Aristotle’s Ideal Man

Published by Michael Marx on August 10th, 2011

In his Ethics (c.330 B.C.) Aristotle describes his ideal man or how a man should live an ethical life:

He does not expose himself needlessly to danger, since there are few thing  for which he cares sufficiently; but he is willing, in great crises, to give even  his life–knowing that under certain conditions, it is not worthwhile to live. He is of a disposition to do men service, though he is ashamed to ha service done to him.  To confer a kindness is a mark of superiority; to receive  one is a mark of subordination….He does not Take part in public displays…. He is open in his dislikes and preferences; he talks and acts frankly, because  of his contempt for men and things….He is never fired with admiration, since there is nothing great in his eyes.  He cannot live in compliance with others, except it be a friend; compliance is the characteristic of a slave…He never feels malice, and always forgets and passes over injuries…He is not fond of talking…It is no concern of his that he should be praised, or that others should be blamed.  He does not speak evil of others, even of his enemies unless it be to themselves.  His carriage is sedate, his voice deep, his speech measured; he is not given to hurry, for he is concerned about only a few things; he is not prone to vehemence, for he thinks nothing very important. A shrill voice and hasty steps come to a man through care….He bears the  accidents of life with dignity and grace, making the best of his circumstances, like a skillful general who marshals his limited forces with all the strategy of war….He is his own best friend, and takes delight in privacy whereas the man of no virtue and ability is his own worst enemy, and is afraid of solitude.

Above, Will Durant’s The Story of Philosophy paraphrases Aristotle’s description in his Ethics of his ideal man.  This Greek view of the ideal man is quite a contrast from the Christian-Judeo ideal embodied in the teachings of Jesus Christ.

Aristotle (384-322 B.C.) was one of the most thought-provoking and brilliant men who ever lived.  At his death he left mankind some four hundred written works on a vast variety of subjects although only a fifth have survived to the 21st century.  These surviving works have made the world what it is today.  The works of Aristotle have become the textbooks of knowledge for the next twenty-five hundred years for those who heeded him.  Aristotle conquered the world of the mind as his pupil Alexander the Great conquered the land.  Twenty-five centuries of wise men have referred to Aristotle as The Philosopher.

In her Lexicon, Ayn Rand admiringly adds:

                      If we consider the fact that to this day everything that makes us civilized

                     beings, every rational value that we possess–including the birth of science,

                      the industrial revolution, the creation of the United States, even the

                      structure of our language–is the result of Aristotle’s influence, of the

                      degree to which, explicitly or implicitly, men accepted his epistemological

                      (the study of the philosophy of knowledge) principles, we would have to

                      say: never have so many owed so much to one man.

Aristotle wrote an introduction to biology called History Animalium (“inquiry into animals”), in which he classified all the animals known in existence, their methods of reproduction and their evolution.  If Aristotle had written nothing else, these essays alone would have made him the first among the ancients because he was the father of zoology. Aristotle invented logic, a science that has remained much as he left it, and logic is his greatest contribution to knowledge.  Logic is defined as the art and method of correct thinking, the method of every science, of every discipline and every art, even music and mathematics.  Aristotle codified the rules of valid thinking, analyzing the deductive syllogism, which is a form of reasoning in which two statements or premises are made and a logical conclusion is drawn from them.  For example: all mammals are warm-blooded (major premise); dolphins are mammals (minor premise); therefore, dolphins are warm-blooded (conclusion).

The great biologist Charles Darwin once said:

     “Linnaeus and Cuvier have been my two gods, but they were mere schoolboys to old Aristotle.”

      In Aristotle’s work Metaphysics, he inquired into the true nature of reality.

      Aristotle advocated that the universe is a universe of form and matter in whose union

      reality is found.  Things about which each individual learns through the senses (from

      one’s eyes, ears, nose, skin, and tongue) are not mere Imitation of Ideas hidden in the

      heavens (as Plato said), but rather the beginning of truth and part of the structure of

      reality.  What does this piece of knowledge mean to the rest of mankind?  Aristotle was

      the first to state that  A is A, that two is two, that a table is a table; he defined reality like

       no man before him.  Aristotle’s reality was the direct opposite of his teacher, Plato.

        Aristotle is ascribed to have remarked: “Dear is Plato, but dearer still is truth.”

