The Gods of the Copybook Headings
by Rudyard Kipling
As I pass through my incarnations in every age and race,
I make my proper prostrations to the Gods of the Market Place.
Peering through reverent fingers I watch them flourish and fall,
And the Gods of the Copybook Headings, I notice, outlast them all.
We were living in trees when they met us. They showed us each in turn
That Water would certainly wet us, as Fire would certainly burn:
But we found them lacking in Uplift, Vision and Breadth of Mind,
So we left them to teach the Gorillas while we followed the March of Mankind.
We moved as the Spirit listed. They never altered their pace,
Being neither cloud nor wind-borne like the Gods of the Market Place,
But they always caught up with our progress, and presently word would come
That a tribe had been wiped off its icefield, or the lights had gone out in Rome.
With the Hopes that our World is built on they were utterly out of touch,
They denied that the Moon was Stilton; they denied she was even Dutch;
They denied that Wishes were Horses; they denied that a Pig had Wings;
So we worshipped the Gods of the Market Who promised these beautiful things.
When the Cambrian measures were forming, They promised perpetual peace.
They swore, if we gave them our weapons, that the wars of the tribes would cease.
But when we disarmed They sold us and delivered us bound to our foe,
And the Gods of the Copybook Headings said: "Stick to the Devil you know."
On the first Feminian Sandstones we were promised the Fuller Life
(Which started by loving our neighbour and ended by loving his wife)
Till our women had no more children and the men lost reason and faith,
And the Gods of the Copybook Headings said: "The Wages of Sin is Death."
In the Carboniferous Epoch we were promised abundance for all,
By robbing selected Peter to pay for collective Paul;
But, though we had plenty of money, there was nothing our money could buy,
And the Gods of the Copybook Headings said: "If you don't work you die."
Then the Gods of the Market tumbled, and their smooth-tongued wizards withdrew
And the hearts of the meanest were humbled and began to believe it was true
That All is not Gold that Glitters, and Two and Two make Four
And the Gods of the Copybook Headings limped up to explain it once more.
As it will be in the future, it was at the birth of Man
There are only four things certain since Social Progress began.
That the Dog returns to his Vomit and the Sow returns to her Mire,
And the burnt Fool's bandaged finger goes wabbling back to the Fire;
And that after this is accomplished, and the brave new world begins
When all men are paid for existing and no man must pay for his sins,
As surely as Water will wet us, as surely as Fire will burn,
The Gods of the Copybook Headings with terror and slaughter return!
Monday, July 25, 2016
Wabbling Back to the Fire
Sunday, July 24, 2016
Geometer and Jurist
A mind well disciplined in elementary geometry and in general jurisprudence, would be as well prepared as mere discipline can make a mind, for most trains of human speculation and reasoning. The mathematical portion of such an education would give clear habits of logical deduction, and a perception of the delight of demonstration; while the moral portion of the education, as we may call jurisprudence, would guard the mind from the defect, sometimes ascribed to mere mathematicians, of seeing none but mathematical proofs, and applying to all cases mathematical processes. A young man well imbued with these, the leading elements of Athenian and Roman culture, would, we need not fear to say, be superior in intellectual discipline to three-fourths of the young men of our own day, on whom all the ordinary appliances of what is called a good education have been bestowed. Geometer and jurist, the pupil formed by this culture of the old world, might make no bad figure among the men of letters or of science, the lawyers and the politicians, of our own times.[William Whewell, Influence of the History of Science Upon Intellectual Education: A Lecture, pp. 24-25.]
(Whewell goes on to note, however, that this would give a purely deductive education, and thus that there would be a need to add inductive approaches to these. Whewell notes that you could do this by picking some natural science, but his recommendation is a focus on the study of the history of natural sciences. One cannot help noticing that geometry, jurisprudence, and history of science would describe a very large portion of Whewell's oeuvre.)
Maronite Year LXII
Eleventh Sunday of Pentecost
Ephesians 2:17-22; Luke 19:1-10
O Christ, You came to find and save us who were lost;
You do not desire the sinner's destruction,
but seek for repentance from evil conduct,
uniting all in one Spirit to the Father.
Strengthened by Your kindness, O Hope beyond hope,
we who falter under sin's weight cry for You.
Do not turn Your face; receive us despite our sin;
Savior of the fallen, have mercy on us,
purify our souls, join us to Your Father,
that we exiles may be made children of Your house.
By Your resurrection, You build a great temple;
apostles and prophets are its foundation,
saints are its stones, and You are its cornerstone.
By the Spirit's anointing You consecrate it.
Only Son of God, You brought us salvation,
favoring us with a compassion divine.
Thieves upon the world's cross, You gave us paradise,
covering us with Your grace of compassion,
justifying the poor and the penitent,
and opening the gates to the garden of light.
O Source of life, we acknowledge Your divine gifts;
In forgiving mercy, You chose to be man,
even descending to the realm of the dead,
to bring rejoicing to the nations of the earth.
Your Father poured forth His renewing Spirit,
dividing His grace among the apostles,
that they might go forth and recall nations from sin.
By destroying death, You awakened our joy,
assembling nations that they might adore You,
that all might joyfully proclaim Your salvation.
Saturday, July 23, 2016
Beyond the Wandering Moon
Somewhere or Other
by Christina Rossetti
Somewhere or other there must surely be
The face not seen, the voice not heard,
The heart that not yet—never yet—ah me!
Made answer to my word.
Somewhere or other, may be near or far;
Past land and sea, clean out of sight;
Beyond the wandering moon, beyond the star
That tracks her night by night.
Somewhere or other, may be far or near;
With just a wall, a hedge, between;
With just the last leaves of the dying year
Fallen on a turf grown green.
Maronite Year LXI
Youssef Antoun Makhluf was born in 1828 in Bekaa Kafra in the mountains of Lebanon. He eventually entered the Lebanese Maronite Order; he then took the name Sharbel, or Charbel, and studied briefly under St. Nemetulla Kassab. In 1874, he became a monastic hermit, and he died on December 24, 1898. Pope Paul VI beatified him in 1965 and raised him to the general calendar in 1977.
Feast of St. Sharbel
Romans 8:28-29; Matthew 13:36-43
O Christ our Light, You fill the earth with light;
You choose worthy teachers to teach Your Church,
securing the good of those who love God,
molding Your people into Your image.
You give Your saints the word of life and truth;
as flame to flame they kindle ardent faith,
each a star to show us the path of life.
From Sharbel's hermitage a great light shines:
through his prayers we receive salvation,
through his intercessions, health of spirit.
O Sharbel, you found the pearl of great price,
giving everything that you might have it.
Our Lord Jesus Christ called you to follow,
and without hesitation you followed.
Feast of St. Sharbel
Romans 8:28-29; Matthew 13:36-43
O Christ our Light, You fill the earth with light;
You choose worthy teachers to teach Your Church,
securing the good of those who love God,
molding Your people into Your image.
You give Your saints the word of life and truth;
as flame to flame they kindle ardent faith,
each a star to show us the path of life.
From Sharbel's hermitage a great light shines:
through his prayers we receive salvation,
through his intercessions, health of spirit.
O Sharbel, you found the pearl of great price,
giving everything that you might have it.
Our Lord Jesus Christ called you to follow,
and without hesitation you followed.
Friday, July 22, 2016
Dashed Off XVI
This takes me up to December 25, 2014 in my notebooks.
Every method is a means with a degree of appropriateness to a context and to an end.
The method of doubt establishes that mind has a teleology.
An event requires location (space), duration (time), and actuality (cause).
respect for individuals as protection against mobbing
A theory drawn from or supported by experiments must be interpreted in ways consistent with the possibility and existence of those experiments and the viability of the supporting inferences.
The chief problem with most theories of punishment is detachment of punishment from questions of justice.
(1) Scriptural memorial of the work of Christ
(2) liturgical enactment of the work of Christ
Scripture as implicate Tradition; Tradition as explicate Scripture. Scripture as Tradition in rule; Tradition as Scripture in life.
Tradition as that which is required fully to unfold Scripture
1 Cor 11:23 & the nature of Tradition
Private revelations as probable confirmations and suggestive clarifications.
Form is that which is capable of having likeness to other forms. (Less trivial than it sounds, particularly with respect to cognition.) Matter is that which limits this capability in form (although form may, e.g., insofar as it has reference to matter, have intrinsic limitations as well).
the capital vices as disorders of humanity itself
Truths about bad deeds are easily poisoned by lies, for people will believe anything about those whom they regard as clearly having done wrong.
"How could that which does not make a man worse, make his life worse?" (Marcus Aurelius)
"We are all working together to complete one work; some of us knowingly and consciously and the others consciously." (Marcus Aurelius)
mereotopology as a theory of distinction and relations among the distinguished
faith expressed in works, in authority, in memory, in tradition, in institution, in reasoning, in ascetic life, in mystical life
It is curious that naturalists have a tendency to reject purely formal accounts of mathematics (platonistic) in favor of purely teleological ones (constructivistic).
the intrinsic structure of observation as the most fundamental issue in philosophy of science (note that this includes but is not reducible to the structure of perception)
mereotopological structures implicit in experimentation
the importance of boundary-to-experiment for experimentation -- with some kinds of experiment, this is very clear; boundaries need to be in place for reasons of avoiding contamination, isolating effects, and simplifying reasoning about the experiment
act, potency, and the principle of causality as the intrinsic structure of sensations
the martyr's prize, the tyrant's eternal torment by fire: 4 Macc 9:9, 9:31-32, 10:10-11, 10:15, 11:3, 12:12, 12:18, 13;15, 18:3-5, 18:18, 18:22-23
4 Macc 13:16 -- 'the full armor of self-control, which is divine reason'
4 Macc 14:7 -- 'the seven days of creation move in choral dance around religion'
4 Macc 16:25 -- 'those who die for the sake of God live to God, as do Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and all the patriarchs'
4 Macc 17:6 -- 'for your childbearing was from Abraham the father'
4 Macc 17:21 -- 'they having become as it were a ransom for the sin of our nation'
4 Macc 17:22 -- 'through the blood' & 'through their death as a hilasterion' (cp Rm 3:25, Hb 9:11-15, 1 Pt 1:19, 1 Jn 1:7)
Purity is primarily purity of reason.
inquiry into angelic knowledge as inquiry into contemplative life
the preparticles of a particle (preparticular properties) -- even the old atomoi had geometrical preparticles
Two problems w/ common Calvinist approaches to Scripture (which otherwise are often excellent): (1) ambiguity about what Scripture is; (2) treatment of all Scripture as positive law even when it is clearly not being an arbitrary authority but teaching reasons.
pleasure as fineza
Aristotelian logic takes known-making as important.
experimental reasoning as proof by sign/example
continuum : composition :: discrete number : division
aesthetic criticism and the involution of art
All technical skills are refined by an aesthetic criticism appropriate to them.
style as a relation to a medium
the aesthetics of philosophical system (we already see this in much of the comparison of scholasticism and cathedral architecture)
Kardinsky's three internal necessities of art: (1) personal expression; (2) Zeitgeist; (3) helping the cause of art
creativity in experimentation, experiments as works of art
experiment as an extrinsic teleological organization of intrinsic final causes
the depreciation of final and formal causes in modern thought as related to the tendency to ignore the character and conditions of experiment
To predict the future course of scientific inquiry would be to produce it before it was produced. (cp Hulme on creativity in art)
experiment // architecture
in being constructed of design solutions
angelic knowledge : contemplation :: angelic speech : magisterial teaching
Act and potency is how we explain two becoming one.
Our intellect is not of singulars directly not because they are singular but because our minds are acquainted with singulars that are material.
angelic knowledge & angelic speech as limit concepts
recreational use of sophisms
Philosophical or political response to evil is only the vigilance of a siege or leaguer, not an uprooting.
Magic tricks are less often unwound by analysis than by history.
principle of causality as integral to identity: if appearances A remain the same while reality R changes, some cause must maintain A as R changes; if reality R changes, some cause must change it
Tools are a kind of sign, so all animals capable of sign use above a certain sophistication are capable of tool use.
'Full of grace' is used by the angel not merely as a description but as a title under which she may be hailed.
Jesus (1) will be great; (2) will be called Son of the Most High; (3) will be given by God the throne of David his father; (4) will rule over the house of Jacob forever; (5) will have no end to his kingdom; (6) will be called holy, the Son of God.
What is manifested through the prophetic writings is manifested in the fulfillment of them.
To endure in the face of evil and difficulty is in and of itself a good.
sense of Scripture as type of the Spirit's work of Tradition
Benefits and harms obviously must be evaluated not merely quantitatively but also qualitatively.
Christ offers Himself (1) on the altar of the world; (2) on the altar of the Cross; (3) on the altars of His people through His priests; (4) at the Throne of God.
The sacrifice of Christ on the Cross is offered on the altar under the sign of the separation of Body and Blood.
enacted vs unenacted memorial
hierarchies of art structured by the two poles of ingenuity-based rendering in visible way of the universal essence, and technical copying of the particular appearance
rhyparography
models as analogical experiments
Intellect 'is a part of ourselves, and we ascend toward it.' (Plotinus)
reproduction as economic system
a dusk of images
the link between the sublime and the purifying
Medieval commentaries often called Lamentations 'Lamentation of Lamentations' to highlight parallel with Song of Songs; seems to be due to Paschasius Radbertus.
