This is what Courage means to Socrates: It is descriptively distinct from and essentially identical with all the virtues. For us this “paradoxical” outcome sets a task—we are to figure out how it might become intelligible. Euripides, it is reported, was “Socrato-nailed-down” (σωκρατογόμφους) – that is, patched up, bolted together, by Socrates.1 I understand this term [...]
Each great teacher locates the fundamental problem of human living differently: The Buddha cites suffering; Socrates points to ignorance; and Jesus identifies faulty love. In addition, all three Masters teach that the task set for each human soul is to travel from illusion to reality. Unlike the Age of Faith, in Postmodernity, or more accurately [...]
Great books introduce us to ideas and to ways of looking at the world that are new to us. They provide a refreshing distance from the trends, fashions, tastes, opinions, and political correctness of our current culture. Great books invite us to put aside for a while our way of looking at the world and [...]
The demise of imitation has been devastating for personal growth. It used to be a commonplace that successful people need to have extraordinary “heroes” whom they admire and try to emulate. But the historical disciplines in the twentieth century waged something of a war against the very idea of the hero. Imitation, like so many [...]
The chief public benefit of liberal education is the formation of a particular kind of person, a particular kind of citizen, who robustly embodies the virtues of both inquiry and membership, and therefore is equipped for the truth-seeking deliberation and responsible action that a republican form of government requires. If we are to make any [...]
The word for truth in Greek means the absence of forgetting—the sudden recollection, the vivid recovery. In the great tradition of the West, when those who study it retrieve immense and priceless knowledge from forgetfulness, we find the hope of renewal. As we approach Thanksgiving this year, the coronavirus phenomenon helps us value rightly what [...]
In times of chaos, it’s profoundly necessary to remember those who have come before us and the innumerable sacrifices they made. Each of these great men, whatever his individual faults, sought to live according to the Good, the True, and the Beautiful. They preserved, and they conserved. As a way of perceiving and a habit [...]
It is the task of the wise ruler to seek to transform the city based on force into one based on speech (if only on myths and noble lies). This is no different for a founder of a community of discourse than for a founder of cities. This is the primary task of the first [...]
Glaucon’s story is part of a well-known political tragedy that swept up many of Plato’s friends and fellow citizens, including Socrates. The evidence for his personal tragedy, however, is deeply embedded in the text. Like a three-dimensional image hidden within a two-dimensional picture, it requires a special adjustment of the eyes to perceive. Perhaps the [...]
Socrates in the Underworld: On Plato’s Gorgias, by Nalin Ranasinghe (192 pages, St. Augustine Press, 2009) Today’s offering in our Timeless Essay series affords readers the opportunity to join Peter Augustine Lawler as he reflects on how Socrates models both rightly-ordered eros and logos, in contrast to the Stoics and Sophists. —W. Winston Elliott III, Publisher [...]
We know that Socrates was accused of introducing new gods and of corrupting the youth. But what was Socrates’ true position concerning the gods? Today’s offering in our Timeless Essay series affords our readers the opportunity to join the late Nalin Ranasinghe, as he analyzes the essence of piety as expressed in Plato’s Euthyphro. —W. Winston [...]
At least since the time of the ancient philosopher Plato, private property rights have posed challenges to those aspiring to craft a just political society. During the nascent years of American civilization, the Pilgrim settlers of the New Plymouth Plantation followed a partly Platonic model of a commonwealth. The survival of their settlement, they initially [...]
Twenty-four centuries after his death, the words of Socrates can still unsettle an attentive listener. However, before we can understand his most famous dictum, we must clear away who we are not to grasp who we are—something only done when we are grounded in the fundamental relationships that are universal to humankind. Probably, the most [...]
I’ve been coaching debate for five years now, and as I’ve taught students how to play the game, the benefits of debate become obvious. At the same time, a danger lurks. Could debate inherently be an activity devoted to sophistry? Back from summer break, the varsity debate team gathers to determine an important part of [...]