Finished Reading "The Origin of Inequality Among Men" by Rousseau

I'll start by saying, right off the bat, that this was not one of my favorite books. In fact, I was eager to get through it because it was making me mad. Yes, things I read can make me that crazy. It's part of why I hate reading comments after online articles.

He had some great points about the cycle of government and social order, but I felt like his premise was started wrong and so the rest really couldn't be depended upon.

For instance, he believes that mankind was not always a social being, that we were not created that way but evolved into a society that has created all our ills. He believes the idea of property was invented. I don't believe that. In fact, the way he describes primitive humans behaving doesn't even happen with animals. 

I believe that the idea of property is a law like gravity. You can think "Hey this gravity thing makes you fall, let's make laws about it and stop it from happening!". Gravity just is and we need to work within it. It's the same thing with property. It goes along with human nature. They best laws and governance work with human nature not against it.

On a personal level I feel like I need to respect a persons personal life before I can take to heart their opinions about other things. I wouldn't take marriage advice from someone who had never been married or couldn't keep one together. This guys life seems pretty shaky. He couldn't keep up with any sort of education or hold any kind of office or job, so how can I take his views of human kind seriously?

Here is a quote that I did like, "The investigations we may enter into, in treating this subject, must not be considered as historical truths, but only as mere conditional and hypothetical reasoning, rather calculated to explain the nature of things, than to ascertain their actual origin;"

I can get behind that. When we think about the origins of things, we have to use our imagination. They are never to be considered ultimate truths. And that's what he is doing in this book. The problem for me is that I can't get behind his beginning of mankind ideas.

And this one, "Peoples once accustomed to masters are not in a condition to do without them." I think we're having a bit of that problem in our nation right not. We've given ourselves over to masters instead of thinking and behaving as a free people should. That is not easily reversed.

The big idea I got from this book is this, the idea of the cycle of government, which I've heard from other authors and speakers recently, but in different words. His idea goes like this.

1. Legitimacy (pre-property, everyone is equal, no society)
2. Establishment of laws and right of property (the creation of rich and poor, haves and have-nots)
3. Institution of magistracy (creation of keepers of the law, brings condition of powerful over weak)
4. Conversion of legitimate power to arbitrary power (keepers decide it owns its power, wishes to keep it and passes it on to heirs, brings condition of master over slave)
5. Slave grow weary of condition, dissolve by revolution

And then the whole thing starts over, except that the legitimacy isn't the same as the very beginning because you really can't take us back to that level without killing off most of the human race.

Some of this I can see, but again, my problem is this idea that man in the state of nature has no sense of property. I don't see this as the case.

Here is one I liked as well, "Nature lays her commands on every animal, and the brute obeys her voice. Man receives the same impulsion, but at the same time knows himself at liberty to acquiesce or resist: and it is particularly in his consciousness of this liberty that the spirituality of his soul is displayed."

This is the free will gift of God. It is what makes us "in the image of God". It is what sets us apart from animals.

I had lots of notes in this book, but these were the most important to me. I don't want to go over the entire thing. You read it!

Finished "Gulliver's Travels" by Jonathan Swift

This book is on my "Great Books of the Western World" list and I've read it before. I love it for the funny stories and would probably get a lot more out of it if I understood more about 18th century politics, but I'm reading so much that every time I go through these books I get more out of them.

Everyone knows  about Lilliput because of e movies, but he gets stranded on several different islands and meets all kinds of peoples. My favorite is the horse people, Houyhnhnms. My only problem with the whole book is the end because he comes back to England witha good dose of self-loathing and especially cannot tolerate his own people. I thought he was an ass by the end of the book and I was glad I didn't have to go on another adventure with him.

Finished reading “On the Nature of Things” Books 1 through 4, by Lucretius

It's another reading from my Great Books list. Hmm...this was a strange one. I had to look up who this guys was and when he wrote it. He was a poet about 50 years before Christ was born. The poem (wikipedia says it's a poem but it didn't seem like it when I was reading it) is about how the world works and denounces superstition and gods. I liked reading it because I didn't realize that the idea of atoms was so old. Also, there was a good bit about the circle of life, you know, rain grows crops that get eaten by animals, we eat the animals, die, fertilize the ground, water evaporates, etc.

