plotinus, think).

Very

cordially

and

respectfully yours,

Kojeve

188

Interpretation KOJEVE, REVIEW OF TWO BOOKS

conscience

II. ALEXANDER

BY G.

FESSARD2

G. Fessard. Pax Nostra. Examen de

international.

Paris, Grasset,

1936, In-16, XX-464,

G. Fessard. La

p.

18 Frs. Le dialogue
p. s
catholique-communiste est-il possi

main tendue?

ble? Paris, Grasset, 1937. In-16, 247 It is impossible to submit Father

that is the least bit detailed
without and at

Fessard'

last two books to

an examination

going beyond the limits

of a

book

review.

And

yet

exploit

this very sincere for Catholicism the

the same time extremely adept attempt to

philosophic effort realized and the

"Marxist"

by

Hegel

and

Marx

and

thus to facilitate for the

"Hegelian"

which means

in

fact,

"modern
and

man"

more or

less

conscious of
requires an

himself in-depth

access

to the

Catholic faith
the actual

the Church

that attempt
a

criticism on

the part of any

of

one who sees

situation.

it in only
it is

misunderstanding

and a

dissimulation

Of

course

perspective of

only

speak of

not up to me to discuss Father Fessard's ideas from the dogmatics: they are since they are published. I can them from the and or, to come to the
"orthodox"

"Hegelian"

"Marxist,"

point,

atheist perspective.

For,

as

Father Fessard has

that the

seen and shown

very well,

it is in the theism-atheism
cal

problem

center of

gravity

of

the

philosophi

discussion

of the questions raised

in these books is fact

situated.

What I

object

to in Pax Nostra is the

that the central problem,

instead

of

being

discussed seriously, is

presented as resolved. presents

In transposing Hegel's his

as

torical schema, Father Fessard

of the pagan thesis and
beyond"

(Catholic) Christianity

the

synthesis

to "go

Jewish antithesis, and infers from that that any Christianity in fact leads to a relapse into either the Nature
and to the empirical given negation. and sterile

attempt
"pagan"

attitude of subordination to
"Jewish"

attitude of eternal

Now

all of

in general, or the Hegel's effort,

must

integrally
and

accepted on this point

by Marx,

tends to prove that the pagan thesis

the

Judeo-Christian (or insofar

gehoben,
"false"

"bourgeois") antithesis can and i.e., done away with [suprimees] insofar as they are
conserved
as

be

auf-

unilateral and

but

they

are

true and essential, in and

by

the

post-

Christian,
essentially
"idea"

or what means

the same

atheist and areligious.

"ideal"

thing, postrevolutionary synthesis, which is Father Fessard appeals to the fact that the
revealed

or

of that synthesis announced

"idea-ideal"

in

and

implies the

in

by Marx and Hegel originates and by Christianity and he

development of the Christian synthesis, which is essentially theist and religious. Now that reasoning, which is certainly not "dia does not seem to me to be conclusive. For by starting from the princi
concludes that
a
lectical,"

it is only

ple that an
one could
"sum"

idea

which

implies
"reduce"

and presupposes another cannot

"go
or

beyond"

it,

just

as well

to

"paganism"

or to

"Judaism,"

to the simple

of

both, Christianity itself,

which,

doubtless,

results

in

denying, here

too, that

creative act of man which

"dialectic"

precisely

wants

to explain.

Kojeve-Fessard Documents

1 89

Certainly, if
less to
attempt

the Christian God exists, Father to go

"dialectic"

beyond Christianity. And the

still
"dialectic"

Fessard is right, and it is use man who believes in God

only has to
and

ask

himself if the

Marx, in developing their which results from it, begin precisely

"modern"

and with

a meaning for him. But Hegel in positing the historical schema the impossibility for them and for

has

man, of admitting that God's existence. And all their effort has the man, the God who has already replacing in that new man by that been killed in them and by them.
"new"

aim of

To
of

"modern"

convince

man of

Pax

Nostra'

s
must

historical schema, the be proven,

existence

the God in whom he no longer believes

than the

and proven

by

other

arguments

familiar

ones which

he

no

longer finds
main tendue.

satisfactory.

And

that

is

what

Father Fessard
arguments

sets out to

do in La
the

We find two
ment and

here, but

first is far from

new.

It is the

argu

in my opinion, the only philosophically discussable argument in Plato (cf. for example Gorgias 23:467 ff.) and which Father found already Fessard presents in the following terms: "Whoever says progress says being better. But the
the
comparison of

the

better to the less

When there is

good requires a reference no

to

end of progress or

to

perfection.

end,
the

no

perfection, there
good

is

no

possibility
no

of

discerning
of

between the better

and

less

and,

conse

progress"

quently,

possibility

really leads to theism is vouched But that same history of philosophy teaches ently. According to Hegel, for example, to

(p. 122). That that way of seeing things for by Plato and the history of philosophy.
us

that things can be seen differ

speak

only

of

him,

"progress"

is

brought
given

about

not

good,

which

Platonic-Aristotelian tendency towards by in fact means in the end towards the Good
the the given real. That negation

a or

real

and

towards

God, but by
that
"better,"

the

negation of

"nonperfect"

given and

by

the

will

to

not accept

it

is only determined by as given. As for the

good"

it is better simply because

being

the negation of the "less

with

it

implies

and presupposes

it,

without

coinciding
and

it,

and

the "less

good"

is

only less
to the

good

because it is deniable
created

really denied because it

gives

way
con

"better"

by

the same

negation.

According

to that

"Hegelian"

ception,

man
"idea"

to take a

"Socratic,"

indeed, banal

example

did

not need

to

have the
stove

of central

heating
know

to build the first stove and to see that that

is

more valuable than a wood

enjoyed
good"

"perfect

health"

and

what

fire; similarly it is not necessary to have it is, to notice that a toothache is "less
all

than a
man

cold.

And

to reply above
to

to

Plato-Socrates in

the Gorgias

do something or "better"; often he gets up does not want to remain seated, whether because cannot or just because he up boring. that position has become physically unbearable or

does

"good"

not always get

"simply"

interpretation is at least as suggestive In my opinion, Hegel's interpretation. And if one is content to reproduce the Plato's
"theist"

"atheist"

as

"Platonic"

interpretation
perhaps also

without

wanting to

or

being

able to add

be

worth while

to reproduce

anything to it, it the contrary interpretation

would
partic-

190
ularly
end

Interpretation
when one

is familiar

with

it. For

when one

reasons, does one not want to

up

with a conscious and

free assent,

made with a

full understanding
"Platonic"

of

the

issue?
But Father Fessard is In his
second argument
ern,"

not content with

modifies

reproducing the

reasoning.

be

at

it very "mod it, it, since it is essentially existential. That second reasoning is as follows: "To the same time true and real, the process of history must have a meaning
he
modernizes

even makes

end"

and

consequently an human history and my God if that

(p. 161). In in it in it

other

words, in the end God

a

must exist

if

place

can

have
are

meaning;

and

must

believe in

history
have
a

and

my

place

I believe that

much can

be

granted

have meaning for me. to Father Fessard: If history (in its

to

en

tirety)
of

must

meaning, recourse must

be

made not

only to the God-Good

Plato, but also to the God-Mediator, to the God-Man of the Christians. Only, who says and who has proven that history must have a meaning or, more exactly, that it actually has one? Certainly I, like every man, have wished
it had
It
one.

But is that
that
can

"desire"

what

Father Fessard

wanted

to discussl And is

it

something
place, that

seems to me

be discussed rationally or philosophically? that Father Fessard addresses my reason. Now, in the first
can,

reason of mine

indirectly, force

me

to oppose my own "desire

for

can make me see that the history which already has a mean different from and independent of meaning any that I impose on it here and now, is not my history, but rather the history of that meaning as such. I will then see that it is not me, but that which has a history, its

meaning."

It

ing,

"meaning"

history having
border
sire"

history

which

"realize,"

perhaps

but

which

I do

not create.

And,
I

seen
on

that, I

can see

that

if in accepting that consequence,

perhaps

"heresy,"

whose

I certainly do not satisfy my pride, i.e., precisely the "de satisfaction is supposed to compensate, in the "New for the
Man," "meaning"

loss
"true

of advantages which the

real"

of

the "Christian
can

synthesis"

and reveal that

its

and

history
not

offered

him. Reason

therefore

there

is

"desire"

within me a

which

enlightened

by

reason

is

opposed to the

"desire

for

meaning,"

by

for the

satisfaction

accepting what reason reveals as the necessary of the latter. And if Father Fessard, by reasoning,

conditions

appeals

to

one of those

"desires,"

how

can

he

prevent

Hegel

and

Marx from reasoning

to
choose

by

appealing to the
the two

other?

But and this

is

more

important

it is

not

up to

reason

between
of pride

desires,

to

decide for

or against of

the unreasonable restlessness

nor to proclaim as

or the circumspect
posed

tranquility
man who

humility;

true

what

to make the

is the

partisan of one of these

"desires"

is sup happy.

Reason,
pose

to possess man, does not need to promote his happiness nor presup him unhappy; unhappy or blessed, it will be equally accessible to him. And that is why, incidentally, philosophy can, far better than religion, support men's efforts to make themselves happy in their own fashion by believing they

can

do

without all

philosophy

or religion.

It doesn't

matter much

to reason that

Kojeve-Fessard Documents
the man in whom
ing"

191

and

for

whom

historical

existence no

longer has "mean

can or can not reason

sophical"

be happy. Generally, it is not up to reason at least "philo to work in the pay of man's desires. It is there only to show he is. Now, has Father Fessard really for him history really has a meaning?
shown

him

what

he is

and where

to

man

by

his

reason

that
so.

I don't think
man when when

he

wants

Father Fessard has simply noted the psychological fact that to think himself happy, blessed, thinks himself even
or

his

name and a

is Hegel

Marx

as

definitive
believe in
other

"absolute"

"meaning."

participating in a And he has perhaps

"history"

which shown

has

that man must

God-Man if he

wants

to

believe in

words, he has at the very

most shown

meaning in history. In that the idea of a (definitive and

such a

"absolute") goal of history and consequently my action within it necessarily implies, even for a Hegel or a Marx, a more or less Judeo-Christian myth. And he can, I believe, be granted that. But the misfortune is that a myth which
knows itself to be had in view,
a myth

is

no

longer less

"myth,"

but

more or

less

"fable,"

conventional or not.

And the

"modern"

misfortune of
modern men

man

that Hegel and Marx

themselves, is due precisely to the aptitude for recognizing myths as such, and consequently in the inca pacity of producing and conserving them as myths which are believed. To show to that man, by an interpretation, that Christianity is a requirement

having

been

more or

"existential"

of a

desire inherent in human in him the

suspicion

nature which

it

alone can

awaken
ist"

that

Christianity,

even

satisfy in its

is to

affirm or

"Hegelian"

or

"Marx
so

transposition, is only

"ideology,"

a myth, or an

fundamentally

sexual,

cial or

tool which was

something else. Generally, it is imprudent to repair something with a forged perhaps without its author's knowledge only for its
undertaken
"modern" "Christian"

destruction. In addition, the type of analyses Father Fessard has could easily have the effect of making man still less
"Hegelians" "Marxists."

than

orthodox

and of

As for his interpretation

the

the hand extended

by

the Communist atheist to

believing Catholic, I am in perfect agreement with what seems to be the substance of Father Fessard's thought. Between atheist and theist the hand can
not and

be

offered

from

equal

to

equal.

If the
as

one extends

his hand to the he

other extends

does it

without ulterior

motives,

Father Fessard

would want

it in the better

manner

the master extends

understand the world

in

which

his hand to the student, in order to help him he lives and to see himself more clearly. for it (who
on

And,

moreover, to take Plato's word

this point, I think, the term

can can

serve as an

authority),

dialogue in the strong

of

and proper sense of

only take place under those conditions. The question then is to know which
master can

the two

must

play the
am:

role of

the

here. And I

would

reply

as

the good

"Hegelian"

that I

the one who

whether which are

play it, the

in the

one who will succeed

in

by

the superiority of his reasoning,

end

imposing himself as or by extra-rational reasons,

actions.

"master,"

reduced

to the success of

his

That is why I

started

by

saying

192

Interpretation
books demanded
an

that Father Fessard's

who see

in-depth

critique on

the part of those

in his truth only a myth. very beautiful As for the "extra-rational there is certainly no question of discuss ing them here. I would like to finish, however, by saying a few words about
reasons,"

them.

Father Fessard tells least

exclude

us

that

the ideal

of socialist

Christianity, at least Catholicism, does not in the happiness, simply adding to it some supple
essential.

mentary

attractions which can

are, moreover,

Let's

admit that.

He

adds

that the ideal

be formed only on the basis of the Christian anthropology which as such, and from the beginning of its appearance is coupled with an appropriate theology whose rudiments are found in the Bible and in the Gos

pels. and

And,

on

that point, he is certainly right.

Finally, he

tells us it

by
can

or at

the very least with the participation of the Church that that
and

is only in idea
But then

can one

day

be effectively
work realized

fully

realized.

