Interpretation, Vol 16-3

A
JOURNAL
OF POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY
Spring
1989
Volume 16 Number 3
David Lowenthal
Macbeth: Shakespeare
Mystery Play
359
Lionel Gossman
Antimodernism in Franz Overbeck's Bachofen's
Nineteeth-Century Basle: Antitheology and J.J. Antiphilology
391
Leslie G. Rubin
Love
and
Politics in Xenophon's Cyropaedia
415
Greg
Russell
Eric Voegelin A Meditation
on the on
Truth
of
In-Between Life:
Existential Unrest
427
Timothy
H. Paterson
Bacon's Myth
of
Orpheus: Power
as a
Goal
of
Science in
Of
the Wisdom of the Ancients
445
Hugh Gillis
Gaston Fessard
and
the Nature of
Authority
465
Sanford Kessler
Tocqueville
on
Sexual
Morality
Book Reviews
481
Will
Morrisey
The Crisis of Liberal Democracy: A Straussian Perspective edited by Kenneth L. Deutsch and Walter Softer
487
Michael P. Zuckert
Alexis de Tocqueville: Selected Letters

Politics
and
on
Society
edited
by
Roger Boesche
and
Alexis de Tocqueville
Politics
and the
New Science of
by
John C.
Koritansky
Editor-in-Chief
Editors
Hilail Gildin Seth G. Benardete

Butterworth Christopher Bruell
Charles E.
Hilail Gildin
Robert Horwitz (d. 1987)
Howard B. White (d. 1974)
Consulting
Editors
Joseph
Cropsey
Ernest L. Fortin Erich Hula
John Hallowell
Wilhelm Hennis David Lowenthal
Harry
V. Jaffa
Arnaldo Momigliano (d.1987) Michael Oakeshott Ellis Sandoz Leo Strauss Kenneth W Thompson
(d.1973)
Associate Editors
Wayne Ambler
Maurice Auerbach
Patrick
Fred Baumann
Christopher A.
Michael Blaustein
Coby
Colmo
Mindle
Edward J. Erler
Maureen Feder-Marcus
Joseph E.
Goldberg
Pamela K. Jensen Will
Grant B.
James W. Morris
Morrisey
Leslie G. Rubin
Gerald Proietti
Hossein Ziai
Charles T. Rubin
Michael Zuckert
John A. Wettergreen (d. 1989)
Bradford P Wilson Catherine Zuckert
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interpretation. Queens
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interpretation
spring 1989
JL
volume 16 number
David Lowenthal
Lionel Gossman
Macbeth: Shakespeare Antimodernism in Franz Overbeck's Bachofen's
Mystery Play
3H
Nineteeth-Century Basle: Antitheology and J.J. Antiphilology
359
Leslie G. Rubin
Love
and

on the
39i
Greg
Russell
Eric Voegelin
Truth
of
In-Between
415
Life: A Meditation
on
Existential Unrest
as a
Timothy
H. Paterson
Bacon's Myth
of
of
Orpheus: Power
Goal
427
Science in
Of the
and
Wisdom of the Ancients

the Nature of
Hugh Gillis
Gaston Fessard
Tocqueville
on
Authority
445 465
Sanford Kessler
Sexual
Morality
Book Reviews
Will
Morrisey
The Crisis of Liberal Democracy: A Straussian Perspective edited by Kenneth

L. Deutsch
and
481
Walter Soffer
on
Michael P. Zuckert

Politics
and
487
Society
edited
by
Roger
and the
Boesche
and
New Science of Politics
by
John C.
Koritansky
Copyright 1989
interpretation
ISSN 0020-9635
David Lowenthal
Boston College
Mystery Play
PRELIMINARY VIEW OF THE SUBJECT
In its date
sar and
of
composition, Macbeth falls about midway between Julius Cae

and
The Tempest,
like
them is known only
from the First Folio. Its

or so of
condition,
however,
seems not to short
be
as good as
theirs,
say the editors,

the
plays and
some of whom suspect
find it too
hands
it is
one of
the shortest
paring by have been additions
other than another
Shakespeare's. All the

at
editors are sure
there
by
hand in
least
one or two scenes

such
(see K.
Muir's Arden edition,
pp.
xii-xiii,
xxiii-xxxiii).
Despite
the
tainties, Macbeth, along Caesar, larly considered one of Shakespeare's most

with
and some of political
scholarly uncer history plays, is popu his he said, "equals Mac

of
plays, as well as one of
best. To Abraham Lincoln it

beth."
was
the best:
story!
"Nothing,"
How
simple and moral
is its
Led
on
by
the prophecy
witches,
and his Lady succeed in secretly murdering King gaining Scotland's throne. Yet they never enjoy the happiness they anticipated from this cruel regicide. Macbeth becomes engrossed in a series of additional mur
Macbeth
Duncan
and
ders,
one worse than the other,
until
opposition
to him
mounts. of an
When Mal
colm, Duncan's elder son, returns to Scotland at the head
English army,
he is joined
siege
by
those suffering under Macbeth's tyrannies, and together
they lay
and
to his castle.
Shortly
afterward,
Lady
Macbeth
commits
suicide,
Macbeth himself dies in face-to-face
combat with
Macduff, leaving
Malcolm
as
Scotland's
deeper
next
king. dramatic
action of a
This is the
obvious
the play, but there are also signs

memorable
of a or
philosophical
subject.
In
play better known for death.
lines
phrases than
speeches, no doubt the

after
with
most memorable speech
is
a
one of
Mac
beth's last, just

reflection on
tomorrow,"
the
queen's
Launching
into
very
abstract and
life,
its
endless and aimless
"tomorrow,
and
tomorrow,
Macbeth
cries
Out,
Life's but That
a
struts and
out
brief
candle
walking frets his hour

no more.
shadow, a poor player

upon a
the stage.
And then is heard

Told
It is
tale
by an idiot, full Signifying nothing.
of sound and
fury.
interpretation.
Spring 1989,
Vol. 16, No. 3
312
Interpretation
to this
a
"atheistic"
According
life
finds that speech, as it has been called, Macbeth

an
itself, like
of
tale told
by
idiot, is
completely
unintelligible.
Now he
could not mean
by
this simply that life has
no moral plan or purpose,
for he
easily have concluded, from his wife's fate and his own imminent downfall, that injustice is always pun which is the conclusion usually drawn ished, that the world is indeed moral
thinks
himself
as
deeply immoral,
and might
by
the audience. But Macbeth has something else in
mind when
he
calls
life
"tale told
by
not
idiot,"
an
ism
often attributed to
something very radical, him at this point. For
and
an
going far beyond the athe idiot cannot tell a tale: his
words
do
hang
fury. When Macbeth things,

sick?
an
together, or, better, are not words at all, but only noises, only one noise follows another unpredictably, and so, idiot
"speaks,"
seems
to think, is
it
with
life. Life too has
no connections
made
among
no
intelligible is
she now
sequences of cause and effect.
What
Why
dead?
Why is he
about
to be
overcome?
Lady Macbeth Why have they

this turn of
both failed? Macbeth finds himself completely events. To him it is simply unintelligible.
In
unable
to
explain
fact,
ing
what
the play does contain a real Macbeth and Lady Macbeth

we
and great puzzle of
causality,
for, know
Duncan's
stated
were
like
when
they
planned
murder,
problem
could
have
predicted
their ultimate fate? No one has

who
the
better than Sigmund Freud, time, the

remorseless
found it inexplicable that,

Macbeth
should
over so
short a span of
down"
Lady
by
remorse, while the fearful Macbeth ends
be suicidally "borne "all Freud up

defiance."
criticizes
Shakespeare because he finds

quite
these apparent reversals of character un
intelligible;
"breaks the
rightly he
refuses
to allow the dramatist any

pp.
leeway
that
connection"
causal
(Macbeth Casebook,
seems to
132,
136-37).
If
Freud is
correct
in his diagnosis, Shakespeare

almost as
have
constructed an un
intelligible play,
gibility.
if to
corroborate
Macbeth's
view of
life's
unintelli-
Freud may
well
be
correct on one point: the changes
Shakespeare depicts in
his
protagonists could not not
certainly kind
mere matter
naturally have occurred over a brief span of time if Freud has accurately gauged the time involved (he thinks it of days). But it is possible Shakespeare has consciously sought
in the play
that what
a a
of compression
by
nature would take much

period of
longer
he has very
caused
to occur within not only a relatively short
time but in a
small number of pages as well.
If he
could
do this
while
providing the
thread of
and effect in the seeming reversal of the better than Freud thinks he does, he will have engineered a special kind of dramatic shock, and a special goad to searching out these causes and effects, much as would a scientist or philosopher like Freud him self. The cause of Macbeth's oft-noted brevity would then lie not in paring
intelligibility
of cause
main characters
by
If
others
but in Shakespeare's dramatic

prove,
and philosophical
intentions
combined.
added
we can
further,
that the
scenes
thought to be
superfluously
by
someone else are also
Mystery Play
-313
intrinsic to Shakespeare's overall plan, the play will be completely freed from the kind of editorial censure it has received. But there is more. What would life be like if it is not a "tale told by an
idiot?"
In
what sense a normal
is life
"tale"
or
nonidiot,
stood
man, life must be
story at intelligible
all?
If it is
tale told
by
and capable of
being
under
in terms
of cause and effect.
But does its
being
a tale suggest an overall
purpose or
meaning to
life? Is life intelligible in
the higher sense of
reason or wisdom would choose?
dential
supreme power
triumph?
Certainly
Is it conclusively moral, directed for the just and the good and guaranteeing their working this would be the case if the God Christians believe in ruled
a number of minor characters who seem
being what by a provi
the
world.
Macbeth does have
to be
the very embodiment of Christian

verse where good as
belief
and
conduct, and who trust in a uni
inevitably
triumphs over evil. Duncan (and earlier, his queen
well) is said to have been like that; at first

who
Lady
Macduff is,
as
and also
the
English king,
3:
miraculously
cures men of a
disease known
the Evil
(IV,
108-11, 146-60;
IV,
2: 73-79).
In
fact,
there is a strong element of this
belief in Macbeth
and
Lady
Macbeth
as well:
Macbeth fears
what will
happen
to him in the life to come, and knows
he has lost his "eternal jewel";

witches
Lady
Macbeth,
and
sleepwalking, thinks she is in hell. Yet the

seem
opening the play,
giving it its essential atmosphere, and it is they, rather than any invisible doom, seem to triumph in the play. Macbeth is
than one, and
a
to personify evil rather than good,
good
God, that, by arranging Macbeth's

more ways
in like a mystery story or novel mystery play Shakespearean plays not simply in the sense that all
character reversals mysteries of
are myster elements
ies. Beyond the mystery of its like the witches, it is filled with investigation. To
(toward the
mention
and of
imposing
fact left to the

to
reader's notice and
only the
most prominent:
whom
does Ross
refer
beginning) by
the term "Bellona's bridegroom"? What makes Mac
beth decide to slay the sleeping guards when he goes up to see the dead Duncan (since it was not part of his plan)? To whom does Banquo so insist ently travel the day of Macbeth's banquet, and volved in his slaying? Why does Ross turn up at
who
is the third
murderer
in
Lady Macduff's castle shortly before her murder, and who sends the messenger to warn her? What brings Ross to England? These questions of fact and motivation are essential to the
understanding
of
life
of
human
affairs
and we must not
be willing to
notice
an unexplained
gap in the
In
sequence without
trying
to pursue it. We cannot re
main satisfied with
the chaotic surface of things, or with superficial and appar

ways small as well as
search
ent motivations. serve

and
large,
we are given
incentives to
confirm
ob
think, to in
at
for
cause
and
effect, and thus to
life's
intelligibility
decide
upon
least this
sense.
We
are also given sufficient
information to
its
intelligibility
in the higher
sense of rational or moral order.
314
Interpretation
THE WITCHES FROM BEGINNING TO END
More than any Shakespearean play that is neither English history nor Ro man, Macbeth derives its content from historical narratives. It is amazing to find how
much of
the characters, and of their speech and action,

and
Shakespeare
amazing,
not
drew from Holinshed's Chronicles

and
like
sources.
It is
even more
instructive,
his
to discover the changes

new
he made, using
certain
features but
others,
cive to
inventing
ones,
and
putting
them all together
in
a manner condu
own purpose. of the
The
general outlines of
the story of Macbeth are
fol
ear
lowed, but many

lier
murder of
details
of
Duncan's
murder come
from Donwald's
King
Duff. Various
witches and wizards are
already in the story,
into three witches, to whom Shakespeare, defiantly anachronistic, adds Hecate. Most of Macbeth is already there, and even Mac duff. But Lady Macbeth had to be constructed out of a few lines referring to
waiting to be
congealed
her
ambition and
her
inciting
Macbeth to
murder
Duncan. And
while
Ross
and
Lady
Macduff
are present
in the story, their

edition
character and role pp.
had to be wholly
Shakespeare'
invented. (See the Furness
(Dover),
us
379-95,
and eerie
Holinshed (Dover),
The play
pp.
18-45.) Let
begin
by
examining those
yet
contemptible witches. opens with a
brief
appearance of
the three witches and then a much
longer
one
two scenes later. Their meeting with
by
the editors, occurs at the end of
Act III
and
universally spurned the beginning of Act IV There,

so
Hecate,
after a
reproving lecture from Hecate, the witches are directed to prepare for a final glorious deception of Macbeth, which all four then consummate together.
of word and
The details
The
deed
provided
in
all
these scenes are more than "at
mospherics,"
though
mood. of
reader
they certainly create a most particular atmosphere and is intended to think seriously about the witches: What kind
they
real?
beings
are
they? Are
What is their
significance?
Who is Hecate,
("when the
will
why is she needed? In their very first lines, the witches for bad weather ("thunder, lightning or in rain"), a taste for
and
show a predilection
paradox
battle's lost
and
won"),
and a gift of
finished "ere the

of moral
set of sun").
prophecy (knowing Their "fair is foul, and foul is

paradox; their
that the battle

fair"
be
seems to reek
call
as well as meteorological
answering
propounds
the
an
of
little
per
spirits
("I come,
Graymalkin!",
his
pet. or
"Paddock calls")
that of the greater
equally
on
plexing lesser, like
metaphysical paradox
a pet owner
being seeming
they
are
to serve the
And,
of
course, why
intent
meeting
Macbeth is begin
never
discussed
divulged.
When they have

a rather
convened again a
little later to
meet
Macbeth,
the witches
doing
that
in the
lengthy conversation, asking interim. They address each other

or
each other what

"sister,"
they had just been

a
as
indicating
and give the
kinship
either of
blood
kind, but they

such
use no
first names,
impression
have them.
they may lack
names,
even
though their petlike spirits
And
since
Mystery Play
perhaps
-315
they
must ask about each other's are
doings,
some
drastic limits to their
foreknowledge
to the things
indicated:
it
extends
only
to the doings of men, or
equally interesting. killing evidently activity needing no further explana tion. The other begs for chestnuts from a sailor's wife, who interrupts her
receiving
their attention.
Their
an
answers are
One has been
swine
chewing only to dismiss the witch quite airily, fully aware she is a witch. Out of what looks like a desire for revenge, this one knowing the wife's husband is the
master of a
to him.
winds
something One thing she will clearly do is use the wind she commands, and the offered by her two sisters, to blow his ship about for "nine times
ship
at sea
will pursue
him in
"do"
a sieve and
nine"
(that is, eighty-one) weeks, tossing it in a tempest, but unable to destroy it. Suddenly, she interrupts this train of thought to show her sister, childishly ea ger to see it, the thumb of a wrecked pilot. Hearing, then, a drum, they dance
around
three-times-three times to make up nine, and set the charm for Mac
appearance
with
beth's
will
before them, apparently
not
knowing,
or
caring, that Banquo
be
him.
What,
signifying
since
so
far, has Shakespeare

claim
told us with these witches?
Remembering
fury,
and
Macbeth's later
that "life is a tale told
by
an
idiot, full
the
makes
of sound and
nothing,"
it
cannot quite
be
said that
witches
talk
like idiots,
in
their conversation makes some
sense.
But it
very little sense,

while
what strikes us most of all
is their childishness,
of
combined with a singular even
clination
to relish
acts
(or relics)
other.
human harming,
not
kindness toward
each
We do
know
what
they look like
exhibiting yet, but
they
seem to
have
certain
human
needs
(for example, the desire for
food)
and
therefore bodies.
They
Tiger,
have
command of the winds and can travel anywhere

seem oddly restricted impression overall remains swine
swiftly, but their

the master of the
powers of no.
destruction The
net
yes, but
unintel-
one of
ligibility
and
hence impossibility: their

we
powers or traits seem nor would
inconsistent
with
each other.
Above all, do
on
do
not perceive
it be
at all consistent
with what we
tanically bent
Saany link between these witches and the devil. evil, in defiance of God's commands, these witches are not.
perceive
There is nothing Christian about them. What the witches look like we must
see them.
on
wait
to learn from
They
are
withered, wild
not
in
their attire,
female
yet
Banquo, the first to bearded, standing

Ban
though
the
earth yet
looking
on
like its
"inhabitants."
They
can understand
question?
quo's
"Live
you? or are you aught
that man may
by
placing
wrinkled
fingers
their thin lips
they apparently
and own
signal
him to
remain silent. you can.
Only
What
when
Macbeth, both commanding

do they break their
asking, says
and
"Speak, if
you?"
are
silence
give
him the famous
"hails."
To Banquo they say nothing, but at his subsequent urging also address their hails to him, prophesying his destiny, and making comparisons between it
and
Macbeth's. With their final "Banquo Macbeth's further questioning
and
Macbeth,
hail,"
all
they
refuse
to
answer
and
disappear.
316-
Interpretation
the witches seem originally to Banquo's
concerned
Why
they
with
Macbeth alone,
nor even
"hails"
and
why
accede
demands,
cannot
be known, The
whether
they
anticipated those
demands
which seems unlikely.
given
Macbeth
mention three heights of place and power, two to be gotten in the future. Since the kingdom already achieved, one have just witnessed (in the previous scene) the bestowal of Cawdor's title
of them
the thanedoms
we
on
Macbeth, in his
the
witches
absence,
by King Duncan,
and
learn from Macbeth himself
that he is already Thane of Glamis due to his father's tell him are
not prophecies at
death,
two-thirds of what the witches
all, though the
power of
to know even these seems beyond any human power.
Only
Macbeth's becom
out
ing king
to
can
be
considered a prophecy, which, as the

"hails"
story unfolds, turns
any any defects in his greatness. These emerge only with the prophecy given to Banquo, which is actually stated in terms of comparison with Macbeth. Banquo will be lesser or greater, not so
he may
encounter
be true. But the
to Macbeth contain utterly no reference to

or to
evils
along the way,
happy,
are
yet much
happier,
begetter
of
kings but
not a
king
himself. These too

evil
largely
confirmed
by
the
further
action of
the play,
but the
Banquo
will
encounter
along the way
being
murdered with
twenty
gashes
in his head
could
and
thrown in a
gathered
ditch,
all
by
command of
his friend, Macbeth

say.
hardly
be
directly
point
from
what
the witches
we
At this
witches
in the play,
please
have
no
idea
whether
it is the
purpose of the
to praise and
as
the great
humans they
single out
for their
atten
tion,
or
it turns
a
out
to tempt them
concealed
by
the promise of great good into ac

no
tions that lead to

witches
doom
from them. We have
idea
whether
the
form
part of a
large
organized even
group
or are out there uncoordinated, at cross-purposes
in
unknown
in
kind
speare
other, working To clarify the larger framework of their operations, Shake later arranges for them to meet with Hecate, in the scene (penultimate
of chaos.
numbers,
perhaps
to
each
in Act
III)
that most editors
seem
intent
already been Fleance) has Banquo's
murdered and replaced also
by
extruding as spurious. Duncan has the Macbeths. Banquo (but not his son,
on
still shuddering after seeing his need for still further mur banquet, anticipating has just declared intent his to visit the "weird He is "bent on ders,
been murdered,
and
Macbeth,
ghost at the
and
sisters."
knowing, by
when
the worst means, the takes place. He
worst"
and this we
the
visit
wants
to learn what
will
only learn indirectly happen to him now that
he has
again
waded, and will continue to wade, in blood.

witches
meet
When the
the first and
witch
Macbeth his intent to
visit
Hecate, Macbeth has already indicated to Lady him, and Hecate is aware of it. The first witch has
the rest are
last lines
of the scene: all
Hecate's. Told
and
by
the
first
an
that she looks angry, Hecate
begins
by
explaining
justifying
her
ger,
which
is directed
at
them. She takes command of their
indicates her
own general
and
regarding Macbeth,
further operations, principle and the one underlying their future strategy concludes by responding to the call of her "little
spirit."
Mystery Play
-317
Of these three
parts of
Hecate speech, the first has
caused
the
most
trouble:
Have I
not reason,
beldams
as you are, you
Saucy,
and overbold?
How did
dare
To trade
and traffic with and affairs of
In riddles, And
Macbeth, death;
charms,
1,
the mistress of
your
The Was
close contriver of all

never call'd
harms,
to
bear my part,
all you
Or
show
the glory of our art?
And,
which
is worse,
have done
Hath been but for Spiteful
a wayward son,
and wrathful; who, as others own ends, not
do,
Loves for his
for
you.
An
earlier
American
editor named
W.A. Rolfe
presented one of
the strongest at
tacks on the authenticity of this

speaks
scene.
To begin with, Rolfe

trochaic."
notes
that Hecate
puts
in iambics,
whereas
"the
eight-syllable
lines that Shakespeare

traffic"
into
the mouth of supernatural beings are regularly

sense could the witches since no
have been
said
to "trade
and
Furthermore, in what with Macbeth,

were
bargain
which
or exchange
has
transpired
between them? What
the
"gains"
in
they
were all
to share, according to Hecate (said a

proved
little later,
and
at
IV,
1:43)?
And how has Macbeth
"wayward son,
theater"
spiteful
wrathful?"
These
and similar considerations

work
lead Rolfe to in the
conclude that the part
of
Hecate is the
of some
"hack
writer
(Furness,
response. same
pp.
232-33).
Rolfe's
criticisms
are
sensible, and deserve an adequate

("trafficking"
In
ac
"trading"
cusing the witches of

ate seems al
emphasizes
presentation
the
idea), Hec
to look upon their
to Macbeth
as
exchange, where the
trading
partners
both have in
view an end or
something like a ration benefit to
themselves.
But the
gravamen of
her
complaint comes
in the
next
lines: You
your
"glory"
failed, Hecate
charms and of our art.
says, to
bring
me
into the action; I,
who
both
control
secretly contrive all harms; I, who alone can show the full In short, you set up shop on your own, so to speak, and were there
overbold."
fore "saucy,
component,
and
And the
complaint
has
second even a
stronger not a
for,
"which is
"son,"
worse,"
you
have done this for

own
"wayward,"
loving
or
devoted
others
who
loves selfishly, "for his

rather
ends"
(but
not
dif
ferent from
in this respect),
than "for
you."
In this part, the image
of commerce or rational with
exchange
is dropped,
and replaced
by
that of
love,
Hecate picturing the witches as Macbeth's mother, who loves her son and expects both love and devotion from him. In both cases, Hecate seems, rather
paradoxically,
to
presume
that
a
the
witches
are
bestowing
benefit,
not
inflicting
harm,
on
Macbeth
benefit they
expect
to result in some
good
to
318-
Interpretation
either
themselves,
stowed
in the form
of a
benefit rationally
exchanged
or one
be
through love.
can
What
Hecate
call
possibly be the herself the "close
reason
for
such complications?
harms,"
Shakespeare has
contriver of all
almost
unproudly,
the human
under
yet matter-of-factly.
What
she means all
is that
all
along the way, not the harm at least
harm,
and perhaps
harm to
Satan
beings
capable of unlike
being
harmed but he
is
her
control.
Hecate is
not
she
fords Shakespeare something like

raise,
more
a substitute
is very for Satan through

at
Satan
she af
whom
can
guardedly, the
questions
that ought to be directed to
Satan himself.
Satan had to be brought into

and ated ated
existence
help
explain
the persistence, gravity,
frequent
success
(short
of
domination)
of evil
in
a universe
cre by somehow manages to derange as that thus a good itself, by God, being leaving God without responsibility for evil. Satan must, to oppose God com pletely, represent evil loved for itself. Hecate demonstrates the impossibility of this idea. Once one postulates beings that bring evil into the world, and con trive all harms, they do so for the sake of either harming or benefiting. But a being that wants only to harm must want to harm itself, and such a being con tradicts the very notion of being. Every being must therefore want to benefit at a good could not create must
God. Since he
himself, he
completely have been
cre
least itself. This is

I
commend
your
also
why Hecate
and
can
later say to the witches, "O,

i'
well
done!
i:
gains"
pains,
us
everyone
shall
share
the
(IV,
42-43)
leaving
wondering
what possible gains
they
can obtain either
from
this successful performance before Macbeth or
from his
ultimate
thumb"
downfall. Will
the first
witch
Macbeth become something like that wrecked "pilot's carries around in her pocket? What needs of Hecate and the
witches
and
how
they be harm?
must
constructed
to have such needs
are satisfied
by
the contriving of
While Hecate may look how little of the punitive or
"angerly,"
and
vindictive she manifests toward
is clearly angered, it is surprising her min

"saucy"
now"
ions. On the contrary, all she asks is that they "make amends by follow her directions. She plans a great of their in all and is its art, glory, ing display engrossed in the thought of it but not as a malevolent Satan, anticipating with
joy
the pain, suffering, and destruction to be
brought
about.
Hecate is,
above
all, an artisan
or, better still, an artist who must create all the elements nec
essary to
rhyme of
a successful
charming
of
Macbeth. And the shortness,
lightness,
and
her lines
are
"chief
of
harms."
contriver of
perfectly in keeping with this approach to her job as We never learn whether there is a "chief contriver
other than she
benefits,"
or appreciated. a
by
whom
themselves
the
and
the
"glory
that
art"
of our
is to
be
Nevertheless,
gives
impression
hence in
bringing
about
harm is
difficult
and complicated
thing,
in her
need of a complex and
glorious art.
excellence
She is therefore
an
characterized
which
by something like
eyes
the
human love
of
excellence
remains
untarnished
because
harms,
presumably, are a necessary
part of
the nature of things. The witches
seem and
Mystery Play
Hecate does be
-319
to
do, by impulse,
what
out of a sense of rational necessity,
by
art.
They
can therefore
wants us
pictured as
childlike,
she as a mature adult.
Yet Shakespeare
and as
to see an essential
response
kinship
call of
between them her "little
as
well,
therefore
makes
her leave in
spirit,"
to the
just
they had in the very first scene. Not only must one wonder how a devotion to harming is consistent with this love of pets, but also how the higher and
greater more and
being
can seek
to serve the lower. This touch is
meant on
to
draw
even
sharply the contrast between Hecate and these witches,

and
the one
hand,
the
Satan
his
witches
viewed
in the
context of
and
Christianity
on
other.
Satan is
all evil,
from top to toe, but Hecate

evil, and
her
witches are peculiar
combinations of good and
hardly
reek of malevolence
in their
evil-
doing. Their peculiarity provokes our interest not only in their motive for doing harm but in their motive for doing good. Is there a counterpart to Hecate re
sponsible
for causing good,

to good
context of
and
if so,
what
is the
relation
between the two? Or

about good?
is
evil subservient
somehow more
difficult to
bring
than good?
Applied in the
sible want or one of
Christianity,
what causes
God to do
What
pos
desire in Him
could make
Him
create a world, and then suffer
for
His
creatures? quite right
Rolfe is
siders
in his
criticism of
Hecate's speech,
so
long
as one con
it
a set of charges against the witches
that, in
literal
and
simply factual
entirely
sheer
sense, are either true or false. In this

wide of
sense
they
hack
are
false,
and seem
the
mark
hence the
work of some
writer.
But the
should
have told him better than that,

as a vehicle
and
if
one thinks of
poetry Hecate's lines pri
marily
good and evil

wants
for exposing the general problem of the relation between in the universe, Rolfe's objections disappear. That Shakespeare to confront this problem is shown, much more graphically than ever be
witches'
fore, in
the next
scene, set, as Hecate had told us, at the "pit of Ache
ron,"
where
Macbeth
will soon come.
Here
we
find the
cauldron a stew made of things that would utterly and audience as evil:
boiling in a instinctively repel the

witches
hideous
animals parts of
that crawl and
fly,
and
run and
swim, poisoned
entrails, poisonous plants,

prostitutes.
Jews, infidels,
in
the strangled offspring of
These ingredients
ples, however.
are not selected
accordance with sharks and
the strictest of princi
Some like
toads, snakes, bats,

others
clearly
vine and
repellent
by
a
nature, but
Jews, Turks,
view, and
at
may be considered Tartars only by di

poisoned entrails
law,
are
or
from
Christian
point of
still others
prostitutes'
strangled
offspring
least partly
by
human intervention.
None
as
simply
characteristic of a universe evil
by
nature or
in itself. In fact,
not
if to
remind us
faintly
of those parts of the universe that

witches
frog"
do
repel,
or
that
even
attract, Shakespeare has the
include in their
"tongue
of
stew
items
of ques as
dog."
tionable repugnance, like "toe of

make sure
and
Later,
if to
caul
the
mood of the
horrid is sustained, the has devoured her

nine
witches
throw
into the
dron the blood
of a sow that
farrow,
and grease
from the
320
Interpretation
gibbet, reminding us,
with
noose of a murderer's spectacle

selves.
the
last,
of the most repellent
in the play
on
that of the murderous Macbeth and
Lady
Macbeth them
Macbeth insists
even
being
answered
by
the
the witches concerning the

winds
future
be
if
all
things must
be destroyed
by
they
command.
But
even
frame his question, the First Apparition knows how to answer it. The spectacle now presented to Macbeth evidently Hecate's masterful con trivance is in fact much more complicated than what the witches had origi
fore he
can
nally
presented on their own.
In
each of
three cases, an unnamed and puzzling
explicitly tells him how to act, practically calling for injustice, and apparently promising him impunity. Finally, at his own insistence, he is given shattering confirmation of the earlier prediction that Banquo's issue will reign
apparition
in this kingdom,
aye accursed
which
leads him to
call
for
this "pernicious
hour"
to "stand
in the
calendar!"
But Hecate has done her job well, and, true

confusion"
to her word, led him on "to his

crimes.
by
This
she
has done
not through outright
assuring him security for his lies but through equivocation,

while
using
usual
words
that in their ordinary meaning give guarantees,
in
some un
meaning withdrawing them.

play's
Toward the beth

senses
end,
on
discovering
that "palter
these extraordinary meanings, Mac

truth,"
the "equivocation of the fiend that lies like
and exclaims
sense'
against these
"juggling
ends
fiends"
with us
in
double
(V. 5:50;
V, 8:25-28). He
destiny he had never ing with the witches,

him up
with
up dead and headless, after the wife concerning whose inquired has already committed suicide. But his last meet
at
the pit of
Acheron,
as
concludes
in their
effort to cheer
spell
music and
dancing,
he
stands
distracted. Their
without
is
now
complete, and its ultimate consequences guaranteed,

their part to check
and good
later. Hecate
and
her helpers
must
beings
his. For
any necessity on whose function

this point he
it is to do harm,
without malice
be
satisfied with their suc
cess.
And Shakespeare
must
have been
satisfied with
by
has clearly distinguished the witches in Macbeth from Christian witches, and plainly entitled them to be headed by Hecate rather than Satan. At the same
time, he has deepened our interest in the problem of evil in the universe. How is it to be accounted for? Why are so many things in nature repellent to man?
Why
is
evil so
important
and
feature
of all
human
affairs?
What
causes evil
in
people
like Macbeth
Lady
Macbeth?
which
Clearly
play, is witches,
us
the perspective from
Shakespeare
views
these matters,
in the
of
not
Christian,
life is
although
the protagonists are.

problem of
With the
Shakespeare
whether
can
a
illuminate the
tale told
intelligible
his help being (to help

the
same
decide
by
an
idiot), using
as a specimen case
nature of
beings supposedly dedicated to the
contrivance of
harm. At the
time tice
allowing the witches to tempt men by promising security for injus Shakespeare can study, as if under artificial laboratory conditions, the
intensification
of tyrannical
rapid amplification and
evildoing,
and the state of
soul
Mystery Play
321
ments of
motivating and accompanying it. He will have recourse to important ele Christian expectation the porter as hell's gatekeeper, Lady Macbeth
thinking hell murky

to which wickedness
named
but only to show the natural hell, the hell on this earth, can lead. And he will have his little joke: a character
pears) to serve
Seyton is suddenly introduced toward the end (and as suddenly disap simultaneously as a bringer of bad news and Macbeth's assis
process
tant, in the
showing
identify
pp.
him
56).
as a mere man
a supernatural ability that (see M. Levith, What's in
makes
it impossible to
s
Shakespeare'
Names?
20,
GOOD PLAN, BAD PLAN
We
The
must now
turn to two bold plans of which we learn
Macbeths'
plan planned
and
to
murder
Duncan,
is
while
paraded
early in the play. before our eyes, is
poorly
plan
executed, but
successful.
On the
other
hand, Duncan's
planned, and
since
to
frustrate Macbeths but
ambition
almost
invisible,
with
well
well executed shows
unsuccessful.
We
must
begin
Duncan's plan,
it
itself
almost at
once, in Act I,
scene
2. Duncan has
always struck who
the
at
careless reader as even
less
capable of
forethought than
King Lear,
seems
had
least
constructed a plan
for the
succession
in Britain. Duncan
old, weak,
midst
impetuous,
on
too trusting, and too ready to distrust. We

not on
first
see
him in the
of a combined revolt and
invasion, relying Macbeth, Banquo, and his older son, Malcolm. Looks can be deceiving, however, for Duncan's support among the thanes is amazingly solid: only Cawdor has joined the rebel, Macdonwald. The chief problem facing Duncan,
own efforts once we put all
his
in battle but
the facts together, has to do not
with
the invasion or the rebel
lion,
strict
as might
first appear, but
with
with
the
succession.
Scotland
was not
then a
its feudal aristocracy, obviously needed a hereditary monarchy, and, mature soldier at its helm. Not only was Malcolm young for this task, but his see: only the efforts of the military ineptitude has just shown itself for all to
bleeding
time,
sergeant
keep
him from
being
captured
in this battle. At the

military
prowess of
same
the sergeant's story testifies to the

who proves
unrivaled
Mac
beth,
himself to be the kingdom's

accounts
salvation against
the
rebels.
This
predicament
for
a series of
apparently disparate
coherence
actions on
and
Duncan's
part
that,
taken
together,
display
his
made
the
of a
plan
good plan.
Duncan had
not yet made
son
Malcolm the Prince
of
Cumber
land
cession
that
is, he had
shown
not yet
publicly
him his heir. Since
(as
from seeming selfish for his devoted to the public good, hoping for some impressive military accomplish But the king's own advanced ment from Malcolm that might justify his choice.
haps delayed to
age, Malcolm's
youthfulness and
by keep
this very
fact)
was still not
automatic, the
hereditary suc king had per and insufficiently family
incapacity
as a soldier, and
Macbeth's
recent
322
Interpretation
battlefield
make
successes on the
sistible choice
Macbeth
rather than
Malcolm the
all
but irre
and oth
do instantly? We do
ers we
for the throne. In these circumstances, what can Duncan do, not know for sure whether Duncan, like Macduff and
(for example, Macduff

even
already suspicious of Macbeth's moral character II, 88, Banquo at I, 3: 121-24 and IH> I: I_3Banquo's prospective murderers at 111, 1: 76-79). It is quite likely that he
about
was
learn
later,
at
4:
was, or he may have simply favored his own sons.
quickly
a
proclaim
Malcolm Prince
violent
of
Cumberland,
and thus
In any case, he his heir, but in
must such
way
as
to prevent
dissidence
and opposition
from Macbeth.
Already
of
Duncan had tried to dilute Macbeth's influence

and
by
to
the
unusual
step
the
and
making him
Banquo
co-captains
in the
war:
we can see
as
this motive in
his question,
Banquo"
after
hearing
of
Macbeth's
prowess on
alone,
what effect
entrance of the
Norwegian force into battle had
"our captains, Macbeth
thus
bringing
Banquo to the
center of attention
But the
presumed treason
of the thane of
along with Macbeth. Cawdor gives Duncan a new and
much more substantial
opportunity, for Macbeth can
instantly
be invested
with
his title
strikes
and
lands just
at the time the announcement about

most precipitate
Malcolm is
made.
It
the reader as
on
Duncan's
part to call
for Cawdor's
action
death, especially
on a mere verbal report of
his treason
by
Ross. But the
had to be calculated, and Duncan speaks truly of himself if not of Cawdor when he says, "There's no art to find the mind's construction in the His
face."
plan,
as we must reconstruct
it, is
to make Macbeth obligated and grateful to

own
him publicly at the very moment that his to double his thanedom Malcolm, is openly and legally set in line for the throne. These
conjectures can
son,
be confirmed by scrutinizing the events immediately proclamation of the succession in scene 4. He has al Duncan's surrounding ready sent Ross and Angus to greet Macbeth, on the way to Forres, where the When Macbeth enters, the king is staying, with the title "thane of
Cawdor."
king
calls
him "O
cousin,"
worthiest
thus
indicating
of
family kinship
he
owes
later
of
confirmed
by
Macbeth himself,
and of course all
the more dangerous in light
the succession problem. Duncan then talks

without
all
how
much
Macbeth,
more
pay."
can
going into details, and ends Notice no mention yet Macbeth
with of
"More is thy due than
than
the title of
vague promises of reward.
responds
Cawdor, dutifully, expressing

"Welcome
make
amid
large but
to excess,
and
it
seems and
the obligations generally owed not only to
Duncan's "throne
hither!"
state"
his
children
but to his
plant
servants as well!
responds
Duncan. "I have begun to

ing."
thee,
and will
labour to
thee
full
of grow
Again, large but

then he
vague
promises, this time permitting the
inference
that
until
has
"planted"
not
Macbeth. In short, Macbeth
and we can un
derstand why had not been one of his favorites hitherto. Then Duncan addresses Banquo as of equal deserving,
and
he
embraces
him, leading
the reader to
an embrace
wonder whether
anything he had just

this point
said to
Mac
beth indicated
for him
as well.
By
Duncan
seems to
have
tears of
Mystery Play
without
323
warning, he launches into the
an
joy
in his
eyes.
Suddenly,
nouncement without
naming Malcolm Prince of Cumberland and heir to his estate and, saying so explicitly, his throne. The nobility of others shall also be
with suddenness means
honored. Then,
Inverness."
What this
again, and striking brevity: "From hence to is that he has just invited himself to Macbeth's
anyone, Macbeth says he
will ride ahead and
castle!
Probably
say:
as surprised as
bring
lier
the good news of Duncan's coming to his wife, and only then does
Duncan
"My
Cawdor!"
worthy
public commitment of
duty,
and now
That is, only after receiving Macbeth's ear his acquiescence in receiving him as
in his castle, does Duncan publicly confirm by his own words the honor he had had Ross bestow on Macbeth. Once at Inverness, Duncan's plan culmi
a guest
in his sending Banquo to Lady Macbeth with the gift of a diamond that night, just before going to sleep. Nor has he been without protective care for
nates
himself,
asked
even
then, for his

plan
grooms are
just
outside
his bedchamber,
and
he has
Macduff to call upon

of
So there is the
him early that morning (II, i: 13-16; II, 3: 50-51). in full: another high honor for Macbeth, a bauble for his
the
next
wife, the appointment

at
king
(so
killing Duncan,
in the way),
as
Macbeth
realizes
once,
still
leaves
an
equally large
obstacle
and then
arranging to
become Macbeth's guest, taking some precaution nonetheless. It is an excellent favorable prophe plan and would have worked, even in spite of the
witches'
cies, had it not been for the extraordinary ambition and
persuasiveness of
Lady
Macbeth, ipated factor,
coupled with
her
and
her husband's stupidity,
and one other unantic
to be
discussed below.
that did not work. Now let us see the ill-
This is the
well-conceived plan
conceived one that communications to
did. If
one examines one will
his wife,
carefully Macbeth's written and oral discover that he never reveals to her two
important facts
of
the prophecy the witches made
Malcolm
as
Prince
the throne
would
for Banquo, and the naming Cumberland. Had he done so, their task in usurping have looked at least doubly difficult and far less promising.
of
plan
This is why they make no overt Donalbain, his younger brother,

And it is Macbeth
also plans
for
killing Malcolm,
with catapults
though
both he
and
are at
not
Inverness
their father that night. them into the throne
why Banquo's
after
luck,
brains,
first
murder
alone, without the queen's help. In the case of

must
persuade
Duncan's murder, both

with acknowledge
Lady
to
Macbeth
Macbeth to do
be
deeply immoral,
latter,
and also convince
deed they him it can be done

a
impunity. To
with
prove the
she suggests that
berlains
alcohol
she can put them
into
deep
they
all.
plying the two cham sleep, leaving Duncan at
by
their mercy. Macbeth adds a touch of his own:
chamberlai
will use
the
as well.
daggers for the dead,
and
then spread blood on their
bodies
In the
ensuing clamor, their As it turns out, although her

guilt will
be
accepted
by
plan called
for their
doing
the
deed together, it
are made.
ends
some improvisations up wholly in Macbeth's hands. And has drugged the that she learns audience Lady Macbeth the
From
grooms'
wine and
324
Interpretation
part
only then done her
in
laying
out their
daggers for Macbeth's leave
use
immedi
ately thereafter. But,
stricken with grooms with
terror after committing the murder, Macbeth
forgets to
them
smear the
blood
and
the
bloody
daggers
with
a task
that must then be undertaken
by Lady Macbeth,
a
whose
hands
are
un
bloodied in the process, like Macbeth's. And

called
final improvisation, wholly

goes
for in the
perfected
plan,
occurs when
and on
Macbeth his
own
up to see the
grooms.
king
after the murder
has been discovered
kills the
This is
account
the
real reason
why
Lady Macbeth,
upon
hearing
Macbeth blurt
out
his
to those assembled in the castle, faints straightaway.
How The
good
weak
is this plan, both in its point of the former was its for
original
and
its improvised
variations?
blaming
the chamberlains, who,
if they
had any
motive
killing
the
king,
would not
be
so
in the very spot where they were expected fall asleep there, defiled with blood. And, of course, once awake the chamber lains would stoutly deny they had such a motive, would tell of being plied with
immediately
obliging as to lie down to stay for the night and
liquor
by
the queen, and

s allusion at
might receive support
from those in the king's
trust
III, 6: 1 1-16). Now, for some reason we never learn lips, he quickly decides to kill the guards when he goes up to see the dead king. From Lennox, who accompanied him, we learn that the guards "star'd, and were Macbeth must have observed this him
(see Lennox
from Macbeth's
own
distracted."
self, and perhaps thought it
unnatural
that
they
were
not
simply asleep (the
drug
he
applied
might
by Lady Macbeth may have caused this have wondered, would happen if they were
stupor?
unusual condition).
What,
shaken and still would not
awaken a
from their drunken he

was not
Did he
guess that
they had been drugged

an
fact
of which
informed
by Lady
Macbeth? Did he fear that
in
quiry into their
condition might lead back to Lady Macbeth and himself? By killing the guards, Macbeth does something exceedingly strange, and hardly justifiable on the grounds of the righteous indignation to which he pre tends. But he takes this risk, and Lady Macbeth not seeing what it can ac complish
for them
way:
swoons.
and
At this point,
huge
piece of unanticipated
after
luck
their
falls their
Malcolm
father's murder, flee, which, picion of the it being thought

deed,"
Donalbain, fearing for their own lives as Macduff later tells Ross, "puts upon
no
them sus
doubt
with
much
Macbeths
It
that the chamberlains
were suborned
by
them to murder their
urging from the fa

make
ther. The story is still

cepted.
was
highly improbable,
who
but
another accident
helps
it
ac
Macduff
he does,
demanded that Macbeth Macbeth's

apparent
explain
grooms;
after
Lady
fainting
why he killed the spell may have kept
him from pursuing the matter further. That Macduff did indeed harbor suspi cions is shown by his later refusal to be present at Macbeth's coronation. But
there was
grounds cluded one person
in the
castle
that morning who
had
much
more
solid con
than Macduff for suspecting the murder was done
Macbeth,
of
and
who was
by
him. This,
calls
course,
had actually Banquo. Just
after
Lady
Macbeth's collapse, Banquo
for
everyone to get
dressed
and return
"to
question this most
Mystery Play
piece of
325
further."
bloody
work, to know it
But
we can
easily why he never gives voice to his suspicions the beginning of Act III): he must have thought the
guess
(explicitly
admitted at about
witches'
prophecy
the future
kingship
of
his
sons would
be
realized after
their prediction about
Macbeth's gaining the throne is. We can therefore imagine that the Macbeths unexpectedly found in Banquo a strong supporter for their effort to condemn the king's sons and then install Macbeth in Duncan's place. This, too, was
how the Macbeths

about
overcame the obstacle
Lady
Macbeth had
never
been told
words,
that
of
Malcolm's
being
named
Prince
of
Cumberland. In
other
by
one and
the same piece of

murder
luck, wholly
and removed
unanticipated, Malcolm could be
blamed for Duncan's

flight became the
from the line thing, it tells
of succession!
His
key
to Macbeth's success.
Why
Duncan
all this emphasis on plans? and about the
For
one
us
something
of
about
Macbeths
about
their mental stature. It permits us to
distinguish further between

Richard III)
and a good as
a tyrannical usurper
like the Duke
Gloucester (in
more
and
the
Macbeths,
the latter
being
more
superstitious,
moral,
deal less intelligent than the former. But there is

reader's perception and
a general purpose of
well, for it refines the
understanding
human
af
fairs generally, and moves him closer to being able to say whether life is a tale told by an idiot or not. To the extent that intelligent purpose, human or non-
human, directs life, it is

such a tale.
not such a
we see
tale
in fact it is the
precise opposite of
In The Tempest
the wise,
premeditated plan of
its hero,
Prospero, determine
learn how
character
the action of practically the whole play. In Macbeth we
one serious
bit
of miscalculation or
ignorance (of
Lady
of
Macbeth's
by Duncan)
very
can
thwart an otherwise excellent plan, and how chance
can make a
poor one succeed.
These
are
important features
human life,
words, we
but in
neither case
does life lose its

makes
causal
intelligibility. In
other
can see
just
what
it is that
the two plans

a
do, showing
least
philosophical
that no part of
life is
tale told
develop by an idiot.
and eventuate as
they
life
the
And the
part of
deserving
that description
which
drama
is the perfectly designed work of allows no part of itself to bear any but
the
whole. not unintelligible sound and
art
a neces an
sary relationship to
entirely
all other parts and
sufficient proof
that life is
The play Macbeth itself is fury!
MACDUFF AND ROSS
Macduff
of
and
Ross
are
cousins, but
they
are
Macduff's
character
was
already
available named
very unlike each other. Much to Shakespeare in Holinshed's

and
Chronicles,
scratch.
whereas
Ross
was
barely
We
see
Ross before
we see
Macduff. With
had to be built up from Angus, he comes riding in
from Fife. There, according to the account he gives King Duncan, the traitor Cawdor and the King of Norway himself were defeated in battle by someone
326 Ross
Interpretation
"Bellona's
bridegroom."
refers to as
Bellona
was the goddess of war, and
most commentators
take this hero to be
Macbeth
again.
But Fife is
a great
dis
tance
from the
area near
Forres
where the
first battle has just
taken place
Mac-
the battle
involving
and
the
bleeding sergeant, Malcolm, Macbeth, Banquo,

reason
donwald,
also
the Norwegian lord. For that simple

of
Macbeth
the
could not
have been the hero
Fife
a conclusion
fortified
by
fact that Mac
beth knows nothing of Cawdor's disloyalty (I, 4: 11-12). And who a more likely candidate for this role than that other great warrior, the thane of Fife himself? For reasons unknown to us, strange reference to "Bellona's
Ross' bridegroom"
seems
to have had the purpose of concealing from Duncan's view

Ross'
the heroic deeds of that other thane and
own at
cousin, Macduff.
nor
Macduff himself has
not
yet
arrived
Forres,
is he
present
must
when
Duncan
makes
his
announcement about at
the succession. But he
have rid
den in from the battle

cause
he is
with
Fife before the king's party leaves for Inverness, be that party as it arrives there. Within the castle, he and Lennox in
a
have been
quartered
kind
of
annex,
and we
first hear Macduff

he
and
speak
in the
at
famous
gate
porter scene
early the next morning,
when
Lennox knock
the
to be admitted into the main part of the castle. Minutes
before, both Mac

return rather
beths had heard the

berlains'
knocking
just
as
Lady
Macbeth leaves to
greeted
the cham
daggers. Macbeth
goes
to the gate and is

thane?"
coolly had
by
Macduff: "Is the

manded
king
call
stirring, worthy
He
adds that
the the
king
com
him "to
timely
on
him. I have
the
hour."
almost slipp'd
Hearing
this the
reader once again senses
importance
of accident: a
few
minutes ear
lier,
and
the Macbeths might have been caught red-handed, literally.

alone on
Calling
from his
murder
the
king, Macduff is
learn that he is
a
anointed
the
first to find him murdered,

pious man:
and
exclamation we
ope
very
"Most
sacrilegious
hath broke
the Lord's
and
temple"
the last phrase combining
elements
from the Old
New Testaments. He
and
rouses the whole not
house,
call
ing by
name
Banquo, Donalbain,
who asks
Malcolm, but
Ross
or
Lady
Mac
beth. It is Macduff
who then seconds
.
Macbeth why he had just killed the guards, and Banquo's proclaimed opposition to the "undivulged pretense
malice."
of
treasonous
as
The
next we see of
him is
For
at a
meeting
with
Ross,
must
apparently have left the

pened there.
he
emerges
from Macbeth's
castle.
some reason
Ross
quickly after the murder, for he asks Macduff what hap Macduff tells him that the flight of Malcolm and Donalbain cast
castle
suspicion
named
of their
father's
murder on
king (presumably by
and that
a council of
them, that Macbeth had already been the thanes, unattended by Ross, in the
castle)
whether castle.
he
will go
And to
Ross'
he has already left for Scone to be invested. Asked by Ross to Scone, Macduff says he will go instead to Fife, his own declaring his own intention to follow Macbeth to Scone,
see that
Macduff bids him

easier
than our
character
done there, "Lest our old robes sit Either suspecting Macbeth or murder, or knowing of his otherwise, Macduff is clearly uneasy, and is courageous or impruthings
are well
new!"
dent
nation. enough
Mystery Play
by
327
absenting himself from the
and
to reveal his state of mind
coro
In Act III Macbeth has Banquo murdered, Macduff. The
in Act IV, the Banquo

and
family
of
editors are never able to make out where
Fleance
are
riding the afternoon of their murder, and think it unimportant to boot. A guess could be hazarded rather easily, had they not followed one of the earliest edi tors (Capell) in locating Macbeth's palace at Forres, not far from Cawdor and Inverness in
stage northern
Scotland. In
all
likelihood, they do III)
so not
because
directions,
of which
there are none, but because
they
assume
of any Macbeth's
origi
second visit
to the witches (at the end of Act
takes place where he
a heath near Forres. From Inverness (near Forres), however, nally met them he had gone to Scone to be crowned, and no direction of any sort ever has him
coming away from there (historically, the Scottish kings were likely to reside in Perth, close to Scone). If one also realizes that the final action of the play, in Act V, plainly takes place in or near the castle he had been busy fortifying at Dunsinane one will not have Macbeth spend close to both Scone and Perth
all
his time in Acts III

"the
and
IV
one
hundred
not at
or more miles
to the north at Forres.
Moreover, he thing
called
seeks out pit of
the witches
the heath near
Forres but
at some
Acheron"
fictitious location derived from the Bible

pit seems
(2 Kings
i,
2-7).
Like its Biblical archetype, this Nor

should we
to be known for its

witches
supernatural clientele.
forget that the three
in the play
over
are associated with one who seeks and
the
various
winds and can therefore meet anywhere with
them
all
the more if
they
are, so to speak,
hovering
Scone
was
him
watching his destiny, as they If Macbeth's castle in Act III is actually located
are with
within castle.
Macbeth.
at either
or
Dun
sinane, it is also Macduff had his
twenty
or
thirty
miles of wherever
and
it
in Fife that
Could this have been Banquo

when reason
Fleance's destina Banquo

about
tion,
mysteriously left unidentified their ride the day of the banquet? The
so
Macbeth
questions
for Banquo's
reserve
is perfectly
clear:
Macduff had
refused
to
attend
Macbeth's
worries
coronation and was share with a close
der
suspicion.
No doubt Banquo had
to
already un friend only

and
Banquo
calls
him "Dear
Duff"
the morning of Duncan's murder
there
fore, despite
haps
as
until
being
Macbeth's
chief
guest,
and
on
peated urgings that
he stay, Banquo insists
despite Macbeth's strong and re departing for several hours, per
the early evening.
This,
a
well, may have
contributed
possibly the news of Banquo's murder to Macduff's decision to rebuff Macbeth's mes
and
senger and
ward
flee to England
94;
decision
of which we
learn very shortly

should
after
(11,
3:
III, 6:
39-43)-
On his
visit
to the witches, Macbeth is told both that he
beware the
thane of Fife and that (as he interprets it) he can be harmed or defeated by no human hand. Despite this last guarantee, he decides to kill Macduff, just to Macduff's flight to England, however, he decides im make sure.
Discovering
without
mediately, and
any reason, to
slaughter
his
wife and
babes instead. The
328
Interpretation
is as mystifying as it is pathetic. Last present at the banquet, Ross is found in conversation with his cousin Lady Macbeth (and her son) in suddenly her castle, hearing her castigate her husband for leaving his wife, babes, man Ross says he sion, and titles "in a place from whence himself does fly.
next scene
.
will return
before long, hints he

then
would
burst into tears later
at their plight
complete
if he
stays
longer,
and
departs his
leaving
A
the reader, as well, in
ignorance
as
to the purpose of
visit.
moment
with
an unidentified messenger
enters,
the
warning
Lady
try
Macbeth to flee
her children,
and the
and
in
another moment
murderers themselves appear to
kill her
boy.
Let
us
to explain these puzzles. The murderers, of course, were sent
by
Macbeth,
and
the
messenger could
only have been
sent
by Lennox,
whom we
know to be in Macbeth's confidence, yet opposed to him. But why Ross? Why has he come to Macduff's castle? He offers his cousin no assistance, gives her
no
warning, tells her nothing

remains:
of
Macbeth's
sent
hostility
and
tyranny.
Only
one pos
sibility by in advance how Macduff had left his castle guarded, Macduff trusted in this
case a cousin of
Ross had to be
Macbeth, for Macbeth

and
could not someone
know
only
Lady
hers
Of course, this casts Ross in the worst tyrannt and a traitor to his relatives and friends. (Furness
out.
find
easily gain access and possible light as a tool of the

cites
could
M.F. Libby's
old
suspicions
of
Ross in Some New Notes

(per his promise)
as
on
Macbeth
[1893].) Whether
is hard to
one of them
he actually
speaks.
returned
one
of the
murderers and
impossible, since they may be masked, only But startling as this deduction is, one fact is even more startling: Mac duff had left his castle entirely unprotected! No army, no guards, no servants at
say, though not
the gates or
ers are able
door,
as shown
by
the
fact that both the
messenger and
the
murder
to enter
without
the slightest
interposition,
obstruction, or distur
bance. There is
her husband
no one else
around, so that
Lady
Macduff
hardly
exaggerates
when she pictures
her
situation as one of complete and unnatural
abandonment,
and
as a traitor explain
to his
family.
us examine
Before trying to
and
this, let
the last
scene
coupling Ross
Macduff, at the very end of Act IV. Macduff is already with Malcolm in England, and has passed the test of his loyalty to which he has been subjected
a suspicious and
by
young
man
Malcolm,
who explains
to the older but rather
simple-
minded sought
naive
that "Devlish
Macbeth
by
is
many
of
these trains hath
to win me
haste."
credulous
into his power, Suddenly Ross

Ross
and modest wisdom plucks me
from
over-
appears and
greeted
by
Macduff
as
his
"ever-gentle
cousin."
speaks of their poor
country,
Scotland, groaning in
Macduff: "How does
children?"
oppression and
suffering, and is then asked

well."
directly by
all
wife?"
my
Answer: "Why,
Question: "And
not
my
their
Answer:
peace?"
"Well, "No; they
too."
Question: "The tyrant has
batter'd
"em."
at
Answer:
were well at peace when
I did leave
Only
seem
with
this last answer does Ross
indicate
though
castle.
Macduff does
answer
or much
not
to
notice
his
earlier presence at
Macduff's
But that
has less
one or more of three possible
defects:
either
it is politically naive,
cognizant of
Mystery Play
or
329
should have it is technically true, since when he left them they had not yet been assailed; or it is only metaphorically true wickedly true since their being "well at would be consistent with their being dead, if he left them a second time as one of their murderers, or
Macbeth's intentions toward the Macduffs than Ross
been,
even as an
innocent;
peace"
immediately
afterward.
report
In any case, it seems entirely odd that Ross upon, the horrible fate of Macduff's family.
should not
know of,
and
shortly afterward, this last peculiarity is shown to be such tonishing reversal. In line 178, Ross had just spoken of Macduff's
Very
by an as family as
"well
news,
peace."
at
which
In line
201
he
prepares
Macduff for
204:
hearing
"Your
the
worst possible
your wife
he then delivers, full force, in and babes savagely slaughtered. To

murder'd
too?"
castle
is surprised;
relate this manner, were, on the

you."
quarry
asks,
of
these
deer,
to add the death of
Incredulous, Macduff
could
"My
found."
Answer: "Wife, children, servants, all that Macduff: "And I must be from thence! My wife kill'd
children
be
too?"
And
finally:
Did Heaven look on, And
would not
take their part? Sinful Macduff!
They
Fell
were all struck

own
for
thee.
Naught that I
mine.
am,
Not for their
demerits, but for
slaughter on their souls:
Heaven
rest them now!
By
this point,
we
have learned
quite a
bit
about
both Macduff
and
Ross.
First,
of
Ross knows
though he
about
the complete
extermination of
Macduff's household, down
to the last detail. He speaks as if he could even "relate the
manner
it,
is
never pressed
to do so. Since he himself
makes no claim must
to have
learned this from others, it while he was there, at

As for Macduff,
after
he left the Macduff castle, he

Ross both
have learned he
the time of the murders themselves.
notice
that he
and
confirm our suspicion that
had left
no
soldiery,
no guards since at
to defend the castle. How could this possibly

not without
happen, particularly
might
Macduff is
peace^
suspicion
that the
"tyrant"
have "batter'd
their
Only
one explanation seems
possible,
and
it may be seen in the line "Did heaven look on, and would not take their Macduff is portrayed as having trusted to heaven to defend his family
heavens"
part?"
he even now trusted, that is, to the God of Christianity, the "gentle begs to let him confront Macbeth in personal combat. That God, Macduff's lines suggest,
could
be
expected
to defend innocent people against attack, and

of
only failed to do
cause of
so not
because
sins!
his, Macduff's,
that
any sins of theirs, which were nil, but be In short, Macduff takes it to follow from his
Christian belief
who
God
permits or
harms,
or at
least
injustices, only
to those
have
sinned against
Him,
to those for
whom a sinner cares.
Nor does it
strike
him that
some question about
God's justness is
raised
by
the latter case
the
case
he takes to apply to his
own
family.
unrealistic
If
one responds
to this conjecture that it is entirely
to suppose a
330
man
Interpretation
so
like Macduff
fanatically
given to such
beliefs
as to take no
precautions
for his family, one would be correct on the level of real bility. But Shakespeare frequently makes a motive unrealistically
order to
psychological
proba
extreme
in
display it,
to
bring
it to
our
attention, even at the
risk
of a certain
unrealism.
Many
really try
Or better, he gives up a more superficial realism for a deeper one. examples can be cited to show this. In real life, would a Jew (Shylock) to cut a pound of flesh out of a Christian (Antonio)? Would a friar be fatal
potion?
likely
to give Juliet an apparently
Could
there
be
a girl so naive as
of guilt?
Miranda? Would Enobarbus, after deserting Antony, drop dead out of a sense Or, from Macbeth itself, would Lady Macbeth never have complained
to Macbeth
of
her
increasing
the superficial sense
isolation from him? Is it realistically possible, in (as Freud, taking this to be the only sense, denied it was),
changed so
for Macbeth to have
rapidly
by
premeditation,
as
he
showed with
becoming king? Still a murderer Banquo, he knowingly becomes, only a

after
with
short time
later,
a murderer
by
impulse
Macduff's
family, announcing
that "From this moment, the very firstlings of my heart shall be the firstlings of
hand."
my The
exaggeration
in Macduff's
motivation must
have
some relation to the
subject of
the play as a whole,

are
which
is the
extent to which
human life,
represents
and
the
universe,
intelligible,
reasonable,
moral.
Christianity
it
one pole
among the possible conceptions, insists

on
for,
whatever place
allows
to evil and sin, it

through love
the supremacy of good, and of good
manifested more
than through
justice, (again,
though both
must
be
combined
in the
ultimate
divine dis
and
pensation and governance.