In this same work, Metaphysics, Aristotle describes a hierarchy of existence, a “Ladder of nature,” proceeding from all but formless matter at the bottom to pure form, Which is the “Unmoved Mover” (or God), at the top.  The “Unmoved Mover” energizes The massive whole, so that each thing (being) strives to attain its complete or perfect Form, and thus the universe is constantly moving and changing.  “Change” is therefore merely the name for this struggle.  The poet Dante writes: “Aristotle is the master of them that know.” Aristotle was the tutor of the thirteen-year-old Alexander the Great who later conquered the known civilized world by the afe of thirty-three.  Aristotle’s instruction to Alexander in politics (Colonists and Monarchy) may have sown the seeds of Alexander’s interest in governmental rule.  Aristotle founded a school in Athens called the Lyceum– the prototype or model for all great libraries of the ancient word–where he collected manuscripts, maps, and a museum of objects to illustrate his lectures, especially those in zoology.  Alexander gave Aristotle millions of dollars (from his world conquests) to form this collection, and Alexander ordered the hunters, fowlers, and fisherman of the empire to report to Aristotle all matters (old and new) of scientific interest.  Thanks to Alexander, Aristotle had some thousand men scattered throughout the known civilized world collecting the fauna and flora of every land. Under Aristotle’s leadership and organization, other researchers studied and organized scholastic disciplines in botany, music, history, physics, cosmology, psychology, mathematics, astronomy, theology, medicine, meteorology, and even the political constitutions of 158 Greek states.  Mankind owes to Aristotle the classification of the sciences (thanks to Aristotle’s love of order).  Although Plato believed that “Nature” was governed by general laws, Aristotle discovered that this whole panorama (of life on earth) could be reasoned out and comprehended.  Thus Aristotle logically categorized by massive investigation that each of the various sciences were each separate departmental fields of inquiry (Durant 45). Aristotle’s orderliness of mind shows itself in the development of a terminology that has even been of great service to the study of philosophy.  The vocabulary of philosophy derives more from Aristotle than from anyone else.  Universals and particulars, premise and conclusion, subject and attribute, form and matter, potentiality and actuality–these are a few of the many antitheses that Aristotle first introduced by name (46).

Aristotle’s Poetics, which is now a fragment, much of it lost throughout the centuries, is still the world’s greatest piece of literary criticism.  All art, drama, creativity is judged by its form and content.Aristotle’s Politics is still one of the most widely read and debated books on government.  In it, Aristotle states that a human being is by nature a political animal (46).  It is natural for man to live in communities of men.  The purpose of government (the state) is to provide its citizens the means for living the good life, for the state alone is able to do this for the good life cannot be lived in isolation.  An ancient Greek adage states: “Life is the gift of nature; but beautiful living is the gift of wisdom” (qtd. in Durant 46).

Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics is still to this day the finest introduction to the study of moral conduct ever written. Though Socrates held that no man is willingly bad, Aristotle said that virtue and vice are matters within a man’s power; it is up to each man or woman to choose virtue or vice.  Aristotle believed that education is ethical; it trains a person’s emotions and body as well as intellectual and moral capabilities.  To Aristotle, seeking and gaining knowledge (which could be called education) and possessing control of one’s mind are the highest activities a human being can do in life (Durant 46). Read again the first part of this quotation describing Aristotle’s “Ideal Man.”  Do not take it lightly.  Do not smirk and say: Why this is everything which today’s men and women have all been taught (by all the world’s religions) not to value; these values of Aristotle, we have been told, are the values of  a selfish, egotistical human being. Look at it this way: Aristotle’s ideal of how a man shoud think and act have been turned upside- down the past twenty-five hundred years by the world’s religions. Look at today’s chaotic, immoral, crime-ridden, undisciplined, irresponsible world and consider the illogical values its so-called moral leaders preach–all values which are quite the opposite of Aristotle’s ideal Man.  Mankind today has been religiously taught to value equality (when there can logically be no equality among unequal) and to oblige and accommodate the feelings and beliefs of all fellow beings (as if all were of equal value). According to socialism, communism, and the world religions, all human beings are supposed to share everything with their brothers and sisters, a dogma that is quite the opposite of Aristotle’s capitalism.  Today’s ideal that it takes a village to raise a child would be laughable to Aristotle who said: “How much better it is to be the real cousin of somebody than to be a son after Plato’s fashion!” (qtd. In Durant 64). In the same vein, Aristotle calls today’s complacency the characteristic of a slave. Aristotle’s  ideal man’s values throw a monkey wrench in the scheme of things valued today in the 21st century.  One can especially enjoy: He is his own best friend and takes delight in privacy whereas the man of no virtue and ability is his own worst enemy and is afraid of solitude.

Ayn Rand wrote:

Aristotle may be regarded as the cultural barometer of western history.