Let's

suppose as much.

how

one explain

that all the approximations of that realization, all the

realized

"forty-hour

weeks"

generally been

thanks to

men

successively in the course of history, have who, far from being docile sons of the
to conserve the Christian anthropology and
or

Church,
all

preferred

for the

most part while

its

practical

consequences,

ogy the Church attaches to

party"

rejecting more it? And how do we

understand

less completely the theol that a "socialist

and which

which at since when

the same time calls

itself

"Christian"

is

Christian,

it

remains recognized as such

by

the

Church

tends almost always to act,

it can,

as the

party

of

that name recently acted in Austria?

am content

to pose these questions. And I know that in themselves to what Father

they
I

are

not yet objections

Fessard
not

says.

But

and

this is

where

would

like to finish
of

must

these questions

be

answered

before

one claims

the role

master,

called to explain to

"Marxists"

how they

must set about

realizing

their master's idea?

III. ALEXANDRE

KOJEVE, CHRISTIANITY AND COMMUNISM

garde

Gaston Fessard, France, prends Chretiens, 1946, 318 pages.

This book is
a

de

perdre ta

liberte! Ed. du temoignage French

size

Catholic
can

critique

directed

against

Communism

and the

Communist Party. It
and value. munist

be divided in two

parts which are unequal

in
of

One

part

is

a critical analysis of

the metaphysical content

Com

doctrine. That

content
part

is

reduced
as

Hegel's dialectic. This

that is never

displays

by M. Fessard first to Marx's, then to it were a knowledge and understanding

doctrine; if he had

found among the

other

adherents of the criticized

wanted, the
cian

author would

certainly have been,

by far,

the

best Marxist theoreti

the

in France. The
"a

part, comprising nine-tenths

propaganda,"

of

book, is

what

is

called

piece of anticommunist

with all

the characteristics of

the

genre.

Kojeve-Fessard Documents
The
detailed
response part of

193
a a

the book

which

is

not propaganda would

would

doubtless deserve
too far.
a

discussion, but

such a

discussion

lead

us

Moreover,

to M. Fessard's outlook is

implicitly

contained
et

in

this journal. (Alexandre

Kojeve, "Hegel, Marx

dans la be
English translation I
will

le

Christianisme"

study to appear in (critique of

Henri Niel's De la

mediation

philosophie

339-65. Kojeve's
no.

note.

by

de Hegel, Critique 3-4, pp. Hilail Gildin in Interpretation I,

to indicate here that any

1 (1970),

21-42.)

content therefore

attempt

to exploit

for Christianity's benefit the Hegelian

discovery

of the

dia

lectic necessarily encounters the fact that dialectic is bound up with finitude, which is revealed to man under the aspect of death. To the extent that Chris
tians accept the idea of the death of God

(i.e., his humanity, his historicity),

to use the Hegelian dialectical

they

can

have the impression

of

being

able

de

indisputable explanatory value. But dialectic the (i.e., decisive, definitive, and irreducible they implicitly deny value of historical action) as soon as they admit the resurrection. Now to deny
scriptions

and to take advantage of their

all

the resurrection of a God who dies is to

deny

his

language, it is becoming, it is obvious

abuse of proper sense of contradiction

still possible

to call

"God"

that that term does not

divinity as such. For if, by an a being whose existence is a apply to a being who dies in the
is
a
a not

that term. The notion of a Christian or theological dialectic

and

in itself,

that contradiction

is

"dialectical": it is simply
of

lack

of

rigorous
book

thinking.

As It

a work of propaganda,
of

M. Fessard's book
would

would

require,

course, a

counter

the same order, which

respond point

have the

"neutralizing"

goal of

it.

would

have to
even

by

point,

trying
be

to remove from M. Fessard's

criticisms

the pertinent ones

"objective"

their persuasive value.

must

Here,

within

the

framework
I

of an

study, I

content with

making

few

gen

eral remarks. would

like to

show at

the outset that

it is very

much a work of

propaganda,

in the sense that the assumed effect of the argument on the reader is more important than the adequation of the argument with reality. Thus, after having
shown

in

truly convincing fashion

not

that Communist doctrine is

at

fundamentally

atheist, M. Fessard does

reveal the

leave it

that. For a

irreparably

erroneous character of a

believer, that is sufficient to doctrine, and therefore the per

follows from it. But M.
modern

nicious nature of

every

action or manifestation which and quite

Fessard probably presumes, believes he is a believer, the

that it
should

rightly,

that for

man,

even

if he

crime of atheism no

longer

provokes

the horror

centuries.

if it really were a crime and which it in actual fact provoked for Also it is not so much as atheists that he denounces the Communists jeopardize the tranquility and personal security (called in the singular or plural) of fathers of families,
workers,
etc.
. . .

to his fellow citizens, but as bad Frenchmen and wicked and dangerous people

in

general who can occasion

on

"freedom"

this

of

unionized or nonunionized

and

last but

not

least

of

intel

lectuals

of all types.

194

Interpretation

This denunciation is made, moreover, in conformity with the proven and One says the truth, nothing but truth. in the truth, but not the whole Thus, passing off an isolated aspect of
classic methods of good works of propaganda.

reality for
without

an adequate

description

of

that reality, one disfigures

it profoundly
to
are

having

"invented"

anything.

With
port

(pertinent) arguments and (authentic) documents him, M. Fessard demonstrates, for example, that the Communists
a number of

sup bad

Frenchmen because they would subordinate French politics to Soviet politics (which he has the tendency to identify, this time without very convincing argu
ments,
with

Russian

or

Slavic

politics).

But he forgets to

mention

that

the same reproach can be made

by

his Communist

adversaries.

For

what

exactly is

actually opposed,
not an acter

and what can and

authentically is apparent to

reasonably be opposed to Communist politics is exclusively French politics (whose anachronistic char
as
of
soon

anyone

as

they have
is

tried to apply it).

To the
counsel

invitation to follow the tracks

to sail

the USSR one only opposes in

fact the

in the Anglo-Saxon
motives, but

wake.

And

one

inspired, in both
or

cases, not

by

patriotic

by

the

desire (admitted

not)

of either

radically trans

forming or maintaining in its essentials a given social and economic order. Thus M. Fessard's analysis would come closer to reality, but only by becoming infinitely less effective from the perspective which concerns him, if he had said
what

in

our age of

in his capacity as a Empires a

well-informed
"national"

Hegelian he

cannot

ignore, namely
no

that

or nationalist politics

is

longer possible,
as

since nations themselves

have

ceased to exist

politically (i.e., militarily)

isolated

entities.

"freedom."

This is why moreover M. Fessard resorts to the supplementary argument of If it were not a work of propaganda, one would be surprised that its
author

Catholic
inter- or
which

is

so

keen

on nationalism and values

liberalism. For
not

Catholic
at

must

know that the

essential

Christian
that

are, if

"internationalist,"

least

trans-national

and

the least that can

they only in circumstances of be said is that the impediments to freedom of conduct

could
realized

be

and expression were not

entirely

suppressed.

But it is

natural and

legitimate, if

one wants to convince

people, to highlight suspect or secondary values, if they are regarded as primordial by those being addressed, even if their outlook is not
authentic source of all truth.

derived from the

However,
author can

and

this again is natural and

effect of

legitimate,

the very
a

person of

the

impede the many

his

propaganda.

Without

doubt,

everyone

is

aware that explain more

modern

Catholics

it

as one can explain

sincerely liberalism in

are

"liberals."

And

one could even

general,3

by

a certain

lack

of

faith,

or

exactly

by

the

fact that Catholics

the traditional

can no

longer

accept

integrally

and

without reservation all even

verbal expressions of

their belief. But

if they actually go so far as renouncing, more or less openly, certain antiliberal practices from the glorious past of their Church (which it would, nevertheless, be easy and even necessary to justify), nothing has yet proved

Kojeve-Fessard Documents
that
nal

195

they

are capable of

forces did
about

not require

freedom, overly lengthy detours,

talking
nation
alone.

establishing and maintaining liberalism if hostile, exter them to do so. It is not surprising then, since we are if others think that, despite their numerous and perhaps
the Communists
might one

day

arrive at

the final desti

that

Catholics

would never

reach, if

by

some miracle

they

were

left

In

a work of
while at

propaganda, it is perfectly the same time reproaching

legitimate

to make use of certain

for using them. While simplifying to the extreme the nascent Communist reality, M. Fessard therefore has the right to reproach Communist polemicists with disfiguring

devices,

one's adversaries

Catholic

reality: which

they do
have
rather

not

take into account the

possibilities

that reality im

plies, but

not yet

been

able to emerge

during
a

the course of what

has

been,

after

all, a

long
be

development. Without
reproach

doubt in

a work of propa

ganda one would

have the right to

him in the

same manner.

But in

an

objective us to

study

we must

content with

noting the

characteristics which allow

classify

as propaganda a

book

by

an author who

has

elsewhere published

some remarkable works of a

Those book

same

features

are

very different genre. found everywhere and in

all ages.

M. Fessard's

only the writings of his co-religionists, but also those of his Communist adversaries. Anti-Communist Catholic literature thus reveals an un
resembles not

deniable
ment.

pleasing In both cases,

and

kinship
one

with

the anti-Catholic literature of the Enlighten

collects

relentlessly

the greatest possible number of to everyone,

absurd or

appalling features, immediately

verifiable and accessible

features that

belong
as

to the surface and only meagerly contribute to characteriz

ing
to

the profound essence of the phenomenon. Thus works of propaganda are

necessarily and,

it were,

by definition,

superficial;
view.

they

should not

be

used

judge

others or

the realities that

they have in

IV. GASTON FESSARD, TWO INTERPRETERS OF HEGEL'S PHENOMENOLOGY: JEAN HYPPOUTE AND ALEXANDRE KOJEVE

Hegel is book
on

decidedly

the toast of France. Last year, Father Niel published a

(Etudes,
of

Mediation in Hegel's Philosophy, which we said, in these pages September 1946, p. 292. Fessard's note.), constitutes a good general
to the study of that author. He now provides us with a translation
on

introduction
duction has

Hegel's Lectures
and notes

by

Proofs of God's Existence (translation with an Intro Henri Niel [Paris: Aubier, 1947]. Fessard's note.) which
the
moment.

arrived at

just the right

For two works,

the

one

by

other or

by

A.

Kojeve, have recently

resurrected

problem of

J. Hyppolite, the Hegel's atheism

theism, raising at the same his philosophy. Dedicated to

these two books
are essential

time the question of the meaning of the whole of the elucidation of the
reader who

Phenomenology

of

Spirit,

for the

has already become

acquainted

196
with

Interpretation
the whole of the Hegelian
oeuvre

by

Father Niel, but for very different

reasons,

which we must make more precise.

When he

published

his translation
that he
was

of the

Phenomenology in
a general

1939

and

1941,
that

M. Hyppolite
work which

announced

preparing
praised

commentary

on

already
p.

contains

in

germ the whole of

at

the Hegelian

system.

The

quality
struire,

of

that translation,

which we

the time

it

came out (Con-

222. Fessard's note.), made all Hegelians impatiently await its They have not been disappointed, first by attending the brilliant defense where it was presented as a doctoral thesis, then by immersing them

VIII,

appearance.

selves

in the

six

hundred

pages of

Genesis

and

Structure of the

Phenomenology

of Spirit (Paris: Aubier, 1947. Fessard's note.). M. Hyppolite declared to his examiners that it was his intention to write a "good scholarly By adding the word to good, both its excellence and its limits are qualified more
"very"

work."

exactly.

At the

price of some

twenty

years

labor,

M. Hyppolite

penetrated

the the

mysteries of one of

the most difficult texts in the

history

of philosophy.

By

his thought, his book is recommended from now on to anyone wanting to tackle Hegel directly. Until now, the Phenomenology stood at the threshold of the system as an almost inaccessible peak, approach
clarity, probity,
and rigor of

able only to those rare mountaineers having at their disposal unusual lung ca pacity and even more exceptional leisure time. Now by his translation and thesis, M. Hyppolite has forged, if not a highway dialectical terrain goes against that and contains, we believe, too many sharp surprises for anyone who
wants

to cross it

by

car at

at

least

a mule

trail,

well marked with road signs

which make

climbing it

time, for the mountaineer. for his achievement. Given the intrinsic
role which

least ten times easier, in terms of both strength and M. Hyppolite cannot be praised or thanked enough
value of

Hegel's philosophy

and the

his dialectic if

plays at

the center of the most serious problems of our

path

time, it

must

be hoped that the

not more so

forged

will

invite

numerous philosophers

and even

theologians to climb it. the summit

or perhaps

In truth,

once

they
a

arrive at

already

en

route, either
of

group
a

might

feel

bit disappointed. For despite

and

or rather even

because

its

excellence, Genesis

"scholarly

work."