"gentleness"
as
The primacy Christianity gives to love, in Macduff's appeal to "gentle heaven"), is
thus to
an element
excessive
closer
to the feminine than the masculine;
it
results
in
excessive
trust,
confidence sure evil.

we
that a good God will come to our rescue, so that

are stronger
we need not make
ourselves
than,
and
smarter
than,
the human forces of
This
problem
before the duff later
murders.
is explicitly brought to our attention in Macduff's castle just Lady Macduff is talking to her cousin Ross, whom Mac
cousin,"
addresses as
a
"my
ever-gentle
but
who
we now
know
that
intends, in but
her husband has
ple
moment, to have her
murdered.
She
complains
bitterly
Her
acted
unnaturally in
leaving
of
his
family
unprotected.
exam pro
is that
of
the mother wren, most diminutive of
birds,
that will
fight to
tect her young against attack.
Ross,
as
course, tells her to have
confidence
in
her husband's judgment Ross
just
his
actions are about
to confirm hers. After

and
leaves,
a conversation occurs
between
Lady
about
Macduff
that
her
small
son,
in
which she
talks
as
if his father is dead
and asks
how he
will survive.
He
says, like the birds she has just been
talking
for
own,
by
nature.
But
what about the traps men
is, by foraging on his have laid for birds, she asks. He

birds but
she
responds that such traps are

rich
laid
"poor"
not
(by implication) for

is that
ones, and he has become
a poor
bird. What
means, of course,
children cannot
Mystery Play
themselves,
331
generally, and
take care of
nor can good people
he tack,
for
naively
since
thinks that only the wealthy must protect themselves against at
the poor offer no temptation to would-be attackers.
Asked
a
what
he
will
do for
father,
the son asks, in
turn,
what she will
do
husband. Her
then equally
joking
reply that she can
could
life,
and
which
them) tells us is founded, necessarily, on ties far

sell
buy twenty (and his, that she something about the inner core of human
stronger
root of
than those of
commer
cial advantage and exchange.
The family, the
loyalty,
will
on mutual
devotion
and protection.
society, is based on love Otherwise it cannot last, chil

all
dren
will
receive
neither proper
nurture, nourishment, or protection, and
fall
asunder.
To
strengthen this
them
by
a moral sense
they
themselves
loyalty, heighten,
can of
men
take vows, and are held to
supported
by
the
most
drastic
trai
sanctions.
This is why
Lady
Macduff
tell her son that
his father
was a
tor,
one who swore and not to
lied. She is thinking
his
loyalty
to her and the chil
dren,
rant.
Macbeth,
must
of whose relations
to Macduff she seems entirely igno the
A traitor
be
hung
though,
men
as
boy
shrewdly reports, this
will
require
that there
be
more
poor
honest
than wicked ones. And when she says,
"Now God
monkey!"
help
thee,
a
we realize that their

no reference
discussion
of
human
affairs, up to that point, had included

an of
to
and shown no need
for,
almightly Being,
God
or gods.
But the inherent instability,

to to
and
insecurity,
the belief
human
affairs seems
as
her
prayerful remark shows
require
in
some supreme and stable power
that can
be
appealed
when all else
fails,
that can strengthen the dedication of human society itself to

and
institutions.
Society
but
requires
religion
and
its necessary bonds Christianity seems to be the

too dependent on
main example
here
religion can also make men
God,
and
insufficiently
asks
dependent
on themselves.
After the
Macduff
corrects a
mysterious messenger comes she should
in to
warn
her
of grave
danger, Lady
fly why herself by acknowledging what "this earthly distinction between it and the afterworld. It was a
she
if
has done
no
harm,
and
immediately
she
world"
is like, suggesting
defence,"
"womanly
harm,
folly."
says, to have thought that because she has done no
she would not
be
harmed.
No,
this earthly
world
laudable,
and
to do
good sometime
like that, for here "to do harm is often In a moment, she accounted dangerous
is
not
her
son will
which
be it
subjected
to the most blameable harm of murder

most proper,
most
to deter
or repel
would
have been
laudable to harm the
would-be attackers.
Similarly,
to do good to enemies is not only accounted but
is
most
dangerous
under
folly
Lady
Macduff does
not speak
strongly
enough.
She
too
remains
the influence of her Christian upbringing, which asks that

that all men
political
evil not
be
resisted and
knowledge the band is in "no
crucial
be loved, thus making it hard for her to ac distinction between friends and enemies, the
accounts
former to be benefited, him. This is the
the latter harmed. This
for her
hoping
when
her hus
place so
that murderers such as these could
find
same thought
Macduff himself
must
have had
he left his
332
Interpretation
unprotected,
family
course
thinking it
which
a place
sanctified
by
their innocence.
But
of
there is no place
murderers
by
any
sanctification whatsoever could
keep
men
like the
The but
scene's end shows not
from committing their crimes. only the immoral strong slaying

Like
the
moral
weak,
gives us another view of the problem of treason.
Lady
Macduff be
mind
fore,
the murderers accuse Macduff of treason.
She,
of course,
had in
his
apparent
disloyalty
to his
family, but
is
the murderers his
supposed
(by
as
them) dis
the
loyalty
laws,
most
to
Macbeth.
Disloyalty
sometimes or
merited,
however,
latter
moral
case shows: which
it may be necessary to averting,
expelling,
great evil.
The
and which are stated society necessarily thinks of as absolute must bow to a larger under aboslutely, if unpolitically, by Christianity
standing of justice, looking to the real benefits ited loyalty of Macduff's son is necessary, but
tion
and moral
and not
harms
of society.
The
spir
enough; his
mother's affec
demands
are
necessary, but not enough: both must be directed

good.
by
suppressing the wicked and advancing the as he is, represents such a widsom. play, Malcolm, young
a wisdom capable of
In this
ROSS
gives the impression of being an extremely moral in which two play play murdering usurpers at first succeed but ultimately, and by some kind of cosmic necessity (or so its appears) come to horrible ends, the one killing herself, the other meeting a violent death in battle, with both ut
By
its outcome, Macbeth

a
terly
stand
miserable
in the final
play?
period of their come to
lives.
Why
then Ross? What

what
does he his
of
for in this
Having
know Ross for
he is in the two last

and reexamine
acts,
we are anxious
to return to the earlier parts of the play

perhaps
entire career.
This Ross is
and never,
the
most
successful
scoundrel
in
all
Shakespeare,
wards of the
from
beginning
to end, does he suffer

at the
misfortune or
defeat. Not only is he

earldom !
never
discovered:
very
end
he
even reaps the re
thanes who opposed the tyrant,
being
elevated, with
them, to
an
Let in the
gle
us see whether play.
Shakespeare
would
Ross'
If he did not,
men
any sign of he be Shakespeare? But difficult to Ross
provides
true colors early
we must
look
with ea
eyes, for
like Ross
are most
penetrate.
a
After all, he is, to

powers of
simple eyes
like
Macduff's,
"ever-gentle"
the
tribute to his
deception. When he first
Forres, in Act I, scene 2, Duncan does not recognize him, but Malcolm does. Ross and Angus seem to have just ridden up, and Duncan asks him from where, again not knowing. It is at this point
arrives at
that Ross tells about the battle at
Fife
battle
editors often place

bridegroom"
Macbeth
at
both because Ross
names no one
but "Bellona's We have
as
its hero
and
because they have

uses this rhetorical
not consulted a map.
conjectured earlier
that Ross
per-
invention to
keep
from naming Macduff
the
logical
son
Mystery Play
we
333
why.
to be
fighting
at
Fife
but
do
not
know
a
He certainly has
scene
not
no
hesi it is
tation to go to greet
Macbeth, coming from
battle
see
too far from
Forres, as the new thane of Cawdor. He says, "I'll done, Angus is there again accompanying Ross.
The He
words
it
done,"
but
when
Ross first king's
addresses
"reading"
to
of
Macbeth,
when
they
meet, are
success
peculiar.
mentions the
Macbeth's
personal
in the fight
against
the rebels, and
finding
hail
him
responsible
wegians.
"As thick
post"
as
came post after
for many deaths among the Nor praising Macbeth's defense of

was not
Duncan's kingdom
but this is queer, for Ross
in the
with
scene when
the
bleeding
ward.
sergeant
spoke, since he seems to have entered
Angus just
after
Yet he
never mentions the
sergeant, speaks
of
as
if only
written messages
appeared, and exaggerates the number
them ("post after post"). This
leads
us
to think that Ross may have at least overheard the

not wish to mention
messengers.
it,
and then
flatters Macbeth
bleeding sergeant but does by overstating the number of

beginning,
his
wanted
In that case,
and
perhaps no
Ross, from
to
see of
the
to
see
Macbeth elevated,
elevated.
had
wish
Macduff
and
own
on
cousin
This inclination (his itself

not at the
tion)
even shows
flattery beginning
he
Macbeth,
Ross'
his playing
his
ambi
of should
speech to
Macbeth,
where
he
says the
king
did
know
whether
be praising Macbeth
or
himself
(as the
one
Macbeth serves)
a subtle
but bound to have
something the king certainly never expressed, effect on Macbeth. And the same tendency shows
when
itself in
dor.
Ross'
last
words on that occasion,
he
says that call
"for
an earnest
of a greater
. .
honour, he [the king] bade

This
"earnest"
me, from
him,
thee thane of Caw
meant
to play
upon
is certainly a bald invention by Ross, the opposite of Macbeth's ambition, and flatter
or promise
Angus'
intention,
It is king's his
which was
to reduce, rather than to add to, the king's
words.
interesting
that when
Macbeth, Banquo, Ross,

speaks
and
Angus
enter
the
presence
together, the Ross
king
to both Macbeth and

we
Banquo,
makes says
crucial announcement about at all to

and
Malcolm (as
who
have already seen), but

there
next
without a word.
Ross'
nothing
shall
Angus,
of
simply
stand
We
see
the importance
this in a
moment.
The
time
name
is
mentioned, he is simply
numbered
among those nobles who accompany the

after
king
want
into Macbeth's castle,

to
undo.
and
the time
that
is
one some overbold editors

chamber was
Here is
why.
We
must realize
that the king's

and
in
had ap adjoining rooms, staircase. When Macduff and Lennox come in from a mounting by the annex early in the morning, Macduff is shown to the king's chamber by Macbeth, who must then be presumed to return to the central area at the foot of
hall
of the castle that
several
that was probably
proached
the
staircase
(off
of which,
incidentally,
the
must
be his
of
own
bedroom). When
Macduff
the floor
comes
out,
he
must run at
least to the head

murder.
the staircase, if not to

and
below,
and
and shout out about
Macbeth
Lennox then
go
running up
Macbeth kills the guards, but,

come
according to the stage direction

our old
in the folio, they
down
with
one other person
friend Ross.
334 Ross
Interpretation
nothing, and, throughout the excitement,
still says nothing.
serve?
says
Rub him
could
out, say
some editors and critics: what purpose

and
does he
How
he
ex
appear out of nowhere
then say nothing? In the Arden
edition
he is
punged,
without a word of explanation.
We
with
can turn this apparent chaos of
into
an
intelligible
pattern
by thinking along
him. In the two
stage
Shakespeare, instead
too), he
presuming
ourselves superior to
previous scenes where
Ross
was present
(because
named
in the
directions
there
also said nothing.
Here he
surprises us
we
even more than
his
silence.
Looking
ahead,
by his very appearance know that in the next scene he
has
quite a
Macduff's
absent
bit to say, telling Macduff he will follow Macbeth to Scone, despite veiled warning. But he lets us infer that he had been mysteriously
castle when the
upon
from the
discussion
as
of
Duncan's
murder
took place and the castle,
the
other after
thanes decided the
Macbeth
his
successor.
Now, in
just
discovery
of
the murder, he does not go up with Macbeth and
Lennox, but he does

rooms
come
down
with
them. What does this
suggest?
In the
in the hall before the king's,

was a second chamber
there
had already been rather curiously told Macbeth had to pass on his way to, and back
we
from,
the
that in it were Donalbain and someone else
king's. We learn from the queen, responding to Macbeth's inquiry, the second person is not named Editors
who suppose that
by
the queen.
Malcolm
and
Donalbain
were
lodged
together, since they are shown together after the clamor, ask why Lady Mac beth mentions only Donalbain (Arden edition, p. 53, note 25). But let us as
sume she room
a
knew
what she was saying.
This
means
Malcolm
was
in
still another
third chamber, probably beyond the
king's,
either
alone, or, like his

and
brother,
with someone else.
In
one of
those
chambers was
probably Angus,
in the other, Ross. Given the

attention
Donalbain
and
his
unnamed
partner get
from Shake
speare, through Macbeth's narration,
likely
have to say that Ross is more to have been Donalbain's than Malcolm's chambermate. Why such ap
we would
parently irrelevant details, as telling us what Macbeth heard outside the door of the second chamber? It is, I suspect, to cause us to put two things together: the
problem
Malcolm
posed
for Macbeth (without his

we
wife's
knowing it),
and
the
character of comes as
have begun to suspect, and which later on be Ross, clear as Shakespeare can allow in such a case. Macbeth understood
which
that the Prince of Cumberland would

yet
inherit
the title
from his
murdered
father,
he
could not
dispose
of
Malcolm the
a
same night without
away.
What he
could
do is begin
relationship
so
that at some
giving himself point would lead

associate
to Malcolm's undoing, and

with
Ross, already
useful, might be glad to
the young men,
rect, and because of

set.
preferring Donalbain, perhaps, because it seemed less di his youth, but really with Malcolm in mind from the out
to speculate which of the two men
would not
an
It is then
interesting
Macbeth heard
of
was
Ross
Donalbain. In any case, Ross intended murder he was hardly enough of

and which
be told
Duncan's
and
intimate for that
so,
when
Mystery Play
-335
the clamor broke out, might be expected to

was
bolt,
as a person whose sense
of self-interest
stairs with
peculiarly keen. That is why he Macbeth and Lennox!

absent
comes
flying
down the
Why
did Ross
Macbeth's fate
was
decided? He
himself from the ensuing meeting of thanes by which could not know in advance, for sure, how that
after all, the possibility that suspicion would be directed at meeting would go Macbeth himself could hardly be ruled out. Nor could he be sure just how he
himself
by others that is, whether the group headed his by recently having favored Macbeth over his own cousin. As it turns out, he need not have feared. In response to his inquiry, Macduff tells him that Macbeth has already left for Scone but Ross, some
was
perceived, just then,

would sense
Macduff
up to the point of decision, and outside the castle, might already have observed Macbeth's departure himself. And if anyone doubts ca
what nervous
Ross'
pacity as a most thoroughgoing liar and deceiver, let him look at the cruel way he talks to the superstitious old man in that very scene. First he assures the old
man of
that
Duncan's horses broke

soon
out of their stalls
that night,
murder.
an apparent omen
the
disobedience
to be demonstrated in the
Then, hearing
the
no report, from hearsay, that those horses ate each other, Ross saying: extends his lie quite a bit doubt enjoying himself immensely further, old man
"They
soon
did so, to th'amazement

Ross'
of mine eyes that
look'd
upon't."
After this,
no
word of
should
be
viewed without suspicion more
by
the reader, and, as we
learn,
there is much
word
to
be
suspicious of.
True to his
seen at the
to Macduff,- Ross
follows Macbeth
in his
palace
to
Scone,
and
and
is
next af
banquet Macbeth has

murder some
prepared
for Banquo,
just
ter
Banquo's
distance from the
palace.
Throughout that banquet

courtier, almost
always
scene, Ross
shows
himself to be
a most serviceable
saying just the sort of thing Macbeth would want him to (a possible exception is his asking about the strange sights Macbeth reports seeing). But by that point
another
flagrant mystery has been waved before us, like a is the identity of the Third Murderer. Without going into
shown
bloody flag,
all
and
that
the
details, Mac
beth has been
directly talking
as well.
to two men, convincing them to murder

will advise
Banquo,
stay
and
and
Fleance
He tells them he
them of where to
at
the exact time for the deed. This he actually
does,
least in part,
and who so much
through the Third

comes
Murderer,
of
with whom
he is
never shown
talking,
independently
about
the
other
two to the scene of the crime.

murderers are
Why
mystery
of the
this
man?
The first two
from
some
other part
chosen because Macbeth country than the palace area, and have been rather than profit. as a revenge of the motive, trust in greater placed reliability
These
men
think
was
they have been
wronged
by Macbeth,
but he
persuades who
them
that Banquo
responsible, not himself. It
is the Third Murderer

of visitors, such as
knows
his way
one of
way.
around
the palace and knows the their horses a mile
habits
the strange
leaving
from the
palace and
walking the rest of the
He
must also make sure
Fleance does
not escape.
As it turns out,
all
three
336
set on
Interpretation
"slave"
Banquo,
whose
denunciation
not
of one of them as a
suggests
that
he
was
known to him. Perhaps
unintentionally, the First Murderer puts out

unpursued.
the torch
Fleance
was
carrying, allowing his escape into the night,

suspected of
Even Macbeth has been been the

than one, the foremost
being
the Third Murderer,

will not
so great
has
urge to solve this mystery.
But Macbeth
do for
more reasons
being
other
that he seems spontaneously surprised at
hearing
the First Murderer's report about what

with
happened, particularly in
possible and
connection
Fleance. On the
arranged
hand, it is entirely
reports was able to
that Macbeth would the Third Mur
have derer
for independent
from both the First
and that the
Third Murderer
before the First,
who
knew little
when
of the area.
find his way back to the palace This might account for a certain have told him the
jocular quality in Macbeth

mor also suggests that the
the banquet scene opens, though his good hu

could not
Third Murderer
whole
truth, that he
one of
reported was
Banquo's death, but in

pursuit of
perhaps said of
also
Fleance only that
the others
him. It is
possible,
however,
that the
Third Murderer did

not
not get a chance
to report to
Macbeth,
or perhaps preferred
to,
knowing
that Fleance had
escaped.
Macbeth's
good spirits at the
ban
case,
quet could
have been based
on expectation rather than report. aptitude
In
either
Ross
might well
have been the Third Murderer. His

when
for
such conceal
ment we
learn shortly afterward,
he
visits
the Macduff
castle
for hidden
and murderous reasons.
Whether,
the
or what,
he
reported
to Macbeth before the
banquet We
and
before the First Murderer

role
reports
is
much
less
certain.
need
nor
not recapitulate
Ross
must
have
played
in the Macduff
murders,
again
the deft but striking change in his story about that

shows
tragedy
204,
when,
mysteriously, he
up in England. Let
178 and
us
try
to
explain
the reason
where
for that change, between lines

Ross had first denied,
193, growing to
what
a climax at
and then
admitted,
in fact happened to Macduff's
family. To begin with, why is he in England at all? His reason is given in line 186: "now is the time of help; your eye in Scotland would create soldiers,
make our women
fight,
to doff their dire
distresses."
But
we must realize that

come
by
"your
eye"
Ross
means
Macduff's eye,
not
Malcolm's: Ross has
to
win
Macduff's
return.
Why? So that Macbeth
can
kill him. Ross thus turns

might
out
to be precisely the kind of person Malcolm

someone sent
feared Macduff
be,
that
is,
by
Macbeth to trick him into

can
returning.
Why
Macbeth took
such
interest in Macduff
the only
easily be
guessed:
Macduff
must
was a potent
soldier, and
living
person against whom

conversation
the witches had warned him.
At this point, the

expected
as
Ross
have
viewed
it
takes
an un
turn, for Malcolm,
not
Macduff,
responds:
"Be't their
comfort we're
coming thither. Gracious England hath lent us good Siward and ten thousand men; and older and a better soldier none that Christendom gives And in the very next lines, Ross begins his shift. Having just learned that he will not
out."
be
able
to separate Macduff
with
Scotland
very
powerful
from Malcolm, and that both are English army, it is "Goodbye
about to
invade
Macbeth, hello
Malcolm!"
Mystery Play
337
Ross'
From this
point
onward, in the course of the last act,
history
blue,
re
is
all
told in stage directions. Scene 4 shows that he is absent
from Malcolm's
the
invading
alongside
army, but in the final
scene
(scene 8) he
appears out of
Malcolm along
with
and
Old Siward,
flattering
of
the
latter
and
his son,
ceiving
classified
the other thanes
the title of earl, and
avoiding
being
queen"
among the "cruel ministers in short, apparently crowned in the
this dead butcher and his fiend-like
with success.
Ross is the
to remain
consummate opportunist, always

shadow of great men, and
looking
out
for himself,
content
service, willing to
good at
completely do anything, however foul, that they
unscrupulous require of
in their
yet so
him,
the
appearing otherwise, and
deceiving
everybody, that he is never de

nature or world at
tected and never punished. Whatever the
forces in human
are working for justice, they are not into existence, and even the flourishing, coming tice in them. Ross is also important because he
large that
so powerful as
to prevent the
of men without a speck of
jus
makes us even more aware of
the hidden motive, the secret action in human affairs,
linking
together and
These events, stretching from the would have to be considered unin end of the to the play, very very beginning telligible mysteries were it not for the clues, carefully left by Shakespeare,
making intelligible
a whole series of events.
pointing to Ross is not

an essential never
a solution a mere
in the
character and or of
deeds
of
Ross. Thus understood, interest in the play, but

affairs
superfluity,
merely
marginal
element, staking
either
out one pole of evil

political practitioners
in human
that must
be forgotten,
by
statesmen placed on
or moral and
political
philosophers.
As for the judgment to be have to

consider not
this apparently
happy
which
scoundrel,
we would
so manifest
in the play, but the

was
state of
his
soul
only the evil done to others, in itself, the full deformity of

reader's
surmise.
Shakespeare
compelled
to leave to the
Alone,
without
friends, caring for

never at
no
one, willing to kill anyone,

and
never of
in
open com
mand of
events, completely dependent on the rise ease, exulting only in the

man
fall
the great, always

machinations
calculating,
success of
his
here is
not
a whole
but
a narrow part of a man, and
worked
to a peak of
efficiency
within
that
narrow
range,
sacrificing
all else to
it.
THE FATE OF THE MACBETHS
The
central
focus
of
the play is on Macbeth and his

state of soul
wife
not
only
on their
words and actions, but on the
from
which
these
emanate.
Of
all
the
mysteries
beginning stated by Freud:

can
in the play, the chief, by far, develop into what it becomes

their
conditions seem
is how their internal
condition at
the
by
the
end.
The
paradox was well
to
interchange,
and
with
had been, coming much more like what Macbeth he more like what she had been: "She becomes all remorse,
Macbeth
Lady Macbeth be becoming much

defiance."
all
338
Interpretation
not regard such a transformation as
Freud does
psychologically impossible in
compressed motives
itself, but he does

gested there.
think it impossible
within
the very
time
frame
of
the play (one week, he says),
and on
the basis of the
For
psychological plausibility,
Freud
prefers
explicitly sug the historical account
in Holinshed,
and
where
Macbeth,
after
his usurpation,
rules
justly for
as
ten years,
only then begins the murders of Banquo and others.
That chronology
the childless con
would
be
of
consistent with
Macbeth's
increasing
desperation
dition
his
marriage persists.
Freud is
about
mistaken about the actual time

which
frame
of
the play, but he is correct

with actions pp.
its felt duration,
swiftly succeeding for a time analysis lapsed causality

of mind of
each other
exceedingly short, certainly to end (see Furness, from beginning

its
complications). would
seems
504-07
states
and some of
In
either
case, his
charge of
against
Shakespeare
be devastating, because the

at the center of
the Shakespeare's at obviously tention, and the general problem of the intelligibility of human affairs so partic ularly important in this play. A gap or void in causal explanation would, in
protagonists are so
fact, be fatal, despite

Lincoln's
coln's all praise:
the
play's
dramatic
equals
effectiveness.
But let
us remember
"I think nothing

search
Macbeth. It is
wonderful."
Given Lin
inclination to
the connections
deeply for causes, he must have found in the play necessary to explaining its outcome. Let us see.
the crown
Both Macbeths
want
badly,
is the
and
immediately
think of murder as
once
the means of getting it.
Clearly
this
case with
Macbeth
he
receives
his
prediction
from the witches,
and with
his
wife once she receives word of
it
by
letter from him. In fact, it

action of the not she
fore the
enterprise,"
seems they had spoken of assassination even be and that he had then been the author of "this begins, play 48). 7: (I, Clearly also their present views of the en
47-
terprise are sharply divergent. She is absolutely determined to do everything

quired other
re
for the purpose, tarrying for fear it

and
no moral or religious compunctions.
On the is im
130-
hand,
the thought of murdering Duncan makes Macbeth's very soul trem
ble
with
foreboding. While his

would risk
conscience tells
him that the

7:
1-
act
moral and
irreligious, he
not
the life to come
(I,
28;
I,
3:
42)
were
for the
likely
the
consequences of under such
the assassination here on

would make
earth.
To kill
such a
king
as
Duncan,
circumstances,
Mac
beth himself hated Until that both to

point
and
likely
victim of a second assassination.
keep
from
We
Macbeth had evidently not considered concocting a plan known as the murderer and to lay the guilt on becoming
can also see
someone else.
from his
great
"If it
were
as
done
speech
that he partly
conceals
direct
moral
considerations,
such, from himself
by
trying
merely prudential: thus all he says about being Duncan's kinsman, subject, host (he omits beneficiary here), and about Dun can's virtues is taken up under this head. Yet, Macbeth does seem to be "too kindness," full of the milk of human as Lady Macbeth had told herself earlier.
These decent
moral
to think of them as
sentiments,
and
his
wish
to enjoy the
"golden
opinions"
coming from his
succumb
Mystery Play
339
recent accomplishments and
honors, do
not
win
out.
They
at
to a combination of his own
ambition,
"vaulting
accusations of
Lady
Macbeth's
tack on
his
a
manliness of
(through
relentless
cowardice), and her
suggesting
made
way ready to do
pinning guilt for the murder on others (the guards). He is what both religion and reason tell him is deeply wrong by her
profound element of
appeal
to ambition, pursued with courage, as the most
his
nature as a man.
straint on
No longer
fearing
and of
detection
or
immoral conduct,
would
the process of
failure, they lose the last re murder begins (I, 7: 30-82).

even
Yet it
out conscience. of conscience
be wrong to think Someone wholly

of
Lady Macbeth,
then,
as
without conscience would not
wholly with have to think utterly

and
the "compunctious visitings of nature";
someone
lacking
for the
deed
in the
milk
gentleness of
her
sex would not
have to
gall;
ask to
be
"unsexed,"
in her breasts to be
replaced
by
someone unashamed of
her
be willing to look upon it herself, and would not ask that it be hid den in night, darkened further by the smoke of hell, so that her "keen knife will
would
not see
the wound it
makes,"
nor
heaven be
able
to see the act and

strewn
call a
stop
to it. This impression is strengthened
Shakespeare. Watched
whole murder should
with
care,
by Lady Macbeth
small
facts
along the way
by
is first
shown
be left to her, then that the two
of
saying that the them will do it, and
finally arranging for Macbeth to do it alone, with only auxiliary help from her. As further extensions of the same pattern, we learn that she had to strengthen
herself
with some of
the same
wine she gave
the guards, and that she would to prepare the daggers
have killed Duncan herself beth "had he

coldness
when she went
not resembled
my father
after
as
up he
for Mac
slept."
So
all of
Lady
Macbeth's
before
and
immediately
of
the murder, her

another
pedestrian
literalness,
in her in the
her
apparent
firmness
purpose,
the
hide
kind
of element
gentler, weaker,
afterlife.
of a
conscious that
murder
is
horrible deed,
believing
Viewed in this light, her swooning at Macbeth's improvised slaying the guards is much more likely to have been involuntary than deliberate. For
moment, after all the
keyed-up
effort and
plan
they had
concerted would come
tension, it looked like the whole crashing down. The swoon, rather than a
of
sign of rational
strength, is a
and suicide what made
small
indication pointing in the direction

53;
her
later sleepwalking We are not told
(1,
5:
I,
7:
69; II,
so
2:
1,
13-14).
we
Lady
of
Macbeth
ambitious, but
do
get some
idea
of what she and

theme"
Macbeth looked forward to. Macbeth thinks
about
"the
imperial
when
he thinks
the
kingship; his letter to his

"greatness"
wife calls promised
her
"his dearest
partner
in
greatness,"
and speaks of the
her
by
witches'
the
prophecy,
even
though it can only
be indirectly,
since
her
name
was never mentioned.
As
she sees
it,
the murder that night "shall to all our
masterd
nights and
days to
come give
Lady
do
so
Macbeth
persuades
solely sovereign sway and Macbeth to surrender his compunctions,
When
she
does
not
by magnifying his vision of what ruling would bring, but by castigating which she simply takes for his inconsistency, his weakness in wanting it
340
granted
Interpretation
yet not
being
willing to do
about
what
is necessary to
get
it.
Along
the
way,
they say nothing

hope
their children
though there
you not given
are other allusions your children shall
to
children.
.
enjoying the succession, even Macbeth has asked Banquo, "Do

?"
be kings
Lady
Macbeth says, "I have

me"
suck, and know how tender life 'tis to love the babe that
milks
(an forth
other sign she

men-children
is
gentler
than she makes out). Macbeth tells her to

children
"Bring
only."
But if any
have already
come
from this union, discussed both Macbeths
they have
not
survived, and others are not consciously anticipated or
by
these peculiar would-be parents. The ambition motivating
therefore seems primarily

scope.
for themselves,
and queen
They
want
to be
king
very moderate, even ordinary, in the way Duncan and his predeces
and of
have been, want the power and the honor (not any increase in wealth), but that is all. They have no want to be the commanding force at the top plans for conquest, or for domestic political changes; they have no past injus
sors
tices
or even slights
to avenge.
murders:
They certainly do
on shoes and rule
not anticipate
being
involved
in
a series of
will
they
grizzly simply step into Duncan's See

also
the contrary, their
notion seems
to be that
so 7:
in
a most
ordinary way
3:
weak
are
their powers of understanding and foresight
(I,
86, 117; I,
54-55,
73-75-
V,
2: 22-28).
We have
but
a
no reason
to believe Macbeth and

certain
Lady
loving
couple, and, despite
appearances,
Macbeth to be anything even to the end. The
puzzle,
however, is
unlike
to explain their
mutual attraction.
Coriolanus
was also an
outstanding soldier,
was
also a spirited and ambitious man,
but his wife, Virgilia,

meant
utterly
Lady
Macbeth. She
was
the
soul of
gentleness, and
to
be
quite
life,
different, in this respect, from the only other woman in his mother Volumnia. Macbeth's marriage would be comparable to Cor
Coriolanus'
iolanus'
weakness must
choosing a mate modelled on his mother. This suggests a peculiar in Macbeth, who too readily thinks of greatness as something that equally with his wife, perhaps because she possesses some ele in him. He may think of her as more realistic, of greater resolve,
steadier.
be
shared
ment
more
lacking
daring,
he
rule
what
the
He certainly does not regard her virtues: on the contrary, he feminine typically
the manly virtues
as
bringing
to political
more of
senses
in her
considers manliness
with
than he
possesses.
This
co
incides
he
her
conception of
herself,
to
elements, only
admires
thereby enabling him

strength
necessary to suppressing his weaker realize his potential for greatness. What
as
in her is
in
areas
where
he is weak,
and vice
versa:
he
could not rise
to the heights
without
her,
nor she without
him.
ambitious
We
can
only
speculate whether
cause of not
having
children,
was
or whether not
Lady Macbeth became lividly having children

symbolic of) a
be
children who
survived and grew
up
due to (or
was
rather
already there, and that would than a father and a mother.
masculinity in her that have given any children of hers two fathers, Coriolanus and Virgilia have a small son. In
years, the
Macbeth, Banquo has
a son of some
Macduffs
a small son and other
children as
Mystery Play
older
341
Macbeths'
well, and Duncan two
boys. The
lack
of
issue is
therefore their
accidental. Whatever its cause, it certainly helps to explain for subsequent acts of inhumanity. Duncan reminded Lady Mac capacity beth of her father, which made it impossible to kill him. And, as Macduff later
exclaims upon
far from
learning
to
the
fate
of
his family: "He has

means
children
no
which, if
it is
a reference
Macbeth, probably
none
that Macbeth was able to kill mere

3: 216).
children
only because he had
himself (IV,
own,
Being
a child tended
by
parents, and
tending
children of one's conscience.
seem
to
strengthen
the
sense of por
moral
limits
or
the natural
without
In further
support of
this, Ross is
trayed as
utterly
family
without or
father,
mother, wife, children.
And
the witches,
possess
also without progenitors
progeny,
have
what
moral
feelings
they only because they are, or regard themselves as, sisters. While the Macbeths are very close prior to perhaps too close
mur
dering Duncan,
queen.
their paths
immediately
are all on
of
start to
diverge
once none
they
are
king
and
Macbeth's thoughts
fear,"
Banquo: "There's
of
but he
whose
be
ing
ecy.
I do
both because
his
nature" witches
"royalty
and
the
and
proph
That prophecy left Macbeth only "a barren his murder of Duncan, his sacrifice of "mine eternal
issue."
sceptre"
therefore made
jewel"
his
soul
serve
only "Banquo's two men he has

conduct at
After this
reflection
Macbeth
and
consults and
incites the
chosen
for murdering Banquo

the prophecy
Fleance. No longer is his

mur
least
consonant with the
prophecies, as in the case of Duncan's
der: he
now
tries to
defy
for Banquo her
possible.
All this is done secretly,

not
and without
by making its fruition im any prior discussion with Lady

the prophecies originally,
Macbeth. He had
been frank
ones
with
about
narrating
only the
favorable
applying
he
to him (and hence to to them
her)
while run.
withholding Banquo's, Tempted by the favorable

come
which
was
unfavorable
in the longer
good prospect,
might
have thought he
the
could over and
the unfavorable evil one.
He
would
grasp
former first,
from his
worry
about the
latter
afterward.
Here
we see
him
doing
just that. But his

an
separation
wife
involves
simply planning physically less available to her, compelling her practically

ment
more than
important
operation
without
her: he becomes
to make an appoint
to speak with him.
Already, by
this separation,
still about
and
his giving himself (as
she thinks) to fearful solitude, worrying begins to sense the happiness they both
the
murder of within
Duncan,
she
thought easily
their
grasp slip
ping
away:
Nought's had, Where 'Tis Than

are
all's spent. got without content.

which we
desire is be that
safer to
destroy
by
destruction dwell in doubtful
joy (III,
2: 4-8).
Her ensuing interview with Macbeth reads queerly. He speaks as if they are still in danger, as if they cannot eat without fear or sleep without "terrible
342
Interpretation
as
dreams,"
if he is
preoccupied not with
Banquo's
and as
murder
but
with
those who
of
might
be conspiring
and
against the throne
now,
if the
whole
frame
things
in this
these
the
other
fears.
Nothing
life may he says,
need of
to be
"disjointed"
in
order strike
to
free them from

as
course,
could
possibly
against
Lady Macbeth
being
and
directed
against
Banquo. No
names are named
he
must speak
vaguely
and
if anything his Donalbain.
remarks seem
directed
Duncan's sons, Malcolm
She tells him to be "bright her to

"eminence"
and
jovial among
tongue to
your guests
tonight"; he tells
then seems to re
give
with eye and
Banquo,
disguise
not
and
turn to the theme of their needing to

safety.
flatter
and
out of a
fear for their
comprehending the drift of his remarks. Then: "O, full of scorpions is my mind, dear but the scorpions are horrible things that might kill others as well as fill Macbeth him
must
"You
leave
this,"
she
says, probably
wife!"
self with
loathing
and
fear. His addition, "Thou know'st that Banquo

struck
and
his
re
Fleance
lives,"
must
have
Lady
Macbeth
as quite
irrelevant,
be
and
her
ply, "But in them
eterne,"
nature's copy's not
should not
read as
extending
per
to Macbeth a license to have them killed

a
certainly
not now.
Impressed,
haps, by strong note of concern in his voice, she may have wished to calm him, as if to say: "If ever they become worrisome to us, we know that they are not immortal, that things can happen to Macbeth's rejoinder that
them."
assailable"
"they
are
might
have
comforted
words start
to
become the poetry funereal but
of
him but certainly not her. His death, and at her inquiry, "What's to be
done?", he
tells her to be "innocent of the
knowledge, dearest
to
chuck,"
and con
tinues to talk with
poetic expectation. prior
The last times

her
plight
we see
Lady Macbeth,
just
after place
hearing
about and
then seeing
in Act V,
ghost
are at and
the banquet scene. Macbeth's vision of

such vision
Banquo's
sitting in his
is the last
he
will
have. The
quietly enough, with Macbeth apparently in a good mood because he expected good news about Banquo and Fleance, and per probably haps also because he thought he had received some sign of acquiescence from
scene starts off
the queen. The First Murderer
reports:
Banquo is dead, Fleance
escaped.
Sud
denly, he
stricken:
Banquo sitting in his seat and is completely unnerved and terrorthe murdered no longer stay put, as they had both before and after
sees
were
human laws
instituted to
visions
protect
the common good.
Lady Macbeth,
of
course, thinks his man,

which
he
says
cowardly and womanly. She tells him to act like a he would do in the face of any natural challenge from
guests
beast
or man.
After his The
leave, he
on
shows what
deeply
worries
him
that
of se
the universe is so made that it reveals, one way or another, the

cret murderers. universe
identity
more
is
the side of the
just! All the
startling,
then, Macbeth's
next
just
scared
the
living
thought, which concerns Macduff. Banquo's ghost has daylights out of him, but his mind moves, some spon
by
taneous inner
force,
to the
next possible source of opposition.

sisters"
He
will send
for
we
Macduff
and visit
the "weird
to learn
what, he does
not say.
As
can now
Mystery Play
will
343 any
evils will occur to
guess,
and
later discover, it is
whether
him
the
(that is, whether, prophecy

own
unlike
Duncan, he
sons still
die
a natural
will
death),
and whether
about
Banquo's
holds. He
murder,
soul).
good,"
including
be
murder after
so
do anything now "for mine steeped in blood is he already

mind
(he does
will
not mention again
his lost he
He has in
"strange He
things"
that
expects
acted upon without

"self-abuse"
delay,
without even
being
"scann'd."
his
not
strange
to cease as
says
grows and
inured to the
doing
of evil.
with
This,
the
sleep
Lady
Macbeth
he lacks
needs, will do away
his
visions
(III,
she
4: 128-44).
Lady
is
Macbeth
wants
seems
utterly
unaware of
their need to protect themselves;
simply
to
relax and
gripped
by
excessive
enjoy insecurity.
sovereignty.
Macbeth,
with
on
the other
hand,
seems
Having
He
killed his away
own
king, he deeds,
deeply
in the
this
all
convinced afterlife
that
murderers
cannot get
their
not
only
but in this life
as well.
now engages
in
a struggle against
moral power of
the universe, refusing to bow to
he thinks
might oppose
him. His very
courage
striking out against leads him to rashness and beneficence
it,
and
cruelty, whereas less impulsiveness and greater understanding of the world

would
have
made
Macbeth is Macbeth is
hardly
not
him solidify his position by acts a politic man. His successful and
of
and
justice.
secret usurpation
leads into
tyranny, but he differs from the tyrant Socrates describes in The Republic. dominated
by
erotic and other appetites aimed at uninhibited
pleasure or gain. seem
There is
and
no
riotous living.
excessive,
these,
unguided
that make his ultimate success
Only in ambition and fear does he by superior intellect, lead him to actions increasingly unlikely. By apparently guaran
tendency
that was plainly
teeing him impunity,

him before his
the witches only accelerate a
in
second
visit, just
was
as
their very first
message
to him only
intensified
from
cally.
all of
an ambition end of
that
already there.
sweeps
Now for the
this amazing and mystifying story. After her absence
Act IV,
Lady
Macbeth
back into
our purview most
dramati
Only
her
nighttime
activity is disclosed,
all of
sleep.
Either
a
her hand
silently writes and seals a letter, or light she always has next to her. She is trying to
she
as she
it done unconsciously, in she walks with a light in

rub out a spot on
her hands, just from her hands
had
said a
little
water would wash off
Duncan's blood
and
and
Macbeth's. But this blood

since
will not wash off
it is lit
is
erally
"damned
spot,"
it has helped land her in hell. The

hell. And
each
candle
meant to
help
her
see through the murkiness of
utterance, in this
her consciousness, is tied to a particular point in her experience, from the time Duncan was killed up to the recent past, when Macbeth was still fearing Banquo had emerged from his grave, and news of
marvellous reconstruction of
Lady
she
Macduff's
murder
had
come and
to her
ears.
may do harm to herself, signifying the queen's death. The letter

she writes
the
next
Quite properly, the doctor fears thing we hear is a wail of women,

who
in her sleep
can
only be to Macbeth,
has
now
un-
344
Interpretation
murder of explains
dertaken the
Banquo
to
no
and the
Macduff
family
on
his own, in
ask
head him?
Mac
long
rush
he
one.
Would the letter simply
to see
Would it in any way express her deep confusion? The reason why Lady beth thinks in unconnected pieces is that she believes herself lost and damned, able to understand how it has all happened. She is in utter yet without
being
misery and Macbeth to

to
can
only
recollect points against
murder
Duncan
along the his will, and
way.
But, having importuned

so often
having
in the
told
him
what
do in the
course of
that great action, she is in no position to criticize now.
Nor
will she complain of convinced
being
left
alone.
Strong
midst of
her
unhappi
ness,
it
will not own
diminish,
she will
take the one way out available to

murder
her:
suicide.
At her
urging, Macbeth did indeed
sleep, the "season
natures"
of all
her
sleep.
That Macbeth
tor he
still
loves his
observe
wife
is
shown
in his
she
conversation with
the
doc
and
has
called
in to
her. He knows
can,
has
"mind
diseased,"
"physic"
asks whether condition.

with
or medicine
with physical
remedies,
cure such a
Clearly
he
wishes
deeply
for her cure, but he is him free
also preoccupied
the English forces coming to defeat him and place Malcolm on the throne.
prophecies as
He has told himself the
keep
secure and
of
fear, but he is
to report
at
shaking
heart,"
inwardly
convinced
with
fear
he humiliates the
messenger who comes
the approach of the English army. And he admits to that
being
entirely "sick
My
way of life Is fallen into the sear, the And that

which should
yellow
leaf;
old
accompany
age;
As honour, love, obedience, troops I

must not
of
friends,
breath
dare
not
look to have; but, in their stead.
Curses,
not
loud, but deep,

heart
would
mouth-honour,
Which the
poor
fain deny,
and
(V,
2: 22-28).
This is the
were able
most pathetic passage
in the
play.
It
shows
how decent
and
ordinary
the ends Macbeth had
sought
to achieve through ambition, all unattain
because he had
puts on
pursued
his
ambition
through murder. It is amid this fear again, and gives

orders
that he
his
armor and
takes it
off
to
"Hang
fear."
those that talk of
A
most
moment
later, Macbeth hears

fears,"
forgot the taste longer for
of
dreadful cry, and remarks that "I have al remembering how easily set off his fears used to
a
be,
and
thinking he has
gotten so used to
plotting horrible
was
murders that such

at
cries can no
startle
him. Informed that it

says
the cry of women
the
death
of the queen, a time
Macbeth
such
have been beth has
tomorrow"
morrow and not
forgotten the
have died hereafter; there would a And this leads him into "Tomorrow and to the most memorable speech in the play by far. Mac taste of fears: the cry fails to startle him because he
should
word."
"She
is already
brimming
over with
fear,
fear
with a more obvious and
pressing
claim on
Mystery Play
345
says
his
attention.
His speech, it is true,
nothing
directly
about
more
his
to
wife,
but this does
not mean she
he feels nothing,
that
or would not
have had
say (and think) had

neither
died
"hereafter"
is,
at a
less frantic
moment.
But
does he dwell
to
upon
himself
or
his
present preoccupations.
Instead, he
or
gives voice so
a reflection
that covers them
both,
and all other men as well

and
his thinks. Tired, desperate, concealing both his sorrow seeks a vantage point external and superior to life's strivings.
his fear, he
not
Still, it is surprising
reaffirm
that
in
a great speech at this point
Macbeth does
the moral nature of the universe
its
finally detecting
punishment.
his
wife and
would
himself, gravely
correspond
criminal, and meting out condign
This
to that
deep
strand
in him that
to
used
to regard the world in this
fash
ion. And
ery, with
we must also admit
its
air of a set
something declamation. Macbeth's Life may be like do not constitute
peculiar
in the
manner of
his deliv
greatest
stupidity, his greatest the world, not his

our
self-deception, one is tempted to say, comes in his

wife and
finding
himself,
to blame.
brief candle, but
tomor
rows,
end
todays, but death. Just like his wife, Macbeth seems not to understand how what happened to them both could possibly happen. As several critics have re
and yesterdays a patternless sequence with no
marked, his speech

charges
is to be
the
read with
the counterpart of the Bible in mind. It

than
the Bible
book that
more
any
other affirms
the
moral nature
of the universe
with error.
Replacing
God,
the Bible is an almost equally apodictic
statement
deposing
who
the perfect
and
enthroning
aimless
idiocy
as the
ruling
principle of the universe.
Those
moment,
find this
great speech
wrong.
are not
one person
entirely before whom it is delivered

appears
unsuitably pronounced by Macbeth, at this We should bear in mind, however, that the
Seyton
has
certain unique charac
teristics. Seyton
in only two scenes (3 and 5 of Act V) in the entire play. Before the former, no one knew Macbeth had an attendant or assistant by that name; in the latter, after announcing the death of the queen, he is heard
from
no more:
following
his
the
"Tomorrow"
speech, spoken, apparently, in his

calls
speechless
presence, he completely disappears. When Macbeth first

name three
Sey
audi
ton, he
coming
armour
repeats
times
within one
speech, making
the bad
sure
the
ence catches
of
it. When he
and
finally
appears, he
army.
confirms
news about
the
Malcolm
his English
also a
When Macbeth
asks
him for his

yet."
as
if Seyton
were
kind
of armour-bearer,
a protector of the
body
scene
he asserts,
5,
when and
pertly and knowlingly: "'Tis not needed Macbeth hears what the stage direction calls "a cry of
rather
"noise"
In
women
within"
asks
what
that
was, Seyton presently tells him: "The
Queen,
is he
made
my
lord, is
the
dead."
At this
point
editors run go
into
an obvious
difficulty, for in
to be
the text no call
for Seyton to
to do
so
out, discover the
queen
dead,
and return.
Nor is
asked
by
Macbeth, who, lost in
a reverie about
cry?"
himself
lasting
seven
lines, only
then asks "Wherefore was that
and receives
Seyton's
346
answer stage
Interpretation
immediately. To
make this answer
women"
of
physically possible, the editors add directions to the text calling for Seyton's exit after he says "It is the cry and his reentrance just before Macbeth's "Wherefore was that
with
cry?"
But tinkering
the
the folio
is
always
dangerous,
as we
have already
seen with
character of
Hecate,
whom so
able. make
Here
we must go
by
many editors consider spurious and expend Shakespeare's mischievous indications and try to
would
sense of them.
Seyton
not
have to leave if he is Satan in dis
a character with supernatural capacities, whose primary function in the is witnessing and confirming the coming of evils. Without taking a step play "Tomorrow" knows the queen is dead. And after he hears the Satan away,
guise
his function in the play ended. As something like an ex tension of Hecate and the witches, he is there to make sure that all that is, all well. is harm-doing going
speech, he is
gone
Because
of
the presence of this unusual

a special way.
being,
as
the
"Tomorrow"
speech
have to be interpreted in
pressed
It is
almost as
if the
view of
may life ex
in the
speech
must please
Satan
if the forces
of
harm
and evil
have
no
desire to
make the world
it from
being
understood as a
wholly evil, but are content if they can keep moral place, directed by a good God. In reality,
however,
forces
most! of
to convince men that "Life is a tale told
by
idiot"
an
is to disarm
the view the
men
them utterly, and to make
life itself impossible. It is, in

genius,
might
fact,
evil,
when
by
a stroke of
have hit
upon to
harm
the
So
Macbeth
expresses
this general conception, it is almost as if a
mind not given
to philosophizing suddenly sets forth a profound alternative to
all religious and rational views of
life. Considered from the

only be the
standpoint of
Mac
beth's psychology, this

the existence of a good
nals as enough
view could
consequence of a mind
fearing
God,
yet still unable
to understand
how two
the
such crimi
himself
and
his
wife come
to the end
they do. And
end comes soon
for Macbeth.
Sensing
on,
that he is doomed in
body
as well as
soul,
and
despite
witches'
learning
of the
equivocation,
earlier
working in his favor but
now against
him, he fights
Even Freud's
lifting himself, by
is lost he
this courage, above the exe
crable and pathetic.
when all
refuses to
bend
or
break.
Let
us return to
observation about
the reversal of roles in Macbeth: to
Lady
Macbeth
goes
from initial
remorselessness
defiance,"
becoming
"all
remo
whereas
Macbeth,
her
who
became "all
had
earlier
been filled
with com
punctions and
a
fear. But does

side
Lady Macbeth
or
show remorse at
the end?
Keeping
"little"
light
by
is
not remorse
but fear. And rueing the
when she smell of

sigh
"damned"
blood
spots on she
her hand,
mind?
is rubbing out the blood on her

is "oh, oh, is it but, again,
re
oh!"
hand,
taken
what
does
have in
At that point, her
by
the doctor to mean that
"the heart is sorely

unjust and evil
charged,"
regret at actions that
have led to
deep disappointment
femininity,
and
misery, or is it
pentance,
remorse at
having done
things? Her reference to her
hand
and
her
sigh
may be
evidence of
gentleness,
and moral
con-
science
Mystery Play
in the hardness
347
trying
to express themselves, but such is the pride

and of
Lady
her
Macbeth
still
takes
in her masculinity,
acknowledge
her ambition, that

of
she cannot
openly
them. What she does is relive some
own words and
actions,
particularly in connection with Duncan's murder, but all the while she herself damned in hell, undergoing punishment for her part in the mur senses der, and trying desperately to undo the signs and symbols of her part in it. She
undoubtedly
rect
connects
her suffering
with
her crime, but Macbeth's

of
of
direct remorse, di
contrition,
she gives no sign. remarkable
It is particularly
how little
of
recent
conduct,
or of
their recent relationship,
is
at the
forefront
her Her
mind.
word
here
about
Lady Macduff,
and
there
about
Banquo, is
all.
present
mind
misery, the returns,
rupture
in their closeness,
Nor
are never mentioned
directly. Her
again and
again, to the past, to the words and deeds that set the awful train of events
motion.
in
can we presume
that her daylight hours are
free from
care.
After
all,
she
keeps light
itself
We
occurs
by her continually that is, day and night and her suicide during the day. But we learn directly of her nocturnal life alone.
gentlewoman's remarks
gather
from her
that her
nocturnal movements are
repeated again and
again,
indicating
to find a way out of her

alter at
misery.
that she is completely unable, Nor does her literal or pedestrian
on
her own,
what she
cast of mind
the end: the audience is aware of the symbolic importance of

much of
remembers,
crime can
it
having
to do
with
be
cleansed and and
forgotten. Still, her does

not expand
how easily involvement in a grave own awareness of this is at best into

ramifications of what she re
subconscious,
her
mind
members: there are no reverberations of
belief
or sentiment even
in the
stricken
Lady
Macbeth.
quite
Macbeth is
different.
Initially
he
experiences
both
compunctions and
extravagantly fearful
the
and
murder.
visions at the thought of
murdering Duncan,
there are
no
and
during
But
with
Banquo
and
Macduff's
family
compunctions,
his
visions of the
former's
ghost
is
not repeated with
the latter.
Originally,
on
Macbeth's fears, and to some extent his compunctions, gious belief on the deep sense that the good God of the Bible
were
based
his
reli
protects
the
good and punishes the

ers.
evil,
and that the world as a whole
hunts down
murder
successfully from murder to murder, with apparent impunity, he does become hardened. Considering himself irretrievably destined for hell, his compunctions disappear as his fear for his earthly security mounts. Never
As he
moves
theless,
sick at
we cannot
say
with
Freud that he is "all
defiance."
At the end, he is
heart
about what separated
his life has turned into,
and while
he does
not com
plain of
being
from his wife, he
remains
deeply
and
concerned about
her
health. Nor does his

row"
remark at
learning
but,
at
of
her death,
the ensuing "Tomor
speech, breathe defiance

unintelligibility.
rather, an
awareness of when
hopeless
and con
temptible
Only
the very end,
he knows he
must
die, is
he defiant, spurning
suicide and
choosing to die in battle.
348
Interpretation
CHRISTIANITY AND ITS OPPOSITE
It is
tyranny.
disconcerting to realize that Thinking himself already

punishment murders
Macbeth's Christian belief helps damned beyond

redemption
worsen
his
Duncan, fearing
series of what
here
as well as not
in the
for murdering he plunges into a afterlife,
heinous
he did
foresee
no
originally.
Having
grown some
hardened to these crimes, he finds
fears that continually agitate him during able as his wife's: together they had indeed
while she
security in them. Judging the day, his nights must be as

murdered
by
the
miser
their own sleep.
And
thinks
of
herself
as
he
never ceases at
to anticipate
already undergoing divine punishment in hell, a similar destiny for himself. Recognizing this,
"hell-bound,"
Macduff,
gel
the very end, addresses him as
and refers to
the an
meaning the fallen angel, Satan. Jose Benardete argues that Macbeth's last words "Lay on, Macduff, and damn'd be him who first cries,
he has
served
enough!'"
'Hold,
damned his
imply
that Macbeth did not think of
himself
as
necessarily
words
by
his murders,
to this
or at
least thought that
acts of courage or cowardice on eternal

with
part could still
be decisive in fear
of
determining
not
his
fate. While the
are subject
interpretation, it does
with
jibe
Macbeth's
actual outlook
that day. He is filled the optimism this

greatest
warrior.
and
foreboding,
and
and neither speaks nor acts with should
view
bravery
victory
Words"
instill in Scotland's
(See "Macbeth's Last
in Interpretation, Summer in very humorous delete. It

of which
1970,
pp.
63-64.)
of
The importance
scene some editors
hell to the play had been
prefigured
have
also thought un-Shakespearean and sought to effect
involves the famous knocking-at-the-gate, the dramatic
De
Quincey
and
so admired.
seek
The
scene occurs
just
after
Duncan's murder,
as
Macduff The
an
Lennox
to enter the main part of the castle early that

hell-gate,"
morning.
porter
imagines himself the "porter

name of
of
and
fancies himself
of
swering, in the
serve
Beezlebub (and Lucifer), the knocks
those who de
to sweat in hell. He
place
finally
gives
up the task, exclaiming:

no
But this in
is too
cold
for hell. I'll devil-porter it
further. I had thought to let everlasting bonfire.

would not prevent
some of all professions that go the primrose
th'
way to
The
castle
is too
cold
for hell,
says the porter,
but
frigidity
it
from
being
considered part of
hell,
as
every
reader of
Dante's Inferno knows.
There, in
the ninth and deepest circle of
fer is eternally fixed for his treason sius for like sins. Of course, what has just
act of
hell, held by a frozen sea of ice, Luci against God, and Judas, Brutus, and Cas
occurred with
in Macbeth's
castle
is
an
treasonous
murder.
The hell begun
that act in the castle may be
said, in
central
fact,
issue
to constitute one of the play's main

of
the
intelligibility
which
of
themes, closely linked to its life. But the hell Shakespeare describes is unknowingly is their hell.
the natural hell to
these simpleminded murderers
bring
themselves: their suffering,
fear,
and sleeplessness
Mystery Play
349
By
gious
all
appearances, an equally irrelevant episode
dealing
with a related reli
theme occurs toward the end of Act
IV,
and some editors retain suffice.
it for
reasons
that,
were
they
the only ones,
would
hardly
Macduff had just
tried to persuade Malcolm to return to

anny.
Scotland
and save
it from Macbeth's tyr lecher
Testing him, Malcolm
claims
to be a very vicious man himself
ous, avaricious,
with none of
the virtues, and eager to
Pour the
sweet milk of concord

universal
into hell,
Uproar the All unity
peace, confound
on earth.
Somewhat strangely, Macduff is willing to accommodate the first two vices, but he gives vent to anger and despair at the rest, and perhaps
of
these
particu with
larly
at
the last.
Finding
Malcolm
"accurs'd,"
so
he
compares
him
his
parents:
Thy
Was
royal
father
a most sainted
upon
king;
the queen that

on
bore thee,
Oftener
her knees than
her feet,
well!
Died every day that she liv'd. Fare thee These evils thou repeat'st upon thyself Hath banish'd
me
from Scotland.
That Macduff is
cord,
universal
deeply
Christian
man
is
again shown
by
these lines. Con
peace, the unity
of mankind are
living
ideals for him
however
on
little
realized
in
practical political
life. And the
queen's
spending her days

counterpart evils
her knees, and dying every day, the thane of Fife despair comes from thinking that the evils of Macbeth have
considers great virtues.
His
in
Malcolm,
make sure
and that
Scotland is doomed to
reveal
suffer on spoke as
interminably.
This induces Malcolm to
that he
he did to test Macduff he had He
and
he had
now
not
been
sent
by
Macbeth. No doubt
vices
with some exaggera
tion, Malcolm
denies he has the
to
which
so
fessed
on
and
lays
claim
instead to their
opposite virtues.
adds
vehemently con that Siward was

now
the point of
leading
ten thousand Englishmen
against
Macbeth, but
goodness
they
will all return
together,
hoping
"the
chance of
warranted.
being
At this
point
achieved
is
as great as their quarrel with
Macbeth is
the
in the final
and
very be succeeded, at the beginning of Act V, by the doctor in attendance on Lady Macbeth. After the brief incident with the English doctor is con cluded, none other than the ever-gentle (the ever-evil) Ross arrives. What hap
scene of
a
enters show
Act IV
doctor
first to
himself in the play,
soon to
pens
English
souls,"
curing malady defeats the medical art, but quickly "Such sanctity hath Heaven given his
whose
hand."
during this brief interlude with the doctor? king will come forth, once he is finished
Malcolm
a
asks
whether
the
"crew
of wretched
amends at
his touch
We
are not
told,
of
course,
what a
doctor
was
doing
there if the king's touch
350 had
Interpretation
the
such efficacy: perhaps
testimony
serves as
of a
doctor to the superiority

most effective of all
of super
(to natural) The doctor departs,

natural
capacities
the
testimonies.
leaving
"the
Malcolm to
and
explain
to Macduff that the
disease the
king
cures
is
evil,"
called
cles with
his
own eyes. cures about
Malcolm does
help, but he
golden
people
necks"
stamp
their
says
benediction,"
"healing
leave to his
"full very
of end of
grace"
king work these mira king gets heaven's with sickly and deformed bodies by "hanging a and pronouncing certain "holy This Malcolm, is rumored to be a legacy the king will
not
that he has seen the
know how the
prayers."
successors.
He
also
has
"gift
prophecy,
of about
and
is
shown
to be
by "sundry
blessings"
that
"hang
his
throne."
Toward the
the scene, after the
exchange with
Ross, Malcolm is
still
intent
or
on
seeing the English
king, but
not
to ask for his
"healing
benediction,"
to so
licit his "gift

with
prophecy."
of
It is to bid farewell
and then march on
Macbeth
help of the English army the king has provided. Nothing in a Shakespearean play is irrelevant to its central
the
evil
theme,
and
here
the relevancy lies almost at the surface. How is human
(symbolized
by
disease
that
called
will
he
"the evil") to be cured? By his actions, Malcolm makes it clear not depend on Christian prayers, love, or miracles. The evil of
Macbeth way
can
be fought against, outsmarted, overpowered, and only in this it be eradicated and the good established in its place. Another varia
must
when
tion on the same theme occurs later
the besieged Macbeth asks his doctor
"What rhubarb, senna,

hence?"
or
what
purgative
drug,
would
scour
these
English
medical or reli
(V,
3:
54-55) Just
absurd
as
it is
absurd to purge
military
evils
by
drugs,
so
is it
to
purge political evils
by
either medical
drugs
gious rites.
Politics may benefit from

political art
widespread religious
belief, but only if

the nat
that belief permits the

ural world as
to cope
with political evils as part of
in the broad
sense of
the term. Macduff is pictured
by
Shakespeare
much
having
false
and
dangerous
mother.
confidence
in God's interventions,
in the
sober.
spirit of
Malcolm's
asks
But Malcolm himself is wary, distrustful,

that rawness left
of
you wife and
leave-taking?"
He
directly
Macduff, "Why in
child, those
refer
precious
motives, those
strong knots
love,
without
"rawness"
ring to his
3: 24-28).
having hurriedly
Yet
while
abandoned
them to the
of
Macbeth (IV,
Malcolm
will not solicit secret prayers and amulets
from
not
the English
above
king,
on
and sees the political
danger
of
Macduff's piety, he is
playing
a
that piety.
eyes, to be therefore
a wholehearted
He adroitly makes himself seem, in Macduff's believer in the practices of the English king, and
"sainted"
fit
successor scene
to his own
father
and
kneeling
mother.
After the final

colm
in England,
at
the end of Act
IV,
we are shown
Mal
of these are in battlefield scenes, the fourth in the finale. In the first, he orders the army to deceive the enemy about its numbers by camouflaging themselves with branches cut from Birnam Wood. In the second, he sends Old and Young Siward into the vanguard of the battle,
in Scotland four brief times. Three
keeping
back
with
his fellow Scotsman, Macduff.
The third
occurs
after
Macduff
ward
Mystery Play
35 1
goes off
hunting
that the castle
for Macbeth, with Malcolm learning from Old Si has been surrendered, and that they have been assisted by
people.
the thanes and many of Macbeth's own that Malcolm himself entered the battle: the
occasion with which
At
no point
is there any
sign well
he
seems
to have remembered
full
the play
began,
when
he
was almost captured not consist

will
by
the
enemy.
So Malcolm's
contribution to
Scotland
will
in
a
abilities of
the sort Macbeth and Macduff preeminently possess. He

superstitious
be
smarter, less
since
leader than them both. He
will
need all
his wariness,
his is
first
act
one of
beneficence
as compared
to Macbeth's murder of Banquo
to reward
not
his thanes
have
escaped
by making including Ross. Yet Ross may for Malcolm intends not only to call home exiled completely,
them all earls,
friends (he does

the "cruel
not mention of
his brother
and
ministers"
Macbeth
by name) but also to Lady Macbeth. And in a

that,
"in
whatever else
find final
and punish
contrast to
Macbeth
grace of
and
Macduff again, he
that
vows
Grace"
is, apparently by God but in fact by

will perform
is needful, "by the his own resources,

place."
his
own
acumen of
he
measure,
time,
and
The
firstlings he
his heart be
as
will not
not, like Macbeth's, be the firstlings of his hand, and impetuous and trusting as he knows Macduff to have been.
will said
Macbeth may be
"masculine,"
to be a play about two defective

and
extremes of
evil, one
purpose.
"feminine,"
one
its setting is
most suitable
to this
ements: a
Scotland contains two powerful and mutually antagonistic el feudal aristocracy, devoted to the virtues of courage and manliness, best shown in war, and the Christianity in which the nobles believe, with its
Eleventh-century
absolute
demand for love
and peace.
As
a practical matter
it
might seem that

would
the former needed the restraint of the latter
that
warlike
thanes
be
con
stantly in revolt against their king, and in contention with themselves, were it not for the influence of Christianity. It was Christianity that made them regard
their
king
as
the vicar of
God,
and themselves as
fellow believers in Christ. In
the play, obedience to Duncan is plainly

men
strengthened
by
as
the Christian belief of
like Macduff,
who
who refers
to the
murdered
king
"the Lord's
anointed
temple."
Macbeth,
valor and as of
begins
by killing
moved
the rebel,
Macdonwald,
herself
and
then himself
appeal
rebels against
Duncan, is
to this act
by Lady
Macbeth's
above all.
to his
manliness, traits
on which she prides

connected
The
question
to whether this
manliness
to war, ambition, mastery, the love

or
superiority
and
honor
is the highest good,

events
is itself
subordinate
to the
virtue of
justice, keeps animating

show
in the
play.
Excessive
manliness oc
curs when the ends and qualities of manliness are made to rise superior to all.
Not only does it
itself in the Macbeths, but

who
also
in Old Siward,
Malcolm
who
is
perfectly
what
happy
cry
to lose a son the

news of
has died bravely,
and even
in Macduff,
who
refuses to
at
his family's murder,
and whom
some
against Macbeth. unsympathetically tries to goad into manly action Almost equally dangerous to human life is the opposite extreme, which
352
Interpretation
and enemies, and exhorts men
about
denies the difference between friends

men as
to
love
all
they love
and trust the good asks
God. Warned
her imminent murder,

no
Lady
Macduff first
why
she should
flee if
she
has done
harm,
and
then
berates herself for
having
used this
false
defence."
"womanly
But it is her hus
band, Macduff,
tection of good
who much more
than she embodies trust in God

excessive
for the
pro nor
human beings. Neither Macbeth's
manliness,
Macduff's
pare
excessive
womanliness, can form the basis of

account of
Jose Benardete's in
these opposites,
room
op.
human society (com cit., p. 68). The former for the

con
turns everyone into enemies and leaves no

cord of good people a
for
friendship
everyone
again
body
politic.
The latter turns

or
into friends
and
offers no protection against
enemies, internal
external,
subverting the
body
politic.
views of
In the play these defective
human life
seem to
be
associated with
opposite views of the universe at
large. One is
expressed
by by
Macbeth in the
noth
form
ing,"
of
"Life is
tale told
by
an
idiot, full
of sound and
fury, signifying
of all
but it is
also related to an older
view, first formulated
the pre-Socratic
things."
philosopher,
Heracleitus, according
into the first
to which "War
cause of
is the father
Heracleitus
generalizes
everything the
rest
contention and
vy
ing
or
for mastery that are characteristic of warring men. in harmony. All states of seeming concord and
the resultants of clash themselves
Heracleitus'
Nothing
are
is simply
at rest
only temporary
sea of change.
phases
in
never-ending
The difficulties in Anaxagoras,

attention
with and
view, so the self-sufficiency

and
of
much at odds with
the rule of mind

received much
being
in Parmenides, for the
from Plato
Aristotle. It
causal
cannot account of
coherence of
indi
viduals or
species, for the

or
interconnection
of
things, for the

universe.
existence of
human knowledge,
for the
of
for the
range
beings in the
Even
while
granting the existence of

persistence of
individuals, it
cannot allow
for their
or
holding
together,
any classes, unities, or wholes, the flux whatsoever. Its defect comes from its very
not
for any transcendence simplicity. It says war is
the father of all things,
the partial cause of all or some things.
Its
whole
in
tention is to make war the cause of things

of
it does
not seem
to be the cause
to make it the supreme and sole cause. And not the
least
of
its
weaknesses
is its
about
inability
flux in
to account
for itself
as an
eternally true and
universal thought
a world of
flux.
life to the
unintelligible sound and
By having
seems to
Macbeth
compare
fury
of an
idiot, Shakespeare
have
takes
Heracleitus'
thought to
its logical
of
on
conclusion.
He
realized that the
their necessary developments
very idea of nature could not be sustained

natural
kinds
of things and
the basis of a philos

nature.
ophy
spect,
of
total flux:
Heracleitus'
philosophy destroys
be the very
and even
In this
re
Christianity
may
at
first
seem to
opposite of
Heracleitus. It
considers the universe an essential

will of
harmony
and
God. But if nothing happens
without
God's
active will and
unity founded in the good its impera
tive for ultimate good,
Christianity
Heracleitus may in fact have something
Macbeth: Shakespeare in its

Heracleitus'
Mystery Play
353
would
common.
view, taken full strength,
deprive human life

makes
of
nature and render
it
unintelligible sound and
fury: nothing God's
life
exist
or change
in
ascertainable
ways; nothing holds it together. But from the
Chris
tian view as well the world,

miraculous
constantly
subject to
exercise of
his
will and
power, is undetermined
views make nature
by
things.
Both
in its
original and proper sense
anything like the independent natures impossible.