I'm sitting here trying to think of something write about this book that might sound intelligent, but I'm getting no where. Most of these books make me feel like this, but eventually I find something to hook this information on and it all comes together in the end. Sometimes when I read I feel like I'm running out of time. I don't spend enough time studying. I need more time!

Here are some good quotes from the book.

From Book 1, “for if men saw that there was a fixed limit to their woes, they would be able in some way to withstand the religious scruples and threatening of the seers.”

To me this means that it's hard to resist religious leaders and their ideas about the afterlife because we cannot know what lies after death for sure. I know what I believe. I know what I feel about God and Heaven, but I cannot be imperially sure about it because no human has ever come back to tell us what's over there. So when some strong persuasive person comes along and tells us that if we don't do X, Y, and Z we will burn in hell, it's hard not to be fearful.

Also from Book 1, “For fools admire and like all things the more which they perceive to be concealed under involved language, and determine things to be true which can prettily tickle the ears and are varnished over with finely sounding phrase.”

That's a classic, huh?!

One last one from Book 1, “Nay you see throughout even in these verses of ours many elements common to many words, though you must needs admit that the lines and words differ one from the other both in meaning and in sound wherewith they sound. So much can elements effect by a mere change of order; but those elements which are the first-beginnings of things can bring with them more combinations out of which different things can severally be produced.”

Elements! There are a fixed number of elements like letters of the alphabet, that make up things in our world. Different combinations of the same elements make of different things. That's what I didn't realize was so old. Pretty crazy to think these guys pretty much already grasped the idea of elements making up the world over 2000 years ago.

This one is from Book 2, “So far as it goes, a small thing may give illustration of great things and put you on the track of knowledge.”

This is what I'm hoping is going to happen for me as I read these books!

In Book 3, he talks about the soul. This guy is a humanist. He does not believe that the soul is immortal or created by any being. I did have a problem with his explanations here because he says everything needs a “seed” or starts somewhere and that nothing is just created out of thin air, but who created the seed? This is a problem I have had with the theory of evolution before. What started it? Where did it come from? Some say aliens. Then who created them?

While reading this book I had a thought. To me, it seems that the soul uses the body to communicate with this world. When the body is sick or weak or dies, it loses that connection. A newborn baby has a full and complete soul straight from God, but is just learning to use that body to communicate.

There are two more books in this “poem” but they are listed later in the reading list. I'm sure I'll be able to understand more when I get to them!

Finished Reading "Introduction to Arithmetic" by Nicomachus

You can't imagine the feeling I got when I saw the next book on my list was a MATH book! Yuck! But I plowed on and found it fascinating. I'm not going to pretend I understood it all, but there were pieces where I thought "Cool!", or "That's amazing!", or even "I can see where he's going with that." Many of the Great Books that I read, I don't really follow completely but I read them anyway, taking a note here and there, and sometimes just writing "What?!" in the margins. I've learned from experience that I may not understand what I'm reading at the moment, but it is building something somewhere in my brain and days, months, or years later, I will find new building blocks to put on top of the ones I've collected here.

This book was written about 2000 years ago and it was not what I expected at all. I thought I'd find numbers and answers and proofs like I found in my math text books, but this was all words. And the math concepts were related to the world around me and philosophy, so it held my interest.

Here are my two favorite quotes.

"Without the aid of these, then, it is not possible to deal accurately with the forms of being nor to discover the truth in things, knowledge of which is wisdom, and evidently not even to philosophize properly, for 'just as painting contributes to the menial arts toward correctness of theory, so in truth lines, numbers, harmonic intervals, and the revolutions of circles bear aid to the learn of the doctrines of wisdom,' says the Pythagorean Androcydes."

What?! We should understand math to truly understand the world and what's in it? Oh, man! Now I've really got work to do. But it's not actually about the numbers exactly. It's about the relationships and that I can handle. Just don't ask me to multiply and divide in my head!

And here's my favorite.

"For it is clear that these studies are like ladders and bridges that carry our minds from things apprehended by sense and opinion to those comprehended by the mind and understanding, and from those material, physical things, our foster-brethren known to us from childhood, to the things with which we are unacquainted, foreign to our senses, but in their immateriality and eternity more akin to our souls, an above all to the reason which is in our souls."