                  Whenever his influence dominated the scene, it paved the way for one of 

                   history’s brilliant eras; whenever it fell, so did mankind.  The Aristotelian

                  revival of the thirteenth century brought men to the renaissance.  The

                  intellectual counter-revolution turned them back toward the cave of his

                  antipode, Plato.  (Rand, Lexicon, 34)

 

Aristotle’s ideal man reminds one of the ideal men who founded the United States of America.  Aristotle’s ancient values of some twenty-five hundred years ago seem more like those of America’s Founding fathers of the late 18th century than the values held in high esteem today in the 21st century.  Reading Aristotle’s ideal man reminds one of the independent characters like George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Patrick Henry, James Madison, Alexander Hamilton, and many others, not as well known to the masses today, who signed the Declaration of Independence and helped write and form America’s Constitution.  They knew and understood what Aristotle idealized in mankind, for most of them exemplified his ideal.  Of course, Aristotle says it best:

                  The operation of the intellect…aims at no end beyond itself, and finds in

                   itself the pleasure which stimulates it to further operation; and since the

                   attributes of self-sufficiency, unweariedness, and capacity for rest,…plainly

                   belongs to this occupation, in it must lie perfect happiness. (qtd. In Durant

                   62-63)

 

Aristotle’s ideal man talks and acts frankly…he does not speak evil of others, even of his enemies, unless it be to themselves.  Aristotle, it seems, never thought much of gossip mongers.  Words said behind another’s back, heard by way of the grapevine, do not build any type of positive relationship between men and women.  Talking one on one, communication, makes one’s life so much more interesting, moral, fulfilling and helps each human being grow in experience and wisdom. Let all mankind communicate face to face with dignity and honor.  Get involved in life with other individuals; no not neglect a valid criticism or compliment.  As Goethe says in The Sorrows of Young Werther: “misunderstanding and neglect create more confusion in this world than trickery and malice.” (4)

 Ayn Rand idealizes Aristotle best:

                    For Aristotle the good life is one of personal self-fulfillment.  Man

                     should enjoy the values of this world.  Using his mind to the fullest,

                     each man should work to achieve his own happiness here on earth.

                     And in the process he should be conscious of his own value.  Pride,

                     writes Aristotle–a rational pride in oneself and in one’s moral

                     character–is, when it is earned, the “crown of virtues.”…A proud

                     man does not negate his own identity.  He does not sink selflessly into

                     the community.  He is not a promising subject for the Platonic

                     [communist] state….

                     Throughout history the influence of Aristotle’s philosophy (particularly of

                     his  epistemology) has led in the direction of individual freedom, of man’s

                     liberation from the power of the state…. Aristotle (via John Locke) was the

                     philosophical father of the Constitution of the United States and thus of 

                     capitalism….it is Plato and Hegel, not Aristotle, who have been the

                     philosophical ancestors of all totalitarian and welfare states, whether

                     Bismarck’s, Lenin’s, or Hitler’s.

                  There is no future for the world except through the rebirth of the

                    Aristotelian approach to philosophy.  This would require an Aristotelian

                    affirmation of the reality of existence, of the sovereignty of reason, of life

                    on earth–and of the splendor of man. (Lexicon 36)

 

 

 

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Posted in Commentaries

The Noble Soul

Published by Michael Marx on July 23rd, 2011

The Noble Soul

Friedrich Nietzsche in Beyond Good and Evil wistfully, with a loud deep hoarse
sound in his heart, wrote:

It is not the works, but the belief, which is here decisive and determines
the order of rank–to employ once more an old religious formula with
a new and deeper meaning,–it is some fundamental certainty which a
noble soul has about itself, something which is not to be sought, is not
to be found, and perhaps, also, is not to be lost.–The noble soul has
reverence for itself. (542)

Well roared, Lion! Ayn Rand maintains Nietzsche’s view of man’s noble soul
has been rarely expressed in human history. At the beginning of the 21st century, this
view is virtually non-existent. Yet before being corrupted, mankind’s youth in every
nation start out in life with a wistful longing, an inherent passion (though agonizingly
confused) that he or she possesses a noble soul. The huge majority of these youth cannot
really define this inner feeling that something is noble within them. These youthful
individuals grope through their early years in a foggy undefined sense of raw pain and
incommunicable happiness. They sense that their lives are important, that great
achievements are within their capacities, and that great things lie ahead for them.