Structure of the Phenomenology has its limits: those of How does the summit of absolute knowledge link up with
the the

those in the Logic

Encyclopedia? What exactly is the nature of Time that Concept? To what extent does he succeed, as he in claims, "comprehending history"? Speculative mysticism or atheist human ism, what is, in the last analysis, Hegel's fundamental thought and its value? On all these questions, M. Hyppolite is content to gather the opposed elements.
or

Hegel identifies

with

But

since

he is

afraid of

a question mark.

between left The

after

and

influencing his reader, he leaves him every time before Scrupulous professor, impartial historian, he refuses to choose right Hegelians and leaves the decision up to us.
also

deficiencies, but

the merits, of a such an approach are

acutely felt
on the

encountering the Introduction to the

Reading

of Hegel (Lectures

Kojeve-Fessard Documents

197

"Phenomenology Etudes, collected

Fessard's
nology
all

Spirit,"

of
and edited

given

from 1933 to 1939

at

L'Ecole des hautes

note.).

by Raymond Queneau, Paris: Gallimard, 1947. For M. Kojeve's work, also an explanation of the Phenome
the complete antithesis of a "good scholarly
where the
work":

of Spirit, is
the

First

of

by

its presentation,

disparate

nature of

the

material

gathered, the

confusion of

lecture form,
But

hardly favors
all, it is
and

the understanding of a text which

is,

moreover,

teeming
mistakes. who

with repetitions and obscurities and above

does

not even ex

clude certain

by

its

author's resolute option

in

favor

of a

Hegel
and

is perfectly

intelligence
view will

the rigorous logic

with which

consciously an atheist. The M. Kojeve defends his

extreme
point of

most and

quickly make one forget the drawbacks in presentation, however. The difficult texts of the Phenomenology, for example on the identity of Time

the

Concept,
are

that M. Hyppolite cited without prejudging their ultimate

as the center of the entire interpretation and are clarified meaning the light shed on the whole. Basing himself on Husserl and even more by they on Heidegger, M. Kojeve makes the Master-Slave dialectic the essential part of

here taken

the entire

Phenomenology,
us

and, after

having

explained not

that man's

radical

fini

tude alone allows

someone who veal

history, he does consciously "identified himself with

to understand
with

hesitate to
but in

see

in Hegel

Christ,"

order to re

to

humanity, along
it is

the

inanity

of

Christianity,

the

inexorable nothing

ness to which

condemned.

In that perspective, where Hegel becomes not only a Feurbachian and Marx ist, but also a Heidegerrian before the fact, it is undeniable that a large part of
the

Phenomenology

and above all

the influence of Hegelianism are explained

and clarified

far better than they

ever

raises the most passionate problems and

have been before. Moreover, M. Kojeve concerning the relations between history

truth.
all these merits are reversed when

Yet,

they

are contrasted with

the value of

the impartial reserve to which M. Hyppolite confines himself. Let's say nothing about the fundamental absurdities M. Kojeve is led to by his intrepid logic,

bringing

Hegel

who could

Marxism along with him. The Communist benefit so much from this book, will have to take a
and
will

"intellectuals,"

stand vis-a-vis

the truths it establishes, and it this

regard.4

be very
wish

interesting
for is

to see their reaction in

But

will

he be forgiven the
history"

notes on pages

388

and

435,

where

the

inhumanity
ism

of

the "end of

revealed?5

they

Let's leave Marx

stay at the level of Hegel interpretation. At what cost can M. Kojeve sustain his thesis of a consciously atheist Hegel convinced of man's radical finitude? At the price of qualifying Hegel's monism as a prejudice (p.
aside and

38)! On the Hegel! On

condition of of

condition

completely opposing natural and historical time in discounting his vitalism, of completely ignoring the

Philosophy
it
were

of Nature

and even

the Phenomenology. The so; but things are

ignoring "embarrassing

the same elements

part"

which are

found in

not so simple.

Hegelianism, it is said. I wish After the treatment he received from

of

198

Interpretation
would

M. Kojeve, Hegel
translated

have doubtless felt he

was

being

mutilated.

Let's

not

talk about atheism: we are content to refer to the Proofs of God's

Existence,
of

by

Father Niel

and to the reaction of the

Marxists! As for the dialec

tic, which, according

finitude
abolish
of

to M. Kojeve is only possible on the

says:

hypothesis

the

man, since Hegel

. . .

"The

essence of

every finite

being

is to

itself

is it necessary to
M. Kojeve's

recall

that

abolish

(aufheben)

also means

in Hegel's language to
the

conserve and transcend?

So that that

citation says rather

moreover

complete opposite of

interpretation, Hegel
of the
"

twenty different places: "It is the very nature deny its negation and become infinite
.
.

finite to
ed.

go

adding in beyond itself, to

p.

(Logik,

Lasson, I,
a

126.

Fessard's note.) We hope to return

on another occasion and at greater

length to

book

and

to

ideas
book it

which merit much more

than such a summary discussion. For both the

and the

ideas

are called to exert a profound

spread around which make

influence. Or

rather

they

exert

already don't forget: the Lectures

now and are

in

more

than one book or review. For

up this book were given beTore the war, over a period of five years. Before a very limited audience, it is true, but one met there besides Raymond Queneau, their present editor, A. Koyre, E. Weill, Raymond Aron, Georges Bataille, P.

Klossowsky, Georges Polin, Marjolin,

M. Merleau-Ponty, Lacan, without mentioning some others who were less dili gent, such as Andre Breton. It would be sufficient to go back to the books,

theses,

review and

journal

articles written

by

the names just cited, to

recognize

to what an extent the authors

lectures heard

at

have been, in diverse ways, influenced the Hautes Etudes. Having had the advantage of being

by

the

one of

M. Kojeve's faithful
with such

listeners,

we

know

what can

be

gained

from

dialogue his

rigorous thinking. It is why

we

do

not

hesitate to

recommend

book strongly to
studied

believing

philosophers and

especially to theologians who are

terms a

preoccupied with the relations of truth and

history.

M. Hyppolite's, they

will see

in

what

Approaching it, after having demanding mind poses

it does
realize,

problems

today

and will

quickly

understand that the sole recourse to the intem-

porality

of

the truth is

not enough

to

resolve

that problem; moreover,

not, to tell the truth,

even

touch

upon

the essential point.

a

They

will

then,
less

to what an extent the

Master-Slave dialectic is
simple

necessary
of

and effective will

instrument for

astonished that

"understanding history"; Marxism had, by a

and

after which certain

among them
that

be

inversion

gendered

Nazism

that the parallels of

Communism

and

dialectic, en Nazism, and not the

recognized as the

pseudo-opposition of
solid point of

Communism

and

Capitalism,6

must

be

to steer himself according to the And if they do not want to despair of the world and of man, they will then be invited to seek what is truly the source of that famous dialectic, and to ask if there are not other dialectics, anterior and superior,
anyone who wishes

departure for

"meaning

history."

of

which are

as,

or even

more, necessary for

understanding

history

and

illuminat

ing

its

meaning.

Among

them, how

will

they

not

quickly discover that the

Kojeve-Fessard Documents
Pauline dialectic
of

199

and Jew has a completely different value to lead man Christ"? In short, after having courageously attended "identify M. Kojeve's school, they will be, as we are, convinced that Marxism and Hegelianism, interpreted by the most intelligent of atheists, will not only be

Pagan
with

to

himself

offered open

to a critique

which

easily

reveals

their

for them the

most magnificent

way to restoring a

fundamental errors, but will also full actuality to both the

historic

and eternal

truths of Christianity.

NOTES

1. The German whereby an 2. This

object

words

Aufhebung

and aufgehauben

in Hegel involve

threefold movement

(Translator's note.) review was originally intended to be published in Recherches philosophiques. After the demise of that journal, the review was entrusted by Kojeve to Fessard. Kojeve also gave Fessard permission to publish it along with a response if the occasion ever arose. With the advent of the
conserved and elevated.

is negated,

Second World War

publication

became

impossible,
Pierre Bayle

and

the

review

remained unpublished until

1985. (Translator's note.) 3. On this subject see the (Kojeve's note.) 4. In an article

writings of

or

Anatole France's Puits de Sainte-Claire

A. A., the Revue internationale,
or pseudo-marxist all
'Marxist,'

entitled

"Was Hegel

Marxist?",
was

signed

no.

12, January 1947, already strongly

interpretation
against of

reacted against

M. Kojeve's "neo already is more

a
correct.

existe

Hegel. "If it is true that Hegel

the criticisms directed

should also expect

Hegel

by

Marx lose their

meaning."

Nothing

M. Kojeve

that, like A. A., the Marxists, to preserve Marx's originality, will become ardent defenders of Hegel's much more ardent than a Catholic philosopher will need to be. Nothing surpris
"theism,"

ing

in this

contrast.

It is

always the

"punishment

of

the

dialectic,"

which as

Engels

states crushes

those who scom

5. "The

end

it because they ignore it. (Fessard's note.) of history is the death of Man properly speaking. After that death there
a

remains:

living
2.
a

bodies

having

human form but deprived

of

spirit, that is to say

time"

of

time or creative power;

Spirit
not

which

which,

being
will

animal

empirically exists, in the form of an inorganic, nonliving reality, as a Book (p. 388). And on p. 431 M. life, no longer has anything to do with

Kojeve tells

us that

Philosophy
Man

have disappeared
could

in the Classless Society, where "Man remains alive in harmony with which is logical since there is no longer a creative Spirit

Nature,"

but

that "the rest can be preserved indefinitely: art,

happy."

love,

play, etc.; in short, everything that

of

makes

What

love

and art

be for beings deprived

spirit,
.

but in themselves, if not the art of a bee or the love of an ape. Notre Dame, spoken of Communist man as an "animal barely
panzee,"

not only in Hegel's view, ? For having, in the pulpit of

superior

to the gorilla or chim

well avenged

Father Panici found himself

"slanderer"

called a

by

R. Garaudy. He is

by

M. Kojeve! But the latter

must expect not

only the objections of the "orthodox

thinkers"

"Trotskyites"

of

the Revue

internationale, but
Pravda's
6. Let's
recall

also the anathemas of the

of

Pensee,

to say nothing of

"condemnations."

(Fessard's note.) that capitalism is in no way

and

Weltanschauung
analogous

and

that consequently it is vain to

try

to

find between it
reminder

Communism

dialectic

to that between Communism and

Nazism. That
munist

party,

enemy of will find himself Christian

is necessary since there are still Christians who justify entering the Com least echoing its propaganda and glorifying its ideal, by thinking it is the mortal capitalism, alone capable of defeating it. Once that root of atheism is cut, Marxist man
or at
again

an

illusion

which

is derived from

true fact but interprets

it

badly. For it is true that

not produce

while capitalism,

because

it, precisely because it is not an its revolutionary ideal, which having freed man and society from Christianity, has been incapable of bridling the excesses of the appetite for gain and the will to power. So that little by
ism
and

its injustices, leads to Communism, it does ideology. The true origin of Marxism is rather liberal
of

200
little,

Interpretation
a capitalist

"state

things"

of

is bom,

against which

Marxism

rebelled and which continues

to

Communism. But Communism, inheritor of revolutionary anti-Christianity, which devel oped into systematic atheism, is much less capable of suppressing capitalism than of aggravating to the extreme the exploitation of man by man. It could only succeed and, in actuality, succeeded only
nourish

by

"generalizing"

ism

which

being
be

Marx said, "the relationship of private and creating a state capital necessarily national, changes into imperialism. "Negation of personality, of cul
as
such

property,"

civilization,"

ture,
who and

of
can

nism"

recognized

are, according to Marx himself, the signs by which "coarse commu (Oeuvres philosophiques, trans. Molitar, vol. VI, pp. 20-21). To those
of

do

not close

their eyes to reality, it is enough to denounce the falsehood

even when

the

Marxist ideal
against

Communist propaganda, capitalism. (Fessard's note.)

it

evokes

the claimed effectiveness of

its dialectic

The Place

of

Leo Strauss in

Liberal Education

Glenn N. Schram
Hammond, Indiana

It is
assume

appropriate that we

inquire into the

place which

Leo Strauss

ought to

in

liberal education, for he

gave more thought to the subject of

liberal

education

than did

any

other major political thinker of the twentieth

century.1

Though his liberal has

views on

the subject may be

disagreeable to
is

some

egalitarians, I do

not propose to criticize of

them, for I

share them.

Strauss's
liberal

account of the nature

posed

education poses no problem.

But

a problem
a

by
B.

the question

of whether

his

own work should

be included in his

education.

The

ques

tion

arisen

because

of the critique of

work

by Shadia

maintains

that

he

was a

hedonistic
and

proponent of the views of

Drury, who Thrasymachus,

I
shall

Machiavelli,
begin

and

Nietzsche

that he radically deprecated

views on

morality.

with an account of

Strauss's

them,
of a

and of related

matters; I

shall then examine

liberal education, of why I share Professor Drury's critique

with a view

to answering the
education.

question of whether

Strauss's

work should

be

part

liberal

"Liberal aristocracy

education,"

Strauss says, "is the necessary

society"

endeavor

to found an

within

democratic

mass
best"

(LAM,

p.

5 [IPP,

pp.

314-15]).

