Philosophy and a healthy republican life are incompatible. But it is better known today through Rousseau but it is also in Machiavelli. Yes, and surely the philosophic life is not—the great question whether the philosophic or the political life is preferable is not explicitly, thematically discussed by Machiavelli. To that extent, I agree with you. Student: hen the suggestion is that the philosophical life remains as a kind of ultimate rival possibility… Strauss: Of course, all these things have their depth and their surfaces.
And he was against them. And he preferred the Scipios and Hannibals and such individuals to the monks. But a certain intransigence, contemplative intransigence which he had. Student: I think the diiculty however is the question of the object of contemplation. In other words, that he gave thought to the human passions, to the human soul, you would probably admit.
Also for an obvious reason, because of the religious connotations. Anima means soul; he never uses that in the two great works. But animo he uses all the time. But anima, the less said about it the better. But that is not all; he has also to think about the government of the whole, of the whole universe. He speaks about it, with extreme rarity.
But he does. I may say something about that later. Student: here is also the fact that when I irst learned about it came as a surprise: that they found that he prepared evidently rather carefully a text of Lucretius. Strauss: Yes.
In Florence. Blanton, you had a question which I thought was very sensible. But I refused to answer it because I thought maybe it will come out from this dis- cussion. Do you remember what your diiculty regarding he Prince was?
Blanton: It had to do with the very soul of the prince, the very man the prince. It seemed that he must mouth things of mercy and religion and yet he must be able in a minute to turn around and do the very basest things. And I am wondering, that raises the question for me of the implications of he Prince itself. You presuppose, according to Machiavelli erro- neously, that happiness consists in virtue, in moral virtue.
He would say that the prince would become very miserable if he were to act always virtuously. And it makes me think of the dialogue of Xenophon… 27 See Chauncey E. Strauss: Do you believe that Stalin did not enjoy excellent sleep? I admit I was never in his bedroom but I believe he slept very well.
Especially ater he had committed a considerable amount of murders of people who could be dangerous to him. I think that is a prejudice that criminals, especially large- scale criminals, have sleepless nights on account of their crimes.
It would be wonderful if that were so. Surely you can say Stalin was punished soon ater his death where in the 20th or 21st Congress where Khrushchev made his famous condemnation of Stalin. But he did not hear anymore. It depicts Perry Smith in that book who says that I liked Mr. Clutter, he was a nice guy. I thought so up until the time I slashed his throat… He did not regret the crime. But I am sorry I cannot reconstruct it. But the reward is glory, honor, and especially on a large scale.
If he is not… Well, how did Stalin say about Hitler, this beauti- ful sentence: Hitler was a very able man, but basically not intelligent. He founded really a new empire. Now if you think of those people who established empires which lasted centuries and were looked up to and revered by many generations as great men—think of Julius Caesar, among other people—that is worthy.
He would say, of course Caesar committed a lot of crimes but all these crimes led to the fact that Rome lasted for a couple of centuries more, otherwise she would have gone to pieces because of the conlict between the patricians and the plebeians. A civil society which their ordinary decency can never bring about. Student: But look what he has to do. If the prince comes by it by his own fortune or his own ability, the prince, in order to found his state, has to do away with the very best men.
Strauss: But there are various degrees of ordinary men. Brutus whose honesty vouched for the honesty of the enterprise and Cassius who had the political sense, the Machiavellianism. To make this [understandable], how did they call it, in the last election? In connection with [George] McGovern?
How did they call that? I do not know. It was a word used in connection with McGovern the last election. Integrity or something of this kind. Politically manageable. But this applies already to an earlier stage. If this was the basis of alliance between Brutus and Cassius, Brutus supplying the morality and Cassius supplying the Machiavellianism. So, that is the proof that Caesar was necessary. You can have this only in one man, not in an alliance of two.
Brutus ruins somehow the Machiavellianism of Cassius. And Cassius on the other hand endangers the integrity of Brutus. Student: I believe in he Prince there is a passage regarding the will of for- tune, that despite the professed attempts of the prince his rule will decline… Strauss: Because of the power of Fortuna. Chapter Is that to be taken seriously? Strauss: Yes, but it is qualiied there. Fortuna is very powerful but if a man is very strong and very virile then he can keep Fortuna under and there- fore Fortuna is ultimately no danger for the right kind of man.
Student: My other question is about the possibility of making a case for the morality of the prince in the circumstances of the founding. What came to my mind was your distinction in Natural Right between means necessary in extraordinary situations versus means necessary in ordinary situations.
