The High Integrity Way to Win Fame | UT Philosopher Thomas Pangle

Added: 2026-05-18

[00:00:00]Tell us about Washington's love of fame.

[00:00:02]>> It is the love of being famous for admirable qualities, not just being well known. Washington was not produced by democracy, right? He was formed classically.

[00:00:13]>> Really by the British Empire.

[00:00:14]>> Nietzsche said every high culture had slavery because you need this pathos of distance to achieve greatness.

[00:00:20]>> Even if they lose the revolution, they'll go to the gallows still believing in the cause. So their lives they're ready to give up, but their honor they'll never give up. That's sacred. Whether >> [music] >> democracy can produce great men. Do you think that's possible?

[00:00:33]>> Lincoln is the proof of that.

[00:00:37]Hamilton wrote in the Federalist Papers that the love of fame is the ruling passion of the noblest minds.

[00:00:45]Hamilton was obviously Washington's aide and you speculate he might have had Washington in mind there. Tell us about Washington's love of fame. It was a strong part of his his makeup, his personality. Uh but I think he was very clear about the fact that the love of fame correctly understood is the love of being famous for admirable qualities, not just being well known.

[00:01:14]Smith said that in the Theory of Moral Sentiments we not want to only be sympathized with, but sympathizable.

[00:01:21]Yes.

[00:01:22]>> In order That That is to say we want the good recognition, but also to be good.

[00:01:27]Um so you've you know, kind of qualified the fame part. The part I still have problem with in what Hamilton said is ruling passion.

[00:01:36]That's where someone like Plato would disagree with him, right? The noblest minds, they their ruling passion they they might still want recognition, but the ruling passion is reason. Is that a theoretical difference between Hamilton and Plato?

[00:01:48]>> Well, right. I think Hamilton has a somewhat too overly two-dimensional concept. I don't think he's thought it through in the way I think probably Washington had.

[00:01:59]I see.

[00:01:59]>> want just the fame of, you know, everyone thinking you're a terrific person. You want a sense and that confirms my own judgment on myself.

[00:02:08]Another way of putting this I think is that for someone like uh Washington and I think he saw this very much in the in the in the figure of Cato. Uh Cato is concerned with fame, but he he's concerned above all with being the kind of person he wants to be and getting confirmation of that through the fame.

[00:02:29]Um the great man's desire for glory is a bit odd because he desires it from usually lesser men.

[00:02:39]One philosophical manifestation of this is the master-slave dialectic in Hegel and for our audience the master fails to get the kind of recognition that he wants even after he defeats the person and renders them a slave precisely because he's made him a slave and a slave cannot give the the the the master the the glory that he desires.

[00:03:00]Is the great man tragic in this way as well?

[00:03:04]I think there's certainly an element of that in the in the great man.

[00:03:07]Um but uh I think not if he keeps straight, which I what I think Washington did that the recognition he wants is a confirmation of his own self-recognition or you could say his own self-admiration or his self-knowledge that he is what he uh presents himself as being and that there isn't a contradiction or a clash between the outer and the inner man.

[00:03:35]And very important in that respect I think is the recognition that he gets from us from people he really respects and this would go to your master-slave, right?

[00:03:46]The master wants me really to be recognized by another master whom he can't turn into a slave, right?

[00:03:52]>> Right. The recognition he got from Hamilton, for example.

[00:03:55]Or even in a way from Jefferson. It was 10 more 10s because but there's always going to be competition clearly between two such great figures, but I think they appreciate above all the recognition that comes from another great figure.

[00:04:09]Right. So, in other words, the great man's path to recognition is only tragic if he believes he is uno solo, as Machiavelli said. He he he he's alone.

[00:04:20]He stands peerless.

[00:04:23]And so, this seems to be the best counter argument to megalomania because it's an imminent critique.

[00:04:30]By thinking of yourself as uno solo, as as as peerless, you actually rob yourself of the peers you need to get recognition from. Yeah. So, something like maybe Napoleon's desire for glory is tragic in a way that Washington's wasn't because Washington was more egalitarian or something like that. Yes, yes. He recognized peers and yeah. And and I think Washington also respected the judgment of ordinary people. Right.

[00:04:59]>> Maybe more than a classical figure would. Washington genuinely appreciated and and felt that there was validity to the recognition of people who didn't know him very well, but knew what he had done. And so, this is the self-interested case for egalitarianism.

[00:05:16]Right, which is to say, "Hey, if you want to be cognitively fulfilled, >> [gasps] >> you actually have to give some social space for other people to kind of affirm you."

[00:05:23]>> definitely, yeah. Um let's let's maybe slightly move to to Cato as you suggest, and that's going to help us understand um Washington a bit better.

[00:05:34]So, you described in your chapter that Cato um was really indifferent to the opinions of people around him.

[00:05:45]Although, what you just said here was that Cato actually still cared. So, which one which one was it?

[00:05:50]>> Well, I think he he he cared, but he really was determined maybe even more than than Washington not to make that the the the guiding or most important factor in his decision-making. He really wanted to to die for his country.

[00:06:08]That is defending it even though he knew it was a lost cause. The Republic was going to be taken over by by Caesar. It was going to become a an empire.

[00:06:17]He knew that it would never, you know, recover.

[00:06:20]And you could say the the rational calculation is, well, just go back to your estate and so throw in the towel. No, no, no. Uh I'm going to I'm going to go down. I'm curious how one develops that that kind of self-centeredness when we all begin especially in adolescence caring quite a great deal about the opinions of others. Um I I I think, you know, it has has something to do with just one's natural character, but also then the experiences that that develop it.

[00:06:51]Um and and thinking through thinking some things through, you know, that what do I really want? What am I what am I really concerned with in so far as I'm concerned with with reputation. I think it is a kind of a high form of self-centeredness. That is I want to be the best person I can be. I want my soul to be ordered in the best possible way.

[00:07:11]Um and um and that includes, of course, taking care of other people and doing things for other people uh partly because I really do care about other people, but also because I want to be the kind of person who does that. I see.

[00:07:24]Um one counterargument, probably the most compelling counterargument for this kind of win the respect of those whom you respect, which seems like a pretty uh got good and obvious advice, is actually Machiavelli.

[00:07:37]Um Machiavelli describes the judgment of ordinary people as both vulgar and good.

[00:07:46]And I think what he's saying is if you care about those whom you respect, sophisticated wise men, Cato, the Stoics, they honor noble losers.

[00:07:57]They honor the the sacrifice even if you lose. Whereas politics is about winning.

[00:08:02]It's about the effects. So, if you actually really just cared about winning, you actually make for a better leader than one who's fine with being a noble loser in so far as they're noble. How I I How do you [clears throat] respond to that? Yeah.

[00:08:18]Yeah, I would say even Machiavelli might grant there are causes that are worth fighting for even if they're losing causes.