Aristocracy

means rule

by

"the

in the

sense of

those who are most vir

wisdom"

tuous; but since, according to Strauss, "virtue seems to require may assume him to mean by aristocracy rule by the virtuous and
p.

we wise

(LAM,

4 [IPP,

p.

313].

cf.

NRH,

p.

140). Since he

speaks of means

democratic
cannot

society,"

mass

and since

democracy
He
must

"aristocracy within rule by the people, he

have in

mind a pure aristocracy.

tion of aristocracy and

democracy

either a

be thinking of some combina system in which the aristocrats and

or,
what

the people each have their own house of the

legislature,

he

more

likely
which

has in mind,

given

his predominantly American readership, for

appointment

a system

in

an elite marked

by

virtue and wisdom makes available some of

its

members

for

popular election to public office or ple's

representatives.2

to such office

by

the peo

Long before reading

an

Strauss

on

liberal education, I

argued

for the

creation of

American

elite of

this kind in view of two

facts.3

First,

the United States

finds itself in
ple.4

a grave spiritual crisis which threatens

its

survival as a

free

peo

Ever

since

taken over

by

I began to hold this view, the homegrown tyranny has been

and

prospect of the country's greater

being
is

than that of
of

its takeover

by

foreign power,

today

the

difference in likelihood

the two events

interpretation, Winter

1991-92, Vol. 19, No. 2

202

Interpretation
ever, owing
not

greater than

only to

recent events

in

the
of

Soviet Union

and

Eastern Europe but

ual and social countries.

also to the continued growth at

which enable wouldbe

home

the kinds of spirit

disorder

tyrants to get control of their own

overcome

Second,

the crisis can, in my

judgment, be

only through
elite

spiritual renaissance

among the in the

all

agents of cultural
mass

formation

governmental of

ficials, teachers,
Let
plated

persons

media,

and clergymen.

The

ought, in

my view, to be trained for

me anticipate

these professions.

my conclusion by saying that for as long as I have contem these matters I have thought about the philosophical and theological be included in the
considerations
education of

works which should

future American

leaders.5

Looming

large in these
was

has been the fact that the

middle of

the

twentieth century

the time of a great

need

flowering

of political

thought in this

country, owing to
ual, social,

Americans'

to come to terms with the immense spirit

and political

disorder

of

the

century.

One

result was six masterful

books originally presented as lectures under the auspices of the Charles R. Walgreen Foundation at the University of Chicago. The books are: two an
alyses of

the

spirit of modern and

times and how it

developed, Strauss's Natural

Right

and

fenses

of

History democracy
and

Eric Voegelin's The New Science of Politics; two de from a neo-Thomist perspective, Jacques Maritain's Man

and the

State

Yves R. Simon's

Philosophy

of Democratic

Government;

and

two realistic assessments of

the National Interest and
1950.6

foreign affairs, Hans J. Morgenthau 's In Defense of George F. Kennan's American Diplomacy 1900-

All

six of these

books should, in my opinion,

help

constitute

the philosophi
elite.

cal and theological component of the education of a new

American

To

them should be added:

from

a neo-orthodox

(1) Reinhold Niebuhr's works on democracy and realism Protestant perspective, dating from the same period and

Walgreen lectures; (2) certain classics of thought, namely, Plato's Republic and, if possible, his Gorgias and Laws, Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics and excerpts from his Poli tics, selections from St. Augustine's City of God, and St. Thomas Aquinas's

having

the same motivation as the

ancient and medieval

Treatise

on

Law; (3) Strauss's

and

and

Voegelin's
of

commentaries on
and

Plato's Repub
about

lic in The
on

City

Man
said

and

Vol. 3
and

Order

History,

respectively,

which more will

be

below;
on

(4)

the classics of modern

the condition that an attempt be made to separate

liberal thought, their truth from their

error.7

As for Strauss himself

the

somewhat more prudent gentlemen:

liberal education, instead of the term elite he uses he calls the products of a liberal educa
pp.

tion gentlemen

(LAM,

pp.

6, 11 [IPP,

316, 324]). He

says

that gentlemen

differ from their inferiors

and not

by

the fact that

they

regard virtue as an end

in itself

simply

as a means

to some

other end

are marked

by

character and taste

p.

the tone their

rule

of

society (LAM,

13

(LAM, p. [IPP, p. 327]). The

(LAM, p. 12 [IPP, p. 326]). They 11 [IPP, p. 324]). Ideally, they set

ultimate

justification

of

is that their

virtue

is

a reflection of

the virtue of philosophers

(LAM,

The Place of Leo Strauss in

p.

Liberal Education
philosophers;

203

14

[IPP,

p.

328]). But they

settled,

are not the same as

they

regard

certain questions as even

whereas philosophers are

the most

important
at

questions ancient

(LAM,
p.

pp.

13-14

[IPP,

constantly re-examining pp. 328-29]). The

contemplation

end of
of

philosophy,

least
pp.

philosophy, is "disinterested

eternal"

the

(LAM,

19-20 [IPP,

337]).
which

But Professor

Drury

separate gentlemen
philosopher views

greatly overestimates the gap from philosophers and the Even if

she were

Strauss holds to he
as a

"contempt"

with which would

gentlemen.8

right,

there

be

no reason one might

to disparage rule
question

by

gentlemen as

Strauss

conceives of

them, though
works are as

his

role

in their education, especially if his

full

as she

says

they

are of challenges

to the accepted answers to questions

about good and

evil which gentlemen regard as settled.

I have already

anticipated

History
stand,

and

the

chapter on

my conclusion by saying that Natural Right and Plato's Republic in The City and Man should be
American
says
elite.

incorporated into the

education of a new

This

advice could not

however, if

what

Professor

Drury

two works is the centerpiece of her critique of

is true, for her critique of these Strauss. The heart of her book is

her Chapters 4
chapter on the

5; the heart of her Chapter 4 is its critique of Strauss's Republic; and her Chapter 5 is devoted primarily to Natural
and what she says

Right
the

and

History. If

in these two I

chapters proves

to be wrong,

charges of

Machiavellism less take

and

Nietzscheanism

which she makes

later in her

book her

will more or

care of themselves.

propose

then to concentrate on

critique of

the two works of Strauss's which I have singled out

for their

pedagogical value.

But first I

wish

to explain why, of all Strauss's works, I

have

singled them out

most

in this

way.

Strauss's

tween ancient
ern thought

important message, in my view, is that of the contrast be and modern political thought. I think that his treatment of mod
when

is too harsh
and

it

comes

to

Locke, but

that on the whole his

contrast of ancients plight of political

moderns

Western

civilization.

It is

also

is necessary to understanding the current fascinating, for he treats the history of His
contrast of ancient and
most abbreviated

thought like a story of good and evil.

modern thought can

be found in its

form in his

article

"On

Natural

Law,"9

phy?"

(WIPP,
and

ral

Right

form in his essay "What Is Political Philoso Chapter 1 [IPP, pp. 2-57]), and in most extended form in Natu History. I do not mean to say that the shorter works are mere in
more extended

summaries of

the

book, for they

doubt
a

are not.

But for

as

full

an account as possible

one must go

to the book.

brilliant philosopher, but I believe Voegelin to have been greater, chiefly because Voegelin was alive to the spiritual dimen sion of ancient political thought as Strauss was not, and because Voegelin had a Strauss
was without surer sense of

the

spiritual

disorder

at

the base of

modern political

thought. The

difference is
with

revealed

in their

conceptions of philosophy.

specifically

ancient

philosophy, Voegelin says that

Equating philosophy "philosophy by defini-

204
tion

Interpretation
has its
center

in the
of

transcendence,"

experiences of

or, in theological lan

of which

guage,

experiences

God.10

Strauss

gives several

definitions,
quest

the

following

is

typical:

"Philosophy,
of the

as quest

for wisdom, is

for

universal

knowledge, for knowledge

not possession of the

whole."

He adds,
truth"

"Philosophy
p.

truth, but

quest

for the

(WIPP,

is essentially 1 1 [IPP, pp. 4-

5]. See
The

also same

LAM,

pp.

6,

13

[IPP,
as

pp.

316, 327]).

difference
psyche,
or

can

be

shown

by

another point.

In his Republic, Plato

reason, spiritedness,

speaks of the
and appetite.

soul,

He

considers

the

soul to

consisting be well
as

of

three parts

ordered when reason

is in the
against

ascendancy,
appetite

with spiritedness

serving

its

obedient servant and

ally

(44 le). Professor

not take

Drury

writes:

Strauss does

Plato's in the

conception of the tripartite psyche

believes that Plato different kinds

was not

describing
world:

the nature of the

very seriously. He human psyche, but the

of men

the lovers of

lovers

of

honor (the

and reputation

(the

gentlemen and

knowledge (the philosophers), the statesmen), and the lovers of

pleasure

vulgar).

(P. 198)

This

statement cannot stand

p.

in the face

of

Strauss's

article

"On Natural

Law"

(SPPP,

138)

and

his

chapter on

Plato's

Republic."

But it is true that Voe

gelin places greater emphasis

than Strauss on the order of the psyche and, what

conceives of
whereas

is especially important, that Voegelin

the psyche as
not.

being

ordered

by

attunement

to transcendent reality,

Strauss does

On

a more mundane age of and

decline in the decline

of of

Thucydides

level, Voegelin has a and Plato,

philosopher.

more profound sense of

Athenian

and of the parallels

between the

Athens

that of the contemporary West. For all these reasons, I

think Voegelin the greater

America

and where

particular on

My understanding of the spiritual crisis it may lead is based largely on Voegelin's work, and in The New Science of Politics and the chapter on Plato's Republic in
much of

the third volume of Order and History. I confess that

the appeal of

Natural Right

and

History

and the chapter on the

Republic in The
works

is

as a supplement and contrast

to the two
am not a and

While I

am not a

Straussian, I

corresponding Voegelinian either,

City and Man by Voegelin.

I have

although

been influenced

more

by

Voegelin

Niebuhr than

by

Christian
book for

and a

liberal democrat. I

am unenthusiastic about are

anybody else. I am a Professor Drury's

several reasons.

The less important

of

that

sentences, that
much

it is

an

instance

the

iconoclasm

of which

it has too many runon there is far too

in the
of

history
with a

today, and that it is what Voegelin would call a positivistic ideas (notice the title, The Political Ideas of Leo Strauss), albeit one
world unfair

liberal bias. More important is the fact that the book is

show

to

Strauss,
was a

as

I hope to At the

by

comparing its
the views

quotations with what

he actually

says.

outset we noted proponent of

that, according to Professor Drury, Strauss

of

hedonistic
sche, tions
and
of

Thrasymachus, Machiavelli,

and

Nietz

he radically deprecated morality. Later we established that her allega Machiavellism and Nietzscheanism are relatively unimportant. We are

The Place of Leo Strauss in

Liberal Education

205

left, therefore,
deprecation
sion of

with

the charges of hedonistic Thrasymacheanism and

radical

of morality.

Professor

Drury

makes

the
and

first

charge

in her discus

Strauss's

chapter on and

Plato's Republic
History. We

the second charge

with

in her
of

analysis of

Natural Right

shall

begin

her discussion

the chapter on the Republic.

In my
ascribes

judgment,
and

the most shocking of the views which Professor

are

Drury

to

Strauss in this discussion

the following:

(1)

of

the

antagonists

Thrasymachus

Socrates, Thrasymachus has

not

the better argument about jus

natural order of

tice;

(2)

Socrates does

hold justice to be "the

natural

the human
of oneself

psyche or

any

such

as opposed

to others; and

fiction"; (3) "the only (4) philosophy

own sake.

good"

is the benefit
kind
of

understood as a

eros, and not

justice, is choiceworthy for its

hedonistic Thrasymacheanism. Professor
pages which each

Taken together, these

to Strauss
ascription

views add

up to

Drury

ascribes

the

first three

views

on

two successive

(pp. 76-77). I it

plan

to

quote

directly

the

and the context

in

separately, showing in he actually says. This procedure may be considered exemplary for any future analysis of her treatment of his work. Superscript numbers in the quoted matter are in her text. It should be kept in
occurs and then to examine each alleged view
she

instance how

distorts

what

mind

that in the Republic Thrasymachus avers that "the just is nothing else than
stronger,"

the advantage of the

particularly the
what she says:

established government (338c-

339a). Here, then, is

that

The originality Socrates does

"remains

of

Strauss's interpretation

of

Plato's Republic

rests

in his

claim

not refute

Thrasymachus;
friends
and

on the contrary,

Thrasymachus's
view

principle

victorious."106

Nor does Socrates

deny

Polymarchus's
Nor does he

that

justice

consists

in

the morally

just life is the

moral

benefiting happy

harming

enemies.

prove that or that

life

or that

justice benefits the just man,

justice (in the

Neoplatonism.

orthodox views

sense) is a good that is choiceworthy for its own about the Republic are fictions inherited from Christian
could

sake.107

Such

Nothing

be further from the

truth.
beast,"

[W]hereas Thrasymachus is depicted

and
"innocent."108

as a "wild

Socrates is

naive

But this does

Thrasymachus. He knew that

fool Strauss. It certainly did not fool Socrates was a "dissembler, a man who pretends to
not

be ignorant

while

in fact he knows
"clever
and

things

well."'09

very

Far from

being

naive and

innocent, Socrates is

tricky.""0

Strauss

admires the

"cleverness

with which

Socrates

argued

badly

on

purpose,""2

in

order to show

Thrasymachus that he is right, but

that Thrasymachus's

not

going
this

about

things the

right

way. could

Strauss

explains

realization of

have

made

Thrasymachus is

"tamed"

him willing to listen silently to Socrates. "refuted.""4 by Socrates, but he is not

.

is the only thing that Strauss insists that

According
the contrary,

to

Strauss, Thrasymachus's

view of

justice is far from "savage";

on

it is

"highly

respectable.""5

206

Interpretation
Strauss
contends that the
a product of

Republic
or of

substantiates the view that

convention."7

justice is
to

fabrication,

art,

human

Contrary

popular

belief,

Socrates found nothing natural about justice. It is human psyche or any such fiction. Justice
everyone's
good.""9

not the natural order of the

.

inevitably
which

conflicts with

inclination to

prefer their

[sic]

own

benefit,

is "the only

natural

The first four

assertion about

paragraphs of

this quotation

all relate

to Professor
a

Drury 's

that, Strauss, justice than Socrates. Strauss does indeed say, as she maintains in the first paragraph of the quotation, that Thrasymachus's principle "remains victo
according to
makes
rious"

Thrasymachus

better

argument

(CM,

p.