It is not in the nature of man–nor any living entity–to start out
by giving up, by spitting in one’s own face and damning existence,
that requires a process of corruption whose rapidity differs from
man to man. Some give up at the first touch of pressure; some sell
out; some run down by imperceptible degrees and lose their fire,
never knowing when or how they lost it. Then all of these vanish in
the vast swamp of their elders who tell them persistently that
maturity consist of abandoning one’s mind; security, of abandoning
one’s values; practicality, of losing self-esteem. (Rand xi)

But a few individuals hold on, mature, and grow in the knowledge that the
fires within their souls are not to be betrayed. They learn how to give this fire shape,
purpose, reality, and meaning. At the dawn of their lives, never knowing what their
future may bring, these few uncorrupted individuals seek this noble vision of man’s
nature and of life’s potential as Nietzsche pontificates. Only a few in each generation, in
every country round the globe, will grasp and achieve this full reality of man’s proper
noble stature.Unfortunately, most will betray their noble souls. But it is these noble few
who will move the world, change it by creating new ideas, inventions, poetry and works
of arts, science and engineering. They will bless themselves for not betraying their
noble souls.

Remember, reader, the days of your youth? Remember the days when your
mind was free to imagine what a wonderful future your life had the potential to offer?

Remember all the grand deeds you dreamed of accomplishing? Remember that time in
your youth when you thought that life on this earth was good, that you were good, and
that you were destined to conquer the world in your own unique way? Those were the
days of your youth when you automatically possessed noble values, and you, without
thinking, revered your noble individual self.

Yet some of you had awful childhoods. Despite poverty, child
molestation, physical and verbal abuse, you still believed in your noble soul, which was
and is your most prized possession. You held on; you still believed. Those days of
youth were the times that you were quite certain of yourself and your individual soul.
This noble certainty was always there within your heart; it was not something you could
seek and find. It was only something you could lose.

Remember your youth? What about right now? Do you still possess that
noble soul that has reverence for itself? Perhaps in your youth, you never realized
how valuable it was, how important that feeling of reverence was, a feeling never to
lose, never to give up, never to be allowed to slowly be chipped away until one day you
realized that it was gone. After its loss, you wondered, did it ever exist?

Remember those days of your youth when you had that romantic certainty
of mind, of enormous expectations, not only from the world around you, but also most
importantly from your own inner self, your own noble soul? In fact the idea that great
achievements were and are within your capacity, that great things lie ahead for you, is
and was your soul, is and was you, what you love most about your individual self, what
you love most about your being.

What happened? Do you still possess such dreams of youth (as it is called
by those who have lost it, the self-proclaimed realists) today, now that you have grown
older, grown up?

As the years have gone by along the travails of life, have you, reader, lost
sight of those glory dreams and goals of youth? Is there still a fire in your belly, still
a fire within your soul, that you will accomplish great things? Or somewhere along the
way did you betray your being?–At that point you lost the quest for the ideal within your
soul, and then you gave up the quest for your own individual Holy Grail. Since that loss,
have you spit in your own face and have you damned existence?

What form of corruption allowed you to betray your noble soul that once
had reverence for itself? Were you told as a child: “Do as I say because I told you so!”
(not told any specific rational reasoning for the command) and you believed it and
followed it without thinking on your own? “Obey! Do not question! Do not think for
yourself! We know what is best for you!” was drilled into you day after day, month
after month. After a few years of this, is this how you lost the fire, the quest for
knowledge and truth?

Or was it peer pressure? You decided not to think for yourself; you let

your friends do your thinking for you. You went along with them, drank alcohol, took
drugs, corrupted your mind and body, got pregnant or got someone else pregnant? Did it
ever occur to you that by allowing others to be responsible for your being, your
individual self, your soul, you became totally irresponsible for your individual self and
noble soul?

Or did you allow yourself to be corrupted by selling out? Did you
succumb to others’ goals and not set your own? Was the security of stability more
important than abandoning your values or more important than losing your self-esteem?

Or did you just wake up one day and suddenly realize the fire, the goals,
were gone? When did you lose them” How? Why? Have you ever understood what
happened?
This essay is for you, reader, and those few out there who have not lost
the noble soul within, the noble soul that has reverence for itself. Do not betray your
individual self! Learn how to give your soul, your noble self, shape. Find your purpose
and make it your reality. You are man’s highest potential and strive to actualize it!
“Remember that the only direct, introspective knowledge of man anyone possesses is of
himself” (Rand 84). Be the dream of your youth! Be the best within your individual self.
If you still possess it, never give up your noble soul. Always think for yourself; never
worry about the opinions and what they think of you. Being in other people’s heads is a
wretched place to be. Live by your own judgments and decisions. To thine own self be
true .

Ignoble souls know they are such within themselves. In the King Vidor
film version of Ayn Rand’s The Fountainhead, one character who lost the fire within his
soul and had lost the reverence for himself felt extremely happy on a rare occasion.
Here is how he expressed his happiness in his sad, ignoble, twisted viewpoint of life: “I
felt as if I were young again, as I did when I was just starting out and still believed the
road ahead was clean and that honesty was possible.” That, my reader, is just the point:
for all individuals on this earth, the road ahead is clean and honesty is possible. Do not
allow world-weary cynics to defeat and corrupt the noble soul, which has reverence for
itself.