[00:08:27]Uh because some some some causes, including one's own full development and flourishing, uh are not worth giving away for anything else.

[00:08:39]Uh and and maybe one's one one's people's flourishing is similar. Part of glory is leaving behind a memory that can inspire other people in places you don't even, you know, know exist yet, who will be, you know, moved to to fight for something worth fighting for because they see that somebody, you know, went down in a losing cause uh believing in it. Yeah.

[00:09:06]I want to go back to Cato's final act here about killing himself because I think historically there's two ways to have to have read it. The dominant one is to say Cato is he's brave, but his son is cowardly. His son didn't kill himself. In fact, Cato advised his son not to kill himself.

[00:09:21]Um the other reading has been No, no, no.

[00:09:25]Cato is actually the vicious one because he's hungry for glory even though he thinks that his son can live a good life still alive. Like, if you actually thought it was impossible to live a good life opposing Caesar, why didn't you tell his son to also commit suicide as well?

[00:09:42]Well, maybe it's a little of both. That is to say, um I wonder if he wasn't judging that his son and he were somewhat two different people in their character. That his son was more capable I see.

[00:09:54]>> of you know, remaining a decent person under under an imperial ruler. And Cato was just too too, you know, too deeply committed to and and uh a a life as a Republican citizen.

[00:10:11]And that he just couldn't imagine, you know, getting up every morning and Bowing down.

[00:10:15]>> bowing down to to a Caesar.

[00:10:18]And couldn't he couldn't take it. Now, that of course means that you could say, well, then he's not quite as glorious because he's taking in a sense the easy way out, you could say, right? Yeah, yeah. He's not quite The Stoics believe that, you know, the sage can go through any betrayals, right? So, he's actually quite weak. Yeah.

[00:10:34]>> Right. But uh it seems to me, you know, the response to that is, well, he's more he's more human. I mean, the Stoics ask for in a way a you know, a more than an ideal that's impossible.

[00:10:45]>> not really not really human. Or is it It's either not possible or it's tinged with fanaticism. Yeah, let me read to you one of your quotes on both Washington and Cato. Washington, like Cato, reveals a deeply enlightened self-interest. By failing to take seriously virtue or true honor as a motive, most modern scholars fail to see the rich form of self-love present even here. Such men as Washington are not truly disinterested, but neither can they be called selfish. Indeed, by providing an example of what it looks like to care for oneself in the deepest possible way, they gave their countries perhaps their greatest gift.

[00:11:22]So, your final reading here seems to be that this kind of greatness of soul is a form of self a species of self-interest, but it's true true self-interest, something like that.

[00:11:33]Yeah. Yeah, but it's it's it's it's self-interest concerned with what what what is the most important dimension of our self.

[00:11:40]What our character is. What kind of what kind of a person one is. Yeah. So, let's zoom out from the particular and and reason about the abstract, which is what is honor and how is it different from or maybe it's the same as the the drive for glory and fame and Well, honor sort of has two faces. On the one hand, it's concerned with what other people think of one.

[00:12:05]But on the other hand, it's a word for the code that we follow in our lives as the most important uh defining dimension of our character.

[00:12:17]And honor in that sense is what is stated in the last sentence of the Declaration of Independence. We pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor.

[00:12:29]What they mean there by honor as sacred is the only thing that's said to be sacred in the whole declaration.

[00:12:35]Is the code they live by. They pledge they will not, you know, give in even if they lose the revolution. They'll go to the gallows still believing in the cause for which they they fought and they pledge to one another that they will do that.

[00:12:51]So, their lives they're ready to give up.

[00:12:53]Our lives, their liberty they're ready to give up if they get taken prisoner, but their honor they'll never give up. That's sacred.

[00:13:00]But that honor is different from what other people Yeah. And so that that Oh, right. So, so just like fame we talked about it it has two two parts, right?

[00:13:10]The kind of being the right character and then receiving the recognition for it.

[00:13:14]You mentioned that there's a monarchical honor and then there's a kind of republican honor.

[00:13:20]Tell us about the difference between these two traditions.

[00:13:23]Well, the monarchical honor is it's very much uh explored and and into some extent celebrated by Montesquieu in his spirit of the laws and he says it's the real the real spring or passion that makes monarchy work is the idea that you you know you have a place in the hierarchical rank of a very hierarchical society from the king all the way down to the footman and that place has specific privileges and duties and you never let anyone forget you know that I am a footman or I am a baron or I am a duke or I am the wife of a printer and with that goes a certain respect that society has to give and if somebody doesn't give that you're offended by that.

[00:14:07]So it's a very inegalitarian very rigidly hierarchical conception of a society where everyone has a pride in a place low and high whereas I think republican honor is a much more egalitarian uh fraternal sense that we are all you know Roman citizens and to be a Roman citizen or an Athenian citizen carries with it certain privileges and certain responsibilities and we don't ever forget that and if we do we'll remind one another and so on.

[00:14:41]It's also this inner sense you know that I I I belong in a certain way to this place. I am you know now for the monarchy it's I belong in this place in the hierarchy and you know below and beneath and above me are whereas for the more republican it's I am part of the team if you will. Yeah.

[00:15:03]Um a constitutive quality of honor seems to be pride some kind of pride.

[00:15:09]A constitutive quality of Christianity seems to be humility. Yes. Is there [clears throat] a Christian honor or or has that term been adapted to Christianity absorbed in any way?

[00:15:19]I think there's a real tension there because for exactly the reason you give that that honor really goes with a pride and a self-affirmation, a self-assertion that is not guilt-ridden and does not involve a sense of shame unless one one makes some kind of flaw. But in principle, no. A man of honor shouldn't shouldn't feel shame.

[00:15:46]Whereas certainly Orthodox Christianity is rooted in the idea of original sin and the sinfulness of human beings and their need to you know, be be humble about that and and worry a lot about pride. So, I think there is a real tension. There's a beautiful illustration of this in the 20th century in Churchill's chapter on Munich in his history of World War II.

[00:16:07]He says uh very frankly that uh what was required in Munich was was certainly not the Christian ethic and that Chamberlain in a way was trying to follow that. Mhm. To turn the other cheek and to go the last mile and even to abase yourself in order to get to to persuade Hitler to to not to do it. And Churchill says there there was another alternative code which if followed would have prevented it and that's honor.

[00:16:34]Honor in the sense of a proud refusal to allow and to to surrender to, you know, what you think is a violation of of what's right. Interesting. Given your your reading of Washington as his most his greatest gift proceeds through a self-conception.

[00:16:52]It in that it's because of his high standards that he holds himself. There's nothing wrong with that. That is the fundamental driver of his kind of altruistic gift.