Machiavelli does not seem to make any such distinction. Strauss: But he implies it. I do not remember at the moment a clear example, but sure. Student: Would you say that he also makes the case persuasively that the actions of the prince are in the name of the good of the whole? Strauss: hat goes without saying. He mentions this I think in the irst chap- ter where he speaks about virtue and vice in general, that is chapter 15, where he says he must use virtue and vice both, alternately, as circumstances require.
Student: hat part I understand, but I am not convinced that… Strauss: But in this connection he says he must of course always speak of the virtues, and say he does it in the name of piety, of liberality, and the other things when he acts impiously and illiberally and so on. It ended only around I would say. I do not know, but I believe it is. So you would of course expect the war, but he speaks instead of war of the prince and his enemies, and then the other part which deals with the prince and his friends, has to do with his subjects, his obedient subjects, that is law, they will obey the law.
You have to igure that out for yourself. You have the Discourses with you. Book 2, chapter 5 and read that. Blanton: From the beginning? Strauss: Ja. But read slowly. Blanton: To those philosophers who maintain that the world has existed from eternity, we might reply, that, if it were really of such antiquity, there would reasonably be some record beyond ive thousand years, were it not that we see how the records of time are destroyed by various causes, some being the acts of men and some of Heaven.
Whoever reads the proceedings of St. Gregory, and of the other heads of the Christian religion, will see with what obstinacy they persecuted all ancient memorials, burning the works of the historians and of the poets, destroying the statues and images and despoiling everything else that gave but an indication of antiquity. So that, if they had added a new language to this persecution, everything relating to previous events would in a very short time have been sunk in oblivion.
It is reasonable to suppose that what the Christians practiced towards the Pagans, these practiced in like manner upon their predecessors. And as the religions changed two or three times in six thousand years, all memory of the things done before that time was lost; and if never- theless some vestiges of it remain, they are regarded as fabulous, and are believed by no one; as is the case with the history of Diodorus Sicu- lus, who gives an account of some forty or ity thousand years, yet is generally looked upon as being mendacious, and I believe with justice.
As to causes produced by Heaven, they are such as destroy the human race, and reduce the inhabitants of some parts of the world to a very few in number; such as pestilence, famine, or inundations.
Of this the latter are the most important, partly because they are most universal, and partly because the few that escape are chiely ignorant moun- taineers, who, having no knowledge of antiquity themselves, cannot transmit any to posterity. And should there be amongst those who escape any that have such knowledge, they conceal or pervert it in their own fashion, for the purpose of gaining inluence and reputa- tion; so that there remains to their successors only just so much as they were disposed to write, and no more.
And that such inundations, pestilences, and famines occur cannot be doubted, both because all history is full of accounts of them, and because we see the efects of them in the oblivion of things, and also because it seems reasonable that they should occur. For in nature as in simple bodies, when there is an accumulation of superluous matter, a spontaneous purgation takes place, which preserves the health of that body.
And so it is with that compound body, the human race; when countries become overpopu- lated and there is no longer any room for all the inhabitants to live, nor any other places for them to go to, these being likewise all fully occu- pied—and when human cunning and wickedness have gone as far as they can go—then of necessity the world must relieve itself of this excess of population by one of those three causes; so that mankind, having been chastised and reduced in numbers, may become better and live with more convenience.
Tuscany then, as I have said above, was once powerful, religious, and virtuous; it had its own customs and language; but all this was destroyed by the Roman power, so that there remained nothing of it but the memory of its name. So he knew something of philosophers and the particular point he has in mind here is that there are philosophers who teach that the world, this world inhabited by human beings, lasts forever. What is the very beginning?
Blanton: I think immediately of Aristotle. Strauss: Sure, the Aristotelians, vulgarly called Averroists, i. What does Machiavelli say? He replies to them. Blanton: He says that there are various causes for the records of human beings being lost and that any man who speaks in terms of eternity is justly laughed at or justly put down, I guess. Strauss: But still, when you read it without any distrust of Machiavelli, you would say he tries to refute this antibiblical argument, but in fact he sup- ports it.
He says: this were true if there were no ruin of documents, therefore the antibiblical Aristotelian argument is not refuted. Blanton: But he refers to the one historian who gives an account of forty or ity thousand years… Strauss: All right, Diodorus Siculus.
Blanton: he latter, I suppose. Strauss: Yes, so that is not very helpful. But there is another point which we have to consider here. And what are the divine causes? But what is true of the ruin is of course also true of the originations of sects—that was a favorite term of the Averroists for religion.