84). There is
not

also some truth

in her

assertion

in the third

para

graph that

Strauss does
speaks of

hold Thrasymachus to be

"refuted"

by

Socrates.12

But Strauss

the victory and nonrefutation of Thrasymachus as occur

ring only in the exchange between Thrasymachus and Socrates in the first book of the Republic. Strauss nowhere denies that in the Republic as a whole So
crates refutes

Thrasymachus. Professor
this

Drury

clearly
to the

conveys

the impression
of the

that Strauss

makes

denial,

and

her

reference

first book
this

Repub

lic

immediately

before the

quoted matter

does

not alter

example,

at the end of the

views about

first

paragraph she speaks of

. . .

fact. When, for Strauss as rejecting

in the Republic

"orthodox
nism,"

the Republic

inherited from Christian Neoplato

performance

she as a whole.

is speaking

of views about

Socrates's

Several
tive

other points should

be

made about

Strauss's true

views on the rela of

merits of

the arguments of
about

Socrates

and

Thrasymachus. The list

So
says

crates's

beliefs

justice

which

Professor Drury, in the first paragraph,

eyes of

remain unproved

by

Socrates in the

Strauss,

are not even mentioned on

the page which she cites in her Note 107. To be sure, Strauss says on this page that Socrates considers his proof of the
general

"goodness

justice"

of

to be

"radically
bottom
of

inadequate,"

the

page

he

but Strauss is referring to but writes that "we cannot yet say
cites,
not

one short proof; at the

with

definiteness that

justice is

good."13

Similarly, Professor Drury is

wide of

the mark in Paragraph

4. On the but

page which she

Thrasymachus's

view of

justice, but

an

opinion of which savage even

highly

it is the consequence, is said to be "not only not manifestly The opinion is the commonplace one that
respectable."

justice

in obeying the law (CM, p. 75). Professor Moreover, Drury overlooks a passage on one of the very pages cited in her Note 1 14 in which Strauss explicitly states that, in the Republic as a
consists

Thrasymachus. Strauss writes: "One is Plato's version of the Unjust Speech in [Thrasymachus] version as his of contrast to Socrates the Just Speech, with the understanding that whereas in the Clouds the Unjust Speech is victorious in speech, in the Republic the Just Speech is victorious in The reference to the
whole, Socrates wins
argument with might

his

say that he

speech."14

play by Aristophanes, need that Strauss terms Socrates victorious.

Clouds,

not concern us.

The important

point

is

The Place of Leo Strauss in

In fairness it
must

Liberal Education

207
one

be

said that on

the same page there is a passage that

there. Although the passage could be read as support her position, Professor Drury fails to quote it. It reads: "Plato makes it very easy for us to loathe Thrasymachus: for all ordinary purposes we ought to
might well wish were not

ing

loathe
deeds
to be

people who act and speak

and never

like Thrasymachus

and never

to imitate their

to act according to their speeches. But there are other purposes

considered"

(CM,

p.

74). One

might well

wish

that at the very least

Strauss had

explained what

those other purposes

are.

If Professor
argument,
she

Drury
also

augments
of

distorts Strauss's meaning about the quality this distortion by misleading the Socrates's intention. At issue begin
with

of

Socrates's

reader about
and

Strauss's interpretation
third
paragraphs.

are

the second

We

shall
on

the second. None

of

the terms applied to

Socrates is to be found
all the

the single page cited in her Notes

108, 109,

and

10;

terms can,
makes

Drury

however, be found two pages later (CM, p. 77). Professor it sound as if Plato, in Strauss's interpretation, depicts Socrates as
in fact Strauss
she makes

"innocent,"

whereas
cent."

says that

Socrates

considers

himself "inno

More

importantly,

it

seem as

least may apply, the terms "dissembler, a man and to Socrates, whereas in fact Strauss
tricky"

if Strauss himself applies, or at who etc., and "clever

pretends,"

says

that

Socrates has these

the source of

traits in the eyes of Thrasymachus. She

the view of

makes

especially

unclear

Socrates

as

"clever

tricky."

and

Then,
from the

at the

beginning
any

of the third

paragraph, she plainly

argued

says

that "Strauss
"

admires the

'cleverness

with which

Socrates

badly

purpose.'

on

Apart

question of

possible

such cleverness

is

ascribed

admiration, Strauss's text is unclear whether to Socrates by Strauss himself or by Thrasymachus

problematic

(CM,
a

p.

84). But

even

if Strauss himself holds the

view, he

reveals

perfectly innocent reason on the next page, where he writes, "What Socrates does in the Thrasymachus section would be inexcusable if he had not done it in
order to provoke

the

passionate reaction of argues

Glaucon

(CM,
so

p.

85). Strauss

thinks

that, if Socrates
of

badly

on

purpose, he does

to further the

development
chus,
as

the

dialogue,

not

to convey a hidden meaning to Thrasyma

Professor

Drury

maintains

later in the third

paragraph.

The

upshot of

that, contrary to her sugges tion, Strauss does not regard Socrates as a tricky dissembler who argues badly in order to tell Thrasymachus that he secretly agrees with him.
our analysis of

the second and third paragraphs is

We

come now

to the fifth paragraph and Professor Drury's assertion

not

that,
one's

according the human

own

to

Strauss, Socrates does

hold justice to be "the

and

natural order of
good"

fiction,"

any such benefit. Professor Drury derives from the first

sentence of

psyche or

"the only

natural

is

what she says about

justice

as a natural

order

the paragraph, where she maintains

that, in the
nature,

opinion of

Strauss,

the Republic teaches justice to be a product,

not of

but

of art or convention.

She bases this

sentence are

in turn

on

three pages which

she cites

in her Note 117. The first two

is in Natural Right
and

in Strauss's

chapter on of

the Repub

lic,

and the third

History. On the first

the three pages

208

Interpretation
indeed find the idea that "justice
arose"

one can

out

of

laws

made

by

the

majority;

i.e.,

out of convention

idea

not to

Socrates but to

(CM, Glaucon, who

p.

87). Strauss, however, attributes the expresses it as part of a case which he

Socrates to
make a

makes against

justice in

order to persuade

strong

case

for it.

The only
the
rulers of

reference

to justice on the second page occurs in a discussion of

the best city. For

common good

its

sake"

own

them, Strauss says, justice "as dedication to the is neither art nor eros; it does not appear to be choiceworthy for (CM, p. 102). Why it is not art I do not know. It is not eros

presumably because the love of the rulers for the city is erotic (eros). It does not seem choiceworthy for its own
cause

friendly (philia),
sake good of the

not

presumably be

the

rulers

identify (correctly,
(41 2d). Whatever

we

may assume) the

their
mean

own good

else this obscure passage

regards

city with it does not means,

that in Strauss's view Socrates

justice

as conventional rather than

natural.

The Strauss
uct of

page calls

in Natural Right
"conventionalism,"

and

History is
p.

part

of a

discussion

of what a prod

which not nature

with

does indeed think justice to be

106). But this idea is

convention,

(NRH,

not one which

conventionalism comes

shares

very close to saying her denial of the fact that in Strauss's

natural order of
Law"

elsewhere.'5

Strauss's Socrates, as Professor Drury herself So much then for the ultimate bases of
mind

Socrates

regards

justice

as

the

the soul. Strauss affirms this

p.

fact both in his

and

article

"On Natu
(p. 127).
to be

ral

(SPPP,

138)

and elsewhere

in Natural Right

History

Professor Drury's
one's own single

charge that

benefit

can

Strauss deems "the only natural be dealt with quite briefly, for it rests on the
page occurs

good"

citation of a

page.

On that

this

sentence:

"Glaucon

thus

rejoins

Thrasymachus in

holding

that the good

of

tion,

more or

less concealed,

life is the tyrannical life, the exploita society or convention for one's own benefit

alone, i.e. for the only

good"

natural as

(CM,

p.

88). But Strauss here is

not and

expressing the controverted idea Thrasymachus. We thus Professor

ing"

his own; he is ascribing it to Glaucon in it

about three of

conclude our analysis of the extended quotation of

Drury

and of what she says

the four "most

of

shock

views which she attributes to

Strauss in her discussion

and not

his

chapter on

the Republic. We may now proceed to the

phy

understood as a

kind

of

eros,

fourth view, which is that philoso justice, is choiceworthy for its own
Strauss
when she writes of

sake.

Professor

Drury

plainly

ascribes this view to

"the

philosopher"

with whom she

siders

choiceworthy for its

own sake and

holds Strauss to identify, "The only thing he con is the philosophic eros or the pleasures of
conversation"

(Drury, p. 81). If philosophy is for its own justice cannot be such a thing. In sake, thing choiceworthy this context she accuses Strauss of hedonism. She makes an explicit charge of
contemplation,
the only

friendship

hedonism

on

the basis

of a an

questionable

interpretation
as eros

of several

pages

in

Strauss's On Tyranny. But

assertion that

implicit

charge of

hedonism is
to

contained
end

in her

Strauss

considers

philosophy

be the only

in itself.

The Place of Leo Strauss in

In

Liberal Education

209

support of this assertion she cites two pages where

eros. of

Strauss does indeed

"quest for

speak of

philosophy as knowledge of the idea

equated with what
neither

But he

speaks of philosophic eros as

good"

the

(CM,

p.

112). Such
erotic

a quest cannot

be
but

Voegelinian Platonists

call

"the

longing

for

God,"

is it the
justice"

same as

"contemplation, friendship
idea
of

conversation."

and

More

over,

while

Strauss

goes on to speak of the

p.

the good as "higher than the

idea
of

of

(CM,

112),

this

fact does

not mean that

he denies the is

status

justice

as an end

in itself.

Later Professor
"philosophical
order of or erotic

Drury

maintains that

for Strauss

there

such

thing

as

justice"

the soul.

(pp. 84-85). Such justice is not, however, the natural "Philosophical justice is indistinguishable from the hedonistic
philosopher"

life

of

the

(p. 85). She

goes on to repeat

her

charge that

for Strauss philosophy ("or philosophical justice") is the only thy for its own sake (p. 85). As evidence for these assertions
more not

good choicewor

she cites several

pages, only in Strauss's chapter on the Republic but also in On Tyr anny and Strauss's The Argument and the Action of Plato's Laws; but the sources fail to support her case. So as not to tax the patience of the reader and
exceed

the bounds of an article, I shall not examine each citation in writing, as

until

I have generally done up

most

now; I
not

shall

deal

with

only the
which

passage that
we are

is

germane,

even though

it is

in the

work

with

at

the

moment

primarily concerned, the chapter on the Republic. In On Tyranny Strauss (1) attributes to Socrates the idea that

wisdom

is the

highest good, (2) identifies wisdom with "the and (3) refers to "the specific pleasures of the wise, such as, for example, friendly (OT, pp. 87-88). But even if we accept Professor Drury's assumption that
discussion"

philosopher,"

Strauss's Socrates
has
a

speaks

for Strauss, this

passage

fails to

prove that

Strauss
of

hedonistic

conception of

rather

than its essence) or

philosophy (pleasure can be a byproduct that he considers pleasure to be the highest

it

good

(wisdom is obviously not the same as pleasure). If we assume that Strauss's Socrates speaks for Strauss, the passage does prove that Strauss regards philos ophy
end as wisdom more

highly

than

justice,

even

justice

as

the

natural order of

the soul, but this

proposition

is

quite uncontroversial.

For justice

can still

be

an

in itself

without

being

the highest good; though wisdom

i.e.,
ranks

wisdom and

justice

can

both

be

ends

in themselves,
and

even

higher.