[00:17:00]Do you think there's ever just altruism for altruism's sake? Like I'm just doing this thing purely for your own sake, not in what other people think about me or even what I think about myself. Or do you think as human finite creatures all of our altruism always proceeds through our self-conception. No, I think there's real altruism. Part of what Aristotle means when he says we're we're political animals, he explains is that even when we don't get anything from anyone else, we just simply want to be together and helping others. There are others we simply care for their good and not and and and are willing to make sacrifices of our own good.

[00:17:38]Even our own good properly conceived in the most enlightened way. Yes.

[00:17:43]I think the clearest and purest example of that is what Socrates did in the apology.

[00:17:48]He in effect, I think you could say committed suicide in the sense that he he gave a speech that he knew would lead to his being convicted and then when they offered him as a penalty anything other than death, he he forced them by insulting them into saying, "I'm not going to propose any other penalty."

[00:18:06]And he said that if you okay, if I have to I'll say, "Put me in the center of the city in the place that you reserve for winners of Olympic victories and give me free food for the rest of my life." That's the penalty I prefer. So, they had to put him to death. And and I think he did that because he wanted to make a very important mark in the world of for philosophy and that means for other younger people and for the his you know, for the subsequent history of philosophy. It was not something that was advancing any particular good of his own. He was still a very vigorous man. He had a wife and three children, one of whom was a baby in arms.

[00:18:42]He had another good 10 years. He was only 70, but he said, "No, I'm I'm ending it here because at this moment in this time I really need to do something for the future of philosophy." Right. I think that's still an example of what I would call his altruism or his a great great gift proceeding through his self-conception.

[00:19:02]In the sense that as a philosophical man I I I I kind of must do this. No, no, but that you're misunderstanding me. I don't I he did it for that reason. I think he did it for the sake of other people who he knew like Plato and Xenophon, but other people that he also didn't know.

[00:19:18]>> It wasn't because he had to live up to his own ideal, unlike Washington. Um so Washington Socrates >> I think that I think he was doing it purely out of his love of other people, some of whom he knew Plato and Xenophon for example, others of whom he knew would would come and and he he cared that that that there be other philosophers who would be protected by the reputation he was going to establish as a kind of hero. Right.

[00:19:44]Right.

[00:19:44]>> And and it was going to show that the people who put me to death, they're going to be known in the future as having made a terrible mistake.

[00:19:53]Why do you read him as this pure altruism and Washington as this most enlightened selfishness?

[00:20:01]Because I think Socrates had thought through more deeply and was therefore able to be purer.

[00:20:08]Mhm.

[00:20:08]>> Knowing he he was able to to understand clearly, what am I doing this for? Much of my life is to make my my life and my character the best it can be, but there will or there may come a time when I'm just going to have to say, I'm going to end my character, I'm going to end my life because there's somebody else's good that I bow I I think Now if he had been 30, I think he might not have done it.

[00:20:31]It you know, his whole life ahead of him, he was just getting started, but he's 70, he's had a good run, he's got a few more years, but I see.

[00:20:41]>> It's time to do something for the team, so to speak. In other words, you're saying that Washington is still not the highest that man can achieve. And I want to get to the contemplative contemplative life, but before that I I wanted to maybe not deepen the problematic, but wrap up our discussion about greatness, the active life, with the question whether democracy can produce great men.

[00:21:07]Um and the intuition maybe is just the Christian intuition I I highlighted. Democracy requires a kind of humility in some sense. It doesn't require shame, right? The tension is less stark, but there's all these other forces in democracy that prevent great men from being gendered. Do you think that's possible? I do think it's possible. I think, you know, Lincoln is the proof of that. I'm not sure we could the democracy can take credit for producing him, but it it it it It didn't It didn't squash him. It didn't squash him. It accepted him and indeed embraced him as it's, you know, Excuse me, as it's a leader in a crisis. Yeah, because Washington was not produced by democracy. Right, he was formed classically.

[00:21:47]>> Yes, and and and he was formed by the really by the British Empire, the British He grew up as a as a, you know, loyal British subject. I've often felt that children of the super rich who grow up in democracies come out malformed.

[00:22:03]It's either going to come out as the extreme guilt or it comes out of as an extreme extravagance, look at me.

[00:22:11]And the reason is actually the egalitarian assumptions within democracy combined with their clear inegalitarian position in society, which is why those children who grow up in autocracies or in hierarchical societies come out better formed usually cuz there's less tension. That makes a lot of sense.

[00:22:30]>> Yeah, and so so and I I guess what I'm trying to say is that's also the the tension for the great man, right?

[00:22:36]>> I'm not quite sure I see what you mean.

[00:22:39]I mean because the the Lincoln, let's say, let's say that just sticking with that example, um I don't think he ever felt particularly conflicted. He didn't come from an elite of any kind, right? And and I think so so maybe that um that makes him different. I mean, maybe maybe what you're saying would be the problem if can a great man who is happens to be born in one of the wealthy families in a democracy escape this problem. Here's what I'm trying to say, which is great men usually have great self-conception.

[00:23:11]Um Nietzsche said every high culture had slavery in some sense or the other that there was like this radical difference because you need this pathos of distance to achieve greatness. Maybe you reject that. Maybe maybe Lincoln had an egalitarian mindset and he was a great man.

[00:23:25]Um but when you have a great kind of self-conception and you live in a society that's supposed to be egalitarian, that's the conflict that the that the rich kid the malformed rich kid has that I'm trying to tease out.

[00:23:36]>> Yeah, I see that the the there's a certain tension there, but it doesn't seem to me that it's so um fatal. So fatal or pathological as it is among many of the super rich >> of the super rich kids that which I think you're you're right about a problem they have. But I wonder whether it you know if suppose Lincoln had been born in a super rich family, I wonder if he would have been subject to that problem. If you really are great like a Churchill or a Lincoln or a Washington, um you I remember once uh when Churchill died, this will date me, uh I was watching on television his funeral and they interviewed Eisenhower who was still alive and they said, "Do you think Churchill had a uh a a Gallipoli complex?"

[00:24:20]And Eisenhower said, "Churchill is not a man to have complexes."

[00:24:25]Elaborate.

[00:24:27]If you're a Churchill, you know, have the kind of I see. Napoleon doesn't have a Napoleon complex, right? Like Like you are fully comfortable and congruent.

[00:24:37]>> Yeah, you're you're you're in you're comfortable in your own skin is what would be would be one way of putting it.

[00:24:42]Right. Um was Napoleon comfortable in his own skin? Uh that's I think there's a bit of a question there, yeah.

[00:24:51]>> [laughter] >> Uh I don't know enough about uh Napoleon, but um uh he he certainly seems to have been someone >> Less comfortable than maybe uh Lincoln or Washington, yeah.

[00:25:01]>> Um, okay, here's my question. Does Lincoln's self-conception of greatness necessarily come in tension with democratic egalitarianism?