Lamentations and salutiferus dolor
Lamentations read morally as an account of human fallenness & repentance; allegorically as an account of persecution
giving one's cheek to the smiter: Lam 3:30 // Mt 5:39
Lam 4:20-22 & atonement
"There are only three ways of judging the prophets: they told the truth, deliberately invented a tale, or were victims of an illusion." Herschel, God in Search of Man
transmission of original sin as negative image of transmission of original justice; the transmission of original justice as parallel/analogous to sacred Tradition
Adam / Christ
Head of humanity / Head of Mystical Body
human solidarity / charitable union of members in Mystical Body
original justice / impress of Christ through faith and sacrament
generation (genealogy) / tradition
fake-awesome as misdirected sublimity (C. Hodge)
Balaam's Ass as a type of the Church (Irenaeus)
obligations arising from summation of possible actions with respect to (1) happiness of oneself; (2) happiness of others; (3) self-harm; (4) harming of others
omniscience Ps 139:1-6
omnipresence Ps 139:7-12
omnipotence Ps 139:13-16
holiness Ps 139:17-24
"each of us has been the Adam of his own soul" (2 Baruch 54:19)
Sir 3:3 & Jesus' honoring of his Father as atonement for sins
Tob 12:9 & Jesus' works of mercy as atonement for sins
'Generations' in Genesis seems to suggest an inheritance or reception-from (note particular 2:4, but also 6:9, where it seems it must include more than mere descent).
The Church teaches not only by laying down definitive limits but also by giving nondefinitive central lines. (Church approval & encouragement of popular devotions is a good example.)
bread of God Lv 3:11,16; 21:6,8,17,22f.
washed with water Lv 8:6-9
anointed with oil Lv8:12
consecrated by sacrifice Lv 8:14ff
David made king (1) privately in Bethlehem (1 Sam 16:13); (2) over Judah in Hebron (2 Sam 2:4); (3) over all Israel in Hebron (2 Sam 5:3)
The canon of the more difficult reading is simply that simple elimination of difficulty may always be done to eliminate difficulty, but introduction of difficulty requires special causal explanation. (i.e., it is based on the asymmetry of removal and addition)
As the sacraments are the presence of Christ and His Spirit, priests serve them and are not lords of them.
impartial spectator and the virtue of prudence (when Smith uses 'prudence', of course, he means something very narrow)
Note esp. his discussion of systems based on propriety, in which he holds that the propriety must be determined by "the sympathetic feelings of the impartial and well-informed spectator"
honor & tradition as integral to large-scale and extensive forms of caring
Without honor, caring becomes betrayal.
the general structure of the Pentateuch as the general structure of reception of revelation
original justice as intrinsic covenant, as radical solidarity, as that which unites priesthood, prophecy, and royalty in a unified (unfragmented) seminal form
To think of Christian life as encounter is not bold enough.
Interpretation of a text is limited by one's ability to discover its final causes.
The starting point of philosophical theology is -- everything available.
knowledge of good and evil as being situated so as to pronounce on what is to be done (see W. Malcolm Clark's 1969 article on this, which is quite a good start)
Merismus is always toned or valenced.
"Life is not made for delicate souls." (Seneca)
"An ugly man, if alive, is more beautiful than a man portrayed in a statue, however beautiful it may be." (Plotinus)
progress of calendar calculation, music, architecture in the liturgical commonwealth
the role of analogies of analogies in theory formation
Jer 1:10 & the papacy (Innocent III)
Melchizedek as a type of the papacy (Innocent III)
what is useful in common as approximation of the just
"every friendship is found in community" (Aristotle)
style as the presence of the author
People most fear death as powerlessness or else as ending of delight.
Titus 2:11-14 & the cardinal virtues
The first step in being a true friend to another is being a true friend to oneself.
Writing on its own presupposes an immense number of things about sensation and cognition.
The good of friendship cannot be reduced to pleasure or preference-satisfaction, although some friendships are constituted by mutual pursuit of pleasure or preference-satisfaction.
plurality of societies and plurality of hopes
A totalitarian regime attempts to eliminate sources of hope.
galley effect and perspective
Doctor debet habere fundamentum doctrinae, et perfectionem.
certain forms of higher criticism as giving heed to fables (purely speculative scenarios) and endless genealogies (of texts)
sophrosyne in Titus
cinema as a visual medium for exhibiting aspiration (sometimes by negative): aspiration made visible and audible in a followable narrative
Without honor and tradition, there is no romance; not because every romantic must directly draw on them but because every action is recognized as romantic only in light of them.
the baptism of John & Jesus as participating in Jewish prophetic tradition (// circumcision and Jesus as participating in Jewish covenant)
symbolism as the natural cognitive environment of human beings
(1) The means to an end can only be agreeable where the end is agreeable. (T 3.3.1.9 (SBN 577))
(2) Means to an end are only valued so far as the end is valued. (T 3.3.6.2 (SBN 619))
(3) Whoever chooses the means chooses the end. (T 3.2.7.4 (SBN 536)
(4) It is a contradiction in terms that anything pleases as a means to an end where the end itself in no wise affects us. (EPM 5.17 (SBN 219))
Liberalizing an institution without breaking it is not a straightforward matter; the danger is that one will achieve the goal at the cost of making people think it not worth their time and energy in the first place.
the danger of not appreciating Scripture in its own right, of using it solely as a means for addressing this question or that
Every method is a means with a degree of appropriateness to a context and to an end.
The method of doubt establishes that mind has a teleology.
An event requires location (space), duration (time), and actuality (cause).
respect for individuals as protection against mobbing
A theory drawn from or supported by experiments must be interpreted in ways consistent with the possibility and existence of those experiments and the viability of the supporting inferences.
The chief problem with most theories of punishment is detachment of punishment from questions of justice.
(1) Scriptural memorial of the work of Christ
(2) liturgical enactment of the work of Christ
Scripture as implicate Tradition; Tradition as explicate Scripture. Scripture as Tradition in rule; Tradition as Scripture in life.
Tradition as that which is required fully to unfold Scripture
1 Cor 11:23 & the nature of Tradition
Private revelations as probable confirmations and suggestive clarifications.
Form is that which is capable of having likeness to other forms. (Less trivial than it sounds, particularly with respect to cognition.) Matter is that which limits this capability in form (although form may, e.g., insofar as it has reference to matter, have intrinsic limitations as well).
the capital vices as disorders of humanity itself
Truths about bad deeds are easily poisoned by lies, for people will believe anything about those whom they regard as clearly having done wrong.
"How could that which does not make a man worse, make his life worse?" (Marcus Aurelius)
"We are all working together to complete one work; some of us knowingly and consciously and the others consciously." (Marcus Aurelius)
mereotopology as a theory of distinction and relations among the distinguished
faith expressed in works, in authority, in memory, in tradition, in institution, in reasoning, in ascetic life, in mystical life
It is curious that naturalists have a tendency to reject purely formal accounts of mathematics (platonistic) in favor of purely teleological ones (constructivistic).
the intrinsic structure of observation as the most fundamental issue in philosophy of science (note that this includes but is not reducible to the structure of perception)
mereotopological structures implicit in experimentation
the importance of boundary-to-experiment for experimentation -- with some kinds of experiment, this is very clear; boundaries need to be in place for reasons of avoiding contamination, isolating effects, and simplifying reasoning about the experiment
act, potency, and the principle of causality as the intrinsic structure of sensations
the martyr's prize, the tyrant's eternal torment by fire: 4 Macc 9:9, 9:31-32, 10:10-11, 10:15, 11:3, 12:12, 12:18, 13;15, 18:3-5, 18:18, 18:22-23
4 Macc 13:16 -- 'the full armor of self-control, which is divine reason'
4 Macc 14:7 -- 'the seven days of creation move in choral dance around religion'
4 Macc 16:25 -- 'those who die for the sake of God live to God, as do Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and all the patriarchs'
4 Macc 17:6 -- 'for your childbearing was from Abraham the father'
4 Macc 17:21 -- 'they having become as it were a ransom for the sin of our nation'
4 Macc 17:22 -- 'through the blood' & 'through their death as a hilasterion' (cp Rm 3:25, Hb 9:11-15, 1 Pt 1:19, 1 Jn 1:7)
Purity is primarily purity of reason.
inquiry into angelic knowledge as inquiry into contemplative life
the preparticles of a particle (preparticular properties) -- even the old atomoi had geometrical preparticles
Two problems w/ common Calvinist approaches to Scripture (which otherwise are often excellent): (1) ambiguity about what Scripture is; (2) treatment of all Scripture as positive law even when it is clearly not being an arbitrary authority but teaching reasons.
pleasure as fineza
Aristotelian logic takes known-making as important.
experimental reasoning as proof by sign/example
continuum : composition :: discrete number : division
aesthetic criticism and the involution of art
All technical skills are refined by an aesthetic criticism appropriate to them.
style as a relation to a medium
the aesthetics of philosophical system (we already see this in much of the comparison of scholasticism and cathedral architecture)
Kardinsky's three internal necessities of art: (1) personal expression; (2) Zeitgeist; (3) helping the cause of art
creativity in experimentation, experiments as works of art
experiment as an extrinsic teleological organization of intrinsic final causes
the depreciation of final and formal causes in modern thought as related to the tendency to ignore the character and conditions of experiment
To predict the future course of scientific inquiry would be to produce it before it was produced. (cp Hulme on creativity in art)
experiment // architecture
in being constructed of design solutions
angelic knowledge : contemplation :: angelic speech : magisterial teaching
Act and potency is how we explain two becoming one.
Our intellect is not of singulars directly not because they are singular but because our minds are acquainted with singulars that are material.
angelic knowledge & angelic speech as limit concepts
recreational use of sophisms
Philosophical or political response to evil is only the vigilance of a siege or leaguer, not an uprooting.
Magic tricks are less often unwound by analysis than by history.
principle of causality as integral to identity: if appearances A remain the same while reality R changes, some cause must maintain A as R changes; if reality R changes, some cause must change it
Tools are a kind of sign, so all animals capable of sign use above a certain sophistication are capable of tool use.
'Full of grace' is used by the angel not merely as a description but as a title under which she may be hailed.
Jesus (1) will be great; (2) will be called Son of the Most High; (3) will be given by God the throne of David his father; (4) will rule over the house of Jacob forever; (5) will have no end to his kingdom; (6) will be called holy, the Son of God.
What is manifested through the prophetic writings is manifested in the fulfillment of them.
To endure in the face of evil and difficulty is in and of itself a good.
sense of Scripture as type of the Spirit's work of Tradition
Benefits and harms obviously must be evaluated not merely quantitatively but also qualitatively.
Christ offers Himself (1) on the altar of the world; (2) on the altar of the Cross; (3) on the altars of His people through His priests; (4) at the Throne of God.
The sacrifice of Christ on the Cross is offered on the altar under the sign of the separation of Body and Blood.
enacted vs unenacted memorial
hierarchies of art structured by the two poles of ingenuity-based rendering in visible way of the universal essence, and technical copying of the particular appearance
rhyparography
models as analogical experiments
Intellect 'is a part of ourselves, and we ascend toward it.' (Plotinus)
reproduction as economic system
a dusk of images
the link between the sublime and the purifying
Medieval commentaries often called Lamentations 'Lamentation of Lamentations' to highlight parallel with Song of Songs; seems to be due to Paschasius Radbertus.
Lamentations and salutiferus dolor
Lamentations read morally as an account of human fallenness & repentance; allegorically as an account of persecution
giving one's cheek to the smiter: Lam 3:30 // Mt 5:39
Lam 4:20-22 & atonement
"There are only three ways of judging the prophets: they told the truth, deliberately invented a tale, or were victims of an illusion." Herschel, God in Search of Man
transmission of original sin as negative image of transmission of original justice; the transmission of original justice as parallel/analogous to sacred Tradition
Adam / Christ
Head of humanity / Head of Mystical Body
human solidarity / charitable union of members in Mystical Body
original justice / impress of Christ through faith and sacrament
generation (genealogy) / tradition
fake-awesome as misdirected sublimity (C. Hodge)
Balaam's Ass as a type of the Church (Irenaeus)
obligations arising from summation of possible actions with respect to (1) happiness of oneself; (2) happiness of others; (3) self-harm; (4) harming of others
omniscience Ps 139:1-6
omnipresence Ps 139:7-12
omnipotence Ps 139:13-16
holiness Ps 139:17-24
"each of us has been the Adam of his own soul" (2 Baruch 54:19)
Sir 3:3 & Jesus' honoring of his Father as atonement for sins
Tob 12:9 & Jesus' works of mercy as atonement for sins
'Generations' in Genesis seems to suggest an inheritance or reception-from (note particular 2:4, but also 6:9, where it seems it must include more than mere descent).