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Posted in Commentaries

“Existentialism”

Published by Michael Marx on July 13th, 2011

Its fundamental tenet is an insistence on the actual “existence” of the individual as the basic and important fact, instead of a reliance on theories and abstractions… The central doctrine is that man is what he makes of himself; he is not predestined by a God, or by society, or by biology. He has a free will, and the responsibility which goes with it. If he refuses to choose or lets outside forces determine him, he is contemptible. Hence the literary works of existentialism insist on actions – including acts of will – as the determining things. (Aristotle said in his “Poetics” that character is revealed whenever a choice has to be made.) The existentialists… consider life as dynamic, in a constant state of flux – a human life is not an abstraction, but a series of consecutive moments. And they always insist on the concrete instead of the abstract, on existence itself rather than the idea of existence.
“The Reader’s Companion to World Literature”

If a human being is not born, then he does not exist and if he never existed, he could never have any values. That is why existence precedes essence, hence existentialism.
Man, each individual being, is what he makes of himself. Every individual living on this Earth creates his own identity, personality, being. Each person constructs himself; each individual is the sum of his acts, his actions, what he has done in his life. Each person is always responsible for every act he initiates and each person is free on this Earth to initiate any conceivable act. Such freedom is called free will.
Man creates himself while “things” do not. Man makes himself by his acts. Man gives sense to himself by his acts. Each individual, alone, must find his own way, by thinking, suffering, facing loneliness, despair, joy and sorrow and through such individual experiences, one in the end creates one’s own essences, that which makes something what it is. Only by action does each individual create himself; if one does not move, make no action, then one still affects other individuals and one is still accountable for such an act as doing nothing. One is always responsible for one’s acts, even doing nothing. For example, if one is walking in a park and sees a child being raped, if one does nothing, then one is contemptible. Refusing to act, refusing to choose is contemptible. Allowing outside forces to determine one’s existence, one’s personality, individuality, is simply a poor excuse for not being responsible for oneself. Your acts, all acts of free will, are not the fault of society, biology, or God. Each human being is always responsible for his actions.
Thus if an individual complains that his occupation is not what he really wants to do, then he is simply wasting his life, wasting his existence, wasting his being. He is choosing wrong; he is making the wrong decisions for himself. There are many ways to do this, ways of fooling oneself, by not being responsible for oneself. One way is to live for “perfect moments,” like “falling in love,” “getting married,” “having a baby,” “I’ll enjoy my life over the weekend or after work.” The “perfect moments” are the moments which many people wait for in anxious anticipation and these moments are what many call “living.” In all reality, one’s whole life is “living” and therefore one should live one’s life when one lives it, at every moment. All this is done to avoid being responsible for one’s own self, one’s own being. Do not be an actor and try to live the lives of other people. Do not try to live like your father or mother, or how you perceive that they would like you to live. Do not try to find “perfect moments” for this sort of “living” will only drive your life, your being, your individuality into despair and you will not be happy.
Another way of fooling oneself, by not being responsible for one’s actions, is to live in the past. Our past gives us security; we rate our present and future to the past. But we cannot relive the past. Men tend to live more in the past; women tend to live more in the future. Men tend to be more logical. Women tend to look for a “perfect moment,” will he call tonight? He calls tomorrow and it does not matter. Many individuals tend to live for Christmas or Easter or for their birthday or for the weekend or for the first of the month or the end of the month or for after work or for sleep or for death. One cannot find justification of one’s life, one’s existence, by living in the past or in the future. By doing so, these people become nauseated with themselves when they do not know their identity. They do not get to know who they are, what they are doing with their lives. They never get to know what the nature of their life is. How do these people correct this?
The aspect of loneliness is a prerequisite of the process that each individual has to go through to learn about his self, his being, his identity. Who are you? One needs loneliness to learn of oneself. But at some point individual men join others and form a community of men. Each man is not alone in the world. Each individual finds himself in an economic, social and historical context and in time commitments are made. A man does not have to join the society of men but most men do; they make a commitment to other men, a social contract. Most men, I, Michael Marx, believe, would intervene if they saw a child being raped. If an individual did not intervene, not only I, but he also would hold himself in contempt.
But even in a social contract, each man, each individual, is free to act; he can quit any commitment. For example, if an individual is a prisoner of war, if he wants to avoid beatings, torture or even death, all he has to do is sign a confession. Here is the choice: resist for essences, get tortured and beaten or even killed for essences or sign the confession. Each individual life, each individual’s existence is more important than dying for some essence, some value that someone else holds or even your own self holds, because if you die, you no longer exist. Existence precedes essence. Just sign what the torturer wants and simply state it is an essence, that’s all. What good and evil is, is secondary to circumstances. Perhaps this is hard to understand for it leaves us no directives to make in the moral field. But perhaps moral problems can never be a problem, perhaps they are a false problem, for all morality depends upon the circumstance. It is secondary to circumstance, as the example of a prisoner of war and his confession. But remember, one is always held responsible for every act one chooses. Life is dynamic, constantly moving and changing and depending upon circumstances, each one unique, each individual must choose what to make out of himself. This is what makes life so exciting and challenging. Best of all, I , Michael Marx, find myself an American citizen living at the end of the twentieth century. What could be better than to exist in the land of self-made men, where every man makes himself, creates himself. I have just created this article. What are each of you readers, individuals, going to do now with your life? What are you going to create today? What are you going to be?