[00:25:09]I think there's a tension there, but I think it's it's a manageable, uh, a manageable tension.

[00:25:15]I mean, Lincoln was in his self-education very much formed by reading Shakespeare a lot. And and especially Macbeth, hm, which he said he he Macbeth taught him what political greatness is. Now, Macbeth is of course is about a political villain, but I think what he probably meant was it it taught it made clear to me what I have to avoid.

[00:25:38]Right, I see.

[00:25:39]Um, let me give you another quote from your book. "American life does not impose moral tests as harsh as those imposed by earlier and in many ways nobler republics. It does not require as frequent or as regular sacrifices of life, property, private liberty, and ease, but it calls each and all of us to an intellectual probity, to an education in the great texts of political philosophy, to a quest for self-knowledge as a people that is perhaps unprecedented."

[00:26:05]Why does democracy offer us this intellectual challenge as it takes away those moral challenges?

[00:26:11]Ours is the only country that is uh rooted in principles rather than in ethnicity or religion or tradition or language and so on.

[00:26:22]And that means we we have as Americans a special incentive and duty to study what those principles are, where they came from, and what's strong or weak about them. I see.

[00:26:34]>> an intellectual challenge that I tried to bring out. I was perhaps being a little hopeful in that statement, but I think it's there's something to it.

[00:26:41]Right. That challenge doesn't have anything to do with uh democratic egalitarianism, but the fact that America's grounded on principles rather than uh rather than ethnicity. Um, in Plato's Republic, the highest type needs to be compelled to rule.

[00:26:57]Does the highest type rule in democracy?

[00:26:59]I think there's a certainly a a degree to which that's true.

[00:27:04]Um, I think there's some pretty strong statements by Jefferson especially, but also by Washington, that public service is a kind of sacrifice. That they both were happiest when they were at their homes, running their farms.

[00:27:19]Living as country gentlemen was when they were they felt, you know, most happy. Now, of course, they both wanted also to achieve great things, but there's an awareness on the part of such men that there is something unsatisfying mixed with the satisfying in in political rule.

[00:27:40]Right.

[00:27:40]>> I mean, an awful lot of political rule is boring routine.

[00:27:44]You know, signing a lot of papers.

[00:27:46]>> Yeah, trying to pander and pandering to them all, right?

[00:27:48]>> Pandering Well, and also you endless meetings with committees and lobbyists and, you know, having to listen to people, talk to people.

[00:27:56]Uh, the great moments, great speeches, great, you know, great decisions are are all, you know, engaging, but um, a lot of political life is drudgery.

[00:28:07]Right.

[00:28:08]I want to go back to what you said about the impurity of Washington's uh, understanding or desire for the good despite his most enlightened self-interest.

[00:28:21]Tell us what the like to to tell us what he's still missing there, yeah. Well, what I meant there was in comparison to Socrates. Right, right, right.

[00:28:30]>> in other words, it's it's I think that, you know, the Socrates or or or the genuine philosopher, because he has really thought through all of his motivations and human nature in general as well as his specific instantiation of it, the philosopher can isolate so to speak and and decide on those moments which are only partial in life when what you're calling altruism really is what he's moved by. Whereas I think the the person who is not a philosopher is always somewhat blurring and confusing and not sorting out his highest motivations which is perfectly healthy.

[00:29:12]But you can do a lot with that. Yeah, you can do a lot with that. And and but but the philosopher you know is is I think a person who cannot stand not having everything clear especially about his own life his own motivations. And therefore when he is Right.

[00:29:28]>> altruistic he is altruistic for its own sake.

[00:29:32]He is helping someone else who he cares about and he cares about for their sake not for his his own sake.

[00:29:39]>> even for the very enlightened ruler which Washington is there's still a uh impurity. There's still a mix of his own self-interest, his own image and the genuine principle. So you know the pushback I was going to say is the fact that Washington is not only motivated by principle but primarily motivated by by principle um I wonder if that made him a philosopher.

[00:30:05]But but you're saying is that it doesn't because the principles aren't fully clear to him or or he doesn't understand the root of the principles or Yes, the principles are not fully clear to him in the sense that I don't think he ever clarified enough the extent to which he was acting for his own self-fulfillment Right.

[00:30:25]>> or he was acting in obedience to some principles or rules that he thought actually involved a sacrifice like we were talking about a moment ago. He would rather be home on the farm. Or to what extent in the third place he was doing this because he cared much for someone or something outside himself.

[00:30:45]You see what I'm saying? But these are three very different motivations which you could be, you know, mainly guided by at in different circumstances or even only got guided by in certain circumstances. The philosopher is someone who will always say, "Wait a minute. Exactly why am I doing this thing now?" If it's important, obviously he doesn't ask every morning, "Why am I putting on my shoes?" But I mean, whenever he's faced with a decision, he says, "I want to be absolutely clear why I'm doing this."

[00:31:13]George Washington would in effect say that, "Why do you need to be absolutely clear?" Right? I mean, gentlemen don't have to nitpick at their psychological motivations. Philosophers do. And is the impurity not knowing which of the three Okay.

[00:31:29]>> Or or or >> Is it following a lesser of the three?

[00:31:36]I think what I mainly have in mind is is not knowing. So, by by purity, I meant purity of understanding. In other words, not being in any way blurred or confused or in a bit of a fog as to just why am I doing this. Whereas the the philosophers, I think as as a philosopher, a real philosopher, says, "I don't want to be in a fog about this. I want to make sure I've got everything sorted out here."

[00:31:59]Right. Is the person who is totally pure about just producing his base desires all the time, never sacrificing for anything, never helping anyone altruistically, is that pure in your in your definition? Well, it is. I guess it is pure insofar as it's intellectually clear. I'm not sure it's humanly possible. Right.

[00:32:20]>> that person is kidding themselves as a little too cynical about what they actually >> Interesting. They're actually more altruistic than they're >> Yeah, I think I think altruism is a part of the human heart and therefore I don't think there's anyone who who goes through life without caring for some other people for their own sake or some other thing.

[00:32:37]>> Okay, fine. Let me ask Let me ask it this way. Um you are clearly putting the contemplative life above the the active life, even the the best active life.

[00:32:46]Um and one part of the betterness, I'm trying to understand why the contemplative is better than the active, is that you're you're clear about what what what what you're doing. There's a purity.

[00:32:56]Another could be that you have better motivations.

[00:33:00]So so so before I did this interview for my own vanity, now I'm doing this interview because I want to teach the next generation.

[00:33:09]Are you also making that claim as well?

[00:33:11]Yes. I I think that our our human nature is more fully realized in full clarity uh not only about ourselves, but about the world, than in the somewhat dimmed or lesser clarity that attends a life of action.

[00:33:32]Right. But the best life, again, let's let's let's say fully pure and fully understand what you're doing, is not always just pursuing the altruistic, either. Oh, yeah.