the natures of things (and
of
Everything
Even Hecate
in Macbeth is bound
the
witches
by
by
chance).
and
have
a nature
they
are
bound
by
a nature
filled,
perhaps, with mutually
inconsistent
elements and therefore
physically impossi
ble, but
a nature
imagined,
nonetheless.
tures, particularly in the case of sexual, and individual parts of our nature,
and
Not that the working out of the na man, is simple. Over and above the general,
we are affected
by
life in society,
To
to each
pur
high commanding voices particularly by such causes must be added the range of invention
the
of
of politics and religion. and choice available
us, along with the mind's unique ability to control
its face
and
hide its
pose.
The
consequence and
is
an
amazing complexity
of
human affairs,
and
where mo chaos
tives, actions,
might appear
plans
rather
are
frequently
fact
and
concealed,
causes of
where
idiotic
to rule
than
intelligible
any kind. This is why the
play is filled
with mysteries of
cause, and the
hovering
presence of the
witches almost prepares us
for
can
such a world.
Nevertheless,
on closer
scrutiny,
the mysteries vanish.
We
discover Duncan's
good plan and see

succeed.
failed;
guess
we see
why the unsound plan to kill
him happened to
why it We can
Ross'
why Banquo had to take his trip. We are no longer mystified by descent from the level of the royal bedchambers, by his remaining outside the
castle,
by his appearance land, by his return with

battle,
and
at
the
Lady Macbeth's castle and soon afterward in Eng invading forces, his disappearance in the subse
among the thanes
at their
quent
his
reappearance
final
elevation
to
earldoms.
Shakespeare is
also
interested in
determining
the place of reason within

conduct.
hu
This is why the man nature, and the extent to which it guides human play gives much more prominence to involuntary visions, incoherent sleep talking, impulses, and passions that reason does not master than it does to de
liberate
pulses
planning.
By having
it
Macbeth degenerate to the
point where
his im
become the basis for action,

as close as
can get
untested and undirected
by
reflection,
witches at
he
the
brings life
to the behavior
of an
idiot. The
and no
outset prefigured much of this
irrational impulsiveness,
better
symbol of
the return to a
sion
more
completely human life

comes not
can be found than Malcolm's acces an avoidance of
to the throne. With him
only
the
extremes of
both masculinity and femininity but a restoration of rational calculation and dein short, of justice under the di liberateness dedicated to the common good
rection of prudence.
Malcolm
when
will not make says
the
mistake made
by
the obviously
foes!"
Christian "Old
with
Man"
he
to the
you;
and with
those that would make
departing Ross, "God's benison go good of bad, and friend of (II,
354
4,
at
Interpretation
a
the end)
lesson in
benignity
that can only feed the malignity of the
morally worst character in the play. Malcolm will not follow excessive mascu linity in making foes of friends, nor excessive femininity in making friends of foes.
Of
Shakespeare is particularly anxious to trace the causal lines that Macbeth and Lady Macbeth to their surprising fates. Quite clearly the
course would-be murderers but play upon an it success, and later assuring Macbeth that he already there, promising be conquered or killed. As a general matter, they facilitate courses of
bring
witches
do
not put ambition
into these
ambition
cannot
action
already prepared for in the souls of men by removing obstacles to their success, and in this respect function very much like the ring of Gyges in Plato's Republic (Book II, 359-61). But all the while, hidden from their own eyes, the
characters
and
circumstances
of
Macbeth
and
his
wife
are
at
work,
leading
them to their peculiar and separate time compressed even

given
dooms. And it
all
happens
within a span of
further
by
Shakespeare's dramatic art,

accelerate a process
with
indications
in
speeches that
unnaturally
witches'
celerated
by
the
guarantees of success and

murderers:
already unnaturally ac security. It would be easy

catches
to conclude that this is what happens to

and punishes
God
up
with
them
their crimes. And the confidence that such is the case may be po
litically
salutary.
But the
real
fate
of the
Macbeths is entirely natural, just like
that of the Macduffs. It stems from the fixed nature of things, and not essen
tially from
or
accident or external supernatural
intervention
of
any sort, demonic
divine.
GOOD AND EVIL
Despite the
optimism
associated
with
Malcolm's final
accession
to
the
throne, the atmosphere of Macbeth is generally dark, repellent, threatening. This effect is achieved by an unnatural poetic exaggeration, emphasizing those
elements of
reality
most
in
keeping
with
the problem of the play, and omitting
those that
would point
in
other
directions. The sunlight, summer,
flowers,
from this
plain
enjoyment of
life, jocularity,
even the use of moonlight
for
romantic associa one.
tions that color so many other plays are for the most part
absent
Instead,
combine
we
have
fog, darkness, blood,

and
and
foreboding. The
witches
embody
also
the subject
by
their visible ugliness and their proclivity to
harm.
They
unnaturally,
therefore confuse, not only masculinity and feminin

purpose and
ity
but
old age and
childishness,
purposelessness,
visit much
even a
kind
of
wisdom and
folly. When they
receive
Macbeth's
later in the play,
palpable magnification of their connection with the
humanly
repellent occurs.
Hecate is certainly quite matter-of-fact in her approach to their art, but once she steps in the results are much more powerful than in Act I. And as the witches
add
to their cauldron the parts of so many abhorrent
things,
we can see
the kin-
ship these things have
own nature makes
Mystery Play
and
355
with
the Macbeths themselves, whose distortion of their
them
frightful
horrifying
to behold.
What
nature of
universe
bearing
the
does the
existence of so much that are abhorrent
is
abhorrent
possible?
have
on
the the
universe?
Why
human beings
Clearly,
is
ings
exist
not simply the theater or home of human happiness, and many be despite the fact that man fears and detests them. Nevertheless, like
man's potential
understated
the ones for good, the many splendid things in the universe in this play may not be available without allowing for those that
repel as well.
In
a material
world, a
world of separate
beings
and classes of
be To
ings,
ask
the possibility of
and
harm
and evil
derives
inevitably
from the
presence of
others.
benefit
good, and the good of some things will be the harm of
for
a world
in
which all men are always
rational, always in control of their
passions and possible.

man
appetites,
ask
never
errant, is to
ask
for
a world that
To
for is
a world
filled only
not
with
things attractive
not
is physically im and beneficial to

growth
for
not
cows and
dogs but
rats, for health but
disease, for
man
but
decay
also to ask the
impossible. Moreover,
has
a natural
place
in this
world.
ious
parts and gradations of the
While sharing characteristics, moral and physical, with var world, he also adds something necessary to its
world would
completion.
Without him the
lie there unknown, uncelebrated,
unrhymed; and poets, like philosophers, would never be called upon (with Hec
ate) "to
art."
show
the glory of our

meet with such
That the Macbeths
bad
endings seems to prove the world
emphatically moral, but it does not. If the world were good in a simple and unqualified way, the Macbeths could not have gone wrong in the first place.
And
while
it may be
said that
him deserve
a punishment almost as serious as the
Banquo's conniving in Macbeth's crime made harm he receives from Mac
beth,
of
the same cannot be said of

perish
Lady
Macduff
and
her
children.
They
prove
that some good people
solely
through the evil of others, and the example

are
never punished of
Ross
shows that some evil

evil
people
for their
evil.
So
hu
evil
human
is
a permanent
feature
the human
world.
Nor is
an ab all
horrence
man
of even
the
worst
beings,
though
it
evil-doing is most unusual
a conscience
to be found in
to
find
it
completely
lacking.
Shakespeare
seems to associate the growth of conscience
in
us
with
family
upbringing Lady her of her father. Macbeth

have
need
Macbeth finds
and
she cannot
kill Duncan because he

what
reminds
Lady
Macbeth both do
they do despite
and
their consciences: the former knows

cieties
murder
is
a crime that
God
human
so
always condemned most strongly, and the latter refers to ambi

such
tion's
for
instruments
"illness."
as an
Only
Ross is the kind

about
of man we
likely
do
to have
no conscience or contrition, and we
know less
him than
peers
about
Richard
III
and
Iago, his
greater
but less
successful
in
evil-doing.
But
to do
what
is this
evil of which we speak?
Do
of
evil men
have
a conscious will
evil
for its
own sake?
Are they lovers
harm
rather
than good?
In the
356
Interpretation
case of the cause
Macbeths,
evil
is
not sought
for itself.
are
They
commit murder not
be
they enjoy
slaughter
in
order
to achieve something
but because they they know to be be

admired and
willing to do something wrong

good.
The
goods
they
seek are
all too ordinary: to rule, to
loved. Even in the
case of
Mac
mo irrational undertaking family tives, while far from clear, do not include any kind of sadism. He expresses no reasons, not even any wish to strike at Macduff in some way, or to warn others
beth's
most
the Macduff
murders
his
against
deserting
to Malcolm. From his
failing
We
to
act
instantly
against
rather
Macduff
than
on
he has
concluded
that he
must
in the future
prevail.
act
on
impulse
slower-moving probably enjoys his superior ability to deceive and defeat more than the pain of those he hurts: in short, human evil is primarily the consequence of seeking some good at the cost of harming others, whether the good is sovereignty, su
periority,
or
reflection
if he is to
must
imagine that Ross himself
any
of
many
other goals
a
that entice
what
ing
or nature could
bring
Ross to be
this play contain any direct evidence
upbring Nor does only (as The Tempest does, for example) of a
he is
we can
men.
What defects
of
guess.
way
of
life
philosophical or poetical soul
rising
superior to politics per se and
making the
play,
is
essentially Hecate's devotion
gentle rather than rough.
The her
as
closest craft
to this, in the the

craft of
to
the
excellence
of
contriving harm. Hecate speaks in kinship between her mastery of

apparitions and the poetic art.
and receive of
rhymed
couplets,
if to
remind us of
the
"charms"
using
combinations of words and

where
(See III, 5, and IV, 1,
the witches do
Hecate's
bidding
Hecate
her praise.)
on good accounts
This dependence
acter of and
harm
for the
peculiar work and char
her witches, for there is nothing satanic about them, not even the slightest sign of an urge to do evil for the sake of evil. Is arranging Macbeth's doom on a par for the witches with cherishing a pilot's thumb? Hec itself: paradoxically, it is only her love of excellence that makes her enjoy the contrivance of harm, for no other mo tive for her activity is ever given. Shakespeare never ascribes either to her or
ate's motive seems to
be her
art or craft
the witches any need

ers.
of
their own nature requiring them to
bring
harm to
oth
It is false, moreover, to consider harm an independent and separate ele in the universe. By nature men seek only good, and it is their limited intelligence and their passions that cause them to do harm. They rarely under stand what is really good in general or for themselves in particular, and often
ment miscalculate the actual consequences of their actions.
They
if
an
are not so solicitous
of
the well-being
of others as
to avoid
harming
them
important benefit
in
to
themselves is
of grave
at stake.
These
characteristics often cause men to engage grave
acts
injustice that
lesson
bring
harm to themselves
as well.
Exaggerated,
most obvi
magnified,
ous moral
and compressed of
for dramatic effect, this is certainly the

the play
Macbeth.
what
If
we put
together
divulges
directly
place
with what
it consciously
certainly
not
keeps from
our
view, the
world
is
not the
dark
it
seems, and
unintelligible. must
Mystery Play
357
natures of
It is intelligible because the
the things in
it are,
and
be, intelligible. With its amazing array of beings, culminating in man, it is even the kind of world reason would choose, given what is possible. It con
beauty, baseness because it
But it is far from
or external
tains ugliness because it also contains

nobility, evil
also contains
because it
also contains good.
a moral order
in
the simple sense, where forces internal
to it guarantee the flour
ishing
ther
of good and the a parable
failure
a
of evil.
Life is
not a tale told
by
an
idiot, but
a
nei
is it
gerous place
deriving
ture
and
by perfectly for men, who are subject not only to natural perils but to those from themselves. All too readily tempted into distortions of their na harboring false or imperfect notions of good, they are the source of
told
good and all-powerful
God. It is
dan
their own greatest misery.

much
Political,
religious, and social institutions can do
for them, but they may also do harm, and, like all other things, are sub ject to decay. Human happiness is therefore very difficult to achieve, and even modest contentment may not easily be within man's grasp. At the end of the
play Malcolm returns to a wise and just course, but we are never told in Malcolm that will resist temptations and hold him to this course. The darker
spite side of
what
it is
life does full
not seem to
have
embittered
Shakespeare, de
seems to
evil
his
having
had
as
a view of
it
as anyone can
have. He
have
concluded,
world,
ever
as a general
matter, that good is more fundamental than
in the
whatever
the practical
great the
actual
difficulties in the way of realizing it, and how predominance of evil. From this came the composure
write
making it
mingle
possible
for him to
both tragedy
and
comedy,
good
and even
must
to com
them appropriately. And his confidence in the

or given
have been
and po
with
confirmed,
etry,
its highest expression, in his

"Tomorrow"
own
philosophizing
the
which perhaps more
than anything else show man's connection

speech
the
divine. If Macbeth's
mism, the
conclusion
great
expresses points
deepest
pessi mixes
to
which
Shakespeare himself
optimism.
in this play
pessimism with a more
fundamental
Antimodernism in
Franz Overbeck's
Nineteenth-Century
and
Basle
Antitheology
J.J. Bachofen's
Antiphilology
Lionel Gossman
Princeton
University
In my view, liberal
theology is
human
a contradictio of
in
adjecto.
proponent of cul
religious
ture, ready to a function
to adapt
of the
itself to the ideas
bourgeois society, it degrades the
an ethical progressiveness.
Thomas Mann, Dr.
Faustus, XI.
This essay has grown teenth-century Basle on
projected out of a
which
larger study
am
book, provisionally
account of one of
entitled
society in nine collaborating with Carl Schorske. The The Prophets of Basle, will consist of an
of culture and
historical
the last city-states in Europe toward the end of its
history
major
as an autonomous
polity, followed
by
chapters on
four
or
five
of
the
figures
associated with
it in these
years:
Bachofen, Burckhardt, Nietz
Overbeck, and possibly the painter Bocklin. The central focus of the is the emergence, in the work of these figures, of a radical study politically
sche,
equivocal
critique of nineteenth-century liberalism, optimism and confidence in science, and of a new consciousness and view of the world. We are also interested in investigating what it may have been about a small,
"postmodern"
economically enterprising but socially conservative and politically powerless community, wedged between three nations at one of the great crossroads of European
commerce and culture, yet at the margins of all of
of some of the most original and and a
them, that
made
it
the home or haven

nineteenth
challenging thinkers of the
century
hatchery
of new and
an
disturbing
ideas.
against
There
were other centers
like Basle. In
800-page diatribe
the pe
who had persistently sought, in his view, to ob ripheral "Germanic struct Germany's development into a powerful nation state, the young Nazi
neutrals"
historian Christoph
cities, the
Steding
identified Norway, Denmark, the free Hanseatic

two great
and
Rhineland,
of a
and above all the
trading
civilizations at
the
head
and the mouth of the
Rhine
Switzerland
the Netherlands
as tradi
tional
focuses
questioning
and equivocating,
ironical,
and negative culture

conviction and
favorable to decisiveness
paranoid as
endless
needed
delaying
for the
tactics and subversive of the the

new
the
and
realization of
Germany. Exaggerated
it is, there may be
a grain of truth
hagen, Amsterdam, Hamburg,

ble
with
and
in this thesis. Danzig, Copen Frankfurt did represent traditions incompati

of
the hegemonic
ambitions
the new Reich.
Nevertheless, Steding
city
of
himself
awarded
"die
Basilea"
stolze
(the
haughty
old
Basle)
privi-
interpretation,
Spring 1989,
Vol. 16, No. 3
360 leged
Interpretation
at the center of this oppositional
way,"
place
network.
It
represented
"in
an
he claimed, the unusually symbolic outdated German Empire. Above all, its historical
had "developed in it the ability to
outlook of an earlier
Europe
and an
experience as a
slither and wriggle around
border city in the cracks be
tween particular powers to such a degree of virtuosity that tual or artistic production that comes out of Basle
today every intellec
is
marked
by
neutrality
(Christoph
ed.
Steding, Das Reich
und
die Krankheit der

1942],
europaischen
[Hamburg: Hanseatische Verlagsanstalt,
pp.
42-43,
Kultur, 3rd 65, 203, et

and most
passim).
My
aim
in this
paper
is
modest:
to present one of the
least known is
enigmatic of our
Basle
"prophets"
to a scholarly audience. There
not a single name
translation into English of anything

miliar to all
by
Franz Overbeck, though his

the
is fa
Nietzsche
scholars as that of the man who was
brought to Basle
was
from
Germany
as professor of
theology
year after
Nietzsche house
brought to land
fill the
chair of
philology,
who
took rooms
in the
same
as
Nietzsche
of
the "Baumannhohle
as the
two friends called it after the name
their
lady
his
and with a playful allusion to a
famous
scene
in Goethe's Faust
to Turin
and
and ate
meals with
him, became his intimate friend,

his madness,
and
went
brought him in bitter
back his
of
after the onset of
defended his memory,
often
conflict with own
Nietzsche's sister, Frau Elizabeth Forster-Nietzsche, to the end of life. What 1 shall be most concerned with here is Overbeck s criticism
what
modernism, but in order to see
differences, if
to Basle
who
any, there might be be
tween the antimodernism there and

never
of a newcomer
one who
never
had found
asylum
thought
of
leaving
it, but
equally
fully
belonged to
it ism
and that of a
wealthy
and prominent member of one of
the city's elite fam
ilies. I
shall also outline a rapid comparison of
Overbeck's
criticism of modern
with
that of J.J.
Bachofen,
the Basle classical scholar and pioneer anthro
pologist.
personally acquainted. Despite rapid expan Basle was still a fairly small city of about 1840, was well defined 60,000 inhabitants in the 1870s. Above all, Basle
and were sion
Bachofen
Overbeck
after
in the decades
"society"
and
compact,
and professors at the
university
were expected
to take their place
in it. That
cause of
was one of
the characteristics of the old humanist city-republic. Be

when
it, Wilamowitz,
for
he
was consulted on an appointment
in Latin,
as
felt he
could not recommend
the Italian Giorgio
Pasquale,
as
whom
he had had
a student
a semester and considered
rightly
it turned
out
one of the
most gifted of
the younger generation of classical philologists.
"Pasquale,"
he
wrote, "is simply unthinkable in an ancient center of distinguished social

ture
cul
like
Basle"
(W. Calder
and
lendorff
The
mained
on the
Basel Greek
Chair,"
C. Hoffmann, "Ulrich von Wilamowitz-MoelMuseum Helveticum, 43 [1986], p. 259). Overbeck appear,

nevertheless, to
relations of
Bachofen
and
have
re
formal. There is
no evidence of
anything corresponding
to the friend-
Antimodernism in
Nineteenth-Century
Basle
361
ship that was quickly established between Nietzsche and the Bachofens and that lasted until Nietzsche's hostility to Christianity became too outspoken for
Bachofen to tolerate. Nietzsche
was a
frequent
guest at the
Bachofens'
house
in the early
Overbeck
381).
years
of
his
sojourn
in Basle (Carl Albrecht Bernoulli, Franz

eine
und
Friedrich Nietzsche:
that
Freundschaft [Jena: 1908],
vol.
2,
p.
It is
not clear
Overbeck
as
ever enjoyed
the same favor. A letter from

of
Bachofen to
sistance
Overbeck,
one of
rector of
the
University
Basle, requesting
widow of
as
from
the university's benefit funds for the
his
old
teacher
each
Gerlach, has a formal ring, as though the two men rarely encountered other socially (Bachofen, Gesammelte Werke [hereafter GW], vol. 10, p.
must
474, letter of November 16, 1876).
Bachofen
have
appeared
to Overbeck as
distinguished had
private scholar
from
one of
the
wealthiest
local families,
an older man who
long
since re
signed
voked
his professorship of law at the university (his appointment having pro a campaign in the radical press against the elite's domination of the
city's educational
institutions) but
who still played an
influential
role
in
univer
sity politics as a former member of the Curate! or Board of Regents and a rich benefactor. Bachofen on his side may well have seen in Overbeck primarily a young professional brought in from Germany, reportedly in response to pres
sure
from liberal
was
groups with which
Bachofen
deeply
of
rooted
in Basle
Bachofen notoriously had no sympathy. society. The Bachofen firm was one of
the most successful of the ribbon manufacturing businesses that at that time
formed the mainstay

riage with
the Basle economy. The
family
was connected
by
mar
many
of the other prominent
fen's finest
mother was a
Merian, his
wife a
Burckhardt
families in the ruling elite and it owned some
Bacho-
of the
properties
in
the city and the surrounding countryside, among them the

and several
imposing
houses in
baroque Weisses Haus overlooking the Rhine

and around the
handsome
Miinsterplatz
and
the Rittergasse. Bachofen himself
had been strongly marked by his neohumanist, Humboldtian education at the local Gymnasium and at the Padagogium (a special preuniversity institution of
which
the Basle
elite was and
particularly proud), influential
which
later study
evidence
at
Berlin
under
youth
Ranke, Boeckh
he had been
(men
such as
as a
Savigny singled out by

political
reinforced, and there

members
is
that
in his
of
the
previous
generation
Andreas Heusler, the liberal-conservative founder
of the
Basler
Zeitung)
As he
future
leader.
grew
older, Bachofen became

was always
increasingly
fun
isolated from Basle

often
soci
ety, but his isolation to

mock
only
relative.
Like Burckhardt, he life

at
liked
his fellow-citizens
and to make and the
of the pettiness of
of
Basle (see
Modernity my essay "Basle, Bachofen, Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes the Nineteenth and well-read classical 47 [1984], pp. 136-85). No doubt the much-travelled Greece and pre who spent his life with the gods and heroes of ancient
Century,"
Critique
in the Second Half
of
scholar,
historic Italy, felt
rather superior
to the
humdrum, bourgeois way
of
life
of
the
362
Interpretation
claimed
local citizenry; he himself
he
never
felt
quite at
home in the
"boring
and
factory
own
town"
(langweilige Fabrikstadt) Basle had
increasingly
become in his
lifetime. Embittered
native
by
the turn of political affairs
in Europe generally
in his
had held
on to power
city in particular, where the rule of the merchant elite, which longer than the leadership of any other Swiss city, was
and political con seemed
finally being
sequences of
successfully challenged, appalled by the social the new industrial order that his fellow citizens
resolutely
if cautiously set to embrace, but unable to suggest any practical alternative, he had gradually withdrawn into a kind of inner exile in his own city. By the time
of
his death in 1887, he Yet his
was
virtually
unknown
to the majority of
millionaire
his fellow
occupied
citizens.
withdrawal was not complete.
The
hermit
house in the very heart of Basle, on the Miinsterplatz Place de la Cathedrale, as he liked to write in his correspondence
a prominent
number
and
2,
he
pre
sumably continued to live off the holdings and profits of the Bachofen firm, the direction of which he had been happy to leave to his younger brothers Carl and
Wilhelm
after
their
father's
retirement.
There
was no question
where
he be his
the
longed, how he
His
own personal
should
be defined
or that
he
was a
Basler through
and through. whatever
entire attitude
to the
world was
that of a man the
for
whom
difficulties
social
life,
life
of a
community,
constituted
highest
reality.
With Overbeck, things
were
different. His grandfather,

to England to
an employee with a
Frankfurt tion,
years and
merchant
firm,
had
a
emigrated
try
to
improve his
return
situa
had
even
become
British subject, but had had to

without
to his native
Frankfurt he
his
about ten years again set out to

married
later,
having
made
his fortune. Within two
try his luck,

was
this time in St. Petersburg. Here one of
sons
the daughter of a local
French Catholic family,

was
and of
this
mixed marriage
Overbeck
born in
1837.
Overbeck's father had in fact

run
a position
in the
called
so-called
Englisches Magazin (which

and the
by
Scotsman
Colquhoun) French, and German

milieu, speaking
a
family
moved
in
a cosmopolitan circle of
English,
to
residents of
of
the Russian capital. Overbeck grew up in this

memoirs
variety
languages. In his
he
returns
frequently
situation
the language question.

general. spoke
Apparently
he
saw
it
as emblematic of
late,"
his
in
"I
got
to have a mother tongue unusually
he
writes.
"I first
Russian, presumably because I learned it from my

was
nurse.
Otherwise
French
the language that

speak
was spoken
in
our
house. To my grandmother,
however,
I had to
in German. From the

life"
age of seven a private tutor was
improve my German, and I also had lessons in English, which I had (Selbstbekenntisse [hereafter SB], many occasions to use in my everyday ed. Eberhardt Vischer [Basle: Schwabe, 1941], pp. 84-85).
engaged to
At the
as a
age of at
nine, in 1846, Overbeck
was sent
to
France to
spend two years
boarder
the
College de
achieved complete and
fluency
p.
in
Saint-Germain-en-Laye, outside Paris. Here he French, but forgot most of his German, English,
return
Russian (SB,
93).
After his
to Russia (he was shipped back

almost
on
the outbreak of the '48
Revolution, but,
characteristically, has
nothing
Antimodernism in
Nineteenth-Century Basle
lessons to
to
363
with
to say about that event in his memoirs), it required frequent association
friends
1850
of
his
own age and more private
bring
back his German. In
Overbeck,
forever,"
then thirteen years old, again left "the land of my
birth,
this
time
and
and went with
his
mother
live in Dresden. His father

was
retired
followed
a couple of years
was
later.
Only
then
it
clear
to
him, he
relates,
that German
everyday life. Even so, he remained fluent in French, his true mother tongue, which he continued to speak at home, and moderately competent in English. (His wife Ida, whom
he
married after
to be the language he would use in his
lator
a
of
settling in Basle, also spoke French well; she was the trans Sainte-Beuve's Lundis). Though Overbeck always identified himself as
acknowledges
German, he
roots
in his
memoirs that
his
family
never succeeded modest
in
striking
in Dresden,
largely
on account of
his father's
financial
comfort
recom
circumstances
(SB,
p.
113).
Uprooted,
promoted
obscure, and only moderately
able, Overbeck's
mendations
family
could not provide
him
with
the contacts and

respect alone
and
that might
have
his
career.
In that
of
his
cir
cumstances were
strikingly different from those

and abroad.
considerable
Bachofen
Burckhardt,
con
both
of whom could count on an extensive network of
family
and
business
nections
in Switzerland
well
As is
known,
settled
there was a
Basle diaspora in the
eighteenth
and nineteenth centuries.
families had
Members of the city's merchant and manufacturing in London, Leeds, Paris, Le Havre, Vienna, Brussels, Amsterdam, St. Petersburg, New York, Rio de Janeiro. By the early decades
of the nineteenth
century others were serving with the Basle Missionary in South Russia and India. Basle's commercial fortunes depended to a degree
on the contacts and
Society
consid
erable
information
provided
by
these expatriates.
The
men of
the ruling class were themselves widely travelled, for it was cus
tomary for
ticed to a
a year
the sons of merchant

with which
families to
spend a year or so abroad appren
did business. In this way Bachofen spent Wilhelm spent a similar period in brother his England; male and fe New York in the 1840s. All the better-class Basle citizens dialect in Alemmanic male spoke French and German as well as the local firm
their
family
in France
and
other; many were also fluent in English Basler doubted the solidity of the ground under his feet. Even the celebrated explorer Lewis Burckhardt, who spent his best years in the Near East in the service of an English geographical society, living and behav ing like an Arab, speaking Arabic and writing his reports in English he died in Cairo and was buried as Sheikh Ibrahim in the Bab el Nasr cemetery just
which
they
communicated with each
and
Italian. But
no
outside
the Egyptian capital

who was related
even
this
unusual
figure
of
the early
nineteenth
century,
to both Burckhardt and
Bachofen,
corresponded regu
larly with his family, kept up with the affairs of the little city-state, home one day to enjoy a quently reaffirmed his intention of returning
existence
and
fre
peaceful
in
one of the
handsome town
or
his country houses that belonged to

and
unremarkable
family.
Overbeck, in
contrast,
despite
an
absolutely ordinary
364
Interpretation
existence as a
bourgeois
university professor,
an outsider
successor
was
in every
other respect a man
of everywhere and of nowhere,
even, in fact especially, in
his
professional
life. As his
in the
chair of practical
theology
and church
history
He
was
at
Basle observed,
gifted,
"by
birth he
was cosmopolitan and
interconfessional.
no expe
rience of the
iations
.
highly day-to-day life of a and habits, no feeling for

entire
outlook
sharp-witted and
immensely
curious.
But he had
German Evangelical
family,
no church affil or congregation.

skeptical"
any homeland, community,

und
His
was
scholarly,
theoretical, critical,
and
(quoted
stadt:
by
Hans Schindler, Barth
Overbeck [Gotha: Klotz, 1936; Darm

p.
Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1974],
141).
Overbeck himself
explains that without
German vaguely feelings
grandmother motivated
of
any strong was a devout
religious
background in his
family
Lutheran
he drifted
only his into theology,
by
the desire to pursue a professional career and
by
at
diffuse
in later
humanitarianism.
a
Among
his fellow
p.
students
in theology
118),
Leipzig,
he felt, he says, like

years
Hottentot (SB,
116;
see also p. of
and
the strange
situation
he found himself in
being
all
a theologian whose
an atheist
chief aim was to criticize
theology
wanted
and who was
in
probability
not
into the bargain
led to
almost unbearable tension.
"I did
teach what I
be
lieved, is, what I

came to
that is to say, what I took it to be my
to, but
what
considered
appropriate, that
duty
teach"
to
(SB,
p.
140).
find his "role only

as a
as a
teacher
not a
distasteful,"
and retained a
No doubt that is why he keen interest in As

a
his
work
learner,
teacher
never
(SB,
p.
159).
human being,
out a
as a
theologian,
and as a
teacher, he
felt "at
home"
and
he lived
thor
oughly contradictory existence. Overbeck had been called to Basle from

the university authorities
wanted church
with of
Germany
in
response
to pressure on
which of
from the local liberally-inclined Reformverein,

of
the biblical criticism
the New Testament
and
the associated field

than the
history
to
be
represented
by
someone more
in tune
incumbent
(Letter
ed.
the modern liberal and
critical
theology
that had swept

1
Germany
invitation to Basle, Overbeckiana, vol. Staehelin and M. Gabathuler [Basle: Helbing

Local
radical politicians would
[the correspondence],
E. 86).
und
Lichtenhahn.
him
with
1962]. p.
like Carl Brenner free
welcomed
the expectation
paths of error
of reli
that
he
"carry
the torch of
criticism
into the dark

had
taken
by
authoritarian
belief
vol.
and assert the rights of reason p.
in the field
gion"
(Overbeckiana,
mote
1,
89). But those
who
counted on
him to
pro
liberal theology at Basle must have felt bitterly disappointed, even be trayed, by his scathing attack on liberalism in The Christianity of our Present-
Day Theology in 1873 (Uber die Christlichkeit unserer heutigen Theologie [hereafter CHT], 2nd ed., [Leipzig: 1903; Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buch
gesellschaft,
1981]).
or
As he
was no more
in sympathy
with
the entrenched Or
a
thodox Calvinists
the powerful Basle

understood
and
Pietists, Overbeck quickly became

adopted city.
writer
solitary, respected, but little
figure in his
In his book
on
Nietzsche
Overbeck the Swiss
Carl Albrecht
Antimodernism in
Nineteenth-Century
Basle
365
that the
Bernoulli,
(Bernoulli,
of the
at
who
had been Overbeck's student,

35).
and
observes
influence
of
"
his friend Treitschke "saved Overbeck from the dangers

vol.
of cosmopolitanism at
i,
p.
The letters from Overbeck to Treitschke

Austro-German for the
wars
the time
German-Danish
testify
to
his
support of
Prussia
this time and to
his
enthusiasm
cause of a unified
German
state under
Prussian
Prussian
leadership
war
rather
than a confederation. At the outbreak of the Francopatriotism was still alive and well.
in
1870
Overbeck's German
The young theology professor, then newly arrived in Basle, immediately in formed Treitschke that "we Germans here have set up an auxiliary committee that will today issue a call to all Germans in Switzerland to rally to the
cause"
(Bernoulli,
In
p.
31
[letter
of
July
20,
1870]).
and
Overbeck later
p.
acknowledged
that he was a "slow
late
developer"
(SB,
72).
politics of
especially, for which, as he himself wrote, he lacked the

was
furor"
"holy
vol.
his friend, he
178).
long
Treitschke'
under
influence (Overbeck
But for that very reason, he added, he could not in the 1, iana, long run stay true to Treitschke, though he loved him dearly. "It was not poli tics that brought us together, but a certain warmly felt human regard for each
p. other of a quite general nature.
That is
also
the
reason
for the
fragility
of our
relationship.
For Treitschke
all"
was a politician und
through and through, which I was

und
almost not at modernen
(Christentum
von
Kultur: Gedanken
Anmerkungen
zur
Theologie
Franz Overbeck [hereafter

p.
CK],
ed.
CA. Bernoulli from
(Basle:
Schwabe,
1919),
191).
Bernoulli had to he first
concede
in the
end that the cosmopolitanism,

saved
which
claimed that all
Treitschke had
teutonicus,"
Overbeck, for Treitschke,
his German
national
the "furor
as
Overbeck, was in fact what saved feeling, from the fanatical nationalism of Overbeck himself put it, of his day. As
early as 1866, at the time of the war against Austria, Overbeck had had to con at seeing fess to an "invincible and bothersome feeling of political
certain goals
with which
uneasin
he
was
in
complete
sympathy
"being
pursued
by
he
Prussia in for
a manner that concerned
began to be
gered cept
constantly ran counter to my lest "as a result, these goals themselves

come."
so that
might
be
endan ex
a considerable time
to
To be sure,
"nothing
can
be done
by
force"
Overbeck
was
already
then no idealist
"but if German
statesman cannot
na
tional unity
is to be
more than a mere of
word, the Prussian
be
relieved of the
duty
finding
Germany."
transformation of
ious
feeling
that no one
a way to moderate the violence of the political In the end he cannot altogether "suppress an anx has quite measured the extent of the misfortune it
would
be if the issues
of national
unity
and of
freedom
were
to be treated as
separate"
(Bernoulli,
century
that
vol.
1,
pp.
17-18).
In these
reservations one can
hear the
voice of
the man who later declared that

was not nationalism
what united
already him to his own
nineteenth
but "that
which was most youthful
in
all
its
for
struggles,"
is, its "striving for freedom

that
and
everything that it
achieved
mankind through
(CK,
p. 293).
366
Interpretation
reacted
We know how Nietzsche
to the outpourings of patriotic

with
fervor
and
the cultural chauvinism that the

academic
war
France
elicited
from the German

who
and religious establishment.
The liberal theologians
had been
Overbeck's friends in his student days had joined enthusiastically in this chorus (see Overbeckiana, vol. i, letters 42-49, 54). One of them, who had been ap
pointed of
to a post in Bern at the same time that Overbeck went to
Basle,
wrote
the "irreparable loss of not
being
able
to live in the great the

noblest vol.
flood,
the ocean of
enthusiasm and of the
deepest stirring
Germany"
of all
human feelings that

p. 93).
presently flow toward in Germany pitied Overbeck for

beyond the frontiers
of
(Overbeckiana,
and
1,
Other friends (Overbeck
having
that
to experience "this great national event

people"
Germany
among
a non-German outpost at
iana,
came
with
vol.
1,
p.
91).
No
wonder
from his
Basle Overbeck be
increasingly
student
suspicious of the
the new German state.
liberal theology that had identified itself from Georg Ebers, a One more moderate letter
fellow
Egyptologist
of most of
at
from Overbeck's Jena years, who had become a highly regarded Leipzig indicates that he may not have shared the enthusiasm
who was
admittedly a concern that, as we saw, Overbeck had already new Empire is costing a great deal of young
will
his friends. Ebers,
of
Jewish origin,
expressed
voiced
to Treitschke. "Our
blood,"
he
wrote.
"Germany
she
have to look to it that

unity"
she
does
vol.
not
lose the little bit

p. 95).
of
freedom
has in
her
new
(Overbeckiana,
I,
By
in The
1873
relations with
Treitschke
were
becoming
led
strained.
Treitschke
ob
served that
the grand avenue opened up
Christianity
of Our
hut,"
by Present-Day Theology
Overbeck's
critique of
Christianity
not
to a majestic palace
but only to "a tiny that is, to "no positive Wagner likewise appreciated Overbeck's criticism of his
p.
result."
Nietzsche's friend but deplored

vol.
Christianity
apparent
lack
of
interest in
discovering
a substitute
(Overbeckiana,
1,
113).
By judging
christian, ing to Treitschke, had

himself took the
political
every worldly form of religion as incompatible with the original Christian message,
taken a far too
narrow view of
fundamentally
Overbeck,
most
un
accord
Christianity. Treitschke
opposite view and admired what
Overbeck
disliked: the
cunning of Christianity, its capacity to survive and adapt to new cir cumstances. In general, Treitschke objected, Overbeck and his friend Nietzsche had understanding of the they have, isolated as they
no
new
Germany
from the
and no
sympathy
with
it. How
could
were
great stream of national
life in the
and
free-city of Basle? "You two sit in your sulking corner, know nothing, absolutely nothing of what moves the It was true that in Basle the old bourgeoisie did not find the face of the
anachronistic old
nation."'
new
Reich
to a that
attractive.
Soon
relations
a
between Treitschke
kind
of
breaking
as
point, then to
not
Overbeck came, if not impasse. Overbeck always maintained

and
Treitschke had
the slightest tincture of

Unchristianity,"
Christianity; in fact he
it (CK,
pp.
regarded
him
his "teacher in
as
he
put
190-91).
When
Treitschke began
to draw nearer to the Church for political reasons
that
is,
as
Antimodernism in
Nineteenth-Century
sake of
Basle
his
own
367
patriotism"
Overbeck himself remarked, "for the

came
what
religion,
he
perilously close, despite the realism and cynicism that motivated him, to Overbeck found most insufferable: the "age-old, cunningly worldly
of compromise and
an authentic
wise"
habit
accommodation, the unwillingness to choose between

and
being
ual,
Christian
being
an
authentically
modern secular
individ
which
he
considered
p.
ernism"
(see CK,
Empire than its nothing

tianity"
worldliness,"
especially nineteenth-century "mod 69). "I appreciate nothing more in the rise of our German Overbeck explained later. "On the other hand,
characteristic of
would
be
more
likely
to
extinguish
the last spark
of patriotism return
in
me
than the expectation that for the sake of this Empire one
had to
to
Chris
(CK,
p.
190).
thusiasm
up by saying that, even at the time of his greatest en for Prussia, Overbeck never made a religion of nationalism. As a Petersburg-born German, with a Russian-born French Catholic mother, living
Perhaps
one could sum as a professor of sate
theology in Protestant Basle, he

isolation
not.
might
have tried to
compen
for his
experience of alienation and
by
passionate
devotion to the
Empire. But he did
consequence of modern price that
On the contrary, he regarded isolation as the inevitable individualism and freedom, and he accepted it as the
had to be
paid. came to
When Overbeck
posts
in Swiss
universities
Basle, he imagined, as most Germans did, that he would return to Germany
who
took up
as soon as a
a provisional
suitable position opened up.
solution, a pis
alter.
"Conditions in he
explained vol.
Teaching Germany
to
in Switzerland
was
only
at the moment are so
hopelessly
to
unpromising for
wait
was an
me,"
Treitschke, "That it
89). For that
makes no sense
around"
(Overbeckiana,
stroke of
1,
p.
reason
the call to Basle
"unexpected
fortune."
But
even as
he
wrote
his letter
of ac
ceptance, "I
Germany"
still permitted
myself
to hope that I
would
some
day
return
to
(Overbeckiana,
vol.
1,
pp.
87-88). An
old
friend
and colleague at
Kiel, Adalbert Lipsius, wrote consolingly that "after all, the Swiss universities and that "a return to Germany will be possi are branches of the German
ones"
ble in the
future"
(Overbeckiana,
will
vol.
1,
p.
89). Another friend,
a professor at and
Jena,
wrote
that he surely
. .
would not and should not settle
down
become (Over
Swissified. "Basle
always
be only
a provisional
home for
you"
beckiana,
The
this
vol.
1,
p. 94).
provisional
home
proved
to be
as permanent a one as
wrote
Overbeck
ever
found. Two
years
before he retired, he
to his
old
friend Treitschke from

similar
home in the city "I have remained him: before many here as a guest for twenty-five
provisional
which
had
served a
function for
so
foreigner in this land,
even after
living
years."
Nevertheless, he
added, he felt very "at
it (Overbeckiana, vol. 1, p. 178). For it was the new German Em him. He himself felt no pire that in the end had become completely alien to that was not an fatherland nationalism and love of sympathy with any form of home in the kind of local patriotism, of love of chored in the "natural
tached"
to
basis"
368 in
other
Interpretation
words, that
was characteristic of
his
provisional
home. His
position
in
this matter was consistent with

eyes was
among the
more
his thinking in general, for nationalism in his degenerate products of the idealism he and Nietzsche
not
criticized unremittingly.
Although he had
become Swiss, he was, in short,
no normal citizen of the
German Empire.
On the contrary, his theological thinking and writing had identified him as a man who had positioned himself against the tide of his time and the efforts of
the majority of his theological colleagues in
religion and culture and
Germany
to hold state and church,
As a result he together, had become, as he himself put it, "embroiled in an unresolvable conflict with the dominant theological current in the German Empire and in consequence
serve each other.
was condemned
have them
or rather
The country he had spent twenty "the Empire that it has become since I left it in
to
1873,"
exile."
years of
his life in
a
1870"
has been in
"state
of war with me since
he declared, that is,
since the publication of
his
Christianity
of Our
cation of that work
which
Present-Day Theology (CHT, incidentally appeared in

of the
p.
169).
With the
publi
the same year and with
the same publisher as Nietzsche's second Unzeitgemdsse (the attack on David
Strauss)
and
which
each
two
housemates, along
with
their common
understanda
Zwillinge"
friend Erwin Rohde, had bound together
and always referred
to,
bly ity
in
view of the
("the twins")
afterwards
similarity of their themes and arguments, as "die Overbeck had burned his boats. There was never any
possibil
where
his going back to Germany. In Basle, on the other hand, he had disappointed the expectations of some and shocked the religious
of
sensibilities of
others, he
was
let be. As both his scholarship

slightest reason
and
his
personal
integrity
his inner
Basle
were
universally acknowledged, people respected his convictions and He

never
conflicts.
had the him
to believe that anyone
in
re
ever
thought of
having
removed
from his professorship, he later

years of
pp.
counted.
On the contrary,
times elected
not once
in twenty-five
or attack
subjected to
interference, criticism,
rector of
(CHT,
teaching had he been 9, 168). He was in

"Basle,"
fact
several
the university
wrote
in the Afterword
of the second edition

'Theology,'
by his colleagues. of his Christianity (1903),
he
re
"has
mained
the refuge of my
and
I have
never ceased to experience
it
as such
from the
moment
1 first
pp.
arrived
gratitude"
enduring
solicit a call
(CHT,
come.
168-69).
there; it has thereby earned my equally Nor did he ever make any effort to
he kept "as
not
to a German university, since he would have been unable to accept
it
even
if it had
myself
For that
reason
quiet as a on
mouse, avoided
account
of
making
more
into
someone
who
could
be ignored
the
countless
books he has written, and in general moved not one of the many than ten fingers that those who feel they may or must attract attention to
well
themselves know so
how to
move"
(SB,
p.
141).
corner,"
Perhaps it
was
only in Treitschke's
"sulking
in short, only in the

as a histori-
predominantly
commercial city-republic which
Treitschke despised
Antimodernism in
cal
Nineteenth-Century
Basle
369
backwater in the
age of
the great nation-states, that Overbeck was

a theologian
with
free to be
the contradictory
was
figure he had indeed become:

who
to
whom
theology
it
and
thoroughly
problematical, and
battled
it
all
his life,
as a theolo
gian, while at the same time refusing to set himself
up
as a reformer of
feeling
(or
no obligation
to press his ideas

the finis
on others.
Only
in Basle
perhaps was
it
possible
for him to
construed
announce
christianismi without
being
to have launched
an
attack)
on
launching an attack Christianity as such, to her

on
ald a new
truly
the
secular culture without
engaging himself
while
behalf
a
of this new or
culture with a
religious vehemence and optimism of a

"modernism"
Strauss,
he
Feuerbach his
Bauer,
to expose and
challenge was perhaps
insisting
on
own mo
dernity. Basle, in short,
the one place where
could
freely
"sich
in die Luft both
hinausstellen,"
as
he
put
it
lift
off
into the
unknown
beyond
orthodox
Christianity
and
the humanist or nationalist Schwdrmerei of the
modern
liberal theologians,
p. 77). respect
without
feeling
he had to carry
everyone
along
with
him (CK, In this
he
and
his
colleague
Nietzsche
at that time a professor of
philology to
were in the same philology had become Nietzsche wrote to Erwin Rohde, "because it has let boat. "I appreciate me live in peace, as on a country estate. In contrast, the sound of Berlin vocal whom
problematical2
Basle,"
organs
is
as
hateful to
von
machin
me as the
clanging
of steam-driven
(Letter
of
1872,
quoted
anachronistic,
Martin, Nietzsche und Burckhardt, p. 21). Eccentric, by determinedly neutral and independent, yet at the same time the
of
traditional point of intersection
the great
lines
of communication offered an
linking
redoubt
Paris to Vienna
and
Northern Europe to Italy, Basle

centers of
ideal
from
bly
listine"
nineteenth-century modernism, most nota the expanding, capitalist, imperialist Berlin of the Grunderzeit and its "Phi culture-czars, could be observed and denounced with impunity. The
which not so couple
the European
Basle capitalists, characteristically pragmatic and fairly tolerant, were enamored of the new German Empire that they might want to prevent a
of
intellectual Davids in their
midst were
Goliath. On the contrary, they

political and
having their sport with alarmed by it as an economic
from
the German
as well as a
with
been military threat and the sympathies of many in 1870 had
France, just as in the heyday of French supremacy they had been with Ger many. Moreover, the nineteenth-century Basle leadership may not have been averse to a fox or two loose among the theological chickens, as it had
letting
done
earlier
circles
in the century when, to the dismay of local pietistic and orthodox to alike, it brought De Wette, the friend and disciple of Schleiermacher,
observed
Basle from Germany. As Burgermeister Wieland

courageous
speculation
on that occasion,
in
matters
of
theology
was
preferable
to the
narrow
self-righteousness and
dogmatism
nach
of
"unsere dermaligen
Zionswachter"
(Ernst
Jenny, "Wie De Wette

Overbeck
Basel
kam,"
Basler Jahrbuch [194U,

neutrality
which was
P-
61).
no means
once explained
his
peculiar
by
370
Interpretation
"Gelassenheit"
indifference: the term he himself

composure)
schke's:
preferred
was conduct
(serenity
as
or
in
comparison
of
his
own
a teacher with Treit-
always
let my
audience
determine for themselves how

me.
as theologians
they
should
deal
with what
they learned from

be
sure,
.
never
tried to
make
things
.
especially difficult
.
for them,
was
nor, to
.
did 1 do anything to I could,

given
make them easy.
What I taught
else, and I
simply
what
I knew
as
about the topic under
discussion, nothing
presented that as
clearly
my very
was a
skeptical and cautious
way
of pro
ceeding in
task of the
matters
historical.
teacher
academic
totally different from Treitschke's (SB, p. 134).

Now that
conception of
the
Overbeck
sights
with saving his best in sharing them generously with his students, as some had maliciously insinuated, but everything to do with his disinclination to play the part of a hunter of souls ("Seelenfanger"). For the same reasons he
emphasized that
this attitude had nothing to do

of
for his
publications
instead
described himself
say,
a guru.
as
"not
cut out
to be
an
important
professor
or, as we would
a
He
always
felt himself
more of a
learner than
and was
driven
by
no
"need to instruct
others"
(SB,
p. 70).
teacher, he wrote, With its meager to

of
tal enrollment of about 150 students

well
in 1871, the
of
University
Basle
might
have
suited
Overbeck's
skeptical and
questioning, but reserved, intellec

with
tual temper as well as the

suited
University
Berlin,
its thousands
of students,
the proselytizing Treitschke. In suggesting that the circumstances in Germany around 1870 were unfavor able to Overbeck's criticaj stance toward the modern ideas of his time, while those of Basle
meant were perhaps
uniquely
not an
favorable,
we
have
yet
to define
what
he
by
"modern."
only is the "der in English,
range of
easy thing for a non-German to do. Not terms designating modernity ("das "die ModModerne,"
This is
erne,"
Modernismus,"
"die
Modemitat")
somewhat wider
in German than
not
only does Overbeck's
criticism of
the modern encompass an
apparently contradictory commitment to it, but the concept of modernity is in itself a peculiarly loaded one in German culture, as the debates surrounding
it
to which there
have been important
recent contributions what
by
Habermas
and
Blumenberg
critics
attest.
understood
by
In many "the
respects
its nineteenth-century German

opposite of what we understand
nowa us
modern"
days
in England,
France,
and
Arperica
is the very at least
by
it. For
it
signifies a
literary,
on
artistic, and
intellectual
"the
movement of reaction against the

world.
positivism and utilitarianism of
tire pineteenth-century bourgeois

modern"
To the
German critics,
that
"moderns"
the
other
hand,
or
meant were
such as
Flaubert
the
Baudelaire
reacting
critical
precisely those features against. At issue,

the inherent
pro and
essentially,
rights and
were a number of of
key
values of the
Enlightenment:
the progress
of
freedoms
cesses of argumentation and public
individual; debate,
confidence
and
in
rationality, the
science;
belief in democratic
and constitutional government.
Taken together these have
Antimodernism in
become
Nineteenth-Century
seems
Basle
371
are such com
so much a part of the
Anglo-French
"foreign,"
inheritance, they
monplaces of our
tradition, that it
to require a special effort on our part
and
usually
of
question
them. (Since
lation
particularly German, thinkers to Oscar Levy, who was in charge of the first English trans Nietzsche, scholars have repeatedly noted the imperviousness of the
some acquaintance with philosopher who mounted
English to the
tific and
where
the most sustained attack on the scien
democratic tradition
of the
Enlightenment.)
In
Germany, in
contrast,
absolu
from the
beginning
Enlightenment
was associated with
courtly
tism, foreign influence, French Jacobinism and Napoleonic imperialism, antiEnlightenment impulses and ideas have always been strong and the legacy itself has been curiously divided,
racy, others,
so
that
while some separated
the goal of technical,
material, and national political development from that of freedom and democ
like Nietzsche,
emphasized
the
heroically
critical aspect of pursuit of
En
lightenment thought
prerogative of an
and regarded the of
aristocracy
the spirit
uncompromising incompatible with the ideals "Was heisst risk
truth as the
of egali
tarian democracy.
Fortunately Overbeck
("What does
noulli's
modern
dealt
directly
modern?"
with
the
question
mean?") himself. Five
pages are
devoted to it in Ber
the
of some
edition
of
Overbeck's
literary
remains.
At
"the
simplification,
one could
say that Overbeck distinguishes in these pages be

"modernity,"
tween something objective:

"modernism,"
defined
as
pure phenomenon of
such,"
the relation of a human individual or even a
thing
as
with
its
present as
and
something formation of modernity that innocence through human
subjective:
results
"the sickly degeneration or de from the possession of it and from the con
defined
sciousness of that possession, the
idea
of
modernity, modernity that has lost its
self-c
consciousness and
(CK,
p. 246).
Modernity
ral,
thus seems
fairly
close to presentness, though as a
prehistorical notion
the latter is prior
to the former. As I
understand
purely tempo it then, That
there is something
"naive"
unselfconscious or
about modernity. reflected
Modernism, in
ex
contrast, is thoroughly self-conscious,

plains why,
same
"sentimental."
upon,
right.
according to Overbeck, right to call themselves 'modern', they have Most until now have made no use of it, our
Indeed
we can
"though
all ages of
human
history
have the
varying uses of this present time has made the

made
greatest.
of
say
of our time that
it
conceives
its
modernity"
(CK,
pp. 243-44).
In its
usual and most
itself mostly in terms frequent usage then,

to
the adjective
"modern"
designates
a certain rhetorical claim to modernity, the

perceive
desire
to
be
modern, a
la mode, that is, to
oneself
as and
pass
for
modern,
fashionable,
up-to-date.
Contrasting
the treatment of Greek religion
by
his friend Erwin Rohde, on the one hand, and gist Ulrich von Wilamowitz-Mollendorff, on
that
where
by
the
eminent classical philolo
the other, Overbeck points out

naive,"
Rohde is "freethinking,
antique, classical, and sense, that is to say,

.
Wilamowitz
"rolls his
that
eyes and
is
modern
in
an unpleasant
.
in the
sense
he is involved,
romantic, sentimental,
(CK,
p.
193). Speak-
372
Interpretation
in bombastic
a and quasi-prophetic
of of pieties
ing
always
tones,
so that
he
gives
the
impres
sion of
being
"theologian
paganism,"
classical philologist who

"Modern"
is full
Wilamowitz is the very type of "the in the modern (CK, p. 194).

manner"
thus appears to mean for Overbeck a self-conscious

substitution of masks and survival at
and, from
life,"
his
point of
view, decadent
images for "real
a willingness
to purchase historical
was
the expense of truth or authentic
naturally thinking chiefly of modern Christianity, which, according to him, tries to deck itself out with up-to-date culture and worldliness in order to pass itself off as scholarly and scientific (see CK, p.
a
ity. As
theologian, he
242),
which
has lost the
courage
to set itself uncompromisingly,
anachronisti-
cally, and in
most unmodem
fashion, in
opposition to the world and to
history,
pp.
but instead
modern
strains
every
of
nerve to permit those that profess

with a good conscience
it to
p.
also
enjoy the
"blessings
culture"
(CK,
99;
CHT,
54-55)> and which is willing to ensure itself a place in the world order by be coming the handmaiden of politics. In general, then, to Overbeck as a theolo signified the adaptation of Christianity, which he claimed is al gian,
"modern"
ways
fundamentally
a
unworldly, to the world, the subordination
of
Christian
optimism
unworldliness or otherworldliness to a
and
thoroughly
modern
historical
belief in
worldly future, the

success
sacrifice of
immediate
religious experience to
the
historical
needs
institutions. Overbeck's antimodernism, it to be acknowledged, implies a negative view of the historical in general
of religious
historical survival, in particular. Politics ap brokerage corrupting by which ideals are accommodated to historical interests, and live convictions turned into manageable and commu
and of
politics,
as the means of
pears as a corrupt and
nicable concepts.
This
view
is
French Jansenists, for
whom with
not only close to that of the seventeenth-century Overbeck had considerable admiration, it is also
disturbingly consonant litically reactionary

George Mosse
nate
ideas
expressed more
crudely
us
by
some of the po studies

of
"volkish"
ideologists familiar to
"Jesuitism,"
from the
and
Fritz Stern.
for instance,
also serves to
desig
the alleged compromises and corruptions of the modern
in the
work of
from the
Houston Stewart Chamberlain. Like Nietzsche, Overbeck kept his distance popular ideologies of his day, and in particular from the increasingly Though he
was
virulent anti-Semitism of the time.

of particular
critical,
as was
Nietzsche,
of
features both
on
of
early Jewish
culture
line
"legalism"
(notably
the
influence
Pau
early
Christianity)
and of modern
Jewish
culture
(notably
its
alleged close association with modern
"demiculture"), he
in
J. Mobius
was
utterly contemp
tuous of the
contemporary
with
anti-Semitic movement
nothing
with
to
do
vol.
it. (See letter to P

203).
of
Germany and would have of 21-22 July 1902, Over
beckiana,
politics
1,
p.
Nevertheless,
the modern
serve as
a
the volkish critics
should perhaps
the common ground Overbeck shares in particular, contempt for rhetoric and warning that he himself requires to be
treated
with circumspection as well as sympathy. of
In this connection, it is
the
worth of the
recalling that the disparagement
the political
by
French Jansenists
Antimodernism in
seventeenth
Nineteenth-Century
at
Basle
373
most admired
century
least
a
by
those whom
Overbeck
was
double-edged. It
produced
radical
demystification
of political
authority, a
significant erosion of
respect; but it also led to political passivity and resigna to be a major support of established political
tion,
which
in the
end proved
power.
Theologians,
as we
especially, are in
Overbeck's
eyes the great champions of
the
modern, since the
heart
of
their task is to make it possible for religion
which,
aor even antihistorical to live a histor essentially ical existence in the historical world. Because it is intimately bound up with and impossible enterprise of mediating be modernism, with the impure
saw, he
regarded as
tween
the
world
of
myth
and
the
world
of
philosophical
and
historical from
reflection, between spontaneous religious experience, which
is
unconscious of
history,
and
calculated, practical, and historical
interests, theology
elicits
Overbeck the striking designation, "the Satan of (CK, p. 13). "That has always been modern and for that reason always been the be has theology
trayer of
religion"
Christianity
217;
is
one of
the
declares in the Afterword to his
Overbeck key arguments of my little Christianity of Our Present-Day Theology For these "traitors to the both true
cause that
book,"
(CHT,
are to
p.
see also
CK,
p.
245).
they
defend"
(CK,
p.
236),
who corrupt
religion and
true
culture
(worldly
not
culture)
find insults
by trying to create enough. They are

religion
a monstrous amalgam of
the two, he can

and
"panderers coupling
Christianity"
Christianity
p.
the
world"
(CK,
p.
273), "the Figaros
of
(CK,
274), "old
washer
women
ter"
drowning
p.
(CK,
are
253).
in the endlessly flowing stream of their chat Neither authentic Christians nor authentic men of culture,
us
for
they
"Christians
to
relation
by observance, but never simple Christians or men whose Christianity is simple and unequivocal; rather servants of Christian
very
existence supposes the existence of a world alongside and out
ity,
side
whose
Christianity"
(CK,
p.
273).
of
correspondingly only
"people
men
who are enthusiastic
And if they are only demi-Christians, they are that is, demiculture, "Philistines of about culture but have no vocation for it, would
culture"
like to be cultured, but

extent
are attached to culture
for
sake." appearances'
only half-heartedly So their culture is "culture with

not
and a
to some
con
bad
that
science,"
and
for that
reason
it has
been to
culture's advantage
they
have
supported
it. On the contrary,

subjection of
what might appear
to be the greatest tri

greatest
misf
umph of
culture, its
religion, is "in reality its
(CK,
pp. 270-71).
As if
all
that were
not
enough, we are told that theologians are "craven wor

forms,"
shipers of power
and
in
all
its
the first "to
swear
homage to temporal
ends"
power
to seek its
protection
in
order
to pursue their own phrase, are
(CK,
p. 242).
All
theologians, in Overbeck's pithy ism is Christianity that has become

"the
absurd
Jesuits, in the
(CK,
religion
sense that
"Jesuit
pp.
124)
and pursues
under
idea
of
imposing
the Christian
on
the world
the the
culture"
explicitly
sanctified guise of modern
(CK,
p.
125).
In this
sense
374
Interpretation
of theology has to be regarded as a thoroughly interconfessional phe as it already was for the (CK, p. 276). For Jesuitical turns out to be
word
Jesuitism
nomenon
simply another seventeenth-century Jansenists Just as according to Overbeck

"historical" "modern"
for
modern.
time,"
means
"subject to
so,
fashion"
then,
since
means
"subject to the
mode or
to
(CK,
timeless
244-45).
And
the
for Overbeck true
Christianity is,
or rather was,
in the
sense
that,
being
exclusively
was
oriented
toward the imminent end of the

averse
world and
return of
Christ, it
tory
has
the very idea of

neither more nor
fundamentally Christianity
"modern"
from is
all worldliness and all
his
an
absurdity, something that

hat."
less
meaning and value than a "modern

possesses
"Even if the
modem
world
world around us
believes that it
we who are
Christianity, it is
around
sane
in
our
something eternal in this judgment and the
'modern'
us,
with
its talk
of modern and
historical
or
"stew"
Christianity
as
things to be
taken seriously, that is
not."
Whether Catholic
ing
gradually
reduced
to nothing in the
Protestant, Christianity is be of this modernism (CK, pp.

religion, Overbeck's goal are, and to
245, 277).
In
was
"modernizing"
stark contrast
to the project of
to emphasize
how far
apart religion and modern secular culture
keep
them apart. "These grapes are too high

when
for
reach,"
you
to
he
warned
Treitschke
the latter began to
try
to place religion
in the
service of
his
nationalist politics
(Letter
of 1
November 1875, Overbeckiana,
vol.
1, p. 119).
He therefore
regarded with skepticism and

or even
distaste
all
efforts,
such as
those of
much whose
David Strauss
Paul Lagarde,
new religions.
with
whom cult
he
the
otherwise
had
in common, to found
"The
'universal'
of
most enthusiastic prophet
has been discovered in but only

a
critic"
our soberest
artifact"
(that is,
Strauss)
(CHT,
p.
is
no
"true
religion"
"mental
(Gedankending)
to denomina
universities
1 19).
But Lagarde's
plan
to confine traditional
theology
tional seminaries and

and to act as
introduce
a new
theology
he
noted
to
be taught in the
the forerunner of a future "German

"Theologies,"
religion"
also seemed always
highly
dubious to Overbeck.
their religions;
gious
drily, "have
followed
in fact, the more energetic and unquestioned the original reli impulse, the longer it took before a theology made its appearance. That a theology should precede a religion is unheard of, and it is scarcely to be ex
pected
that something of that

can
kind
could
happen in the
of what
future"
(CHT,
belongs
p.
129).
There In
be
"programming"
no rational
by
its
nature
to a to
tally different
order of experience.
conciliatory and compromising efforts of modernism to maintain a comforting sense of historical continuity by adapting the new to the old and the old to the new, Overbeck's is radical and revolution ary, closer in certain respects to that of the Modernes of the early Enlighten ment in France. It requires acknowledgment of the gulf that separates past and
"modernity"
opposition to the
present,
recognition of the
fact that the
Christianity
of
the nineteenth century is

religion of
something entirely different from the world-denying
two thousand
Antimodernism in
years
Nineteenth-Century
is
Basle
375
which
before,
and that
to the modern nations
Christianity "in the by no means only

form in
p.
age"
form in
a which
it has
come same
down
time a
religion"
but "at the
culture,"
in fact "the
embalmed
classical
antiquity has been

most so-called genuine an
transmitted to our own

modern minds are
(CHT,
22), that
in
a word
equally far
removed
from
genuine
Christianity,
tiquity,
and genuine modernity. as it originally Feuerbach once man,

was
Christianity
modern
wrote.
has disappeared from the everyday world of Reduced to a religion for Sundays, it has
centered on
"nothing
of sition
to do with a
life
now
entirely
man, dominated
stands
by
a sense
history,
and motivated
by
drive
toward the
future. It
in
stark oppo
to our world of fire and life insurance companies, railways and locomo
museums
tives,
and
galleries, military and professional schools, theatres and
natural
history
he
collections"
(Wesen des Christentums [Leipzig, 1883], "You
p.
32;
cf.
CK,
in
once
p. 26).
Overbeck
applied
accepted
this diagnosis fully. To be modern in the sense

call yourselves
which
the term to himself
modem
he
exclaimed; "I am even more so! What else should I be but
thoroughly
modern"
(CK,
p.
292)
meant
to acknowledge
of
honestly
(CK,
p.
that the renunciation,
otherworldliness, and eschatology

with
the early Christians were irreconcilable
the "future
more
orientation"
of solutions
the present time
66). It
meant not
look
of
ing
any
for
on the
basis
of the
Bible (capable
now
"only
awakening
prophets of new and others
erals, orthodox,
debates among lib religions") p. (CK, 77), but understanding instead that "old
or of theological
religious problems
have
now
to be considered
on
an
entirely
new
basis
ultimately
gion,"
perhaps at
the expense of what has hitherto been thought

circumstances
of as reli
and
that this rethinking should in no
and one would
like
to underline this point a hundred times

a substitute
be
and
accompanied
by
an effort
to "find
for this thing (i.e. religion) up

with
by
means of rhetorical
conjuring
tricks come
name of
some still-undefined new construction clothed

p.
in the
old
religion"
(CK,
270).
truly
It
new, to be willing to "take
To be truly a leap into the
modern meant
air"
to be ready
for the
in
order
to
move
forward. owning
passage
meant
resisting the temptation to settle for the instead

of struggling to create a
"Philistine"
comfort of
a past culture
live
one.
In
striking
Overbeck
tered
compares the situation of modern man with that of the original

choice
Chris
en
tians. For neither could there be any

upon
but to
pursue
the path already
into the
unknown.
At the
point where we
have been brought
by
all our efforts, all our

we are
thinking
and
imagining,
despair
we are so anxious and
dissatisfied that
renounce all
further
striving.
But it is in
vain.
ready to turn around and in The choice is no longer ours.
Our defection from the
old and our

.
from Hebrews 6, 4-8. option but to press on further,

who were once what
away from it are irreparable, as we learn There is nothing for it: having come so far, we have no
falling
and
however
one
looks
at
it, "it is impossible for

an
those
enlightened"
or
for
those who have probed into the darkness to throw
away
they have
once tasted of without
becoming
"earth
which
beareth
376
Interpretation
briers."
only thorns and least expect to receive

sure that adinaton
If
our
new
away has truly extinguished all light, we can illumination by turning back and we can be all the more
falling
it
can
only lie
ahead of us.
We find
ourselves placed
before the
same
[impossibility]
as
the early Christians
(SB,
p.
166).
Though Overbeck's
"volkish"
antimodernism
has
more
in
common with
late Romantic
was
ideologies than
one would
like, he
always
insisted that he
was not
him
self
modern; except that the modernity he espoused

revolutionary. with
incomprehension"
shamefaced, but
radical, uncompromising, and
"uneasiness
and
This is probably the source of the which his work was received by his
student
contemporaries
(CHT,
p.
158).
His former fellow

a position
Carl Holsten who,

as professor of
like Overbeck himself, had found

ology
at
in Switzerland,
"Naturally,"
the
Bern, probably
in
most of
expressed
the feelings that Overbeck's
Christianity
aroused
his
"liberal"
old
friends.
Holsten wrote, "it
must cause me
pain,
deep
a
pain, that you have to attack the liberal pastors and

new
theologians who are working to shape the
'view of
life'
conciliatory way into

make
practical
worldview more
for the
people.
gradually and in a Your book will

is"
their position significantly
difficult than it already
(Overbecki
and
ana, vol. 1, p. 100).

