If Socrates reveals anything about the moral life, it is how uncertain and unstable it is without grounding in knowledge of the Good; and yet he confesses that such grounding is beyond his reach, beyond the reach of human reason itself to attain. In this way Socrates reveals the genuine problem of moral relativity that [...]
Today, conceptions of virtue are at open war, with Christian virtue being termed “bigoted” on account of its failure to abandon the family, the unborn, and our duty to serve our God, in the face of an alternate vision of virtue as autonomous action circumscribed by an all-encompassing toleration that equates indifference with caring. Believe [...]
Excellence predicates aspiration and transcendence, a quest for a higher quality of attainment and, in effect, going beyond the moment. Excellence, which can be defined as the state of excelling and of surpassing merit, is now increasingly one of the lost words of the English language. And increasingly the special qualities that this word denotes [...]
Many parents, ministers, camp councillors, and even school teachers are trying to teach virtue to the young, simply by means of lists and definitions. And surely definitions are useful... eventually. But the primary means by which kids grow in virtue are their models and heroes, seen as whole characters. In my mid-twenties, I had an [...]
Are there men and women in America today possessed of virtue sufficient to withstand and repel the forces of disorder? Or have we, as a people, grown too fond of creature-comforts and a fancied security to venture our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor in any cause at all? “The superior man thinks always [...]
To question is not merely to know that one lacks knowledge but to love knowledge passionately, to pursue it and never give up. “…by indirections find directions out…” ~Hamlet, 2.1 The Meno holds a distinguished place in the St. John’s curriculum. As the first Platonic dialogue that our freshmen read, it is the gateway to [...]
That which makes education liberal is not the acquisition of virtue, for that would subordinate such education to some extrinsic good, and the essential characteristic of an education that makes it liberal is precisely its intrinsic good, the fact that its value does not depend on some good outside itself. I wish to offer some [...]
The beautification of life, the highest “household art” of making people happy and places pretty, also encompasses the adornment of the soul. Because life is more than work, economics, and money, the life of the heart and spirit need constant replenishment. What do decorating a room, wearing tasteful clothes, expressing cheerfulness, offering friendship, enjoying Mayday, [...]
In a broken world, wholeness shines. Moreover, the beauty of this wholeness can put the world on a new path because seeing beauty is one of the first steps toward wanting to make the assent to it. Integrity comes from the Latin adjective “integer,” meaning entire, whole, complete, and sound. It is a beautiful word [...]
Aristotle says that friendship makes life worth living, but despite being a central feature of daily life for almost every human being who has ever lived, friendship seems curiously absent from many philosophies of education. Aristotle, however, reminds us that education should focus on what is central to a flourishing life, and so it must [...]
Sin, on the whole, is choosing our will over God’s, and it leads to our greatest unhappiness, even if we don’t always realize it in the beginning. The darkness and mire of sin, however, melts away against the backdrop of the Father’s love. According to the National Catholic Register, “the Catholic jubilee has added spiritual [...]
In a democratic age, how can greatness come to be? Edmund Burke offers a way forward: prudence as a form of excellence. Our conference is subtitled “equality and the survival of heroism.” My concern is the survival of prudence amid the longing for heroism—in particular, the misalignment between ambition and circumstance, the persistent pursuit of [...]
One of the greatest adventure stories in exploration history was a dismal failure. The ill-fated voyage of the ship Endurance never reached its destination. However, the story of its heroic captain, Sir Ernest Shackleton, survives as a stirring inspiration for all time. The 1914 expedition sought to be the first to cross Antarctica. It failed [...]
Sherrard Billings, one of the three founders of Groton School—and the American Mr. Chips—did his part to develop good and wise habits among the “Grotties.” Through his own life of suffering, he taught them to how to live, pursue the truth, love the good, and pass on wisdom. The Groton School The New [...]