[00:33:41]>> Right? Right.

[00:33:42]>> it's it's a Like Like that that's also a pathology, right? Maybe it's like giving too much to to someone to be doing, right?

[00:33:48]>> I think that's possible, being being too uh slavishly serving other people. Yeah.

[00:33:52]Yeah. Um so I suspect that you share Aristotle's opinion that the contemplative life is better is is this kind of supreme life.

[00:34:01]>> Yes.

[00:34:02]Can you give us your own defense? Uh and you can channel Aristotle how much how much you want. [laughter] Of of why why why that is especially to American ears, that might seem quite an odd concept. Yeah. You know, what makes us human above all is our self-consciousness.

[00:34:18]And our self-consciousness is most fully developed in the life of of devoted to understanding, among among other things, ourselves. You know, who who And I think someone who the the the philosophic life gives to that person the fullest self-awareness and self- therefore self-possession, the fullest being oneself. But, it's also a life, of course, that is concerned with understanding the whole world around one to the to the greatest extent one can.

[00:34:49]And I think again that understanding that awakeness to things that that constant um you know, reconsidering, rethinking, re-questioning uh is is uh is the fullest life because our minds are the fullest part of us. Right. So, this is very Aristotelian, like teleological. We look at the the true or the the most unique nature, that's our rational nature.

[00:35:13]What is the fullest development of that?

[00:35:16]You're saying the unexamined life is not worth living. Um the critique would be is the unlived life worth examining?

[00:35:23]Another way to frame this is is this kind of purity of thought is it lexically prior to all other goods? So, if I had Okay, Washington's life versus a philosopher who does nothing in their life, they just sit in their room, they have very little friends, but they fully cognitize why they're doing what they're doing.

[00:35:42]Are you still saying that the contemplative life >> Well, I don't think the I think the philosophic life is intensely social.

[00:35:48]Right.

[00:35:48]>> if the philosopher does have friends.

[00:35:50]And again, I would say the strongest of all friendships if it's if it's other philosophic people. And he's always, you know, very very involved in teaching, you know, he he's like I said about Socrates in the apology, he's very much in love with his his students and students he you know, doesn't >> may not ever meet. Yeah, might not ever meet. And so so I think the part of the philosophic life is an intense activity of a uh of a sort.

[00:36:20]>> of a sort, yeah. Now, uh there are, of course, philosophers or or at least people who who come close to being philosophers like Cicero, like Xenophon, who also lived part of their lives were very active. So, it a lot depends on what one's nature is. Not Most of us are not suited for a purely contemplative life. I know I'm not. I'm not sure I've ever met anyone who who was. I haven't met a Socrates. Uh but Socrates even Socrates fought. Uh well, yeah. Yes, he did. Uh I I suspect he he was he was he was doing it for you know, ulterior motives. Not not because he enjoyed the fighting.

[00:37:03]>> Duty or or Duty and and a sense of, you know, reputation and and, you know, you you going to live in a city, you you you need to, you know, fulfill your the funk what's expected of you or or you'll bring into disrepute what you are and what you're doing. So, your response here seems to have slightly weakened your previous claim that the contemplative life is better in the following sense.

[00:37:26]You're saying to me that a Hindu would say everyone has their own dharma, you know. I may be 50% action, 50% contemplate. You're maybe 80% contemplation.

[00:37:37]But I thought you were trying to make the blanket claim that the contemplative life is better for everyone.

[00:37:42]Uh no, I wasn't making that claim. I mean, let let me put it this way with an example. Xenophon is not a complete philosopher and he makes that very clear. You know, he was a great military leader. He led the 10,000, the great retreat from uh and um uh he was a great orator.

[00:38:01]But, he also wrote philosophically, especially about Socrates.

[00:38:06]And what I think he makes it very clear is he understood Socrates very well and Socrates understood him and they had a very deep bond, but they both were perfectly clear about the fact Xenophon is inferior.

[00:38:20]Uh now, part of his inferiority is he's much better at leading military troops.

[00:38:26]And that had something to do with the fact that he was, when it came to it, he was willing to inflict capital punishment on criminals in his military.

[00:38:35]He do it himself, with his own sword. He would cut off a man's head. I don't think Socrates would ever quite have the the thumos to do that.

[00:38:43]Uh, Socrates was was not somebody who you can imagine killing anyone. And that makes it lesser because that makes him lesser because >> No, no, no, I'm I'm trying to say that makes him in a sense better. He had a capacity that humans need to have to to make society work.

[00:38:58]>> society work and also to combat evil.

[00:39:01]Socrates was a great talker. Right? He could persuade anyone of anything if they listened. But what about people who don't listen? And who just, you know, come after you with a knife?

[00:39:12]It's not clear, I think Xenophon makes this clear, to Socrates himself it wasn't clear that he had the oomph to do certain things that really we somebody has to do. Socrates depended on somebody like Xenophon to do that for him.

[00:39:24]>> Right.

[00:39:25]But still you want to say Socrates is the higher type.

[00:39:28]>> Yes.

[00:39:29]>> Objectively.

[00:39:29]>> Yeah. But but the higher type is is not eligible for most people.

[00:39:35]Right.

[00:39:36]>> They can participate or or have a share in it to some extent and and each person in a sense you've got to find what is what is what is one's best level.

[00:39:44]>> Right. So, let me let me see if I got your position. Purity of of uh purity of of intention, of of knowledge, of self-understanding is the highest good for man because our rational faculty is what makes us unique. This is the Aristotelian argument. That isn't That That actually requires you in in a Hegelian way to actually be active in order to see what kind of your your own nature is. That's one.

[00:40:10]Number two, not all, maybe most people can't develop that even if they can become more pure.

[00:40:17]Yes. So something something like that.

[00:40:19]Right. Um one of Aristotle's defenses of the active the contemplative over the active life that that you seem to reject is the self-sufficiency of contemplation. That you can uh practice philosophy with a lot less dependencies than you can win political glory.

[00:40:37]But but you you just said that the the the philosopher needs friends.

[00:40:41]Presumably they need teachers as well.

[00:40:43]How self-sufficient is the contemplative life?

[00:40:46]Well, it's certainly not uh totally self-sufficient by a long shot. Um but I think it it does need less uh whatever Aristotle calls equipment, choregia.

[00:40:55]Right.

[00:40:57]>> It it needs less of that at least in the ordinary sense. Money, power, uh all of the apparatuses of life. But it has a strong need for friends and an and you know an opportunity to to teach and to and to converse and to and to read and to study, all of which needs the protection of you know, lots of people who are not philosophers. So it's not by any means totally self-sufficient, but I think it's more That's the point. It's more self-sufficient.

[00:41:23]>> Um tell us about your first entry into the contemplative life uh with meeting Allan Bloom.