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Posted in Commentaries

“The Concept of Decadence”

Published by Michael Marx on July 13th, 2011

Waste, decay, elimination need not be condemned: they are necessary consequences of life, of the growth of life. The phenomenon of decadence is as necessary as any increase and advance of life: one is in no position to abolish it. Reason demands, on the contrary, that we do justice to it. It is a disgrace for all socialist systematizers that they suppose there could be circumstances – social combinations – in which vice, disease, prostitution, distress would no longer grow. – But that means condemning life. – A society is not free to remain young. And even at the height of its strength it has to form refuse and waste materials. The more energetically and boldly it advances, the richer it will be in failures and deformities, the closer to decline. – Age is not abolished by means of institutions. Neither is disease. Nor vice.
Friedrich Nietzsche, “The Will To Power”
Waste, decay and yes, even the thing we as humans fear most, death, are as natural to life, living on the Earth, as life itself. Everything on this planet is born, grows, multiplies, decays, withers away till it dies. We should not fear it, but rejoice in it. This is how life eliminates itself and allows itself to grow again out of the waste and decay for new life. This is how the Earth eternally stays young, fresh and new. No thought system, no philosophy, no religion, no wish can abolish this truth. So when various “social groups” constantly complain that certain decadence must be stopped, slowed down, destroyed from existence, their goals are much like Don Quixote fighting windmills. It will never happen. Usually when these “reformers” get into positions of power, political and military, they, in pursuit of their goal to destroy decadence, end up destroying only life. The communists of the 20th Century have murdered over one half billion human beings in order to achieve their so-called “higher” or “superior” truths of socialism. Ayatollah Khomeini of Iran and his “followers” today, too, have destroyed more life, more human beings, than they have ever promoted. These fanatics who want to make human beings “right” are really the condemners of life, the haters of life, the enemy of life: basically death in disguise.
“The more energetically and boldly” a society advances, creates new technologies, conquers new frontiers, the higher a society becomes, “the richer it will be in failures and deformities.” That is what makes a society such as ours so rich, diversive and so creative – the conflict of all its many virtues and vices, the diversity of its diseases. No government on earth, no institutions can ever destroy this rich contrast of virtues and vice; because if it goes out to destroy the vices, the diseases, distress, then it will end up destroying life itself in order to make everyone “obey” its value system, its “higher” goals. All the tyrants of the world claim their aim is to end some sort of “evil” that they want to eliminate from life on the Earth. Here’s a short list of them: Stalin, Mao, Castro, Idi Amin, Saddam Hussein, Lenin, Khomeini, Ho Chi Minh, Hitler. Again take note: people who kill other people en masse for whatever “higher goals” are in all reality haters of mankind, haters of life, condemners of life. There is nothing to admire them for much less to become one of their “followers.”
So it goes for “social reformers” in our time or any time. Though they claim to be fighters for life, actually they are life’s messengers of death. For example, in everyday American life, why waste billions of taxpayers’ dollars on dead, dying cities that no one even wants to live in? Let us look at the death of certain American cities. If some of America’s older cities are exhausted, useless and dying, then let them die, for this exhaustion is only a natural occurrence of societies. As Nietzsche points out, all over the globe, people are afraid to recognize that death, like birth, is a natural function and occurrence in the process of living on Earth. In spring, leaves blossom from trees only to die and fall from their branches in autumn. Individuals are born and later they die. Cities are no different. Some members of mankind (society) at a certain point in time have a common interest: they want to live in a certain place for thousands of different reasons – a city is born, a city grows; people are proud of it; they stay; more people come. Yet perhaps hundreds of years later, life has changed, the society has altered, the city is different, people begin to move out of this city looking for new frontiers. Many may want a new job, a new home; another city grows, possibly thousands of miles away. The old city does not die immediately – it slowly exhausts itself -it may take generations of years, until finally what is left is slums, no tax base, crime and poverty – a consequence that has been going on for years. No government, no matter how much money is thrown at this dying city, can stop it (if America is still to have the freedom of movement it has always had). There is nothing wrong with a city dying, as in the same breath, there is nothing wrong with a city being born. History is merely repeating itself; the eternal recurrence.
After the Roman Empire fell, exhausted, dead – hundreds of cities all over the world died, from London to even Rome itself. Civilization, as man had known it, seemed to have ended for nearly a thousand years. But Man survived the plagues and the terrors of the Dark and Middle Ages. And life came back to the cities – the Renaissance was born – London, Paris, Rome grew again. The society of man takes care of itself. There are high points of civilization and to know those high points, one must know those low points in contrast. But from out of all the depths, at the lowest points, sometimes spontaneously new incredible heights are attained, i.e., after the horrors of World Wars I and II, the collapsed war-torn world industrialized itself beyond belief, most especially in the late 1940s and 1950s, and some sections of the world economy are still growing from that era. America, too, is growing, but not like it used to grow, and this perhaps confuses us. In our time new cities are sprouting and being born, yet, at the same time, many older cities are dying. That’s life. That is life. So why let the government throw away new money taken from these growing, expanding new cities to waste on dying, exhausted old slums (towns which are on their deathbed)? What a waste! Let the producers keep their own money and let them use it for growth, not death. Society can take care of itself. Let the people, by voting with their feet, take care of themselves. Government interference and waste will not be able to save anything. Let the dead bury the dead and let the living give life to the living, as is only natural. Death is far more powerful than money, and for that matter, so is life. Let us together, the taxpayers of America, support the will to life, not its enemy, the will to death, as the “reformers” would do.