In

another work with which we are not at

the moment primarily concerned,

Natural Right
sic natural
ism"

right,"

with which

History, Strauss clearly rejects hedonism. He says of "clas he plainly identifies, that it rejects "conventional
of the good with

and with

it the identification
is

the pleasant. He writes,

"The thesis

of the classics
good

is that the

pleasant, that the

more

good is essentially different from the fundamental than the (NRH, p. 126).

pleasant"

We may therefore conclude not only that Professor Drury fails to show that Strauss holds philosophy as a kind of eros, and not justice, to be choiceworthy for its own sake, but also that independent evidence exists against Strauss's

holding

this view.

210

Interpretation
we

Before dispel kinds

leave the

chapter on the

Republic,

an attempt should

be

made

to

possible confusion
of

justice

and that

arising from the facts that the Republic Strauss does not consider participation in

speaks of

two

the second

kind to be choiceworthy for its own sake. It is true that the Republic teaches justice to be the natural order of the soul. More particularly, it teaches that the
soul

is just

when each of

its three

parts performs

its function
function

well.

But it

also

teaches that there is

a parallel

between the

soul and

the city, so that the city

which

is

just his

when each of

its three

classes performs well the

pp.

it is best
makes

suited to perform

(441d. Cf. CM,

108-9). As

result, everybody

proper contribution to the common good.

Strauss repeatedly questions (1) the parallel (because it is based on an "ab from eros") (CM, pp. 109, 111, 138) and, more importantly, (2) the status of participation in the second kind of justice as choiceworthy for its own
straction
sake

from the

standpoint of
city.16

the individual faced

with

the question of

whether

to

do his

duty

to his

Moreover,
they
from

Strauss

repeats

his

questionings on

the last

page of the
order

chapter,

where

are

especially

obvious.

point all

this out

in

to prevent the reader

being

surprised

by

what

Strauss in fact does

say.

Turning

to Professor Drury's critique of Natural Right

and

History,

we

find
with

that she makes two major charges there. The

a version of

first is that Strauss identifies

which knows no rules of morality for guid it knows officials; ing only a hierarchy of ends to be wisely pursued, any one of which may be the chief object of pursuit owing to the circumstances of the situation at hand (Drury, pp. 98-103, esp. p. 101; cf.

"classic

right"

natural

governmental

NRH,

pp.

157-63). Although
action"

she quotes

Strauss

valid rules of
action"

when

in fact he

says

saying that "there are no that "there are no universally valid

as
right"

rules of

(Drury p. 101; NRH, p. 162, emphasis added), I think the charge to be largely true. I also think this version of "classic natural to be for I with the version which does know universally valid mistaken, identify
rules, Thomistic
sible or
natural

law. But I do
since

not

think

Strauss's
he

version to

be indefen Professor

outrageous, especially

he tempers it in

ways which

Drury

overlooks.

He implies
be
p.

universal rules when

writes:

Natural

right must

mutable

in

order to

be

able to cope with the

inventiveness

of

wickedness.

(NRH,

161)
sense and

The true

statesman

in the Aristotelian

takes his bearings

by

the normal

situation and

by

what

is normally right,
order to save

normally
p.

right

only in

he reluctantly deviates from what is the cause of justice and humanity itself. (NRH,

162)
I do
not

Consequently,
serious.

think Professor

Drury's first

major charge

to be

very
radi-

Her

second major

charge,

however, is

quite serious.

It is that Strauss

The Place of Leo Strauss in

Liberal Education

21 1

cally deprecates morality, however conceived. Moreover, she bases this charge in part on the two most problematic passages in Natural Right and History. If
the book
assume
can

survive this

charge, therefore, it

can

survive anything.
are

If

we

that the book and the chapter on the Republic

most significant

Strauss's

ped-

agogically
these two

works,

and

thus the only works of his that many

students are

likely
which

to read, a defense of the book ought to

works.

But first let I

us examine the charge.

be based primarily on It is contained in two

paragraphs,

shall quote complete with superscript numbers:

as the
end61
. . .

stands

For Strauss, moral virtue stands in relation to intellectual virtue in relation to the philosopher, one is a means, the other the
virtue

city

Moral

is therefore
view

not a noble
a radical

Strauss's does

implies

way of life desirable for its own sake. deprecation of In the course of his
. .

morality.62

exchange with

enjoy "intellectual

not

Jacob Klein, Strauss a particularly high is

not
virtue."64

admits that

in his

scheme of things
as

status.63

Indeed, for Strauss,

dignity"

morality for his Aristotle,

perfection"

"does

not require moral

than moral perfection, it only "higher in This means that intellectual excellence can be
with

attained

by

one who

does

not

bother

morality

or the

"vulgar

virtue."65

Strauss's
human

contempt

for the morally

p.

virtuous man takes on extreme proportions when

he describes the just

being!"66

or moral man who

is

not also a philosopher as a

"mutilated

(Drury,

105)

Before

we examine

the evidence that Professor

Drury

musters

to support

these assertions,

let

us

look

at some counter evidence. says

In the
whom

chapter on the

Republic, Strauss repeatedly

considers to possess

that "the

philosopher,"

he presumably

"intellectual

just his

man

(CM,

pp.

115, 127,

philosopher possesses
spiritedness and

is a just man indeed, the only 135). We may assume him to mean that the the first kind of justice, so that his reason is in control of
a moral person. and

perfection,"

appetite, making him

Thus,

whatever

their

precise

right,"

morality go together. As for Natural Right and History, Strauss says in it that "classic natural with which our analysis has shown him to identify, considers man to be
constituted

relationship, "intellectual

perfection"

"so

that he

cannot achieve
impulses.' "

the perfection of his nature without the

own

coercion of

his 'lower
p.

This language is Professor Drury's

paraphrase

(Drury,

93). As life is

evidence she might

elucidation

quote, these
ral

statements

from Strauss's
. . .

have quoted, but did not of the tenets of "classic natu

a well-ordered or

right": "The

good

the

life that flows from

healthy
man

soul"

(NRH,

p.

127),

which and

is

"incomparably

the

most admirable

hu

phenomenon"

(p. 128);

the perfection of man's nature "includes the

justice"

social virtue par excellence,

(p. 129). from

a

Finally, let
life to

us

look

at a sentence

third work, Strauss's Studies in

Platonic Political Philosophy: "The

philosopher

is the

man who

dedicates his
quest"

the quest for knowledge of the good, of the

idea

of

the good; what we

would call moral virtue

(p. is only the condition or by-product of that 172). While Strauss here clearly ranks philosophy higher than morality, he

212

Interpretation
describes philosophy for knowledge of the good; and he going together, not necessarily in a means-end by-product of philosophy). The sentence thus
as a quest

nonetheless

sees philosophy and morality as relationship (morality may be a puts Strauss's conception of the relationship between philosophy and morality into a perspective somewhat different from that afforded by Professor Drury.

Of the
and

pages most

that she cites

in

support of

found

to be more or less beside the

her assertions, I have examined all point. The cited pages, however,

potentially quite devastating. Again to stay within the bounds of an article, I shall deal with only these two passages, both of which are in Natural Right and History, and a third in whose light they should
contain two passages that are

be

seen.

In her Notes

61, 65,

and

66, Professor Drury

cites

inter

alia a page

where

this passage appears:

If striving for knowledge of the eternal truth is the ultimate end of man, justice moral virtue in general can be fully legitimated only by the fact that they are required for the sake of that ultimate end or that they are conditions of the
philosophic

and

life. From this

point of view the man who

without

being

a philosopher appears as a mutilated

.

is merely just human being.

. .

or moral
.

It

becomes
merely

a question whether

what

Aristotle
p.

calls moral virtue

is not, in fact,

political or vulgar virtue.

(NRH,

151)
64:

The

following
natural

passage occurs on

the pages cited in Professor Drury's Note

The

law

which

is knowable to the in the

unassisted

human

mind and which

prescribes

chiefly

actions

strict sense

is

related

to,

or

natural end of

man; that end is twofold: moral perfection

founded upon, the and intellectual perfection;

intellectual
virtue.'7

perfection

is higher in

dignity

than moral perfection; but intellectual

reason

perfection or wisdom, as unassisted

human

knows it, does

not require moral

In the

following
and
us

analysis second

these two

passages will

be

referred to as

"the first

passage"

"the

passage,"

respectively.

Let

begin

by

in it Strauss
phasis

says that

reading the first passage very carefully and recognizing that "moral virtue in general can be fully (em
legitimated"

added) only
as

as a means to the end of philosophy: own sake.

it

can

legitimated first
"moral

choiceworthy for its

Consequently,
second passage are

thus be partially Professor Drury's

paragraph stands

largely

refuted.

In the

Strauss

says that

perfection"

and

"intellectual

perfection"

both

components of the

relationship may be in other respects, there in one respect are equal. Here we find some evidence against the fore, they radical deprecation of morality to which Professor Drury refers in her second
natural end of man: whatever their paragraph.

Any

further

exegesis of the

two passages must take place in the light

of a

The Place of Leo Strauss in

third passage, which occurs in

Liberal Education

213

Strauss's
passage

chapter on

Aristotle's Politics in The Professor Drury's

cita

City
In

and

Man. I

was

led to the

by

another of case.

tions, but it
order

works against rather

than for

her

It

reads:
must start

to grasp the ground of Aristotle's procedure, one

man

from the facts

that according to him the highest end of

or

by

nature

philosophy and this perfection does not require just and noble deeds as choiceworthy for their own
that man's proper, toward

is theoretical understanding moral virtue as moral virtue, i.e.

sake.

It

goes without

saying

highest

end cannot

be

achieved without actions

resembling

moral actions

but the his

end.

actions
.

in

question are

intended

by

the philosopher as mere means

halfway
least,

For Plato, what Aristotle calls moral virtue is a kind of house between political or vulgar virtue which is in the service of bodily
self-preservation or

well-being (of
animates

peace)

and genuine virtue which, to

say the

only

the philosophers as

philosophers.18

Here Strauss
refer to

uses

the term "moral

virtue"

in

a restricted sense:

he

uses

it to

just

contrary to is choiceworthy for its

virtue"

choiceworthy for their own sake. Again Professor Drury's first paragraph, he does not deny that "moral
and noble

deeds that

are

own

sake; it is

so

by

definition. What he denies

is that philosophy requires "moral philosophy depends on what for practical tue";
ends

virtue"

as

such.

He

goes on same as

to say that

purposes

is the

"moral

vir

i.e., just

and noble

deeds, but just

and noble

deeds committed,
second passage

not as

in themselves, but as means to philosophy. In the light of this fact three changes occur: (1) the
Professor

becomes in her
require

quite

innocent, (2) Drury becomes misleading second paragraph that for Strauss "intellectual
virtue,"

when she says

perfection

does

not

"moral

next sentence
who

becomes downright wrong when (3) that for Strauss "intellectual excellence can be
and

she

she says
attained

in the

by

one

does

not

bother

morality."

with

As for her
with

attribution

to

Strauss in the it
should

same sentence of an equation of

morality

"vulgar

virtue,"

be

clear

from both the first

as

and of

the third

passage

that Strauss regards "vulgar

not

virtue"

but

one

kind

morality, and as a to "vulgar

very

vulgar

kind

at that.

Whether "moral

virtue"

is

virtue,"

reducible

as

Strauss

suggests

it
no

may be in the first passage, is indeed questionable, but the grave cause for offense. We have
yet to

suggestion

is

deal

with

three of Professor Drury's assertions, all in her

assertion

second paragraph cal

deprecation

morality,"

of

her summary her

that "Strauss's view

implies

a radi

assertion

that Strauss admits to not regarding that

morality particularly highly,

unphilosophical man as a

and

her

assertion

he

portrays the moral

but

In view, not only of all but also of some her evidence, quality allegation cannot and Strauss's admis the counter evidence, stand, summary important.19 His use in the first passage of the term "mutilated sion is not very
"mutilated human
that

being."

has just been

said about the

of

human

being"

in the way

which

Professor

Drury

describes is indeed

unfortu-

214

Interpretation
cause

nate, but it is insufficient the hands

of

for

keeping

Natural Right

and

History

out of

impressionable

undergraduates.

It is true that to

save

the book I

have had to rely

sage

nificant chapter on

on a passage from Strauss's pedagogically rather insig Aristotle's Politics, but teachers could easily bring the pas into classroom discussions of Natural Right and History.

heavily

I thus

conclude that

both Natural Right

and

History

and

Strauss's

chapter on endow

the Republic should

a

be incorporated into

liberal

education

intended to

this

gentlemanly elite with the country. In reaching this

wherewithal conclusion

to initiate a spiritual renaissance in

rather

I have dealt

fessor Drury's book, but I hope to have dealt more dealt with Strauss's work. It should be added that from somebody who has read his students, and that she has
I have
said

fairly

with

severely with Pro it than she has

one cannot

help learning
Strauss
and

as an

extensively

as she

in the

works of

nothing

about

engaging her belief that Strauss

length,20

style.

was an esoteric

writer,

even

though she elaborates on

it

at great

because I

am not convinced

that it

expanding on economy so careful as he should have been to distinguish he was not length; clearly between his own views and those of the participants in dialogues which he was analyzing; he did not always say everything that was on his mind; his
wrote with an

is true. Strauss

of expression rather than

points at

prose

is

at times

obscure; he

was an

elitist;

and

he did

not

believe in

religion or

identify

with conventional morality. of

But

not even all this

taken together adds

up to a state ical initiates

things in which he said one

thing

to a small

group

of philosoph

and

people who might

something happen upon his

as

else

to gentlemen and any members of the common

work.