[00:41:28]>> [laughter] >> Well, it wasn't um I don't think it was it was very contemplative. Uh I mean he he was a mesmerizing uh and and uh uh uh dynamic teacher, lecturer, interlocutor.

[00:41:43]Uh he seemed always to have a better understanding of of of what was in my mind than I had. And he would tell me before I had formulated it what I was where I was coming from and other students had the same experience.

[00:41:56]So he was he was not I would say a uh a very contemplative man himself in at least at at the at the higher levels.

[00:42:06]He had more the the gift of knowing uh s- human souls and recognizing the different types and knowing how to speak to them to arouse in them the desire to understand and know more themselves and and and others and the world. So, he was more a kind of uh >> rhetorician of the soul rather than a philosopher.

[00:42:28]>> Yes. Yes.

[00:42:29]>> I see. He He was He had something like what the part of Socrates that is called his Daimonion. Mhm. Wait, but that's the part that told tells him not to do things, right?

[00:42:38]>> Well, it also told him to to do things, especially in Xenophon. Uh And above all, it helped him select people to know who to say what to whom.

[00:42:48]What to say to whom.

[00:42:49]>> Yeah.

[00:42:50]One um one part of Aristotle's defense of the contemplative life seems to be that it's less corrupted by honor in some sense. It's less tainted there.

[00:43:00]This is might be another sense of purity.

[00:43:03]Uh I'm a big fan of Rousseau's first discourse, who obviously lays out all the problems how easily the the contemplative life is tainted by pride.

[00:43:10]And these you know, these damn intellectuals trying to come up with new theories that disrupt Um and as you know, working in the academy, it's a it's it's no less prideful than Goldman Sachs or Morgan Stanley, right? The competition is just as strong.

[00:43:25]Um yeah. Do Would you agree with that? Yeah.

[00:43:30]>> I don't think the contemplative life has any place in the American university system. Academics are not following the contemplative life. Socrates was never a professor. Interesting. Are you a contemplative or are you a professor? Uh I'm a professor struggling to be as contemplative as I can. Interesting.

[00:43:46]>> But you know, the the whole academic arrangement is >> Right. is >> It's mercenary.

[00:43:52]>> into Well, it's but it's also split into departments and fields and and a whole, you know, array of professional um requirements and and and rules and so on that discourage to some extent wide-ranging free-swinging uh you know contemplative investigation.

[00:44:14]Where in society is the contemplative life best protected or possible today?

[00:44:20]>> [sighs] >> Marginally in the universe it finds a place in the university, but it also finds a place in in some in some think tanks. I think you can find people who have found a niche.

[00:44:33]That's not to say everybody there is but you know I think I think the contemplative life uh it it has to you know kind of find its niche here and there. There is no real you know class or social structure that that supports it. The contemplative life is oriented around truth one's own truth the truth of one's society.

[00:44:55]But truth is quite dangerous to the well-ordering of the city.

[00:44:58]>> Yes, it can be because it's it requires constant questioning critical examining interrogation self-interrogation questioning the givens and the all of the uh the supposedly unquestioned you know absolutes. Yeah.

[00:45:14]>> Yeah. Which is Washington would have lost the war if he had Well, is this self-evident right?

[00:45:20]Well, is it really defensible? So does does the city need to be protected from philosophy?

[00:45:26]>> Yes, I think so.

[00:45:28]Yeah.

[00:45:28]>> Definitely. And so you think that's definitely a responsibility of intellectuals to to let me frame it actually in terms of this project that I'm embarking which is public and it's philosophical. I've often wondered what is the responsible way to teach Nietzsche to give an authentic attack of egalitarianism and the things that the society holds dear that's authentic to truth or to really water him down, right? And then to protect and it's not really clear which one is the responsible thing to do.

[00:45:59]>> Yeah, I think that's a good an of the problem. Yeah. Yeah, and the solution is is what?

[00:46:04]>> [laughter] >> I only teach Nietzsche in small groups of students.

[00:46:10]Uh I suppose you could come back at me and say, "Yeah, but you published several things on Nietzsche."

[00:46:15]Uh and it is always, you know, with Nietzsche especially a a question of of social responsibility and how much to press certain things.

[00:46:24]You know, Strauss who you studied with had this very famous idea of esoteric and exoteric. You want to write in this way that the message gets to the right person, but the mob won't inoculated from it both to protect yourself also to to protect protect them.

[00:46:40]And you you mentioned one off-handed sentence in one of your books that the erotic dialogues in the Phaedrus is the best example of this.

[00:46:49]Why Why is that?

[00:46:50]The Phaedrus is the Platonic dialogue about writing.

[00:46:54]Right, yeah.

[00:46:55]>> That's where Socrates develops his a critique of writing, yeah. And thereby indicates his very, you know, severe criteria for what would be an acceptable writing.

[00:47:07]And the great problem, he says, is writings seem to speak the same to everybody.

[00:47:12]Whereas philosophic communication always has to be adapted to the individual Right.

[00:47:19]>> and what is best for the individual to hear and to think about it.

[00:47:23]>> Including lies. Yes. Uh and and and so how do you do that if you write something that everyone's going to read? Well, uh you have to, you know, uh write in a in a way that that uh um is is is elusive and and uh you know, to some extent discloses itself, the real meaning, only to somebody who begins to pick up on clues and realize you're put asking him to put in put together different things in different parts of the book and so on. Right. So, after the cameras go off, I'm going to ask you what you really think about everything we've talked about and um does does one still need to write esoterically? Not for the city-state.

[00:48:04]That That That's going to be done. But, to protect yourself.

[00:48:08]And I say this because we live in a nominally, at least, liberal tolerant society. There's freedom of speech that is protected in America.

[00:48:17]Does the philosopher still need to protect himself when he writes today?

[00:48:22]Well, I think Yes, but I would say primarily, most obviously, he needs to protect the society. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm I'm trying to tease those two things apart.

[00:48:31]>> seems more obvious that the philosopher needs to protect the the society.

[00:48:34]>> what you're saying. But, but today, it seems like you're rewarded for outlandish takes, right? You're you're Like like My my question is is there still for for pure brute self-interest concerns, is there still any reason to write esoterically today?

[00:48:50]Well, I think the the reason the philosopher writes and and and of course, for publication, and Socrates did not. Right. Nor did Confucius, or Epictetus, or Socrates, or Buddha, yeah. So, when the philosopher does get into that game, it's it's already a certain departure from the the strictest contemplative life, which is, I think, much more an oral transmission and tradition. Uh and and much more in smaller groups and and getting to know people and their differences.

[00:49:22]Because it Because it must be personalized because it's didactic. I see. Um uh and so, when the philosopher does do that, he I think he or she would be reaching out to the future or to a world that he will never be able to get involved with in personal dialectic.