The Church teaches not only by laying down definitive limits but also by giving nondefinitive central lines. (Church approval & encouragement of popular devotions is a good example.)
bread of God Lv 3:11,16; 21:6,8,17,22f.
washed with water Lv 8:6-9
anointed with oil Lv8:12
consecrated by sacrifice Lv 8:14ff
David made king (1) privately in Bethlehem (1 Sam 16:13); (2) over Judah in Hebron (2 Sam 2:4); (3) over all Israel in Hebron (2 Sam 5:3)
The canon of the more difficult reading is simply that simple elimination of difficulty may always be done to eliminate difficulty, but introduction of difficulty requires special causal explanation. (i.e., it is based on the asymmetry of removal and addition)
As the sacraments are the presence of Christ and His Spirit, priests serve them and are not lords of them.
impartial spectator and the virtue of prudence (when Smith uses 'prudence', of course, he means something very narrow)
Note esp. his discussion of systems based on propriety, in which he holds that the propriety must be determined by "the sympathetic feelings of the impartial and well-informed spectator"
honor & tradition as integral to large-scale and extensive forms of caring
Without honor, caring becomes betrayal.
the general structure of the Pentateuch as the general structure of reception of revelation
original justice as intrinsic covenant, as radical solidarity, as that which unites priesthood, prophecy, and royalty in a unified (unfragmented) seminal form
To think of Christian life as encounter is not bold enough.
Interpretation of a text is limited by one's ability to discover its final causes.
The starting point of philosophical theology is -- everything available.
knowledge of good and evil as being situated so as to pronounce on what is to be done (see W. Malcolm Clark's 1969 article on this, which is quite a good start)
Merismus is always toned or valenced.
"Life is not made for delicate souls." (Seneca)
"An ugly man, if alive, is more beautiful than a man portrayed in a statue, however beautiful it may be." (Plotinus)
progress of calendar calculation, music, architecture in the liturgical commonwealth
the role of analogies of analogies in theory formation
Jer 1:10 & the papacy (Innocent III)
Melchizedek as a type of the papacy (Innocent III)
what is useful in common as approximation of the just
"every friendship is found in community" (Aristotle)
style as the presence of the author
People most fear death as powerlessness or else as ending of delight.
Titus 2:11-14 & the cardinal virtues
The first step in being a true friend to another is being a true friend to oneself.
Writing on its own presupposes an immense number of things about sensation and cognition.
The good of friendship cannot be reduced to pleasure or preference-satisfaction, although some friendships are constituted by mutual pursuit of pleasure or preference-satisfaction.
plurality of societies and plurality of hopes
A totalitarian regime attempts to eliminate sources of hope.
galley effect and perspective
Doctor debet habere fundamentum doctrinae, et perfectionem.
certain forms of higher criticism as giving heed to fables (purely speculative scenarios) and endless genealogies (of texts)
sophrosyne in Titus
cinema as a visual medium for exhibiting aspiration (sometimes by negative): aspiration made visible and audible in a followable narrative
Without honor and tradition, there is no romance; not because every romantic must directly draw on them but because every action is recognized as romantic only in light of them.
the baptism of John & Jesus as participating in Jewish prophetic tradition (// circumcision and Jesus as participating in Jewish covenant)
symbolism as the natural cognitive environment of human beings
(1) The means to an end can only be agreeable where the end is agreeable. (T 3.3.1.9 (SBN 577))
(2) Means to an end are only valued so far as the end is valued. (T 3.3.6.2 (SBN 619))
(3) Whoever chooses the means chooses the end. (T 3.2.7.4 (SBN 536)
(4) It is a contradiction in terms that anything pleases as a means to an end where the end itself in no wise affects us. (EPM 5.17 (SBN 219))
Liberalizing an institution without breaking it is not a straightforward matter; the danger is that one will achieve the goal at the cost of making people think it not worth their time and energy in the first place.
the danger of not appreciating Scripture in its own right, of using it solely as a means for addressing this question or that
Rome, Naples et Florence: October 1816, Part I
We are currently on page 13.
[1er octobre]
Stendhal reflects that the art of Italy, like that of much of Europe, is in shambles: music is «le seul art qui vive encore en Italie». The claim that there are two routes to pleasure in music, «la sublime harmonie» and «la mélodie délicieuse» is an interesting one, although I can't speak to the quality of Stendhal's music history in his discussion of it.
Most of the rest of the day's entry is the Story of Gina, which seems a fairly commonplace story of lovers. I suppose it connects to Stendhal's prior comment connecting the living music of Italy with love. It's possibly notable that Stendhal's Charterhouse of Parma has a character named Gina, although, since I have never read it, I also cannot speak to whether there is any influence on the book to be found here.
[2 octobre]
I confess it took me more than a bit to figure out what chétive was supposed to tell us. So we now learn that Soliva is puny like a man of genius, which is a description I intend to use of someone at some point in the future. And we get more description of the opera, Testa di bronzo, this time focusing on the cast.
[3 octobre]
The orchestra of Milan lacks brio; it is good for sweetness rather than forcefulness, in contrast to the Parisian orchestra of Favart. Thus Stendhal's recipe for a perfect orchestra:
Alessandro Rolla was a musical innovator and the music teacher of Paganini, and was the orchestra director at La Scala from 1802 to 1833. His music was often quite intense -- hence the gossip, which Stendhal also gives, that his music gave women "attacks of nerves".
Alas, I have no idea what Stendhal is trying to convey by his final analogy between French authors and Italian composers.
[4 octobre]
Finally something other than music! Bernardino Luini was a sixteenth century painter whose works are found throughout Northern Italy. Here is Luini's Adoration of the Magi, which I believe was once at Soronno, but now is at the Louvre:
Daniele Crespi is seventeenth century; since Correggio is Stendhal's favorite painter, his saying that he has the sense of Correggio is a high compliment.
According to Daniel Muller's notes, Antonio Litta (1745-1820) was made duke by Napoleon, and was a particularly high muck-a-muck of Napoleonic Italy. Antonio Canova was the greatest sculptor of the day; it was on his advice that the British Museum bought the Elgin marbles. I don't know what statues by Canova Stendhal would have seen, but Canova's most famous work is Psyche Revived by Cupid's Kiss, which gives a sense of his neoclassical style:
And then more opera. I suppose you really need to appreciate opera to appreciate Stendhal.
The Edinburgh Review gets rather biting with Stendhal's comments on Milan, for perhaps not entirely objective reasons:
David Muller describes this as «un ton un peu pincé». One can hardly blame the reviewer, though. That aside, it's another example of Stendhal's somewhat odd choices in comparisons. And, in any case, you can add 'more chatty than Cicero' to your list of ready insults.
We get a mention of Italian ice cream, and Stendhal is indeed right that it is divine.
[6 octobre]
More of the singing of Angelica Catalani.
If I understand the publication timeline correctly, the Milan entries ended here in the original 1817 edition, and then the work went briefly through Parma and Bologna to get to Florence. In later editions we get a good deal more of Milan.
[7 octobre]
Lady Fanny Harley apparently had a very beautiful face.
[8 octobre]
So beautiful that we're going to talk about it some more.
In seriousness, though, it's interesting that everything we get about Lady Fanny Harley's face is stated entirely in terms of how it reminds Stendhal of paintings. It reminds me of Eco's monks, who always describe things through books.
And there's a break of nearly two weeks in the entries, so we'll pick up again in two weeks on page 34 with bonhomie italienne.
[1er octobre]
Stendhal reflects that the art of Italy, like that of much of Europe, is in shambles: music is «le seul art qui vive encore en Italie». The claim that there are two routes to pleasure in music, «la sublime harmonie» and «la mélodie délicieuse» is an interesting one, although I can't speak to the quality of Stendhal's music history in his discussion of it.
Most of the rest of the day's entry is the Story of Gina, which seems a fairly commonplace story of lovers. I suppose it connects to Stendhal's prior comment connecting the living music of Italy with love. It's possibly notable that Stendhal's Charterhouse of Parma has a character named Gina, although, since I have never read it, I also cannot speak to whether there is any influence on the book to be found here.
[2 octobre]
I confess it took me more than a bit to figure out what chétive was supposed to tell us. So we now learn that Soliva is puny like a man of genius, which is a description I intend to use of someone at some point in the future. And we get more description of the opera, Testa di bronzo, this time focusing on the cast.
[3 octobre]
The orchestra of Milan lacks brio; it is good for sweetness rather than forcefulness, in contrast to the Parisian orchestra of Favart. Thus Stendhal's recipe for a perfect orchestra:
Dans un orchestre parfait, les violons seraient français, les instruments à vent allemands, et le reste italien, y compris le chef d'orchestre.
Alessandro Rolla was a musical innovator and the music teacher of Paganini, and was the orchestra director at La Scala from 1802 to 1833. His music was often quite intense -- hence the gossip, which Stendhal also gives, that his music gave women "attacks of nerves".
Alas, I have no idea what Stendhal is trying to convey by his final analogy between French authors and Italian composers.
[4 octobre]
Finally something other than music! Bernardino Luini was a sixteenth century painter whose works are found throughout Northern Italy. Here is Luini's Adoration of the Magi, which I believe was once at Soronno, but now is at the Louvre:
Daniele Crespi is seventeenth century; since Correggio is Stendhal's favorite painter, his saying that he has the sense of Correggio is a high compliment.
According to Daniel Muller's notes, Antonio Litta (1745-1820) was made duke by Napoleon, and was a particularly high muck-a-muck of Napoleonic Italy. Antonio Canova was the greatest sculptor of the day; it was on his advice that the British Museum bought the Elgin marbles. I don't know what statues by Canova Stendhal would have seen, but Canova's most famous work is Psyche Revived by Cupid's Kiss, which gives a sense of his neoclassical style:
And then more opera. I suppose you really need to appreciate opera to appreciate Stendhal.
The Edinburgh Review gets rather biting with Stendhal's comments on Milan, for perhaps not entirely objective reasons:
About this period of his progress, breaks out that hatred of the English which never quite quits him during his whole journey. In the only remark upon Milan not connected with the theatre, he says the Milanese is remarkable for two things, 'la sagacité et la bonté;' and he adds, 'quand il discute, ile est contraire des Anglais, il est serré comme Tacite.' It is some comfort, however, to find that we are blamed in good company; for it seems, 'dés qu'il ecrit, il veut faire des belles phrase toscanes; et il plus bavard que Ciceron.'
David Muller describes this as «un ton un peu pincé». One can hardly blame the reviewer, though. That aside, it's another example of Stendhal's somewhat odd choices in comparisons. And, in any case, you can add 'more chatty than Cicero' to your list of ready insults.
We get a mention of Italian ice cream, and Stendhal is indeed right that it is divine.
[6 octobre]
More of the singing of Angelica Catalani.
If I understand the publication timeline correctly, the Milan entries ended here in the original 1817 edition, and then the work went briefly through Parma and Bologna to get to Florence. In later editions we get a good deal more of Milan.
[7 octobre]
Lady Fanny Harley apparently had a very beautiful face.
[8 octobre]
So beautiful that we're going to talk about it some more.
In seriousness, though, it's interesting that everything we get about Lady Fanny Harley's face is stated entirely in terms of how it reminds Stendhal of paintings. It reminds me of Eco's monks, who always describe things through books.
And there's a break of nearly two weeks in the entries, so we'll pick up again in two weeks on page 34 with bonhomie italienne.
Thursday, July 21, 2016
The Opposite of 'Hypocritical' Is...
...'penitent'.
This is actually quite clear if one reads Jesus's denunciations of hypocrisy in context. What makes hypocrisy actually wrong? That it is a way of refusing to repent of one's sins.
People who remark on brazen wrongdoers (whether they are speaking of themselves or others) that 'at least they are not hypocrites' have missed the point entirely.
This is actually quite clear if one reads Jesus's denunciations of hypocrisy in context. What makes hypocrisy actually wrong? That it is a way of refusing to repent of one's sins.
People who remark on brazen wrongdoers (whether they are speaking of themselves or others) that 'at least they are not hypocrites' have missed the point entirely.
Reading the Harm Principle Upside-Down
I happened to be reading through various posts and tweets on Mill's harm principle the other day, and found it interesting how confused they often are; some very notable mistakes. As far as I can tell, nobody has anywhere pointed out the errors, so I thought I'd do it just so that there is someone somewhere noting them.
The harm principle comes from Mill's On Liberty, Chapter I:
A common misinterpretation of this, no doubt due to the label that has come to be attached to it, seems to be that this is an authorization of harm -- that is, that it says that you can interfere with liberty of action when it harms another. This is upside-down -- despite the label 'harm principle', the principle is not about harm or response to it, but about protecting liberty. And Mill explicitly rules out any interpretation of the principle as telling you when you can intervene in Chapter V:
In other words, the harm principle does not tell us at all when the government intervene; it just claims that it is not even a legitimate option except when there is harm to others.
It's quite obvious, and no doubt was obvious to Mill (who was a close reader of Plato, who makes the point), that much depends on exactly what counts as harm. Mill, however, deliberately avoids going into any detail, arguably because for his purpose he wants to argue that this is one of the things that needs to be openly and freely discussed in a free society. One obvious question is whether verbal harms can count, and it seems to be a common view that the harm principle allows for this. However, even setting aside the fact that this is arguably against the very spirit of On Liberty, Mill seems to me to rule this out quite definitely as well.
The harm principle draws a distinction between public and personal interests -- society cannot interfere with what pertains merely to a person himself, but only where the person's actions become a real public concern in its own right. Mill guards against a simplistic understanding of this (although how well he does so is open to dispute); almost any private action has some kind of public consequence somewhere. However, if these public consequences are such as arise only through the "free, voluntary, and undeceived consent and participation" of the others involved, this is not what is meant. However one takes this, Mill is clear that the point is to protect liberty of thought and conscience from outside interference. And this, he insists, requires also the protection of the liberty of expressing and publishing opinions:
He will go later to say that liberty of thought and liberty of speaking and writing are inseparable, and he regards treating them as such to be part of what is required to have a free society in the first place.