Wow. Do we need things like a basic understanding of mathematical principles to help us understand the universe and God? After reading other books that show the magic and symbolism of numbers, I say yes. Understanding these patterns shows us the majesty of God, in my mind. It's amazing!

Oh! One more. This one relates arithmetic, geometric, and harmonic to philosophy as well.

"For the realm of the greater there arise excesses, overreaching, superabundance, and in the less need, deficiency, privation, and lack; but in that which lies between the greater and the less, namely, the equal, are virtues, wealth, moderation, propriety, beauty, and the like, to which the aforesaid form of number, the perfect, is most akin."

Just perfect. I hope next time I read this, or something like it, I can understand more of the math though. I have loads of notes, but I don't see how I can write it out on a blog. More drawings than words.

Finished reading Books 2, 3, and 6 of “Nicomachean Ethics” by Aristotle

I'm not a fan of Aristotle right now. It's hard for me to read for some reason. I feel like it may be the translation I'm reading though. It's as if he uses the same word to describe a word. Virtue is a virtue that all can achieve by practicing virtue, that kind of thing. But here are some of my favorite quotes from what I read this time.

Book 2 was about virtue. “the virtue of man also will be the state of character which makes a man good and which makes him do his own work well.” See?! I have a vague idea about what that means. I think, in another a part he is trying to say that practiced virtue comes from within, it's automatic. It's when you have the knowledge about what is right and wrong and choose the right.

Here's one part I really did like. “For instance, both fear and confidence and appetite and anger and pity and in general pleasure and pain may be felt both too much and too little, and in both cases not well; but to feel them at the right times, with reference to the right objects, towards the right people, with the right motive, and in the right way, is what is both intermediate and best, and this is characteristic of virtue.” Right! This is something I can sink my teeth into. It makes perfect sense. We can have too little or too much fear, but to have the right amount, at the right time, and about the right things is the goal.

Book 3 was about courage. This was good too. It's stuff we don't really think about much but maybe we should, so that we are better at recognizing what is real and what is pretended. He talks about the difference between courage and cowardice.

“One might rank in the same class even those who are compelled by their rulers; but they are inferior, inasmuch as they do what they do not from shame but from fear, and to avoid not what is disgraceful but what is painful.”

This one caught my eye because it's something we try to do with the kids. I don't want them to behave kindly and politely because they fear punishment but because they know what is right and have that virtue in them. We want them not to steal things, not because it's the law and they will go to jail if they don't, but because it is not virtuous to take what is not theirs.

Book 6 was about wisdom. The difference between political and practical wisdom. You can look at a room and measure it and then measure the furniture and know that it fits. But experience will let you look at a room and look at the furniture and know it will not fit or look good in the room. It's two kinds of wisdom, book learning and experience, both are needed at one time or another.

That's what I got out of these books...this time. I'm sure I'll read more and read it again in the future and get more from it. That's what I love about going through the great books. Even if I don't fully understand everything I'm reading, it will come around again after I've read something that gave me more insight, or I'll read something else that will remind me of something I read today and give me that “a-ha!” moment I was hoping for.

I'll have you know that I'm not the best typist and I'm even worse right now. I cut the very tip of my pinky finger off with a vegetable slicer and I'm typing without it. Dumbest move ever...but it is a pretty impressive wound to my sons! I'm so blessed. Jake helped me dress the wound and then cleaned up the mess while I recovered my wits on the couch. They've both been helping cook and do the dishes and such. They are such sweet babies!

Finished Aristotle's "Poetics"

This book should be used in every “language arts” class! It's all about what makes a good story and why.

Here is my favorite quote from this book, “to be learning something is the greatest of pleasures, not only to the philosopher but also to the rest of mankind, however small their capacity for it;”.

How did he know? Sometimes it doesn't matter what or how much I'm learning, just that I'm actively pursuing some goal. Sometimes the only goal is to continue to learn new things! And sometimes I don't believe at the time I read something that I'm learning anything at all, but I find out later that I did learn something. It's awe inspiring.

Finished Plato's "Meno"

Plato's Dialogues are really hard for me to read. Socarates makes me crazy with the round and round talking. I can see Abbot and Costello performing it!

I feel like the meaning is just out of my reach.