no
To Overbeck, however, the truth was not negotiable desire for comforting compromises could find a way around it.
not advocate an all-out war against
Nevertheless, Overbeck did
Christianity.
Though many contemporaries were outraged ing, he himself contended that his intention
truth
by
the aggressiveness of his writ
was
only to
promote
the cause of
always
by
presenting the issues as
trenchantly
as possible.
Moreover, he
thought of himself as writing for other scholars, not for a large public. Far
from trying to engage in a campaign to sway public opinion, he was convinced that a bitter struggle to root out Christianity would only serve to keep obsolete
feuds,
mine
passions,
and ways of
thinking
alive,
when
they
ought rather to
be
al
lowed to die for it that
off naturally.
It
was more prudent and more effective
to under
an end
p.
Christianity
would
slowly by peaceful scholarly labor, and so "prepare do it more honor and entail fewer perils for (CK,
us"
69).
Bachofen's
too carried out
position was
an
strikingly
close
in many
respects to
and
Overbeck's. He
he too denounced culture, unrelenting it for its inauthenticity. As a theologian, Overbeck focused his attack on mod
critique of modern
ern
theology
and modern
theologians
salon
chief
Adolf Harnack, "the
professor,"
supreme
among them his erstwhile friend the "protestant the
abbe,"
"smug
the
bourgeois"
(like Nietzsche in the

who was
second
Unzeitgemdsse, Overbeck
the well-being
master of the
University,"
uses
French
word
satisfait),
and
"happy
with
provided
by
pp.
the present
day
Reich"
who,
as
"theological
wil
wig"
lingly
served as
"principal friseur
at modern
of
His Majesty's theological

and modern philologists
(CK,
chief
199, 208, 209). As
a classical philologist and student of ancient
law, Bachofen
among
directed his barbs
philology
Antimodernism in
them Harnack's
Nineteenth-Century
and colleague at
Basle
311
of
friend
the
University
with
whom
Berlin
and
at
the
Royal Prussian Academy, Theodor

once entertained
Mommsen,
but
whom
he had likewise
decently
collegial relations
he
now castigated as a
"modern Berlin
emptyhead,"
the
"very
model of a modern
fashionable thinker,
a man who expresses

within
openly
and
unreservedly everything
men
that the age conceals
itself (GW,
to
vol.
io, letters 143, 150).

theologians are
or of
According
incapable
to
of
religion
Overbeck,
demiculture, Philistines
honest
support either
understanding
or
to culture and,
giving in their
wholehearted and efforts
to reconcile and combine the
two,
both. According to Bachofen, the new philologists, under influence, have completely misunderstood and misrepresented the culture of antiquity since they have no feeling at all for what he claims was its very life, namely its foundation in myth and religion. Instead they trace every
corruptors of
Mommsen's
thing back "to

ism."
the pet ideas of the shallowest modern Prussian salon liberal
In Mommsen's
highly
successful
Roman
of
History (1854-56) everything
turns on "imports and exports, the
balance
and
free
ports, navigation acts,
factories is
trade, investment, competition, emporia, as if that was the only point

and evaluate
of view
from
which
it is
possible
to consider
the
lives
of peoples.
This 'practical
admired
view'
point of
even carried over
for their 'clear

liberalism"
rationalism,'
law is
considered
into religion, the Romans are from the perspective of

barriers is
seen as a tri
land
and personal
credit, the
and
elimination of customs scholars who are not
umph of
those
sufficiently
advanced to
ap
preciate such arguments are
dismissed
as persons with whom

age"
it is
a waste of
time to carry on a discussion. "The entire
modern
its obstinate, overbearing, vacuous, Prussian ted in Mommsen's book (GW. vol. 10, letter 143).
"with
all
demagogy"
according to Bachofen, is concentra
If, for Overbeck,

religion
the
religion of
the early Christians has become a culture
in the hands
of modern
has been
transformed
by
theologians, genuine antiquity, for Bachofen, the liberal German philologists into an ideological
nation-state or a
support of the modern sional pedantry.
imperialist
bloodless
object of profes (schulmeis-
terri) the
great
Like the dwarfs they are, modern scholars texts of antiquity in order to reduce them to their
from them
the
whatever might
"edit"
own
petty di
mensions and remove
disturb their
own
certainties;
by
their
labors they debase
magnificent myths of
the past and degrade a
he
roic spirit that
they
cannot comprehend.
As
always with
Bachofen,
Basle
and
the political
and economic conservatism of the well-to-do
burgher
of
his
hostility
property
settle
to Jacobin-inspired
criticism
of and
large
concentrations
of wealth
and
glimmers through the
lexicon
imagery
of
his
attack on modern philological of the earliest
criticism of the ancient sources. ments
Here he is writing
Greek
in the Peloponnese:
have
often
The mighty into a mass
building
blocks
of
the
gigantic old walls
been broken down
of smaller shaped stones
in
order
to
make
them
available
for
new
proj-
378
ects.
Interpretation
They
for
proved
too mighty
for
the small and weak race of men that now wanted to
use them.
great
Homer
met with a similar
fate. Gigantic figure that he was, he his
was too
and
mortals as
they
now
are, was therefore shorn of
individuality
in
a
dis
solved
into
a collective
idea
which could
be
offered
for
with
sale
quantity
of
of small within
lots, like
reach of
a great
property
after
the
owner
has died,
the aim
putting it
the
feeble
resources of
poverty (Griechische Reise [hereafter

p.
GR],
ed.
Georg
Schmidt [Heidelberg: Richard Weissbach, 1927],

as
in).
For Bachofen,
which
for Overbeck, the

from the
essential
thing is
of
the "massive
abyss"
old,"
"divides the
new
the irremediable
no
fact that "between
our
present time and ancient times there pp.
is
conscio
190-91).
Every
attempt
to get round this abyss,

point
continuity instead thinking, is
(GR,
of
acknowledging
it
as
as the
only
possible
starting
for
our
rejected
faith"
by Bachofen,
for
new an
it
was
by Overbeck,
of
with scorn.
What Strauss's "new
represented
Overbeck, is
Kingdom
enormous
represented
for Bachofen
by
"today's Bavarian Greece [the

1832 under
.
Greece
established
by
the
Great Powers in
Otto I], full
contradiction,
at once ridiculous and repellent.
people
of
ditions
uniforms and con impetuous energy has been decked out in Bavarian of the most primitive kind have been prettied up in the taste of the deca dent monarchies of the nineteenth (GR, p. 161; see also p. 213). The
century"
servants'
Greeks
nineteenth-century Greece were separated only by their re ligion: in their ignorance of antiquity and their indifference to it, they were
and
Turks
of
alike,
with with
and at equal
least honest.
"They
and
passed
by
the relics of the
famous
of
old
days
forgetfulness
as
incuriosity."
The
modern
kingdom
Greece,
Athens
the
ous or authentic
its Wittelsbach monarchs, is thus not a spontane historical phenomenon but the grotesque product of the ^'schol
capital of
West"
(GR, p. 192). arly enthusiasm of the Germanic The philologists, in other words, have done the same job
the theologians
did, according
"modern"
to
Overbeck,
at
on
on antiquity that Christianity. And in both cases
the criticism of the

mass culture of and alleged
is
the same time a criticism of the so-called
cheap
newspapers and the popular of
press,
of
the democratization
of
vulgarization
learning,
and of
the transformation
literature
into
commodity produced with an eye constantly on the market. Modern learning, it is claimed, no longer has anything to do with genuine culture: orga
a
nized on the model of an gree of and
division
of
labor,
and a
specialization,
industrial enterprise, it is characterized by a high de a massive increase in scholarly production, writing, deliberate cultivation of notoriety and publicity, but a
not conform
firm ban
p.
on whatever
does
to established ideas
204 [Afterword to the 1903

almost as
edition]).
(CK, p. 233; CHT, Overbeck ridicules Harnack's "Vielfor

that
fashion,"
schreiberei"
of
the philologists.
frequently as Bachofen expresses his contempt "Personally motivated research is no longer in

"To
pass
Bachofen
tion
observed sarcastically.
of
for
a scholar of and
talent one has to

and no
blow the trumpet
today's fashionable leaders
tone-setters
vol.
devia
from the
royal
Prussian line is
permitted"
(GW,
10, letter
244).
To
Antimodernism in
Nineteenth-Century
the
scholar's part
Basle
379
religious
Bachofen, in
required a
contrast, philology was a calling in an almost

on
sense; it
dedication
that had nothing to do with publicity
everything to do with his own culture and education. Like Bachofen and Overbeck both kept their distance from the modern Burckhardt, return to Basle in 1858, as is well known, Burckhardt market. After his culture
and publication and
stopped
publishing his
work and
devoted himself exclusively to his university

public
teaching, to the education of his fellow citizens through

the
exchange of
lectures,
and
to
ideas
jor
works were either
friends in his correspondence; Bachofen s unpublished or printed in ridiculously small editions,

with close
ma
vir
tually for a small circle of associates; Overbeck wrote exclusively for learned journals and would have nothing to do with efforts to reach a wider readership. from The alienation of Northern (in particular modern German) scholars
the culture
they
purport
to interpret is highlighted
by
Bachofen through
and club
re
peated allusions
to the Platonic cave,
hyperborean mists,
the poor, artificial

men,"
light
of oil
lamps. The Prussian
scholars are around
"smoking
for
he writes,
without
"bunglers
books"
and rationalists
moving
in their
"With
rooms"
smoke-filled
naturally "ever coming to any
insight"
correct
"history
is
not to
be found in
(GW,
vol.
10, letters 264,
199).
all their
ceed
only in getting to the
point where
they
can peer out
scholarship they suc from a remote forgot

see also
antiquity"
ten corner at the grand spectacle of

54)-
(GW, letter 18;
GR,
p.
plained whom
What chiefly obstructs the vision of the German scholars, Bachofen ex in a letter to Lewis Morgan, the great American anthropologist with he
entertained an active correspondence toward the end of
his life
an
and
of
whose portrait
hung
in
in
a place of
honor in Bachofen's study, is

are represented
idea
a
Bildung
or culture
which
the Greeks and Romans
"as
kind
in any circumstances to be compared with barbarian peo an idea that must in any case have been to (GW, vol. 10, letter 304) an invented "so-called tally unacceptable to the deeply Christian Bachofen (sogenannte Classicitdt), which is in fact a product of our culture,
of elect who are not
ples" classicism"
is a product of modern way that Overbeck's times and has little if anything to do with the faith of the early Christians. Above all, the insight into antiquity is blocked by their desire to read the old in terms of the new and the new in terms of the old, so that they can
in the
"culture-Christianity"
same
Germans'
present themselves as the modern classical

tians"
Greeks
or
Romans
and
impart the
prestige of
just as the modern "culture-Chris antiquity to their new Empire Bisthe of heirs seen as the want to be early Christians. As there is a marckian Christianity, in short, so there is a Bismarckian antiquity. In several letters Bachofen attacks Adolf Kiesseling, a German scholar who had been
as professor of classical philology.
make
brought to Basle
the
as
'miserable'
"As
true bootlicker of
virtue,'
Mommsen's he liked to
Roman
the scourge of; the
fun
of
Brutus, 'that
the
as a
model of
to scoff at to
present
'ridiculous'
patriciate and
Stoics,
Tiberius
school-
Junkers, Tacitus
liar,
Suetonius
as a pinkie
380
Interpretation
administrative machine of
Republic"
master, and to praise the to the free strength of the
the Empire as far superior

212).
was
left Basle in back

of
response
to a call
at
io, letter Bachofen to Hamburg,
(GW,
vol.
When
Kiessling
to see the
was
happy
him. "He
not
age,"
stood
the peak of the
he
wrote
and this
a
definitely
licker
word,
of
a compliment!
"was
fanatical Bismarck supporter,

a
boot
a
Mommsen,
was painted
an admirer of
Tiberius,
disparager
of
Christianity, in
a
he
in
modernity"
all
the colors of
(GW,
vol.
10, letter 258).
The true task

mode.
of the classical
scholar,
however, is
not
to be modern or
of what
no
la
It is
not
to modernize,
as vol.
but to
show
"the difference
to Morgan in his
has been
once and what atic
is
now,"
Bachofen
wrote
longer idiom
"In
order to
English (GW,
10, letter 308;
see also
letters
63
and 322).
trace our steps back to the time of the ancient
Greeks,"
in his
120).
account of
his
journey
to
Greece,
"we
must
he had already declared first lose (GR, p.
ourselves"
The
core of
the
conflict
between Bachofen
and
the German philologists was

and classical culture,
the latter's
commitment
to a harmonization of
Christianity
religion and worldliness,
in
which
religion, in Bachofen's view, as
in Over
un
beck's, had necessarily

derscored the capacity
yielded
to culture.
Bachofen, in
contrast, constantly
and
irreconcilability longing
of
"Bildungsclassicitat"
of this
"Hellenomania"
religion, the in
vol.
of aesthetic culture and modern
(GW,
6,
p.
8)
to
"satisfy
nating
the eternal
the human
soul"
(GR,
p. 53).
Instead
of subordi
religion
to culture, he subordinated classical culture to religion,

manner of
by
em
phasizing in the
Zoega
and
Creuzer the
religious significance of
the
ancient myths and their central place
nean, officially repudiated relation
in Greek culture, as well as the between Greek culture and the

century, still
meant
subterra
"maternal"
Orient (which, in the early the lands of the Bible).
nineteenth
in the first instance
Ultimately,
ical
the consequence,
for the
author
himself,
of
Bachofen's philolog
away
not
ancient
antimodernism was to
be
an
increasingly
pronounced shift
from
progressive or narrative an autonomous
history, but
even
from the idea that
only his
tory is
of
field
of
study, toward the comparative study
of myth and
all
enduring, long-term
of
social
structures, toward anthropology, and above
toward the study

can as well as
kinship
and
relations
in
all
Greek
Roman. In this
respect
early societies, African and Ameri he followed a route similar to he forsook

narratives of political
that taken
by
his
compatriot
Burckhardt
when
history
for
cross-sectional synchronic accounts of cultural
history,
such as the
Civilization of
the
Renaissance in Italy.
Bachofen thus
deal Both
Overbeck
and
shared a good
of common ground.
mounted vigorous attacks on the condition of their chosen profession and on
the practice of their colleagues. If

theology,"
Overbeck
Bachofen
claimed
it
was
argued strongly for a "new critical "high time for German classical scholar
on
ship to
pursue a new course and
lead
historiography
to a
different
track
from
Antimodernism in
the one
Nineteenth-Century
with
Basic
381
Niebuhr"
it has followed
smug
self-satisfaction since
(GW,
vol.
io, letter 63). Both
men claimed
that the studied
indifference,
was
or at
best bewil
hav
of
derment,
with which
their
work was received wisdom
in
Germany
due
to their
ing
challenged
the received
of their
time, disturbed the
routines
their
increasingly
put
professionalized
object of
guilds, and exposed the
efforts of
their col
leagues to
the
their
study
Christianity
in Overbeck's case, antiq

and
in the service of contemporary culture uity in Bachofen's liberalism and nationalism. For both, the ancient world of
was separated
the
politics of
myth
and religion world with
by
an unbridgeable gulf
from the
modern
bourgeois
its belief in
scribed
"progress"
and
its
pursuit of
historical
success.
Finally, both de
themselves as exiles or
GW,
tiny
of
vol.
hermits in the contemporary world (Bachofen: letter Overbeck: 10, 322; SB, p. 152). But both accepted their des
without demur, declining every form of activism, not out they claimed laziness, pusillanimity or indifference, but out of a kind of historical fatal ism, because they were convinced of the futility of all efforts to either avert or precipitate the inevitable, and because it was impossible for them to intervene
in
public
debate
without
the Vielschreiberei
Yet there
are also
becoming party to the culture-business denounced and despised. they significant differences between the two men. In the end,
themselves
Overbeck
some of
was an
the immigrant professors
isolated figure in the closely knit society of Basle. Unlike Wilhelm Wackernagel, for instance, in
Germanic philology, or Carl Steffenson in philosophy, both of whom married into distinguished Basle families he never struck roots in Basle, had little
sense of
belonging,
and no
loyalty
As
or obligation except
his intense, limitless
commitment to truthfulness.
a consequence of
the
all
freedom he
else, it
valued so
highly
as philosophical
that, perhaps, he thought of rather than political. Above
that
is,
not
prejudices.
and
the opportunity to make free and honest judgments free, presuppositions and from but from inner external constraints only was "irrepa The "defection from the old, the falling away from
meant
it,"
rable,"
in
disenchanted
world
the genuinely modern,
free individual
must
leam to do
on
without all traditional supports.
"Whoever
stands
truly
and
firmly
his
nothi
own two
no
feet in the
speak of
must
world must
have the
courage
to stand on
he may
can
longer
God, least
be
able
of all rediscover
without
God in himself. "The

. .
thorough
individualist
as a
to do
God.
Only
without
God free
he live
free individual. If he
it has
cannot not
bid farewell to God,
either
his in
dividualism is
dom"
not genuine or
developed to its fullest
point of
(CK,
p.
286).
The
radicalism of
Overbeck's thinking
of
sets
him
worlds apart
from the
pious
and conservative
Bachofen. The
most memorable aspect of
Bachofen's
work
is
his his
enthusiasm
for "the antiquity
and
for the lost

world prior
world of
myth,
passionate and poetic evocation of an
Edenic
to
paternal
law
and paternal
so-called Mother-Right. property rights, a world governed by the the wealthy and with either to Yet Bachofen never came close breaking
enter-
382
Interpretation
prising Basle bourgeoisie to which he belonged or with orthodox Christianity. He remained committed to the Law of the Father and while he sang the praises
of communal
life, he
never sacrificed
the individual.
regarded
In
faCt,
the
individual
of virtu
plays a vital role
in Bachofen's thinking. He
attempt
the socialist
doctrines
his
day
as
regressive; the
to
return
to a
bygone (that is, for him,
ally prelapsarian) social order in modern conditions could only produce a new and terrible barbarism. "In all ages whatever is truly great was the work of in
dividuals"
(GR,
p.
in).
In Bachofen's
the communal
and there
woman or receive
worldview
(as in many
the
represents
other
it is the individual is
who represents
spiritual
nineteenth-century worldviews), (also the masculine) principle,
or popular
that
the material (or
feminine)
principle,
no question about
the
proper relation of
these two principles. Like to
matter, the people
prepares
itself
by
a slow process of maturation
the seed that, like divine grace,

accomplished
will awaken
it to
higher
spiritual
life.
This awakening is
rather perhaps as
by
life
the
hero,
the genius, the great
individual,
immi
the
old medieval
Basle
of guilds and artisans was awakened
to new and vigorous economic

grated
by
the enterprising capitalists who
to it in the early
modem
period,
bringing
both
new
money
and new
ideas, and who founded the city's leading families: the Bernoullis, the Burckhardts, the Debarys, the Legrands, the Paravicinis, the Passavants, the Vondermiihlls, and the Bachofens themselves
the heroic bourgeois of Basle.
The lent
preparation of the soil
may last
the
untold millenia. of nature.
The
peaceful
labor is like the
si
uniform operation of all
forces
The
work goes period
the same way
for thousands
of years.
For that reason, this
has
forward in exactly no history.

. .
And
and
so the remote
therefore
no
Pelasgian early age of the land of Argos knows no development history. A history begins only with the arrival of Danaus. It is he,
who
the stranger
royal
from Egypt, fortress, and brings

p.
founds
to the
a ruling dynasty, builds up high Larissa as his land the beginnings of culture and artificial irrigation
(GR,
169).
Yet this hero is

sense.
no
modem, critically-minded individualist in Overbeck's
He himself belongs
as
'
fully
to the world of myth, and as
his
mother s
son,
peo
that
ple
is
the son of the earth, represents the great forces of nature, or the
man,"
(GR,
17).
p.
1 19-21).
"Every
a child of
according to Bachofen, "is
a product of
his soil,
1,
p.
a son of
his time,
the customs of his
motherla
(GW,
vol.
to the people
modern
The King, the Savior, is indeed "prior to the City, the ruler is prior But he is no independent, autonomous, (GW, vol. 1, p. individual: he "stands in the middle, between the mortals and the im
277)."
mortals;
on one
side, he
represents
his
people
before the throne (GW.

vol.
of
Zeus the
p.
highest,
on
the other he rules over it as

of
Zeus's
deputy"
1,
282).
As the "product
his
soil,"
the son of an earthly and carnal mother and at the
Antimodernism in
same
Nineteenth-Century
worlds and
Basle
383
the hero is a Christ-like
second consecration of and
particular
time the representative of "Zeus the
highest,"
mediator
between two
the instrument of a
of the a
the community.
In Bachofen's
or
view
polis,
individuals but only

vol.
families (magistrates
"higher"
patricians) play
"higher"
leading
role,
as mediators of
ideas
and agents of are
purposes
(GW,
i,
pp.
35, 38-39,
nature, and
55-56, 313).
community community
are
They inseparably
only be
themselves part of a totality, in
which
God,
linked (GR,
or
pp.
119-20,
199-205).
Though the
can
raised above
itself
and transfigured still
through the media
tion of an extraordinary
ground of all
figure
hero, it is
of
the enduring, encompassing
human
existence.
In terms
of
the great families was due to the skill
local Basle history, the well-being and enterprise of outstanding individu
als, the prosperity of the little city-state itself to the skill and enterprise of refu
gees and mains
immigrants from
other
the object of
and
individual lives
Bachofen
lands: it is the commonweal, however, that re and gives them meaning. "The destinies of in the
great
families
states,"
wrote
1854
autobiographical
letter
not
to his teacher
Savigny (usually
other"
referred
to as the
Selbstbiographie), "are
uber
fulfilled in
one after
ed.
one
lifetime, but through
an entire series of generations

und
following
the
(Selbstbiographie
Antrittsrede
Alfred Bauemler [Halle/Saale: Max Niemeyer, 1927],
p.
das Naturrecht, 25). It is the indi

also
vidual's
duty
to respect and prolong
tradition,
and tradition
is
the
principal
basis of authority and social order (GW, vol. 8, p. 494). "Tradition and discipline are correlates. You cannot have one without the other. Where
tion is
honored"
social
tradi
not
and
Bachofen
means
by
1,
that where the

of
individual has
"you
what
emancipated
himself from every constraining law

discipline"
the community
find there is
also no
(GW,
vol.
p.
45).
Piety,
respect
for
transcends the individual

of all political wisdom and
constitutes the "content religion, in other words the firmest basis for the flowering and happiness of
vol.
commonwealth"
a great
(GW,
1,
p.
33).
The individual, in the
sense of
individual person, the individual group within the community (for example the as distinct from the magistrates and patricians), or the immediate
the
"people"
present
ways yield to the totality.
(as distinct from the historical continuity of the community) must al For Bachofen the freedom of the individual and the
"isolation that
the
are
inevitably
it,"
accompanies
which
Overbeck believed
could
be
point of a new morality and a new wisdom (see CK, pp. 286-87), only symptoms of decline and min. Even Burckhardt could acknowledge that "along with its many dark
starting
sides"
his
own age
had
some advantages,
of
openness to an
immense variety
according to
notably its "enormous different cultures and

was
recepti
and artistic
styles.
The
nineteenth century, velopment of art
history
al.
at
history as a University of Basle,
uniquely favorable to the de discipline (Introduction to his lecture cycle on art
Burckhardt,
1890,
1874-
Gesamtausgabe,
13,
p.
ed.
Emil Diirr
et
[Stuttgart, Leipzig, Berlin,
1929-34],
vol.
23).
Bachofen's
conser-
384
Interpretation
possibility
with of
vatism excludes the could

never
any
positive attitude
to his own culture. He
have said,
Overbeck,
was
that
what
always
inspired him
and
"binds him to the dom. He liberate
century"
present
the century's striving to achieve
free
could never
humanity
where
have considered, as Overbeck did, that his task was to from all forms of deisdaemonia (CK, pp. xix, 290). On the
claimed
contrary,
Overbeck
that a future
humanity
of
would
leam to live
when
without religion,
Bachofen dreamed nostalgically
bygone times
human
life
was permeated
by
religion.
Overbeck's highest
nition of
values were the was
individual
and freedom and
limits to these begins
intended only to
community
protect them
his recog from destruction.

criticism of
Bachofen's highest
the
modem
values were
and order.
Overbeck's
embracing of it; what he criticizes in the new faiths and the new ideologies is in in in the Hamack, modem, Strauss,
with an unreserved
their
failure
to go the whole way, their
half-heartedness,
and at
their compromises.
The
strength of
his desire to "pursue truth

155), the
never
the same time avoid cyni
cism"
(SB,
p.
complete mle out or
absence of
which
he in fact
had,
any nostalgia for a lost past, for him the temptation to seek consolation
all-too-sober
for the
miseries of
the time
for the
truth
in
esthetic dream-
images. In Bachofen's work,
on the other
hand,
the
the evocation and representa

remote
tion of a glorious elsewhere, supposedly discovered in the

most
past, but
of
al
certainly
as
associated
in his
mind
as
with
with
old
Biedermeier Basle
to the modem
his
youth, has a consoling as well
respect
a critical
function,
cient
with
Bachofen himself
often acknowledged.
The
vanished world of an
Greek civilization, he once wrote, in which "man the forces and all the phenomena of nature was
. .
walked
hand in hand
to the
so much closer
beginnings
gin of all of
of
human kind, had

. . .
far keener
consciousness of the common ori
things
and stood
in
friendly
and respectful relation
to the powers
the entire
universe."
For the
pioneer
mythologist,
as
for Overbeck, "our de

The disen
fection from the
old and our
falling
away from it
irreparable."
are
chanted modem world will never recover the relation to nature and to the
of
Gods
the ages of myth. "But as memories of youth shed a golden glow over age,
so can the spiritual riches of
that ancient
world shed a
last beneficial ray
of
light
on
the colorless desert of our
world"
(GR,
pp. 54-55).
compatriot
Bachofen found
several occasions
to voice his criticism of his
life for different conditions, which he believed had existed in the past, easily led to a kind of exoticism, an aesthetic pleasure in the spectacle of antiq uity, a flight into fantasy. The present reality of aesthetic experience provided
aestheticism.
with
Burckhardt's
But
him, too,
unhappiness with
modern
and
longing
consolation
reality. gust
for
In
the misery of present social reality and the loss of a better past letter to his friend Meyer-Ochsner he told of being in Paris on Au
14, 1864.
Antimodernism in
It
was
Nineteenth-Century
national
Basle
[to
385
Italian
campaign).
the
day
before Napoleon's
holiday
celebrate the
The
crowds seethed and
heaved in the
streets to the point that
I longed to be back
among the
perial
peasants and the snows of seemed
brilliance
to
me.
Aeschi. How pathetically mediocre all that im But 1 had the Campana Museum, and so in the year
1864, I was
188).
able
to spend many a
day
among the Etruscans (GW,
vol.
10, letter
And
so criticism
and
discontent
ended
in
pleasure and enjoyment.
Bachofen
even acknowledged
enjoyment.
that the pastness of the past
facilitates
such pleasure and
Ruins
and
desolation,
reality.
of
which offer no resistance
to the
imagination,
louder to
are preferable to
living
"The
relics of past greatness speak
heart
cannot
cited
mind than the glory presently existing wealth and power, and I believe that Corinth in the days of its greatest prosperity would have ex my expectations more than the little city of today with its two thousand
and
souls and
its
houses"
poor wooden of
(GR,
p.
68).
was
This kind
Romantic
longing
and compensation
firmly
resisted
by
Overbeck,
only in its
and with
prose,"
it the tendency to aestheticism. "I have been a dreamer he once said of himself (SB, p. 109). His language has none of
the greatest possible honesty.
radicalism was tempered
the enchantment of Bachofen's. Its power lies rather in its refusal of all poetry,
austere commitment to
Nevertheless, Overbeck's
alism
"provisional"
that was curiously compatible with the
by an legendary irony
anti-Romantic re and caution of
his
home. While asserting the freedom and autonomy of the modem individual, he also emphasized that limits are placed on all human, and in par
ticular on all individual endeavor. "Man did not create the conditions of exis
and
tence,
em
he
cannot alter them.

pp.
Certainly
is
no not
idea
can alter them
for
mod
man"
(CK,
and
. . .
280-81).
The
universe
the product of our thinking.
Pessimism
optimism, "rejection
defensible.
For that
reason man
world than to acknowledge relevance of

also
it
and
it are equally has nothing higher or better to do with the accept it as it is, and to let the idea of the ir
of the world and adoration of
his judgment
165).
of
it
sink
thoroughly into his
mind"
(CK,
p.
29;
see
SB,
p.
Realism, Overbeck
explained, "is the
effort to
rationally from within its humanly understood course, try to "place ourselves beyond the world in our
world
it,"
boundaries."
grasp the We can, of

than we
efforts
to understand
but it is
not obvious
our
that this has
yielded more
satisfactory
results
can get
by "keeping
limits."
thinking
within
worldly
not partic
end of
The early Christians could disregard these limits because they did ipate in our rational, critical, and historical culture, but believed the
world was at
the
hand. To the degree that
we
"of the
age"
present real
no
longer
share
that
belief,
a
the attempt to transgress the boundaries of the

that
transforms man
into
that
"Lebenskiinstler"
is to say, it
as
produces an aestheticist subjectivism
makes our relation
to
life,
Kierkegaard
also
held, thoroughly
inauthen-
386
tic.
Interpretation
of the
With his idea

victim
superman, Overbeck claimed, even
Nietzsche had
class,"
fallen
to the Philistine idealism which, because of the close connection
between
modem
individualism
and
"the
educated
German
middle
had
always attached to individualism and which Nietzsche

combatted and
himself had persistently

transformed
an
(CK,
p.
287).
For if reality is
will
not made or
philosophies, if nothing was ever created "either
by
idea
or
by theories by a
idea
could.
word,"
then
. .
"the idea
of an
idea
be
even
less
able to achieve what no

will not
What heroes
p.
could not
do, hero-worship
aphorism,
also
accomplish"
(CK,
as
281).
Nietzsche's
use of
which
intimately
related to
his
individualism,
writing
and
certainly Overbeck acutely perceives comes in for criticism. The truth

more
. .
communicated
in
aphoristic were
would
appreciated, if time
taken,
be "more securely and given, to found it carefully. Damocles

which
simply The pos
sibility
one
of
contradiction, that to
sword of
hangs
than
over whatever
tries
found
or
demonstrate, is less dangerous

lacks
a real
the
congenital
infirmity
with which whatever
foundation
enters
the world, how
ever meteoric and ual relies on
lightning
his
p.
own power more
bright that entry may be. In aphorism, the individ than is permitted him for his activity in the
are achieved
world"
(CK,
not through
283).
Great things
only.
only through individuals, but

place
individuals
"The individual has to find his

will
in the
world.
If it
comes
to a conflict, it is the individual who

modem
bear the
of
cost.
These
are
p.
truths that
287)/
individualism is
often
in danger
forgetting"
(CK,
Overbeck's curiously modern antimodernism comes close at times to being indistinguishable from a kind of conservatism that could not have been dis
pleasing to those in the Basle elite who had already been unexpectedly gratified by his attack on liberal theology. Since David Strauss's so-called modem reli for human suffering, but only abstract meta physical ideas, since it is vastly inferior with respect to its social and ethical teachings to traditional Christian doctrines, such as those of Augustine (CHT,
gion offers no genuine consolation
it has nothing to propose but a disguised egoism which in fact even its leaves every human being as isolated and abandoned as before champions acknowledge that it "could only be a religion for the middle
p.
115),
since
class"
(CHT,
p.
119)
"there is
reason,"
no
Overbeck suggests, "to

us cast off the
share
of
the haste
and ruthlessness with which
it
would
have
p.
bonds
speaks
that the old
faith
he
provided"
(CHT,
118).
Overbeck
almost
community like a
Basler
when
recalls the value of
community
structures and
beliefs:
Today in
classes of
particular, when the nations are
becoming
ever stranger
to
each and
other, the
society threaten to become ever

suffer
more opposed and
hostile,
individuals
that
themselves
not
from
based
on material
indifference to every form of community it is of inestimable value that at least the advantage,
a
disquieting
is
appella-
Antimodernism in
"Christian"
Nineteenth-Century
hover
which
Basle
fateful
387
scene of
tion of
should
over this entire
dissolution, like
pp.
kind
of categorical
imperative, by
perhaps
it
stands condemned
(CHT,
1 18-19).
One
ought not
to
forget it
the advice given to his

own
landlady by
the profes
sor of
theology,
who wrote of was
his
first
year of
theological study at
Leipzig
that all
he
got out of
the
loss
of what still remained of she could
the faith of his told Anna
childhood
(SB,
p.
122).
The best thing
do, Overbeck
since
Baumann, was to not bring happiness;

recommend
continue as
believing
as
for the
them
might
works of
could, strongly his fellow lodger Nietzsche, he did

vol.
as she
doubt does
not
that
she read
(Overbeckiana,
be
I,
p.
192).
number of
factors
and
adduced to account
for the differences be belonged to

a
tween
Bachofen
was
Overbeck,
the native son and the immigrant: generation
Bachofen
twenty-five years older than
Overbeck
and still was
the Romantic generation; education and career

classical
Bachofen
jurist
and
scholar,
who
had been
raised on
the ideals of Humboldtian
neohuman-
ism
was
and embittered
by
the revelation of their
trained as a theologian and

as a
Church historian; from

one of
impracticality, whereas Overbeck social background, standing

the wealthiest and most promi
and expectations
nent merchant
young
man
families in the city
where
he
was
bom
role
and
lived his
entire
life,
Bachofen had
fully
expected
throughout his life remained

of
in his community and play leading intensely interested in politics, despite the failure
to
a
came
that expectation, whereas Overbeck

whose
from
class
family many bled into theology as the most obvious entry into professional life, and, having realized that he was not cut out to be a pastor, can never have expected to have
migrations rendered
had
relatively modest middle it virtually rootless, stum
anything
em
other
than an academic career. On the basis
of
Bemdt Moeller's
con
troversial thesis about the different turn taken
by
the Reformation
in the
north-
German kingdoms
and principalities, where relations
between
cities of
church and
southwest-
state were always troubled and ambiguous, and

em
in the free
and
Germany and Switzerland, where religion seen as intimately connected, one might also be
difference in
emphasis
tempted to
community were always investigate whether

was most
between the German Lutheran tradition that

all
familiar to Overbeck, notably its persistent suspicion of and the Swiss Reformed tradition, in which Bachofen
also
institutionalization,
raised,
might not
was
have
contributed
to divergences
in
outlook
and
sensibility in the two
scholars.5
In the end, however, one differences. Both Bachofen

which
of
must and
be
stmck more
stood
by
in
the similarities than the

a no man's
Overbeck
nor go
land, from
the pieties
of a new
they
could neither go
neither
back
forward.6
Both
challenged
their time, but
was
ready to lead
crusade
on
behalf
worldview or world order.
As the
theologian of a
deus absconditus, Overbeck
388
Interpretation
an
kept rattling the spoon in the bowl to show that it was empty, to borrow age Gunther Anders once used of Kafka. He left the working out of
worldview no
im
a new
to future
generations.
Bachofen
was a man of renunciation.
For him
too, way back was possible, and he looked on the way forward with grim foreboding. Bachofen's ambiguities allowed his work to be exploited by the
most
there
widely divergent groups, on the left as well as the extreme right, and is enough uncertainty about Overbeck's final meaning to have permitted his work to be interpreted by Karl Barth, for instance as a challenge or
provocation to
Christianity
rather neither
than an out-and-out
scholar could
rejection of
it.7
be properly "at any where, but if there was any city in Europe that they could feel a certain affinity always a place of transit and Spedition (trans with, it probably was Basle
As transitional figures,
shipment or
home"
forwarding),
neither
French
with
nor
German
nor even
unequivocally
Swiss but
something of all three, economically even but daring, progressive, culturally and, for most of the century, politically conservative. One cannot help reflecting that while Nietzsche could not settle in
a so-called
Dreilanderecke
Basle but left it in 1879 for

madness, both Bachofen
a career of
wandering that
ended a
decade later in days in the
and
Overbeck
remained to the end of their
city Nietzsche
ills"
finally
came to think of as
"the unhappy
breeding
ground of all
my
(Letter to Overbeck,
May
3,
1879).
NOTES
1.
See See
also
Heinrich
von
Treitschkes Briefe,
von
ed.
Max Cornelius (Leipzig, 1914-20),

und
vol. 3, p.
375, letter
2.
of 28 on
October
19.
1873.
this point Alfred

p.
Martin, Nietzsche
Burckhardt,
der
2nd ed.
(Munich: Ernst
Reinhardt, 1942),
3.
See
also
"Die Grundgesetze der

of
Volkerentwicklung
drive toward
ever
Historiographie,"
und
GW,
vol.
6,
pp. 416-18.
On the idea
relation of alleged
history
as a
higher spirituality,
see
p. 431.
4.
5.
On the On the
individual
and species
(Gattung),
CK,
pp. 280-81.
the Swiss and Gerd Mohn, 1962)
difference between North German Lutheranism and the Reformed tradition of South German cities, see Bemdt Moeller, Reichstadt und Reformation (Gutersloh:
and
"Deutschland im Zeitalter der

und
Reformation"
in Deutsch Geschichte,
Calvinism: 1541-1715, ed. Minna Prestwich (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1985), 368-90; Hans Baron, "Calvinist Republicanism and its historical Church Historv, 8 (1939), pp. 30-42; Ernst Troeltsch, Social Teachings of the Christian Churches, trans. Olive Wyon (London: George Allen and Unwin, 1931), vol. 2, pp. 590-92 et passim. On the debate around Moellcrs
tional
roots,"
Ruprecht, 1985) pp. 68-69, 90-93. On the greater social content of the reformed doctrines of Bucer, Zwingli, and Calvin, as compared with Luther, see also Wilhelm Pauck, The Heritage of the Reformation, new ed. (Chicago: The Free Press, 1961), especially ch. 5 ("Luther and [orig. 1929]; Herbert Luthy, "Variations on a Theme in Interna by
Butzer"
Weber,"
(Gottingen: Vandenhoek
thesis, see Steven E. Ozment, The Reformation and Univ. Press, 1975), pp. 7-9 ("Trends in Reformation
the
Cities (New Haven

and
and
London: Yale
Research"),
Kaspar
von
Reformation: Stand (1985), pp. 6-63.

und
Greyerz, "Stadt
76
und
Aufgaben der
Forschung,"
Archiv fur Reformationsgeschichte
Antimodernism in
6. On Overbeck
und
Nineteenth-Century
Ubergangs,"
Basle
389
Mythos
as
"Denker des
see
Arie Nabrings, "Theologie

36
zwischen pp.
Reflexion. Franz Overbecks

7.
Diagnose,"
Theologische Zeitschrift,
(1980)
266-X5.
the
pt.
of Bachofen, see my Orpheus philologus: Bachofen versus Mommsen on of Antiquity (Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society, 1983 [Transactions, vol. 73, 5]), pp. 1-7, and "Basle. Bachofen and the Critique of Modernity in the Second Half of the
On interpretations
Study
Nineteenth
esp. pp.
Century,"
138-40.
Journal of the Warburg For divergent interpretations
and of
Overbeck,
and pp.
Courtauld Institutes, 47 (1984), pp. 136-85, see for example, Karl Barth, "Unset
tled Questions for

trans.
Theology
Today,"
in his
Theology
Church, Shorter Writings 1920-28,
58-73 (originally a review of Over beck's Christentum und Cultur [19 19]); Hans Schindler, Barth und Overbeck: ein Beitrag zur Gen esis der dialektischen Theologie im Lichte der gegenwdrtigen theologischen Situation (Gotha:
Louise P. Smith (London: S.C.M. Press, 1962),
Klotz,
1936);
and
John Elbert Wilson, "Die Zweideutigkeit in Franz Overbecks Aussagen iiber

40
sein
Unglauben,"
Theologische Zeitschrift,
(1984)
pp. 211-20.
Love
and
Leslie G. Rubin
Duquesne
University
This brief essay is intended to shed light on the significance of one of the many colorful episodes in Xenophon's Education of Cyrus. I have chosen to
examine
the passages relating to Panthea, reputed the most beautiful woman in for various reasons. Aside from the charm of her story and the nobility of Asia, her deeds (Higgins, p. 53), Panthea sparks one of only two dialogues of a
philosophic
nature
in the
work
discussion between Cyms
and
his friend
Araspas concerning the effects of erotic longing on the human soul. Next, this discussion of love turns out to be related in a significant fashion to the other
philosophic
interlude, in
which
Cyms
and
his friend Tigranes discuss fear
and
its capacity to make intransigent men malleable and arrogant men discreet. Third, while I cannot define precisely the role of these discussions in his over all teaching without producing a thorough interpretation of Xenophon's epic, I
will present some speculations on political scheme.
the place of
Cyms'
reflections on
Cyms'
love in his
capture of
The discussion for
and events
that follow from

over
Panthea
Cyms'
provide a metaphor
hold
his
massive
army
and empire.
In the end,
however, Panthea's story is just

the
Cyms'
as much an actual experiment political subjects.
in
capturing holding loyalty By exploring both the metaphor and the experiment, I will suggest a way in which the dia logue on love illuminates Xenophon's political purposes, both to explain and to
and of
Cyms'
criticize
success at
wish
The issue I
to examine
most
mling (cf. Newell, 1981; Glenn). is one for which Xenophon
prepares us at the
not
beginning
mand
of
his book:
forms
of political mle
simply do
last. Cyms is
to
com
the only mler known to Xenophon and his companions the obedience of a "vast
were
who was able
nations"
number of people and cities and a
despite
knew
the
of
fact that "some

many months;
distant from him

. .
journey
him,
of
many days,
of
and others
. . .
others
had
never seen
and still others
well that
him"
are those of
they Miller; I have
never should see

altered
(I.i. 3. The translations
the Cyropaedia
them only on those occasions when his
in
de-
consistency in the use of terms renders the meaning unclear). the Cyms and the Persia here is generally agreed to be pseudo-history
This essay
was prepared
The Cyropaedia
for
presentation at
the
meetings of
the American Political Science As
sociation under the auspices of the
Wayne Ambler
in Washington, DC, August, and Gary D. Glenn,

reviewer
Society for Greek Political Thought, North American Chapter, 1986. I am grateful to those present at the panel, especially Profs.
as well as
to Charles T.
revision.
Rubin, W. John Coats, Jr.,
and
this
journal's
for
comments
helpful in its final
interpretation,
Spring 1989,
Vol.
16, No. 3
392
scribed
Interpretation
did
not exist.
Yet, in
the
form
of a
historical-biographical
speculation
account of
Cyms the Great, Xenophon

conqueror's
moral
works
out a vivid
on
the renowned
training in Persia and Media and his career empire. What made a vast variety of peoples subduing and mling this large mle desirable and thus vir willing to be mled by a stranger? What made digression on erotic love, sparked by Panthea's apparent The irresistible? tually
and practical
Cyms'
presence
answer
in
Cyms'
camp, turns
out
to be
an excellent place
to begin to find the
to these
questions.
In the
episodes to
be
examined most
Cyms'
thoroughly, Xenophon
seems to
digress
from his primary focus, present a discussion of love
empire and
building
When
and
leadership
qualities, to
its
power.
we
join the
narrative with the

as
Panthea story, Cyms has been sociated with the Persia mled
gence of all mled
educated
in both
an austere
gentlemanliness,
of
by
by possibility desires through tyrannical monarchy, associated with the Media his grandfather. He has begun the conquest of a vast empire by sub
and the
his father,
the
indul
duing
a revolt
in
tributary kingdom, Armenia,

context, the story of
a
and
advancing
on Assyrianand
held territory. In
experiences of modem p. viii).
Cyms'
such a
friend, Araspas,
his
love has
decidedly
characterization of the
Cyropaedia
humorous aspect, according well with the as an historical romance (Miller,

The issue is this:
presents a
Cyms'
will
argue,
however,
Cyms'
that these episodes are not tangential, but crucial

enterprise. yet
to the understanding of
abilities as a
unfavorable
leader
and mler are

Cyms'
obvious,
mle at
Xenophon
decidedly
evaluation of a practical one
the end of his book. Some argue that his failure is
that he neglected to educate
his
sons
properly for assuming
the throne. I believe

cipled reason
that, on the contrary, the Panthea for rejecting method of mle. Newell (1981, passim; 1983, pp. 900-905) looks
Cyms'
episodes uncover a prin
at
Panthea
as significant
to an understanding
Cyms'
of
mle
by
representing the highest is

cmcial to
aspirations
for
the beautiful and the noble among

cannot allow to
Cyms'
subordinates, aspirations that Cyrus
be fulfilled. The
or
erotic
Newell's analysis, but love
not
in the
same way I have found
toward the same end as in the analysis to follow.
no place
in the first half he
of the
Cyropaedia in
which
or
things erotic are mentioned. Though there are many references to

to
Cyms'
desire
befriend
almost everyone
meets and to
his
close
familial ties, his

Cyrus'
prepara
tions to undertake an ambitious
With the
point.
exception of
military his mother, women

aloof
career are
foremost in the homosexual
narrative.
hardly
figure in
of
life up to this
activities
new
He keeps
innocently
from innuendoes
and,
shortly after his dialogue with Araspas, he refuses the offer daughter in marriage (I. iv. 27-28; V.ii. 7- 12. The use of the
of a
ally's
word erotikos at pp.
III.iii.12, has, therefore,

Newell, 1983,
produce a
p.
special
significance.
See infra,
at this point
399, 401;
should and
895). It is, thus, full-blown theory of the
all
the more
interesting
that Cyrus
effects of
love
in his life
Love
then
and

absolutely
correct.
393
the subject, but
be
proven
He has clearly
to young
men.
contemplated
perhaps not
in
a manner common
THE PANTHEA EPISODE
begins in Book V, should be placed in context. To ward the end of Book IV, as a result of the first major engagement with his pri mary enemy, the Assyrian army, Cyms has acquired a bountiful booty. Most of it he appears to distribute to his army, most of that to the non-Persians, in
Panthea's story,
which
hopes
of
retaining the
loyalty
is
of
these
men.
He directs that the

show gratitude
Cyms'
spoils
be
so
di
vided as appease
to reward and satisfy his allies, to
to the gods, and to uncle, and, up

curious that
Cyaxares,
who
king
of the
Medes,
peevish
to this point, his

Cyms'
greatest source of supplies
(IV. v. 38-54). It is
general principle of yet
rewarding the
and
most valiant
is
not mentioned
here,
it
cannot
apply only to Persians (III. iii. 6-8). Rather the principle at work
the Median cavalry
will
here is to tmst that the Hyrcanians

spoils
ms'
divide the
prize orders.
equitably and leave something for the Persians. The Medes choose before they select prize, showing disobedience to
Cyaxares'
Cy
val
Cyms'
He does not, however,
object
to the selection (IV.vi.i 1). This most

refuses
uable and glorious prize
he keeps, but
to touch or
even
to examine.
Aside from adding luster to his growing fame, it proves to be quite useful to him in prosecuting his military campaign. Thus Book IV ends with the King of Assyria dead and many of the Assyri
ans and their
allies,
as well as
their camp and most of their supplies, captured.

who
Cyms
gains a new
ally,
Gobryas,
desires
vengeance on
the new Assyrian
king. Book V
opens with a
relatively
prowess
peaceful scene: upon request,
Cyms
pres
ents a musician to one of

might consider
Cyaxares'
associates,
not as a reward which
the latter
in battle, but explicitly as a favor from Cyms. In return, the Mede declares he would be more eager to follow Cyms to his due for
war
than to remain at home. Cyms here cultivates gratitude,
combined with
the
enchantment of the musician's art, to create a tie
between himself
and
his fol
lowers. Cyms has previously tried

and
to
incur the
gratitude of
his fellow Persians

generosity,
their allies, to
even
the allies
gained
by force, by
various acts of
vi.
in
order
cement their
loyalty
to him (I. iv. 2, 10-13, 26;
24; Il.i. 21;
iv.io;
IILi. 28-31; ii. 12-26; iii.4-5; IV. iv. Cf. Farber, 508-509). There are two po tential dangers in this ploy: either the Mede could become so enchanted with the music-girl, that is, with the pleasures of peacetime, that he could withdraw
from
warlike activities altogether raise
or,
continually satisfy all his

them. As
his demands for
prizes.
tiring of this diversion, the Mede could Nonetheless, Cyms seems anxious to
generous and acts
associates
that he is most
consistently to
please
long
as the gift of a musician suffices
for this purpose, he
will give
it.
394
Interpretation
next calls
Cyms
prize,
in Araspas
and asks
him to take
charge of
woman
his
most valuable
she
"who
was said
to be the most beautiful
in
Asia,"
Panthea,
appar grandfa
the wife of Abradatas of Susa (IV.vi.i i; V.i. 2-3).
Araspas,
Mede,
his
ently became
friend
of
of
Cyrus
as a
during
the time Cyms spent with

returned
ther, the
King
gift
Media,
boy. When Cyrus
to his
homeland to
very fond
complete the mandated education of a

robe a
Persian gentleman, he
whom
gave a sumptuous
was
from his
grandfather
to someone of
he
(espazeto) (I.iv.26). At
the recipient
of
that point in the narrative, Xenophon did not

more of
identify
the gift. We are told nothing

until
him
we
do
not even
learn his
name
the
earlier
story is
of
recalled
in the
episode of
Panthea. It his
rela
is, therefore, impossible tionship

no
with
Araspas'
to
gain evidence of
character or of
Cyms independent
the ensuing events. It is as if Araspas has
life independent
as
ferred to
much
Cyrus'
of his relationship with Cyms. Araspas is repeatedly re in his conversation with Cyms, but he cannot be "the young younger in age than Cyms. Perhaps the description refers to his naivete?
man"
request plete
to care for the beautiful Panthea
might seem
to indicate com
tmst in his friend. This interpretation becomes
implausible, however,
when we
leam
most
Cyms'
view of
the effects of attending to this prize on even the
strongest,
Cyras'
dedicated
soul.
Though his tme
motives are never made

will
fully
explicit, the results of giving Araspas this assignment

of of
indicate something
thoughts
on
this occasion, for he will never react with surprise to any
Araspas'
actions.
It
seems
that Araspas cannot believe that Cyms proposes this task for him.
Cyms has
tured
not seen
Panthea,
give
while
Araspas
was a member of
the party that cap
her. He tries to
Cyms her
some sense of physical
the
beauty
of this woman.
He
focuses his
own attention on
beauty, but
the description of the cir

.
cumstances of
her capture also reveals the beauty of her soul Though she may be merely attempting to escape detection, she appears not to be haughty, for she is dressed like her slaves, veiled, and looking at the ground when her cap
tors enter her tent. What

and
distinguishes her from her

which a
were
slaves
is her
virtue
(arete)
her
that of
her
graceful
bearing,
apparent to the virtue
beholders
without
speaking
attitude
a word or
performing
deed. Her
is feminine
virtue
(On feminine virtue, cf. Aristotle, Nic Eth, VIII. xii; Politics, I. xiii. 3-7; Ill.iv. 16- 17; Homer, Odyssey, II. 206.) She is
more
than of action.
Araspas'
crying and one of will be the prize of
a man no
company tries to comfort her by explaining that she less handsome, intelligent, or powerful than her
Far from mitigating her distress,
which
highly-honored husband,
complete
perhaps more so.
this news causes her to cry aloud and tear her clothes. (We leam later of her
devotion to her husband

be
and
his glory,
indicates
that this
in
creased anguish could
as much on account of
his disgrace
as on account of
her captivity.)
beauty
her
as revealed
Completely ignoring her distress, Araspas comments on her by her torn garments and her gestures of grief, and confirms
beautiful
mortal woman
reputation as the most
in Asia (V.i. 4-6). Perhaps
Love
and
Politics in Xenophon
Cyropaedia
pains of
395
it is because Araspas is insensitive to the

service
slavery, indeed because his
to Cyms has so far been relatively painless and has cost him no great
sacrifice, that
he does
not
understand
that this woman's
(kale) is greatly
enhanced
by
her
nonslavish reaction to
nobility her fate. (It is quite
beauty
or
striking the frequency with which kalos is so used in the Cyropaedia as to al low the ambiguity of its meaning to remain. I will translate it "beautiful or no in this account, because it is often not clear which Xenophon (or Cyms)
ble"
sees as the object of
the lover's passion.)
Cyrus
and
Araspas Debate
to
Concerning
Love
the guise of the servant to any other
Cyms, in
of
contrast
Araspas, is
commands
a man who assumes
his
people while
he
them,
and eschews servitude
master.
He her
must appreciate
Panthea's
anguish at
being
enslaved, though he dis
cusses
beauty
he
and
her
usefulness
an oath
Zeus"
to him in a rather detached manner. to

go
First,
she of
he declares to Araspas (with

and
Zeus)
that he has
now
not seen
the
woman
then that
will not
"by
to see her
"all the less if
is
say."
such as you
His first
explanation
Cyrus'
for his
self-imposed
ignorance
her
appearance reveals much about man
desires in
general:
understanding of his own soul and hu He declares that he has no time to spare from his active
gaze at
life for gazing at her, and particularly for repeatedly returning to (V.i. 8). That is, Cyms judges that the attraction of extraordinary
cause a
her
will
beauty
person, even such a strong
person as
himself,
to
neglect all other mat
ters,
all
without regard
to their importance. Cyms thus

of
reinforces
the image
evi
dent in his military deeds

the soul's
weaknesses.
his determination to
conquer
both his
enemies and
and
Though his intentions to
conquer
the Assyrians
to gain a great empire seem quite genuine, his intention to conquer erotic desire
may be merely
when
a means
to these
other ends
a means that would
be
abandoned
the ends are
achieved.
Cyms
makes no argument on principle
that erotic
or unjust. Indeed, activity or the capture of another man's wife is ignoble Cyms promises his loyal followers that his empire will provide them with the
satisfaction of
We gazing
must on
23-24). many desires (e.g., I. v. 8-13; Il.i. to notice, however, that Cyms does have an inclination
Araspas'
spend
time
or
nobility.
Panthea merely on the strength of He already exercises a strength of character

not even seen
account of
uncommon
her
to
beauty
most
men,
for he has
her
and
he feels
an attraction
to her
an attraction
detrimental to his military venture. Actually to see her, to know her, would, he be seems to believe, require a virtually impossible restraint and would, thus,
fatal to his independence.

His friend
or wishes. argues that
beauty
cannot
entrap the
to a
soul against a man's
interests
Araspas'
argument appeals
dilemma)
those
over
between those
the
reaction
to
(probably a false things that compel a response in us by nature and control. Introducing a which a human being exercises
radical
distinction
396
Interpretation
that will
become significant, Araspas observes that fire always bums human beings who touch it, while the decision to love someone is a mat
comparison
ter of individual choice. (V.i. 9-10). This distinction is very difficult to main tain in the face of actual human
action.
That
some men
love
certain
beautiful simply
nor
things and others love other beautiful things does not prove that one
chooses
the objects
a
of
his love,
as
he
chooses clothes or shoes
(V.i. 11),
does it disprove
erotic part of
largely
uncontrollable attraction cast characteristic
by
the beautiful on the
the soul. It is a
of
human life to love beautiful have

are
things. It
is
also a
function
of
human
nature
that men
some
capacity to
examples
control that
love:
religious and civil
laws
against
incest
Araspas'
(V.i.
10).
The
existence of such
attraction
laws, however, indicates
the
stroying the erotic human his

and
or
completely, either
by
self-restraint or even
difficulty in de by law,
divine.
Araspas'
Taking
argument
from the hot in
opposite
end, one could also object to
examples of the things cold
naturally
uncontrollable summer
feeling long-standing
16), has
in
winter and
civic education
in the
case of
hunger, thirst, Cyrus, building on a his Persian officers (I.ii.io-n,
by
man
(V.i.
11).
achieved such
imal
rations and even resist what we,

of nature.
discipline in the army that they remain efficient on in a highly technological age, still The
abstemious and
min refer
to as the call their

man
disciplined Persians,
with
Cyms
at
head, have
who
achieved what
not eat
Araspas,
Mede, deems impossible:
to forbid a
does
to
feel
hungry
Cyms'
(Il.i. 29; III. iii. 9; IV. ii. 38-41, 46-47;

rewards
V.ii. 17-19). On the

valor
other
hand,
for self-control, discipline, food

or other
and
in his
else
subordinates often take the

give them?
Cyms'
form
of
bodily
pleasures.
What
does he have to
Honors
and promotions are much more

again seems
limited than
his
actions.
material prizes.
twofold purpose
to influence
Cyms
Araspas'
counters
points with
the observation that people who
suffer
an erotic attraction cannot escape
tent
that,
while
they
once
deny its power, to the alarming ex believed slavery to be "a great they become
it,
cannot
evil,"
enslaved to the object of their

released
love. These
sorrowful sufferers
from their
a stronger
self-destructive
condition, but
they find
serve
that
may pray to be they are "fet
tered
iron"
by
necessity than if they had been fettered

surrender
with shackles of
They Indeed, they act to keep

12).
(V.i.
to the
beloved; they
in
the beloved blindly.
their
"masters"
power at all costs.
It is
as
if the
vic
tims
nize
of
love know slavery to be

and
evil
their condition as slavery

sort perhaps
only in an abstract sense, but do not recog perhaps because their suffering is of a differ
master
ent
because the
play the
in this
master-slave
relationship is
portrayed as reluctant to
despot,
while
the slave eagerly surrenders his
freedom.
Araspas
ert claims
that it is only the
weak who
become
enslaved and neither ex
themselves to be
wish
released nor muster the strength to

a
they
for death (V.i. 13). In
kill themselves, though he is sense, arguing that only the naturally
Love
slavish
and
Politics in
Xenophon'
Cyropaedia
397
become slaves,
while
the natural gentlemen (kaloi
kagathoi)
and
restrain
their
desires "for money

entrapment
and good
horses
and
beautiful
to
women"
limit their
by
their understanding of the
right (to dikaion),
thereby or they
to
commit suicide
(V.i.
14).
He
equates enslavement
eros with enslavement
any passion, using the desire for gain as his prime example. If people can and should be punished for theft, the law presumes that the thief has the capacity to
act otherwise. master
If
one
may
master
the desire to steal
the
desire to he has
possess a certain
a beautiful object, one may beautiful human being. Somewhat im
modestly, Araspas
mentions
himself
as
exemplifying his
enslaved to
argument:
He has
seen
Panthea
and
not
become
hopelessly
her
or to a
desire for
be
her. Rather, he is carrying on his normal military duties (V.i. 15). Cyms replies by asserting that, with time, Araspas or any man
trapped
would
by
Panthea's beauty. While Araspas

not
contrasted
love
with
fire, Cyms
touches
observes
that just as a flame may
immediately
bum the
one who
it,
it is
possible
that some time will be required for the love of a beautiful

metaphor a
or noble
object to
put one's
develop. To take the hand in

a
step further, just

the human
suffer
can
as
it is foolish to
so
fire to test its
effects on
body,
its
it is foolish
to tempt oneself
with
beauty
actions.
Through
cool observation of
while expecting not to human experience, one
consequences.
determine that
admits
pain
will result
from both
The only difference Cyms

things also
between fire
a
and
love is that beautiful
or noble
"insidiously
they bum
kindle
with
fire
even
in
those who gaze upon them from afar, so that
eros"
(V.i. 16).
This
power
to
bum,
so
to speak, at a
distance,
combined with
the capacities to
enslave even those who who as a
do
not see
know slavery to be "a great but only imagine the beautiful object,
reckoned with. speech on
evil"
and to singe those shows
beauty
or
nobility
force to be
Araspas'
After this impassioned

cepts
the dangerous
power of
passion, Cyms ac
his capacity to resist Panthea's beauty and dele gates him to take great care of her. His explanation: "... this lady may per (V.i. 17). What is haps be of very great service to us when the time Cyms up to? It is entirely possible that he is planning to use Araspas to test his theory of the power of love. Newell suggests that Cyms is testing
professions of
comes"
Araspas'
power sage
to
restrain
"physical
urges
hedonism"
(1981,
p.
160).
He
cites an earlier pas and
in
which
Cyms
his
men
to
delay
their
feasting
plundering
after
capturing the Assyrian camp for the sake of

plunder
greater pleasure
through greater
in the future. Is Araspas

Araspas'
even
implicitly
promised a greater reward
than
pur
Panthea for guarding Panthea pose would Cyms use As Xenophon's

readers
and
restraining his desires? For
what
further
power of self-restraint?
becomes completely en surely predict, Araspas prepared us to expect: he has snared by Panthea's beauty. He acts just as Cyms is conquered love (helisketo eroti) because of her physical charm as well as
by
her kalokagathia, that is, her

now that
gratitude and
Cyrus'
Xenophon
endorses
her generosity (V.i. 18). Knowing theory, we should look more deeply into
398
Interpretation
Cyms has discovered in
view
erotic attachment.
the properties
ment of
Despite his
rejected
endorse
Araspas'
Cyms'
of
love, has Xenophon completely

of
attitude?
The
pains and
degradations
slavery free
are a recurrent
theme of the
friends'
exchange:
Panthea has been bonds
enslaved and suffers great woman
anguish; Panthea is eas

noble
ily
distinguished from her
slaves as a
by
her
bearing; Cyms
compares the
of eros
to the shackles of slavery and finds them stronger
overcoming even the strongest man. Further, the service of eros is said to become such an all-encompassing enterprise that it resembles ordi it leaves no leisure time, even for what the enslaved considers nary slavery
and capable of
more
important
activities.
Despite this
treme degree of erotic
attachment
similarity to slavery, even this is deceptive, in that the enslaved does

clear condition.
ex not
recognize the tme character of
his
These themes
are played out
in
the ensuing action: Araspas is

plays a
conquered against even under
his will,
while
Panthea dis
contrasting kalokagathia it unwillingly

a
of
the circumstances of captivity. Al

no noble and good
though Araspas views servitude as a sign of weakness

man would enter
or
fail to
escape
it
when
it becomes ignoble
he is drawn into
and
degrading
his
servitude, apparently quite against his intention
in ignorance
situation.
As
a counterpoint to
the slavery theme, Cyms and Araspas also discuss the
conditions of
freedom
or
independence.
then there
If,
is
as
Araspas argues, love
can enslave
only the
weak and
ignoble,
another part of the soul that can
be
successful
in combating the
or
effects of eros.
His first formulation
suggests
that
wish, choice, or consent

one sense
(boulomenon,
combat
ethelousion), intellectual activities in

cf.
another,
can
love's influence (V.i.9-11;
IV. 2. 11;
Xenophon, Symposium, VIII. 13). If thoughtful intention fails, fear (probably of the gods) and the law, that is, external forces, must enforce resistance. Aras implication is that the noble know the right course and follow it, while the
pas'
ignorant
strength
must
be forced
by
or
threats to act rightly.
Cyms denies
soul
such act
great
in the reasoning
under
calculating
part of
any
all men
proven
thor
oughly
irrationally
the influence of love. Cyms has also
that law
or custom can
do many
unexpected
things, but he doubts that it
can counteract
the power of love.