Thus Mill's harm principle does not allow for the possibility of verbal harm, as such. There is still some wiggle-room -- Mill thinks you can in principle have public decency laws against pornography, for instance, because he allows for the possibility that one might have good arguments that it is harmful to society at large if not kept purely private, and arguably there are some kinds of verbal harassment that he would allow to be regulated because the way they are done makes it impossible for people to opt out (and thus their exposure to it is not free and voluntary). But in neither of these cases is there actually any notion that expressing and publishing an opinion, however atrocious or offensive, could possibly be regarded as harm on its own.
A third common misinterpretation, that the harm principle only applies to government, I have dealt with before; Mill is quite clear, as you can read in the passage above, that it also applies to interventions of public opinion (shaming and boycotting would be examples).
There are a lot of people who seem to like to talk the Millian talk, but make qualifications that are actually fatal to Mill's entire argument. You cannot be a classical liberal, in the sense in which Mill's On Liberty is definitive of the position, and also hold that speech, however atrocious, can be regulated on its own, even if only by nothing more than public shaming tactics. Trying to hold both requires reading the harm principle upside-down, as a restriction of liberty rather than (as intended by Mill) a basic protection of it.
The harm principle comes from Mill's On Liberty, Chapter I:
The object of this Essay is to assert on every simple principle, as entitled to govern absolutely the dealings of society with the individual in the way of compulsion and control, whether the means used be physical force in the form of legal penalties, or the moral coercion of public opinion. The principle is, that the sole end for which mankind are warranted, individually or collectively, in interfering with the liberty of action of any of their number, is self-protection. That the only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilised community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others.
A common misinterpretation of this, no doubt due to the label that has come to be attached to it, seems to be that this is an authorization of harm -- that is, that it says that you can interfere with liberty of action when it harms another. This is upside-down -- despite the label 'harm principle', the principle is not about harm or response to it, but about protecting liberty. And Mill explicitly rules out any interpretation of the principle as telling you when you can intervene in Chapter V:
...it must by no means be supposed, because damage, or probability of damage, to the interests of others, can alone justify the interference of society, that therefore it always does justify such interference.
In other words, the harm principle does not tell us at all when the government intervene; it just claims that it is not even a legitimate option except when there is harm to others.
It's quite obvious, and no doubt was obvious to Mill (who was a close reader of Plato, who makes the point), that much depends on exactly what counts as harm. Mill, however, deliberately avoids going into any detail, arguably because for his purpose he wants to argue that this is one of the things that needs to be openly and freely discussed in a free society. One obvious question is whether verbal harms can count, and it seems to be a common view that the harm principle allows for this. However, even setting aside the fact that this is arguably against the very spirit of On Liberty, Mill seems to me to rule this out quite definitely as well.
The harm principle draws a distinction between public and personal interests -- society cannot interfere with what pertains merely to a person himself, but only where the person's actions become a real public concern in its own right. Mill guards against a simplistic understanding of this (although how well he does so is open to dispute); almost any private action has some kind of public consequence somewhere. However, if these public consequences are such as arise only through the "free, voluntary, and undeceived consent and participation" of the others involved, this is not what is meant. However one takes this, Mill is clear that the point is to protect liberty of thought and conscience from outside interference. And this, he insists, requires also the protection of the liberty of expressing and publishing opinions:
The liberty of expressing and publishing opinions may seem to fall under a different principle, since it belongs to that part of the conduct of an individual which concerns other people; but, being almost of as much importance as the liberty of thought itself, and resting in great part on the same reasons, is practically inseparable from it.
He will go later to say that liberty of thought and liberty of speaking and writing are inseparable, and he regards treating them as such to be part of what is required to have a free society in the first place.
Thus Mill's harm principle does not allow for the possibility of verbal harm, as such. There is still some wiggle-room -- Mill thinks you can in principle have public decency laws against pornography, for instance, because he allows for the possibility that one might have good arguments that it is harmful to society at large if not kept purely private, and arguably there are some kinds of verbal harassment that he would allow to be regulated because the way they are done makes it impossible for people to opt out (and thus their exposure to it is not free and voluntary). But in neither of these cases is there actually any notion that expressing and publishing an opinion, however atrocious or offensive, could possibly be regarded as harm on its own.
A third common misinterpretation, that the harm principle only applies to government, I have dealt with before; Mill is quite clear, as you can read in the passage above, that it also applies to interventions of public opinion (shaming and boycotting would be examples).
There are a lot of people who seem to like to talk the Millian talk, but make qualifications that are actually fatal to Mill's entire argument. You cannot be a classical liberal, in the sense in which Mill's On Liberty is definitive of the position, and also hold that speech, however atrocious, can be regulated on its own, even if only by nothing more than public shaming tactics. Trying to hold both requires reading the harm principle upside-down, as a restriction of liberty rather than (as intended by Mill) a basic protection of it.
Wednesday, July 20, 2016
Notable Links, Notably Noted and Linked
* Robert J. Lang on the use of origami to improve optical systems.
* Mike Aquilina on philosophical ancestors of the Music of the Ainur
* There was a recent kerfuffle about celebrating Mass ad orientem rather than versus populum; Corpus Christi Watershed notes the current state of liturgical law on the subject.
* Geoffrey Pullum lets loose all guns against Strunk and White's The Elements of Style.
* Matthew Normand argues that psychologists would be better served by more careful causal studies of single cases than they are when trying to pull their conclusions out of statistics of populations.
* Gregory Stackpole on the contribution of monastic governance to some of our common expectations for good political systems: Part I (only the first part is currently up).
* Ian Ground on the philosophical analysis of ugliness.
* How Voltaire became rich by gaming the lottery.
* Ancient and Medieval Anesthesia at "Aliens in This World"
* Therese Ann Druart, Al-Farabi, at the SEP
Nadja Germann, Al Farabi's Philosophy of Society and Religion, at the SEP
Karen Gorodeisky, 19th Century Romantic Aesthetics, at the SEP
* The reasons for the success of the AR-15, at "DarwinCatholic"
* Eve Keneinan on Plato's tripartite account of the soul and on Intellect vs Imagination.
* Clothing in the Viking Age
* Sukaini Hirji on Aristotle on virtue and eudaimonia at Meena Krishnamurthy's blog, "Philosopher".
* The Vatican Library is digitizing its entire manuscript collection.
* How easy is it to move in late medieval and early modern armor? Contrary to the popular view, it is remarkably easy to do so.
* Ages ago, one of the things I argued here is that while a sense of disgust is not in any way sufficient for moral life, it is in fact (contrary to the views of a number of current moral philosophers) a necessary moral sentiment, and cultivating it in proper directions is an important part of moral life. I was reminded of this because of Anthony Esolen's recent article on the uses of disgust.
* Die Fuggerei was founded in Augsburg, Bavaria in 1516 by the Fugger banking family to be a community for the needy, and is still doing today what it was founded to do. To rent the apartments there was originally one Reinischer Gulden a year, so to keep the rent about the same as it has always been, the current rent is 0.88 euros a year. Obviously there are preconditions; one must be Catholic (and willing to say basic Catholic prayers each day as part of the religious life of the community), have lived in Augsburg for at least two years, and not, despite one's unfortunate circumstances, actually be in debt.
* Mike Aquilina on philosophical ancestors of the Music of the Ainur
* There was a recent kerfuffle about celebrating Mass ad orientem rather than versus populum; Corpus Christi Watershed notes the current state of liturgical law on the subject.
* Geoffrey Pullum lets loose all guns against Strunk and White's The Elements of Style.
* Matthew Normand argues that psychologists would be better served by more careful causal studies of single cases than they are when trying to pull their conclusions out of statistics of populations.
* Gregory Stackpole on the contribution of monastic governance to some of our common expectations for good political systems: Part I (only the first part is currently up).
* Ian Ground on the philosophical analysis of ugliness.
* How Voltaire became rich by gaming the lottery.
* Ancient and Medieval Anesthesia at "Aliens in This World"
* Therese Ann Druart, Al-Farabi, at the SEP
Nadja Germann, Al Farabi's Philosophy of Society and Religion, at the SEP
Karen Gorodeisky, 19th Century Romantic Aesthetics, at the SEP
* The reasons for the success of the AR-15, at "DarwinCatholic"
* Eve Keneinan on Plato's tripartite account of the soul and on Intellect vs Imagination.
* Clothing in the Viking Age
* Sukaini Hirji on Aristotle on virtue and eudaimonia at Meena Krishnamurthy's blog, "Philosopher".
* The Vatican Library is digitizing its entire manuscript collection.
* How easy is it to move in late medieval and early modern armor? Contrary to the popular view, it is remarkably easy to do so.
* Ages ago, one of the things I argued here is that while a sense of disgust is not in any way sufficient for moral life, it is in fact (contrary to the views of a number of current moral philosophers) a necessary moral sentiment, and cultivating it in proper directions is an important part of moral life. I was reminded of this because of Anthony Esolen's recent article on the uses of disgust.
* Die Fuggerei was founded in Augsburg, Bavaria in 1516 by the Fugger banking family to be a community for the needy, and is still doing today what it was founded to do. To rent the apartments there was originally one Reinischer Gulden a year, so to keep the rent about the same as it has always been, the current rent is 0.88 euros a year. Obviously there are preconditions; one must be Catholic (and willing to say basic Catholic prayers each day as part of the religious life of the community), have lived in Augsburg for at least two years, and not, despite one's unfortunate circumstances, actually be in debt.
Tuesday, July 19, 2016
Sidgwick, Merit, and Excellence
In The Methods of Ethics, Chapter V, Henry Sidgwick argues that the philosophical dispute over free will has no major effect on discussion of ethics, despite the common view. His argument, however, I find a little odd.
Sidgwick holds that ethics tends to divide into two different types, one focused on Happiness, and another focused on Perfection or Excellence, and he argues that being a determinist wouldn't seem to affect questions of Happiness. He then goes on to argue that the same is true of Excellence:
It is not at all obvious, however, that merit (or desert) is not part of our ordinary conceptions of intellectual perfection and moral excellence. Sidgwick accepts that determinism is inconsistent with "the ordinary notion of merit", although he holds that determinists can have other notions of merit (or similar notions) that can do similar work. So the question is whether our common notions of intellectual perfection and moral excellence are completely detachable from our common notions of merit. Sidgwick argues in a footnote:
But the reason that the perfection of the Divine Nature doesn't involve merit is that God is not the kind of thing that merits any kind of goodness; God has it all by nature already. Human beings are not in any way like this, however; we are the kind of thing that do not have intellectual and moral goodness by nature and so we must achieve excellence in these things. That we can have a conception of excellence that does not require achievement does not establish that our conception of human excellence does not require it, and it is obviously the latter alone that is relevant to ethics. We often clearly recognize a distinction between having intellectual excellence by nature (native intelligence) and intellectual excellence by achievement (hard work, careful self-cultivation, etc. related to intellectual life). So the only question is whether the excellence of intellectual achievement itself involves the notion of merit. And that is certainly the most natural way to read the distinction. Thus our common notions of intellectual excellence appear to involve the common notion of merit, and thus are not detachable from the question of free will (assuming Sidgwick is right about everything else).
This becomes even more obvious with moral excellence than with intellectual excellence. The claim that the manifestations of the virtues do not become less admirable because of determinism is again a shifting to a different topic. The questions are whether the virtues themselves require some kind of free choice, and, more specifically, whether merit belongs to the notions of these virtues. We already know that 'manifestations' of virtues, i.e., actions, can be done by people who do not have the virtues, and that this is quite common. For instance, people who are trying to get the virtues, get them by doing the actions associated with the virtue. We can see that such action is admirable; but the question is not about the action without the virtue but about the having of the virtue itself. Another case, and an interesting contrast, is hypocrisy, since hypocrites are careful to have the same same 'manifestations' of virtues in order to cover up the fact that they don't have the virtue; and we can see that this is not admirable, whereas the same actions would certainly be admirable if done by someone who actually had the virtue or weren't using it as a way to deceive people into thinking that they had it. What makes the difference? One reading, a very natural one, is that virtues themselves are not merely admirable, but are admirable because they have been merited; and the actions of virtues are admirable, even without the virtues, when they are part of the work of meriting that goes into beginning to have the virtues.
And the admiration is an interesting aspect, too. When we say that something is admirable, we may mean either that it is admired, or that it is such as to merit admiration. These are not the same thing, and the latter is what is most commonly meant when talking about the admirableness of virtues and virtuous actions. If determinism, as Sidgwick thinks, messes with our notion of merit, then it messes with our notion of virtue.
****
Henry Sidgwick, The Methods of Ethics, Seventh Edition, Hackett (Indianapolis, IN: 1981), p 68 & 68n-69n.
Sidgwick holds that ethics tends to divide into two different types, one focused on Happiness, and another focused on Perfection or Excellence, and he argues that being a determinist wouldn't seem to affect questions of Happiness. He then goes on to argue that the same is true of Excellence:
...if Excellence is in itself admirable and desirable, it surely remains equally so whether any individual's approximation to it is entirely determined by inherited nature and external influences or not:--except so far as the notion of Excellence includes that of Free Will. Now Free Will is obviously not included in our common ideal of physical and intellectual perfection: and it seems to me also not to be included in the common notions of the excellences of character which we call virtues: the manifestations of courage, temperance, and justice do not become less admirable because we can trace their antecedents in a happy balance of inherited dispositions developed by a careful education.