[00:49:40]Uh and therefore, the writing does need to be exoteric exoteric in the sense that you have to try to write in a way that will bring the reader you most want to reach who is somebody who is a a student who needs to progress to help them make that progress in and through what what you're writing.

[00:50:01]>> Do you mean this latter? Yeah. You need to meet kind of people where they are.

[00:50:05]But again, my question is because one of Strauss's big concerns is people are worried about their persecution. That has been one of the dominant reasons for esoteric writing, right?

[00:50:14]>> Yes. Is that gone?

[00:50:18]In in in in at least America today. In at least America and and It's It's largely diminished. I think that's right. But But the philosopher, you know, his his writing is not merely or even maybe mainly for his own time and place. Right. Interesting.

[00:50:34]Okay, this this this is something I didn't realize before this conversation about Strauss. When I read persecution or writing, I thought primarily it was about protecting philosopher from the city.

[00:50:44]But But your claim is it's primarily about teaching others and protecting the city from the philosopher.

[00:50:50]>> Yes. And therefore, those reasons still stand even if the persecution reasons go away.

[00:50:55]>> Right. I see.

[00:50:57]Um What does the philosopher owe to the city? Well, I think the philosopher owes to the city his beginning education, if you will. I don't think a philosopher is possible unless he grows up in a society of you know, some degree of of of serious moral concerns.

[00:51:21]They may be kind of crazy, but you can't grow up in the wilderness, so to speak.

[00:51:26]And then I think he he owes to the society finds himself in the production of of young people and and and peers with whom he can share the essentially social character of philosophy. He can He can have, you know, dialectical partners, so to speak.

[00:51:43]>> Right. So So that's owe in terms of Yeah, like how how does city contribute to his formation? I'm talking about when he's been developed does he is he obliged to teach other philosophers? Is he obliged to teach the political leaders and try to get them Plato at Plato at Syracuse, right?

[00:52:03]What are what are those like kind of political duties of the philosopher to the city given this contentious relationship?

[00:52:10]>> Yeah, I think I think the philosopher has a has a pretty important duty to to do his best in private but also in public communication to strengthen what he understands to be the the the virtues of the city and and to try to discourage its and its discourage its vices.

[00:52:28]Um not just for the view to his possible intellectual, you know, interact interactors interactions but altruistically for the sake of the others in the city. I think the philosopher naturally has a certain love for his own people, his own country.

[00:52:48]Yeah.

[00:52:48]>> Uh and and that may not be the most important thing in his life and it won't be as important as it is for a Washington but it's an element. Right. And so in other words, the philosopher is his contemplation is not just about understanding himself and getting that purity. There's also a social responsibility there.

[00:53:05]And so philosophers today should they guide help guide the development of technology? Should should they try to get involved in some way and I think to the extent they can, yes.

[00:53:16]Yeah.

[00:53:17]Yeah. Interesting. And in your own projects, how has that First of all, are you What is the proportion do you think of your desire of contemplation for your own purity and then trying to help the polis and how has the second part manifested in your work?

[00:53:34]Uh I'm not sure I could put percentages on it but but certainly yeah, both are present and you know, I I my my [clears throat] writing about the American founding and and about the American civic tradition has been the part which which has been most done out of an effort to try to make a contribution to the country.

[00:53:55]I think just for my own if if I had thought only of my own benefit as a as a student and thinker and and teacher I probably would have you know stuck with revelation religion >> Yeah, spent more time on on the great philosophic issues and the the great books that preceded the American founding. The American founders are not philosophers, right? And reading the Federalist is for me not nearly as exciting as as reading you know Kant or Hegel or or even maybe even Tocqueville. Yeah.

[00:54:27]>> But I spent a lot of time with the Federalist because I thought it's important to for the polis for the polis, yeah.

[00:54:33]So we talked about the many tensions between the active and contemplative life and action and this is Nietzsche's untimely meditations and we talked about it how Washington's lack of examination of perhaps the founding principle of America was made him what made him so effective. Xenophon's willingness to behead is is what made him so effective.

[00:54:52]Is it possible to fully combine the two?

[00:54:55]The philosopher king.

[00:54:55]>> I don't think so.

[00:54:57]And I think the the Republic makes that very clear. It you know in the Republic philosophy and and kingship are are are are is an attempt to bring them together and it's like pulling two saplings together to try to make them grow and they it won't happen. And and in all sorts of ways that is shown as the Republic unfolds. Okay, so the Straussian reading the the the apparent reading is his his his recommendation is the philosopher king and you're saying the real message is this can't be done.

[00:55:28]Yes.

[00:55:29]>> [clears throat] >> What are some of the key moments do you think that that that shows this?

[00:55:33]Well, for example, you know we know that Socrates spent his life in dialogue, dialectics, cross-examining himself and others, raising questions all the time.

[00:55:46]In the education of the philosopher kings in the Republic, dialectics is outlawed.

[00:55:52]It can never be used for anyone younger than 30.

[00:55:56]Right, right, right.

[00:55:56]>> Not even the philosopher kings can engage in it until they're 30. Right.

[00:56:02]That's a clear sign that Socrates would never be a philosopher king. He couldn't be.

[00:56:07]He would be outlawed. Well, the reason he gives, if you remember, is that the minds of young men are fickle and they are they are led astray more easily. So so they do but but they do preparatory work for dialectic, which is math and poetry, right? So so I'm not seeing the tension you're you're you're Can you can you can you maybe frame the tension again?

[00:56:28]>> Socrates, in in his dialectic, is mainly interested in teenagers.

[00:56:33]Right. Teenagers, for example. Right.

[00:56:35]>> Yeah.

[00:56:36]Alcibiades, Charmides, Glaucon, Adeimantus.

[00:56:39]He he's he's not particularly interested in talking to mature and older men, except for short moments like with Cephalus at the beginning of the Republic.

[00:56:49]So your claim is that if he wants to make philosophers, you go for the teenagers, but the fact of the philosopher king, you can't go for the teenagers, means that you you need to preserve some delusion in them, right?

[00:57:01]It's something like maybe it's like Washington, right? just not undermine undermine their civic kind of >> Yes, that's right, yeah. They have to be brought up to be dedicated to taking care of the city, and that means you're really going to be disturbing and messing that up if you spend much time with them questioning what the city believes in.

[00:57:21]Interesting. So so in other words, there's normal political leaders, there's philosophers, they cannot be fully combined, but there is a possibility of this middle like like the ideal is the philosopher tutors the king.

[00:57:36]Is that is that right or is is that the best we can do or >> Yes or maybe you know you know or maybe a young prince who becomes philosophic and it turns out he can't avoid taking the throne let's say but he he he tries to you know suppose for example Socrates were born the son of a king and it was made clear to him from the very early in his life you're going to be king someday.

[00:58:01]>> Right. So there's no question of that you know.