This one is about the meaning of virtue and whether or not it can be taught. Does it change through time and culture? Is it passed down through generations? Can it be exclusively taught to another? Or is it modeled and hopefully picked up by those closest to you?

I'm reminded of a thought I had a while back. There is always someone watching you and they learn from you even if you aren't trying to teach. Is that virtue that you are showing them, or a lack of it?

When you return an item to the store because you forgot to pay for it, even though the store doesn't know you have it, is that virtue? When the store clerk thanks you, is that “teaching” virtue?

When you give your son a warning that you need to leave for the post office in ten minutes, and gently help him leave without a scene, is that virtue? When another parent sees you and tries the same technique, is that “teaching virtue”?

When you help your elderly parent with shopping and doctor's appointments because he's losing his memory and needs the help, is that virtue? When your children see you and believe this is what you do for your parents, is that “teaching virtue”?

Finished reading Herodotus' “Histories"

Only the first two books are on my reading list right now. There are nine books.

I read a little about Herodotus before I started reading the book and found that he isn't all that accurate in his descriptions. There is debate about whether this was because he was a big story teller and everyone knew it or he was trying to look smarter about the world than he really was. Some of the stories are true, some a complete fantasy, but all are pretty fun to read.

Here are a few of my favorite parts.

A man asked why the other thought a man to be the “happiest of mortals” and the man replied, “First, because his country was flourishing in his days, and he himself had sons both beautiful and good, and he lived to see children born to each of them, and these children all grew up; and further because, after a life spent in what our people look upon as comfort, his end was surpassingly glorious.” He died in battle.

I love stuff like this. Humanity hasn't changed a bit.

“For assuredly he who possesses great store of riches is no nearer happiness than he who has what suffices for his daily needs, unless it so hap that luck attend upon him, and so he continue in the enjoyment of all his good things to the end of life.”

“No on is so foolish as to prefer war to peace, in which, instead of sons burying their fathers, fathers bury their sons.”

Many of the stories remind me of Homer, Sophocles, and even Shakespeare. I could see a comic book, oops, I mean “graphic novel”, written of them. They were great stories! A few I read out loud to the boys while they ate lunch and we marveled at how they turned out.

I'm on to the next book on my list, but I look forward to reading more of these later!

Finished reading "Antigone" by Sophocles

And the curse continues. Seriously, what did this family do?

My favorite quotes from this one?

“No man can be fully known, in soul and spirit and mind, until he hath been seen versed in rule and lawgivings.”

Creon says this about himself. He had taken rule over the land when Oedipus died and took into his care Oedipus' children. He's pretty proud of himself. But it is true. Power can change a person, even a good one. We cannot really know how someone will react to receiving power over another. We can test it with a little power at a time and see what they do with it, but “ultimate power will corrupt ultimately”.

“when one who hath been caught in wickedness then seeks to make the crime a glory.”

Creon says this about Antigone because he believes she is going mad trying to get out of what she has done. But she isn't. I think she is right. She is ultimately responsible to her god and family before her king. She isn't not trying to hide or justify what she has done. She is standing up to tyranny. Kill me if you must, but I know I've done was is right.

Also, Haemon (Creon's son, betrothed of Antigone) comes in to his father and does not go right into that he believes his father is wrong. He goes in on a positive note and then goes into trying to make his father see another side of the argument. Always a good idea. You catch more flies with sugar, right? So he butters him up a bit, but when he sees his father has gone right over the edge of tyranny, that he just cannot be wrong, he tells him like it is and storms out.

“For if any man thinks that he alone is wise – that in speech, or in mind, he hath no peer – such a soul, when laid open, is ever found empty.”

and

“That is no city, which belongs to one man. Thou wouldst make a good monarch of a desert.”

Only when Teiresias the seer enters and tells him what will become of him, does he begin to see his errors, but it's too late. He had ample warning and opportunity to learn from others.

“All men are liable to err; but when an error hath been made, that man is no longer witless or unblest who heals the ill into which he hath fallen, and remains not stubborn.”

Exactly. Everyone makes mistakes but to not own up to them because of pride, well that's unforgivable. And when someone errs against us, it is our responsibility to forgive them when they make amends. Don't let pride get in your way on either side.