It is not at all obvious, however, that merit (or desert) is not part of our ordinary conceptions of intellectual perfection and moral excellence. Sidgwick accepts that determinism is inconsistent with "the ordinary notion of merit", although he holds that determinists can have other notions of merit (or similar notions) that can do similar work. So the question is whether our common notions of intellectual perfection and moral excellence are completely detachable from our common notions of merit. Sidgwick argues in a footnote:
But I do not see that Perfection becomes less an End to be aimed at, because we cease to regard its attainment as meritorious. The inapplicability of the notion of 'merit' to Divine action has never been felt to detract from the Perfection of the Divine Nature.
But the reason that the perfection of the Divine Nature doesn't involve merit is that God is not the kind of thing that merits any kind of goodness; God has it all by nature already. Human beings are not in any way like this, however; we are the kind of thing that do not have intellectual and moral goodness by nature and so we must achieve excellence in these things. That we can have a conception of excellence that does not require achievement does not establish that our conception of human excellence does not require it, and it is obviously the latter alone that is relevant to ethics. We often clearly recognize a distinction between having intellectual excellence by nature (native intelligence) and intellectual excellence by achievement (hard work, careful self-cultivation, etc. related to intellectual life). So the only question is whether the excellence of intellectual achievement itself involves the notion of merit. And that is certainly the most natural way to read the distinction. Thus our common notions of intellectual excellence appear to involve the common notion of merit, and thus are not detachable from the question of free will (assuming Sidgwick is right about everything else).
This becomes even more obvious with moral excellence than with intellectual excellence. The claim that the manifestations of the virtues do not become less admirable because of determinism is again a shifting to a different topic. The questions are whether the virtues themselves require some kind of free choice, and, more specifically, whether merit belongs to the notions of these virtues. We already know that 'manifestations' of virtues, i.e., actions, can be done by people who do not have the virtues, and that this is quite common. For instance, people who are trying to get the virtues, get them by doing the actions associated with the virtue. We can see that such action is admirable; but the question is not about the action without the virtue but about the having of the virtue itself. Another case, and an interesting contrast, is hypocrisy, since hypocrites are careful to have the same same 'manifestations' of virtues in order to cover up the fact that they don't have the virtue; and we can see that this is not admirable, whereas the same actions would certainly be admirable if done by someone who actually had the virtue or weren't using it as a way to deceive people into thinking that they had it. What makes the difference? One reading, a very natural one, is that virtues themselves are not merely admirable, but are admirable because they have been merited; and the actions of virtues are admirable, even without the virtues, when they are part of the work of meriting that goes into beginning to have the virtues.
And the admiration is an interesting aspect, too. When we say that something is admirable, we may mean either that it is admired, or that it is such as to merit admiration. These are not the same thing, and the latter is what is most commonly meant when talking about the admirableness of virtues and virtuous actions. If determinism, as Sidgwick thinks, messes with our notion of merit, then it messes with our notion of virtue.
****
Henry Sidgwick, The Methods of Ethics, Seventh Edition, Hackett (Indianapolis, IN: 1981), p 68 & 68n-69n.
Monday, July 18, 2016
Two Poem Drafts
Sleep-Melancholy
Dreams in my head in the dark:
deep are the seas that now flood.
Strange, dark shapes, black forms,
press into thoughts like a wind.
Misery wells in my heart,
surging like waves in a storm;
doomed ships drown in the night,
waiting for hope where is none.
Upward the waves in the wind
carry the ship to its doom;
sails are to long shreds torn,
rudders are broken to sticks.
Cast to the seabed below,
sailors are meeting their death.
Waves break over my head.
Sorrow my heart will soon drown.
Night Walk
In silent starlight rivers flow,
their waves of moonshine rippling light,
and I am where I do not know
on empty lane in quiet night,
and I am walking, robed with glow,
on pebbled way of gray and white.
The stars like song refract a fire.
Their iridescent showers fall
on rivers silver like a wire
and snow the caps of mountains tall;
and as I walk, I never tire,
but stride refreshed by heaven's call.
On night-lit paths my feet have passed;
in shadows I have voyaged far,
on farther lands my fortune cast
with no companion but a star,
and all has led to this at last:
to walk wherever visions are.
Dreams in my head in the dark:
deep are the seas that now flood.
Strange, dark shapes, black forms,
press into thoughts like a wind.
Misery wells in my heart,
surging like waves in a storm;
doomed ships drown in the night,
waiting for hope where is none.
Upward the waves in the wind
carry the ship to its doom;
sails are to long shreds torn,
rudders are broken to sticks.
Cast to the seabed below,
sailors are meeting their death.
Waves break over my head.
Sorrow my heart will soon drown.
Night Walk
In silent starlight rivers flow,
their waves of moonshine rippling light,
and I am where I do not know
on empty lane in quiet night,
and I am walking, robed with glow,
on pebbled way of gray and white.
The stars like song refract a fire.
Their iridescent showers fall
on rivers silver like a wire
and snow the caps of mountains tall;
and as I walk, I never tire,
but stride refreshed by heaven's call.
On night-lit paths my feet have passed;
in shadows I have voyaged far,
on farther lands my fortune cast
with no companion but a star,
and all has led to this at last:
to walk wherever visions are.
Sunday, July 17, 2016
Re-Post: Three Peculiar Pages
This is a slight revision of a post originally published in 2005.
Laurence Sterne's The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman, published in multiple volumes in the 1760s, is perhaps the world's greatest experimental novel. That's a fairly bold statement, but if any experimental novel has a claim on that title, Tristram Shandy does. One can see something of what Sterne does with three pages in particular, each of which captures something of the mystery or perhaps oddness of human life.
The Black Page
In Volume I Chapter XII we find a page that looks something like this, assuming I get the HTML right:
It is an elegiac page; Sterne inserts it after the death of the parson Yorick (Alas, poor Yorick! -- According to Shandy, this Yorick is a relative of Hamlet's Yorick). It symbolizes the mystery of death. Death is a black page, something put in the novel which we are almost expected to read (and which we all try to read, as we always try to 'read' death and the mysteries involved therein).
The Marbled Page
This page, which is inserted at the end of Volume III Chapter XXXVI, I can't really reproduce here; for an example, see Tristram Shandy Online.
I say 'an example' because an example is all that it is. It is one marbled page. But the marbling process creates a different page each time. Thus, every single book with a true marbled page has a different marbled page! And that's the point. As the narrator says:
A "motley emblem of my work": in other words, the book itself. But the book is itself a sort of presentation of life -- Sterne is constantly mocking the pretensions of the novel to being 'true to life' by giving it, in Tristram Shandy, a task that takes such a pretension seriously: the actual recording of a full life, The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy. With the exception of a few digressions and what one generally learns about a narrator (who is Tristram himself), we learn virtually nothing about Tristram's actual life: virtually all the long, sprawling, unfinished nine-volume work is devoted to the background that would be needed to understand Shandy's early years. A large chunk is taken to develop the background necessary for understanding his conception, and another to understanding his birth; we already get something of the Tristra-paedia, and would no doubt get more if Sterne had managed (as he intended) to write yet more volumes. The novel's 'trueness to life' is simply inadequate for a serious demand that it be true to life. Tristram Shandy is motley and endless because human life is motley and so individualized -- each person being, as it were, a unique marbled page, whose individuality is so precise it admits of no adequate description.
The Blank Page
The third peculiar page is found in Volume VI Chapter XXXVIII. Shandy has just begun to talk about the widow Wadman, of whom he says at the end of Chapter XXXVII, "never did they eyes behold, or they concupiscence covet any thing in this world, more concupiscible than widow Wadman". He then goes on to say:
The Picture of the Widow Wadman, the most desirable of all women, is a blank page. And after the blank page, the narrator continues:
It might be a bit too pedantic, or too pompous, or both, to say that this blank symbolizes the mystery of love, although I think a lot could be said in such a vein. What we call 'beautiful' or 'attractive' is actually just that which is blank enough that we can 'please our fancy in it'; we conceive it aright when we just let our imagination make it up. And it's surprising how obvious this sometimes seems if you think about the fashion industry, or Hollywood. There are always exceptions, of course; but attractive people are often blank -- not quite as blank as the picture of Widow Wadman, but blank enough -- and all their attractiveness is just what we have chosen to write on them with our imaginations (often guided by designers and directors). In other words, they are attractive to so many people because they are so easy for everyone to adapt for their own imaginations.
But it's possible to look at the blank page a bit differently (one of the problems with the interpretation of a blank page, I suppose). This is suggested by the "Thrice Happy Book" paragraph. The blank page is not merely about the interpretation of beauty or 'concupiscibility'. [Incidentally, the ambiguity of what Sterne actually says about the widow is interesting. He says that our eyes have not seen or our concupiscences coveted anything so concupiscible as the widow Wadman. One reading of that, encouraged by the lines immediately following the blank page, is to take 'concupiscible' as synonymous with desirable; but it could be a play on words, as well, since 'concupiscible' can also mean 'filled with strong desire, lustful', which describes the widow to a T, as she lays siege to poor uncle Toby in order to get him as a husband.] The problem with interpreting concupiscibility can be generalized to all interpretation. By providing a blank page, Shandy purports to give us the one page in his book safe from distortion by malice or ignorance; since there is no right or wrong way to interpret a blank page, it is immune from misinterpretation.
Those are just three pages in the novel. Sterne does a many other experimental things that are fascinating in themselves. But the three peculiar pages are my favorites.
Laurence Sterne's The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman, published in multiple volumes in the 1760s, is perhaps the world's greatest experimental novel. That's a fairly bold statement, but if any experimental novel has a claim on that title, Tristram Shandy does. One can see something of what Sterne does with three pages in particular, each of which captures something of the mystery or perhaps oddness of human life.
The Black Page
In Volume I Chapter XII we find a page that looks something like this, assuming I get the HTML right:
It is an elegiac page; Sterne inserts it after the death of the parson Yorick (Alas, poor Yorick! -- According to Shandy, this Yorick is a relative of Hamlet's Yorick). It symbolizes the mystery of death. Death is a black page, something put in the novel which we are almost expected to read (and which we all try to read, as we always try to 'read' death and the mysteries involved therein).
The Marbled Page
This page, which is inserted at the end of Volume III Chapter XXXVI, I can't really reproduce here; for an example, see Tristram Shandy Online.
I say 'an example' because an example is all that it is. It is one marbled page. But the marbling process creates a different page each time. Thus, every single book with a true marbled page has a different marbled page! And that's the point. As the narrator says:
Read, read, read, read, my unlearned reader ! read, -- or by the knowledge of the great saint Paraleipomenon -- I tell you before-hand, you had better throw down the book at once; for without much reading, by which your reverence knows, I mean much knowledge, you will no more be able to penetrate the moral of the next marbled page (motly emblem of my work !) than the world with all its sagacity has been able to unraval the many opinions, transactions and truths which still lie mystically hid under the dark veil of the black one.
A "motley emblem of my work": in other words, the book itself. But the book is itself a sort of presentation of life -- Sterne is constantly mocking the pretensions of the novel to being 'true to life' by giving it, in Tristram Shandy, a task that takes such a pretension seriously: the actual recording of a full life, The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy. With the exception of a few digressions and what one generally learns about a narrator (who is Tristram himself), we learn virtually nothing about Tristram's actual life: virtually all the long, sprawling, unfinished nine-volume work is devoted to the background that would be needed to understand Shandy's early years. A large chunk is taken to develop the background necessary for understanding his conception, and another to understanding his birth; we already get something of the Tristra-paedia, and would no doubt get more if Sterne had managed (as he intended) to write yet more volumes. The novel's 'trueness to life' is simply inadequate for a serious demand that it be true to life. Tristram Shandy is motley and endless because human life is motley and so individualized -- each person being, as it were, a unique marbled page, whose individuality is so precise it admits of no adequate description.
The Blank Page
The third peculiar page is found in Volume VI Chapter XXXVIII. Shandy has just begun to talk about the widow Wadman, of whom he says at the end of Chapter XXXVII, "never did they eyes behold, or they concupiscence covet any thing in this world, more concupiscible than widow Wadman". He then goes on to say:
TO conceive this right, -- call for pen and ink -- here's paper ready to your hand. ---- Sit down, Sir, paint her to your own mind ---- as like your mistress
as you can ---- as unlike your wife as your conscience will let you -- 'tis all
one to me ---- please but your own fancy in it.
The Picture of the Widow Wadman, the most desirable of all women, is a blank page. And after the blank page, the narrator continues:
------ Was ever any thing in Nature so sweet ! -- so exquisite !
---- Then, dear Sir, how could my uncle Toby resist it ?
Thrice happy book ! thou wilt have one page, at least, within thy covers,
which MALICE will not blacken, and which IGNORANCE cannot misrepresent.