Araspas'
second attempt to persuade
Cyms that love
can
be
conquered adds
the
element of spiritedness
to the theme of restraint

or
by
punishment.
It is
not
the
law,
as
dispassionate arbiter, but Cyms

. .
the
wronged
ishes the thief (.

stmggle on who
kai
ou sungignoskeis,
alia
party ("you") who pun kolazeis) (V.i. 13). To put the
the most
power
has the
individual level, then, Araspas speaks of the gentleman (dunatai) within himself to resist excessive desires for
It is
as
money,
horses,
and women.
if
one part of within
the man, a potent
spirited
ness, fights
another
to
keep
of the
his desires The
the bounds of "the

will
right."
Cyrus
rejects this argument as
well.
spirited part of a man as a
also succumb
eventually to the lure
beautiful, just
fire
will
eventually
cause even
Love
green
and

to
399
skepticism
wood and
burn. Events
seems to
prove
Cyms
right
in his
regarding
thumos to
overcome
Araspas,
withstand
he
the assault of
doubt the ability of even his own immense beauty. Newell states that Cyms is "able to
,
his desire
completely"
(
to the tme
1 98 1
p.
163;
cf. p.
of resistance ness
test, for he
refuses
210), but he never puts his powers to look at Panthea until her useful
has been
exhausted.
Bmell (pp. 128-131) suggests that Cyms has repressed the erotic such that his life is maimed. Afraid that his military activity and its fmits will not prove to be as attractive as Panthea's beauty, Cyms simply cuts himself off from her.
Bmell
that
argues that
Cyms'
failure to
confront the erotic
is
a significant
indication
en
he has
not given serious consideration to the goodness of

who admires
his imperial
terprise.
Xenophon,
be
beauty
and not
overcome
by
Socrates for his ability to confront physical it (Memorabilia, III. 1 1), therefore, would fault
on
Cyms for his
his incomplete understanding of the human good. As it turns out, however, it is not simply out of fear that he would succumb to her beauty that Cyms avoids Panthea it is part of a calcu
weakness which
is based
lated
her.
effort to advance
his military
advantage.
He
uses
her
and those who
love
In their
zeal
to belittle the
dignity
of eros and
to cast aspersions on those
it, Cyms and Araspas do not mention the induce ments that ensnare the lover. It should be observed, however, that the slavery of love gains much strength from its rewards or from the hope of greater re
who are preoccupied with wards
in the future. The he
enslaved
may
suffer a
sake of what
choice
considers a greater pleasure.
variety of pains, but all for the Despite the appearance of free
in this trade relationship, the two men concur that the situation is indis tinguishable from slavery. Araspas and Cyms also agree that self-destmctive
erotic relationships occur commonly.
The
nobleman,
attributes them to
the
weakness
former, because of his training as a of the lover, while the latter, less at
of
tached to noble action for its own sake, to the overwhelming power
eros,
but both
must concede that the erotic can
be
relied upon to create
strong bonds
in
most people.
contractual
hand, rarely
love
or
approaches the
loyalty
relationship or a citizenship bond, on the other and desire to benefit the other that either
friendship
can produce. much
And,
and
whereas a
friendship
as
binding
a
as erotic
love usually takes eros bums almost

woman spell
careful
cultivation
immediately
attention, Cyms that the mere description of

and
while
claims that
beautiful
tempts him away from his

of
duties,
the sight of her would probably

Cyms'
the end
his independence.
the descriptions of the
In
a similar
fashion,
intended conquests, and the possibility of men to love Cyms and his enterprise, sight unseen,
the advantages the
nobility of future rewards clearly

not an
exploits and
seduce
many
he
offers or
to desire to
of
help
a
merely to agree with admired friend. (At III. iii. 12 begin his
campaign
word erotikos
describes the desire

are
Cyms'
officers to
of conquest.
They
instmcted to instill
desire
[epithumia] for battle in their
400
Interpretation
a new
divisions. Cf. VI. ii. 21-22.) Has Cyms discovered

the
of mler
way
of
understanding
win
empire.
relationship To achieve this aim, he attempts by various methods to sonal loyalty, not only of his close advisors and lieutenants, but
to
mled?
He intends to
conquer and maintain a great
the per
entire
of
his
army and, indeed, of the conquered peoples (e.g., the Armenians and Chalde IV.iv.513, ar|d ans, Ill.ii. 12-27; tne farmers on his conquered territory, Croesus
men's ation.
He has tested the capacity of laws to control attachments, through his enforcement of the Persian standards of moder He has been zealous in associating the gods with his enterprise. He has
of
Lydia, Vll.ii. 11
14).
engendered
loyalty by
acts
refusing to accept much iii. 30-33, iv. 30-33). By his

of
generosity making splendid gifts as well as that is offered him (e.g., IILi. 33-37, 42; V.ii. 7- 12,
of
wit and
friendliness, he has
and
reinforced the appeal wisdom.
his courage, moderation, distributive justice, less, Cyms knows that the fear of punishment be
nullified
military
men or
Nonethe
by
by
gods, gratitude,
ac
and admiration can all
by
the awakening
of erotic will
desire. Cyrus him

and
curately grace himself because his

arguments to
predicts
that his
of
long-time, admiring friend

love. His
characteristic
disobey
dis
with
circumspection, coupled
leash this
effects,
sires of
most potent of
Araspas, lead me to speculate that Cyrus believes he can un forces, eros, and successfully channel its dangerous
his
own advantage. will
indeed,
his
earlier
turn them to
If he
can enlist the erotic
de
people
in his
own
service, he
The him
books
show that since childhood
be virtually unbeatable. Cyms has wanted people to like

Cyms'
and
has
acted so as
to elicit their friendship. In the earlier cases, primarily
those of his
grandfather and with more
been described
phileo
his young play-fellows, familial or friendly terms

kindness
which
relationships
of affection
have
aspazomai,
cultivated
by
acts of
incur
gratitude.
In this episode,
noble
the stakes are raised. A beautiful
woman
has been taken from her
hus
band,
come
and
Cyms
puts an old
test. As we shall see, the means
friend's capacity for self-restraint to an extreme by which Cyrus manages to elicit gratitude be
experiments with
increasingly
devious. Cyms
love's
powers
and
suc
ceeds
in predicting the enslavement of a previously quite unwilling victim. Xenophon may be outlining for us, in the character of Cyms, an understand
of
ing
the place of eros
in
political
life
an alternative
to the antagonistic rela
tionship described in Plato's Republic. Newell discusses the "intriguing but his that the Cyropaedia is Xenophon's response to torically un verifiable
tradition"
the Republic
(1981,
pp.
17-18).
or more
The texts
provide some support
for this view,

meritocracy Persia
whether taken
literally
figuratively. For example,
Cyrus'
directly
and
attacks the egalitarianism within the noble class of pre-Cyrian
the support for that meritocracy comes
well-moderated and
desires for
material satisfactions.
directly from unleashing previously Regarding the subject of love

institutions necessary
desires toward the
while
politics, Socrates attempts to describe the political
to subdue the
good of
disintegrative
effects of eros and
direct
erotic
the city in order to create the most unified city.
Cyrus,
appearing
Love
and
Politics in
Xenophon'
Cyropaedia
not
401
on
to reject erotic attachments

subjects.
himself,
have
will
insist in
such self-denial
in his
Rather, he
empire,
seems to
a method
mind of
ers of eros over a vast
to achieve a similar end

not
a unified political order
using the strong pow but extended

to direct his
can
merely
over a small polis. rather
By contriving
each
subjects'
affections
toward
himself,
than toward
other, he
de
fuse love's dangerous
effects and enhance
his
own political position.
The Results of
Cyrus'
Experiment
with
Eros
resumes
Having
Cyrus'
Araspas'
recorded
entrapment, Xenophon
his
narrative of
political and
lengthy
Cyrus'
dialogue
on
military love (Compare V.i.i
plans
just
as
if it had
with
never
been interrupted
by
this
V.i. 19). Both before
and
after,
prime concern maintain
the
loyalty
of
is to satisfy Cyaxares with the spoils of battle and to the Median officers to himself rather than to their king
to be anxious to secure the
a
(V.i. 20). Cyrus

new allies.
also continues
loyalty
of
his
various
Though
describing
battle
few
minor
battles,
much of the remainder of
Book V takes up
niques to
Cyrus'
overt efforts against of
to prepare
by
the
use of persuasive
tech
fight
a major
the Assyrians and their allies. In addition

against
to
using force and the threat against his allies, much of
force
Cyrus'
intentionally
"tools"
flatters his
men
with
the enemy and occasionally is psychological. For example, he strategy his ability to remember everyone's name,
then he assumes the role of craftsman,
using his adoring followers
as
his
en
for battle
or
to inspire courage or fear (V.iii. 46-50). As regards the
emy, Xenophon summarizes at one point: Cyms took three unnamed forts
one
by
storm
(bia),
one
by
intimidation (phobos),
one
by
persuasion
(peitho)
his
own
(V.iv. 51). A
long
passage
describes
Cyms'
successful seduction of
Cyms'
Cyaxares.
Though his
people, the
should clear
uncle
has
good reason
to be jealous
of
hold
over
Medes,
and
none
his
success
in the
field, Cyms
persuades
him that he
love Cyms
much of
the less (V.v). Without going into more

power
detail, it is
into
that
Cyms'
derives from his capacity to
charm others
acting in favor of his interests and often against their own. Book VI opens with staging a discussion among the allied leaders to be overheard by Cyaxares for the purpose of convincing him to continue the
Cyms'
war.
With his
approval secured
by
these devious means,
Cyms is free to
plan
his
next moves.
He invents
stronger, more stable, scythe-bearing chariot to

and
shred
enemy
and
men and
horses,
much with
sively
to secure as
from enemy territory

maturity.
Araspas'
he instmcts his army to forage more aggres as will be useful in the com
ing
trials. In
keeping
these preparations, the
fmit
Cyms'
of
debate
with
Araspas concerning love ripens to Xenophon now elaborates on

enamored of
plight.
He becomes
so
thoroughly
Panthea,
while she remains so
that Araspas threatens to rape

slavement a great
thoroughly faithful to her husband, her. Though he once professed to believe en

himself thoroughly
under
evil, he
places
Panthea's
power.
402 Her last
Interpretation
resort
is to
beg
Cyms for
protection.
While
another
Mede is horrified
by
Araspas'
behavior, Cyms laughs. Of

to this scene
course, he sees the to this
irony
as
Araspas'
of
predicament, but there is evidently
much more
laughter,
and
Xenophon's
to him
introduction
a
indicates: "Now, [Cyms]

Assyrian
was
wished
to send someone as
spy into Lydia to find
out what the
doing,
it
seemed
that
on
Araspas,
his
the guardian of the beautiful woman, was the proper person to go
mission"
this
(VI.i.31).
By
a
own actions and
by
Cyrus'
arrangement, Araspas has been placed in

Cyms'
very delicate position. He is so ashamed of his deeds, particularly in light of his own speeches on weakness of character, and so afraid of righteous
displeasure that he becomes completely subservient to Cyms. The appearance of a falling out with his commander thus makes Araspas a perfect candidate for dangerous spy mission. first act, after someone else makes Araspas fully aware of his wrong-doing (VI. i. 34-35), is to forgive Araspas for falling
a victim
Cyms'
to the love of the beautiful. He admits that he is himself responsible

actions an admission
for
tac
Araspas'
that,
be
of
course, detracts nothing from Aras
pas'
feelings
of shame
(Farber,
pp. 509-510). set
The
Cyms'
next of
mthless
tics for the coming battle can
now
in
motion.
In Book III,
Tigranes,
effects of of
another childhood
friend
of
Cyms,
engaged
him in
an
inquiry
of a
into the
fear
on
the human soul. He educated Cyms in the use
combination
fear
and gratitude.
First, Cyms learned

indeed"
that "fear is
heavier
of
punishment
for human beings than to be injured
(IILi. 23). Fear

who
harm, better
be
than harm
itself,
can
instill
moderation
in those
have been
brought to
should
see their genuine

reinforced
inferiority
to another,
though that moderation

uti
by
the superior's vigilance (IILi. 27). One means of
fear to the best advantage, Cyms also learned, is to incur the lizing deepest gratitude by pardoning the one who has good reason to fear punish
abject ment.
For his forgiveness
Tigranes'
of
with riches and armed
forces,
and
tleness, beauty or nobility, when Cyms has learned a

same
Tigranes'
and
father's treachery, Cyms was rewarded lauded for his wisdom, strength, gen greatness (IILi. 41). As we see in Book VI,
he
was
practical
lesson, he
shame
never
forgets it. He
uses
the
strategy on Araspas, but father due to its association

Tigranes'
Araspas'
is
even greater than that of
with erotic excess.
In the
rather
cases of
father
and
Araspas, it is
pp.
clear
that
Cyrus'
virtues,
than serving
a
some notion of manipulable
the good and noble, serve his
interests, by
creating He is
perfectly
tool
(Farber,
500-501, 511 -12). Like his
Cyms'
magnanimity,
not a
philosophic
of wisdom
inquiries
own
serve a
wholly
would
practical purpose.
lover
for its
sake, for that

of
be just
as
distract
ing
lays his
from his
out
political enterprise as
new
the love
human beauty. When Araspas

and not
his
theory
of
the soul to explain both his desire for Panthea

mission
willingness
to leave her to take on his
for Cyms, Cyms does

response:
.
take up the conversation.
His interest is in the
practical outcome of their earlier
debate
you also
Cyms was right and Araspas wrong. His only have decided to go, this is what you must do
"Well then, if
(VI.i.42).
Love
In
and

Cyms'
403
return
for
pas promises
Cyms'
to lie to his
wrath and
apparently magnanimous decision to forgive him, Aras friends and the enemy alike, to act as if he were going
over to the
planned
fleeing
emy
while
able to prosecute a
carefully
valuable
Assyrians. Under this cover, he is disinformation campaign against the en

-43).
quite useful
intelligence (VI.i.42 His espionage proves gathering to Cyms in perfecting his plan of attack for the great confrontation. father and Araspas, modus Judging from the episodes of operandi in incurring gratitude and devotion appears to have several parts.
Tigranes'
Cyms'
First, he
be any
that the
victim
allows an erotic attachment
for
forbidden
object
object other
than
himself)
ignoble
act.
to strengthen to such a
or
(which may merely degree of entrapment
lover
commits an
illegal
act.
Next, he
produces shame
in his
before he forgives the
The
greater
the shame, the greater the fear of
his
wrath and
the greater the gratitude incurred

can ask
by
forgiveness. Then,
when
he
has forgiven the act, he

preciation. others
his
victim
to do most anything to show his ap that Araspas loves him above all
Cyms may be seeking
sure proof
that even the attraction of the beautiful Panthea cannot

service of the noble
when
distract him
phase
from the
of the
put
Cyms. Predictably, Araspas fails in the first
test, but
his
shame
to use. The desire to please
is aroused, his devotion can be rekindled and the beautiful and noble Cyms and to win his fa
possess
vor prevails over the possible

once.
desire to
the beautiful and
noble
Panthea. It is
that the utility of this strategy is limited in that it

paid
would
Having
the price for his misdeeds,
would
Araspas
wants
ever
only work let himself
be trapped
pas'
again?
Or, having been deprived
of what
he
most, will Aras
devotion to Cyms last?
Love's Effect
on
the Noble Abradatas
The Araspas/Panthea
we were shown
episode
bears fmit
of
on a
different branch
as well.
As
in the description
was
her capture, Panthea had
reason
to fear
a man
world grow
the great conqueror who

more powerful
her
new master.
Cyms,
the
she was
told, is
than her
makes
powerful
husband
and
most
(V.i. 6). Cyms
ing
at
growing army from fortress to castle in pursuit of new allies, and yet he her. What can she imagine her fate to be? In the meantime,
her
a part of the
entourage
amazing in the following his

never
Cyms'
looks
friend
and
her designated her treatment

of
protector makes repeated and

Cyms'
increasingly
heated her
advances
to her. Not understanding
plan, of course, Panthea
postpones complain
ing
of
as
long
she
as she can
bear it. When her fear
of
position ri
vals
her fear
Cyms,
does
said
complain.
Very
soon
thereafter Araspas
disap
from the camp believes Cyms to have

pears
and
is
to have deserted to the Assyrians. Because she

of
saved
her from Araspas, Panthea's fear

to
Cyms turns
to gratitude.
Out
of
gratitude, she
pledges
Cyms'
bring her husband,

is,
the great Abradatas of
Susa,
her
and
his forces into She is

certain
army, that
to ally her beloved husband with
captor.
that her husband will come over to
Cyms because the
404
new
Interpretation
of
king
Assyria
once tried to
take her from her husband (VI.i.45).
Of
the
course,
what
has Cyms done, if her terror

and
not succeed
in the
same enterprise
in
which
Assyrian failed? (Cf. VI.i.47) The blocked

out
act
of
banishing
original
Araspas
seems
to
have
fury
over
her
capture.
Panthea believes
her,"
Cyms has displayed "piety, moderation, and compassion toward he has, in the process, lost a friend (VI.i.47, 45). Again, however,
parent virtues serve
and
Cyms'
that
his
short-term
to his
own glory.
They
his
do
not
ap interests in prosecuting the war and adding aim at the noble for its own sake (Farber, pp.
erotic
501-502).
risked
Indeed, he has
sacrificed
nothing
ally,
by
actions.
nothing but he has gained Rather,

of
Cyms'
entanglement,
and
a valuable
spy
and a pow
erful new
while
Abradatas does
(VI.i.48). The bond
trayed
come which
his enemy indeed offer to be
depriving
Abradatas'
services.
"friend,
ally"
servant,
and
por
of
love between Panthea

be
and
her husband is vividly
by
is
the scene of their meeting after a
long
absence
during
which each
had
to believe
they
would
separated
responsible
for
Abradatas'
forever. Indeed, it is this erotic bond willingness to ally with Cyms. First, he is
a past attempt
ill-disposed to the
new
king
of
Assyria for
to
steal
his
wife.
Then, he is full
of gratitude
to Cyms for protecting his wife from outrage and
for arranging their reunion (VI.i.47). His political decisions are dictated by his love for Panthea, a predicament Cyms has studiously avoided. Cyms has seen
the dangers
is, therefore, eminently prepared he falls prey to them. Abradatas and Panthea, on the other hand, become another example in eyes of love's self-destructive consequences. As we saw in experience demon case,
of such erotic entanglements and when
to exploit Abradatas
Cyms'
Araspas'
Abradatas'
strates
the
difficulty
of
for Panthea
will consume
achieving independence from him entirely.
desired
object.
His love
As the time of the

pleted.
Cyms'
great
While thr reports

men
battle approaches, of Indian spies regarding the
Araspas'
service to
Cyrus is
com
enemy's preparations put
into
panic, he uses his powers
of persuasion and charm
to calm
them with promises of greater rewards than

sessment of the
they have
in their
yet seen and with an as
improvements he has
made
own readiness.
The
armies
begin to
march
toward each other. Araspas returns from his spy

armies are
before the two
to
meet.
Cyms
makes
highly
before his bodyguard

on
and close advisors.
shortly praising Araspas Araspas then provides vital in

a point of
mission
enemy troop strength, order of battle, and battle plans. Cyms places him at the head of a wing in the post of muriarch or general. We never hear of Araspas again. If he is rewarded for his work, as Cyms promised (at
Vl.ii. 16), Xenophon
promotion to
separated
formation
gives no particular account of

official post under
it. Perhaps his Cyrus. He is,

at
reward
is
muriarch, the highest
any rate,
from his beloved
by
the
that his
this
reward consists of what
summoning of Abradatas, so it is doubtful he desires most of all. Perhaps he is killed in

his
contribu
battle, but Cyms
makes no more public acknowledgement of
tion to its success.
Love
and
Politics in
fate is
Xenophon'
Cyropaedia
plans
405 battle. Last to be

suggests as
Abradatas'
sealed when
Cyms
his
order of
signed places
in the battlelines
are the three chariot
forces. Cyms
that
the three commanders

will
draw lots to determine
whose one
hundred
charioteers
take the position against the center of the enemy phalanx. This method is
striking, for
might most
Cyms rarely leaves

test of
Cyms'
such questions
to chance. In
response
to
what
be
officers'
courage, Abradatas
and
volunteers
to take the
him."
dangerous
Cyms'
position
in the battle
Cyms is insist
said
to have "admired
The Persian (and

wins
chariot commanders
refuse and
to yield the most honorable position

on
admiration) voluntarily,
the place in any case.
evidence
drawing lots,
but Abradatas
As
that love affects both

we are shown
men and women
scribed
to
Araspas,
Panthea's
gifts
in the way Cyms de to her husband on the eve of
battle. She has

Abradatas. In
spent all
she owns to
have
a golden suit of armor made
for
spite of
knowing
appear
that her actions conflict with

will
her interest in
keeping
battle,
wishes
her husband alive, that is, he

wants
very
likely
she
him to
to others as glorious as he
and
be killed in the coming appears to her
(VI.iv.3). She
considers
his nobility
enemy.
his
beauty
to be
inseparable,
and she
to add to them, target for the
though surely this armor makes him an even more
prominent spur
His disgrace
would
him to the
most valiant
acts, particularly in
gratitude
be her own, so she must to Cyms (VI.iv.6-
9)-
Moments before the battle begins, Cyms
gives
his final instmctions to Abra

recklessness.
datas, encouraging him

his
new
to
bravery,
and perhaps
to
Cyms
reminds
ally that he wanted this forward position and that the Persians will
be
watching his
of
the post he has
bearing in battle, won by chance. Cyms

against
suggesting that he must prove himself worthy

also promises
that the Persians will
support
his
maneuvers
the enemy.
will
They
engage
in boastful banter,
Abradatas'
Abradatas
claiming that
his forces
be fine but he fears for the flanks, Cyms

task
present charges
merci
claiming he will set the enemy's flanks in flight so quickly that will be lightened. In the process, Cyms suggests that he will himself be
Abradatas'
to reinforce
charge
with
(Vll.i.
16
17).
In the event, Abradatas

Cyms'
into the
fray
abandon, mshing forward and whipping his horses

attack
lessly. He times his

so successful
in
accordance with
orders, but he is
initially
in his scythe-bearing chariot that he finds himself in the midst of the Egyptian forces thrown from his chariot. No amount of valor can save him from this hopeless
Abradatas'
situation.
Only
at
this
point are
the Persians said to reinforce
Was Cyms merely delayed by the exigencies of battle or did Cyms give Abradatas false indications of his intent to back him up? It is im boast possible to determine intent, but it is obvious at least that clear tendency to be excessively fearless in battle. spurs on
attack.
Cyms' Cyms'
ing
Abradatas'
In
interpreting
Abradatas up rious rival for honor
drawing of lots, Newell (1981) suggests that Cyms sets from the beginning to be killed, in order to eliminate the only se
the
and
its
rewards
remaining in Asia. This
speculation
is
406
plausible
Interpretation
in light
of what we
have
Cyms'
seen of
character, though there
is lit
a
tle positive evidence to support it.
At the very least, Cyms has discovered

Abradatas'
by bringing him
means
which
to nullify the danger to his

own camp.
military
case of
prowess presents
by
over
Cyms
succeeds once again
in manipulating
the usefulness
a spirited man
by
his
be
erotic
desires. As in the As
Araspas,
s
of
Abradatas
as a tool
is limited to
cultivated.
one episode of
manipulation, after which his

Newell'
devotion
need not
a variation on
would suggest
that Cyms had expended his leverage against
wife, and was therefore willing to dispense with his fearlessness to advantage and allowing him to be killed. using In contrast to his treatment of Abradatas and his forces, Cyms is
turning his
interpretation, I Abradatas by re the man himself,

able
to
make
long-term
contract
with
the Egyptians and
bring
large
and
well-
trained force into his camp. The Persians surround the

all
Egyptians, but,
unlike
the other allies of the
Assyrians,
and
the Egyptians fight valiantly.
By
a combi
nation of
flattery
and
his
practiced gratitude-from-fear
ploy, Cyms persuades
them to
alliance
desert the Assyrians is

enhanced
join his
army.
no
Perhaps the
longevity
of
their
by
the fact that there is

Cyms'
among the Egyptians who could rival they killed (cf. Newell, 1981, pp. 205-210).
Cyms'
outstanding leader mentioned renown, no one like the Abradatas

and shown
leadership
is juxtaposed to that
of
Abradatas in this battle
to be more successful. When Abradatas enters the thick of the battle against the
well-armed
Egyptians, only his

men
close
friends
and
messmates
follow,
while
many
of
his
ride
off
to chase retreating chariots.
Cyms, in
contrast, leads
when
a much
less
reckless attack against the rear of the
Egyptian forces and,
he
is thrown from his horse, all of his men join together to protect him and restore him to a mount. The attachment for him that Cyms engenders in his subordi
nates
is
shown
here
as elsewhere to
be
cmcial
to his success as a military
commander.
The Panthea he
episode culminates
promised
in
final
scene of
mourning
and suicide.
Though Cyms had

claims
to provide support for
Abradatas'
chariot
was
forces,
killed.
two days after the battle not to know that Abradatas

of
When he leams
of
Panthea's funeral plans, he
gathers an ostentatious collection
cavalry, adornments,
and
and sacrificial animals
in honor
of
Abradatas. Panthea
10).
blames both herself indeed

responsible
Cyrus for her husband's death (VII. iii. 8alliance with
She is
for
Abradatas'
Cyms,
which placed
him in this
Cyrus'
and for impressing him with the necessity to prove valiant and a friend Cyrus. Does she, however, know something we are not told about responsibility for her husband's death? Cyms responds only by praising Abra datas and calling his death the most beautiful or noble end. Because Cyms suc
battle,
of
in winning a wealthy empire from which every beautiful thing is avail him, it is unnecessary for him to take solace in this consolation, the beautiful/noble death in battle. Cyms will die of old age.
ceeds able
to
Having
invested everything
she
has in Abradatas
and
his
performance
in the
Love
and

sees
407
battle, Panthea
him
more she will
away try has already succeeded (Vll.iii. 13 15). Because of their devotion to their beautiful and noble mistress, Panthea's three eunuchs also
to send
no other recourse but suicide. As she said earlier, she loves than her own life (VI.iv.5). Though she virtually warns Cyms that kill herself, in order to join Abradatas, he goes and does not
until she
help
commit suicide.
Cyms builds
in these
a man
a great monument
to
all
four.
nobility.
Cyms is
pears
shown
scenes
to be a leader
of
deceptive
and
He ap
quite
even
glorious,
of grand
aspirations
the
capacity
man.
them
a critical reader can
leader like Cyms depends

There is
aims and
more to
on his astonishing success. be said, however, about the man behind this facade and the methods of his mlership of both his armies and his empire.
hardly resist admiring dazzling image and his
the
to fulfill Indeed, a
THE PLACE OF LOVE IN POLITICS
By
dia,
way
of
conclusion, I
would
like to
make
two related points.
First,
ac
cording to
slaves.
Xenophon's discussion
of regimes at
the
beginning
of
the Cyropae
successful
mlership is indistinguishable from

uses enslavement as a metaphor reader should
the successful mastery of

Cyms'
When Cyms
to the
beloved,
the
pay
attention.
for the lover's relationship Xenophon juxtaposes
successful method of makes
his despotism
evident.
exercising leadership to the ways of a beloved and thus Though in some ways this despotism is pleasant
nonetheless.
for his
(loving)
Cyms
subjects, it is despotism
of
Second, in his
makes
attempt to
capture the people
loyalty
his
subjects
engages
makes
in
an
both the nobly extended deception

appear people
educated and the common

which
them fall in
and
love
with
him. He
himself his
beautiful, both physically

find him irresistible. This
of
by
of
dis
plays of great
deeds,
so that
superficial
beauty successfully
lifetime. The
causes the
hides the hollowness
his
virtue
for the duration

advocates,
his
emptiness of the virtue

of
Cyms
practices and
however,
praise of
politi
downfall
this
vast empire
From the first Cyms

cal mle and the
paragraph of
in the very next generation. the Cyropaedia, it is clear that the is

no significant
rests on the premise that there
distinction between
mastery
of slaves.
Democratic government, monarchy,

contribution
oligar
chy, and the
mle of
household
of
servants are all examples of

Thrasymachus'
the exertion of sim to the
ilar
this
to
authority.
Reminiscent
offers
Republic,
the
analogy Xenophon determine

all where
between herdsmen
shepherd, the one
and successful mlers

who wants
illuminates
men seeks
view of politics:
like
to mle over
they may
and
go to graze and where
they may
not go and
to
keep
the profits that the subjects produce, while the subjects remain loyal to
their mler or keeper

345e versus
hostile to
all others
Cyms'
(I.i. 2. Cf. Plato, Republic,

empire
342e-
Aristotle, Politics, I.i).
is
said
to provide historical
[epistamenos]"
evidence that this aim
is attainable, "if
one acts
knowledgeably
408
Interpretation
Cyms'
(I.i. 3). While Xenophon's
account of of
career stretches
historical events,
reveals
much
his
Cyms'
account
of
method
gaining
and
keeping
power
about
imperial monarchy
manifestation of
and the
One
Cyms'
mastery knowledge
of men.
as applied
to politics
is his capacity
to turn observations about human nature to
his
political and seek to
All he leams he
uses and
only the
useful studied
does he
military advantage. leam. (Cf. Bruell, Ch.

sees
VIII,
of
esp. pp.
125-127.)
Having
the effects of
love, Cyms
the
po
tential political use of eros, the irresistible
love
of
the beautiful and
ultimately
his
own
beauty
or
nobility, and succeeds in manipulating men of otherwise

Cyms'
strong characters. The consequences of Panthea's capture make up only two, but I believe representative, examples of methods of making noblemen his instmments, to be
pressed used according to his will. Commoners may be im his to remember their the well-bred must be manipu names; by ability lated by their desires as filtered through their noble educations. Many of
men are
Cyrus'
tricked
by
their
love
not
to recognize their servitude to
him
of
as
slavish,
just
as
Araspas, representing
Cyms'
all
lovers, is forced
Panthea
by
his love
Panthea into for
betraying
his love
Cyms'
tmst and acting ignobly. In a sense, Abradatas is punished
of
Panthea
by
his love
of
combined with
his
noble aspirations.
highly
effective
leadership
is
not
founded
on
the persuasion of the to their
mled to
be mled,
nor even on such overt
force
as would alert the mled
situation, but
cited
on a seduction of the ruled
by
the inducements of desire. In both
works, Newell stresses fear as the
most
fundamental
Cyms'
ground of
of his military prowess among the conquered peoples and the his displeasure among his closer associates. Fear is essential, but 1 wish to suggest that it does not wholly account for the phenomenon Xenophon de
power, the fear
fear
of
scribes not
in Cyms. Though he has terrorized his
subjects
in
subtle ways,
Cyms is
process of creating gratitude, and followers (Li. 5). The fact that felt his gratitude, among apparently deeply followers love him is not diminished by the possibility that they fear to a
Cyms'
Stalin. As I have argued, fear begins the
love
anyone else.
Cyms'
hold
over
his
people
the story begins
with an almost
inely hoping
Cyms"
to befriend one
insidious than ordinary tyranny. Though compulsively honest Cyrus, apparently genu and all by his generosity, as the "education of
is
more
continues, he becomes
Cyrus'
more
deceptive
first toward the enemy,
of
course, but then toward his commander, Cyaxares, and finally toward some of his closest advisors. As youthful attraction to nobility fades and the no
bility
of
his
actions
becomes
more apparent and
less real,
so
does the aging
Cyms find it necessary to enhance his beauty gant make-up (VIII. i. 40, where these devices
Cyms'
with elegant robes and extrava
are said
campaign to
"cast
spell"
a sort of
on
his
subjects;
explicitly to be part of VIII. iii. 1,4, 13- 14).

Cyrus'
Xenophon
on
maintains the parallel of
beauty
He
and
its
decay
of
into
his
mere appearance. as a
also
nobility through his observation supplies a bridge between his

method of
tactics
leadership
military
commander and
securing the
obedience of
subjects as an established mler.
Love
Cyms
leam in
and
Politics in
himself
Xenophon'
Cyropaedia
or noble
make
409
all who gaze on or as
makes
appear
beautiful
to
to
about
him. It is to his
advantage
himself
beautiful
as
merely Panthea He
some
sense, and then to eliminate her as a rival for his
men's admiration.
knows that
beauty/nobility
about
can make acts
him irresistible, like

a
even
to those who have
merely heard
him. Cyrus
beloved in
another respect as well
he he
appears not
to want to be a
despot,
the master
of a slavish
lover. Indeed,
claims
to desire to be
friendly
to those he can help. He cannot, of course,
have any friends in the most genuine sense, for no one can be his equal (New ell, 1983, p. 902). Though friendship requires equality, the erotic relationship
of
lover The
and
most generous suggests
beloved is radically unequal. type category for

Cyrus' "type"
of mle
is benevolent despotism. is that

of a
Glenn
that the
a
of mle
nor
Cyms
represents
hegemon for Machia

intention in Machiavelli
neither velli's
wholly
king
best
wholly
a tyrant.
Perhaps,
for this
as a model
mlership.
prince, hegemon is an
at a
appropriate
title
My
as
calling Cyms
would not
benevolent despot is to emphasize,
openly
p.
do,
that
he is
despot,
that his subjects are enslaved to him.
Newell (1983,
floats
900)
also argues that
Cyms
and a tyrant
somewhere
between
of
being
king
according to Xenophon's willing

subjects
con
ventional
definitions
those
terms, for
although
he
rules over
in
ac
cordance with
knowledge, he
of
could never
have founded his

the
rational empire without
abrogating the laws
Persia
and
terrorizing
vanquished.
Farber (pp. 503-504) discusses how Cyms, like
tyrant,
substitutes
his
will
for law. He
lawless
argues
that the term tyrant,

while
however, is
moved an argument
more appropriate
polis
to the
mler of a
polis,
Cyrus has
beyond the
that
to an empire.
cannot suc
While Farber
ceed
sees
in Xenophon's Hiero
tyranny
in
polis, the
circumstances of empire
building
and maintenance, requir
If the original something like martial law, are more conducive to tyranny. question of the Cyropaedia concerns the mle of cities and households, that
ing
Cyms'
example works
only for
a vast empire
thing is
wrong.
Is the only
method of
may be the first clue that some in a republic or mon solving

civil strife
archy to transcend the city? Unlike Panthea, the despot Cyms

gathia
acts
generously
own sake.
not
because
of a
kaloka
that supports good behavior for its

able to
Quite deceptively, there

the complete manipula
resent
fore, he is
become
a potent master
capable of
tion of his followers because
they
can see no reason
to
his mastery (cf
love of him. They may say that they have no leisure to consider their own in expect rewards, but, like slaves, they terests or to do anything but what Cyms wishes them to do. Even if they were first persuaded to join the imperial campaign for the sake of their self-interest,
VIII.ii.14).
They
act
for the
sake of
their
Cyms'
beauty/nobility
so ensnares
his followers that

who and
such considerations
as
sume
superior pire.
those secondary importance. Often even fortunes to his their skill tie military
have been beaten

willingly
submit
Cyms'
by
to
his
em
410
Interpretation
sacrifice all
If the conventionally noble Abradatas and Araspas can be manipulated to they desire for Cyms, how much more vulnerable are the common
ers under as
his command, those

evil"!
who are not other
"a
great
There
of
are
extensively trained to view slavery examples of devoted followers who are

can
burned bum
by
love
Cyms kindled in person, but Cyms knows that love

his
reputation
also
from
afar and
ingly
25.
without
any
personal contact
brings many to with him. (See
submit
to his
mle will
Artabazus'
description
of
Cyms'
capacity to draw followers as a leader bee leads the drones at V.i. 24Other followers burned by love of Cyms include Croesus and Gadatas.) He "to
nations,"
reduces
obedience a vast number of men and cities and
stilling
a mortal
fear
of
resistance, and then
by
sire to please
him,
that
they
always wished to
with
Cyms'
awakening "in all be guided by his

enterprise:
empire
so
first by in lively a de
(I.i. 3,
5).
speaks at
will"
To length
address and
the second problem

of
Cyms'
Xenophon
bitterly
the collapse of
showing that his sons are incapable of the multitudes. That some editors wish
shortly after his death, the hold Cyms gained over sustaining to expunge this last part of the book,
must
believing
a
that any unfavorable reflection on Cyms
have been the
work of
later,
the
perhaps
excessively fastidious,
Cyms'
editor shows
that it remains possible to
be
seduced
by
success.
Cyms'
size
decline
of
Machiavelli presumably would also deemphaacquisitions after his death. Many, including Xeno
phon,
judging by
his
examples of other
kings,
would agree with
Aristotle,
that
monarchy is generally more prone to corruption than the mle of many and that even the best kingships are prone to decay after the original extraordinary man
has died (Politics, III.
15).
Leaving
aside
the practical difficulties of main
taining
like to
large
empire or
address an
producing inherent flaw in least
princes as capable as their

Cyms'
father, I
would
project
from
what
I believe to be
Xenophon's
viewpoint. makes at one
Xenophon
judgment
of
Cyms
quite evident as
in the Pan
acting
so as
thea episodes. Without
being
Greek, Cyms is clearly described

do the in
noble
to emulate the magnanimous man (in the sense Aristotle delineates in the
Nicomachean Ethics, displays, literally for

practical
the man who seeks to

all
for its
own sake).
He
the world to see, the virtues of courage, moderation,
wisdom, distributive
justice,
ambition
accord with sense of
his capacities,
neither
tmthfulness (not in the
philosophic
sense, but in the
practicing
boastfulness
per and
and
ironic modesty), wit, friendliness, liberality, even good tem magnificence. He is admired for his acts of generosity, forgiveness,
nor
justice
by
both Araspas
and
Abradatas, indeed, by
strong
most
everyone
he
meets.
As Aristotle tells us,

a greatness of
a man of such
character
deserves to feel for
pride,
soul,
and
to act magnanimously toward his inferiors. The
reader of the
Cyropaedia is
inevitably
seen
drawn into this

world.
circle of admiration,
Cyms
ation,
represents what
is rarely
in the
Upon
more careful consider
however, one is brought by Xenophon hollow, this beauty/nobility superficial.
to see that this magnanimity is
Love
The
and
Politics in
Cyms'
Xenophon'
Cyropaedia
-411
end of
virtue
is his early
own self-interest.
He
attempts officers.
to make a
ancient
principle of self-interest
in
an
speech to
his Persian
The
traditions of moderation made the

show
for their
Cyms'
efforts.
new
Persians virtuous, but they had nothing to political principle is that virtue will be
as
rewarded
with material
gain,
so
(I.v.8-11). He
more
restrains
his
own
his military campaign is successful desires for wealth and bodily pleasures much
long
stringently than he expects

which all
his followers
to
do in
order to conquer an em
pire
in
the world's wealth and pleasures are at his command. As a

a
means of
gaining
loyal following, this may be
Cyms'
a politic practice.
vir
tue, however, simply

tion
with respect render
masks acts of self-aggrandizement or vice.
His
modera
to the most beautiful woman
in Asia
her
more useful
to his military venture.

won
ploy calculated to His generosity in returning her

was a
unscathed
to her husband
at
him
a new
ally,
one whom
it is
possible
to argue
he betrays
that
the next opportunity. He forgives his friend Araspas for misdeeds
pas even more
he practically forced him to commit, and by that forgiveness he puts Aras surely under his power as a tool in the military campaign. In
that the apparently
with magnanimous
deed, he has learned

wrongs meted
of
forgiveness
can
of still
the
others, fortified
perhaps the
the
intimation that gaining their

Cyms'
punishment complete
be
out, is
end
best
method of
loyalty.
In the
Xenophon does
assessment of
not endorse would applaud
approach to mle.
While the in
un
Machiavellian
Cyms
his
political acumen
derstanding
that the appearance of
lofty
virtue, covering the reality of calculated mler, Xenophon shows us the

noble man
self-interest, is the only tme

Cyms'
virtue of a political
actions and attitudes of the more

virtues appear
conventionally
and, in comparison,
flawed. First, the

and
ence
between the right he
the
naive Araspas, who knows the differ disgraceful, but has some difficulty living up to
the standard he sets for

and what most
himself, is ultimately willing
to sacrifice both his life
in the army, his fate is loyalty to Cyms and in
desires to rectify his misdeed. His reward may be promotion obscurity. He has given up Panthea for the sake of his order to prove that he can tame his erotic desires, while
only for the sake of the complete satisfaction future time. The more mature Abradatas displays a certain
self-restraint
Cyms
of
practices
his
his desires
at a
recklessness
in battle
and
is
not
completely
admirable
itary
decisions to his
erotic
devotion,
but
at
for subordinating his mil least he demonstrates two

of the
significant tmths: that erotic attachments on the and personal sacrifice plete sacrifice
level
family
are
beautiful
for the
sake of such attachments
is noble,
and
that com
for something one considers greater than oneself is more noble than short-term sacrifice for the sake of future indulgence. Unlike the sheep who follow Cyms in return for his protection and to the detriment of their own
independence,
it. His
view
Abradatas has
not
"fallen in
and
love"
with
Cyms. He
maintains
his
standard of virtue, prowess

willingness must
in battle,
does
not expect material reward
for
to ally with Cyms derives from
his perfectly
understandable
that he
repay the man who
returned
his
wife unscathed.
Abradatas
412
comes
Interpretation
to Cyms in gratitude as
"friend,
servant, and
The
friendship
to
is
not
beloved wife, reciprocated, his continuing devotion to his
rather than
Cyrus,
is
punished.
Not only does Cyms display jects incapable of practicing or longer trained in the
restraint of
a spurious even of
virtue,
he
renders
his
political sub
recognizing true
virtue.
They
are no
the passions of which most men are capable,
for they act constantly out of a passion to please him and to gain unspecified future material rewards. They care neither for the improvement of their own
souls nor mire
for their
political
freedom. Again Machiavelli
would
find
much
to ad
own
in
Cyms'
capacity to turn the altmism of others to the service of herd

a animal out of a man. angle: on
his
desires: love
ment
on a mass scale makes a
Bruell's
argu
throws
light
this
point
from
different
Cyrus in
seems to aim at
the noble understood as the splendid, rather than

noble understood as
and
conflict with
the
the virtuous (pp. 132-33). His

own
followers,
taught not to ad
mire
the noble for
its
sake,
also
fail to imitate
Cyrus'
splendor.
Without it,
their efforts at aggrandizement are reduced to

riches to
thievery
and their enjoyment of
decadence.
Cyms'
sufficiency and capacity to act well, adoring subjects depend on the favor of the herdsman and are conscious only that they would not want to live without the object of their love. Just as attrac
own
Araspas'
Rather than their
tion to Panthea
is
enhanced
by
her
acts of solicitude, the conquered peoples
"fall
for"
Cyms'
love
causes
generosity in allowing them to keep their own land. Their them to forget their own interests (the grounds on which he origi
and/or
nally brought them into his military enterprise his will. Cyms has enslaved these people.
The nobility
memorialized
of private erotic
his empire) in the face
of
attachment,
not an
of the selfless
devotion to
The
another
by
the Panthea story, is
issue for Cyrus. He is he
concerned
with the effects of eros at a
distance
subjects'
and on a grand scale. wins
devo
tion to Cyms becomes completely their understanding their

pas and
unconscious
their
loyalty
without
predicament.
Remember that Xenophon
shows
Aras
cal
Cyms agreeing actions of a lover are

reference
though perhaps
ridiculous and
with
for different
reasons
that the typi
ignoble.
mentioned
In
and
to the contrast
the Republic
earlier, both Cyrus
the Republic's Socrates
err
It is because Cyms
considers the world to
exercise a combination of a
in rendering eros so completely a public issue. be his household, over which he may master's prerogative and a father's benevolence,
that it could seem appropriate that

Cyrus'
all his subjects develop a love for him. As Glenn shows, self-understanding as the father of his peoples is highly ambiguous (VIII. i. 44; ii.9. Cf. Aristotle, Politics, I.i; Il.ii-iii). As confirmation that Xenophon is vitally concerned with the issue of the
maintenance of virtue,
decline
ciplined
as
of
I will merely point to the last chapter of his book. The Persians is cast exclusively in terms of their unethical and undis behavior. They no longer even practice virtue for the sake of rewards,
the
Cyms
initially
taught.
Rather, they have
given
up
all pretense to virtue
in
or-
Love
and
Politics in
Xenophon'
Cyropaedia
Cyms'
-413
der to increase their

and
wealth without
limit.
method of
military
leadership
imperial
and virtue.
ultimately Without at least self-restraint,

no
mle
undermined all support
for
genuine self-restraint
political order
disintegrates.
attachments
In short, love is
one's political
substitute
for
politics. and
If
erotic
dominate
aims
actions, self-sufficiency
control
the erotic completely, the genuine

and
dignity decline; if altruism of a loving

should not
political
denied. Seduction
suasion and
disguised tyrannical force
relationship is substitute for per

a
law-governed force. Seduction is

one's power
effective
in attracting
appearance. reign.
follow
ing, but then

seducer
disappears,
many
upon
so
depends solely on a seductive does the unity and peace of

conquers are
"happy"
When the
Cyms'
The Persians
and the
nations
Cyms
in
a worse condition as a result of
his
"benevolent"
mlership imposes both disappear

check and make when
and their
submission to
it. The discipline Cyms
them and the rewards in material satisfactions that
he
metes out
there is no
radiant
them
feel
satisfied with what
personality to hold their desires in he chooses to give them.

anticipation of modem
If, as Newell liberalism, or if,

can
argues, the Cyropaedia is an ancient

as
Glenn argues, Machiavelli's prince, based in

Cyms'
part on what
be learned from
success, is
a modem model of executive
leader
ship, the Panthea story should cause us to reconsider the grounding
of contem mled.
porary
views of the proper
relationship
of
leader to led
and mler
to
REFERENCES
Aristotle. Nicomachean Ethics. Edited

Politics. Edited
by
L. Bywater. Oxford: Clarendon Press,

1957.
Cyrus."
1894.
by
W. D. Ross. Oxford: Clarendon Press,
Bruell, Christopher. Xenophon's "Education of University of Chicago, Depart ment of Political Science, Unpublished Doctoral Dissertation, 1969. American Journal of Philol Farber, Joel. "The Cyropaedia and Hellenistic
Kingship."
Glenn, Gary D.
tice
ogy 100 (1979): 496-514. Corruption

"Cyrus'
Aristocracy."
of
In Law
and
Philosophy: The Prac
of Theory, by W. T. Braithwaite, J. A. Murley, forthcoming. of Ohio Press, University

edited
and
R. L. Stone. Athens:
New York Press,
Higgins, W. E. Xenophon
1977.
the Athenian. Albany:
State
University
of
Newell, W. R. "Tyranny
rus."
and
the Science of
Ruling in
Xenophon's Education of
Cy
Journal of Politics 45 (1983): 889-905. and the Classical Critique of Liberalism. Xenophon's "Education of Ann Arbor: University Microfilms International, 1981. J. Burnet. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1902. Plato. Republic. Edited
Cyrus"
by
Xenophon. Cyropaedia. Translated
by
Walter Miller. Cambridge: Harvard
University
Press,
1914.
Memorabilia. Translated
by
E. C. Marchant. Cambridge: Harvard Univer
sity Press,
1923.
1923.
Symposium. Translated
by
O. J. Todd. Cambridge: Harvard
University Press,
Eric Voegelin
A Meditation
on
on
the Truth
of
In-Between Life
Existential Unrest
Greg Russell
Northeastern Louisiana University
One
work of
of
the most
illuminating, if
not
persistent, themes to
emerge
from the his
the late Eric Voegelin is the
virtual eclipse of philosophical meditation.
In seeking to clarify
man's experience of
reality,
as well as
the reality of
experience, Voegelin singled out the question of transcendence as the

problem of philosophy.
decisive
time and
According
to
Voegelin, philosophizing
Christian
philosopher's quest
about
existence
has become the has

come to
modem equivalent of the
mystic's medita
tion. What
its end, then, is the
to circumscribe
the stmctures of existential consciousness

treme: A
Meditation,"
( "Wisdom
and
the Magic of the Ex

1981]: 285).
The Southern Review 17 [Summer
The fundamental motivating from the
stmcture of philosophical consciousness arises
contemplative response to the question of the tmth of the reason of
things, the
the
loving
open
search
for the
mysterious and elusive ground of reality.
The
of
philosopher stands as
the
self-reflective man who

wonder and
is
sensitive to the
reality
Whole,
to the horizon of that
mystery that surrounds the exis

to the
tence of
man and all
is,
and who
is
open
sustaining
participation of
the reality
of nature's
time and space and of man's
history
and mind
in the di The
vine ground. of the
Moreover,
of
the philosopher is called upon to clarify the question
meaning
all
the
process of
reality,
while
preserving its
mystery.
pro
cess of
tion
in
reality becomes intelligible to human consciousness through levels of reality from the corporeal to the divine ground. The is the
"In-Between"
participa
process
of consciousness
(metaxy)
of
the tension bounded
by
the
polarities of
immanent in the
and
transcendent being.
The
genius of the classic philosophers

psyche of man.
is to have discovered
reason as
the
source of order seen
by the Hellenic philosophers immortalizing order of the psyche and the mortalizing forces of the apeirontic The Southern Review lust of being in time ("Reason: The Classic 10 [Spring 1974]: 237, 261). Both Plato and Aristotle straggled to clarify the
Experience,"
The unfolding of noetic consciousness is as a stmggle in the metaxy between the
formative
center of experience,
the metaxy, and to protect the noetic center the time. In
against the
pointed out
deformative forces
prevalent at
Anamnesis, Voegelin
that the term metaxy has its
origin
in the
concrete experience of a
philosophizing man seeking to designate the Niemeyer, p. ix). The In-Between character
essence of
his
is
humanity
(trans. G.
of existence
of particular impor-
interpretation,
Spring 1989, Vol. 16,
No. 3
416
tance
Interpretation
response
in understanding
to the
movements of
the
divine presence, for
the
experience of such movements
is
not
located in
man's stream of conscious
ness, in the immanentist sense, but
in the In-Between
of
the divine and
human.
ex
The
objective of
this paper is to more specifically examine

metaxy.
Voegelin's
ploration of
Plato's
Plato
symbolizes
the experience of the noetic quest
as a transition ation will
in the
be
given
from mortality to immortality. Particular consider to the meaning of noesis as an active inquiry into the tran
psyche
scendence of
immanent Between
tial
cal
and transcendent.
human existence, thereby establishing the poles of consciousness: In conclusion, Voegelin's explanation of the In-
will
be
portrayed as a meditative
inquiry
into the
structures of existen
consciousness.
This
perspective enabled
Voegelin to
expand on
the histori
dimension
of
of meditation with special relevance
for Plato's
situation
in the
Hellas
the fifth and fourth centuries B.C.
METAXY REALITY: FROM COMPACT TO DIFFERENTIATED
CONSCIOUSNESS
According
that of the
to Voegelin's
appraisal of
the
history
of experience and symboli
zation, there have been two historical
modes of experience: on
the
first level,
cosmos,"
"primary
experience of
the
or the
and
and, on a more advanced
level,
that of "differentiated
tence"
consciousness"
"differentiated
experience of exis
("Immortality, Experience
272).
Symbol,"
Harvard Theological Review
60 [1967]:
The primary level

rather
of experience
is
being
las,
the most
fundamental;
cultures,
it is the level
Egypt
of
not primary in the sense of interpretation that first man
ifests itself historically. There were, preceding

cosmological
such as
philosophical culture as
in Hel
themselves in terms of myths.

myth
Mesopotamia, which like Mircea Eliade, pointed Voegelin,

and a ground
expressed
out that a
is
technique of
imputing
to an object of experience. Describ
ing
the
compact vision of cosmological myth,
Voegelin
wrote:
The
cosmos of the
of
primary
experience
is
neither the external world of objects given
to subjects
cognition, not
is it the
world that
has been
created
by
world-
transcendent God
above of celestial
It is the bodies
and
whole, to pan, of earth
below
and a
heaven
their movements; of seasonal changes; of

.;
fertility
a cos stressed as
rhythms
mos
in
plant and animal
life
and above
all, as
Thales
still
knew, it is
be
full
of gods.
This last point, that the The
gods are
intracosmic
cannot
strongly enough, because it is

polytheism and monotheism.
almost eclipsed
numbers are not

or
today by such facile categorizations important, but rather the con

and
sciousness of
divine reality
p.
as
intracosmic
transmundane (Order
History. 4
vols., 1956-74, vol. 4,
68).
In Voegelin's analysis, the

made
experiential
field
of
the primary experience is

categories:
up
of
individual
entities that tend to
fall into four
God,
man,
Eric Voegelin
the world, and
on
the
Truth of In-Between Life

symbolized
-417
society.
As
in the
ancient cosmologically-concerned
of as
societies, these entities are not usually thought
entirely discrete but

continuum of
as
participating, on a
hierarchy
of
of
levels, in
an
underlying
reality, a
"cosmos"
"primordial community
being,"
which as a whole constitutes
the
that embraces all partners.
In
other
words, the primary experience embodies the

and
dual
"consubstantiality"
attributes of
"separateness
cosmos
substances."
of
In The
Ecumenic
Age, Voegelin
of
argued that
"the
is
not a
thing among
point
others;
it is the background in the

mode of
reality
against which all existent
things exist; it
nonexistence"
(OH,
expressed
vol.
4,
p. 72).
The
key
is reality in Voegelin's
appraisal
is that it is the is
experience of
this underlying embracingness of all that

symbolism
exists
which
in the
cosmological
(OH,
vol.
1,
pp.
-16).
In short, the
cosmos of the
of existence out of nonexistence. cosmic areas of
primary The symbolism, however, is

articulate the tension of
experience encompasses
the tension
unstable.
Intra
reality
can provide one another with analogies of
being, but
these analogies cannot

ence
adequately
the primary experi
(OH,
vol.
4,
p. 76).
The
core of
the primary experience was formulated
by
Anaximander (fl.
560
as a
B.C.) in his
process of
celebrated
fragment.
Reality
from,
vol.
was and p.
described
by
Anaximander
in
which
things emerge free
disappear into, the

174).
nonexistence
the apeiron, the Unlimited

rather
(OH,
4,
Things do
not exist out of
themselves; from
they
s
exist out of the ground to which
they
return.
Existence,
Anaximander'
perspective, involves participation in two the timeless

arche of
modes of real
ity: (1) in the

cession of
apeiron as
things and
(2) in
the ordered suc

experience of
things as a
manifestation of
the apeiron
in time. The
character of
the tension of existence out of
nonexistence
has the
the In-Between
reality, rience,
governed
by
the tension of life and death. At the level of primary expe
one can go no
further than the
simple elucidation of textual material.
Any
attempt at
perience would
paraphrasing destroy its compactness (i.e.,

noticed as
the cosmological symbolization of the primary ex

experience
having
distinguishable
features
death
yet
to be
distinct). Voegelin
pointed out
that "one must be
aware of
as
identifying
of
the immortals as gods, the mortals as men, or
life
and
that
human beings,
or the things (ta onto) as inorganic objects, or

vol.
societies"
ganisms, men,
or
(OH,
4,
pp.
174-175).
The inadequate
cosmos
articulation of
is
resolved
revelation
in the
soul.
only by This is the
in the primary experience of the the differentiation of the divine ground through its
the tension
process that
took place
in the Hellenic poleis,

the
philosopher
which, because
to
of
the
absence of and
imperial stmcture,
of
permitted
freely
explore
the rise
fall
the universally human reality or order,

an empire
without restriction to
its
mediation
by
(David J.
Walsh, "Philosophy
ed.
in Voegelin's
Work,"
in Eric Voegelin's Thought: A Critical Appraisal,

pp.
140-
Ellis Sandoz [Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1982], primary, cosmological style of tmth is unstable because
141).
The
there
is
a constant
pressure on consciousness to recognize the element of radical
discontinuity
418
Interpretation in its directional tendency (Anamnesis,

p.
the full beyondness
76).
In de
view to differentiated scribing the transition from the primary, cosmological "the in suggested that Voegelin leap being differentiates worldconsciousness,
transcendent
Being
as the source of all

immanence"
the world the character of
being, and correspondingly (OH, vol. 3, p. 277).

divine
ground.
attaches to
In the Philebus (1 6c -17a), Plato

psyche through
exhibits a concern with
its tension
toward the
the ordering of the Socrates introduces the
discussion
There is
by
alluding to the revelatory

the gods
character of
the
to
differentiated
From their
with a
symbols:
a gift of
to men,
so at
least it
appears
me.
abode
they
let it be brought down
by
someone
were
like Prometheus, together

we are and
fire exceeding
gods,
light. The
men of
old, who
better than
all
dwelt
nearer to the
passed on this gift
in
saying:
That
things that are ever said to exist
have their be
ing
Plato
from One
and
(apeiron)
(quoted in
Many, OH,
and conjoin vol.
in themselves Limited
(peras)
and
Unlimited
4,
p.
184).
characterizes
the philosopher's role in
history
as open to
ing
to let the gift of the gods
illuminate his
is
and the
and
existence.
reality and will In addition, Plato's exe
gesis of the
differentiated
experience
symbolized
tween the poles of the One

changes over
(hen)
in the mystery of being be Unlimited (apeiron). Where the One
into the
Many (polloi)
184).
the Unlimited
there arises, between the two poles, the number things
(arithmos)
into the Limited (peras), and form (idea) of
(OH,
vol.
4,
p.
Voegelin
stressed
that this area of form and num
ber is the In-Between (metaxy) of the One and Unlimited. The metaxy is a symbol of rich complexity and depth,
guage of
drawing
on
the lan
divinity
and of spirits as well as of man and psyche:
Man he is
experiences
himself
as
tending beyond human imperfection

him. The
spiritual man, the
toward the perfec
tion of the
divine
ground that moves

quest of
moved
in his
the ground, moves somewhere
daimonios aner, as between knowledge and
ignorance
monion)
(metaxy sophias kai amathias). "The whole between (metaxy) god and is halfway
. ...
realm of the spiritual (dai-
man"
(Symp.
202a).
Thus,
the
empty space between the poles of the tension but the "realm of the spiritual"; it is the reality of "man's convergence with the (202203), the mutual participation (methexis. metalepsis) of human in divine,
not an
in-between
is
gods"
and
divine in human, reality (Anamnesis,
p.
103).
The In-Between
Sorcery,"
represents the
consciousness of their
meeting ground of the human and divine in a distinction and interpenetration ("On Hegel: A Study in
of
in The
Study
Time,
ed.
J. Fraser
et
al.
[New York:
Springer-
Verlag,
nonreal was
1972],
1:434).
The
philosopher
is
not allowed
to settle down on the

of real and
positive pole of existential
tension; only
the tension
is the full tmth
of reality.
According
in its polarity to Voegelin, Plato's
key
insight
tran
the
discovery
being,
of consciousness as
the In-Between of immanent
and
scendent
so that
it
participates
that the experience which motivates
experientially in both, and the discovery philosophizing is the movement of the soul
in
response to the pull of
divine
reality.
Eric Voegelin
In Plato's
In-Between
prophetess
on
the Truth of In-Between Life
-419
Symposium,
the erotic tension in human life is

of existence
son of
symbolized as an conveyed
reality.
The tmth
in
erotic
tension
and
is
by
the
Diotima. Eros is the
Poros
(riches)
Penia (poverty). He
is daimon, something between god and man just as the spiritual man who is in search of tmth is somewhere between knowledge and ignorance. Socrates says
that the spiritual powers "interpret and things
and
divine to rnen; carrying prayers from above; being themselves midway between the two, them together and weld them into one great Accordingly, they bring
commandments
convey things human to the gods and and sacrifices from below, the answers
whole."
"only
or
through the rnediation of the spiritual powers

gods"
can
man, whether waking

p.
sleeping, have converse with the
(OH,
vol.
4,
185).
in Plato's soul, an event in reality process of which the reality becomes luminous to itself. This, for Voegelin, is the epistemological cmx behind the tmth of reality apperceived by Plato. The The tmth
of
takes shape as a dialogue
tmth
of man's
existence
is
achieved and
by
dialectical
movement
in the
soul
which
flows between knowledge it

constitutes
ignorance. Plato's insight is itself tme in

experienced"
sofar as
"the
exegesis of the erotic tension

experienced
and arises
"only
its
when
the tension
is
in
4,
such a manner
p.
that it breaks forth in

of
own
dialogical
exegesis"
(OH,
vol.
186).
The tmth
the metaxy
is
"the event of an experience articulating This helps to explain Socrates is reluctant to make a on Eros and allows the tmth to why unfold through his recollecting of the dialogue with Diotima. Moreover, the di
viewed as
"speech"
itself."
alogue as
it
occurs
in the human
soul
is
not one man's subjective perception of man
reality, but
ground of
within
in the metaxy where the process that is common to

an event
variation
has
converse with
the divine
movement
all men.
The dialogical
the soul and the
between the two
extremes uncovers the mean

noetic
ing
4,
of existence as a movement
in reality toward
luminosity (OH,
vol.
P-
186).
THE METAXY AND NOETIC CONSCIOUSNESS
Voegelin
of
stipulated that
philosophers
the classic
of
"the unfolding is not an idea,
of noetic consciousness
or a
in the
psyche
tradition, but
an event
in the his
con
mankind"
tory
("Reason: The Classic
Experience,"
p. 284).
Philosophy
ceived of as the symbolic guished
form
of
the noetic mode of participation
is distin
by
the
philosopher's
discovery
of self-reflective reason as the specific
essence of man and the substance of the psyche, which
knows both itself
and
its affinity
cal effort
cal
with
the
ultimate
divine
reality.
"The
core of
the classic philosophi
and of
human
nature which
itself
is
openness
to the Ground as the verti

manifold
tension of
existence
is
rendered
intelligible through the
symbols of rational exegesis called

olution:
(Ellis Sandoz, The Voegelinian Rev [Baton Introduction Rouge, LA: Louisiana State Uni A Biographical
noesis"
versity Press, 1981],
p.
185).
In his discussion
of
the
stmcture of
existence,
420
Interpretation
of nous:
Voegelin distinguishes between four functions

of
(i)
the
"illumination"
the
transitory
nature of
human existence;
(2)
the apprehension of
"transcen
dence"
(3) the formation of an of the stmcture of existence ("ideation"); and (4) the rational elabora tion of experience and its components. (See Dante Germino, Beyond Ideology: The Revival of Political Theory [New York: Harper and Row, 1967], pp. 163of an ultimate ground of all
existing things;
"idea"
165.)
The
epochal
feat
of
the
classic philosophers was
the articulation and sym
bolization
manity.
of
the questioning consciousness as the essential constituent of hu

examines
Voegelin
the stmcture of the noetic experience in which the
symbolism of gestions
produced; he reconstmcts it from a series of sug philosophy that can be brought together from expressions scattered throughout the
was
writings of
Plato
and
Aristotle. The first level
of noetic experience
is
mirrored
of
by
the Socrates of the Theaetetus
who recognizes
in the
experience
(pathos)
wondering
embodied
search
(thaumazein)
and
the
mark
of the philosopher.
The
or
relevant
symbols
in the Socratic
A
(zetesis),
p.
searching (zetein), ("Reason: The Classic (aporein, diaporein) questioning

experience second
include: seeking
entails
Experience,"
243).
level
the philosopher
feeling
himself his
(kinein) by some drawn (helkein) into the

moved
unknown
force to
a
ask
man
the questions; he feels himself

can
search.
Third,
become
conscious
which
of
questioning
unrest as caused
by
the state of ignorance from
he
yearns
to arrive at tme knowledge
the
key
ten
terms are ignorance agnoian),

p.
(agonia,
round
amathia),
flight from ignorance (pheugein

The
turning
(periagoge),
knowledge (eidenai, episteme) (Walsh,

is grandly
elaborated
142).
compulsion to raise the questions
regarding the
and
ground of all existence prisoner
in Plato's
parable of around
the cave where the
is
moved
by
the unknown force to turn
(periagoge)
begin his
ascent
to the
light. Specifically, Voegelin
considered
this infrastmcture of experience to be

with noetic problems
the catalyst that brought the pre-Socratic occupation
into
focus
as
"a
concern with the
the divine
this
ground."
In
ordering summary passage, he

of
of the psyche through

wrote:
its tension
toward
is
the
language
seeking, searching, and questioning, of

of
ignorance
and
knowledge concerning the divine ground,

ation of
futility,
absurdity, anxiety, and alien
existence, of
being
moved of
to
seek and
question, of
being
drawn toward
vol. 4. pp.
the
ground, of
17-18).
turning
around,
return,
illumination,
and rebirth
(OH,
The wondering
of a
and
questioning
of
the classic philosophers is the

unfold
beginning
only if the man who experiences it responds by articulating its dimensions in appropriate language symbols. This chain of events can be likened to a revelatory development in which the noetic
theophanic
event which can
fully
structure of the psyche
becomes transparent
to
itself. The
precognitive unrest
noema
becomes
a cognitive
consciousness, noesis,
intending
the ground as its
Eric Voegelin
or noeton;
on
the
421
of
the desire to know becomes the consciousness of the object
de
sire; the ground can
be
reached
through the
all
via negativa which points
to
what
is Beyond (epekeina, Republic, 509b) the world; it is the One (to hen) that is
can
limited reality and purposes within present in all things as their ground and
be identified
with
wisdom
30c -e)
(Walsh,
p.
142).
and understanding (sophia kai nos, Philebus In short, the discovery of nous symbolizes the noetic
experience
disclosing
the divine ground of
being
in
a manner comparable
in de
tail to the
p. 212).
disclosures from the Israelite
and
Christian horizons (see
Sandoz,
The illumination
nous toward the
of
the tmth
of man's existence as
the tension of the human

articulate the process as the struc
divine Nous
made
it
possible which
for Plato to
of
reality
as a whole.
The In-Between
had become luminous