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“How Organized Crime, Unions and Governments All Work Under the Same Basic Principles”

Published by Michael Marx on July 3rd, 2011

Extortion (Webster’s dictionary definition): The act or practice of wrestling money, etc. from a person by force, threats, misuse of authority, or any undue exercise of power. To twist or turn out, to draw by force or compulsion; to wrest or wring from by physical force, violence, threats, misuse of authority, to exact (money, etc.) as, conquerors extort contributions from the vanquished. The act of exacting an exorbitant price for something.
The mob boss says: “From the profits of your restaurant, pay a lump sum of $100,000 now and agree to pay $2,000 a month in street taxes’ to my crime family or I will ‘blow away’ your children.”
The union president says: “From the profits of your factory, pay me a kickback of $10,000 a month under the table for my silence or I will call a strike of my union members (your employees) to demand higher pay and better pensions; thus your company will lose its share of the market and perhaps even go bankrupt.”
The local, state and/or federal tax bureaus say: ‘From all the earnings you make in a year’s time, in whatever manner you make money, give us (the government) approximately 40 percent or we will confiscate your bank accounts, your car, your house and your property and if you do not give us enough we will legally send you to prison. Pay up or we’ll see to it that you will be a disgrace before your friends, neighbors and family.”
Protection (Webster’s dictionary definition): Money extorted by racketeers as insurance against threatened violence; extortion of this kind.
The mob boss says: “From the profits of your automobile dealership, pay me and my organization $150,000 for ‘protection:’ this service ‘protects’ you from theft, fire and total destruction of your property (by us). Best of all you only need pay my crime organization: my family will ‘protect’ you from all the other crime organizations in town.”
The union leader says: ‘From the profits of your automobile factory, pay me $100,000 immediately or I’ll organize the workers to strike in the middle of the work shift; if that happens I cannot ‘protect’ the assembly line from being heavily damaged by irate striking workers. Pay me or I cannot ‘insure any guarantee’ against factory property being destroyed by fire, theft or vandalism.”
The federal government says: “Do not give us any trouble; pay your millions of dollars of corporate taxes quietly. Be a good automobile manufacturing corporate citizen and pay your taxes in the best society in the world. The tax money you pay, about a third of which goes for our defense budget, is to ‘protect’ you from all the other evil governments in the world. If you are good about paying your taxes, we’ll give you a bit of a kickback – you can make our tanks or jeeps or helicopters for the next war.
Blackmail (Webster’s dictionary definition): Formerly, a tribute paid in the north of England to freebooters and bandits to assure protection from pillage. Anything, as money, extorted by means of threats of exposure or danger. To coerce (into doing something) as by threats. Payment extorted to prevent disclosure of information that could bring disgrace. The mob boss says: “I want to make you an offer you can’t refuse – join our crime organization, share your profits with us, live under my protection, maintain your own territorial rights and in return I won’t kill you and have your entire organization eliminated.”
The union boss says: “I do not think you will be running against me for the presidency of this union. I have access to photographs of you in bed with another man, taken during last year’s union convention in the Caribbean.”
The Internal Revenue Service says, “Doctor, we caught you not paying your allotted ‘fair share’ of taxes. Now we wouldn’t want to embarrass you by releasing your name to the press and as a bonus we will not monetarily penalize you at all, if only you’ll give us the names of your friends, other doctors, acquaintances, whom you’ve heard say they cheated on their income taxes.”
Strike (Webster’s dictionary definition): To refuse to continue to work at (a factory, etc.) until certain demands have been met. To give, deal, or inflict (a blow, etc.) To give a blow to; to hit with force. To come into violent or forceful contact. A concerted refusal by employees to go on working in an attempt to force an employer to grant certain demands; any similar refusal by a group of people to do something; as a buyer’s strike. To steal money (old slang). In politics, an attempt to obtain money, a concession, etc., as by introducing a bill or measure in a legislature with the idea of being bought off. The mob boss says: “Mr. Union Boss, when your union goes on strike next week, my organization will provide plenty of ‘strike fund money’ (about $100 a week for each striker). Keep the membership busy picketing, causing a ruckus, and having a meager minimum of money to spend on food and necessities. We don’t want the union membership questioning or raiding the pension fund for most of their lifetime’s pensions have quietly been invested in our ‘legitimate business’ investments. In other words, there is nothing left of their pensions; keep them busy.”
The union boss says: “What do we care if you have provided all of us with jobs to feed our families, buy our homes, send our kids to school, and provided us with a living? Without our exploited labor, you couldn’t make a profit. You owe us. If you don’t give us more, we are going to strike and destroy your business.”
One Congressman to another: “I won’t introduce legislation terminating the naval base in your district if you don’t introduce legislation terminating an army base in mine.”
The average government worker says: “We don’t have to go on strike. Already we make more money, have more holidays and vacation time, have better health benefits and a much more lucrative pension plan compared to the rest of the tax-paying citizenry who work for private business. Besides we hardly have to work at all. We are in a business which produces nothing so we basically do nothing, except cause problems for the rest of the citizenry of non-government employees.”