It might be a bit too pedantic, or too pompous, or both, to say that this blank symbolizes the mystery of love, although I think a lot could be said in such a vein. What we call 'beautiful' or 'attractive' is actually just that which is blank enough that we can 'please our fancy in it'; we conceive it aright when we just let our imagination make it up. And it's surprising how obvious this sometimes seems if you think about the fashion industry, or Hollywood. There are always exceptions, of course; but attractive people are often blank -- not quite as blank as the picture of Widow Wadman, but blank enough -- and all their attractiveness is just what we have chosen to write on them with our imaginations (often guided by designers and directors). In other words, they are attractive to so many people because they are so easy for everyone to adapt for their own imaginations.
But it's possible to look at the blank page a bit differently (one of the problems with the interpretation of a blank page, I suppose). This is suggested by the "Thrice Happy Book" paragraph. The blank page is not merely about the interpretation of beauty or 'concupiscibility'. [Incidentally, the ambiguity of what Sterne actually says about the widow is interesting. He says that our eyes have not seen or our concupiscences coveted anything so concupiscible as the widow Wadman. One reading of that, encouraged by the lines immediately following the blank page, is to take 'concupiscible' as synonymous with desirable; but it could be a play on words, as well, since 'concupiscible' can also mean 'filled with strong desire, lustful', which describes the widow to a T, as she lays siege to poor uncle Toby in order to get him as a husband.] The problem with interpreting concupiscibility can be generalized to all interpretation. By providing a blank page, Shandy purports to give us the one page in his book safe from distortion by malice or ignorance; since there is no right or wrong way to interpret a blank page, it is immune from misinterpretation.
Those are just three pages in the novel. Sterne does a many other experimental things that are fascinating in themselves. But the three peculiar pages are my favorites.
Maronite Year LX
Tenth Sunday of Pentecost
1 Corinthians 12:1-11; Matthew 12:22-32
O Lord our God, on Sunday You rose in glorious splendor!
By the power of the Holy Spirit You have wrought our salvation.
Only through the Spirit can any say that Jesus is Lord;
though gifts are many, there is one Holy Spirit who gives them all.
By the Spirit's power we have been baptized as one body;
we have been given drink from the same fountain of living water.
Christ overcame all suffering and destroyed death's victories;
He brought back sinners from death and clothed them with the robe of glory.
On Sunday we are marked with the seal of our Lord's endless light;
thus, O Lord, we sing Your praises with all the choirs of seraphim.
Friday, July 15, 2016
Dashed Off XV
Qualia-based defenses of dualism generally seem to require that all sufficiently developed animals are such as to require dualism (and 'sufficiently developed' would seem to have to be quite generous).
We do not need abstraction to explain the fact that we classify things; but abstraction does explain why we are so extraordinarily good at it, able to navigate rather high-level classifications when (e.g.) helping to sort books at a library, and why as a species we are able to take it so far as to build periodic tables that predict properties of elements not yet discovered, classify subatomic particles we can never sense, and sort stars by age and composition based on lines of light.
All of Hume is a sort of proof that intellectual abstraction is not reducible to phantasms and imaginative processes.
arguments from evil as falling into (1) quasi-ontological (2) quasi-cosmological (3) quasi-teleological (4) quasi-moral groups
(1) evil makes existence of infinite good (conceptually) impossible (2) evil rules out infinite good as cause (3) evil rules out infinite good as exemplar for world (4) evil rules out infinite good as practical postulate
respect & gratitude as essential elements of good stewardship
The translations of Enoch and Elijah, the assumption attributed to Moses, the Assumption of Our Lady, the Ascension of Christ, all perhaps suggest that what we call death is but the defective malfunction, the disordered falling-short, of something profound in us, of a transcendence that must be restored if we are to be whole.
What is especially significant of human classification ability is not that we classify but that we consider why we classify the way we do.
All accounts of scientific realism can be seen as converging on Aristotelian principles, although this is a matter of degree (it of course also follows that proponents of those accounts could well say instead that Aristotelian principles go too far in this way or that).
roles of metaphysical principles in fields of natural science
(1) to explain how and why those fields can explain
(2) to establish the general for what in that field is specific
(3) to relate that field to other fields
(4) to serve as heuristic in the inquiry of that field
(a) impressions are productive causes of future properties
(b) powers of an object are productive causes of future properties
(c) changing the course of nature may cause a change in the powers of the object
(d) custom is a cause of the idea of causation
A healthy government restrains itself not only in light of legal requirement but also in light of the way actions would function as symbolic precedents.
situationism as a problem for utilitarianism: the fragility of psychological states like pleasure & pain or satisfaction
artificial classifications as approximations
real numbers as: points in axis/lines in area/points in plane; infinite decimals; a particular kind of set construction given rational numbers; an ordered field with the least upper bound property
- the problem with the geometrical account is that reals and rationals do not seem easily distinguishable this way.
- the problem with infinite decimals account is defining the arithmetical operations
- the problem with cut-based accounts is construction the relevant subsets of rational numbers in the first place and defining arithmetical operations with them
A free society requires the ability of citizens on their own power and authority to form quasi-public institutions.
Note that Calvin holds that unction was an apostolic sacrament but that it ceased with the cessation of the gift of healing he regards it as having signified; the obvious difficulty is that the remission of sins seems to indicate that there was more to its signification.
The rule for the interpretation of Scripture is the Spirit that animates the whole Church.
baptism saves Mk 16:16; 1 Pt 3:21
clarifying & facilitating freedom as one of the functions of law
discipline, foresight, and thoroughness as properties of prudence
tea ceremony as training in civilization
"If the universe is so bad, or even half so bad, how on earth did human beings ever come to attribute it to the activity of a wise and good Creator?" (CS Lewis)
preceptive, directive, and facultative rules in liturgical law
Schelling distinguishes two kinds of idea in Plato: those that ground the world with respect to materiality and those that do so with respect to form as such. (The former objects, the latter the Good, quantity, quality, causality, etc.)
The purpose of Descartes's Meditation IV is not to get God off the hook, but to put us on it -- i.e., to establish that we are responsible for our own judgment.
testimony as self-reflective (qua testimony, it can be regarded as being partly about its own causality)
the affinity of justice and truth
Paleatiology requires a temporal ordering of first causes aligned with their logical ordering (so that prior/posterior/indifferent in logic can be translated directly to time)
- in what domains does spatial ordering align with logical ordering? (and what kind of ordering? up/down, in/out, to/from, over/under)
(think of logical diagrams here, which use topological relations to model logical relations)
using etiological and causal role accounts of function in application to scientific inquiry itself
Etiological accounts of function, as given by analytic philosophers, are ironically not themselves historically structured, thus treating the function of intellectual problems, etc., as non-etiological.
sacred narrative as an expression of providential order
almsgiving and the temporal prosperity of the Church
Bellarmine's note of temporal prosperity is linked to the existence of communitas perfecta.
prosperity is relative to common good
Every etiology is an account of a series of causes that is itself an effect.
Bull's two arguments for angels: plenitude and best explanation for vastness of the universe
invocation of saints (1) to think and speak humbly of it (2) to proclaim them blessed (3) to ask for their prayers
The modern age favors the idea of faith without zeal.
principles of mutual forbearance in inquiry
Swiftness of progress along a certain line of inquiry may also be accompanied by shoddiness of constructive and critical thought. Pressure to progress swiftly, or even steadily, is pressure to take shortcuts.
Fiction and nonfiction alike are testimony, with different causal accounts.
simulations as artificial testimonies
People will usually act on their own interest; but they will also usually try to avoid ways of doing so that interfere with what they see as the general interest.
soil sampling requires
(1) representativeness of sample
(2) stability of sample
(3) representativeness of tested subsample
(4) accuracy of test
- it seems like error statistics would be appropriate here
Phenomena are not identifiable without appeal to causation.
A sample's role in inference is determined by its causal profile.
artificial analogies converging on natural analogies
Every actual being is intelligibly actual; what is intelligibly actual is either itself a principle of intelligibility or requires a principle such that its actuality is intelligible.
Meno as a comic dialogue
Ungoliant as envy
guidance by example and counsel as essential to integrity and health of law and government
the extent of lobbying as a sign of the extent to which a government is not sticking to its duties of governance
dreams & unsettled classification
'qualia' as a residue concept
As the books of the New Testament are being written, they proceed from and to churches already living in the Tradition of Christ and His Apostles, a tradition from those who had known Christ Himself or His Apostles who had known Him
Jesus scholarship as aggressive Gospel Harmony
Every pursuit of pleasure requires restraint.
Some punishments clearly do allow for penal substitutions like fines (cf. David Lewis)
philosophical systems as both discursive and intuitive in character
illusion of abundance as the principle of fast food
Barzun: decadence as good intentions exceeding power to fulfill them
Our body is mostly in the domain of allowing rather than doing, and the allowing shows a difference between an active and a passive allowing.
Every human being unfolds out of motherhood.
Mary Lk 1;42
Jael Jdg 5:24
Judith Jud 13:18
Jael crushes head of Sisera, Judith severs the head of Holofernes; Gn 3:15 in some mss
Knowledge requires a standard to exist at all; it is an inherently normative concept.
virtues admitting of infinite intension -- prudence and charity obvious candidates, poss. also justice
-- some virtues seem necessarily to have only finite intension (temperance & its parts, fortitude, as poss. candidates; possibly also faith and hope)
-- Aquinas explicitly argues that charity admits of infinite intension (ST 2-2.24.7)
Hope is an intrinsically narrative virtue.
Malachi 2:7 and the mark of priesthood
Every psalm as a standpoint and an addressee. (This is explicitly recognized by St. Hilary as the key to interpreting the psalms.)
The Gospel known by the prophets under symbolic veil was known by the apostles through manifest seal.
almsgiving as a discipline of humility
prevalence of distraction as a deteriorating factor in the availability of good counsel
It is important to grasp that people not only argue at others but also with and for them.
the moral as well as physical defenselessness of the infant
cooperative reinforcement of distinct lines of argument (parity, analogy, practical suitability, metaphorical/symbolic aptness, co-parsimony)
poignancy and precious pains (pains that make life better)
poetry:logic::music:mathematics
Jesus' resurrection in Mark: 8:31, 9:31, 10:32-34; aslo 9:2-13; 14:27-28; 16:6
Synoptic sharing shows a congeniality of shared material for diverse groups of early Christians.
galley effect as showing that sensory experience is more than sensory perception
constancy & coherence as aspects of semiosis
simultaneity (of time) as primarily a systemic concept
the principle of plurality of societies (Every human being is a member of multiple societies, each with some protection and good of its own)
the legitimacy and necessity of rational faction -- the modern state has attacked social pluralism under the name of faction
Arguments from evil require that our moral sense be sufficient to establish impossibilities and necessities of a high degree of metaphysical importance, or it cannot get its conclusion, indeed, cannot get more than a puzzle; but if our moral sense is this sure, it is itself a reason to believe that God as a moral principle exists.
the danger of using fuss over the appearance of tradition to cover lack of the substance
Some prices are too high for saving even the innocent. (Everyone actually recognizes such cases.)
personal and abstract ends of society (abstract ends include intrinsic interest, principle, and traditional loyalty)
Hund-Mulliken molecular orbital theory and the relation between part and whole in a molecule
gold:proclamation::frankincense:sacrifice::myrrh:reception
vagueness of location (note that this is quite intuitive -- we only locate things to a given precision -- but immediately causes problems for strict denial of multilocation
localizable abstractions (e.g., local jurisdiction)
Rehabilitation requires free will if it is not to be mere manipulation.
all patriarchal sees are as if one Petrine see (cf Gregory the Great to Eulogius; REg Ep Bk VII, Ep 40)
(this is obviously said analogically, via relation to Peter)
(but note especially the connection with John 17:21
"the good of a neighbor is common to one who stands idle, if he knows how to rejoice in common in the doings of the other" (Gregory the Great Ep 40)
Liturgy of St. James as the primary liturgical type of the Church
(various Latinate rites are from different sources, and Liturgy of St. Cyril is from Liturgy of St. Mark, but Liturgy of St. James splits into Liturgies of St. BAsil and St. John Chrysostom and Syriac Liturgy of St. James)
Note that the praise of creation in Sirach 43 prepares for and anticipates the praise of Simon the Just as high priest in Sirach 50.
A movie is not an illusion of motion; it is an actual motion of representation by light and filter.
Matrimony receives from baptism that our bodies are for the Lord.
Matrimony is pedagogical as law, as symbol, and as grace.
Pauline & Petrine privileges as linked to marriage's role in knitting together the Body of Christ and uniting it to Christ.
complete definition, varied examples, explicit reasoning, developed foundations
cultivation of asymmetric confusion as one of the fundamental problems of military strategy and tactics
"success at the cost of one's kindred is the greatest misfortune" 2 Macc 5:6
What passes for historical objectivity is usually just a certain sobriety of political judgment.
Observation is a change that is caused in such a way that allows reliable semiosis.
(1) principle of asceticism
(2) principle of purity
(3) needful things
(4) moral good taste
(5) making virtues manifest
realism vs anti-realism as being at root a question of the relation of intelligible to sensible
experiments as changes, experiments as effects, experiments as signs
Seraphic Doctor
Today is the Feast of St. Giovanni di Fidanza, better known by his nickname of Bonaventure, Doctor of the Church.