Sects have their origin not in divine acts but in human acts. Strauss: Not revelation proper. Now this I may link up with… he Discourses is about four or ive times as long as he Prince and is much richer in matter than he Prince, much more diicult to understand also.
I can only give you one little help towards this understanding: he ith chapter of the second book, which we just read, is the sixty-ith chapter of the whole work, the irst book consisting of sixty chapters.
Now let us have another discussion, for the same reason for which I had to propose a discussion a short while ago. Student: Of course, to agree with Averroes on a certain point does not necessarily mean to be an Averroist. He might agree with regard to the pos- sible eternity of the universe but he might not agree with theological irst cause, for example.
Strauss: Ja, that is true. But the question is how deeply had Machiavelli studied these kinds of things. And there is no place for teleology in Machiavelli, there is no place for teleology in Lucretius. And therefore I believe the most cautious suggestion one could make is this: the natural philosophy on which Machiavelli builds is a decayed Aristotelianism somehow under the inluence of Epicurus. Could nature be called fortuna? Would that be another name for nature?
Strauss: No, it is not possible. Because the orderliness which belongs to nature does not belong to fortuna. For example, you have two ears, that is our nature. Student: He speaks of purgation in this ith chapter [of book 2]. Strauss: hat is correct.
Student: hat is also a kind of fortuna. Strauss: No, on the contrary. And then coming with that overpopulation, immorality—say, cannibalism.
And then something must be done by nature, [i. And therefore wars are an important part of natural economy: to get rid of the danger of overpopulation. Student: he diiculty is of course that a war, a plague, a lood seem to be interpretable as for the sake of ridding us of excess population. Strauss: Ja, this is true.
I see now, there is a variety of considerations com- ing there together. Because what Machiavelli is doing in chapter 5 of book 2 is to present his very heretical view in as respectable a guise as possible. And therefore he brings in the lood; lood which is ater all not only a teaching of pagan philosophers but of the Bible itself.
Machiavelli uses that for his own purposes, that such loods lead to destruction of all monuments of the earlier times and no wonder that there is no argument available proving that the world is older than ive thousand and so hundred years. Strauss: Ja, that is also true. You may have read the article by Harvey Mans- ield; he has written an article on the Mandragola from this point of view.
Two entirely diferent provinces, akin because they are both human, and yet radically diferent. But it seems to me even harder to understand in Machiavelli because at least in the Republic or in a city in the way that the ancients talk about it there is a fatherland, there is a strict deinition somehow of who a proper citizen is.
But in the terms of Machiavelli it seems that the citizens that the prince would be friendly to are not neces- sarily those within his city but some people appear, maybe in the city maybe out of the city. Strauss: Not quite.
Student: It seemed that the prince is potentially vicious towards every- one, there is no one that stands outside of the possibility of being sliced up. Vickie B.
But if he behaves why should he slice him up? Is it not better, as Socrates even put it, to use him alive than to kill him and only have the trouble of having him buried? Strauss: But why does Plato introduce the example of the dogs there in the second book? What is the purpose, the comparison of the guardian with a dog?
Student: I am not sure. Strauss: A very obvious phenomenon: the simple man identiies the fel- low citizen with a friend and the foreigner is a damned foreigner.
From ordinary experience, we all know how easy the combination is and Socrates puts in a way that it seems to be very paradoxical so that he can solve it only by going outside of the human sphere and bring in the dogs, you know, as if there were no human examples for that.
In fact they are just the opposite of philosophers. Strauss: Well, a philosopher would not say that the mere fact that a man is an alien makes him an enemy. Student: Is the Mandragola an example of ministerial poetry or is there such a thing in Machiavelli?
Strauss: No, I mean you can put it this way, you can say there is a sphere of politics which is the most magniicent and impressive sphere which exists for most people, for Machiavelli especially. But there is something else and this can be loosely described as the sphere of levity; because politics, that is great, think only of war which belongs to politics, gravity. And love, levity. So you can say, although it is to take some liberties, but it is not wholly irrational to say that the Mandragola and similar works of Machiavelli deal with the nonpolitical, with the transpolitical to the extent to which Machiavelli is willing to deal with that.
Did I make myself understood? Student: Would there then be any political role for comedy or tragedy, or poetry in general? Strauss: Machiavelli never spoke about that, he wrote something about Dante and Boccaccio but not about tragedy and comedy as such. Surely he would say that, but his business was to write the Discorsi and Mandragola and related things.