The
ture of man's existence could now be seen to be the structure of all things that
exist
in the In-Between
Nous
of
the One
and apeiron.
noetic stmcture
with
implicit in
of
the cosmological symbolism
had been differentiated
the
discovery
where
the
divine
ground as
and man's consciousness as
the site
the In-Be
tween process of reality becomes
The In-Between quality into

reason and
of
luminous to itself (see Walsh, p. 142). reality is further illuminated by Plato's insight
context of
the passions in the
the tension between life and
death. In the Laws, Plato develops a myth of the puppetplayer who pulls the human puppets by various metal cords, by the golden cord of reason and the lesser is
cords of
the passions. Voegelin
experienced as
choosing either of the divine Nous

sions.
referred to this myth as the reality which own stmcture. On man falls the burden of beyond its moving to engage in the action of immortalizing by following the pull
or
choosing death
of
by following
the counterpull of the pas
Plato
symbolizes
this experience of the pull
(helkein)
of
the Word
and
the counterpull
(anthelkein)
of man as
the worldly temptations

gods"
in the "tme
and
story"
(logos alethes)
the
Extreme,"
the "puppet
of
the
("Wisdom
the Magic of than man,
p.
254).
Why
is it that
man should
follow
one pull rather on
another?
Voegelin
argued
that,
by
putting the
choice
unequivocally
questionable
Plato
gods
as
wants
to stress the mystery
of
the game and the

pull of
hand the
have in it
questionable, in that the
the other
metal cords
is just
phi or
divine
as the pull of the golden cord.
The
answer
is to be found in the
quaerens
losopher's
quest for the tmth of existence as a fides
intellectum,
faith in search of understanding, requiring clarity concerning both the fides and the intellectus. In Plato's case, the fides has found its symbolic tmth in the vi sion of love as the source of order in reality and by the vision of truth in human
existence through participation
yond.
in the
the
movement of
The intellectus
reality
constitutes
noetic action
reality toward the divine be of exploring the stmctures in

the
revela
Extreme,"
a process of
where order and
directions
are revealed through of the
tion of God's
presence
("Wisdom
and the
Magic
p.
255).
Further
and
refinements
in the metaxy,
necessitated
by
the differentiation of life

seen
death
as
the moving forces behind
reason and
the passions, can be
in
422
Interpretation
Plato's Philebus. As previously mentioned, Plato symbolized the mystery of being as a meeting ground between the One and the Unlimited. In the differen
tiated tmth of
Plato,
the One has become the
cause
(aitia)
that
is
present
in
all
things
(30b),
to be identified with
wisdom and mind
(30c-e). The Unlimited
represents the creative ground ceived them
(arche)
perished,
"things"
that released
while
into
being
and re
back
when
they
Time
with
its
ordinance was the
limiting
there
pole of existence. at work
Voegelin
experience
acknowledged that
"behind the
passions
is
the lust of
set
law
of
the cosmos has

p. 254).
in depth (i.e., the injustice on which the of death in ("Reason: The Classic the penalty
Time)"
Experience,"
The
conflict
between
reason and
the passions assumes
its
specific character
from the
sage that
participation of the psyche
in the
metaxy.
This is illustrated
by
a pas
Voegelin
quotes
from Plato's Timaeus:

himself to his desires
and
Now,
must
when a man abandons
ambitions,
indulging
them
in
his
continently, all his thoughts of necessity become mortal, and as a consequence he
become
mortal
every
bit,
as
far
as
that
is possible, because he has
nourished
mortal part.
When
when
on the
true wisdom,
vine
cultivated his love of knowledge and contrary he has he has primarily exercised his faculty to think immortal and di since
things, he
as quoted
will
in that
manner
he is touching
nature p.
truth
become immortal
of
necessity,
far
as
it is
possible
for human
to participate in
255).
immortality
(90a-b;
To
in "Reason: The Classic
Experience,"
move within
the metaxy, exploring it in all directions and orienting himself to

man
in the
perspective granted
by
his
position
in reality, is the
proper
task of
the philosopher.
CONCLUSION
This
paper
has illustrated how Voegelin's

for tmth
exposition of
Plato's metaxy
considered
em
braces the
existential quest
and reality.
In addition, it
the
development
of
of noetic consciousness as a mode of
explaining the
significance
the metaxy for the experience of the classic philosophers. It
now remains
to
offer some
final
remarks
regarding the historical nexus between the

of the
participa
tion of
being
in the horizon
metaxy
and the eclipse of meditative
inquiry
in the
philosophical tradition.
eclipse of meditation signifies the
The
derailment (parekbasis)
of
the philos
opher's articulation of the stmctures of existential consciousness. component of
The historical
as
the
meditative
process center of
is
characterized
by
Voegelin
the
clarification of
protection of
time."
"the formative
existence, the metaxy
as well as the prevalent at the

and
this "noetic center against the deformative

suggested
forces
In particular, Voegelin
the Beyond
of
that "a Plato had to see, articulate,
symbolize
the cosmos and its gods as the immortal
divinity
that
Eric Voegelin
drew him
on
the
423
irresistibly
into the
exist
quest and pursuit of the tme order of
("Reason: The Classic
Experience,"
lustrative
of the experience of
Plato's philosophy of history is il immortalizing in the unfolding of rational con

p. 285).
sciousness and can
be
reduced to
three core components:
(1)
the
In-Between,
as
the area
in
which
the cosmic process
progression of consciousness
becomes luminous for its meaning; (2) the to noetic heights as the historical dimension of
progression of conscious
meaning; and
ness
(3)
the stmctures that emerge from this
in the metaxy as categories of meaning in history (OH, vol. 4, pp. 187to denote human participation in the met188). Plato uses the term
"dialectics"
aleptic
it
extends
reality (that is, the reality between apeirontic depth and noetic height as into the human psyche). It is the participatory reality in the philoso
that structures the meditative ascent to the perfection
pher's existential struggle of
life in death.
Only
and
if the reality
poles
of existential consciousness
has been suspended,
so that
the reality of the
human
in the metaxy has been eclipsed, can the divine be hypostatized into autonomous entities. Participatory move
movements
ments
in the metaxy may be
preempted
in
one of
two
ways.
First,
the experi
ence of
transcendence, which lies at the root of the problem and motivates the creation of symbols for its expression, may be abandoned. That is, the symbols of transcendence may be perverted by speculation on immanent problems. The
"philodoxer,"
were an eternal object.
according to Voegelin, is one who treats existence as though it This is the style of the sophistic intellectual.
second way in which participation in the metaxy may be preempted results from the desire for certainty in philosophic speculation to know whether the
thing
speculated about
really
exists and to
know it exactly
warned
as
it is, in
a compre
hensive
and absolute manner.
Voegelin
that there
is the danger that

real
man will yield
to the temptation to collapse the tension of the participatory

and substitute
ity
in the Between
for it
fallacious
second reality.
In addition,
the
closed
the self-proclaimed second reality reflects the
egophanic
mode of
usurps the place of God and opens up false (Dante Germino, "Eric Voegelin's Framework in Eric Voegelin's for Political Evaluation in His Recently Published
self,
or
ego, to the
point where
it
standards
for
action
in the
world
Work,"
Thought,
to
istics,"
pp.
1 19-123).
To illustrate this
"dialectics,"
sort of absolutist claim that attempts refers to
overleap the human condition, Voegelin

which contrasts with
Plato's
use of
the term "er

represented
or
the
manner of
inquiry
p. 256). Er in the Philebus (Philebus, 17a; "Reason: The Classic istic thought (the word comes from the Greek word for strife, eris) contends that there is only one point of view, its own, and that what is seen from this an
Experience,"
gle
is
not
in any way
a matter of
interpretation but the reality
itself, known
is
conscious as
with
of
certainty and stated with finality. By his existence in the metaxy explores his from
contrast, the person who

real
situation
in the Between
viewed
various perspectives and as represented
in the interpretive
models
that express them
(Anamnesis,
p.
107).
424 The
Interpretation
noetic constituent of meditation which reveals
which
the metaxy as the cogni

not
tive center at
reality becomes luminous for tmth has

of
lost meaning for

and and
the
great
problem
the contemporary situation
the pervasive social phe
uncons
nomenon
that Voegelin called the "public

Extreme,"
( "Wisdom
the
Magic
ence,
of
the
and
p.
286).
In both The New Science of Politics

took the position that
Sci
Politics,
Gnosticism, he
"gnosticism"
is the
"essence
of modernity"; the main thrust of
cess which elevates the external over scendence.
modernity is a despiritualizing pro internal and immanence over tran the
The
and
significance of gnosticism armed
for Voegelin's diagnosis

of
of
the spir
itual
decay
ideological dogmas
summarized.
the nineteenth
and
twentieth
centuries
may be
briefly
The
"secularization"
of
the modem West concomitant with the gradual

relegated
dissi Chris
pation of the medieval
Christianitas
the
spiritual concerns of
tians to the
private sphere and
"left the field
open
for
a respiritualization of the and social and
public sphere
from
sources,"
other
for example, nationalism, liberal biological

and reductionist
tribalism"
ist
"economism,"
versions of
various
doctrines,
a closed collectivist
form
of
"humanitarian
(From Enlightenment to
Revolution,
standing
claim
and
pp.
20-28).
More importantly, the

altered
classical and
Christian
of
under
of man was
fundamentally
by
gnostic
forms
thought which
to have bridged the chasm between essence and existence, immanence
transcendence.
According
to the gnostic viewpoint, the uncertainties and

natural
anxieties which arise are resolved
by
from the In-Between quality of "endowing man and his intramundane

fulfillment."
human
existence
range of action with the
meaning
In the
of eschatological
measure
in
which
this
immanentization
progressed experientially, civiliza
tional activity
soul which verted
became
a mystical work of self-salvation.

was
The
spiritual strength of
the
in
Christianity
devoted
to the sanctification of
and
life
could now
be di
into the
more appealing, more
tangible,
so much easier creation of

pp.
the terrestrial paradise
(The New Science of Politics: An Introduction,

revival
124, 129).
According
ninth
to
Voegelin, following its

symbolic
by
Johannes Scotus Erigena in the
century, the gnostic
form
manifested
itself in the
"system"
millenarian
movements of
the later Middle Ages (Joachim of Fiore is the

the radical sects of the
key figure
in this
development),
of
Reformation,
the
constructions
Hobbes
and
Spinoza, Enlightenment
communism
progressivism, Hegelian
idealism, Nazi
racism,
and
Marxist
ical Thought: Machiavelli to

1979],
p.
Germino, Modern Western Polit Marx [Chicago: University of Chicago Press,

and complicated secularization process as a
(see Dante
14).
Voegelin interpreted this
long
tragic saga of experiential contraction and symbolic to see the
impoverishment,
such as
of
failure
human form
as a
unity, a physical and
spiritual entity.
For example,
This
reduc-
the progressive thinkers of the French rot,

and
Enlightenment,
man
Voltaire, Dide
Turgot, "mutilated
the idea of
beyond
recognition
Eric Voegelin
tion of man and
on the
425
his life to the level

of
of utilitarian existence
is the
symptom of
the
critical
breakdown
Western
civilization
through the atrophy of intellec
substance."
tual and spiritual
In the Positivist movement,
beginning
in the
mid
dle
of
the eighteenth century, "the term man no
longer designates the

The "normal
mature
man of
the humanist and Christian tradition, but only the crippled, utilitarian
fragment"
(From Enlightenment
to
Revolution,
man"
p.
95).
in
the modem vocabulary of Western politics is characterized as the

power-seeker of
immanentist
or
Hobbes,
or the pleasure-pain mechanism of the of
utilitarians,
the "megalomaniac
man"
intellectual"
Condorcet
and
Comte,
or
Marx's "socialis
tic
who asks no metaphysical
questions, or Nietzsche's
Ubermensch
to
who
extends grace
Evaluation,"
to himself.
(Germino, "Eric Voegelin's Framework for Political

see also
pp. pp.
129-30;
Voegelin, From Enlightenment
Revolu
tion, 69, 97, 132, 178, 258.) Voegelin wrote that "the modern study of man has become questionable because the revolt against dogmatic obscurantism
has
not regained
the philosopher's noetic experience,

of
but has
own
imposed
tmth"
on the new
freedom the heritage
dogmatic form
p.
as
its
form
of
("Epilogue,"
in Eric Voegelin's Thought, in the
200).
The
action,
modus operandi of reason or
noetic sense peitho
is
not
revolution, violent
compulsion, but persuasion, the
that is central to Plato's phi
losophy. The
philosopher's articulation of concepts appropriate to the
illumina
tion of man's participation
in
a multidimensional
reality
can yield
perspective, for
man cannot
step "outside
Being"
and must
only a partial base his self-con

within
scious reflection on
the
experience of participation
itself. However,
the
not
limits
simply private, but

will pation
reality illumines the mystery of existence for anyone who take the trouble to reenact within his own psyche the experience of partici
which
of
his humanity, the
philosopher can offer a vision of
which
is
to which the philosopher's symbols refer (see Dante

of
Germino, "Eric
Voegelin: The In-Between

phers, eds.
Human
Life,"
in
Contemporary
Political Philoso
Anthony
de
p.
Crespigny
101).
and
Kenneth Minogue [New York: Dodd,
Mead
and
Co.,
1975],
Bacon's Myth
Power
as a
of
of
Orpheus
Science in
Goal
Of the
Wisdom of the Ancients
Timothy H. Paterson
Saint John's College
Most
attempts to understand the

of nature
historical
origins of
the
modem concept of
mastery Bacon. Despite this, the
have devoted
at
least
of
some attention to the thought of

own
Francis
grounds
Bacon's
turn to power rather than
tmth as the primary goal of science remain obscure, and have
been described in
the evidence
diverse
and
mutually contradictory
this question
ways.
Here, it is
earlier
argued that
provided on
by
one of
Bacon's
works,
Of the
Wisdom of
misunder
the
Ancients, has been largely

of
neglected.
This
neglect
is traced to
standing
the
literary
character of
the book and a resulting failure to take it
seriously as a deeply considered expression of Bacon's own philosophical views. Through a close analysis of Bacon's treatment of the classical myth
which
he
personified
chose as a symbol of
with other
"philosophy
passages and
and a
juxtaposition
of
this text
key
Baconian
themes, it is
argued that
Ba
con's turn
to power may in part be traced to his desire for a kind of philosophy
which might
be
able
to mle religion,
rather
than
being
mled
by
it.
ON THE LITERARY CHARACTER OF WISDOM OF THE ANCIENTS
Almost
forty
years
ago, Fulton H.
Anderson
called
attention
to the
un
justified
neglect of
De Sapientia Veterum
philosophy
(Philosophy
some valuable accounts
for understanding Bacon's Francis Bacon, Chicago, 1948, p. 57). Despite of of the historical background of the book, it is fair to
as a source
say that this neglect has not been remedied by more recent studies. My effort to do so here has two primary intentions. The first is to suggest that misunder standing of the literary character of the work is a major reason why it has not
been
studied more
seriously
as a work of philosophy.
The
second
is to indicate
the lines along
which a comprehensive
interpretation
of
might
proceed,
by
offer
or
ing
an analysis of
Bacon's interpretation
the myth of Orpheus
("Orpheus;
The
the eleventh chapter of Wisdom of the tions for the understanding of Bacon's philosophy
purpose of such a
reinforced
Philosophy,"
Ancients)
as
and
its implica
ultimate
a whole.
study is to clarify the
prior motives which either produced or
the
emergence of power as
the
The
question
of the
literary
character
primary goal of Baconian science. of Wisdom of the Ancients has two
interpretation,
Spring 1989,
Vol. 16, No. 3
428
aspects:
Interpretation
the more general
problem
of
the
manner
in
which
Bacon
wrote
his
his intentions in writing Wisdom of the An books, and the cients itself (in particular, the question of how seriously Bacon took his claim concealed in classical mythology). to have recovered a lost "ancient
specific problem of
wisdom"
The
general problem can
best be
approached
by
recalling that James
Spedding,
the principal shaper of the great and still standard nineteenth-century edition of
Bacon's works,
seemed to
or manner
noted the
imply
(J.
vols.
that Bacon
many puzzling passages in Bacon's writings which had a teaching which he kept secret in some sense
and
1857-
Bacon, 7
otherwise
Spedding, R. L. Ellis, LondomLongmans,

all references
D. D. Heath, The Works of Francis 107113. Unless 1870, Vol. 1, pp.
noted,
to Bacon's writings will be to this edition. Brief

and cited
parenthetical numbers as
text references are to this edition

reference
by
volume and page cited
alone; for example, the
just
made would
be
in the text
[1:107-113]).
Spedding
concentrated on the question of whether these re reserved
marks meant
that Bacon
had
for
private communication views which
he entirely refrained from expressing in his published writings, even indirectly. In viewing the problem in these terms, he gave insufficient attention to Bacon's suggestions that in his writings he sought to combine a direct appeal to the
reader of
cations of a
ordinary abilities, dominated by received opinions, further teaching addressed to "the deeper
makes several
with
indirect indi
intellect"
(6:690).
Bacon in fact
an
direct
and open references
to the possibility of
"acroamatic
method"
or enigmatical
of
transmit new discoveries in a way
which would
writing (4:450), one which would "above all, [select] to itself the
to quote two of the
more
legitimate
reader"
(7:367). Here, it
suffices
striking
among these references:

The intention
of
[this
acroamatic or enigmatical vulgar
method]
seems to
be
by
obscurity
of
delivery
those
to exclude the
who
from the
secrets of
knowledges,
of
and to admit
only
of
have
either received the
interpretations
the enigmas through the
hands
the
the teachers, or
have
wits of such sharpness and
discernment
as can pierce
veil
(4:450).
...
The discretion anciently observed be to the taste nor capacity of all, but
not to of affection
of
shall as
publishing in a manner whereby it shall not it were single and adopt his reader, is
abuse
be laid aside, both for the avoiding of in the admitted (3:248). ening
in the excluded,
and the strength
These
and
many
other statements about
the general problem of indirect com

would
munication suggest
that Bacon expected that at least a few of his readers
do
a certain amount of
reading between the lines (On the
general problem see
Works, 3:255,
363; 4:42, 53, 311, 371; 5:31;

701-702).
6:377-378,
387-389, 403-404,
429-431, 456,
such an approach and
Bacon's works, few seem better suited to than does Wisdom of the Ancients. The letters of dedication
Among
the preface to the book all,
indicate that Bacon
considered
it
an
important and,
of
above
a philosophical work
(6:689, 691, 699). Yet from
the perspective
Bacon's Myth of Orpheus
429
Bacon's philosophy as a whole, the very existence of Wisdom of the Ancients would seem to be strange and paradoxical, a flat contradiction of Bacon's fun
damental animating principle that "new discoveries must be light of nature, not fetched back out of the darkness of
specific
sought
from the
antiquity
things and not from texts and particularly not from old texts.
claims
on
which
(4:109), from Moreover, the
the book seems to rest have a
fantastic
character
difficult to hensive
was
reconcile with
Bacon's customary sobriety
and matter-of-factness:
that classical mythology is an allegorical or esoteric

philosophical or scientific superior
presentation of a compre
teaching
which preceded now
Greek
science and
allegorical
vastly
to
it,
and
that Bacon has
decoded these
messages so as
to
reveal
for the first time the consciously intended meaning
of
their putative authors.

of Wisdom of the Ancients has focused on the question of Bacon really believed this claim that classical mythology was a ' I believe that consciously devised allegorical presentation of "ancient the overall interpretive claim he makes in the book is radically insincere, and
Much discussion
whether or not
wisdom."
his belief in the
real existence of such evidence
"ancient
wisdom"
wholly
and
deliber
of
ately feigned. The
for this,
which seems
to me conclusive,
is
two
kinds,
to it.
one external
to the
work
itself,
the
other
derived from Bacon's
preface
The
con,
external evidence consists of clear and unequivocal statements
by
Ba
written
both
prior
to
and
following
publication of
Wisdom of the Ancients,

"fiction"
to the effect that any such work would properly be
regarded as a
or
"imposture":
[Bacon] knew
not
well
that, if he
chose
to act
with
less than
absolute
sincerity,
it
would
be difficult to
a
convince men of
that among the sages of antiquity,

of much more
long
before the
Greeks,
sunk
Science
Nature had flourished,
in deeper
connect
oblivion.
He knew
well
ies to
them with remote antiquity
potency than theirs and add to new discover would what solemnity it men invest self-made in the same way as glory of some an facts and avoid any
themselves
cient stock. sort of
person
from the dubious But Bacon
traditions of the genealogists with the
was resolved pp.
imposture (Farrington, here).
to rely on the evidence of 86-87. Bacon is writing of himself in the third
the fact of the funda perfectly clear admission before The most serious Wisdom. in claim interpretive Bacon's mental insincerity of imputation of deliberate de the and detailed attempt to clear Bacon's name of
This
seems to
be
ception
is that
made
by
Paolo Rossi,
who argues
that shortly after writing the

allegorical
above passage
Bacon
changed
his
mind and
decided that in fact the

account of
hypothesis
stages which
was
correct.
Rossi
presents
a complicated
the alleged
in the is
evolution of
Bacon's
attitude
towards classical myth, an evolution

position taken
schematic
supposed
to have
culminated
in the
in Wisdom of
of
the
Ancients (Rossi,
pp.
81-96;
see
in
particular
the
summary
Rossi's
430
Interpretation
view on p. 95).
My
objection
to this
theory is
four
that it requires us to posit even

period of
more changes of
mind,
taking
place over a
longer
time,
than
Prof.
to
Rossi describes. Rossi's

wards myth
cients
account speaks of
reversals
in Bacon's
attitude
in
six
years, and treats the position taken in Wisdom of the An
(published in 1609) as final. But it seems that by the time Bacon pub lished The New Organon in 1620, he had again changed his mind on this
subject, returning to his
myth and
original skepticism about the philosophical content of

similar
restating it in language very

chosen
to that just cited:
And I know that if I had
thority for my
. . .
suggestions
and so gained
to deal less sincerely, I might easily have found au to the old times before the Greeks referring them for them both support and honor, as men of no family devise for
by
themselves
cient stock.
by
the good
help
of genealogies the
nobility
of a
descent from
some an reject all
forms
of
But for my part, relying on the (4:108). fiction and imposture
evidence and
truth of
things, I
Moreover, it
would appear
that a few years later (in 1623) Bacon returned to
the belief in the
real existence of
"ancient
wisdom,"
for he included
revised
versions of three of the myths examined

panded
Latin
version of
in Wisdom of the Ancients in the ex The Advancement of Learning (4:315-335). In short,

age al
on
taking Rossi's theory seriously requires us to believe that from middle most to the time of his death Bacon kept flip-flopping back and forth
question,
cealed
this
now sincerely believing in the existence of an ancient wisdom con in mythology, now denouncing any such assertion as an act of conscious fraud. Rather than attempting to save the theory by adding to it still more epi
cycles upon change-of-mind
epicycles, it
seems to me
simpler, far
more plausi
ble,
cient
and more consistent with
Bacon's
obvious stature as a
thinker to assume
an
that he always meant what he said in speaking of the pretended existence of

wisdom
as
primarily
means
of
through
a conscious
deception,
and that
adding prestige to his own thoughts he wrote Wisdom of the Ancients in
that deception of many of his readers. The primary motive behind the unconvincing and plainly ad hoc hypothesis that Bacon kept jump ing from one position to its opposite and then back again seems to be that most
tending precisely
modem
scholars
find the possibility
of such authorial
insincerity
distasteful.
The
problem with
pretation of
allowing Bacon's writings is that he himself did
such understandable reactions
to govern the inter
not regard
this kind of dis

put
sembling as fundamentally and says, in great and rare matters human knowledge
and
invariably
and
objectionable.
regarded
As he
it in the Es
surely he
his
proposed reform of
on
the
human
estate as such?
lying
can,
occasion, be
justified (6:389).
The internal
evidence that
thology
was philosophical seems
cited, but also
never seriously believed that classical my is allegory necessarily more ambiguous than that just convincing. It should be plain to any reader not implaca of radical authorial
Bacon
bly
opposed to the
very possibility
irony
or
insincerity
that

Bacon's ering
a
431 importance to the

and claim that
preface attaches no cmcial ancient science or
he is
recov
lost
philosophy,
that this claim is undermined

a careful
by
a number of
things
which
he himself
Baconian
says.
Moreover,
for the
reading
of the one
preface reveals a plausible
motive
pretense
in question, in
completely
con manner as
consistent with
that implied in the writings referred to earlier. Ba
tells us that it
is
an old and
frequent
practice to allegorize myth

antiquity"
such a
"to
gain
the sanction and

all
reverence of
for
one's own
doc
trines (6:695).
myths:
It is
too easy to read
whatever one pleases
into
made
classical
"Not but that I know very
well what pliant stuff
fable is
of, how
freely it will follow any way you please dexterity and discourse of wit meanings
be plausibly put upon (6:695). Bacon then offers four reasons to
spite
it"
to draw
which
it,
and
how easily
with a
little
it
was never meant to
bear may
proceed with
the allegorical enterprise de

validity.
these
forcefully
religious:
stated objections
to its
fundamental
The first
would
ar
gument
is
to declare valid myth interpretation impossible
be
"boldness savoring
shadows,
of
profanity; seeing
humanity"
that religion
delights in
such veils and
and to take them and
between Bacon's
divinity
own
away would be almost to interdict all communion (6:696). It is difficult to see the relevance of
examined
this argument, since the
fables
in Wisdom
are neither
biblical
nor
(by
from any divine being, but rather are supposed to be allegories consciously devised by wise men who sought to illu minate "the difficulties of life and the secrets of (6:689-690); denial
hypothesis)
communications
science"
of
the allegorical hypothesis in this particular case cannot in any sense be
said
to "interdict all communion between
divinity
or
humanity."
and
number"
The
so
second reason
is that
"some"
"no
small
of
the myths can
be
convincingly indisputable (6:696). But the
explicated as
to make their
allegorical character manifest and
specific examples of such
allegedly indisputable convincing

as
interpretations
weigh the
which
Bacon
goes on to cite are
hardly
so
to out
fundamentally
of
question-begging
character of
this argument, particu

and
larly
in light
the
admission
that "a little
dexterity
more
discourse
wit"
of
suffice to give a plausible air even to quite unjustified allegorical
interpreta
that be
tions. Bacon's argument

cause myth can must
amounts
to nothing
than the
assertion
plausibly be
read as though
which
it
were philosophical point
allegory, it
be
philosophical
allegory,
is precisely the
that
myths
in dispute.
a
The third
volved
of
reason given
for
believing
that
"contain
hidden
and
in
meaning"
is
that "some of them are so absurd and stupid upon the
face
afar
the narrative taken
by itself,
they may be
said
to give notice
argument
from
and
and
cry
out
that there is a parable
below"
(6:697). The
that absurdity
stupidity
are reliable signs of the presence of philosophical and scientific
wisdom requires no comment.
The fourth reason,

that of Homer and
which
Bacon declares to be the
one which
he finds
most
convincing, is that the
classical myths
Hesiod, in
whose work
clearly derive from an age earlier than they first appear. Bacon revealingly
432
remarks and
Interpretation
that had the
myths not
been
shown
to be
of
contemporaneous
with
Homer
Hesiod, he "should
such a
have thought
looking
for anything
reasons given
great or
lofty
by
from
source"
(6:697). That
is,
the
first three
for adopting
the allegorical hypothesis are
implicitly
remark on which
conceded to
be unconvincing taken
themselves; moreover, Bacon's

ciple of reverence
tends to discredit the fundamental prin
for antiquity
these
at
Wisdom of the Ancients itself is

and at worst
osten
sibly based.
Having
guments
con seems
offered
best inconclusive
obtmsively feeble
so
ar
for
believing
that mythology is systematic philosophical allegory, Ba

rather not
to shift his ground
dramatically; in doing
he both
admits
that the allegorical hypothesis is
hints
at
his
reason
for writing
as
absolutely crucial to his book and quietly though it were crucial. He addresses a hypo
previous
thetical reader
unconvinced
by
the
arguments,
who still
believes "that
genuine, but
the allegorical meaning of the fable was in no that always the fable
clares that
upon a was
case original and put
first
and
the allegory
in
after"
(6:698). Bacon de
another manner
he "will
point,"
not press
that
but
will proceed
"in
fresh
ground"
(6:698).
This "fresh
ground"
consists or
of
the
following
intended for
argument.
Let
us
concede
that no allegorical
myths. were
hidden meaning
and
was
by
all
the authors of classical
There
nevertheless remains another use
such
fables (however they

use
devised),
one
"grave
sober, and
free from
vanity; of prime
to
the sciences, and sometimes indispensable: I mean the employment of parables

as a method
mote
of teaching, whereby inventions that may find

ancient myths
are new and abstruse and re
from
unde
vulgar opinions
an easier passage to the
(6:698,
and
emphasis added).
In
times when reason was new and strange
may have been used "not as a device for shadowing and concealing the meaning, but as a method of making it under stood. And even now if anyone wish to let new light on any subject into
the possession of
few,
men's
minds, and that
without offence or
harshness, he
must still go the same
way
and call
in the
similitudes"
aid of
(6:698,
emphases added).
value of
Bacon's
conclusion
clearly indicates that the
his book is
not cru
cially dependent
Upon the
great or
shadow
on the truth of the allegorical
hypothesis:
whole
conclude with this: the wisdom of the primitive ages was either
lucky;
great, if
the meaning;
they knew what they were doing and invented the figure to lucky, if without meaning or intending it they fell upon matter
to such worthy contemplations.
which gives occasion either upon
I it
shall
will
be throwing light
be found
.
though the
antiquity subjects be
or upon nature
itself.
Here
new
that
old, yet the matter
is
(6:698,
of
emphasis added).
When
we read earlier
these statements in the context
the external evidence
of
in
cited, sincerity antiquity which ani mates Bacon's philosophy as a whole, I think we may reasonably conclude that Of the Wisdom of the Ancients was a deliberate and self-conscious attempt to
and recall the profound rejection of

present
433
of a
Bacon's
own
thoughts in the guise

one adds
feigned recovery
"ancients,"
of a
lost
an
we
cient wisdom. ought
When
to this evidence Bacon's own statement that

own
to regard the men of his

arrivals
time as the true
since as
the
later
they
are
in
position
to benefit from all the previously

of mankind
of
made
discoveries
whether
and
prior
historical
experience
(4:82),
one
wonders
the very title of the book is not an example

refers
Baconian
wordplay.
On
ancients"
the surface, "wisdom of the
to the
wisdom of men who

"true'
lived
long
that
ago; beneath the surface, it refers to the
wisdom of
the
ancients;
is,
the modems!
sought
In Wisdom of the Ancients Bacon

"primeval antiquity
to take advantage of the fact that
[was]
an object of
the highest
veneratio
(6:689)
and
ar>d
to the
"add solemnity to new ancients. In doing so, he

present
discoveries"
by feigning
appealing,
means
them to have been made
by
sought an
his
own
views, as well as a
that
they
were
his (the
proclaimed role of
inoffensive way to of obscuring to some extent the fact interpreter of the thoughts of others
indirect,
serving
as an obvious
defense
of one's own reputation and
security in the
event
that the views presented in such a manner
do
give offense or cause one's own might
orthodoxy to fall
as well
under suspicion).
That there
have been
solid prudential
as pedagogical and propagandistic reasons
will, I
hope, become
apparent
in the
course of
for proceeding in this way my attempt to recover Bacon's
thought from his interpretation of the Orphic
myth.
"ORPHEUS; OR
PHILOSOPHY"
The first thing to
note about
to
restore a
of the myth of
Orpheus
to life as
is that he his its
chose the
story
of an attempt
dead human
being
to
symbol of natural philosophy. noblest work of and
"For
natural
philosophy
proposes
itself,
as
corruptible,
vation of
all, nothing less than the restitution and renovation of things (what is indeed the same thing in a lower degree) the conser
state
bodies in the
in
which
they
are, and the retardation of dissolu
putrefaction"
tion and
(6:721). This
choice was neither casual nor capricious.
The
key
of
to Bacon's understanding
of
human psychology,
unequivocal
and
the psychology
of the philosopher
ment
in particular, is his
that
statement
in The Advance
whereunto man's
continuan
Learning
most
"immortality
or central
is "that
nature
doth
aspire"
(3:318). The
theme of his interpretation of the
Orphic
myth
is the
role played
in the
philosophic
life
by
various
forms
of
the
aspiration to immortality, and his most astonishing suggestion, intimated rather than clearly stated for obvious prudential reasons, is that the original form which this takes is the desire for bodily immortality. This understanding of the
ultimate goal of natural end.
philosophy
pervades
Bacon's
work
from
beginning
spoke of
to
In
an
early
work which
he
chose to
leave unpublished, he
"the
434
tme
Interpretation
knowledge"
end of
as
"the
discovery
were
of all operations and possibilities of
operations, from
immortality
History
(if it
possible) to the
meanest mechanical
practice"
(3:222);
toward the end of
his life
(fittingly
to the
enough) he devoted an
problems
entire
book (The
health,
and mortality.
of Life (For some
and
Death)
of
longevity,
other passages
which
indicate the
intensity
and pervasiveness of
Bacon's
concern with
these matters, see
Works, 3:157,
was
158, 159, 160, 167; 4:85-86, 383-385, 390-391, 4i8; 6:749,761).
"Immortality
possible? unqualified
(if it
were
possible)
Did Bacon in fact think that it

religious
Given the then-existing positing

of
constraints
on
any direct
and
bodily immortality
as
the supreme goal of science, it is
impossible to determine exactly how far he went in his in nermost thoughts; difficult too to distinguish convincingly between hopes seri ously entertained and illusions which he thought it useful to encourage in an difficult
and perhaps
indirect
port
and
tacit
manner as part of an effort
to
win
the
maximum possible
sup
for Baconian
sober
science
(Works,
4:85-86, 90-102; 6:411). If in fact the

ever cherished such
usually (which
and
clear-sighted
Bacon
fantastic dreams
one
dence), it
seems clear that
naturally hesitates to believe despite the undeniable textual evi he regarded their fulfillment as possible only in the
very distant future: in his imaginary kingdom of Bensalem, a society in which Baconian science is supposed to have been in existence for about nineteen hun
dred years, the
progress scientists of Salomon's House seem to have made only limited in overcoming age and reviving the dead (Works, 3:149, 159). About all that can be said with confidence is that Bacon's writings contain a
number of
surprising
to the
direct,
and an even greater number of
and preserve
possibility using health. These

an
of
scientific medicine seem
to revive the
at
indirect, allusions dead, prolong life,
to be
hinting
erably beyond
ordinary
concern with
something which goes consid maintaining health and living out one's
three-score years and ten. Some of his formulations
(e.g., "immortality
indefinite
or con
tinuance") tion of life
suggest a and
blurring
of
the distinction between the to
prolonga
might
immortality,
or seem
imply
that perhaps the
former
progress to such an extent as
to make it all but
indistinguishable from the latter
(The Historie of Life and Death, New York, 1977, pp. 1-7). To the extent that it was a sincere hope rather than an illusion deliberately fostered in the interest
of
mobilizing
all possible
human
of
energies
for
scientific
progress,
immortality
possibility Baco
and
would appear
in Bacon's thought
as a
kind
of extreme or asymptotic
arising from the juxtaposition

nian:
two prior beliefs which are
indisputably
health,
itself be
that scientific medicine might prolong life and preserve
that
the science on which such medicine would be
based
might
capable of
indefinite
or
infinite
problem
progress
in the mastery
of nature.
interpretive
in
an altered
form,
since
But this only restates the it is notoriously difficult to say

nature"
might ultimately go. exactly how far Bacon thought "the mastery of Whatever his final and perhaps unrecoverable thoughts on this matter, it is clear
that as a propagandist
attempting to
win support
for
science
Bacon
sought
Bacon
to
Myth of Orpheus
435
insinuate the idea that
significant spects
science might make possible some indefinite but very increase in human longevity, and that he was in this as in other re far less concerned to indicate limits on any such enterprise than to deny
them,
remove
sive motive and
them, or obscure their existence. An additional and perhaps deci for both the substantive concern with "immortality or
mobilize
continuanc
the propagandistic efforts to
human
energies
for the mastery
of
nature
by implying
that such mastery
might
logical terminus
pheus"
will appear after we
have
examined
have mastery of mortality as its the implications of "Or
for Bacon's understanding
of
the relation between philosophy or science
and religion.
It
was clear
to Bacon that for the

"immortality"
foreseeable future (and

available
perhaps
forever)
the only form of

was
that
which
Orpheus
sought after
realistically his failure to
to the best human beings
rescue
Eurydice: the diluted
and
derivative
"immortality"
produced
by lasting
fame. Fmstrated in the direct
attempt and
to master human mortality, Orpheus turned to charming animals, trees,
stones.
Following
he
an
established
tradition of Renaissance mythography,

as a symbol of
Bacon interprets this

phy,"
part of the
fable
"moral
to
and civil philoso
which
presents as an effort
by
the
philosopher
win
fame
by
using
"persuasion
and eloquence to
insinuate into
men's minds
philosopher which
the love of virtue and
peace"
equity
and merit and
(6:722). In
doing
this, the
or
is
"seeking
immortal
those the
renown"
ity by
(6:722),
to
the
fame
is the
reward of
who order
human
of
communities and
hence
assure most can
human beings
of
only kind
ance").
"immortality"
which
they
aspire, that achieved through

of
their children (a third and still
more
derivative form
"immortality or
form
of
continu
The
philosopher's motive
in
doing
this is not pity for mankind, still
less any
sort of
Christian charity, but is

mortality.
rather a modified
his
original
concern with
overcoming
Bacon here
provides one
among
a number
of similar clues
to his understanding of his

at a remarkable
philosopher.2
own motives as a
In addition, Bacon hints
understanding
of
the nature
of
"phi
civil"
losophy
not
moral and
and
its
relation
to
natural philosophy.
The immediate
and public purpose of political
the
promulgation of own
philosophy is the production of order and peace, theoretical tmth. So far it is from revealing to men the
that its
success
tmth about their
natures
depends
rather on
producing
kind
of
forgetting
of
human
nature:
lB]y
in
the same sweetness of his song
and
lyre he drew to him
all
kinds
of wild
beasts,
such manner that

. .
putting off
their several natures,
forgetting
all their quarrels and
ferocity
they
all stood about
only to the concords of bond of that order and good fellowship,

.
him gently and sociably, as in a theatre, listening [T]he charm being broken that had been the his lyre.
confusion
began again; the beasts

other as
returned em
each
to
his
several nature and preyed one upon
the
before
(6:72 1 ;
phases added).
Moreover, Bacon's interpretation
of
the fable's
sequence of events
(first
nat-
436
ural
Interpretation
philosophy, then its

moral
failure,
is
a
then moral philosophy) clearly
implies that
civil"
"philosophy
sense
and
derivative
and
secondary enterprise, in the

4:114: the enormous
that its character depends on the amount
of power over nature achieved
by
the existing natural philosophy. (Compare the way of
Works,
dif is
ferences between
life
of civilized
Europeans
and that of savages
entirely due to different levels of development of "the arts.") In The New Orga non, in brief remarks that are otherwise almost wholly unexplicated by the rest
of the
Baconian
corpus
(and
which moreover
flatly
contradict can
his seeming
as
surances that scientific and technological
innovation
states
be
combined with po
litical
new
and religious conservatism).
Bacon
that his new natural science or

politics"
"scientific
method"
will also produce a new
"ethics,
could
and
(4:1 12).
"Orpheus"
suggests science
which
that among
overcome
other
things Bacon meant to say

which
by
this that a
suggest to
had
was
mortality (or
plausibly
might
mankind
that it
man affairs
in
a spirit and
making steady progress toward this goal) very different from the "sorrowful
political when philosophy.
turn to
hu
mood"
characteristic
of ancient
moral
Bacon indicated the fundamental

Utopian work
character of salem
that spirit
he
entitled
his
"New
Atlantis"; Ben
to rule both
and
is
"new"
Atlantis because Salomon's House

that hubristic
pride and
"old"
embodies a modified and aspiration
redirected
form
of
immoderate
portrayed
nature and man
found in the
Atlantis
in Plato's Timaeus
Critias. (See J. W
troduction to the
view, Vol. 70
Weinberger, "Science
of
and
Rule in Bacon's Utopia: An In American Political Science Re
Reading
p.
the New
Atlantis,"
(1976),
879.)
opher
This astonishing conception of philosophy and the psychology of the philos seems, in addition, to have a definite historical dimension or referent
which conveys
Bacon's understanding
of of
of what
he took to be the
of
single greatest
which
historical distortion
took
place
the true nature and function
philosophy, that
in the thought
Orpheus'
Plato
and
Aristotle.
Bacon
emphasizes
the
significance of
the temporal sequence
of events
in the Orphic
at
myth: natural phi produces
losophy
is
the subsequent
initial concern, "turn to human
and
his failure
carried
this enterprise
affairs"
out
in
mood
"sorrowful
philosophy to civil affairs is properly represented, and according to the true order of things, as subsequent to the diligent trial and final fmstration of the experiment of restoring the dead to (6:722;
application of
"And this
body
life"
emphasis added).
This
"turn"
from
natural such
minds one of the single most
famous
by Plato, an event in the history of ing Cicero) elsewhere describes in terms which suggest he had it in mind when interpreting the story of Orpheus. "[W]hen Socrates had drawn down philoso
phy from heaven to earth, moral philosophy became more fashionable than ever, and diverted the minds of men from the philosophy of (4:78).
nature"
philosophy to ethics and politics re turning, that of Socrates as portrayed Western philosophy which Bacon (follow
The
pre-Socratic philosophers
with
had
conducted serious
inquiries into
nature,
but
po-
beginning
Plato this
enterprise
had been
undermined and corrupted
by

litical
pp.
Ail
and theological ambitions and
by
the desire for
literary fame
(Farrington
"Neither is my meaning, as was spoken of Socrates, to 64, 83, call philosophy down from heaven to converse upon the earth; that is, to leave natural philosophy aside, and to apply knowledge only to manners and
110-116).
policy
(3:294). The
shift of emphasis effected
by
the Platonic
Socrates,
so
fateful for
so much of subsequent of
philosophy, is
portrayed
in
"Orpheus"
as a consequence
the failure of pre-Socratic natural philosophy to achieve its proper goal (the
"noblest,"
one which was
first in time,
and most
deeply
to
win
rooted
in human
na
ture). It was a
derivative
effort
by
the
philosopher
fame for himself
by
benevolently
mastering
other men
after
the original attempt to
master nature
had failed. The suggestion that Bacon's ical

the
referent
version of
the Orphic myth has a precise histor

of
is
supported
by
his interpretation
a
the destmction of Orpheus and

said
political order which
he created,
destmction
to have been accom

of
plished
by
is
"certain Thracian women,

would appear
under
the stimulation and excitement
Bacchus"
(6:721). It
not
that philosophy's ordering of human com
munities
In
fact,
"Orpheus"
particularly durable; some force works to undermine that order. contains a Delphic criticism of both the dominant tradition
in
ancient
such
philosophy (the Socratic tradition, defined broadly enough to include figures as Aristotle and Cicero) and the Christian religion which outconmake claim
verted, outorganized, outlasted, absorbed, and came to dominate it. To this at first sight rather fantastic plausible,
of we must
the details of Bacon's interpretation

well as
the
fable
of
pay Bacchus
close attention
to
as
or
Dionysus
that of Orpheus.
note
first that
moral and civil philosophy's

"Orpheus,"
ordering
of
human society,
as
Bacon
presents
it in
seems
to
make no use of religion as a means of
producing social peace; despite the fact that Bacon elsewhere calls religion "the chief band of human (6:381), here philosophy employs rhetoric ("per
society"
suasion and and
eloquence") to instill
affection toward the moral virtues

of
("virtue
equity
and
peace") (6:722). The treatment
the
Orphic
myth
in The Ad
re
vancement
of Learning,
by
contrast, does
said
mention
the role of religion in this

civil peace
gard; there, the story

men ear
of
Orpheus is
to teach that
depends
on
"to precepts, to laws, to religion, sweetly touched with elo giving (3:302). That quence and persuasion of books, of sermons, of harangues
"
.
theological traits usually

to
is to say, in Wisdom of the Ancients Bacon seems to eliminate the religious associated with Orpheus in the Renaissance
Bacon in
part relied, traits which
and
mytho-
graphical tradition on which
he himself
refers
in
other works.
(On the
relative merits of
social
peace,
consider
the essay "Of that
Superstition"
philosophy and faith [6:415-416]).
as sources of
Second,
under
Bacon
recounts
Orpheus
was
torn to pieces
by
"Thracian
women
Bacchus,"
the
stimulation and excitement of
but
offers no specific
inter
pretation of this particular stmction of the
detail
of the myth.
says
In his interpretation
of the
de
Orphic order, he
only that "after kingdoms and
common-
438
wealths
Interpretation have flourished for

a
time, there
. .
arise perturbations and seditions and

"
wars;
amid the uproars of which
the laws are put to silence

place?
(6:722).
women
But
what produces such
disturbances in the first

represent
Do the Thracian
under
the influence of Bacchus
anything
more specific and

of order
histori
cally lapse into disorder? In

the
women under
concrete than some assumed general

"Orpheus"
tendency
periodically to
we accept
itself, Bacon
offers no suggestion as to what
the influence of Bacchus might represent, but if

principle
his
own ostensible
interpretive
philosophical
remarks
allegory contains no which he makes in other chapters,
in Wisdom of the Ancients (namely, that a doctrinally insignificant details) then certain
and
in the
expanded version of
the
Dionysus fable in the De Augmentis Scientiarum, are illuminating. In his interpretation of the myth of Dionysus in Wisdom (6:740-743),
find that among
rites
we
other
traits Bacchus was "the inventor and founder of sacred

yet such as were
and
ceremonies;
fanatical
and
full
of
corruption, and
besides"
cmel
(6:741). In the
enlarged version of not
the same fable in the De

of pagan religion
Augmentis, Bacon indicates that he is here, for he says that the savagery of
of
thinking solely
rites
shows
orgies of
Bacchus'
that "the pollutions
heretics
are worse than the
Bacchanalian
and
the
heathen"
(4:335). (On
the connection between
Christianity
"Dionysus"
383-384, 470-471, 732-733.)
fanatical cmelty, see Works, 6:381, reveals that Orpheus was not the
was
only
one victimized
by
these rites; Bacon notes that "it

orgies that two
by
women excited
to phrensy in
[Bacchus']
illustrious persons, Pentheus (6:741). If

chapter
and
Or
to
pheus,
explore
are said to
have been torn to
pieces we
we attempt
this reference to
which
Pentheus,
find that the
"Actaeon
and
Pentheus,"
immediately
human
"Orpheus"
precedes
in Wisdom of the
to grasp the
"Dionysus,"
Ancients,
di
presents
Pentheus
as a symbol of reason
those
who aspire
secrets of
vinity
by
means of
(6:719-720). In
however, Pen
theus becomes a symbol of those who calmly and rationally inquire into the tme nature of violent and unmly passions, and Bacon makes all but explicit the
implied identification
passion:
of religion or
the cormption of religion with unreasoning
"Nor is it
wonderful
that superstitious rites are attributed to
Bacchus,
cir
since
every insane
passion grows rank of
in depraved
and
religions.
[T]hat
cumstance of the
tearing
Pentheus
and
Orpheus has
and
an evident allegorical and
meaning; since
curious
inquisition
[Pentheus]
from
salutary
free
admonition
[Orpheus]
743).
are alike
hateful
intolerable
to an
passion"
overpowering
together these hints philosophy, employing
(6:
The
suggestion which emerges
bringing
and re rhet
marks seems to
be that the
of
peace and order which
oric, is capable
emption of
bringing
to human societies is
periodically destroyed in the last

for
analysis
depraved
passions
expressing themselves through religious

related and perhaps and
"superstition"
by the frenzy
hu
or enthusiasm.
(On the closely
identical
topic of the rivalry

man
between
"learning"
control of the
mind, compare
am correct
Works, 3:316-317
with
Works, 6:415-416.)
moral and political
philoso-
If I
in suggesting that Orpheus the

pher stands not
439
only for philosophy in general but for post-Socratic ancient phi in particular, then a comparison of the language which Bacon uses losophy here with that found in The New Organon's description of the fate of ancient
philosophy destmctive
order suggests
that the
dismembering
of
Orpheus
represents not
only the
effect of religion per se on moral and civil philosophy's

also
human society, but
Christianity's destmction
of
ability to the independence of
ancient and
philosophy in particular, or the distortion of philosophy by religious theological concerns. In speaking of the condition to which "perturbations
wars"
and seditions and
reduce
commonwealths, Bacon says that "if such trou

also and
a
bles
last, it is
not
long
before letters
that no traces of them can
be found but
and
philosophy are so torn in pieces few fragments, scattered here and
there like
waters of
planks
from
shipwreck;
then a season of barbarism sets
in,
the
Helicon
being
of
pointed
vicissitude
among other nations discussion which drops
sunk under the ground, until, according to the ap things, they break out and issue forth again, perhaps (6:722). In The New Organon, in the course of a
some rather
broad hints that
Christianity
has
retarded
the development of natural philosophy, Bacon says that "down times of Cicero and subsequent ages, the the pre-Socratic inquirers
works of
even
to the
the old philosophers
[that is,
which
into nature]
still remained.
But in the times
followed,
man
when on
the inundation of the barbarians into the Roman Empire hu
learning
planks of
had
suffered shipwreck, then the systems of and
Aristotle begins
and
Plato,
like
lighter
less
solid
material, floated
barbarism"
on
the
waves of
time and
preserved"
were after of
(4:76). The "season
of
therefore
some time
"the times
of
Cicero
ages"
and subsequent
when
or with
the barbarian invasions
Rome,
and extends
into that time
the
systems of
Plato
and
Aristotle
were recovered and preserved. of
It is tempting but incorrect to
identify
the season
of
barbarism
with
the actual barbarian invasions. The
exact
duration
that
season
may be seen by remembering that it was not the invaders of the Roman Empire but rather the medieval church which recovered the thought of Plato and Aristotle and pronounced this fragment of Greek science to be vastly supe rior to
whatever
had been lost. As for the

to the
exact period
during
which
the waters
of
Helicon (the
"break
river sacred
Muses)
plunged underground, and when
they
might
out and
issue forth
again,"
Bacon declares his
own age
to be a
worthy
ones
candidate
to become the third

and
great age of either
learning,
the two previous

and signifi
being
those of Greece
Rome; he is
conspicuously
cantly silent about, or openly contemptuous tian Middle Ages (4:77). The declaration in
and eclipses of
things"
toward, the
"Orpheus"
learning
of
the Chris
that these flourishings
learning
take
place
"according
to the appointed vicissitude of

greatest vi
is
clarified
cissitude of 514)-
in his essay "Of the Vicissitude of Things": "the things amongst men is the vicissitude of sects and
the independence of
science and
religio
(6:
Bacon's desires to
secure
philosophy from
religious supervision and to end
"the
cormption of
philosophy
by
superstition
440
Interpretation
theology"
and an admixture of
(4:65)
are well
known.
My
suggestion
is that
which
these
made
concerns
led him to
reflect on what
it
was
in
previous
philosophy
it
vulnerable
to this kind of distortion
by
religion, and in
particular what
it
was about ancient
and
domination
by
philosophy the Christian
which
had
made
it
unable to resist absorption
religion. elusive of
If I have correctly understood the admittedly Bacon offers in his interpretation of the myth
analysis of
hints
and suggestions
Orpheus, his fundamental

might
the relation between philosophy
and religion
be
hypotheti-
cally restated as follows. Ancient philosophy possessed a certain ability to or der human societies through its "power of persuasion and eloquence"; indeed, Bacon
seems
to have considered,
and civil
without
definitely
be
embracing, the idea that
philosophy, rhetoric,
maintain
the art of
politics might
sufficient
by
themselves to
an
sanction.
respond
orderly But ancient
society
natural
without
the need for

or
philosophy's
effectually to the
witting human concern
any unwitting failure

with
religious
bond
or
or
refusal
to
mortality
and self-preser
any employ that mastery to better the earthly condition of man, rendered it vulnera ble to the destructive emption of this concern in the distorted form of frenzied
religious
render
vation, its conscious
or unconscious rejection of
effort
to master nature and
enthusiasm,
and
in
particular possible
vulnerable
to the Christian claim to
kind
of
immortality
through
on
least in the dominant Socratic
form) had
faith. Ancient philosophy (at the whole sought a kind of practical

of
accommodation to moderated and purified

which
forms
the reigning
religions with
it
was
familiar, seeing
them as actual or
potential sources of support
for
social
peace, individual moderation, and respect for law, written and unwritten. But it did not foresee, or did not pay sufficient attention to, the possibility of a
religion such as
Christianity;
that
is,
a militant and
dogmatic faith
with signifi
cant philosophical pretensions of
compromising
sies and gave
adoption of
its own, whose emphasis on the correct belief as the heart of faith bred
open and un
endless
here its
it
ability
to
bring
for promoting social conflict which believers together. "The quarrels and divisions
a potential
outweighed
about religion
religion of
were evils unknown
to the heathen. The reason was, because the
the
heathen
. .
in any constant belief. But the true God hath this attribute, that he is a jealous God; and therefore
consisted rather rites and ceremonies than
partner"
in
his worship will endure phers had not seen that

would
no mixture nor
(6:381). The
ancient philoso
philosophy's accommodation to a religion of this

absorption
kind
con
inevitably
become
by it,
nor
that their own
lack
of
any
cern with resist
the practical mastery of nature would render their
followers
unable
to
the claims of a religion which combined philosophy's claim to give the most
a su
perior account of
important things
with a religious claim
to an active,
loving,
and
benevolent
concern with the ultimate
fate
of each
individual human
the igno
life. The failure to

rance and
overcome through the practical

which
mastery
of nature
helplessness
decisively
effort
strengthen religion's natural
hold
over
the human mind
doomed any
to employ rhetoric to persuade men to "put

off
441 flourishes
tnis
and acquires vigor
with
natures."
their
and
"Every
forbidden"
passion
by being
re
sisted
(6:743),
ar>d
concern
one's
own
mortality,
which ancient most
philosophy had urged men to ignore or transcend, is the ruling or consistently effectual human passion. Until Orpheus learns how to restore
Eurydice to life
claim
(or,
more modestly, until
he learns how to
render plausible
the
he is making steady progress towards that goal), he and his accom plishments will periodically be destroyed by "certain Thracian women under
that
Bacchus."
the
stimulation and excitement of
The
foregoing
analysis,
which
power orientation of of
Baconian
science
is admittedly speculative, suggests that the is in part shaped by the desire for a kind
resist
philosophy fidence in the
which can
successfully
domination
by
religion.
One's
con
essential correctness of this reading of Bacon's intentions is con and siderably strengthened by the fact that the work which is both his his most detailed picture of the religious future of mankind (the New Atlantis)
"utopia"
does indeed describe

over religion.
society in
which science
clearly
exercises a
kind
of mle
No
one will
deny
a
that Bacon's Bensalem

significant public
and
is
a utopia
in
which science and
scientists seems
play very to be the real center

kingdom"
political
role.
Salomon's House
of national aspiration and and
pride; it is called "the that

ever
very
eye of this
(3:137)
"the
noblest
foundation
earth"
was upon the
(3:145). Scientific
power over nature enables the scientists prepare
to advise the
natural
which
citizens
how to
foresee,
and
for,
and minimize
the effects of
disasters
of various
sorts, and one naturally
wonders whether
any group
to the
makes such a
common good can said
to advise
publicly possibly be denied a share in rather than "the "the

people"
dramatic
acknowledged contribution mle
(notably,
the scientists are
king"
or
"the state") (3:166). The

arrival of one of
scientists are
obviously figures
the European
out
of great
prestige; the
them in
the city
where
visitors are
event which
brings
the entire
staying is depicted as a populace (3:155). The scientist
major public
seems to
moves
be
quasi-religious
figure; he is
greeted
by
kind
of reverent
hush,
and
among
the citizenry
gestures
and a
preceded
by
the
signs of office of a
bishop
archbishop, and
a religious
with
[though] blessing secular figure, he clearly

earlier
"as
people"
the
outranks
(3:154-155)- As botn
priest who
the Christian
deals
the
Europeans
in the book (3:135-147).

withhold whatever general public
Salomon's House is explicitly stated to be in a position to discoveries and inventions it wishes, not merely from the
also
but
from "the
state"
(3:165).
Among
other
things, this
gives the scientists sole
possession of advanced
cion as well as persuasion
military technology; (3:163). The central
science provides means of coer political role of
the scientists
is
amply indicated
by
the fact that the book

on
ends with one of
them in effect re
of
pealing, apparently
his
own
initiative,
law
which
has been
fundamental
importance to Bensalem for

creed that the
nineteen
hundred
years:
King
Solamona had de
island isolate itself from the
rest of
the
world and
keep
its very
442
Interpretation
existence a secret
(3:144-145), but
to publish an
the Father
of
Salomon's House
gives
the
narrator permission
account of
Bensalem "for the
good of other
nations"
(3:166),
vision
that
is,
even the oldest and most
basic laws
are subject
to re
by
scientists
The
of the
ultimate
acting in the interests of mankind. implications of this political position of
science
for the
problem
relationship between science and religion appear most clearly and con cretely in the account of the manner in which Christianity was brought to Bensalem (3:136-139). Two
aspects of this account are
First,
Baconian
science
is
said to
have been
established
particularly revealing. in Bensalem about

the New
three centuries before the birth of Christ and the
arrival of
Testament
in Bensalem (3:144); that
is, Bacon himself

to,
and
kind
of science
has
roots prior
unambiguously indicates that this hence independent of, Christianity. Sec
ond, and most
important,
the event the
which
heralds the
arrival of
the Gospel in the
Bensalem is
accepted
by
populace as a genuine miracle which proves
divine
origin of member
the Bible only after that miracle has been authenticated as such
by
of
Salomon's House (3:137-138). Bacon depicts
situation
which, reflecting his own hopes for the future
relation of science and rather
religion,
exactly
nian
reverses
the actual situation in early-modem Europe:
than
Baco
to be
science
having
to argue its
own
Christianity
allowed
has to be
vetted and validated
legitimacy by Baconian
before
Christian society, in
order
can
science
entry into Bensalem. The

vis-a-vis
scientists of
Salomon's House
occupy
this position
faith for
one reason above all:
their own control of nature to be miraculous. In partic
approaches that which religion
had
formerly judged
ular, it gives them the ability to

cern with
respond
self-preservation,
which
effectually to the powerful human con ability or feigned ability Bacon seems to
power;
all
have identified
save
of the
as a principal source of religion's
Christ's
miracles
one, according to
Bacon,
concerned
the preservation, support, or
healing
Ba
human
years
body
as
(4:379). The
regime of
Bensalem has
survived
for
nineteen
hundred
con
(3:144) because
scientific power
"vicissitudes"
has
mastered
both
of what
identified
and
the two greatest
sasters,
the social turmoil generated
by
religious revolution
myth as
affecting human life: natural di (6:512-514).