Although he despaired,
made a powerful case not
it.21

I do not,

of

just for

revelation

reconciling but for

right"

reason and a

revelation, he
of

literal interpretation
he did

Moreover,
himself

the version of "classic natural

with which us

he identified is
not con

not so vacuous as sider

Professor

Drury

would

have

believe,

and

In short, he is not a dangerous writer, though one might regret his failure to temper his elitism by urging upon elites a religiously grounded humility.
above morality.

NOTES

The

following

abbreviations will

be

used

CM: Leo Strauss. The

HPP: Leo Strauss

City

and

Man. Chicago:
eds.

and

Joseph Cropsey,

in citing books written or edited by Strauss: University of Chicago Press, 1978. History of Political Philosophy. 3d ed. Chicago:

Chicago Press, 1987. IPP: An Introduction to Political Philosophy: Ten Essays by Leo Strauss, edited by Hilail Gildin. Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1989. This book is an enlarged version of Political Philosophy: Six Essays by Leo Strauss, edited by Hilail Gildin. Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill, 1975. The book is mainly a collection of previously published articles and chapters by Strauss.

University

of

It

will

be

cited

in

parentheses after

the citation of the original work.

and

LAM: Leo Strauss. Liberalism Ancient

Modern. Ithaca, NY: Cornell

University Press,

1989.

The Place of Leo Strauss in

NRH: Leo Strauss. Natural Right
1968.
and

Liberal Education

'215

History. Chicago:

University

OT: Leo Strauss. On Tyranny. Revised

and enlarged edition.

of Chicago Press, 1953. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press,

SPPP: Leo Strauss. Studies in Platonic Political Philosophy. Chicago: 1983. WIPP: Leo Strauss. What Is Political Philosophy?
cago
and

University of Chicago Press, University

2 (IPP,
of

Other Studies. Chicago:

in

Chi

Press, 1988.
views on

Strauss's 45). For

a
Education,"

liberal

education are contained

LAM, Chapters 1

and

pp. 311

detailed

Walter Nicgorski, "Leo Strauss and Liberal Interpretation: A Journal of Political Philosophy, 13, No. 2 (May 1985), 233-50.
analysis of these

writings,

see

2. Strauss

considers

these systems or variations thereon

in LAM,

pp.

12, 15, 18 (IPP,

pp.

326,

330, 335-36).
3. "On the Education
ter
of a

Democratic

Elite,"

Dialog: A Journal of Theology, 18, No. 1 (Win

1979), 32-37.
History,"

4. I have argued this point most recently in "Western Civilization in the Light of the Philoso Modern Age, 33, No. 3 (Fall 1990), 249-58. I developed the point fully for the phy of first time in "Eric Voegelin, the Christian Faith, and the American Dialog: A Journal
University,"

Theology, 16, No. 2 (Spring 1977), 130-35. On how Strauss's followers view "the crisis of see Kenneth L. Deutsch and Walter Soffer, eds., The Crisis of Liberal Democ racy: A Straussian Perspective (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1988).
of

liberal

democracy,"

my "Reinhold Niebuhr and Contemporary Political Thought: A Re Interpretation: A Journal of Political Philosophy, 6, No. 1 (Fall 1976), 65-77; "Progressivism and Political Science: The Case of Charles E. Interpretation: A Journal
conclusions of
Article,"

5. See the

view

Merriam,"

of Political Philosophy,
Elite."

8, No. 3 (May 1980), 174-87;

Strauss's
and

and

"On the Education

of a

Democratic

6. For Voegelin

a comparison of

on

Machiavelli

Modernity,"

and

66. Simon's book

review of

also contains a good

Voegelin's views on modernity, see my "Strauss and Modern Age, 31, Nos. 3-4 (Summer-Fall 1987), 261discussion of the nature and functions of authority. A in WIPP,
are
Voegelin,"

the book

by

Strauss is

reprinted

sidered:

Morgenthau, Kennan, Niebuhr,

on

and

17-21. Other books based

Walgreen lectures

306-11. See also my "Realism Recon The Cresset, 50, No. 2 (December 1986), Strauss's Thoughts on Machiavelli, John H.
pp.

Hallowell's The Moral Foundation of Democracy, and Clinton Rossiter 's The American Presi dency. Kurt Riezler, whom Strauss eulogizes in WIPP, Chapter 10, also gave a series of Walgreen

lectures, published 1954), 1-55.

7. For
an

as

"Political Decisions in Modern

Society,"

Ethics, 64, No. 2, Part II (January

Pornography,"

example of such an

attempt, see my "John Stuart Mill

and

The

Cresset, 49, No. 5 (March 1986), 24-25. 8. Shadia B. Drury, The Political Ideas of Leo Strauss (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1988), I pp. 82, 248. Although Stephen Holmes describes this book as a "marvellously clear
hope to 9.
article

overview,"

show

that its clarity was purchased at a great

price

in

accuracy.

See his 'Truths for

the

Philosophers is

Alone?"

Times

Originally

published

No. 4,522 (December 1-7, 1989), 1319. in the International Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences in 1968,

Literary Supplement,

in SPPP, Chapter 6. 10. Eric Voegelin, Order and History, Vol. 2, The World of the Polis (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1957), p. 275.
reprinted

11

CM,

p.

109. A
which

shorter version of

Strauss 's

chapter on

Plato 's Republic

can

be found in the

for HPP (IPP, pp. 167-245). 12. It should be pointed out, however, that in the only actual use of the word refuted on the five pages to which Professor Drury refers in her Note 114 Strauss speaks of Thrasymachus
chapter on

Plato

Strauss

wrote

as

being

refuted, rather than as not refuted, at one point in the Republic

unimportant

(CM,

p.

83). This fact,

while

relatively Strauss.

in itself, is indicative

of

the care

with which

Professor

Drury

quotes

seventh

13. CM, p. 83. Emphasis added. Cf. what Strauss says later (CM, p. 129): "By the end of the book justice has come to sight fully. Socrates has performed the duty laid upon him by

216

Interpretation
and

Glaucon

Adeimantus to
and

show

that justice is

choiceworthy for its

Professor Drury's
without

own sake, regardless of

its

consequences,

therefore that it is unqualifiedly preferable to

passage

injustice."

14. CM,
cannot

p.

74. This
to

patently

contradicts

assertion

later in her

book,

with reference to

her Chapter 4,

which we are now

examining, that for Strauss "the 'Just

Speech'

be
"

required

give a rational account of

itself

being

destroyed

by

the 'Unjust

Speech'

(Drury, p. 180). 15. Drury, p. 93; note

"Socratic"

the last

paragraph on

"classic

right,"

natural

which

Professor

Drury

describes
16.
what

as
pp.

(p. 90).
see also

CM,

128, 138;
calls

CM,

p.

102. Just
"political

as

the first kind of justice is not the same as

Professor justice
us

Drury
are

"philosophical

justice,"

so the second
justice."

kind, contrary

to what one might

expect, is not the same as what she

political would see

calls

The

concepts of philosophical and

the creations, not of Strauss in his

of

chapter on

the Republic (as Professor

Drury
also

have
p.

believe), but mainly

pp.

Professor

Drury

herself. See

Drury,

pp.

80, 84-85; but

OT,

94.
163-64. Professor

17. NRH,
require moral more

Drury

quotes

the last five

words of

this passage ("does not

virtue") three times in her

conclusion

(pp. 198, 200, 201). It

is, therefore,

all the

important that the meaning of the words be explained. 18. CM, pp. 26-27'. On the distinction between "vulgar
p.

virtue"

and genuine

virtue, see also

Strauss,"

NRH,

121.
admission occurs

19. The

in "A
of

Giving

of

Accounts: Jacob Klein

and

Leo

an ex

change published cited

St. John's College, Annapolis, MD, 22, No. 1 (April 1970), 4, in Professor Drury's Note 63. This exchange adds little or nothing to what we already know
in The College
passages

from the "That the

on, how

just

examined.

The

key

passage and

in the

exchange

is this is

statement

by

Strauss:

philosophic

life, especially

as

Plato

Aristotle

understood

it, is

not possible without

and so

self-control and a can

few

other virtues almost goes without saying. question

If

a man

habitually drunk,

he think? But the

is, if

these virtues are understood only as subservient to

virtues."

philosophy and for its sake, then that is no longer a moral understanding of the 20. Drury, Preface and Chapters 1, 2, and 10, especially p. 191. Professor Drury also thinks believes that Plato uses that Strauss interprets Plato as an esoteric writer. She writes,
"
.Strauss

Thrasymachus

as

his

mouthpiece"

(p. 26). I hope that the

foregoing

21. Leo Strauss, "The Mutual Influence of Theology and nal of Philosophy, 3 (1979), 116-18 (IPP, pp. 305-10). Cf. SPPP,

Philosophy,"

study disproves this assertion. The Independent Jour

p.

151.

Book Review

John

Locke, Questions Concerning the Law of Nature, Horwitz, Jenny Strauss Clay, and Diskin Clay (Ithaca University Press. 1990), x + 260 pp., $29.95.
Will Morrisey

edited and

by

Robert H.

London: Cornell

Locke begins this

for the
and,
as

existence of

work by restating the argument the Apostle Paul makes God: "Since god shows himself everywhere present to us

course will

it were, forces himself upon men's eyes, as much now in the constant of nature as in the once frequent testimony of miracles, I believe there
no

be

one,

who recognizes

that either some rational account of our

life is

necessary
vice,
work upon

or that there exists

who will not conclude

something deserving for himself that god

the name of either virtue or

exists"

(p. 95). Locke

ends

the

equally firm moral tone: "the interest, but interest follows from
an scholars

in

lightness of an action

does

not

depend
and

rectitude"

(p. 251). The

beginning
law,
a

end of

the Questions dovetail with the teachings of

Christian

natural

fact

many

today

will

take to confirm their belief that Locke reflected the

substantial

reigning orthodoxy
tion of the

of

his time. In his

introduction to this

new edi

Questions,

the late Robert H. Horwitz observes that Locke deals

systematically with the issue of natural law nowhere in his published writings (p. 1). The Questions shows how carefully Locke thought about natural law

during

his tenure

as senior censor of moral

philosophy

at

Christ Church Col

lege, Oxford, in
around that

the 1663-64 term. Locke evidently prepared the manuscript

prior to

time,

his

participation

his

advanced students
as

(pp. 29-30). Nor did Locke

copied

in formal scholarly disputations with put his manuscript aside and

forget it. As late

never published

1681-82 he had it

by

hand

and corrected

it. But he
who

the work, resisting the importunities of at least one friend

kept it

and studied

it

during

Locke's

exile

in Holland. Upon his

return

Locke

took pains to conceal the

was not

manuscript

discovered
supreme

and published
self-possession

among his papers, succeeding so well that for some two and a half centuries.
and prudence specimen
attention

Locke's

come of

Horwitz's introduction, While urging readers "to

of

an

exemplary

out very clearly in biographical criticism.

concentrate

their

in

which

understanding Locke 's reflections on the law of Horwitz makes this Locke has left them to
us,"

solely on the difficult task nature in precisely the form

easier

to do

by

provid-

interpretation, Winter

1991-92, Vol. 19, No. 2

218

Interpretation
not

ing

only

an

account

of

the circumstances surrounding the manuscript's

composition and subsequent

mind as reflected actions.

history, but

also a picture of

Locke's habits

of

cal events of

in The philosopher actively participated in the politi late seventeenth-century England, in which Protestants and Catho lics struggled for control of the monarchy. Locke, "a man who never took

lightly,
and

either

property"

in theory or in practice, the indispensable good of life, liberty, (p. 40), and who may have witnessed "the last major public book
six-year exile

burning"

at

Oxford shortly before his

were consigned

(the heretical

works

of

Thomas Hobbes
nent

to the

flames),

survived even as other promi

Whigs his

such as

Algernon

Sidney
and

served prison sentences and even

died for

their convictions (pp. 9,29). Locke "took great pains to conceal

many

of

most

important
written

potentially

most controversial

authorship of works from few

weeks

the time

they

were

and published

[anonymously]
own

until a

before his

death"

(p. 2,n.2). Even in his

or

library

catalogue

he did
his

not own

classify his Two Treatises

name.

his Letters concerning Toleration

which

under

This
After

caution extended
publication

to the manner in
of

Locke

wrote

his

manuscripts.

the

his

Essay Concerning

Human

Understanding,

"Locke's contemporaries, immersed as they were in every aspect of the Chris tian natural law teaching, perceived an important and critical ambiguity in Locke's
matters,"

particularly a reluctance to "identify the Bible simply as the revealed word of (pp. 21-22). Some contemporaries found this reluctance profoundly unsettling; others, whom Horwitz calls
position on

these

God"

"Locke's

helpers,"

pious supplements. continued

work

into

our

eagerly supplied, or urged Locke to supply, the decisively He never quite did so. These contemporary disputes have own time, as Horwitz shows in his discussion of the editorial
von

done

by Wolfgang
in the 1940s

Leyden,

the scholar who discovered Locke's

under

manuscript

and published misidentifies

it in 1954

the title Essays

on the

Law of Nature. This title

sections consist von

the genre. These are not essays; some

only

of a question and a one-word answer.