Student: But Mandragola is the problem for me. Strauss: No, that cannot be called grave. Student: Political aspects of it as Dr. Mansield thought so. Strauss: he point is that it is not political. You mean its kinship, in the parallelism with politics. Is that what you mean? All right. Student: One could also say there is a kind of presentation of what might be called the ethical doctrine of he Prince insofar as it gives you examples of how virtue is to be used.
Strauss: But princes are warned by Machiavelli to be particularly cau- tious regarding the womenfolk of their subjects. He had so many opportunities apart from that, there is no good reason for it. Student: here is no way to answer that and remain decent, there is no way to try to argue with that and remain decent.
Strauss: Ja, probably, yes. What was the name of that woman, the ances- tress of William the Conqueror? Or was it the wife of his… he woman in Bayeux, whom the Norman nobleman saw doing her laundry in the river 32 Machiavelli, he Prince, chap. And then took her on his horse and rode away with her. Was she the mother of William the Conqueror? But I forgot the exact relation. Maybe the wife of William the Conqueror, I think he got into trouble with that boy later on who came from this relation.
So you see it is not advisable, even if you are William the Conqueror, to do that. Strauss: hat depends a bit on the point of view. But if you take Hobbes on his own terms and Machiavelli on his own terms, then you can say however anti-Platonic and anti-Aristotelian they may be, they are so diferent that it is of no use to bring them together, it is in no way enlightening to bring them together.
It was a general rule of policy not to mention the name of Machia- velli. Let me see, the irst man who mentioned Machiavelli, his enemies of course mention him all the time, but the irst man who was not an enemy of Machiavelli, was this strange man, a Belgian, a professor at Leuven, what was his name? He changed his religion according to the political order, when the Protestants were in ascendancy he was a Protestant, and when the Catholics were in ascendancy he was a Catholic, he was a very famous man—oh, Justus Lipsius!
Well known in the literature as the founder of the neo-Stoic school and he wrote textbooks of politics based partly on Machiavelli and partly… how the Stoics come in I do not know, I had a student who wanted to write his doctoral dissertation on how the Stoics came into this mixture but he never inished his dissertation, he went into academic administration, which is I believe the death of doctoral dissertations in many cases.
Yes, Justus Lipsius. He was in his way an important man, not only on account of Machiavelli, but he was also a correspondent of Montaigne. Thus the majority of those who read it take pleasure only in the variety of the events which history relates, without ever thinking of imitating the noble actions, deeming. Wishing, therefore, so far as in me lies, to draw mankind from this error, I have thought it proper to write upon those books of Titus Livius that have come to us entire despite the malice of time; touching upon all those matters which, after a comparison between the ancient and modern events, may seem to be necessary to facilitate the proper understanding.
In this way those who read my remarks may derive those advantages which should be the aim of all study of history; and although the undertaking is difficult, yet, aided by those who have encouraged me in this attempt, I hope to carry it sufficiently far, so that but Httle may remain for others to carry it to its destined end. Those who read what the beginning of Rome was, and what her lawgivers and her organization, will not be astonished that so much virtue should have maintained itself during so many centuries; and that so great an empire should have sprung from it afterwards.
To speak first of her origin, we will premise that all cities are founded either by natives of the country or by strangers. The little security which the natives found in living dispersed; the impossibility for each to resist isolated, either because of the situation or because of their small number, the attacks of any enemy that might present himself; the difficulty of uniting in time for the defence at his approach, and the necessity of abandoning the great- er number of their retreats, which quickly became a prize to the assailant, — such were the motives that caused the first inhabitants of a country to build cities for the purpose of escaping these dangers.
They resolved, of their own accord, or by the advice of someone who had most authority amongst them, to live together someplace of the selection that might offer them greater conveniences and greater facility of defence.
Thus, amongst many others were Athens and Venice; the first was built under the authority of Theseus, who had gathered the dispersed inhabitants; and the second owed its origin to the fact that several tribes had taken refuge on the little islands situated at the head of the Adriatic Sea, to escape from war, and from the Barbarians who after the fall of the Roman Empire had overrun Italy.
These refugees of themselves, and without any prince to govern them, began to live under such laws as seemed to them best suited to maintain their new state. In this they succeeded, happily favoured by the long piece, for which they were indebted to their situation upon a sea without issue, where the people that ravaged Italy could not harass them, being without any ships. Thus from that small beginning, they attained that degree of power in which we see them now.
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