Martial, the things for to attain
The happy life be these, I find:
The riches left, not got with pain;
The fruitful ground, the quiet mind;The equal friend; no grudge nor strife;
No charge of rule, nor governance;
Without disease the healthy life;
The household of continuance;The mean diet, no delicate fare;
Wisdom joined with simplicity;
The night dischargèd of all care,
Where wine may bear no sovereignty;The chaste wife, wise, without debate;
Such sleeps as may beguile the night;
Contented with thine own estate;
Neither wish death nor fear his might.
I have to confess, my right leg is absolutely killing me right now.
Naturally, like most teenagers and college students before me I treated it like any other part of my body. Having broken it in ’95 and feeling invincible afterwards, I played baseball, cycling, tennis, football, rugby, racketball, and just about every other impact-sport you could perform. Truth be told, it never really started bothering me until my primary run for House of Delegates in 2005 — when I wore out my only pair of good dress shoes all the way down to the socks inside.
Since about 2002 when I first chose to run and bow out of a Fredericksburg City Council race (I went to support and then ran the race of Matt Kelly, who eventually won and held the City Council seat in Ward 3), two unit chairman spots, a career in politics ranging from field work to communications to fundraising to campaign management, and eventually to election to public office myself — I can only say that such responsibilities wear on those who assume them.
The best part? The vast majority of our friends care little about how children are educated, taxes are collected, borders are defended, whether a Democrat or a Republican are setting policies for whether a certain energy standard is being implemented, codes and local ordinances are enforced, etc. That’s a good thing when you realize the world flows along, mostly benign to the service provided. Jefferson’s old dictum that “a government governs best when it governs least” may be better suited to better to a government that governs unseen.
[1]Such is the Jeffersonian utopia, one that modern politicians continue to pursue. Even St. Thomas More would ask the question whether a true “utopia” would be desirable, or even preferable to obtain. Most readers since have viewed his book on the topic to be anywhere from a critique on the society of his time all the way to a very serious and practical method of governance (certainly the Jesuits thought so [2]). Still others stretch back for a “libertopia” where the maximum liberty is held by the greatest number, free to do as conscience and society dictate.
Aristotle would have thought differently. Man, as he is famously known to conclude, is a political animal. Yet even in this condition, Aristotle would have concluded that the greatest excellence or happiness to be obtained would be in contemplation. The Aristotelian God, as he concluded, would therefore be a being in a supreme state of self-contemplation. Autarkestatos is the word chosen, and those human beings who elect themselves to follow in a similar path of self-sufficiency are given the virtue of autarkes — self-sustaining.
No doubt Jefferson would have found much to admire in Aristotle, as would many of our early American forebearers. One almost has to wonder what they would think of a commercialized 21st-century America where food comes from a conglomerate, electricity comes from a company, clothes are shipped from China, and even the things we write and say are forever recorded by an omnipresent and omniscient (but not omnipotent) Internet?
But I digress.
Most folks know I live in Fluvanna County near the practical heart of Virginia, on about 10 acres that I modestly am attempting to turn into a farm. It’s part of the American patchwork, and true to my Aristotelian nature. Yes — here I grow enough food to compliment what is served at my kitchen table, have chickens and goats, chop and burn my own firewood for heat, and teach my children about what it is to live in the country.
Riches got without pain, fruitful ground… the Earl of Surrey would have said I was off to a fair start.
I mention this as a contrast, and I offer you the above poem and this short clip from Showtime’s The Tudors where the actor playing the Earl of Surrey (David O’Hara) converses with his friend the Duke of Suffolk (Henry Cavill):
Often times, I hear friends of mine who are not involved with politics, often self-described moderates or purveyors of “sanity” proffered by Comedy Central, sneer at the very idea of politics today. When they are asked why they choose not to participate, the answer is usually never as specific or erudite as the Earl of Surrey puts it here — “no charge of rule nor governance” — mostly because it is a role they could never achieve. Sometimes it’s better to hate what one cannot have? Or is it that, because the field is left to the lowly and cruel, that it is best not to resist? Because in doing so, one disrupts this “happy life” that all men seek?
[3]Marcus Tullius Cicero, in his literary masterpiece De Officiis [4], writes to his son about the duties of a man. Cicero lived during the fall of the Roman Republic and had even served as one of her consuls, yet did not live to see its conclusion with the ascension of Augustus Caesar. Briefly removing himself from public life, he could not help but put himself back into the fray. In fact, Cicero saw it as much more of a duty for men to be involved in public life:
So, while this desire is common to men of political ambitions and men of retirement, of whom I have just spoken, the one class think they can attain their end if they secure large means; the other, if they are content with the little they have. And, in this matter, neither way of thinking is altogether to be condemned; but the life of retirement is easier and safer and at the same time less burdensome or troublesome to others, while the career of those who apply themselves to statecraft and to conducting great enterprises is more profitable to mankind and contributes more to their own greatness and renown.
And so there it is. Public office is difficult, and retirement the end of the fulfilled man. But Cicero defines these men as the worst sort of cowards:
So perhaps those men of extraordinary genius who have devoted themselves to learning must be excused for not taking part in public affairs; likewise, those who from ill-health or for some still more valid reason have retired from the service of the state and left to others the opportunity and the glory of its administration. But if those who have no such excuse profess a scorn for civil and military offices, which most people admire, I think that this should be set down not to their credit but to their discredit; for in so far as they care little, as they say, for glory and count it as naught, it is difficult not to sympathize with their attitude; in reality however, they seem to dread the toil and trouble and also, perhaps, the discredit and humiliation of political failure and defeat. For there are people who in opposite circumstances do not act consistently: they have the utmost contempt for pleasure but in pain they are too sensitive; they are indifferent to glory, but they are crushed by disgrace and even in their inconsistency they show no great consistency.
But those whom Nature has endowed with the capacity for administering public affairs should put aside all hesitation, enter the race for public office and take a hand in directing the government; for in no other way can a government be administered or greatness of spirit be made manifest. Statesmen too, no less than philosophers — perhaps even more so — should carry with them that greatness of spirit and indifference to outward circumstances to which I so often refer, together with calm of soul and freedom from care, if they are to be free from worries and lead a dignified and self-consistent life. This is easier for the philosophers; as their life is less exposed to the assaults of fortune, their wants are fewer; and, if any misfortune overtakes them, their fall is not so disastrous. Not without reason, therefore, are stronger emotions aroused in those who engage in public life than in those who live in retirement, and greater is their ambition for success; the more, therefore, do they need to enjoy greatness of spirit and freedom from annoying cares. If anyone is entering public life, let him beware of thinking only of the honour that it brings; but let him be sure also that he has the ability to succeed. At the same time, let him take care not to lose heart too readily through discouragement nor yet to be over-confident through ambition. In a word, before undertaking any enterprise, careful preparation must be made.
There is no part to highlight in this. Every person considering themselves for public office, and every person who believes politics to be a lowly and cruel profession, should consider each of these words carefully and thoughtfully.
But it doesn’t quite answer the question. Who is right? Aristotle, Martial, and the good Earl on one hand? Or Cicero on the other? Aren’t there “good men” in politics anymore?
I wonder, especially now as winter comes and the season of campaigning is weeks behind, if another philosopher shouldn’t come to mind. Diogenes and his bad leg, it was said, would limp around ancient Greece looking for “an honest man” with a lantern and dressed in rags, worn out, as it were, by the search.
Perhaps his shoes look a bit like the pair I wore in 2005? But my leg is hurting, and this post is long enough.