I believe he hoped it
Reading
might other
therefore
reveals
of
the
Orphic
be
read
its
complex and multifaceted connections to portrait of
Baconian texts
and themes.
The
Bacon
which emerges
is,
of
course, very different from that found in the standard textbook
accounts.
The
Bacon
of
christian motives are
Wisdom of the Ancients is a thinker in whom antitheological and antifar more important than they are generally thought to have
explain
been. In seeking to
science,
most one
the emergence
of power as a goal of early-modem
naturally turns to Bacon as one of the

and
first
and
forceful have
influential
spokesmen
for that
point of view.
as
surely one of the Yet the ultimate
grounds of science
most
Bacon's
own turn to power rather
than tmth
the supreme goal of
remained somewhat mysterious and

and
diverse
mutually contradictory
ways.
have been described in the I do not claim to have solved
443
the mystery here. But Bacon's myth of Orpheus

that an
does
seem
to me to suggest
important
and
hitherto its
neglected motive
reinforcing this turn to

which
power was a own
(more modestly) underlying desire for a kind of philosophy or science

or
generate not
could, as a result of
activity,
the power necessary for
philosophers or scientists sufficient religion
to mle society
or, if
to mle it
directly,
of
at
least
to
forestall the domination

Baconian science,
power
of science and the
dismption
and
the spokesmen of religion.
More
fundamentally,
to "that
power
society by is the
highest
goal of
power over other
human beings
as well as
power over
nature
nature, because
most
itself is
a means
whereunto man's
Power over na is, immortality or ture aims, ultimately, at immortality of the body, but the actual achievement of this goal is at best something for the very distant future, and may be simply im possible. Power over other human beings, which is based in part on under
aspire;
which
doth
continuance."
standing them
stitute
and
in
part on
the coercive
and persuasive powers which
mastery
that
of nature grants
to those who do the mastering, aims at the derivative

of
and sub
"immortality"
lasting
fame. (For
an
extremely
see
clear statement
power over other
human beings is is the
as much the goal of
the human sciences as
power over nature
goal of natural
science,
"Sphinx,
Science,"
or
Works, 6:757.) Since

mastery tery in many
of nature
the mastery of nature may never reach that state of com
pletion which could assure man of
literal immortality, for the foreseeable future

to the mastery of man,
a mas
is in the last benevolent
analysis a means and
ways
certainly
of
not to
be simply
equated with
sort of cmde political
tyranny
or economic
exploitation, yet
nevertheless
any funda fame

mak
mentally self-serving, in the sense dure or continue. Bacon's own aim
serving the
deep
is
need of
the self to en
of
"immortality"
in the form
lasting
to
for himself
as a
founder
or prophet of a science which

rational
understood
be
ing decay
of
progress
towards the
might
be
regarded as a
mastery kind of blending

Orpheus'
of all
the causes of mortality and

"Orphic"
of
the
original
"political"
goal goal of
subsequent philosophy (overcoming death) with his own name and memory. means of human as a preserving ordering society appears not as something sug Viewed in this light, "the relief of man's
estate"
"secularization"
gested to
Bacon
by Christianity
or
by
the
decay
or
of
Chris
or
tianity, but
rather as an
instmment serving his
own need
for
"immortality
continuance."
NOTES
By
far the best
of
these discussions
pp.
of Discourse, Cambridge: 1974,
173-192.
is Lisa Jardine's Francis Bacon: Discovery and the Art Jardine's view of Bacon's method and intention in
Wisdom of the Ancients is very
similar
to the one given
here,
save that she neither endorses nor re
jects
eron
the conclusion that writing the book involved
fully
self-conscious
fraud. See
also
Don Cam
Allen, Mysteriously Meant: The Recovery of Pagan Symbolism and Allegorical Interpretation Phiin the Renaissance, Baltimore: 1970, pp. 244-246; Benjamin Farrington, trans, and ed., The
444
Interpretation
p.
losophy
of Francis Bacon, Chicago: 1966,
82,
n.
and p.
121,
n.
1; Charles W.
Lemmi, The
lo
Classic Deities in Bacon, Baltimore: 1933, pp. 1 -41; Paolo Rossi. Francis Bacon: From Magic Science trans. Sacha Rabinovitch (Chicago: 1968, pp. 81-96).
2.
Here
and elsewhere
it
will
be
obvious
that I regard Bacon as a master of

am well aware
Christian
minority
rhetoric
point of
for
the
Christian society rather than view, but lack space to argue the
a
a sincere point
believer. I
that this
is a
here. (I have discussed this
question
in
great
detail in "On
Role
pp.
of
Christianity
in the Political
Philosophy
of
Francis
Bacon"
in Polity. XIX. 3.
1987,
419-442.
For Bacons hope that he

see above
subsequent
generations,
something akin to a all, The New Organon, Book I, Aphorism I 29. [Works,
might
be
regarded as
god
Spring by
14-
4:1
115]).
Gaston Fessard
Hugh Gillis
and
the Nature
of
Authority
Canadian Department of Fisheries
and
Oceans/Ottawa
You know that, among the

and those who are great you
Gentiles,
those who claim to
bear
mle
lord it
over
them,
it
must
among them make the most of the power they have. With be otherwise; whoever has a mind to be great among you, must be your
servant, that the

. . .
and whoever
has
a mind
to to
Son
of
Man did
not come
be first among you, must be your slave. So it is have service done him; he came to serve others
Mark X: 42-45
as modem political
Insofar
thought is dedicated to the realization of human
freedom
and
equality, it is
marked
by
open
hostility
towards the notion of au thought that derives from

of
thority. In the name of
freedom,
a poweful vein of
as
Rousseau
and
Kant decries authority

the
rational will
the
infringement
subordination of
of
to alien, heteronomous
all political
powers.
autonomy and the In the name
equality, Karl Marx denounces
sion of class antagonism and exploitation.
authority as the masked expres In the Communist Manifesto, he con
trasts public power with political power, "the organized power of one class
another"
op (Karl Marx and Frederich Engels, The Communist Manifesto, pressing in the Marx-Engels Reader, ed. Robert Tucker: New York: Viking, 1968, p.
97)-
The
measure of
the success of the
modem assault on
authority
can
be
seen
in Hannah Arendt's
on
assertion that the prevailing concepts of authority are based
misunderstanding and intellectual confusion. Arendt maintains that we can differentiate between tyrannies and even the most draconian of authoritarian
governments
nations of an cion
because the latter individual. The
are
based
on
laws
of
and not on
the will and incli

not
defining feature
authority is
its
use of coer
but its dependence

source of
on a transcendent source:
authoritarian government
The
authority in
own
is
always a
force
external and which
superior to
its
power;
it is
from
always
which
this source, this external
force
tran that
scends the political realm,
the authorities derive their
'authority',
is,
their
legitimacy
Past
p.
and
and against which their power can
be
checked.
(Hannah Arendt, Be
tween
Future; Eight Exercises in Political Thought, New York: Viking,
1968,
97.)
For Arendt authority is a type of command that is based on neither physical force nor rational persuasion, but rather an assent that recognizes the superiorThe
author would
anonymous reviewer of
like to thank Paul Benoit, Tom Darby, Janet Gendron, Cynthia Gillis Interpretation for their assistance in the preparation of this essay.
and
the
interpretation,
Spring 1989,
Vol. 16, No. 3
446
Interpretation
While force
failed"
ity of the claim of authority. ing people obey, "authority

where
and
authority
are
both
means of mak
precludes the use of external means of
coercion;
(ibid., p. 97). authority has The most powerful intellectual forces emanating from the Enlightenment have, according to Arendt, deprived all forms of authority of their transcendent
used
force is
foundation. This loss

solution of the and
of
authority is irrevocable
religion and tradition.
and
is the final
stage of the
dis
bonds Of
tradition, provided the ground for a world quired to find a new ground, something that can
lows
people to
attempt
Authority, along with religion now lost forever, and we are re

provide a consensus what
that al
live together. We have, literally, forgotten

to revive the concept
of
Any
onstrate
authority
must move on three
authority is. fronts:
(1) Against
thority, (2) between
nation are
those who attack authority in the name of autonomy, it must dem
that tme autonomy
is only
authority
possible
through the interiorization of
au
Any
defense
of
must call
into
question
Marx's
opposition
'political'
'public'
power and
power and show that relations of coordi
dependent,
some relation must and
least in part, on relations of subordination; that is, be established between authority and the common good,
at
(3) Against
has
those who maintain that authority has been
historically
super
a once
ceded or
withered
away, it
must
be
asserted
that authority is not
dominant
logical
specific
historical form but life. To
rather
it is
an
integral
element
in the
onto
role
stmcture of social
retrieve
in generating and perfecting the social Traditional Catholic teaching, basing itself Paul's Epistle divine
to the
origin of
authority bond.
on
we must understand
its
the thirteenth
chapter of
St.
Romans, has always upheld the necessity and indeed the authority. For St. Thomas Aquinas the individual is not
for the bare
self-
sufficient and requires the aid and cooperation of others to provide necessities of
life,
to say nothing of the requirements for civilized life. Because
society
of
requires a
diversity
of
functions
a need
and a
talents among men, there is

and
for
there is a corresponding diversity force to direct and coordinate these
diverse functions
ety.
and
talents to
a common end.
This force is
conduct
authority.
Political
organization enables civilized
human beings to
that
their
lives
within soci
Insofar
as
it is God's
can
will
man's social nature requires subordination
hierarchy, it
be
said that
authority
comes
authority, because it
word subordination
produces order within
ultimately from God. Indeed, society (as the etymology of the

power.
suggests)
participates
in God's
Here Aquinas
the Pauline
com
bines the Aristotelian

that
concept of man's political nature with
notion
authority has its primordial source in God. This twofold theme of authority's naturalness
and
its
sacred
character
is
echoed
out
by modem Thomists. According to Jacques Maritain, hierarchy a whole without subordination of the parts to
of
"a
a
totality
with
possible.
sity
is im "The necessity of authority in the political community, as the neces the State itself, is inscribed in the (Scholasticism very nature of
things"
whole"
and Politics, Furthermore,
trans, and ed. M.J.
Adler, London: Geoffrey Bles,
1954,
a
p. 78).
the sacred character of authority, the notion that
it has
transcen-
Gaston Fessard
dent source,
sees
and
the
Nature of Authority
447
of
characterizes
any
pp.
nonmaterialist conception
the
world which
the foundation of
man's
social, political and ethical life
in
nature and
the
world's
intelligibility (ibid.,
82-83). '
and
The French Jesuit
philosopher
1978), little known outside

traditional
of a small
theologian, Gaston Fessard (1897circle of French Catholics, upheld the

"the necessity of political power un origin of ("Politique et strucpower"
Catholic teachings Recherches
on authority:
til the end of time and the supernatural

turalisme,"
et
debats, decembre,
and
1965,
p.
120).
Fessard,
who
be
longed to the same generation of French Jesuits that produced such brilliant
scholars as
Henri de Lubac
Jean Danielou,
a
was
a seminal of
figure in the
French Hegelian revival,

andre
Kojeve,
whose
penetrating famous 1930s Sorbonne lectures
and
was
critic
on
Marxism. Alex
the
Phenomenology
of Spirit Fessard attended, once remarked that if he so wished, Fessard could have been France's leading Marxist theorist ("Communisme et christianisme",
Critique, 3-4, 1946,

"impressive
p. 308).
A North American
could
well
reviewer noted one of
that Fessard's
of
literary
production
become
the landmarks
contemporary French
1 98 1, p. 128).
Catholicism"
During
(E.L. Fortin, Review of Metaphysics, 35, World War II, Fessard was active in the Resistance,
a critique of
clandestinely publishing
cies,
the
ton
Vichy
regime's collaborationist poli

major works
France,
prends garde
de
perdre
dme (1941)- His
include
et
Pax Nostra (1936),

commun
an examination of volume
international relations, Autorite
Bien
saint
(1945),
the three
Dialectique des Exercises Spirituel de
volume appearing posthumously in 1984), De I'Actualite Historique (i960), outlining his philosophy and theology of history and Chretiens marxistes et theologie de la liberation (1978), a critical analysis of
Ignace (the third
the
foundations
of
liberation
theology.
His
work constitutes a profound and en
gaging meditation on language, history, and society, ter known in the English-speaking world. Despite his
olic
and
it deserves to be bet
Catholic tradition, Fessard, unlike most modem Cath thinkers (at least prior to Vatican II) did not develop a theory of authority
fidelity
to
based
on
Thomist
assumptions.
Rather, in opposing contemporary thought,

a
Fessard's imitation Aquinas did

church
of
Aquinas took
refute
different form
altogether.
Fessard
notes
that in attempting to
not
Avicenna, Averroes,
and their Latin
disciples,
reply
on a recourse to
the Platonism of St. Augustine and the
fathers:
was compelled
Rather he
to study
Aristotle, because
the Philosopher
was
the imme
diate
in
source
from
which
his
adversaries
had drawn
Scripture
their
best
arguments.
And it
was
never
losing
sight of the teachings of
and
Tradition that he
succeeded
which
in is
baptizing
still
Aristotle
living today
and in constructing a new synthesis (De I'Actualite historique, vol. II, Paris: Desclee, i960,
for
sacred
doctrine
p. 293).
For Fessard, Catholic theology combatting

such
was called as
to an
analogous
undertaking in
existentialism.
Specifically,
contemporary errors it must confront "the immediate
Marxism
source
and which
from
its
adversaries
448
Interpretation
best
Hegel.
apt
had drawn
their
arguments",
could
namely
as
an
The
Hegel"
theologique avec
work.
serve
description
essay "Dialogue of Fessard's life
for the Middle Fessard, "if Aristotle was 'the the right to the same title for and in particular for an Hegel has Aquinas, Ages, Stuttgarter Hegel avec our ("Dialogue thelogique Tage, 1970, Hegel", ed. H.G. Gadamer, Bonn: Bouvier, 1974, p. 248). Contemporary Catholic the
Philosopher'
According
to
time"
ology
to the
must
do for Hegel
what
Aquinas did for Aristotle:
appropriate
of
his truths
of
Catholic tradition
was
and correct
his
errors
in the light
the
deposit
faith. As
dition
thus
the case in Aquinas's interpretation of
Aristotle,
scripture and
tra
provide
leading
overcoming the errors of Hegelian philosophy", to the hope that the German philosopher can be brought "not to "the
means of received
baptism
alite
[since] he has already historique, II, p. 293).

the
it
but to
recantati
(De I'Actu
Throughout this dialogue

representations of
Hegel, Fessard sought "to rehabilitate the Absolute Religion, against the 'domination of the Con
with
cept', at least to the extent that it has the

self
tendency
avec
to unilaterally transform
it
into
tyranny"
a rejects
("Dialogue theologique
notion
Hegel",
p.
231).
Fessard
sur
resolutely
the
that Christian dogmas translated
have been
definitively
passed, yet preserved,
by being
can
into the
the
categories of
Hegelianism.
within rec con
Nor does he
and
accept
Hegel's
immanentism,
be
belief that the divisions

and of
between human beings between

can
overcome
in time
history. The final finite

and can
onciliation
master and
slave, to say nothing
infinite
sciousness,
only be
fully
realized
beyond history, though it

satisfaction
anticipated within time.
In its purely temporal state, human

seek
consciousness a
be partially is
and
bound to
For
remain never
'unhappy', to
its definitive
world.
in
'beyond',
thus to be
fully
at
home in the
Fessard,
on
the theological engagement

of
with
Hegel
meant above all a re

chal on
flection
the nature
human historicity,
to
on man's an
historical being. The
lenge Hegel
presented was the need

would
develop
"essentially
historical
be in continuity with classical (which for Fessard tology", meant primarily Thomist) metaphysics (De I'Actualite historique, pp. 24, 1 14). Fessard's oeuvre can be understood as an immense effort to analyze the histori
which
cal, "both in its own essence and in its relation to other

more
dimensions
of
being,
familiar to the theologian

etc"
or
philosopher,
such as
the natural, the rational,

there are
the supernatural,
(ibid.,
p.
10).
For Aquinas,
following Aristotle,
St. Thomas
only two regions of being: nature and reason (cf. mentary

on the
Metaphysics, IV, lee.
4, 573-74)- For
Aquinas, Com Fessard, the historical
constitutes a third realm of

velopment of a
are nature and
being (De I'Actualite historique, 1, p. 19). The de historical ontology does not lead to the oblivion of nature; nor history simply opposed. On the contrary, in certain circum
jurisdiction
over
stances,
nature exercises a
history
an
insofar
as
dom
history
and
free
never
can and must
treated the relation
have meaning (ibid., p. 25). between history and nature in
Unfortunately, Fessard
extended, systematic
fash-
Gaston Fessard
ion. The
gelian
and the
Nature of Authority
449 He
exact nature of
the continuity between Thomist
metaphysics and
historicity
remains obscure and
difficult
questions of their ultimate com
patibility
remain unanswered. of
The philosophy
of
and
history, Fessard
maintains, does not mean the
delineation Comte
the successive stages of
mankind's
development, in the
analysis of
manner of
Marx (ibid.,
being,"
p.
114).
Rather it is "an
as a
the stmctures of human

means
historical
which
for Fessard,
which of
theologian,
in its
profoundest or
sense, "the dialectic
by
the supernatural
life is
engendered,"
in
Kier-
kegaardian terms, the
process
ization
of
writings,
history including
and the
historicization his
those on
becoming a Christian through the of Eternity (ibid., p. 1 12). In all Fessard remains deeply theological, politics,
most perceptive critics
eternal-
his in
of
deed Christological. As Fessard's thought is cally

the
conceives
one of
notes, at the heart

which and
a vision of
the "communication of
idioms,"
dynami in
the
hypostatic
as
union
(the
union of
divine
human
natures
one person of
Christ)
the union of opposites (E.
la theologie de Gaston Fessard", Revue de

p.
metaphysique et morale,
Ortiques, "Reflexions sur 66, 1961,
317).
Communication
of
of
idioms is
the
a theological term
relations
St. Cyril
natures
Alexandria to
explain
originally coined by between the divine and human Hegelian dialectic

and the
with
in the Incarnation. Fessard

of
seized upon the
its
interplay
means of
the
finite
and
the
infinite,
a
the
universal
particular, as a
of
exploring
and
developing
philosophy idioms
and
theology
history
cen
tered on the
communcation of
idioms.
underlies the
The
principle of the communication of
dynamics
of au
it structurally thority acts as the mediator between God

and makes scent to man ator
analogous
to the Incarnation. Just as Christ
and man so that
in the Incarnation, God's de
is simultaneously man's ascent to God, authority acts as the medi between the good and the common, making the good common and the
ontotheol-
common good.
Like Aquinas, Fessard conceives the social order and authority ogically, to borrow a Heideggerian term. In contrast to the Thomist position,
Fessard
and
emphasizes the
historical
process
whereby the
content of natural
law in
through authority becomes
actualized or achieves concrete embodiment

mores of a particular society.
in
the
laws, institutions,
customs, and
related
This histori
cal process
will, in turn, be
to a
metaphysical superstmcture of egressus
and regressus,
of emanation
from
and return
to
God,
which
has its
roots
in
Christian Neoplatonism. Fessard's sically

when,
that
writings merit
attention, if for no other

attempt
reason
than that it is intrin
worthwhile
to scrutinize any
by theology
of
to constmctively en
gage a philosopher of the stature and

as with
depth
Hegel
Fessard,
the theologian is aware of
this, all the more so the risks as well as the gains

and
source of
such a venture poses
for
revealed
religion.
Since Hegel is the
most philosophical speculation on the nature of
history,
and
the
confrontation with
tra-
Hegel
raises
the
question of
the nature of
historicity
its relationship to
450
Interpretation
ditional Catholic thought,

thought take
including
its teaching
on
authority.
Can Catholic
the concrete
historicity
Can the forms
notion of the natural
seriously law
of
authority
still
be
jettisoning by which to judge maintained? Can human historicity

without
the
philosophia perennisl
as a standard
be thought That
through
in
such a manner
that
it does
not
lead to the
oblivion of eternity?
Fessard's
writings raise such questions
demonstrates
their seriousness.
An
aspect of the
meaning
of
authority is
shown
in its
etymology.
The Latin
is
root of
authority, augeo,
means
to grow, to augment, to
increase;
thus growth
growth
a
or
development is the
original
and
defined
by
its
origin
underlying meaning of the word. Since end, the derivatives of augeo have
double
significance: on the one

or accomplish.
produces,
hand, to produce or give birth, on the other, to perfect Etymologically, authority has the sense of a dynamism which develops, and perfects the bond uniting human beings. On this basis,
preliminary definition of authority as "the bond, tending on its own to grow until its
2nd ed.,
generative power of
fulfillment"
Fessard
gives a
the social
(Autorite
et
bien commun,
Paris: Aubier-Montagne,
p.
13).
According
and
to
Fessard,
there are three principal senses of authority.

refers
The first
most common
dique),
the power which
meaning belongs to
refers
to legal or de jure power (pouvoir juria
head
or
delegate
of a
legally
constituted
body
fait),
gal
or society.
The second,
to actual or de
facto
power
(pouvoir de
the power to
status.
The
matic,
natural
upon or influence others apart from any le de facto authority is Max Weber's charis bom leader. The third is the value (valeur), which compels rec
impose decisions
prime example of
ognition
which on
solely is based
by
virtue of
not on
his
personal characteristics or
its value, for example, the authority of the his legal status but
expert
rather
the truth of what he has to say.
Fact, law,
value
-these
are the three pri
mary forms of authority and encompass the entire sphere of hierarchical rela tions between humans (ibid., pp. 11- 12). Their dialectical interplay deter
mines
the development and stmcture of authority: its origin,
growth and end. social
Authority
These forces
has its
origin
in the forces
which give
birth to the
bond.
exist prior to
authority has its origin Prior to obedience to laws is

14).
any legal or rational formulation. Indeed, all dejure in de facto power, though its origins are often obscured.
obedience to a
dominating
individual (ibid.,
p.
It is this
obedience that provides the
basis for the
creation of the social
bond.
emotions
to Fessard, this obedience has its source in two elemental desire for well-being and the fear of violent death. The desire for well-being is engendered in the elementary stmctures of fam the
According
ily
relationships, specifically the
parent's power over
the child, and
by
the
abil-
Gaston Fessard
and the
Nature of Authority
451
who
ity
and
of
the charismatic natural-bom leader.

prelegal
Here Fessard follows Weber

of
identified the prerational,

charismatic
legitimations
domination
as partriarchal
Religions"
authority ("The Social Psychology of World From Max Weber: Essays in Sociology, tr. and ed. H.H. Gerth
in
and
CW.
Partriarchal authority, according to Weber, is the foundation of all authority that claims tradition as its sanction. As such, it is the foundation of the customary, the routine, of what is perma
p.
Mills, New York: Oxford U. Press,
245).
nent and
charismatic
ongoing in everyday life. Opposed to it is the unsettling power of the leader able to dominate men by the sheer force of his personality.
The
charismatic
leader is the leaven
of
society,
"conquering
image"
an
inert
or
hostile
et
social
world, moving it and

p.
moulding it in its
a
new new
own
(Autorite
bien
commun,
within
15), thus creating
consensus,
community, in other words, a
self-understanding basis for the social bond. The

use
new
vision
of the charismatic
leader becomes in time routinized, to
Weber's
part
phrase, integrated into the community's everyday

of
life, eventually forming
its
stock of
tradition.
Both
patriarchal and charismatic
rial and spiritual goods patriarchal unit and
authority aim at the provision of the mate that contribute to human well-being. In Weber's words,
authority is an extension of the "is rooted in the provisioning of
family
as
the basic
socio-economic needs of
recurrent and normal
the
workday world", while charismatic authority is the foundation "of the provi (From Max Weber, p. sioning of all demands that go beyond everyday
routine"
245).
Both
are expressions of
of goods which constitute a
human sympathy and tend to create a community basis for measuring the common good. authority
are
Although
patriarchal and charismatic
prerational,
they
pursue
rational ends.
olent
As Fessard realizes, the

an
other source of
obedience, the fear of vi

of society. of
death, introduces
in the
irrational
element at
into the foundation

civil made
The
idea that the fear

not new
of violent
death lies
the basis of
history
of political thought.
Hobbes
course, society is, it the cornerstone of
his
fol philosophy and the motivation for the social contract. Fessard of the account Hegel. His developed lows the Hobbesian teaching as it was by
political
based on the authority that has its origin in the fear of violent death is famous master-slave dialectic in the Phenomenology of Spirit. By introducing the master-slave relationship, Fessard adds a third type of domination, in addi
form
of
tion to Weber's
master-slave cion.
charismatic
and patriarchal
types.
Unlike the latter two, the

rests
dialectic has
a
no real
legitimation initially. It
element
solely
on coer
Nevertheless, it is
into de jure
master-slave
necessary
in the
tranformation of
de facto
power
authority.
The
dialectic is
composed
of two
moments.
The first is the

unreciprocal
straggle to the
death between two
adversaries which results
in the
recognition of one combatant as a master
by
another who
becomes his
slave. attach
The
master
is
able to establish
ment
to his
natural existence and
his domination because he is willing to risk his life in
overcomes
his
combat whereas
452
the slave
Interpretation
remains attached
to life
and
is therefore
overcome
by
the fear of vio
lent death
and submits.
"The
recognition which ends
that stmggle creates the
first
social
bond
which
unites
the two individuals while
differentiating
p.
them
rec
classes"
into two
ognition
unequal social
(De I'Actualite historique, I,
142).
This
is for Fessard the
origin of
history
and politics since

et
the master is the

pp.
most primitive as
form
of the sovereign
(Autorite
bien commun,
. . .
16-17).
claims the monopoly Weber contends, "the state is a community that If, this p. Max (From of force within 78) Weber, monopoly is initially established through the master's triumph over the slave. As in Hegel, this
straggle
remains
constituent
element
in
all
the
transformations
and ana
p.
refinements of political sovereignty.
The
master-slave
dialectic "is found
relations"
logically
143).
at the
base
of all
social
(De I'Acutalite
historique, I,
It "represents
not
only
the
first
social
bond
and origin of all political soci
ety, but
also an essential moment
in the
genesis of
human reality, i.e.,

social
a transi
tion which repeats itself in each instant and at every level of from the least relations between two individuals to world
H9)-
relations,
affairs"
(ibid.,
p.
The
master-servant
facto
and
relationship is the first instance of the coexistence of de de jure power. Because no law can exist without the power to en
force it, de jure authority presupposes the existence of the Master's de facto power. No authority, however evolved or spiritual, can renounce this support.
Even the church,
nication p. 21). a
purely
spiritual
body,
must resort or schism
to the threat of excommu
to overcome the threat of
heresy
(Autorite
et
bien commun,
must wars and revo
No
matter
how
much a particular government rests on
consent, it
be
able to
defend itself from internal
and external
threats, from
or a police
lutions. No
modem state can exist without an
army
force. Because
and thus con
irrationality
stant
and violence remain permanent aspects of social
human life
threats to the
bond,
there is need for a countervailing force.

master-slave
The
second moment
in the
dialectic is labor
where the
slave,
under the master's
command, transforms
given nature through moment of
his
productive
activity for the

straggle to
the
dialectic, the the death, is the origin of politics, the second moment, labor, marks beginning of economics (De I'Actualite historique I, p. 153, Autorite et
master's consumption.
If the first
the
bien commun,
that
p.
82). The
structure of the
dialectic
gives a relative pp.
politics over economics
(De I'Actualite historique I,

occurs
146-47).
priority to This means
truly human labor only

master's
in
stratified,
class on
society or, in Marxist

men.
terms,
that the administration of things
is dependent
the government of
Through the
the fear of violent

sion
imperium, death, the slave is

desire. He
the result
enters
of an
and the
removed
accompanying from the

a new
anguish produced
by
immediacy
of
immer
with
in instinct
and
into
'intentional'
the natural world,

condition
could not
as
internal transformation This

new
relationship which is the
pre
for the transformation be

preserved
of nature.
intentional relationship
con-
if the
slave
immediately
appropriated the object;
Gaston Fessard
sciousness
and the
Nature of Authority
tme
453
nature.
would
not
achieve
independence from
no
Consequently
labor"
"without
fear
of obedience there
is
humanizing
(ibid.,
that
or
p.
148).
In Hegel's words, "If
consciousness
universalizing fashions the thing without

attitude; for its form
and
initial
absolute
fear, it is only
an
empty
self-centered
negativity is not negativity per se, and therefore its formative activity cannot (The Phenomenology of give itself a consciousness of itself as essential
being"
Spirit,
tr. A.V.
Miller, Oxford: Oxford U. Press,

master-slave
p.
119).
As Hegel himself notes, the

not the sufficient condition
for the
genesis
relationship is only the necessary, and development of political society:

it"
in violence, it does not rest on (Hegel's tr. W. Wallace and A.V. Oxford: Oxford U. Miller, Philosophy of Mind, master-slave dialectic combined with must be some Press, pp. 173-74). The
"although the
state
may
originate
other sociohistorical process
in
order to create
the state
whose end
is
to
satisfy
human desires While the
and aspirations.
dialectic is indispensable for explaining the genesis of authority, it is incapable, by itself, of showing how political domination can be directed toward the common good. If the stmggle to the death were the sole
master-slave
basis for be
anthropogenesis
then the natural condition of human relations
would will
war and
there would be no other foundation for peace than the imposed
of the master and
the slave's fear of violent death. How can a common good be
established when the slave's

master's selfish
labor is directed solely to the satisfaction of the desires? Hegel himself never adequately explained how the
evolved
master-slave
relationship
into the
state whose essence
is to be the
real
ized
tion
civil
expression of ethical substance.
According
human
to
Hegel,
the fight for
recogni absent
belongs to the
primitive stage of
social
development: "it is
in
society and the State because here the recognition for which the combat ants fought already (ibid., p. 172). The question remains, however, as to how the de facto unequal and unreciprocal recognition of the master-slave
exists"
citizens within a state.
relationship is transformed into the de jure equal and Is there not some other human
master-slave
reciprocal recognition of
relationship, no less
fun
damental than the
relationship, that provides the basis
for
an alter
nate principle of recognition?
The young Hegel pointed to such a possibility in what is now known as the "Fragment on Love", where he discussed the relationship between man and
woman which other
in dialectical terms. There Hegel
contrasts
love
with
the understanding
undialectically leaves opposed terms still hand, "the separate does still remain, but
as
opposed.
"In love",
united
on
the
as
something
p. 305)-
and no
longer its
separate"
something
of
(Early
Theological Writings, tr. T.M.
Knox,
finds op
Philadelphia, University
concrete embodiment
reunion.
Pennsylvania
child.
Press,
1971,
This
union
in the
"Thus the
process
is: unity,
separated
posites,
their
gel
After their
union
the lovers separate again, but in the child
union
has become
(ibid.,
p. 380).
According
to
Kojeve, He
content
in love the specifically human originally believed he had discovered
454
of
Interpretation
existence and what
human
distinguished it from
natural or animal existence.
In the Phenomenology of Spirit, Kojeve claims Hegel abandoned this position. The desire for love between man and woman is replaced by the desire for rec
ognition
between two
combatants as
the
source of
human distinction.
Indeed,
dialec have to
the mutual recognition between lovers is only possible because the animal man
has previously become human

tic. "In
through the anthropogenetic master-slave

view of
accepting the point of
the
Phenomenology,
one would
say that Man can love (which no animal can do) only because he has created (A. Kojeve, In himself through the Risk incurred in a Fight for
Recognition"
troduction to the
Reading
p.
of Hegel,
note).
ed.
A. Bloom, tr. J.H. Nicholson, Ithaca:

of
Cornell U. Press, Fessard

man and
244,
reverses
this
perspective
by
making the relationship
love between
woman, prior,
logically
p.
and
temporally
to
to the master-slave
master-slave
dialectic.
Hence it is both complementary

tique et structuralisme",
of
and superior
dialectic ("Poli
136).
the
reciprocal recognition
that the
"Marriage", Fessard writes, "is the archetype Phenomenology had, just before analyzing
as an
the Master-Slave
I'
dialectic, defined
as the
which
is
We
and a
We
which
is
an
signalling it
initial
emergence of relations
the 'notion of
Spirit into the
spiri
tual daylight of
presence'"
("Les
familiales dans la Philosophie du Like the

master-slave
Droit de Hegel, Hegel-Jarbuch, 1967,

the man-woman dialectic can be
p. 40).
dialectic,
tions; it is not,
man
as
found analogically at the base of human rela Kojeve insisted, purely private. "All unification between hu
also
wills,
not
only individual but
collective, finds its
perfect archetype p.
in
woman"
that conjunction of man and

man-woman
(De I'Actualite
historique, I,
165).
The
dialectic
provides the means
lectic
by providing it with an end, a goal How is the mutual recognition found in the
a whole?
for transforming the master-slave dia that is directed to the common good.
man-woman
relationship
ex
tended to society as
The
man-woman
family
where
domination
or mle
is
exercised
relationship gives rise to the for the common good. Paternity

power'
provides
the origin and model of the conversion of 'political

and
into 'pub
lic power',
service. an
thus the means
The
a
end of
the parent's
for transforming the master's domination into rule over the child is to transform the child into
adult,
"can
the
a
being who is recognized as an equal. Similarly, the master's power becoming true authority only by emancipating (affranclussanf) Slave, by recognizing in him, at least in principle, an identity in nature and
commence
with the
Master"
legal equality
(Autorite
et
bien commun,
p.
45).
By
inter
acting with paternity, the master's power becomes educative and the slave's la bor is directed towards the common good of both master and slave. "Under the
influence
the
of
paternity, the Master becomes Lord, Prince
or
King,
then
and
State,
while
correspondingly
p. 26).
the Slave
Citizen"
becomes Serf, Subject,

de la societe",
as
finally finally
(Esquisse
pour une analyse chretienne
Communio, V,2,
mars-avril, 1980,
tential
impasse"
Thus far from

not
being,
who
does
change, the
master
Kojeve maintains, an "exis is no less the motor of his-
Gaston Fessard
and
the Nature of Authority
455
tory
and progress than

master
The
terior
of
the slave (Introduction to the Reading of Hegel, p. 19). is required, at the outset, because there must be an imposed, ex discipline in order to have peace. In time, through the educative function
order
at
paternity this imposed
is interiorized, the necessary
condition of all
master-
emancipation.
Nevertheless,
re-emerges
times of rebellion and civil war, the
slave
dialectic
in
order
to re-establish the imposed exterior peace.
Between the two

communication of
dialectics,
man-woman and of
master-slave, there "exists
their properties
theological
their
'idioms'
in the technical
sense of
origin"
that
expression of saint
Spirituels de
of
Ignace,
vol.
(Fessard, La Dialectique des Exercises Ill, Paris: Lethielleux, p. 357). The interaction
dialectic
requires that the master renounce a
paternity
and the master-slave
his
will-to-power and
transform himself
et
into
servant, thus
p.
in
effect
reversing the
master-slave
dialectic (Autorite
St. Paul: "His
emptied
was
bien commun,
101).
ciple as
is Christological. The
model
for the dialectic

was
conversion
yet
The underlying prin is the Incarnation

not
described
with
by
state
divine,
assume
he did
cling to his
equality become
God, but
Himself to
the condition of a slave, and
as men
are; he
humbler yet, human
even to
cross"
(Phillipians IL6-9). Kenosis, in imitation

state and
accepting death, death on a of Christ's renunciation of

the master's power to
his divine
taking
on
form,
and
the communication of idioms
as the principle of
dialectical
conversion are what allow
be
placed at the service of the common good.
Ill
De facto power, Fessard maintains, has

acter and transform
stitutions.
tendency
to lose its personal char

and
itself into
stable
Thus it takes
on a more
forms, into customs, mores, laws, rational character, becoming de jure

milieu, become
reflected
in
author
ity. For example, the
vision of
the charismatic leader will, if it
corresponds
to
the needs and aspirations of a
social
in
a society's on
going social life, eventually taking on an institutional existence that no longer depends on the personal influence of the initiator. Thus it moves from a partic ular to a more universal form. Similarly the master's force is transformed into
the punitive power of the law.
dejure authority is de facto power, its end is revealed by ex of amining the third of Fessard's three basic forms of authority: the authority of its own tmth. If de strength on the itself imposes that which that value, is,
If the
origin of
facto
power
is
what gives
birth to the
social
bond
and
de jure authority the
means
would
by
which the end of
bond develops
this
process.
and grows,
mean
then the recognition of tmth
be the
Does this
that for Fessard the authority

or
of
the
'savant'
(for example, the scientist, the scholar, The

answer
expert)
represents
the
to
culmination of all authority?
is both
yes and no.
It
would seem
456
be the
out
Interpretation
perfection of
authority because "tmth

the social
bond"
obtains the consent of wills with
violating
personalities and produces a universal agreement of

perfection of
spirits, thus
realizing the
possible,
(ibid.,
and
p. 23).
This
consent
is only
science
however, among
equals, among those
who are capable of understand
is only for the scientist that demonstrations and discoveries acquire
ing
the expert. "It
those that practise
his
an absolute value and compel rec p.
merits"
ognition
by
virtue of
their
own
(ibid.,
23).
Because
assent
is based
solely
on
demonstration,
in
the expert's tmth becomes recognized only to the ex
tent the expert's authority disappears. The expert's authority is only an author
ity
for
nonexperts and
proportion not
to their lack of
knowledge. For the

its
own
non
experts
"knowledge does
impose itself
plays
by
virtue of
value;
on
the
contrary, from their perspective, it the weakest; it imposes itself nonexpert, knowledge
exists as a
the same role as does force vis-a-vis
externally"
(ibid.,
p. 23).
In
other words,
for the
de facto
power.
The dox: facto
notion of truth as the end of
either
the expert's
authority gives rise to the following para tmth becomes a common property among equals, in
authority disappears, or the expert's truth becomes a de for the nonexpert, in which case we return to our point of depar ture, the origin of authority in de facto power. The argument appears trapped in a circle but for Fessard the circle is not vicious. On the contrary its circular na
which case the expert's power
ture reveals the essence and aim of
authority:
Is
not
the end of authority to
the moment when
de facto
power comes
disappear in realizing itself? So that its growth begun up against de jure authority and is trans
essentially
at
formed into
[se
the
latter,
would aim at
developing
the social
bond to the
point where all

supprime
terms whose
consequently does away with itself elle-meme], thus realizing the perfect accord between the opposed conflict gave birth to it (ibid., pp. 24-25).
rendered useless and
superiority is
Authority
end"
then
p.
is legitimate to the The final

goal of
extent that
it "sets
out as
its
end
its
own
(ibid.,
summation,
personal end of
25).
modeled on the
authority by authority is "to

mean that
authority is its termination through con authority of the expert who does away with his making his truth available to others. Paradoxically, the
will
its
end"
own
(ibid.,
p. 26).
Does this
abdicating?
for Fessard the leader
of a state would
fulfill his
role
by
of
Clearly
can
not, since such
an act would of
only lead to the dissolution
the social bond. The literal
interpretation
the perfection of
such as
authority
as
its
disappearance
only be
applied to
limited cases,
the teacher-student
relationship where the teacher aims at raising the student level. In the case of the state it must be interpreted
analysis that shows that
to the teacher's own through an
"dialectically",
authority "only has meaning, value, and, consequently, legitimacy, to the extent that it tends, not to abolish itself materially, but rather to realize itself, to regain unity with its (ibid., pp. 27- 28). realizes its says Authority essence, Fessard, by acting as the mediator of the
essence"
Gaston Fessard
common good.
rapport.
and the
Nature of Authority
457
Authority and the common good stand in an intimate reciprocal Authority is what engenders and sustains the common good, while the common good is what constitutes and measures the legitimacy of authority. In
producing the common good authority has two interrelated ends: to promote the social bond uniting individuals and to be the means by which transcendent prin
ciples
become
actualized
in
social a
life. The first community
corresponds
to the horizontal
axis which unites
individuals in
centered on the common
good,
the second to the
vertical axis which unites good.
the community with the transcen

of these
dent
the
source of
the common
of authority.
The interaction
as
two axes constitutes

a universal and the
dynamics
a
Insofar
the transcendent is
means
community
manifested
universal.
particular, authority becomes the

within
by
which
the universal
is
concretely
the particular and the particular elevated to the
Authority
uses as
realizes an
its
end
by
Fessard
taken
illustration
of the
creating a concrete universal. dynamics of authority, an
example
from everyday life

resembles
the relationship between a doctor and a patient. The
insofar as he is an expert whose authority is based knowledge. His relationship with a patient differs from that of teacher and student, however, in that the end of his authority is not to turn the patient into a doctor. From the patient's perspective the doctor possesses a de facto power;
doctor
on
the teacher
his knowledge
exists as a
form
of power.
This de facto
power
is transformed
into dejure authority when the patient agrees to follow the doctor's orders. The doctor's knowledge appears to the patient not as a tmth, but as a good, some
thing
in its
that
that answers a specific need. The doctor acts as a the tmth. Through the
mediator access
between the
patient and
doctor,
the patient
has
to the tmth not

as
abstract
formal sense,
as pure science or
knowledge, but
something
corresponds
to a felt need (Compare
Plato, Statesman,
293b-d).
For Fessard, the doctor-patient relationship illuminates the disinterested na ture of authority. It is by virtue of disinterestedness that authority dialectically realizes its essence as the wish for its own end. The doctor's disinterestedness
is
rooted
in the very
of
nature of tmth as universality.
Through the doctor's
medi
ation
tmth
"descends"
into the actual,
concrete
the
level
the patient's
requirements.
world, accommodating itself to Fessard terms this descent "the gratu

central
itousness
of
authority"
of
since
(ibid.,
p.
30),
term that is
to his understanding
assumes a which
authority
it
explains
why the
exercise of
sacred character.
The disinterested free
communication of analogous
authority always knowledge to
the
patient would not otherwise of
have access, is
act.
to God's grace
by
virtue
it
being Authority
to
a gratuitous and exists as
two inverse
one
movements
between the
poles of
individual from indi

author
and universal. vidual
On the
hand,
there
is the
ascendent movement power
universal
in the
transformation of
de facto
into dejure
ity. On the
the the
other
hand,
there
is the descendent
application of
movement
from the
universal
to
to
particular exemplified
in the
the doctor's
universal science
particular requirements of
the patient.
Fessard sees the two
movements as
458
Interpretation
in the
genesis and realization of authority.
two stages
The descent
of
the uni
versal to the particular universal

end of
is simultaneously the
The
elevation of
the particular to the
in
and through
the growth of authority that leads to its

model
fulfillment
and
(in the double
sense of that word).
for this two fold
process
is,
course, the Incarnation.

realize
How does authority in this process end? According to Fessard, it does so

the universal and the particular, a
ens and on
its
essence as the wish a new
for its
own
by
generating
relationship between
transforms the social
relationship which at the same time strength bond. The process involves a double mediation: between
master and subject
axis
the horizontal axis it is a

and
mediation
(teacher
and
me
student, doctor
patient,
prince and
people); on the vertical
it is the
diation between the tme On the horizontal

tered on
and
the
good.
axis
the relationship between master and subject

needs.
is
cen
realizing their particular The
This is
seen
in the
example of the
patient-doctor relationship.
patient's
health
which
is the bond between doc
tor and patient
is
not
merely
an abstract universal:
It becomes first
a good communicated satisfaction of
from doctor to patient, then

well-being.
a good communi satisfaction
cating to the latter the

not
his desire for
This
does
leave the doctor indifferent. At the very least, he finds in it confirmation of his diagnosis and therapy. So that his healing becomes in turn, a good communicated from the
patient
to the doctor and a good communicating to him a satisfaction analo
gous to that of the patient
(ibid.,
p.
35).
Because it
satisfies their particular and patient
desires,
on
the patient's health creates a bond

realization of a
between doctor Since the

will on
centered
universal
the
common
good.
Through the relationship, the

mon.
becomes
concrete
common good results
from their
reciprocal action and
in making itself com is an act
of
free
both their parts, doctor

axis, the
and patient see
it
as a good communica
ting itself
On the
to both of them.
vertical
common good results not
between doctor
and
patient, but
also
from the
universal which
only from the relationship in and through
this relationship communicates itself to them. The self-communication of the

universal
in
and through
the particular occurs
by
means of
the mediation of the
tme and the good.
Reflection
their
on the relationship between doctor and patient will reveal "that interaction has been throughout the course of its development, com
manded and sustained
by
the
interaction
of
the good and the
tme"
(ibid.,
p.
40).
For Fessard, this means that the metaphysical source of the common good is "a Good which is beyond them, incorporates them and communicated itself to (p. 41). The vertical axis points beyond the temporal horizon to "an
them"
dimension"
other
(p. 39) to
what
is "the
exemplar"
cause and
transcendent
uses
(p.
38)
of all values active metaphysics
in the
social world.
source
Fessard
the
language
of tradi
tional
in calling this
the
Good,
thus
differentiating
it from
Gaston Fessard
any it
it
and the
Nature of Authority
459
and
particular goods.
The Good is both transcendent
immanent, both be
world
yond
the world and active
in it. Although it transcends the

to human social
it is
not
static;
remains a
dynamic
as
presence within
the social world, the ground of all tme
authority.
Insofar
common
the
Good
pertains
life, Fessard
speaks of
as
the
Good (le Bien its
commun).
All
particular common goods are
authentic
only to the extent that

realizes
they
participate
in the
common
Good. in the inner
Authority
life
of
essence and end
by becoming
a moment
the common Good. Fessard describes this inner life as an activity:

the unity
of
where
being
all
diffuses itself
and returns
to itself in a movement
without and
end, the good expressing this unity in a multiplicity because it

the tme
is diffusum sui,
sui
gathering
grounds of
multiplicity in that unity because it is index
(ibid.,
p. 41).
Authority
itousness
the bond uniting individuals in this inner life. The gratu

'charismatic'
the universal means that the individual authority's gift (his skill,
his knowledge,
which
his
leadership) becomes
vital
the
vehicle
through
the Good incarnates itself as the

can summarize
We
presented with a
Fessard's teaching on "double whereby it realizes its

option"
force animating communal life. authority as follows: Authority is

essence as
the
mediator
of the common good
(ibid.,
open
p. 47).
Insofar
as
it
rests on
de facto
power
it is
itself to the universality of law. Otherwise it is in necessary authority danger of becoming a tyranny based on selfishness and exploitation. Insofar as
that
it is de jure authority it
as a mediator
must ground all
law in
transcendent
role
Good,
not
the
ulti
mate source of all particular common goods.
The leader's
the
is
between
man and man
but
also to act as
mediator
only to act between the
community
and
the transcendent Good. Because authority is

always an element of
grounded
in the
transcendent there is
the
sacred
in its
exercise.
Because
authority has its ultimate source in value it realizes itself by willing its own end: it affirms not itself but the value it transmits. Authority exists not as an
end
in itself but
as a means through which the universal
becomes the
informing
of au
master-
principle of a society.
thority; it is
slave
also
Thus the willing of its own end is not only the end its beginning, its initial inspiration. In this process the
reversed as
dialectic is
the master renounces his
will-to-power and
trans
forms himself into
a servant.
IV
Fessard's
account of
authority
raises several questions which can
be
conven
iently
ical
grouped under
two
general subject
headings. The first
concerns
the rela
tion between
history
and metaphysics; the second with the value of a metaphys
transcendence. authority for a society that has rejected historicist a ontology it is not Fessard claims that in attempting to delineate his intention to replace or repudiate Thomist metaphysics. In fact, he regards account of
460
the
Interpretation
as a complement to classical
historicist ontology
labor
Catholic thought. Never
theless problems exist

account of
when we
try
to correlate the two. For

upon
instance, Fessard's
dialec
and economics
work as
is dependent
Hegel's
master-slave
tic which sees human

such
the negation of given-being or nature.

what constitutes man as a relate
Indeed,
negating activity is primarily How does such a concept of work

completing
rather
historical being.
to the Artistotelian and Thomist con
cept of work as
negating nature? Can the two concepts be brought together, or are they antithetical? We are brought back to the pri mary question: What is the relationship between history and nature?
than
The danger
provides
of
purely historicist
preface to
account of
authority is that
of Right. Hegel of Right,
history
alone
the models and norms for any particular form of authority.
Hegel
made this clear
in his
The
Philosophy (Philosophy
states that phi
losophy
is
always
bound to in
a specific time and culture:
"philosophy
tr. T.M.
too
is its
thoughts"
own time apprehended
Knox, Ox
ford: Oxford U. Press, 1962,

means
p.
11).
Applied to
political
philosophy, this
that the philosopher
must confine
rationality of existing institutions. "As a apart from any attempt to constmct a state stressing the actuality of the idea, Hegel tween the ideal (in the sense of the full
just
as
himself to understanding the inherent work of philosophy, it must be poles

as
it
be"
ought to
(ibid.,
p.
11).
In
tends to obliterate the distinction be

realization of
reason)
and the
actual,
and
his immanentism tends to

Fessard
maintains
obliterate the
distinction between time
eternity.
the tension between time and eternity, while out the tension between time and eternity must
and
lining
be
their interaction.
However,
complemented
by
tension between the ideal
the actual.
emphasis on the transcen a
Fessard dent
avoids
the extremes of historicism
by
his
character of the common
Good. This implies
distinction between the

common
common
Good
and
any
particular common goods.
The is
Good
as
both
than
the
exemplar and source of particular common goods
more not
less
real
they
are.
Because the
common
Good
possesses more
reality it
of
can serve as
guide and standard
for existing historical societies. The Hegelian insistence on the inherent rationality be
counterbalanced
existing institutions
which
must
by
an emphasis on
the
degree to
the
common
Good transcends any existing common goods. Fessard presents the germ of this idea, but it must be elaborated. His presentation of the common Good's activ
ity
within
the historical world must be complemented
by
an outline of an over
arching order which can serve as the standard by which to judge specific histor ical forms of authority. In other words, the historical account of authority
needs to
be
completed
by
an account of
the good or
strict sense of the
word, that
is,
a political order outside of which
just regime, a utopia in the history.

and metaphysics
Can find
the
a
an account of
authority
derives from theology
hearing
of
today? Fessard's appeal to the transcendent clearly goes beyond
bounds
there is
wards
a correlation
contemporary social science. Hannah Arendt has shown that between the contemporary hostility or indifference to
and
transcendence
the oblivion
of authority.
As
she points
out, it is
not
Gaston Fessard
accidental
and the
Nature of Authority
and
461
that the
loss
of
religion, tradition
authority
was
also accom
panied
by
the demise of traditional metaphysics. (See Arendt's essay, "Tradi
Modem Age, in Between Past and Future.) For both Arendt and Fessard, the very concept of authority implies some form of sacred or transcen dent foundation. If, as Arendt maintains, the collapse of religion, tradition, and
tion
and
the
authority
creates
the mass society which makes totalitarianism possible, then thought is
contemporary restored (though

transcendent
political not
faced
with
two alternatives: either authority is
necessarily in its
original
form)
and with
it
some
form
of
justification,
or we attempt
to find a substitute for authority, some
thing
that can provide a basis
for the
social
bond for
and
is
not
based
on coercion
and violence.
Arendt herself
provides some suggestions
a possible substitute
for
au
by turning determining how human

thority, life
past or the transcendent.
to the political life
of
Athens for
new norms and models
for
beings
can
live
basis
and act together. In

without appeal
Athens,
political
was conducted on a noncoercive
to the authority of the
Athenian
life.)
Athens
provided a
(Arendt may be overlooking the part religion played in different paradigm for social cohesion, one
authority.
that was based on power rather than that

as
Arendt defines
power
in
a sense
is,
perhaps, unique with her. Power is not understood in Weber's terms
"the possibility of (On Law in Economy
imposing
and
one's
will
on
the behavior of other
persons"
Society,
ed.
M.
Rheinstein, New York: Simon

to the human ability
and
not
Schuster, 1954,
p.
323).
Rather "power
corresponds
just to act, but to act in court, Brace Jovanovich, 1970, collectively on the basis of lence or force; "where the
56).
concert"
p.
Har(Arendt, On Revolution, New York: 44); that is, it is the uncoerced ability to act
consensus.
Like authority,
power
is
opposed
to vio
p.
one mles absolutely, the other
is
absent"
(ibid.,
As
a substitute
for authority, Arendt
seems
to make power
an end-in-itself.
On Fessardian grounds, this attempt to replace authority with power raises two objections. The first is that it is highly unlikely that any consensus could be formed
without
the
mediation of some
form is
of authority, either traditional or
charismatic.
The
second
is that if
power
a consensus aimed at collective ac

consensus
tion, it begs the

values sus
question what
the content of this

as an end
is
and what are
the
it
affirms.
If
"power"
is taken
in itself, the
general
goal of the consen

notion of
is to form
be
a consensus.
accused of
Like Rousseau's
and
will, Arendt's
power can
formalism
indeterminateness. Can
social
such an
inde
terminate form become the basis for the
bond?
Fessard
rightly
This
contends
that the basis
for
consensus must
be the be
actualiza
tion of the common good and that any

universal.
means
tme common good must
a concrete cannot
that
social
cohesion,
as
if it is to be enduring,
the
be in
generated on
the horizontal level alone,
in Arendt's
on
concept of power or
vertical axis.
social contract theory.
There
must also
be interaction
on
Soci
ety
needs recourse
to a
universal
to integrate it
the horizontal level.
Man
cannot
dispense
with a transcendental mediation
for society
without
re-
462
Interpretation
form
of universal.
course to some other
Much
of modem political
thought can
be
seen as attempts
to find an immanent
and
universal of
to replace the transcendent as
the basis
for authority
the foundation
the social bond. Numerous writers
have
pointed out the affinities
between is to
modem
ideologies
and religion.
when
Fes
the
sard's contribution mediator of
to this
position
show
that authority,
sacred.
it
acts as
the universal, takes on the aura of the

universals as
It is
not
surprising
that
such
immanent
Comte's
humanity
and
Marx's
classless soci
ety become simulacra of the sacred (in Raymond Aron's famous phrase "secu lar religions") and that politically they take the form of what Berdyaev called
"inverted
theocracies."
For Fessard, totalitarianism is

and
characterized
by
"the
ex
clusion of all race or class
transcendence",
over
the sacralization of such pseudo-values as

p.
(De I'Actualite historique, I;
63). In this process, the hieratic

whose claim to
function is taken
that
they
a
can
direct
by humanity
is
a
"clercs de l'ordre "fusion
humain"
to its final end on the basis of

and confusion of
authority is their ideology (p.

glorified"
64). As 65).
result, there
the political and the sacred,
more complete than that whose
dissolution they had previously
(p.
the common good

mon
Such inverted theocracies, Fessard would contend, are incapable of realizing because they lack a tme ontological foundation. If the com
good
is
generated end of
by
the interaction of the tme and the good, the good
which
is the
reflects and participates
authority can only be real if it is tme; that is, if it both in the ultimate source of values. The political task is to invoked
discern if the it is
an
universal
by
ontologically based value. determining the tme final end of humanity

to make this final end possible.
authority is genuine, if it is tme, because Foremost in this endeavor, is the necessity of

an and
the secondary ends
which exist
Religion is the
principal
locus
of
the vertical interaction between a particular
community and universal value. When society denies religion it effectively denies the possibility of such an interaction. This means that authority if it is to realize its essence must ultimately be spiritual. Within society there exists a
the temporal. When spiritual authority its final it acts as a limitation on all human, end, humanity temporal authorities (Autorite et bien commun, p. m). In its proper exercise,
spiritual and
fruitful tension between the

claims to
lead
to
spiritual
authority does not,

the
on some nor
mate powers of programs
State;
theocratic model, seek to usurp the legiti does it intend to impose detailed policies and
onstrates to the conscience of
for the State to follow. Rather its task is twofold: negatively, it dem society how certain secondary ends are destruc
end and of
tive of
its transcendent final

the
therefore should be avoided; positively it

time and eternity, a goal or ideal for
pp.
soci
presents a model of
interaction
ety to
follow (De I'Actualite
historique, I,
66-67). In its
proper
exercise,
authority fulfills the essence of tme authority. Its goal is to useless, to enable the directed conscience whether individual
spiritual
make or
itself
collec and an
tive
to direct
itself
and
thus provide human freedom
with a
meaning
Gaston Fessard
end
and
the
Nature of Authority
463
an eternal aspect of
will never
(ibid.,
p. 70).
But because human

man, the need
infirmity
is
histori
cal and contingent
for
spiritual
authority
disappear.
NOTE
Cf.
also
Man
and
State (Chicago:
University of Chicago Press,
1951),
pp. 126-39.
Another
notable
twentieth century Thomist
ture and Function of Authority Democratic Government (Chicago:
authority is Yves Simon. See his works, The Na (Milwaukee: Marquette University Press, 1940). The Philosophy of
who wrote on
University
of
of
Chicago Press, 1951),

1962).
and
A General
Theory
of
Authority
(Notre Dame:
University
Notre Dame Press,
Tocqueville
on
Sexual
Morality
Sanford Kesscer
North Carolina State
University
In
Democracy
in America, Tocqueville
attacked
the aristocratic principle
of arranged marriage
for
fostering
the loose sexual morals which endangered

principle of marital
French freedom in the
1830s.
He defended the democratic

widespread
freedom
same
linking
it to America's
chastity
and political
health. At the
time, he showed that under certain circumstances marital freedom also promotes license. Tocqueville suggested that American moralists prevented this
by
making
a
enlightened self-love secularization
the primary support for female chastity,
by
es
preventing
from
destroying
Christian
sexual
morality,
and
by
tablishing
causes
limited form
of sexual
equality.
Although Tocqueville failed to

us
foresee the American
sexual
revolution, he teaches
a great
deal
about
its
in the Democracy. Unfortunately, he teaches

the likelihood or
us
little
about
its
political
changing its course. Tocqueville's immediate reason for studying American sexual morality was to address a grievous political problem in postrevolutionary France. Although
significance or about
desirability
of
the French Revolution permanently democratized the
country's political
life,
the
it failed to
establish
the mores, or traits

attributed
of
character, necessary to sustain

over
freedom. Tocqueville
proper
this failure to confusion and conflict

new era.
foundation
secular
of virtue
in the
As French liberals
argued
for
a ra
tional,
morality based
on
Enlightenment philosophy,
conservative
aristocrats
sought
to restore the prerevolutionary the
hegemony
of
the Catholic
Church. These
groups also clashed over
pace and scope of
further democra
tization. Liberals wanted to

while
destroy
all
vestiges
of
the Old Regime quickly,

was awash
traditionalists tried to curb the
popular will.
Finally, France
with philosophical
theories which denied the possibility of
political reform and
stifled creative statesmanship.
By
the time Tocqueville and Beaumont left
for
America in
658-662).*
1831, these developments had virtually depleted the
country's
moral resources
(pp. 15-18, 287, 305, 312-315;
see also
Caesar,
1985,
pp.
One
of
the
most visible symptoms of
France's
moral crisis was a
high in
cidence of sexual license, especially among the lower and middle classes. Tocqueville believed this evil posed a serious threat to his country's freedom.
*Democracy
ville's other
in America
cited
(1969) is
cited
by
page number without
texts are
by
abbreviations noted
in the
reference
any title list.
abbreviation.
Tocque
would
like to thank the National Endowment for the Humanities for the
article.
generous support
it
provided
for writing this
interpretation,
Spring 1989,
Vol. 16, No. 3
466
Interpretation
unbridled
In his view,
sensibility, and
sensuality magnifies selfishness, distorts judgment destabilizes personal relationships. After dismpting family
and
life,
France it invited tyranny by inevitably and concern for the common legitimate respect for authority ening Tocqueville feared the imminent rise of a new form of Caesarism in
it
exacts a
large
political
toll. In
weak
good. which
of
nothing
would stand
between the French

312-315).
people and the unlimited
authority
a single man
(pp. 291, 599,
Tocqueville thought that the only way his country could avert this danger was through moral reform. Unlike most European and American thinkers of his
day, he
ther
considered good mores of greater value
to
democratic freedom than

laws. In this
to be the
respect
ei
ideal
geographical circumstances or excellent

who
he fol
lowed Jean-Jacques Rousseau

stone"
believed
p.
mores
"immovable
how
key
main mo
of political objects
life (Rousseau, 1978,

in America
and
38).
One
of
Tocqueville's
in writing
Democracy
was
to show his countrymen
res contributed to ute
America's freedom
could, if properly
examined
fashioned,
the
contrib
which
to their own. In the
Democracy he carefully
mores.
factors
created and sustained
American
Although he
recognized that
natural,
historical, and political differences divided the two countries, he thought that France, as a newly emerging democracy, could benefit from America's long
democratic
experience was
(pp. 287, 305-308,

pp.
315).
with
Tocqueville
morality.
particularly impressed
America's high level
of sexual
(See JA, 1959,
21-22, 54-55, 113-114, 222-223.)
m contrast
to the moral and political chaos plaguing
France, American family life

freedom
were secure
was
stable, law
and
government
respected,
and
(pp. 291,
292).
Tocqueville thought that American

country's
on
women
largely
responsible
for the
their character to
chastity and, be
as a
consequence, considered the
formative influences
Although he does
of great political
importance (p.
590).
why he attributes such power to women, we may assume he again followed Rousseau in stressing their ability to control the sexual approaches of
not explain men and
to establish the
p. 327).
legitimacy
of children
(Rousseau,
to
1979,
pp.
359-361;
MEM 1,
tions of
and
Despite the importance Tocqueville
attributed
Democracy
in America
dealing
with sex are
female chastity, the por among the least discussed

as not
least
understood parts of
the book. Ever since John Stuart Mill in 1840 dis
missed
Tocqueville's
views on
"democratic
either
morals"
being
"of any
con
value,"
siderable
entirely it only in passing (Mill, 1963, p. 244). This is tme of students of women in Western political thought such as Okin (1979) and Elshtain (1981, 1985),
to
sociologists of
scholars
have
ignored this
material
or referred
Tocquevillians
and
Robert Bellah (1985), and most including Lively (1962), Zetterbaum (1967), Schleifer (1980), Lamberti (1983). Tocqueville's views on sexual morality are dealt with
character such as
America's
briefly
The
in Morton (1984), Bloom (1986), and Winthrop (1986). reasons for this widespread neglect are not hard to discern. Although
Tocqueville
on
Sexual
Morality
467
Tocqueville carefully explores the causes of female chastity in America, his case for its political importance is brief, and thus a less obvious subject for study than his extensive treatment of other supports for American freedom,
such
as
religion
and
political
participation.
More important, Tocqueville's
views on
and academic.
chastity are deeply at odds with contemporary opinion, both popular Most Americans accept, even if they do not applaud, the sexual
behavior between consenting adults a private af fair. If the case for chastity is made, it is usually made on religious rather than political grounds. Yet Tocqueville warned that partisans of freedom ignored
revolution and consider sexual
questions of character at their peril and

avert
designed his "new
science"
political
to
ar
this error (pp. 12, 308). This warning alone demands that we give his
gument serious attention.
My
can
primary task, then, is to

the 1830s
explore
Tocqueville's
He
account of
why Ameri explanatory
women of
were so chaste.
considered several
factors, including
the racial makeup of the population, the climate of the coun
try, its religiosity, its social condition, and the role of statesmanship (p. 595). I shall discuss his views on the relative importance of each of these factors pro
ceeding from the least to the most significant. I shall also consider Tocque ville's brief but important analysis of the sexual behavior of American men. Fi
nally, I shall critically assess Tocqueville's analysis in the hope
some and
of
light
on
both the
recent
dramatic
the
changes
in American
morality is
sexual
shedding behavior
the prospects
for chastity in
Tocqueville's
future.
on
Understanding
partly because
tious
of
views
of
sexual
difficult job,
pmdence"
the complexity
the subject and partly because of his cau
mode of writing.
Tocqueville
prided
himself
on
his "tact
and
in
allowing his ideas to "unfold themselves by degrees instead of being thrown in (MEM 1, pp. 381). Further, he was acutely a heap at the head of the situation in France and sought to marshal the political to the volatile sensitive
public"
opposing groups to his cause without exacerbating their differences. He therefore addressed different sections of his analysis to different audiences
support of while
blurring
the apparent contradictions between them. He attempted, for ex
ample, to
convince
French liberals that
Christianity
was essential
to sexual mo
rality
cratic
while persuading conservatives that chastity required a secular, demo foundation. In order to resolve these contradictions, we must pay careful
attention
to the various
unfoldings of
his text.
refute
Tocqueville's first
concern was control
to
the currents of thought which
held
sex
that forces beyond human

ual
such as race or climate
determined
behavior. He
considered
these explanations unpersuasive and pernicious

an
be
cause
they
encouraged
passivity regarding
3-5).
important determinant
of
freedom
(pp. 594-595, 705;

and
see also pp. 542-546,
letters to Gobineau in ER, 1959b,

observed considerable
Schleifer,
1980, Chapters
Although he
attributed victims
license
among
southern
American blacks, he
this to their social state rather

moral devel-
than to their
color.
Slavery
denied its
the opportunity for
468
Interpretation
opment, legitimate
conditions,
rather
family life,
relations
and even control over their own
bodies. These
than innate
moral
inferiority,
failed to
accounted
ture of black sexual
and widespread
also
for the transitory na miscegenation (pp. 317-318, for the different level
of
343-344,
sexual
356).
Racial theories
account
morality among Anglo-Americans and their British cousins. Despite biological inheritance, Anglo-American women were superior to common their
their British
counterparts
in
all matters
pertaining to
of
sexual conduct
(p.
595).
Tocqueville
admitted
also
downplayed the
the
significance of geography.
Although he less in
that
climate affects
intensity
eros, he
considered weather and political
relevant to a country's sexual mores than stitutions.
its religious, social,
History
teaches that a nation of constant climate can experience
case
sharp changes in its sexual life as a result of regime changes. Such was the in France after the Revolution. In the last years of the Old Regime, license
men were chaste
was prevalent
among a corrupt aristocracy while the vast majority of French by habit and conviction. Although the upheaval caused by the
the sexual
morals of
Revolution
of
unsettled
the masses,
it
returned
the
remnants
the old aristocracy to their
once respectable moral standards
(pp. 594-595,
599-600).
Initially, Tocqueville
was attributable
of
suggests that
America's high level
of sexual
to the enormous influence of
Christianity
originated
of the spiritual
morality lives
American
women
(p.
291).
This influence
seventeenth
among the Puritans

for their piety
sexual code re
who settled
New England in the God's

will.
century to live according to their

were noted
unique perception of
and
These Christians
the austerity of their
moral and religious principles.
Their
quired
virginity
outside of
marriage, continence
and
fidelity
Yet,
on
within
marriage,
and the strict avoidance of all
forms
of
license. The Puritans

excessive.
enforced these
laws
with a zeal which
Tocqueville found
the whole, he ad
continued
41-
mired their ethos and
occasionally
suggested that
its
moral
influence
undiminished
from
colonial
times through the Jacksonian era (pp. 32, 36,

short
43, 279, 432, 592). (A good,

marriage
historical treatment
of
Puritan love
and
may be found in Morgan [1956], pp. 9-28.) Tocqueville's linking of sexual morality to Christian piety was part of his broader endeavor to stress religion's to America's political
indispensability
of
health. He further
ciples, habits
of
argued
that it
and
was a source of
the country's democratic prin
restraint,
instinctive love
freedom. Tocqueville "political
sought
to reconcile French
liberals
to
Christianity
as a valuable
institution"
if
not as a
not
did
inspired faith. But his concern was more than think freedom could survive in any modem democracy
divinely
rhetorical.
He
without wide
spread religious
extensive
discussion
belief (pp. 16-18, 287, 292, 294, 299-301, 439). His most of American sexual morality, however, contains surpris
He
also slights
ingly
few
religious references.
religion
which
in his treatment
of
American
considered
family
life
and
education
subjects
traditional
churchmen
exclusively
within
their domain (pp. 590-603).
Tocqueville
What
was
on
Sexual
Morality
469
while
accounts
for this
anomaly?
Tocqueville thought that

of
Christianity
over
initially
and
responsible
for America's high level considerably
chastity, its influence
sexual
behavior had
waned
since colonial
times. (See MEM i, p.

were more
362;
LET,
pp.
48-53.) The Americans he knew
worldly than
source of
their Puritan ancestors and generally
"wishfed]
to find the chief arbiter of their

kind"
beliefs within,
and not
beyond,
the limits of their
(p.
435).
The
this transformation was the social condition of equality which,
ironically,
288).
the
Puritans introduced to America for equality

50).
grew
religious reasons
(pp. 18, 36, 287,
As
in strength, it
came
to exert a decisive influence on the American
character,
leaving Christianity
shift
This
is
reflected
play an in Tocqueville's
to
important, but secondary

explicit claim
role
(p.
in his
most extensive
treatment of sexual behavior that equality accounted for the great strictness of
American
and
the precise relationship between equal is more complicated than he makes it first appear. chastity, however, ity Tocqueville begins the bulk of his analysis by criticizing the aristocratic practice of arranged marriage which survived the general democratization of
mores
(p.
595).
Ascertaining
life in nineteenth-century France.

the right to choose
considered undesirable matches.
According
to this custom,
or
fathers
reserved
marriage partners
for their daughters

criterion of
to veto
what
they
The first
suitability
was common
that paternal
choice.
membership in the same social class. Defenders of arranged marriage argued judgment was a surer guide to marital happiness than freedom of Tocqueville disagreed, pointing
not
out that
the primary
goal of most
fa
thers in matchmaking was
to secure their
daughters'
personal well
being,
but to further the
economic and political goals of
their extended families. He
also tied this abuse of paternal power to the unjust use of conjugal
and
other
infringements
responsible
on women's
authority freedom. These practices, he believed,
were
largely
for the host
of unstable marriages and
illicit
affairs
in
France (pp. 595~596\ 602, 591; OR, p. 83). Tocqueville found no trace of aristocratic States. bands
marriage customs
in the United
By
and
the 1830s equality had weakened the authority of American
hus
that
fathers,
created a classless chooses
society,
and established
the
principle
in marriage, "each influence or even

In America,
his
companion
for himself
without
any
external consid
aristoc
prompting"
(p. 596;
see also pp.
584-589, 600). He
ered this type of marriage a sign of

racy. and
democracy's
moral
superiority to He
women could strive
for
personal
happiness through
and respect.
marriage
enjoy
a conjugal
gests that marital

of chastity.
relationship based freedom was largely

are
on mutual
love
responsible when
for the
country's
also sug high level
Women
only licentious
the argument goes. If no
obstacles preclude
forced to marry against their will, their freedom of choice, they are
(pp.
595~597)and
paternal
likely
to be chaste
when single and
faithful
when married
Unfortunately,
pears.
Tocqueville's
comparison
of marital
freedom
authority in relation to sexual morality is less His primary purpose in criticizing arranged
straightforward
than
it first ap
marriage was
to persuade
470 French
system.
Interpretation
aristocrats
to abandon one of the last remnants of their doomed social
He
shows
the
careful
reader, though, that
aristocratic
institutions
were
quite capable of also suggests more

of
that the
promoting chastity in predemocratic times (pp. 596n, 599). He sexual disorders of his generation may have been caused
of
by
the
immaturity
influence"
French
all that
democracy
France
than
by
aristocratic abridgments
freedom. In this case,
required
was patience
to allow the
effect
"beneficent
599)-
equality
exerts on sexual
behavior to take
(pp.
Tocqueville further indicates, however, that even in a mature democracy the relationship between equality and female chastity is problematic. His pre
cise argument strengthens a
is that equality does
not
by
itself
create strict
mores, but
rather
deprived
cense
of
preexisting tendency in that direction. In fact, when chastity is its religious roots, equality can contribute to a climate in which li
flourishes (pp. 595, 733). There are several reasons for this. The sexual passions, in Tocqueville's view, are the "most tyrannical passions of the human (p. 591). When Christianity tmly governs a woman's soul, it suppresses
heart"
these passions, testifies to their sinfulness, and may even foster a
self-forgetting
social sys
piety America its
which
renders
license
unthinkable.
Such
vast
was
the case in both Puritan
and aristocratic
France despite the
differences in their
tems. As
democracy
weakens traditional religion,
however, it denies chastity

will. period of
lofty Democracy
they
foundation
and
frees
eros
to exert
its imperious
also grants women great

most
liberty during
the
their
lives
when
are
impatient,
At the
a
their passions most unstable, and their tastes

same
most unformed
(p.
591).
making
physical
attraction
natural
and
time, it focuses their minds on eros by legitimate basis for marriage (pp.
combination of
595-597)-
Tocqueville believed that this
but increase the

it"
intensity
it
of their sexual
desires.
the more attention
gets,"
he noted, "and is
to a novel
help "Every passion grows stronger swollen by every effort to satisfy

could not of selfishness with
factors
(p.
552n).
gives rise
Finally, democracy
ville called
form
Tocque
individualism. This
phenomenon causes people to
focus
almost ex
clusively
themselves, and, in his view, was one of the strongest and most dangerous forces unleashed by equality. While contributing posi potentially tively to a concern for individual happiness, individualism also weakens per
on sonal
loyalties
and strengthens
the
desire for immediate

critique of
pleasure at the expense
of on
long-range its
goals.
Tocqueville's
negative effects on male
individualism focuses primarily citizenship (pp. 506-508, 509-510). He also

equality.
believed, however,
when saw
that it
can undermine a woman's sense of moral obligation
linked to
a
an excessive version
love for
Such
was the
danger Tocqueville
women the same
in
European
and
of sexual as men
equality
was
which gave
rights,
duties,
functions
mature
in
all areas of
life (pp. 601-602).

as well as to
By
showing that
democracy
hospitable to license
Tocqueville
strict
on
Sexual
Morality
to
Al 1
morals, Tocqueville highlights the political challenge
facing
American
statesmen.
Their task
was
develop
new,
secular
strategy for promoting
chastity which would replace its religious safeguards while preserving women's freedom. The centerpiece of this new method was a doctrine which Tocqueville
called
"self-interest properly This doctrine, which stressed the links between virtue and private advantage, supplanted Christian altmism as the
normative concept ual
understood."
in American
moral
life. Its
proper
working
required
individ
freedom
and sufficient enlightenment
to prevent selfishness from

wished
becoming
interest in
coarse and
destructive (pp.
525-538).
Perhaps because he his
to avoid of
fending
the pious, Tocqueville doesn't explicitly discuss the

sexual
use of
managing
desire. Yet
a careful
reading
of
analysis reveals
its
perva
sive presence.
American
souls of
moralists
instilled the
through
principle of enlightened self-love

an elaborate
into the
Tradi
American
women
system of education.
tional Christian educators regarded women as

ings,"
whose sexual
frailties
required severe where
"seductive, but incomplete be restrictions on their freedom (p.

still governed the
602). In Tocqueville's France,

received a
the
Church
young, girls
cloistered"
"timid,
of
withdrawn, almost
world and
upbringing
aimed at
keeping
them ignorant
the
training
reinforced
repressing their sexual desires (p. 591). This the patriarchal stmcture of French society and created adult
and
women who were
Tocqueville's Americans
their tant
women.
self-deprecating (p. 602). freedom rather than authority to educate Although he first links this use of freedom to America's Protes
fearful, dependent,
relied on
heritage, he later
shows that
it
signifies a virtual
political
break
with religious moral
tradi
tion (p. 590). The Puritans enjoyed

were more tightly thing Puritan women learned
freedom,
but their
lives
constrained than those of the about

sexual
Catholics they despised.

was
Every
coordi
conduct
"classified,
nated,
were
foreseen,
and
decided in
advance"
(p.
47).
Their descendents, however,

on a rational view of orientation was not
taught to
make
independent
moral
judgments based
the world (pp. 374, 590-592). The source of this
Chris
tianity, but a philosophical approach to knowledge which dominated American life as a result of the democratic revolution (pp. 429-433).
American young
forts"
moralists
hoped
that a
free
view of chaste.
the world
would
convince
women of
the advantages of
being
They
clearly
recognized
that
ef
the virtue of their charges
would often
be in danger
and that
"incredible
were required to enable them to

consisted of
master
themselves (p. 591).
Part
of
their
pedagogy
well as
training
women
to understand the value of chastity as

preserve
the
nature of eros.
They
also
taught the young how to self-confidence,
their
virtue through a combination of will power,
and wit.
These
lessons,
of
course,
required women society.
to leam a considerable amount about men

sophisticated
through mixing in
man nature
On the whole, their

frightened"
knowledge
591).
of
hu
all
"surprised
and almost
Tocqueville (p.
When
472
else
Interpretation
moralists
failed, American
turned to religion
for
aid.
Yet
even
their an
guished appeals ened self-love
to piety were most
likely
variations on
the theme of enlight
(pp. 591-592,
528-530).
At first glance, it is difficult to understand why American women considered it so advantageous to be chaste. Indeed, given the temptations they experienced
and
the general weakness of traditional authority, their self-restraint was quite
remarkable.
Tocqueville
resolves
this paradox
by
showing that the freedom the

than real.
young enjoyed with regard to sexual matters believed that all societies have to accept an
members question where
was more apparent
He
external moral
to
function effectively
either alone or
in
common.
authority for their For him, the central
in studying it resides. In
social mores was not whether such an
authority exists, but
democracies, Tocqueville
and
moral code
asserted, majority opinion de

and restricts
cides what
behavior is honorable
dishonorable
freedom
more
severely than any traditional

what
(pp. 433-436). The
moral content of
ma
democracies honor is determined
by
the real or perceived needs of the
jority and may or may not (pp. 616-617, 625-627).