Just

as

important,
overlook

Leyden

invariably

ascribes a pious

meaning to Locke's answers,

as well as

ing
law
that

the "pervasive tension

nature"

between two

or more opposed understandings of

the

of

found in the text (p. 61)

Diskin
and,

the "manifold

contradictio

force

attentive readers to think the problems co-editor voice

through for themselves (p.

speaks
of

61,
and

n.138).

As

Clay

observes, Locke

in

"Christian"

"pagan"

voice,

sotto

voce, in the accents

Hobbes, Grotius,

Descartes (p. 80) The Christian and pagan voices speak of natural law but express different conceptions of the origins of the natural law. The
voices

must

'modern'

do

not speak of nature

in the
"a

same sense at all.

The Questions Locke "all

consist of eleven questions and answers.

rule of conduct or

In the first

answer

affirms the existence of

law

nature,"

of

creatures

in their

obedience to
life"

[god's]

will

have their
of nature

own proper

whereby laws
natural

governing their birth

and

(p. 95). The law

differs from

Book Review

219
the

right,

which

does

not

command; the law

of nature

is "the

command of

divine will, knowable by the light of (p. 101). The light of nature, human reason, interprets but does not make the law of nature "unless we are
nature"

(p. 101) and willing to diminish the dignity of the supreme man a self-legislator. As evidence of these assertions Locke argues that "principles
nature,
as
conduct"

lawmaker"

make some

of

are recognized

universally,

and

universality

points to

conventional

distinguished from the heterogeneous, even contradictory realm of laws. Locke concedes that most people do not recognize 'univer
laws
of nature.

The many are governed by "the onrush of their feelings and bad habits"; "we must not consult the majority of mankind, but the sounder and more perceptive (p. 111). Unfortunately, sound and sally
part"

recognized'

perceptive

thinkers

do

not

agree,

either.

Locke doesn't bat

fiercely"

an eye:

This dis

only "strengthens [the conclusion] that a law of this kind exists, (p. 111). As further concerning this very law all contend so evidence, Locke also cites conscience, the argument from design, and what
agreement since
might

be termed the

argument

from

society: of

Society

"seems to

rest"

upon a would

fixed

political regime and absent a

the

keeping

covenants; these

"foundations"

"collapse"

law

of

nature,

with supreme political power no

Hobbes) observing Finally, "without the law of nature there would be no virtue or vice"; "man [would be] the supreme judge of his own actions (p. 117). The discovery of
preme and citizens

licence (as in

enjoying su deference (p. 115).

conventionality
own

of

the law

of nature would result

in the

concept of man as

his

judge, legislator,
is knowable
on

and executioner. of

The thirteen
nature

paragraphs

the second section, affirming that the law of

by

the light of nature, define the light of nature not as

breasts"

"inscribed

tablets in our
as

to be read

by

an

"inner

light"

conscience,

in

short

but

the "right

use"

of unaided natural

faculties (p. 119). The

which

"very
unless

knowledge"

origin of

is

not even natural

reason, to

"does nothing
"sense."

something has been established natural means of knowledge are

beforehand"

and agreed

(p. 121). The three

"inscription,"

"tradition,"

and

Inscrip
it (p.

tion, the

claim

that the human

mind

has the law

"graven"

of nature

upon

123),
based

was rejected earlier and will

"faith,"

be

rejected again and certain

upon

is "not

primary
and some

in Question IV. Tradition, means of knowing the law of

and each must of which cannot

nature,"

because

there are

many

contradictory traditions,
of

finally
judged

trace itself back to

source, the reliability

be

by

tradition. All our

knowledge

the law of nature derives

of

from

sense.

"Good, rich
toil to no

veins of gold and silver

lie hidden in the bowels

out."

the earth";

by

natural means alone we must work to

avail,"

"dig

them

as

"only

few.

.are

guided

by

Even then, "some we see reason in the concerns of their

daily

life"

(p. 135). Locke thus challenges

and

natural

powers,

only their

natural

his young scholars to exercise their powers, to investigate the claims made
as

for the law

of nature.
circumstances

Under the

it

seems

bold to declare,

Locke

does,

that the

220

Interpretation
"a law
nature"

existence of

of

has been

"proved"

(p. 139). A
not

careful reader

might conclude

that a law of nature s existence has

of

been disproved. Return

ing

to the

issue

conscience, Locke

claims that

reason, "the discursive

faculty
new

soul,"

of the
rived

"directs sense,

and arranges and orders the

images

of

things de
other

images"

from the senses, and forms [and] derives from this source (pp. 155,157; italics added). Law presupposes a legislator,
to
which one

"superior
the

power"

is

"rightfully

subject";

since

"every

conception of

mind,

as of the

body,

always comes

from

matter"

some pre-existent

(p. 157;

italics added), it
machine of

appears

world"

this

formed
of all

accident"

by

chance and
things"

is matter, "the Locke hastens to "could not have been which, add, but only by "some powerful and wise creator
that the legislator of the law of nature
could not

these
not

(p. 161). Man

have

"produce[d] himself because

of which

"man does

find in himself

all

those

perfections

his

mind can

conceive"

such as would

immortality
better job

(p. 161); that

is,

had

man produced

himself he inimical to

have done

and would not

have been "hostile

and

and

himself (pp. 161-63). Is

not go so

"god,"

then, hostile

inimical to

man?

Locke does
to

far, asking
(p. 167).

piously,

"Who, indeed,

will

say, that clay is

not subject

the potter's will and that the pot cannot be destroyed

it"

by

the same hand that

shaped potter.

Obviously,
prefer a a

this argument would equally apply to a human

'modem'

Could Locke

self-recreating
nature of

man who will not

botch

the job out of ignorance of the true

things?

Be that
claim

as

it may, the sixth,

seventh and

central section

tersely denies

the Aristotelian
inclination"

that

mankind should orient

itself

by

its

own telos or

"natural

(p. 169). The

the

longest

section

denies that the law

of nature can

be

known "from the

not

mankind"

consensus of

(p. 173). The

voices of

the people are

voice of god

or, if

they

are, then

god's voice contradicts a compact

itself. Con

sensus

has

no

natural

character,
and with

being

only

(p. 175). As Locke

shows, enthusiastically

many examples,

no universal consensus ex

ists. Even breadth

self-preservation

is

overridden

in

some societies.

Drawing

upon a

of anthropological

knowledge that
unique

would

and must societies

have been nearly

in his

own

be noteworthy even today, day, Locke observes that human

disagree

on even the most

fundamental principles,

and god and

the

immortality

of or

the soul are called into doubt.

These,

although

they

are not practical propositions

laws

of

nature, must, nevertheless, be necessarily assumed for the existence of

the law of nature, for there can exist no law without a legislator and law will have
no

force if

without punishment.

(P. 193)

Further,

agreement about the gods

(polytheism) "was
as polytheists
are

of no

help

whatsoever under

in

the proper

formation

morals,"

of

"atheists

another

name"

refers

to "the

(p. 195). (It is noteworthy, perhaps, that Locke himself in this work.) Further, monotheism is not
gods"

more than once

mor of

necessarily

ally sound,

as seen

in the

example

(telling

for Locke's Christian audience)

Book Review
Judaism. Further still, 197). Even Christian
testant audience
sal

221
(p.

philosophers also
monotheists

disagree

about the

highest

good

disagree; Locke reminds his largely Pro of Catholicism (p. 197). Finally, mere agreement, even univer
opinion,
or section

agreement,

cannot prove the soundness of a moral principle,

action

(p. 199). This

putative universal recognition.

devastates any claim to base natural law on its This is perhaps the one rigorously empirical and

logical
In
men.

section

of

the work,
of

i.e.,
of

the one most

thoroughly

consistent

with

Locke's definition
answer to

"the light

nature."

the eighth question, Locke affirms that the law of nature binds
"God"

He

refers to

"[W]e

are

bound To

by

creator and preserver of nature.

only in this section. as our God, who is best and greatest, because he (pp. 205, 207, 211). God authored and published the law
of
or

instead

"god"

"the

gods"

wills"

deny
[all]

this would be to "overturn at one blow all government

society"

among men,
sal opinion or men need

authority, rank,

and

(p. 213). One is tempted to

consider whether

the law of nature

derives, then,

not

from

some sort of univer

society itself. Insofar as have the to uphold the law of society's society, they duty This law, Locke now confesses (in contradiction to his own assertion in Ques tion I), is not binding on brutes. Locke can say this now because he has arrived
necessities of
'nature.'

'conscience'

but from the

at a

human-social definition visibly But

affirms

of

the law of nature

origin. even

he

most

its

'divine'

in this very section in which Man's obligation to obey this law

recognition

seems perpetual and

and partial.

universal,

if his
can

perhaps not:

"[0]ne

binding binding

upon the

human

whole"

race as a

is perpetually clouded doubt that the law of nature is rightly (p. 217), for to assert the rightfully

character of

the law of nature would be to exercise a sort of tyranny:

"What cruelty, even that of Sicily, was so great that it would will its subjects to observe a law which it would at the same time conceal from them and to show
themselves
speaks of
obedient

to a

will

that

know?"

they

could

not

(p. 219). Locke

priests.

nature, but

makes

the reader think of God and God's

decisive"

"bonds"

Such objections, Locke hastens to claim, are "not (p. 219). The of the law of nature are "eternal and coeval with the human (p.
obligation of

race"

219); "the
221).

this law never changes, although the times and circum

which our obedience

stances of the actions

by

is defined Locke

change"

might
refers

(p.

By

"eternal

and coeval with the

human

race,"

to such overt

worship of divinity, comforting an afflicted neighbor, relief of in trouble, and charity for the hungry; "to these we are not bound (p. 223). Some overt forever but only at a certain time and in a certain
actions as public someone
manner"

actions,

such as

stealing, murder, "and

other

things of this

kind"

(p.

221),
of

are

always prohibited.

Such inward dispositions

as reverence

for

and

fear

divin

ity,

sense of

duty

toward one's parents, and

nature

love

of

neighbor, are likewise that is fluid and

things."

universally binding. The law of human or divine

changeable"

"depends

not on a will

"but

on the eternal order of

That is,

"there follows from the

constitution of man

at

birth

some

definite duties he

222
must

Interpretation
perform"

(p. 229).

either

from

men's seduction
home"

Conflicting opinions with respect to these duties arise "by long established habits or the examples [they
passions

discover] at at the beginning

metamorphoses

or
of

from

(p. 229). The

argument

from design

cited

the Questions as evidence of god's

an argument

existence

into

for

law

of nature as evidenced

gradually in man's
constitu

existence and constitution and

the

necessities

derived therefrom. This

has a degree of malleability, as seen in the rarity of those who deduce their duties rationally from human nature, and from the latitudinarian character of the duties Locke deduces rationally from human nature, as well as from the
tion

nearly chaotic In the final

"great

diversity
section

of

human

societies.

Locke denies that "the

private

interest

of each

individual

constitute^] the foundation of the law of

iniquity"

nature"

(p. 235). This is

notes,

an opinion of

does

not

(p. 237). Of course, Locke oppose "the common right of

greatest

immediately
(p. 237).

private

interest
of

man"

Indeed, "the law

individual"

nature

is the
be
a

Locke
would

would of

property only that the individual is "free to judge by himself what advantage to himself as the occasion arises"; then again, "no one

defense

of

the private

of the

(p. 239).

deny
and

can

be

fair
each

just

assessor of what

is

good

for

another"

(p. 239). Locke

a standard

leaves to

individual the task

of

judging

for himself according to

that one may not apply to others. He concludes that obedience to the
nature

law

of

brings happiness

peace, concord,

friendship, freedom from fear

of un
not

just punishments, security, possession of our own property. Self-interest "is a foundation of law or a basis of obligation, but the consequence of (p. 251). He then
writes

obedience

that "present

advantage"

is

not

the criterion of recti

added).

tude,
itself

that

"interest follows from from

"god"

rectitude"

(p.

251; italics

Rectitude from

comes rather

or

from the

social

necessity that

arises

human This Locke

natural necessity.

edition

of

the Questions should prove a permanent contribution to

scholarship. useful

In

addition

to

Horwitz's

valuable

succinct,
plete

discussion

of

the manuscripts

introduction, it includes a by Jenny Strauss Clay, the com

build

Latin text, and facing-page translation in English with helpful notes that on von Leyden's earlier work. Because any outstanding work of Locke
of political philosophy, we
editors'

scholarship simultaneously contributes to the study are doubly in the debt.

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Concerning

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