Finished Reading “Oedipus The King” by Sophocles

I love reading plays. I can hear the voices and see the scenes in my head. Sometimes prose is nice because there is a lot more description of scenes and costumes, but a play is all you. I envision the set they are on, how the light hits them, who is in the shadows. When I read I hear Oedipus as he commands and Iocasta as she pleads for him to cease his searching. But when I try to read it out loud...it bombs. The words don't sound half as pretty coming out of my mouth as they do in my head. I was never much of an actress.

Everyone knows the plot of Oedipus, right? The story is so much better read or seen live on stage, let me tell you. Here is my favorite line in the whole play, “Alas, how dreadful to have wisdom where it profits not the wise!” I wonder how many people think that each day.

Why was Oedipus cursed in this way? What did he do? The curse was actually on his father and his father attempted to change fate by having his baby son killed. But like any good movie, he doesn't actually do the deed, he has someone else do it and of course that guy has no motive to kill a baby and tries to save it. The prophesy is fulfilled and so many peoples lives are ruined. Why? What did his father do to deserve this curse?

Is is because of this line? “The old prophecies concerning Laius are fading; already men are setting them at nought, and nowhere is Apollo glorified with honours; the worship of the gods is perishing.”

Is the point of the play to show that ultimately the gods will get their dues? Did Laius fail in serving Apollo and that is why he cursed him? And did Oedipus' belief that he could outrun the prophecy make the gods continue their curse against his family? What will happen to his children now? Will this curse continue to run through their family for generations?

I always leave these plays with more questions than when I started.

Finished “Eumenides” by Aeschylus

Third book in this trilogy. Orestes seeks refuge in Athena's temple. He has killed his mother, his own blood and the people are against him. Apollo defends him because he told him to do it. There is a trial, Orestes is set free. The people are mad because they think these young gods are trying to turn their world upside down.

Here's where I get confused though. In the end, the chorus leaves happy as a clam with Athena's decision. I don't get it. What happened? Maybe I'll understand more next time I read it.

One cool quote from this play though. “To be called mother is no wise to be parent, but rather nurse to seed new-sown. The male begets: she's host to her small guest; preserves the plant, except it please God to blight it.”

You always hear about how “Just because you got a girl pregnant, doesn't make you a real father.” but you don't hear that about women. Just because you gave birth, doesn't make you a real mother. And that's true too.

Finished reading “Agamemnon” and "Choephoroe" by Aeschylus

Wow! This play was awesome and I can't wait to read the next one. 

Let me see if I can summarize this for you. Agamemnon comes home from Troy with a prophetess (hint hint, nudge nudge). His wife is pissed off because he sacrificed her daughter to win Troy. She's off with some cousin guy who's pissed off because Agamemnon's Dad killed and cooked up his siblings for dinner. They kill him off....(insert dramatic music here)...but he has a banished son who is sure to avenge his death.

I love the poetic language in these plays. Much like Shakespeare, sometimes I don't understand everything being said, but I can't stop reading it because it sounds so beautiful!

A side note, Tom recently commented on a movie we were watching, “Paths of Glory” with Kirk Douglas, directed by Kubrick. He said that the dialog was different, harder to follow, but he liked that. He felt like you really had to pay attention to the movie to understand what was happening. There was more philosophy and thinking in these older movies that he really liked to watch. Hmmm...I feel the same way about these old classic plays!

And I'm on to the next play!

And the drama continues! I couldn't put this one down and read it all this morning. In my book it is called “Choephoroe” which means “The Libation Bearers” I'm guessing. In other editions it's called that instead. The revenge of Agamemnon's children, Orestes and Electra kill their mother and her new beau. But Orestes runs off, I'm assuming to do himself in because he can't deal with killing his own mother. 

Here is a line I really liked,

“Children are voices that shake off the lethe of drowsy Death; yea, floats, whereby the thread and thin-wove line of Being is up-buoyed above the swallowing gulfs that yawn beneath.”

Did you get chills? Because I did! Isn't that true? Our children and theirs are what makes us immortal in a way. But in this story...wow. Electra says this as she plots revenge against her mother.

Here's another one,

“Time grants no our so perishable clay bliss that endures or glory that shall last; Heaviness wears the instant hour away, or it will come before the next be passed.”

Yep. Time is against us in this world. Use it wisely!