...God, the supreme good, is above us; our soul, an intrinsic good, is within us; our neighbor, a kindred good, next to us; and our body, a lesser good, below us. Therefore, the proper order of loving is to love God first, more than all else and for his own sake; our soul second, less than God but more than any temporal good; our neighbor third, as much as ourselves, as a good on the same level; our body fourth, less than our soul, as a good of lesser degree. It is here also we should place our neighbor's body that, like our own, is a lesser good than our soul.[Bonaventure, Breviloquium, Monti, tr., The Franciscan Institution (St. Bonaventure, NY: 2005), pp. 201-202.]
Thursday, July 14, 2016
Decorum
A recent tweet from Arlington National Cemetery:
ADDED LATER:
And I had missed this one: Holocaust Museum to visitors: Please stop catching Pokémon here
We do not consider playing "Pokemon Go" to be appropriate decorum on the grounds of ANC. We ask all visitors to refrain from such activity.
— Arlington Cemetery (@ArlingtonNatl) July 12, 2016
ADDED LATER:
And I had missed this one: Holocaust Museum to visitors: Please stop catching Pokémon here
A Person of Taste
To be a person of taste, it seems necessary, that one have, first, a lively and correct imagination; secondly, the power of distinct apprehension; thirdly, the capacity of being easily, strongly, and agreeably affected, with sublimity, beauty, harmony, exact imitation, &c.; fourthly, Sympathy, or Sensibility of heart; and, fifthly, Judgment, or Good Sense, which is the principal thing, and may not very improperly be said to comprehend all the rest.
James Beattie, Of Imagination, Chapter IV
Wednesday, July 13, 2016
Rabban Bar Sauma and Thirteenth-Century Ecumenism
In the thirteenth century a Chinese Christian belonging to the Church of the East decided to go on a pilgrimage to the Holy Land. His name was Rabban Bar Sauma, and he was born in Beijing and became a Christian priest. He set out on the pilgrimage with a student of his, named Rabban Markos, and they got as far as Persia, where they met with the Catholicos (patriarch) of the Church of the East, who was Mar Denha I. In the course of their travels they learned that the entire region around the Holy Land was in a state of tumult and war, so while they were wondering what to do, the Catholicos asked them to go to the court of Abaqa Khan, to get the documents officially recognizing Mar Denha as the patriarch. They did this, and Mar Denha intended to send them as messengers to China, but war to the east prevented that as well, so they stayed in Baghdad making themselves useful for a while. Mar Denha then died, and Rabban Markos was elected Catholicos of the Church of the East, taking the name Mar Yahballaha III. They went to Abaqa again to get the official confirmation letters, but Abaqa had died and his son Arghun had become ruler of the Ilkhanate.
The Mameluk territories to the south and west were extreme irritations to Ilkhanate, and so Arghun Khan hoped for an alliance between the Buddhist Mongols in the East and the Christian Franks in the West to fight together and conquer the Muslim Mamelukes Syria and the surrounding region. He asked Mar Yahballaha to recommend someone to go to the West with letters proposing it. Mar Yahballaha, of course, recommended his teacher Rabban Bar Sauma. So Rabban Bar Sauma, who had never been able to complete his pilgrimage to Jerusalem because of the dangers, in his old age now had a new pilgrimage.
It was quite a journey. He visited Constantinople and was stunned by Hagia Sophia; while there he met with Emperor Andronikos II Palaiologos. He sailed to Italy, and as they were sailing past Sicily, he saw the eruption of Mount Etna on June 18, 1287. On June 24, 1287, he saw from a distance the Battle of Sorento, a naval battle between France and Spain in the War of the Sicilian Vespers.
A big part of Bar Sauma's mission was to deliver the messages to Mar Papa, the Catholicos of the West, but when he got to Rome, the pope had recently died. So he toured St. Peter's and talked with Cardinals. Since they were thirteenth-century Catholic churchmen, they wanted to discuss and argue, and so they asked Bar Sauma what his views on various theological topics were, and he acquitted himself fairly well, although he had to cut them short and finally tell them that he wasn't there to debate theology to deliver his letters and received the blessing of the Mar Papa in Rome. Since there was no Mar Papa at the time, he continued on his way: Tuscany and Genoa, where he spent the winter, and then on to France, where he met King Philip the Fair. King Philip was interested in the alliance, and so arranged to have a French nobleman go back with Bar Sauma whenever he ended up going back. In Gascony he delivered the message to King Edward I of England, as well, who would eventually send an ambassador to Arghun Khan's court. (Despite the interest, however, very little ever came of the attempt to build a Franco-Mongol Alliance.)
Bar Sauma was a bit worried about not having delivered a message to Mar Papa -- it meant his mission was strictly speaking a failure, and Mongol governments were not exactly tolerant of failure. One of the people Bar Sauma had talked to, however, had business that took him to Rome, and so Bar Sauma received a message from the newly elected Mar Papa, Pope Nicholas IV, inviting him to Rome. So back to Rome he went to meet with the Pope and deliver his message; the Pope asked him to stay for the holy days, because it was halfway through Lent. He was treated with great hospitality, and he suggested to the Pope that he should celebrate the Divine Liturgy one day so that the Pope would know what the Use of the Church of the East was. The Pope thought this was an excellent idea, so Bar Sauma celebrated the Divine Liturgy to a very large crowd who were curious to see how Christians among the Mongols said Mass. The people were impressed, and said that it was the same rite as their own, just with differences you'd expect from the differences in language.
So Bar Sauma asked for something a bit more courageous: he asked if he could receive communion from the Pope himself. And on Palm Sunday, he did. It was a very emotional experience for him. He saw the service of Holy Thursday in St. John Lateran, and the Maundy footwashing, the Good Friday procession, Holy Saturday and the Easter Vigil, and then Easter Day at St. Mary Major, and a week later a consecration of bishops.
The Pope invited him to continue to stay in Rome, but Bar Sauma had to get back to let people know that he had finished his mission. He asked the Pope for relics to take back with him. The Pope pointed out that they couldn't give relics to everyone who came to Rome, or they'd soon have none, but because Bar Sauma's pilgrimage had been so unusually long, they would make an exception in this case, so they gave him some small relics. The Pope also sent with him a tiara and vestments for Mar Yahballaha and a papal bull recognizing Mar Yahballaha's authority and jurisdiction as Patriarch over the Church of the East, and naming Bar Sauma as Apostolic Visitor to the East. And so Bar Sauma returned to Baghdad in honor, where he would die in 1294.
But not before he wrote a book describing his extraordinary journey. The original Persian text doesn't seem to have survived, but a Syriac abridgement was made at some point, continuing the story through the entire reign of Mar Yahballaha. The text was completely translated into English in 1928 by Sir E. A. Wallis Budge, under the title, The Monks of Kublai Khan, Emperor of China, which you can read online.
Rabban Bar Sauma's visit may have piqued Pope Nicholas IV's interest in the East; not long afterward he sent several missions to various parts of the East. The most successful of these was that of John of Montecorvino, who founded a Catholic mission in Beijing that lasted for several decades. Mar Yahballaha, in turn, explicitly affirmed communion with Rome in a 1304 letter to Pope Benedict XI; but it was not a union that had much practical effect, or that lasted past his death.
The Mameluk territories to the south and west were extreme irritations to Ilkhanate, and so Arghun Khan hoped for an alliance between the Buddhist Mongols in the East and the Christian Franks in the West to fight together and conquer the Muslim Mamelukes Syria and the surrounding region. He asked Mar Yahballaha to recommend someone to go to the West with letters proposing it. Mar Yahballaha, of course, recommended his teacher Rabban Bar Sauma. So Rabban Bar Sauma, who had never been able to complete his pilgrimage to Jerusalem because of the dangers, in his old age now had a new pilgrimage.
It was quite a journey. He visited Constantinople and was stunned by Hagia Sophia; while there he met with Emperor Andronikos II Palaiologos. He sailed to Italy, and as they were sailing past Sicily, he saw the eruption of Mount Etna on June 18, 1287. On June 24, 1287, he saw from a distance the Battle of Sorento, a naval battle between France and Spain in the War of the Sicilian Vespers.
A big part of Bar Sauma's mission was to deliver the messages to Mar Papa, the Catholicos of the West, but when he got to Rome, the pope had recently died. So he toured St. Peter's and talked with Cardinals. Since they were thirteenth-century Catholic churchmen, they wanted to discuss and argue, and so they asked Bar Sauma what his views on various theological topics were, and he acquitted himself fairly well, although he had to cut them short and finally tell them that he wasn't there to debate theology to deliver his letters and received the blessing of the Mar Papa in Rome. Since there was no Mar Papa at the time, he continued on his way: Tuscany and Genoa, where he spent the winter, and then on to France, where he met King Philip the Fair. King Philip was interested in the alliance, and so arranged to have a French nobleman go back with Bar Sauma whenever he ended up going back. In Gascony he delivered the message to King Edward I of England, as well, who would eventually send an ambassador to Arghun Khan's court. (Despite the interest, however, very little ever came of the attempt to build a Franco-Mongol Alliance.)
Bar Sauma was a bit worried about not having delivered a message to Mar Papa -- it meant his mission was strictly speaking a failure, and Mongol governments were not exactly tolerant of failure. One of the people Bar Sauma had talked to, however, had business that took him to Rome, and so Bar Sauma received a message from the newly elected Mar Papa, Pope Nicholas IV, inviting him to Rome. So back to Rome he went to meet with the Pope and deliver his message; the Pope asked him to stay for the holy days, because it was halfway through Lent. He was treated with great hospitality, and he suggested to the Pope that he should celebrate the Divine Liturgy one day so that the Pope would know what the Use of the Church of the East was. The Pope thought this was an excellent idea, so Bar Sauma celebrated the Divine Liturgy to a very large crowd who were curious to see how Christians among the Mongols said Mass. The people were impressed, and said that it was the same rite as their own, just with differences you'd expect from the differences in language.
So Bar Sauma asked for something a bit more courageous: he asked if he could receive communion from the Pope himself. And on Palm Sunday, he did. It was a very emotional experience for him. He saw the service of Holy Thursday in St. John Lateran, and the Maundy footwashing, the Good Friday procession, Holy Saturday and the Easter Vigil, and then Easter Day at St. Mary Major, and a week later a consecration of bishops.
The Pope invited him to continue to stay in Rome, but Bar Sauma had to get back to let people know that he had finished his mission. He asked the Pope for relics to take back with him. The Pope pointed out that they couldn't give relics to everyone who came to Rome, or they'd soon have none, but because Bar Sauma's pilgrimage had been so unusually long, they would make an exception in this case, so they gave him some small relics. The Pope also sent with him a tiara and vestments for Mar Yahballaha and a papal bull recognizing Mar Yahballaha's authority and jurisdiction as Patriarch over the Church of the East, and naming Bar Sauma as Apostolic Visitor to the East. And so Bar Sauma returned to Baghdad in honor, where he would die in 1294.
But not before he wrote a book describing his extraordinary journey. The original Persian text doesn't seem to have survived, but a Syriac abridgement was made at some point, continuing the story through the entire reign of Mar Yahballaha. The text was completely translated into English in 1928 by Sir E. A. Wallis Budge, under the title, The Monks of Kublai Khan, Emperor of China, which you can read online.
Rabban Bar Sauma's visit may have piqued Pope Nicholas IV's interest in the East; not long afterward he sent several missions to various parts of the East. The most successful of these was that of John of Montecorvino, who founded a Catholic mission in Beijing that lasted for several decades. Mar Yahballaha, in turn, explicitly affirmed communion with Rome in a 1304 letter to Pope Benedict XI; but it was not a union that had much practical effect, or that lasted past his death.
Tuesday, July 12, 2016
Plato Was Closed; Mine Eyes No More Awake
Sonnet
by William Julius Mickle
Plato was closed; mine eyes no more awake;
But Plato's lore still vision'd round my head:
Meseem'd the Elysian dales around me spread,
Where spirits choose what mortal forms to take:
'Mine be the poet's eye; I crowns forsake.'
Sudden before me stood an awful shade;
On his firm mien simplicity array'd
In majesty, the Grecian bard bespake:
He thus: 'Bright shines the poet's lot untried;
Canst thou than mine to brighter fame aspire!
High o'er the' Olympian height my raptures tower'd,
Each Muse the fleet-wing'd handmaid of mine
Yet o'er their generous flight what sorrow plied,
While freezing every joy Dependence lour'd!'
William Julius Mickle was a Scottish poet most famous in his own day for translating the Lusiad. The narrator in this poem must have been reading the end of the Republic.
Monday, July 11, 2016
Themistocles in Plato's Gorgias
After this he equipped the Piraeus, because he had noticed the favorable shape of its harbors, and wished to attach the whole city to the sea; thus in a certain manner counteracting the policies of the ancient Athenian kings.[Plutarch, Lives, Themistocles 19.2-3]
For they, as it is said, in their efforts to draw the citizens away from the sea and accustom them to live not by navigation but by agriculture, disseminated the story about Athena, how when Poseidon was contending with her for possession of the country, she displayed the sacred olive-tree of the Acropolis to the judges, and so won the day. But Themistocles did not, as Aristophanes the comic poet says, ‘knead the Piraeus on to the city,’ nay, he fastened the city to the Piraeus, and the land to the sea.
Themistocles (along with Pericles) was one of the architects of Athenian greatness. He is also (along with Pericles) something of a villain in the Platonic dialogues, and the above passage by Plutarch captures, I think, why this is, since Plato sees Themistocles as perverting the true nature of Athens. In the next sections Plutarch will note that the ancient Greeks thought of maritime empire as the "mother of democracy", because it puts the real power in the hands of those who control the ships; and I think the argument can be made that Themistocles' subversion of Athenian principles connects to Plato's skeptical views on the stability of democracy.