In the 1830s, American
coincide with
universally
valid ethical
principles
public opinion condemned
license
with unparalleled
severity (pp. 595, 622). Tocqueville attributed part of this harshness to the influence of Christianity which, even in its weakened condition, continued to
shape public
thinking
to a considerable extent (p. 592). Its chief cause,

material gain engendered
how
Dur
ever,
was
the pervasive hunger for
by
equality.
ing
Tocqueville's time, America

almost
was a
trading
and
industrial community de
exclusively to exploiting the country's vast natural resources. Americans honored chastity most because it fostered commercial habits, kept
voted and helped maintain the political stability essential for (pp. 621-622). Tocqueville stresses the importance of these factors prosperity in order to emphasize the extent of American chastity's secular support. Even
families productive,
the survival
of
Christianity, he indicates,
love
of wealth.
was
to the national
Chastity's
status
partly due to its accommodations in American religion would be

than served
economic growth
far less secure, he implies, if it hindered

(pp. 447-448).
rather
The
connection
sheds new
light
on
Tocqueville draws between chastity and public opinion the freedom enjoyed by young American women. Put sim
to allow the unmarried significant moral choices
was essential
ply, it was not

ual
intended
in
sex
matters, but
rather to show them that

an apt student
happiness. What
was part
the very high cost
of
chastity quickly learned from her exposure to the world sexual misbehavior. She could not "for a moment de
to their future
from the
usages accepted
by
her
contemporaries without
and
immediately
social
put
ting in danger her

chaste
peace of mind,
her reputation,
her very
exist
(P- 593)- Tocqueville
was well aware
that pressure of this sort

and
made women
in
conduct rather than
disposition
therefore less than
tmly
virtuous
Tocqueville
on
Sexual
Morality
however,
473
that this type of virtue
was all
(JA,
p.
114).
He believed,
that could
be generally hoped for in democratic times (pp. 590-592). A woman's freedom was clearly intended, however, to prepare her to decide when and whom to marry. Used wisely, it enabled her to find a true compan
ion
a man
who would
well as
father
and protect
satisfy her various physical and emotional needs as her children. This choice was clearly the most impor
serious responsibilities and
tant of her
life, entailing
irrevocably determining
Bloom, 1986,
choose p.
her
prospects
for future happiness (pp. 595-597;

American
see also
84). While
single
a significant number of
women
did
to remain
in Tocqueville's America, divorce
was not a viable option
(see Cham
bers-Schiller
[1984],
pp.
1-5
and
Degler,
pp. 165ft.).
Thus,
women proceeded
cautiously, waiting
until
their minds were experienced and mature
before
mak
ing
decision. In the end, though, the free

strength
nature of their choice gave

without
them the
inner
to endure its consequences
complaint
or
regret
(pp.
592-594). As Tocqueville describes it,

which single. married
life
suffered
from
a moral seriousness
sharply curtailed the independence and pleasure women enjoyed when Public opinion confined American wives to the "quiet sphere of domes
and
duties"
tic
forced them to
submit
to even "stricter
obligations"
than their
suggests
European
counterparts
(pp. 601,
592).
Indeed, Tocqueville
that a
woman's contact with male

p. 243).
society virtually ended on her wedding day (but see Although moralists defended these restrictions on a variety of grounds,
"regularity"
their central purpose was to establish the
of a married remain chaste.
woman's
life,
or, in
other
words, to insure that she

which
These
new shackles
testify
view,
moral
to the gravity with
Americans
regarded
female
adultery.
In their
to the
no other crime posed such a grave of the
threat to
family
stability
and
fiber Today's
country
as a whole
(p.
592).
claim
readers might well view

with a certain
Tocqueville's
not
that such
women were and
genuinely free
the constraints
73T~733)stituted a
skepticism, if
disbelief. Their hard lives
they sympathy and indignation (see pp. From Tocqueville's perspective, however, American marriage con revolutionary advance in the relations between the sexes. The reason
suffered elicit our
both
is
fairly
straightforward.
Despite their
station
various
disabilities,
married
American
women occupied a
higher
(p. 603). Although European

ruled
them
despotically
on
in life than any of their European counterparts flattered and pampered their wives, they the basis of a grossly exaggerated sense of male su
men
periority.
The only way
women could exert significant
influence
over their
hus
bands
was
through the arbitrary use of their sexual power (p. 602).

wives enjoyed an
In contrast, American
unprecedented.
ners to
equality (p.
with
their spouses that was
They
and
entered marriage via a contract which assumed

responsible adults
both
part
be free
conjugal
morally was based authority
596).
Their
submission
to
the
on consent rather
than
coercion and
limited
by
474
respect
women
Interpretation
accorded their
generally
also
judgment
and virtue
(pp. 601-602). American

superior, in
assumed
duties
considered most
equal, if
of
not
dignity
to
those of their husbands. The

mained of
important
these
were
transmitting
p.
what re
the
of
country's
Christian heritage to future

see also
generations and
their love
freedom (pp. 291, 590;
MEM 2,
349).
nourishing Tocqueville
hus
greater
thought that American wives were more adept at these tasks than their
bands, despite
natural
their selfish
and
propensities.
This
was
due partly to their
piety,
worst aspects of
partly to the individualism.
shield
their confinement provided against the
Tocqueville believed that America's decision to

role
grant women a significant
in shaping
character was a stroke of political genius.
In aristocracies,
men
were considered the arbiters of
mores, thus violating what he considered na
ture's intention (p. 587). This
perversion
denied
women
the
opportunity to
use
constructively their talents and reinforced American

their
wives occupied an exalted
moral
both domestic
on the other
and political
tyranny.
station,
hand, largely because
chastity in serving the cause of freedom. Indeed, by stressing the paramount importance of mores, Tocqueville suggests that women contributed more than men to America's free
pedagogy effectively
complemented
their
dom despite their lack

The high
of
formal
political power
(pp. 590, 600-603).

wives and
regard with which
Americans held their
daughters led
them to take strict
measures against external
threats to their virtue.

who
They
were
more solicitous of women than the

with considerable contempt
French,
treated
female vulnerability
public opin
woman would
(pp. 602-603). In the United States,

nor
ion tolerated find
neither
language
literature
which an
honorable
offensive.
While there
was no official
can author was even tempted to write

rejected the
censorship as in France, no Ameri licentious books (p. 256). Americans also

adultery.
French double
standard
for
as
With them, Tocqueville (p. 602). Finally,
noted
"the
seducer
is
as much rapists
dishonored
a
his
victim"
while
the
French treated
with
certain
tolerance, Americans
was so safe
considered
their
crime a capital offense. women could
The United States
in the
1830s that
"set
fear"
out on a
long journey
protective
alone and without
young (p. 603).
Despite the
need
for these
measures, American men posed a rela
tively tranquility
found
40].) This
channel
mercial erotic
minor
threat to their country's
morals.
and shunned romantic adventures of
no rakes of
the type that existed

was
generally sought domestic kind (p. 598). (Tocqueville any in France in America [Letters, 1985, p.
They
straints of public opinion, and
due partly to marital freedom, partly to the tight con partly to the tendency of mature democracies to male energy almost exclusively toward the acquisition of wealth. Com life made our forefathers exceedingly practical, preoccupied, and un
docility
(pp. 598, 532-534). It
also made
them especially open to the doctrine of
enlightened self-love which economic goals
linked
asceticism to the attainment of
long-range
(pp. 528-529). did have

a weakness
American
men
for visiting prostitutes,
a vice which
re-
Tocqueville
quired
on
Sexual
Morality
475
or
little time,
emotional
involvement,
imagination. Lawgivers
tolerated
prostitution
kept
but
national
wise
prevent adultery and thus, in an indirect way, Tocqueville considered this policy a regrettable morality concession to the intractability of male lust (p. 598, JA, p. 223). sound.
because it helped
At this point, discussion

of
brief summary
sexual
of our argument was
is in
order.
Tocqueville's
at
nineteenth-
American
morality
aimed
primarily
century France where, despite the advent of political democracy, the relations between the sexes were largely based on the social principles of the Old Re
gime.
uted
He believed that the first
of these
principles,
arranged
marriage, contrib
significantly to the sexual license

was
which endangered
French freedom. His

marital
strategy
greater
to enlist reluctant aristocrats on the side of

women
freedom
and
freedom for
in
general
by demonstrating
the intrinsic justice of
these principles and their beneficial effects on sexual behavior. These could
seen in America which, in the 1830s, enjoyed a higher level of chastity any other country in the world. Tocqueville did not envisage an uncomplicated relationship between wom en's freedom and strict morals, though, because of the danger posed to chastity
best be
than
by unrestrained sexual desire. In fact, he admired American statesmen for devising strategies which preserved the essence of freedom while preventing its
degeneration into license. Their first basis
the
accomplishment was
to
institute
a system
of education which made enlightened self-love rather than religion of chastity.
driving
the primary became necessary when interest replaced piety as force behind most American behavior. They managed to preserve a
This
reform
residual
influence for Christian
sexual
morality,
however, by trimming Chris

women
tianity
as
to make it compatible
with
majority
opinion.
American
moralists also raised
the status of married
by treating
they
them
the moral and intellectual
equals of men.
At the
same time
prevented considered
adultery by denying them social and this form of sexual equality a "true
603). It both
protected
political
rights.
Tocqueville
conception
of
democratic
progre
(p.
op family integrity portunity to shape America's character in ways that promoted freedom. It also held American men more fully accountable for their moral failings than their
the
of
the
and gave women a unique
counterparts
in France
and other
European
countries.
subtlety of Tocqueville's analysis, his ac count of American sexual morality is open to serious criticism. Tocqueville is most widely admired for the light he sheds on contemporary American life and
Despite the
obvious
depth
and
problems,
and
for his
almost
uncanny ability to
predict
future
political events. moral
Yet he failed to foresee the
sexual revolution which

never
has transformed the
landscape
term
past
of our time.
Indeed, Tocqueville
solution
effectiveness of
America's
we
longseriously doubted the to the problem of license. Within the an

unprecedented
generation,
however,
have
witnessed
increase in
rare
promiscuity, adultery, rape,
and other
forms
of sexual
behavior relatively
in Tocqueville's day. Although
a slight resurgence of traditional
morality has
476
Interpretation
the AIDS
epidemic
accompanied
and the recent rise of religious
fundamen
(see
talism, the prevailing
sexual
ethic
is
one of almost complete relativism
Carlson, 1980,
trol license was
pp.
68-71, 76-79
and
Bell, 1985,
pp. 47-53)-
Although Tocqueville's
regarding America's future ability to con unfounded, Democracy in America remains an excellent source
optimism sexual mores resulted
for understanding why our American sexual revolution

principles which
ultimately changed. Ironically, the from the radicalization of the democratic promoting chastity during his time. came to foster license will show the ex
as
Tocqueville identified
A brief
sketch of
how these
principles
tent to which
he
misjudged
their efficacy. to assume that the
Tocqueville's first
mistake was
democratic forces
be
which
liberated American
women
from traditional
shackles could
confined within
their then established limits. Although he knew that the democratic passion for
equality
respect
was
"ardent, insatiable,
find American
or
invincible,"
eternal, and
he
predicted
it
would
the various inequalities which then acted as barriers to desire (p. 506).
women conjugal
.
"You
will never
managing
as a
a
.
business,
.
interfer
ing
has
in
politics,"
"regarding
rights,"
he
asserted
authority (pp. 601-602). Since he wrote,
usurpation of their
however,
the United States

eco con
established political
nomic and social

sider marriage a
equality for women and eliminated most forms of discrimination against them. Also, most Americans now
ence and command.
relationship of shared decision-making rather than of These changes have brought America close to the equality
which
obedi
radical
European
version of sexual
Tocqueville
opposed. science
This transformation
which
was aided
by
certain
developments in American
relate
Tocqueville identified freedom. He
and
analyzed, but failed to
to the
growth of
women's
predicted
that in an expanding commercial
democracy,
most scientists would seek
to promote material well-being rather than to engage
in
abstract theoretical machine which
studies
(pp.
454-465).
In
such
milieu, he argued,
every
462).
lessens
work or
diminishes the
cost of economic produc

mind"
tion seems the "most magnificent accomplishment of the human
(p.
By
the
beginning
of
the twentieth century,
labor-saving
devices
were
emanci
pated women
responsible
from the time-consuming household chores which for their domestic confinement. Technology also
the
work
enabled
partially large
numbers of women to enter
force,
engage
in
social and political activ
ity,
and expand
most
their
intellectual horizons.
scientific
The
important
inventions
bearing
on
the
relations
between
the sexes,
however,
were
contraceptive
devices
which
first
appeared
pp.
in the
United States Birth

control marital affairs
during
from
the
mid-nineteenth
dissociated
sex
century (Degler, 1981, from the duties of parenthood and
218-219).
shielded extra
public reproach.
Scientific theories
years
such as psychoanalysis
virtues of modest
enhanced this measure of

sexual pleasure.
freedom in later
which existed
by
celebrating the
Finally,
science, taken
as a
whole, greatly eroded the
religious support
for chastity
during
Tocqueville's time
by
call-
Tocqueville
on
Sexual
Morality
ignore
or even
All
ing
into
question
its theological
now
premises.
Many
Americans
who
consider
themselves
while
Christians
church
clergymen
tolerate
doctrine regarding sexual behavior condone their once forbidden activities
(Carlson, 1980,
p. 74).
"self-interest properly replace as the of American chastity. The long-term would Christianity mainstay efficacy of this principle, however, required that both sexes continue to reap tangible benefits from being chaste. In contemporary America the connection
principle of
Tocqueville believed that the
understood
between chastity and self-interest, at least as Tocqueville understood it, is tenu ous at best. Although acquiring wealth still demands a certain single-mindedness, it
no
longer forecloses
possibilities
for
extramarital
sexual encounters.
Indeed,
nomic
these possibilities have multiplied exponentially as the social and eco
barriers separating men and women have cmmbled and sex has become increasingly independent of love. The old equation of sexual morality and na
now
tional economic prosperity also no longer holds as the sexual revolution
fuels
1985,
a significant part of p. 48). of
the American economy
(Carlson,
1980,
p.
74;
Bell,
In America
without
the 1830s,
women could not violate
traditional
sexual mores
risking
be
public
disgrace. Despite
appearances to
the contrary, Tocque

moral princi
ville
thought that democratic public opinion regarding
deeply held
ples would
highly
conservative
(p. 640). His
assessment of
American
atti
tudes toward sexual
behavior
was correct
for
several generations after stable
he
wrote.
Until the 1960s, these

women continued
attitudes were
relatively
and, as a consequence,
to regard chastity as a "point of the American

public came
honor"
(p. 622).
By
the
early 1970s, however, from chastity as a result of the weakening of its traditional supports (Carlson, 1980, pp. 69-71). At the present time, the forces which shape American
values
to tolerate broad deviations
the universities, the media, and the arts than
encourage
license
with
far
more vigor
they
ever promoted restraint. sexual
In today's America,
freedom has
merged with a swollen
individual
ism to seriously endanger traditional family life. Tocqueville thought our an cestors had secured marriage against individualism by making it a voluntary as
sociation whose end was private
for many
generations after
happiness. This strategy certainly he wrote. But the current high incidence
of marriage when grounded
pp.
succeeded
of
divorce
attests to the ultimate assessments of
fragility
well-being (Shorter, 1975,
7,
277-279).
solely Domestic insta
on subjective
bility has contributed to a large number of ills including crime, suicide, drag abuse, welfare dependency, and illegitimacy (Carlson, 1980, pp. 62-63;
Wilson,
1985,
pp.
7-9,
12-14).
The
social cost
to future
generations
is
still
to be reckoned.
Tocqueville thought that the

to
strengthen
chief tasks of
nation's
statemanship in any
which
epoch were political
those
elements
of a
character
support
freedom
and
to curb those
elements which undermine
it (p.
543).
In addressing
478
Interpretation in the 1990s,

and we must ask whether
these tasks
Tocqueville's
warnings regard
ing
ful
license
tyranny
the
still
have
relevance.
traditional sexual morality pose a serious

consideration of
Specifically, does a disregard for threat to America's freedom? A care

the
of recent
sexual revolution also requires an examination of
relationship between
eros and
individual happiness. Has the

or
loosening
morals enriched our private
lives,
has it deepened the
restlessness and mel
ancholy Tocqueville believed intrinsic to our character (pp. 535-538)? Unfortunately, Tocqueville's analysis of sexual morality is of limited answering these
check
questions.
help
in
the
political
instability in
he later
His primary France
reason
for advocating chastity

and
was to
which presaged
the arbitrary mle of a
single man.
But
as
pointed
out, anarchy
traditional
tyranny
are
less
a
to be feared in mature democracies like our own than democratic

novel condition
despotism,
in
which people
lose
their
freedom
forms. Tocqueville discussed the

to avert
causes of
while retaining its outward democratic despotism and the ways
it, but did

also
not explore
the links between sexual behavior and this evil
(pp. 543, 667-702).
Tocqueville
utility.
fails
to examine the value of
Although he believed in the

(pp.
existence of moral
chastity apart from its political laws based on the "uni

their ju
mankind,"
versal and permanent needs of
he
never placed eros under
for chastity on religious grounds despite the fact that he was a practicing Catholic (p. 295). Thus, we never leam whether he regarded chastity as an important, but none
risdiction
616-617, 625-627). Nor did he publicly
argue
theless conventional virtue, or as

soul.
an
essential
component of a
well-ordered
If
careful
study
should prove
that
greater
desirable, it
remains
highly
ways.
questionable
chastity in America is politically whether our sexual mores can be

forces beyond their
(p.
tightened in significant
Tocqueville
once compared statesmen to naviga
tors whose realm of action is strictly limited

163).
by
control
This
metaphor seems wrought
today. The changes
aptly to describe the plight of would-be reformers by modem American democracy in science, com
between the sexes, religion, education, and, above all, public opinion, seem to have made the sexual revolution a permanent part of our national life.
merce, the
relations
cratic statesmen
Tocqueville denied, however, that irresistible forces could prevent demo from fostering the essential prerequisites of freedom. In fact,
wrote
he
Democracy
was
in America to
705).
convince the
best
of also
them that the
fate
of
freedom
in their hands (p.

times,"
Yet Tocqueville
knew that
statesmen
had to modify their strategies for promoting freedom according to changing conditions. "Different he wrote, "make different (p. 543, see
demands"
also p.
12).
be
rigid prescriptions
He did not, therefore, intend his reflections for the future, but rather, starting
no
on sexual points
morality to
for discussion
we may have for preserving
and
thought. If promoting greater chastity is

on
longer
feasible,
to
focus
different
aspects of
Tocqueville's
multifaceted plan
Tocqueville
freedom
or
on
Sexual
Morality
479
to consult the writings of other political philosophers. We must

great
leam from the
thinkers of the past, but
always with an eye
toward the
unique requirements of our own age.
REFERENCES
Bell, Daniel. 1985. The Revolt Against Modernity. The Public Interest, 81:42-63. Bellah, Robert N. et al. 1985. Habits of the Heart: Individualism and Commitment in
American Life. Berkeley:
University
on the and
of
California Press.
of the and
Bloom, Allan. Justice and
1986.
Rousseau Here
Equality
on
Equality
1985.
Now. Ithaca
London: Cornell
Sexes. In Frank S. Lucash, ed., University Press.

and
Caesar, James.
the Role
of
Political Science, Political Culture,
Intellectual. American Political Science Review, 79:656-672. Carlson, Allan C. 1980. Families, Sex, and the Liberal Agenda. The Public Interest, 58: 62-79.
the
Chambers-Schiller, Lee Virginia.

London: Yale
1984.
Liberty. A Better Husband. New Haven

and the
and
University
Press.
Degler, Carl N.
to the
1981.
At Odds: Women
Family
in America from the Revolution
Present. Oxford: Oxford

1981
.
University
Press.
and
Elshtain, Jean Bethke.

cal
Public Man, Private Woman: Women in Social
Politi
Thought. Princeton: Princeton

1983.
University
et
Press.
Lamberti, Jean-Claude.
taires de France.
Tocqueville
les deux Democraties. Presses Universi
Lively, Jack.
1962.
The Social
and
Political Thought of Alexis de Tocqueville. Oxford: Politics

and
Clarendon Press.
Mill, John Stuart.
1963.
Essays
on
Culture. Gertrude Himmelfarb, ed.;
Garden City, New York: Doubleday Anchor. (Originally published, 1840) Morgan, Edmund S. 1956. The Puritan Family: Essays on Religion and Domestic Rela
tions
in
Seventeenth-Century
New England. Boston: Trustees
of the
Public Library.
Morton, F. L. 1984. Sexual Equality and the Family in Tocqueville's Democracy in America. Canadian Journal of Political Science, 17:309-324. Okin, Susan Moller.
1979.
Women in Western Political Thought. Princeton: Princeton
University
Press.
1978.
Rousseau, Jean-Jacques.
Of
the
Social Contract. Richard Crosby, trans. Bruns

Tocqueville'
wick, Ohio: King's Court
Communications, Inc.
Schleifer, James T.
Hill: The Inc.
1980.
of
The
Making
of
Democracy
in America. Chapel
University
1975.
North Carolina Press.
Shorter, Edward.
The
Making
of the Modern Family. New York: Basic Books,
Tocqueville, Alexis de
(MEM).
2 vols.
1861.
Cambridge: Macmillan
1955.
Memoirs, Letters, and Remains of Alexis de Tocqueville and Co.

and the
The Old Regime
French Revolution (OR). Stuart
Gilbert, trans. Garden City, New York: Doubleday Anchor. Tocqueville, Alexis de 1959a. Journey to America (JA). New Haven
and
London: Yale
University
Press.
1959b.
The European Revolution

and ed.
and
Correspondence
with
Gobineau (ER). John Lukacs, trans,
Garden City, New York:
Doubleday
480
Interpretation
Anchor.
York:
1969.
Democracy
in America. George
Lawrence,
trans. New
Doubleday
Anchor.
Tocqueville, Alexis de 1985. Selected Letters on Politics and Society (LET). Roger Boesche, ed. and trans, (with James Taupin) Berkeley and Los Angeles: University
of
California Press.
1985.
Wilson, James Q.
icy. The Public
The
Rediscovery
of
Character: Private Virtue

and
and
Public Pol
Interest, 81:3-16.
1986.
Winthrop, Delba.
Democratic ford
Tocqueville's American Woman

Political Theory,
14:239-261.
"The True Conception
of
Progress."
Zetterbaum, Marvin.
1967.
Tocqueville
and the
Problem of Democracy
Stanford: Stan
University
Press.
Book Reviews
The Crisis
Deutsch
of
Liberal Democracy: A Straussian Perspective. Kenneth L.

editors.
and
Walter Softer,
cloth
Albany: State
University
of
New York
Press,
1988, 304 pp.;
$44.50;
paper
$16.95
(corrected
edition*).
Will Morrisey
The
editors
write, "The crisis

foundations,"
life."
of
liberal
democracy
often
is best
understood as a
crisis of moral
the moral neutrality of liberal
democracy
"concern
about con
ing
the
choices of ways of
good"
Liberal democrats
believe "assertions
to be
"noncognitive, radically
'impersonal'
personal"; perhaps as often,
they
cede
cognitive,
good.
status to such assertions
but
call
individual free influence

on a
dom the highest
As
result, "Liberal democratic regimes have failed to
develop
plane,
standards of political
character
morality
by
the
which of
to judge
and
actions
that affect the
and
preservation
the regime
itself";
loftier
they
offer no
"public
good."
vision of
Against this tendency, Leo Strauss defended

'need'
natural
right. Liberal democrats

of nihilism more or
natural right
if they
will not succumb
to some
form
liberal democracy, public artfulness is too poor to conceal anything for long. Although liberal democracy, a modem re gime, rests on modem natural right, which turns on itself and finally issues in
concealed and a
less artfully
in
nihilism, Strauss nonetheless sees nonmodern reasons to support the liberal
re
in contemporary natural right.

gimes
circumstances.
He
would reestablish
them
in
classical
The
says
part
divide their book into three parts, with four, eight, and two es a total of fifteen if the introduction is included. The first respectively
editors essays
contains
discussing
Strauss's
views
on
"the
question and
of natural
relation
right."
The
second part contains essays and
discussing
liberalism
The
its
to
liberality, freedom
part concern
equality, consent,
and nihilism.
essays
in the third
liberalism in the United States.

Life,"
Michael Piatt In "Leo Strauss: Three Quarrels, Three Questions, One provides an overview in which the details never blur. In politics, the contradic
tions between ancients and modems,
reason and
revelation, philosophy and po
etry, cause quarrels; among philosophers, unitary,

and a philosophic
they
raise questions.
But
tme life is
life
proceeds with
the knowledge that some questions
*The first
edition of this
book,
published
These
errors
have been
corrected
in the
new edition.
in 1987, contained numerous typographical errors. The press has also taken the opportunity to
lavender to
a restful
change the color
from its initial
and unfortunate
blue.
interpretation,
Spring 1989,
Vol.
16, No. 3
482
should
Interpretation
be
ranked
higher than any

"
contentious set of answers.
Piatt
writes
two
marvelous sentences on
Machiavelli,
. .
who raises all of
these questions
in
an es an
pecially
ger at
quarrelsome way:
Machiavelli
allows anger at
God to become
the good. In this want of discrimination
Strauss
saw a
failure
of philoso
phy to be
politics
philosophic."
But
by
the same token, Strauss's subordination of
to philosophy never reduces politics to the status of mere rhetoric.
Like
Socrates, Strauss attends to human things in order to become more philosophic, not merely to defend himself or even to give liberally in a spirit "more chari
true."
table than
rates
"The
ancient
Socrates is
and
superior
to Nietzsche and to
his Soc
in both
practical
wisdom
solitude
because he has found the least

city."
unsatisfactory
those
other
reconciliation of
philosophy
a one
and
the
an
Perhaps glancing
at
today
who call
Strauss
Platonist,
Nietzschean,
thing, Piatt
calls
Socrates the
"Strauss loved
most"
Epicurean, or some Socrates, the
philosopher most
free
of
doctrines,
the most full of questions, the example of
the philosophic life.
Victor Gourevich unqualifiedly

claim
no
reads
Strauss's Natural Right
and
History
to
ask
if Strauss
endorses classical natural right.
to an extent partakes of
He carefully suggests that Strauss the historicism Strauss apparently attacks. Historicists
even
that the Whole is unknowable

can
in
principle
because "where there

come
are
human beings there itself
be
being,"
no
and
human beings
into
exis con
tence only
cerns
ternatives"
at a certain point
with an
in time; in saying that Socratic philosophy

framework"
"unchanging
with
of
"fundamental
problems and al
that
gives at
is "coeval
human
thought"
(emphasis added), Strauss

speak of phi
least
as a
part of the point to
Heidegger. Strauss "refuses to

more of
losophy
a
potentiality"; it is "no
classics'
than a possibility, and he refuses to
subscribe
to the
understanding
it
possibility."
as a permanent of some
But if
un
historicist, Strauss eschews the thumotic like Piatt, Gourevich believes Strauss to be
to politics. To
dogmatizing
and politics
modems;
somewhat of an
Epicurean
with re
spect
Gourevich,
natural
right
generally
and
appear more
as noble
lies than
as paths to philosophy. preface
Roger D. Masters discusses the

path to
'corrects'
to Natural Right
History
as a
em physics.
better understanding the contrast between Aristotelian biology and mod Masters Strauss, whose "formulation of the modem pre
Nietzsche."
Nietzsche shares be derived substantially from the modem physics view of nature as a human construct. Against this, Masters defends Aristotelian biology, including the Aristotelian definition of man as dicament
seems to a political animal.
He blames
monotheism and creationism
for the
exaggera
tions
of modem
physics,
obsessed with problems of origin and
making, prob to
mention
lems
now
dangerously
considerable
secularized.
Masters errs, I think, in

Jonas'
failing
Strauss's
interest in Hans Aristotle
statement of neo-Aristotelian
physics to
book The Phenomenon of Life, a biology. Strauss by no means believed modem

on
have
refuted
the level of biology.

contribution
John G. Gunnell
makes an
important
to the volume
by bringing
Book Reviews
483
of sincere
moral
Strauss before the bar

"rhetorical"
indignation.
Calling
Strauss's
work
in the
as
pejorative
"abstract,"
sense, he describes the Straussian

"intellectualized,"
account of
lib
eral
democracy
"ideational."
and
project"
Strauss's de
scription of
"the
modem
is
"tale,"
albeit not one
told
by
an
idiot.
On the contrary, Strauss

contradiction
exhibits great
and
academicist
selfcunning in the deliberate use of myth; Gunnell decries the thought that "dis
exchange."
sembling is
not
an acceptable
form
of education and
repel
scholarly
with
He does
consider
that Strauss
thoughtful to think
may thereby harder. Gunnell charges Strauss from the cave, that "no
historicism"
the thoughtless and cause the
knowing
that ph.ilos.p-:
phy ical
cannot emerge relativism and
philosophical solution to philosoph

not prove
exists.
He does
this assertion.
Fur
a
ther, Strauss's
"claim"
that "value
relativism"
contradicts
itself "is far from
compelling basis for embracing absolutism"; Gunnell does not produce any evi dence that Strauss commended any such embrace. The volume's second part begins with an exchange between Hilail Gildin
and
Victor
Gourevich,
an exchange
that begins but does not end with a consid

observes that
eration of
liberal democracy. Gildin
for Strauss, Nietzsche's
cri
tique of modem rationalism precludes a return to early modem political philos
ophy as "derives
a solution to the crisis of

powerful
liberal democracy. But liberal

political
democracy
support"
from
premodern
very indirectly, as that philosophy was not fend philosophy; through the mle of law, they also provide political stability based upon a certain kind of moderation. Both liberal democrats and Aristotle
agree
although philosophy democratic. Liberal democracies de
that in
a political
best
eral
and
regime one can

democracy"
economy of abundance, constitutional democracy is the reasonably hope for. "The essential difference between lib
and
its
principal
contemporary rivals,
regards some alone.
communist oligarchies
tyrannies, "is that liberal

itself,"
democracy
"Liberal
things as more sacred
than
and
thus tries to leave them

good.
In
an era of vast technological gives
power, this is no trivial

the
western
democracy
the effort to
a
preserve
chance."
tradition, in a manner worthy of that tradition, Gourevich finds Gildin's reading of Strauss unduly
fighting
Moderation
'optimistic'
but not a virtue of thought, and Strauss distinguishes men and philosophic ones: Political men crave the love between political sharply of people but philosophers do not. The sharpness of this contrast ought to be
is
a virtue of conduct
maintained.
If it is not,
philosophic
doubt
will
infect politics,
and political
dog
matism will pollute philosophy.
In modernity, this
them,"
could result
in the Strauss
ian
promotion of
"technology
and material
plenty and, hence, unleashing the
passions that most contribute to

ral
thus overturning the very classical natu
right Strauss intends publicly to uphold. Gildin's reply occupies the central position in the
to
read
volume.
He finds it im That is,
'public'
plausible
Aristotle's Politics
as
merely
philosophic
exercise.
political
life
exhibits
rationally defensible
'support
virtues or an order of natural
right
system'
not valuable
only
as a
for the
life,
and
far from
484
merely
Interpretation
'us'
'them.'
involving
an attachment
to
and a ends
hostility
to
Further,
one
need not regard
the
moral virtues
"as
in
themselves"
as gentlemen
do
in
order
to have "the right to strong, principled, and perfectly genuine political

convictions."
preferences
and
As examples,
the
Gildin
cites
Machiavelli
and
"principled"
Alexander
tion
of
Kojeve, pmdently omitting

This
suggests a
word
from his
descrip
them. Pmdence
is indeed the mediating
virtue
between
philosophic and
political virtue.
or
hierarchy
of
virtues, the
consists
lower approximating in making oneself as The pious gentle

knowledge,"
imitating
the higher. To Aristotle, "tme piety
like
men
wisdom."
as possible
to
God,
the
exemplar of
theoretical
may be brought to
different"
sympathize with
philosophers, if philosophers educate

practical
gentlemen prudently.
Statesmanship, "the highest

essays
is both
"essentially
but inseparable from the highest theoretical knowledge. in the

second part
The five remaining

principles to
the study
of political philosophers who address
apply Straussian interpretive issues now con

Aristotle
and
fronting
velli on
liberal democracies. Richard H. Cox liberality. Cox finds

educated people
contrasts
Machia basis
today largely
private
unable
to "judge
a of
property
thoughtfully concerning
the nature and purpose of
liberty
tivity"
and of
liberality. Aristotelian liberality, "a
highly
disciplined
right
moral ac
guided
by
pmdence, consisting of privately giving to the
people,
at
the right time, in the right way, overcomes the inordinate desire to protect
one's
body by
accumulating "external
or
possessions
Liberality
contrasts with
magnificence, the
consists of
virtue associated with public giving.
Machiavellian
liberality
vellian virtii
giving is "a
appearing to give ultimately in order to take. All Machia

dominion,"
mode of acquisition of
and
that includes both the
courage of the
not
lion
and
the pmdence
of
the fox. Men give the name of liberal

avoid
prac-
to those
who give
taking from one ice the liberal

"giving'
of
virtuously but to those who give sumptuously. To a dangerous his subjects in order to give to others
prince will plunder other cities.
This is
'frugality.'
The basis
of
is
getting.
Laurence Bems
contrasts
Aristotle
with modem political philosophers on
the
themes of freedom and
equality.
To modems, freedom
'legislates'
means
autonomy,
self-
legislation. Neither God is to be

conquered.
nor nature
for man; rather, the

partake
nonhuman
part"
Although the American founders

politics,"
"in large
of
under
the "new science of
much of
their task requires an Aristotelian
standing
of pmdence and of
liberal
education.
Their regime,
nonetheless
although not
iden
of
tical to an Aristotelian polity or that regime's best
mixed
regime,
imitates many
procedures and effects.
Bems
emphasizes the
contemporary
educate
need to strengthen the aristocratic component of the regime:
"Who is to
the
educators?"
Judith A. Best is the
examines
simple celebrant of modem auto-nomy.

consent sole condition of
John Locke's teaching Although he
on
consent.
Locke is
no
agrees with
Hobbes "that
Hobbesian
worse
legitimate
government,"
he
rejects
absolutism
because tyranny is
even worse than
the State of Nature. It is
Book Reviews
because it is
more
485
"Consent is
more
even more unreasonable.

of will.
than agreement;
an agreement of
it is
to a
than an act
It is
an act of
rights."
specific
thing: the protection of natural

causes of
determinate will, But this "collapse

a
problem
the distinc
tion between reason and
consent"
best
exemplified
in the
at
American
regime
in the figure
Stephen A. Douglas. Popular sovereignty
tempts to replace constitutional government;

publicanism.
democracy
would overthrow re
In "Nihilism L. Pangle
thought
posure
and
Modem
Democracy
in the Thought
Nietzsche,"
of
political
Thomas
provides a so
brilliant introduction to Nietzsche's

modem
thought. This the ex
begins,
of
to speak, with a critique of

or
"decadence,"
"nihilism"
the
and
nothingness
of
the deepest convictions of both
Jerusalem last
Athens. All
a and
standards of significance and coherence
"are in the
arbitrary,"
analysis
fact
perceived
only
by
philosophers who
have "the
Because
historical
man
sense"
therefore engage in "historical
philosophizing."
is
or
death
by giving nothing to esteem. Pangle traces Nietzsche's historicist philosophizing about history, his attempt to show that Athenian reason and Jerusalemite conscience turn on themselves
of man as well as
man
has been "the esteeming the death of God,
animal,"
historical
relativism
threatens the
or self-destmct.
Both
finally
which
yield either
fully
conscious nihilism or a sort of
reverse
Hegelianism in
history
ends not at
the summit of
wisdom
but in
this
at nei
the exhaustion and self-contempt of the 'Last
Man.'
Nietzsche
would avoid man
whimpering
apocalypse not
so much
by
simply reinspiriting
need not
but
by
is
tempting
ther
to overcome
nor
'man.'
As Pangle
remark, this
attempt
liberal
democratic.
hilist?"
Robert Eden's characteristically insightful essay, "Why Wasn't Weber a Ni illuminates the sort of concerns raised by Professor Gunnell. "Weber's
is
a
perspective
defense
of
politics, and as Strauss
attempts causes
to
demonstrate, any
which we
defense
of politics a
that abstracts from ranking the
for
fight is
be the
necessarily
fense
defense
of politics against philosophy;
its
root
dogma
must
impossibility
mately
nihilism,
to sustain
and
of political philosophy.
My
suggestion
is that indignation in de
which
of politics
is the basic
Weber
problem of
the social sciences,
Weber
ulti
personified."
opposes egalitarian
liberalism,
natural
right,
vulgar
Nietzschean nihilism, but he lacks the classical pmdence needed Niethese rejections. As a result, he falls into a milder version of
what
tzscheism. Weber is to Nietzsche

out
Locke is to Hobbes, but entirely

without
perhaps with considerable
Locke's self-knowledge,
and almost
Locke's
.
pmdence.
Modernity finally
horizon
of
jettisons the
via
via contemplativa
All
choices are re
stricted to the
the
activa, politics. third part of the volume, on
Stephen Salkever begins the American is

regime, with the only
liberalism in the
"What if there
souls as
sensible question not yet asked:
democracy?"
no crisis of
liberal
and
Guided
by
such unmelodramatic succeeds
Aristotle, Publius,
there is
de Tocqueville, he
Salkever
objects
almost
in showing that
state
"theorists"
no crisis at all.
to the way many
the
486
Interpretation
conflict
problem, namely, as a
and
between
liberty
and
equality, individual rights
interests
mle
majority
ual
majority but "mle by people

when
versus
power.
He insists that
primarily
when
democracy
is
who are
concerned with
aims at
not simply income and
security."
Democracy
rights, but
acteristic virtues of admire this subtle
becomes liberal "not
it
protecting individ
the members of the mling people are marked

or or
by
the char
can
moderation."
[!] generosity liberality Aristotelianizing of the issue. To Aristotle,

greater possibilities
One
only
"the
poor who
love
wealth who
present
for
and
education
in
virtue
than do the
wealthy racy
love
honor."
Both Aristotle
de Tocqueville
of
consider aristoc
but dangerous, because the aristocratic love to-acquire as manifested among the few who are rich)
noble spectacular crimes. custom
'middle-class'
honor (the
desiremost
and
can
lead to the
rale of
But democracies lend themselves to the
law
especially
of on
democracies,
given attitude
where
the many are too
busy
to rale directly. "The quality
any
the
democracy
should
be
seen as adver
bial,
of
as
it
were
it depends
and
democrats take toward the

that is a necessary
pursuit
of our
wealth,
income,
attitude
security,
a pursuit
feature
lives. This
traditions that
education
in turn is primarily determined by the inform democratic life in particular

of
nature of customs or
places."
Democracies
need
"in the light
[their]
own
best
possibilities,"
not some radical trans
formation. Pace Rousseau: We do Tocqueville

have
a
not need citizens
but
good
bourgeois. De
system
shows that
America in its local
politics and
its
jury
does
than a
basis for its liberal regime, but this is no more (and no less) basis. Certain kinds of religion contribute to "habits of even-tempered
and
'citizen'
benevolence
lives."
liberality,
abstracts
which
are
the
measure
of
the best democratic
Salkever nearly
most significant
the United States from the
world.
"Perhaps the
and
difference"
between de Tocqueville's America

that we have
no great wars
ours, "is
not
that it
can no
longer be
fear."
said
to
He does
and
say, "no sight,
deter."
great wars to
That
would raise questions of
discipline
fore
problematic
mention
in any democracy whether liberal or illiberal. Nor does he Soviet Russia. Those who ignore the political context of the most
great war, can much more
likely They
racy.
future
easily
deny
any
the need
for
old-fashioned
count
citizenship
and
its
willingness
to fight and to sacrifice for 'God and

existence of
real crisis of
of
can more
easily doubt the
liberal democ
equality
will
They
can assume
that some pmdent balance
liberty
and
suffice
for the
perpetuation of our political
institutions, overlooking military
ef
forts,
which require more volume's
than
liberty
and equality.
In the
concluding essay, William T. Bluhm asks, "Can individual

points
preferences
be the starting
for the
order?"
construction of public
Survey
and
Bentham, John Harsanyi, John Rawls, Robert Nozick, William Riker, he finds no solid answer. Rather like Weber, he concludes
ing
the writings of
that
"modem
self
political
science, to
avoid cynicism and
sterility,
the
needs
to
address
it
to questions about the nature of the good
life,
character of
tmst and
Book Reviews
how it
can
487
and
be nurtured, the meaning

one might reply,
fostering
of responsible
leadership,
as pedantic
consensus."
community,
as
and a vital and noble value
Without
being
it sounds,
"Yes, but
some
who
'value'
once you word as
say
you've conceded should replace
defeat in
'values'
advance."
Perhaps
'principles'
such
in the
writings of
those
hold that
ethics consists of more
than con
vention and
feelings.
The Crisis of Liberal Democracy testifies to the intricacy and depth of Leo Strauss's political philosophy. The editors have selected essays illustrating two
kinds
of controversy Strauss's thought by volume as
about
non-Straussians
Strauss. One controversy and of defenses
consists of attacks
on
by
Straussians. In this
away impressed with Strauss's ability to anticipate his critic's argument, enabling his students to respond to them merely by explicating some passages in his writings. The other contro
elsewhere,
a careful reader will come
versy consists of disagreements among Straussians about Strauss's teachings. This controversy takes a longer and more winding road, but the views are better.
Roger
and
Boesche,
editor:

of
on
Politics
Society University $27.50; paper, $10.95.
(Berkeley:
California Press, 1985) 288 pp.; cloth,
John C. Koritansky: Alexis de Tocqueville

(Durham: Carolina Academic Press, 1986),
and
the New Science
of
Politics
170 pp.,
$17.50
Michael P. Zuckert
Carleton College
Not too many
years
ago, J.
Tocqueville
paid
need no
with
the
complaint
P. Mayer began his biographical study of that politically interested individuals had not he deserved. Fortunately, that
edition of
Tocqueville the kind

longer be
said.
of careful attention new and much
improved
Tocqueville's
complete works
(edited
by
the same J. P.
as
Mayer),
new translations of
individual
books,
selections of
letters (such
the Boesche
volume under review
here),
and now
many back. sky volume), all attest to the fact that Tocqueville is, as they say, Tocqueville. in interest great the insight into Both these books provide Boesche 's collection, "the first English translation of a broad selection of his
letters,"
serious studies of the
French thinker
(among
them the Koritan
aims
to
provide
"an
overview of
Tocqueville's
political
ideas
and po
litical
life."
personal
person and his They do more, providing insight into Tocqueville's Tocqueville with familiar exclusively relations as well. To a reader
Boesche'
through his writings,
s overview makes visible the great place
his
po-
488 litical
Interpretation
took in Tocqueville's life.
career
Boesche has included many letters

about
which reveal
Tocqueville the politician, worrying

of
being
elected, sizing
up the leaders
fretting
over
political
day, mulling policy they arise, why he and his few political friends had so little impact on French life. His letters also provide a marvelous instance of a man of great
the
over specific
questions as
political acumen and thoughtfulness
reacting to but
political
events.
At the
same
time, he
the
stands as an example of the highest kind of accept
integrity
in
politics.
Never
to
willing to
vulgar
merely
of
vulgar
success,
never
willing to
succumb
failure
despising
the
those around him as too

path of personal
impure to deal with,

the same
good
Tocqueville
always sought
honor
which was at
time the path toward the public good as

sought
he
understood
it
public
in France very
no great admirer
forge
a political
in his study of America. He was of the July Monarchy, but he attempted to work within it to third way, different from the petty politics of the main fac
much
in terms laid
out
tional leaders. He
welcomed
the republican possibilities of the Revolution of

"Red"
1848,
although
emerged at
strongly opposed the that time. Finally, he found the

and
he feared he
forces
which
also
"Empire"
of
Louis Napoleon
so
objectionable that
again
withdrew
from
political
life
and
devoted himself
once
to his writing. To this
unfortunate
turn of political events, then, we owe

and the
Tocqueville's last
great work on
The Old Regime
Revolution.
Revelatory
with
as
Boesche's Some
his
selections.
some of
the
more
tedious at times
same
agree entirely among them) will find detailed comments on the passing political scene in France they certainly are often repetitious. Others (or perhaps the
collection
is,
not
every
to
reader will
readers
(I
must admit
being
ones)
might wish
for
more
letters
of a philosophical of
cast.
Tocqueville
himself, late in his life,

of
assessed
the relative importance
the different sides
his
It
career
thusly:
seems to me that
my true
worth
is
above all
and
in the
works of
the mind; that I
am
worth more
in
thought than
in action;
that, if there
remains
written
anything
of me
in
this world, it
of what
will
be
much more
the trace
of what
1 have
than the recollection
I have done.
the collection is
However,
students of
by
no means
devoid
of matters of real
interest to
Tocqueville's
example,
political philosophy.
There is
was
a wonderful series of
which we
letters, for
first
see point of
written while overwhelmed
Tocqueville
all
in America, in
Tocqueville
by
my ideas are in such state of America. But three weeks later, in

an analysis
which
confusion"
he has seen, admitting that "up to this that he didn't know what to think
letter to his friend Kergorlay, he
the argument of
pre
sented
clearly
anticipated of social
Democracy
of
in
America, including
racy, the task
political
the the
discovery
state, the
inevitability
democ
facing
freedom,
in
and
combining equality of social state with his insights into the surprising (from a French point of
new world of
view)
ways
which the
Americans had
managed
that combination. Of great
Book Reviews
489
where of
interest, too,
value and
are
letters from later in his life
he developed his
will
reactions much
to socialism. In short, any serious student
Tocqueville
available
find
of
interest in these letters
now made
easily
by
so
Boesche. And
the the
letters, as they reveal husband, the son, will

of our attention.
the man, the thinker, the political actor, the

remind us
friend,
an ob
why
we
find Tocqueville
worthy
ject
by presenting an original In doing so, he brings out the account of Tocqueville's "new political scope, comprehension, and beauty of Tocqueville's Democracy while suggest ing the depths from which Tocqueville's apparently effortless analyses emerge. Koritansky captures the overall flavor of his reading when he pronounces that "Tocqueville attempts to rewrite Montesquieu's political science by way of Koritansky
contributes
science."
John
to that same insight
an extension of
Rousseau's
reinterpretation of
human
nature."
He thus
presents
the
most
way
with
opposes
consistently Rousseauean Tocqueville in the literature, and along the interpretations. Koritansky argues the variety of
"conservative"
that Tocqueville "attaches a positive value to equality, and

freedom."
links it
more
of
closely
the value of
He
sees
little
of
the hesitation some
the more
conservative readers see
in Tocqueville's
supported
commitment
to democracy. (In this,
collection of by Koritansky by arguments about the inevitable letters.) Koritansky also credits Tocqueville's coming of democracy as a seriously intended doctrine, and not a matter of rhetoric, as Marvin Zetterbaum treated it. Koritansky finds the grounds for Tocqueville's judgment on the inevitability of democracy in the emergence of "the idea of an idea lacking in antiquity, but, once emerged, one which pushes inexorably towards democracy. Koritansky's Tocqueville is not indiscriminately committed, however, to any and all forms of egalitarianism. Tocqueville's task, Koritansky concludes,
the way,
is
the evidence
in Boesche's
humanity,"
is to further the "noble love

other, "debased love
of
equality,"
of
and
to
counter as
far
as possible
the
of
equality."
The distinction between these two forms

entire
equality is, says Koritansky, "the fundamental distinction for the The noble love of equality, he concludes, is identical with that
Tocqueville
work.
liberty
which
frequently
indicated he
wished
to
preserve
from the
onslaughts of
democratic
egalitarianism.
the problem of
democracy."
democracy
Thus understood, Koritansky for Tocqueville is that of "reconciling nobility

seek
can also conclude that and with
Tocqueville does not, therefore,

rather one
to
counter
equality
some other
principle, but
form
of
equality
with another.
Koritansky's Rousseauean Tocqueville is visible also in his solutions to less Montesquieuan the problem of democracy. It is, as he suggests, a much Tocqueville he
presents.
Stmctures,
above
while not without some
role,
are
strongly
depreciated. America shows,

are successful
all, the limits of to

other
stmcture: stmctures which
in America
are unsuited
places, because
they
can work
only in
the
special
American
environment.
institutions gues, "American
are successful
More fundamentally, Koritansky ar in regulating the democratic passion
490
because
Interpretation
of certain
features
of
American life that
are
not,
in turn, derivative
from those One his

of
institutions."
the most
interesting
and novel parts of
Koritansky's interpretation is
the centerpiece of the
refuses
understood
downplaying
of
"self-interest
rightly
democracy by
. . .
most powerful previous would seek to
interpretations. "Tocqueville
and
to
join those
who
improve
purify
to think and act upon their own self-interest.

a
exhorting democratic citizens The picture of democracy as
society
where enlightened men pursue
only
ville
unrealistic
but
ugly.
It is ugly
and unrealistic
only their material well-being is not for the same reason it rests
nature."
on an
incomplete
not
account of
the needs of
human
Koritansky's Tocque
does
by
any
means reject self-interest
altogether,
however; "the
pur
suit of self-interest can

which men
be
either
debilitating
least in
pleasure
or
it
can
be the activity through

all
assume command over at and
part of
their own affairs, engage
with spirit
their
fellows,
it is
feel the
being
free. It
depends
on
the
in
done."
which
Thus,
the effects of pursuit of self-interest are them
selves
of
fundamental. something more fundamental feature variously over the course describes the Koritansky his book. At some points, he speaks in clearly Rousseauean language: "the
dependent
on more solution
final
to the
problem of
democracy
on
the level of
democracy is,
in
word, the 'general

analysis points villian
will.'
If Tocqueville does
other
not use that
expression, his
whole
to
it."
At
times,
Koritansky
speaks with a more
Tocque
tongue,
as when
he
emphasizes
the role of mores, or of civil religion,
or,
somewhat
Koritansky
strength of
less Tocquevillianly, of "public has in mind here, are certain ways

democratic
citizens."
philosoph
Above all,
and
what
of
understanding
the world which "uplift the
spirit,"
and which responds of
develop
acting in "the moral
democratic
a
Tocqueville
to these needs
by
point
ing
out or
citizen
providing "within reach

"modem
of even
"poetic
description"
democratic life
political
which puts
the
of the passionate
world."
devotion to
freedom that may

presents a poetic
redeem the
Thus, for
example, Tocqueville
interpretation
the materialistic aspects of American life. He emphasized

commerce"
the "heroic spirit with which Americans conduct

mere material gain
rather
than the
to be derived
from it. Or,
more
broadly, Tocqueville inter

bmte
preted material progress
itself "poetically": "In
man an angel teaches a
how to satisfy its From this, Koritansky concludes, preted, indefinite progress in the direction of material prosperity
viduals
desires."
"rightly
can cause
inter
indi
to feel the source of greatness in their own souls. It is this that can lead
sacrifices."
them to make
Commerce love
and material
progress,
even
if poetically
the souls of
understood,
are
only
the
second
noble
best means, however, to

of
strengthen on
democratic
identical
men:
equality proves,
thus
final analysis, to be
re
soldier."
with
"the
spirit,"
warrior
and
healthy democracy "absolutely

citizen and
quires a combination of provision
the roles of
democratic
proper
army and for martial elements within democracy are therefore indispensable for the kind of future that Tocqueville hoped would
a citizen
emerge.
for
Book Reviews
491
Koritansky finds neither this nor the other solution adequate, however, and concludes by rejecting Tocqueville's new political science. Freedom and equal
ity,
the central concerns of
Tocqueville's politics,
are
too ambiguous, Koritan
sky holds, "to inform the common life and rejuvenate society. An inspiration beyond the idea of freedom is needed to capture the imagination and fire the
men."
passions of modem
Koritansky
suggest
does
not explain
be so,
men.
nor
does he his
"inspiration"
any
alternative
why he believes that to of his own for modem
His
conclusion of
is
disappointingly
scanty, it
must
be said,
following
on
the
heels
thoughtful and sympathetic account of
Tocqueville's
new polit
ical
science.
Tme Tocqueophiles may find other features of Koritansky's book with which to take issue. Indeed, Koritansky's study is one of those (few) that one
cherishes
for the
strength and
intelligence
of
its argument,
a
even as one
finds
much with which one cannot agree. ous
Koritansky focuses,
political
more
than any previ
writer,
on
Tocqueville's "new
That
think, for it
provides a
very fmitful focus, I thread through Tocqueville's immense and seemingly has three
a chief
age,"
science,"
sprawling "new political
project.
new political science
science
for
a new
that
is,
democratic
political science
features: (i) it is a for

convic
the democratic age, which takes

tion of the
its
point of
departure in Tocqueville's
and
inevitable coming
of
democracy,
ultimately in his
a particular
view of
the
justice
of
"social state";
democracy; (2) and (3) the new
the central concept of this new political science

political science
is
a
has
task
to
find
way to combine the new conditions of equality with liberty. I can only briefly indicate aspects of Koritansky's treatment of each of these where he has not
persuaded me.
Koritansky
on
comes closer than most to a

vacillates
democracy, but he
in
unaccountable ways.
satisfactory reading of Tocqueville He attempts to credit
both Tocqueville's
"When Tocqueville
claimed
says
neutrality and his commitment to democracy: that he cannot judge whether democracy is ultimately
mankind, he
means that
prejudicial or profitable to
he is
attached
to
democracy
by [a] feeling dimly, animates

that
for the
equal rights of all men at

modem men.
the hearts of
birth to liberty, that, however He is, however, under no illusion
he
can articulate a
defense for that

several
feeling."
Koritansky
if
proceeds, how
"feeling,"
"defences,"
ever, to attribute to Tocqueville

then of
ness of
democracy"
not of
that
democracy
itself. He has
chapter, for example, titled "The Natural
Democracy"
in
which
he
sets
forth
an argument with
nature's
for "the
natural superi as more
ordina
ority
of
as
"more
consistent
"powerful,"
or more successful.
Or, in
another
place,
Koritansky
place, he
asserts
that
at
the "essence of human

which
nature"
corresponds or points
to the kind
of
society
healthy democracy
virtues are
aims.
And in
yet another
suggests
that
natural,"
"democratic
and that the
democratic
condition
is
one
in
natures."
which men can
"express the
gives
goodness
in their
views
Where
Koritansky
to
too many and conflicting

altogether
on
Tocqueville's
commitment
democracy, he
(or nearly so)
scants the
literally
cen-
492
Interpretation
political
tral feature of Tocqueville's new
science,
social state.
Koritansky fails
to
mention what
I believe is the
single most
. .
Democracy
havior; it
must
res."
in America: "The
the
social state and
revealing statement in the whole of may be considered as the prime

which control
cause of most of
laws,
customs,
ideas
the nation's
be
one
modifies even
those things which
it does
not cause.
Therefore laws
first study
social state
if
one wants to understand a people's
and mo and
Tocqueville's book is
organized
in
accordance with this

social
passage,
his
I
analyses
constantly take their bearing Koritansky's book and miss the idea of only
a
from
state.
But
one could read altogether.
social state
in Tocqueville
can recall
few
mentions of
it,
and none of
There
seem to
who
be two
classes of
any importance. contemporary readers of Tocqueville
sociologists,
and
tend to miss or depreciate Tocqueville's political

which
intentions,
the
degree to
he
wrote a
book
meant
to guide political action, and
thus which recognizes the possibility of semiautonomous (at
least)
political ac
tion. On the other side
are political scientists role
like
Koritansky
who seem unwill
ing
to concede the
must
immense be said,
Tocqueville
attributed
to social causation. the phenomenon,

not social condi
latter."
Zetterbaum, it
as when
presents a more extreme case of
he
asserts
that "one can only conclude that

latter"
ideas,
tions, are primary in Tocqueville's thought, despite his emphasis on the But why should Tocqueville "emphasize the if he means the former?
And why does he go to such length to show dominant ideas and attitudes as de rivative from social state? The real task in understanding Tocqueville is to see
how he
the one
combines the sociologist and the political
scientist, and not to affirm
by ignoring
or
denying
the other.
the task of Tocqueville's new political science
Finally, Koritansky identifies

in
an
overly
narrow way. and
bine
democracy
As he rightly sees, Tocqueville sought a way to com liberty. The great threat to that combination, says Koritan
of
sky, is the
mention
contest
between the two forms

as one of
love
an
of equality.
Tocqueville did
that contest,
the
But
Koritansky
almost altogether a
admittedly very important one. ignores the other main threat the lack of
and thus outside the
more
threats, if
"intermediate
range of guided
powers,"
typically Montesquieuan focus,
Koritansky's Rousseauean Tocqueville. Yet Volume I is
surely
found
more
by the quest for alternatives to the secondary powers Montesquieu so central to liberty. Tme, as Koritansky says, Tocqueville found mores
than
important
laws, but they

of
are more
important precisely
as
they help
secondary associations. Koritansky sys tematically depreciates the degree to which Tocqueville saw mores as rooted in practices and structures, including social state. Where Koritansky puts a "po
liberty"
Americans fulfill the functions
the
etry
of
of
at
the center of solutions, Tocqueville himself put the "practice
liberty"
within
free institutions, and, I
must
say it, "self-interest rightly
understood."
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Antimodernism in Franz Overbeck's Bachofen's

Nineteeth-Century Basle: Antitheology and J.J. Antiphilology

Politics in Xenophon's Cyropaedia

Eric Voegelin A Meditation

the Wisdom of the Ancients

Alexis de Tocqueville: Selected Letters

Hilail Gildin Seth G. Benardete

Robert Horwitz (d. 1987)

Howard B. White (d. 1974)

Ernest L. Fortin Erich Hula

Wilhelm Hennis David Lowenthal

Pamela K. Jensen Will

John A. Wettergreen (d. 1989)

Bradford P Wilson Catherine Zuckert

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College, Flushing, N.Y

Macbeth: Shakespeare Antimodernism in Franz Overbeck's Bachofen's

Nineteeth-Century Basle: Antitheology and J.J. Antiphilology

Politics in Xenophon's Cyropaedia

Wisdom of the Ancients

The Crisis of Liberal Democracy: A Straussian Perspective edited by Kenneth

Alexis de Tocqueville: Selected Letters

New Science of Politics

PRELIMINARY VIEW OF THE SUBJECT

composition, Macbeth falls about midway between Julius Cae

them is known only

from the First Folio. Its

seems not to short

say the editors,

some of whom suspect

paring by have been additions

other than another

Shakespeare's. All the

editors are sure

one or two scenes

Muir's Arden edition,

tainties, Macbeth, along Caesar, larly considered one of Shakespeare's most

and some of political

scholarly uncer history plays, is popu his he said, "equals Mac

plays, as well as one of

best. To Abraham Lincoln it

simple and moral

one worse than the other,

colm, Duncan's elder son, returns to Scotland at the head

those suffering under Macbeth's tyrannies, and together

Macbeth himself dies in face-to-face

the play, but there are also signs

play better known for death.

speeches, no doubt the

most memorable speech

beth's last, just

endless and aimless

walking frets his hour

shadow, a poor player

And then is heard

by an idiot, full Signifying nothing.

Vol. 16, No. 3

finds that speech, as it has been called, Macbeth

could not mean

this simply that life has