[00:58:03]>> But but he would be a disastrous king.

[00:58:05]Well he might he might not be a disastrous king but he certainly would be a reluctant king.

[00:58:10]Hold on but but now you're saying that philosopher and king can be fully embodied in one.

[00:58:14]>> Well I'm I'm saying that would be the more likely possibility but but it would be a very reluctant and and somewhat you know torn life that Socrates would then be leading but yeah that's that's possible but this whole idea of a society that would produce cultivate cultivate a you know a class of philosophy kings that's I think is is is a bit of a stretch as they say and it's and then Plato's intention I think is to help us understand the natures of philosophy and the city so to speak.

[00:58:45]>> Right.

[00:58:46]>> And exactly why they're so opposed.

[00:58:48]>> so they're so impossible to to interweave. And the best relationship between the philosopher and the city if I understand you correctly is the city does not persecute the philosopher the philosopher does not in Rousseau's word in the first discourse harm the city but the philosopher speaks in these ways like you did with the Federalist papers that shapes the city where it needs to go sometimes through lies if talking to different people sometimes through truths and then the philosopher also cultivates the young political leaders not to be philosophers but to be the best political leaders. Yes that I hadn't mentioned that but yes that would be a part of it too. I mean, so that for example, you know, talking to a young person, one of the I think one of the things Socrates has to decide about Alcibiades, for example, is he really potentially philosophic, or should I not let him go the way it looks like his heart wants to go to some kind of political ambition, but try to moderate that ambition and make it more reasonable.

[00:59:49]Right. Um I see.

[00:59:50]>> and you know, the first time he starts to talk or he often usually first observes a young person, that's partly what Socrates is trying to figure out, you know, is this person really suited for me to I see. This is the myth of metals, right? So it's like sometimes at best you're going to be silver. Yeah.

[01:00:06]And I'm not going to try to make a silver soul into gold. Right. I see.

[01:00:11]Um What is Jefferson and Franklin represent if it were if we're going to stick in this taxonomy? Washington is the uh maybe he's a philosopher king, right?

[01:00:23]Because he's the best version of the of the ruler.

[01:00:26]What are Jefferson and Franklin, which are more philosophical than than than Washington? How how would you map that?

[01:00:33]You know, Franklin especially, because he he was, you know, quite a scientist for his time. Um I think I would say, you know, Washington is much more the classical gentleman statesman.

[01:00:44]>> Yeah. Yeah. Uh whereas both Franklin and and Jefferson are are more amateurs in in both fields to some extent. Both as statesmen >> Great amateurs, right? But kind of trying to to to to bring to to engage in both. I see.

[01:01:02]Um Let me give you a quote from your book.

[01:01:06]Jefferson referred to an earlier time when he valued more highly the active life, not out of any moral sense, but rather because the esteem of the world was of higher value in my eye than everything in it.

[01:01:18]But age, experience, and reflection preserving to that only its due value, have set a higher on tranquility.

[01:01:26]This is when he was older and he said that he's becoming an Epicurean.

[01:01:30]What he's claiming here is extraordinary. Which is that his political involvement was motivated by false impurity in some sense, and that it was a almost mistake.

[01:01:40]At least selfishly for him it was a mistake. Is that Yeah. Is he being tongue tongue in cheek here or No, I think there are other statements I think that are even stronger where he says, you know, public service was was really a burden.

[01:01:53]But okay, but but it was was it a burden he could affirm because of the positive consequences or was it just When he the statements I'm thinking of are pretty dark in the sense that that if you just had only those statements, you would say he really regrets he ever did it. I think he's probably, you know, more moderate. More moderate, but I think he uh you know, I think he he did have a a strong side of him that felt was it really worthwhile what I had to do you know, all those years in the you know, in the in in Washington when he I I think he was especially not very happy as president, right?

[01:02:31]>> Right. This is why public service is sacrifice.

[01:02:35]>> Yes.

[01:02:35]>> Right. And in in the in the on the bounds of self-interest.

[01:02:40]But if you have a more enlightened So so did did he have a lower understanding of self-interest than Washington? Cuz Washington also felt this, but you your claim is that his his noble character self-interest didn't make this seem as a a loss, whereas Jefferson's Epicurean self-interest made it seem just like Yeah, a loss, right?

[01:03:00]>> Yes, I think you put it well, yeah.

[01:03:01]Right. So so he so the the the the failure of Jefferson or or the reason he sees it as a loss is because he has a lesser idea of of of what a self truly is or something. So he's less pure than Washington in this regard.

[01:03:14]Yeah, I I it's kind of presumptuous to judge such great men, but yeah, I think I probably would rank him a little below Washington. Interesting.

[01:03:23]Um, what this reminded me of >> Even though he was much more intellectual Right.

[01:03:26]>> and and probably, you know, knew knew more about the all kinds of things that Washington, but Washington's character and what he did know about himself, I think, might have been better. I see.

[01:03:35]So, he was more content He was closer to Socrates than Jefferson. Even though Jefferson was more intellectual. Yes, I think that's right.

[01:03:40]>> Wow, wow. This reminded me, by the way, of the uh myth of Er at the end of the Republic, where uh a person had you know, they're reincarnating, they're choosing next lives, and he sees Odysseus experienced everything. I want to be a farmer. Yeah. All right. So, do you think that all political activity has to be tricked into it? Or or to be put in another way do you think that um it's it's only through the false seduction of vanity or glory that that men are No, no, I think I think that, you know, that there is a real rich satisfaction that comes from uh political life if you have some luck and all goes well and your projects are not terribly frustrated >> Right. um that one can one can take, you know, great satisfaction from from really accomplishing. I mean, think of think of a great political figure like Frances Perkins who gave us social security. An amazing accomplishment. Uh and I knew her in her old age and she was, you know affirming extremely happy that she had had done that, that she had been the one who who put through social security.

[01:04:52]>> Interesting. Just an interesting contrast I noticed. Jefferson on his tombstone, he put founder of UVA, author of declaration, and author of statute of Virginia for religious freedom.

[01:05:03]He did not put president. No.

[01:05:05]Aeschylus put on his tombstone, fought at the Battle of Marathon. He did not put great tragedian. Yeah.

[01:05:13]What do you make of that?

[01:05:15]Well, yeah, I I think it it it it probably says a quite a lot about both of them. Um, maybe in the case of Aeschylus I can't help but wonder whether um it wasn't him thinking, you know, well, everyone will know I'm a tragedian forever.

[01:05:30]>> Right. Yeah, I just want to remind you about Marathon.

[01:05:32]>> you, you know, that I was not just a poet. [laughter] Right. It's a >> a soldier of action.

[01:05:37]>> megalomania.

[01:05:40]That's my suspicion. I see. Well, thank you for fascinating interview, Professor. Okay. My pleasure.