The place one can see the thematic opposition play out most clearly, although without any names, is in the Atlantis myth of the Timaeus and the Critias, in which the island is the symbolic representation of the ideal of maritime empire, which is opposed to the autochthonic, and thus land-focused, Athenians. The sea as a factor in Athenian corruption comes up elsewhere in the dialogues, e.g., in Laws. But it is in the Gorgias that Plato is fairly explicit about what, precisely, he sees wrong with the Themistoclean sea-dream.
Themistocles was the first politician fully to understand the implications of the overthrow of the Athenian kings and their replacement with the Demos: namely, that anyone could have any power that they wanted as long as they could convince enough people to give it to them. He is also very recognizable as a politician in our sense of the word. He moved to the poor part of town, playing the part of a man of the people, going from door to door and asking the poor citizens of Athens for their assistance, being careful to remember everyone's name. People, of course, loved it, and thus Themistocles built a constituency; on the basis of that, he campaigned for office. Being an excellent speaker, roused the crowds in his favor again and again. It is thus not surprising that Gorgias mentions him as an example of the power of rhetoric (455d-e):
GORGIAS: Well, Socrates, I'll try to reveal to you clearly everything oratory can accomplish. You yourself led the way nicely, for you do know, don't you, that these dockyards and walls of the Athenians and the equipping of the harbor came about through the advice of Themistocles and in some cases through that of Pericles, but not through that of the craftsman?
SOCRATES: That's what they say about Themistocles, Gorgias. I myself heard Pericles when he advised us on the middle wall.
Themistocles is certainly in mind when Socrates and Polus argue over whether one wants to be able to do whatever you like, "whether it's putting people to death or exiling them, or doing any and everything just as you see fit" (469c). One of the major early highlights of Themistocles' career was his convincing the people to ostracize (temporarily exile) his major political rival, Aristides. But another possible sign of it is when Socrates rejects Polus's idea by using the example of the "marvelous tyrannical power" of a dagger (469e):
On seeing it, you'd be likely to say, "But Socrates, everybody could have great power that way. For this way any house you see fit might be burned down, and so might the dockyards and triremes of the Athenians, and all their ships, both public and private." But then that's not what having great power is, doing what one sees fit.
We see a reverse of this in the life of Themistocles. At one point, it is said, Themistocles came up with a plan to guarantee Athenian sea superiority: he would burn the combined fleet of Athens's allies, which at the time was wintering at Pegasae. He told the Athenians that he had a plan that would be extremely advantageous to them -- but he couldn't tell them what it was beforehand because it needed to be done with secrecy. And the Athenian Assembly, in a moment of wisdom, told him to tell the plan to Aristides, and if Aristides also thought it was a good plan, he would be fully authorized. When Themistocles told Aristides, Aristides replied to the Assembly that there was no plan that could be more advantageous to the Athenians, and none that could be more unjust; so they refused.
Themistocles comes up again explicitly in the discussion between Callicles and Socrates. Socrates asks whether the oratory directed to the Athenian people is done with regard to the best; that is, whether such political oratory is concerned with making people better or gratifying them like children. Callicles responds that it is too simplistic to put it this way, because some do and some don't. Socrates concedes the point, and says that it suffices for his purposes: there is flattery, which is shameful, and there is encouragement to virtue, which is admirable. But has Callicles ever seen the latter? Callicles responds that none of their contemporaries seem to be such; and Socrates asks whether this is also true of former times. Callicles mentions Themistocles, Cimon, Militiades, and Pericles, all of whom were major players in Athenian military greatness. And Socrates' response is unequivocal (503c-d):
Yes, Callicles, if the excellence you were speaking of earlier, the filling up of appetites, both one's own and those of others, is the true kind. But if this is not, and if what we were compelled to agree on in our subsequent discussion is the true kind instead--that a man should satisfy those of his appetites that, when they are filled up, make him better, and not those that make him worse, and that this is a matter of craft--I don't see how I can say that any of these men has proved to be such a man.
Socrates will later press Callicles on the point again, and when Callicles insists that these Athenian heroes really did make the city better than it was, Socrates replies that if this is so, then when (say) Pericles started out, the people should have been worse, but as time went on, they got better. But, Socrates notes, as time went on the Athenians got tired of all of these people: Pericles was convicted of embezzlement (although he was later restored to office), Cimon was ostracized, Miltiades narrowly avoided being put to death, and Themistocles was ostracized and later, under encouragement from the Spartans, they tried to summon him to trial, probably on trumped-up charges, and he fled for his life.*
Callicles has throughout been arguing that someone who pursues philosophy rather than oratory can be charged on false charges and unable to defend themselves, so although it is not emphasized by Socrates, it is very relevant to the discussion. People like Themistocles work by flattering the people, and it is no more surprising that this makes the people worse than it is surprising if you became less athletic because you got nutritional advice from the doughnut shop, or that people become sick if they are given incentive to do things that are bad for their health. To be sure, people praise Themistocles for his achievements. But in reality they have sickened the city and erratic behavior is inevitable (519a):
For they filled the city with harbors and dockyards, walls, and tribute payments and such trash as that, but did so without justice and self-control. So, when that fit of sickness comes on, they'll blame their advisers of the moment and sing the praises of Themistocles and Cimon and Pericles, the ones who are to blame for their ills. Perhaps, if you're not careful, they'll lay their hands on you, and on my friend Alcibiades, when they lose not only what they gained but what they had originally as well, even though you aren't responsible for their ills but perhaps accessories to them.
Of course, this does not mean that they will not harm Socrates, either. But if the leaders of the city are already sickening the city, its behavior will be erratic regardless; the question is, what politics makes the city healthy rather than sick? And, of course, the answer Socrates gives is that he is the only one, or perhaps at best one of a few through history, who practice the "true politics", the kind that aims at what is really good for people rather than what they merely happen to like.
-----
* It is worth keeping this in mind when considering the argument Socrates gives in Plato's Meno that virtue cannot be taught because Themistocles, as a virtuous man, would have taught his sons more virtue than they show -- we should be wary of the ironic edge of the argument.
Quotations are from Plato, Gorgias, Zeyl, tr, in Plato: Collected Works, Hutchison, ed., Hackett (Indianapolis: 1997).
Sunday, July 10, 2016
A Quick Trip to Italy, Miscellanea VIII
Rome: Walking Away from Vatican City
More shots of Castel Sant'Angelo:
The Tiber River:
Whoever does Roman advertising for Sky Box Sets has an impeccable sense of location:
The entrance to the Parthenon:
Milan
More external shots of the Duomo:
The equestrian statue of Vittorio Emmanuel in front. Because there were so many events going on, it was hard to get any good picture of it:
Inside the church:
Two more shots of Santa Maria delle Grazie:
Castello Sforzesco:
Can you spot the cat?
And those are the miscellaneous shots for the trip.
More shots of Castel Sant'Angelo:
The Tiber River:
Whoever does Roman advertising for Sky Box Sets has an impeccable sense of location:
The entrance to the Parthenon:
Milan
More external shots of the Duomo:
The equestrian statue of Vittorio Emmanuel in front. Because there were so many events going on, it was hard to get any good picture of it:
Inside the church:
Two more shots of Santa Maria delle Grazie:
Castello Sforzesco:
Can you spot the cat?
And those are the miscellaneous shots for the trip.
Maronite Year LIX
July 10 is the Feast of the Blessed Massabki Brothers, Abdel Mooti Massabki, Francis Massabki, Raphael Massabki. They lived in Damascus during a time when tensions were very high in the Ottoman Empire. A great civil war broke out in the region of Mount Lebanon and Syria in 1860 between Maronites and their Druze governors. The fighting was fierce, and the Maronites at an inevitable disadvantage against Druze forces backed by Ottoman troops. In July 1860, the fighting came to Damascus, and the results were brutal as much of the relatively peaceful Christian population was slaughtered by Druze and Muslim paramilitary groups while the government looked the other way -- thousands of Christians died in the Damascus Massacre, perhaps as many as ten thousand, and the Christian quarter of the city was almost entirely destroyed. The massacre might well have been total had it not been for cases of Christians being saved by their Muslim neighbors, especially in poor areas around the city. Of note as well was the work of Abdelkader El Djezairi, an Algerian Sufi freedom fighter who was living in exile in Damascus at the time; having forewarning of the trouble, he and his fellow Algerians sheltered hundreds of Christians in his house and sent his sons out into danger in order to bring Christians to safety.
But there were many who had no such protection, and no recourse but to pray. The Massabki brothers, prominent Maronites in the city, were praying in a Franciscan church on July 9, 1860 and given the choice to die or convert to Islam. They were beatified in 1926 by Pius XI.
Ninth Sunday of Pentecost
2 Corinthians 5:20-6:10; Luke 4:14-21
O Christ who knew no sin, but who was made sin for us,
in You we are transformed into divine holiness.
Who can praise Your mercy? We cannot count Your wonders,
which You performed on the day of Your resurrection.
With David we exclaim, 'This is the Lord's day; rejoice!'
This day has no equal; it is the crown of all feasts.
Let us welcome our Lord, who on Sunday has saved us.
O Lord, we ask that You forgive our sins and our faults.
Grant good works to us, Lord, rising like pleasing fragrance;
grant us genuine faith, an incense in Your presence;
grant us truth of witness, a temple for Your great name.
Send Your Spirit upon us in charity and hope.
Under lash, in prison, in the tumult of the mob,
in exhaustion and fast, in sleeplessness and torment,
in affliction, in need, in condemnation and fear,
grant us the patience of those who bear Your holy Cross.
Though they call us liars, may we speak Your holy truth.
Though they ignore our words, may we rest only in You.
Though they harm and slay us, may we live in Christ Jesus.
May our weapon on every side be true innocence.
Though they make us to mourn, let us in Spirit rejoice.
Though we are but beggars, may we enrich the whole world.
Though lacking legacy, may meekness inherit all.
May we be gracious with the grace that comes from Your Name.
May we be pure-minded, enlightened and forgiving;
may we rely on You -- in charity's graciousness,
in truth of the gospel, in the power of mercy --
whether we are honored or condemned, praised or betrayed.
The Feast of the Three Blessed Massabki Maronite Martyrs
Hebrews 12:1-9; Luke 12:6-10
Let us praise Christ the Martyr;
He shed His blood for our sins
and crowns those who persevere.
Behold the Massabki saints!
Their crown is of purest gold.
Holy martyrs, pray for us!
O brothers, You prayed in faith
and died in Christ, in His Church,
forgiving persecutors,
like the Lord upon His Cross.
Thus you are honored with Him!
Holy martyrs, pray for us!
Jesus said, "Follow." You did.
You heard the call of heaven
and for love of Christ endured.
Trusting in Christ's great mercy,
You won crowns of victory.
Holy martyrs, pray for us!
But there were many who had no such protection, and no recourse but to pray. The Massabki brothers, prominent Maronites in the city, were praying in a Franciscan church on July 9, 1860 and given the choice to die or convert to Islam. They were beatified in 1926 by Pius XI.
Ninth Sunday of Pentecost
2 Corinthians 5:20-6:10; Luke 4:14-21
O Christ who knew no sin, but who was made sin for us,
in You we are transformed into divine holiness.
Who can praise Your mercy? We cannot count Your wonders,
which You performed on the day of Your resurrection.
With David we exclaim, 'This is the Lord's day; rejoice!'
This day has no equal; it is the crown of all feasts.
Let us welcome our Lord, who on Sunday has saved us.
O Lord, we ask that You forgive our sins and our faults.
Grant good works to us, Lord, rising like pleasing fragrance;
grant us genuine faith, an incense in Your presence;
grant us truth of witness, a temple for Your great name.
Send Your Spirit upon us in charity and hope.
Under lash, in prison, in the tumult of the mob,
in exhaustion and fast, in sleeplessness and torment,
in affliction, in need, in condemnation and fear,
grant us the patience of those who bear Your holy Cross.
Though they call us liars, may we speak Your holy truth.
Though they ignore our words, may we rest only in You.
Though they harm and slay us, may we live in Christ Jesus.
May our weapon on every side be true innocence.
Though they make us to mourn, let us in Spirit rejoice.
Though we are but beggars, may we enrich the whole world.
Though lacking legacy, may meekness inherit all.
May we be gracious with the grace that comes from Your Name.
May we be pure-minded, enlightened and forgiving;
may we rely on You -- in charity's graciousness,
in truth of the gospel, in the power of mercy --
whether we are honored or condemned, praised or betrayed.
The Feast of the Three Blessed Massabki Maronite Martyrs
Hebrews 12:1-9; Luke 12:6-10
Let us praise Christ the Martyr;
He shed His blood for our sins
and crowns those who persevere.
Behold the Massabki saints!
Their crown is of purest gold.
Holy martyrs, pray for us!
O brothers, You prayed in faith
and died in Christ, in His Church,
forgiving persecutors,
like the Lord upon His Cross.
Thus you are honored with Him!
Holy martyrs, pray for us!
Jesus said, "Follow." You did.
You heard the call of heaven
and for love of Christ endured.
Trusting in Christ's great mercy,
You won crowns of victory.
Holy martyrs, pray for us!
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