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The Sign of the Dollar: $

Published by Michael Marx on July 2nd, 2011

Consider, first, the absurdity of the desire for material goods. Fools believe that if they can only achieve wealth, their wills can be completely gratified; a man of means is supposed to be a man with means for the fulfillment every desire. “People are often reproached for wishing for money above all things, and for loving it more than anything else; but it is natural and even inevitable for people to love that which, like an unwearied Proteus (in Greek mythology, a sea god who could change his own form at will), is always ready to turn itself into whatever object their wandering wishes or their manifold desires may fix upon. Everything else can satisfy only one wish; money alone is absolutely good because it is the abstract satisfaction of every wish.”
Nevertheless, a life devoted to the acquisition of wealth is useless unless we know how to turn it into joy; and this is an art that requires culture and wisdom. A succession of sensual pursuits never satisfies for long; one must understand the ends of life as well as the art of acquiring means. “Men are a thousand times more intent on becoming rich than on acquiring culture, though it is quite certain that what a man is contributes more to his happiness than what a man has.”
Will Durant, “The Story of Philosophy” (on Schopenhauer)
“Money alone is absolutely good….because it is the abstract satisfaction of every wish.” Perhaps money cannot buy happiness but it keeps away a lot of unhappiness. Money is magical in the sense that it is always ready to turn itself into whatever wish or desire the holder wills. Nothing else on Earth can do that; no wonder the making of money is such a universal goal of human nature. Money is Aladdin’s Lamp.
A few of us have the Midas Touch; most of us do not. We have all heard the story that if all the money were taken away from a self-made millionaire, within a few years he would reproduce it again; once you learn the secret to riches, it never escapes you. In contrast, how many fortunes have been lost or wasted away by those who inherit fortunes from other members of their family? Many “lottery millionaires” end up the same way – broke a few years after the cash stops coming their way. Why? Because they never understood the value of money. As Schopenhauer stated: “What a man is contributes more to his happiness than what a man has.”
There are basically two viewpoints in regards to money. How do you, my reader, view it? Is money good or evil? Your viewpoint of money, whether money is good or evil, tells quite a tale of your own character and your own happiness.
Are you of the school: money is the root of all evil? When you see the dollar sign ($) does it symbolize crookedness, graft, the earnings of a Shylock? When you think of rich tycoons does the image in your mind reflect a newspaper cartoon where the dollar sign ($) rests obtusely on the vest of every fat, pig-like figure denoting a sure-fire brand of evil (a la Gary Trudeau)?
Or does the dollar sign ($) stand in your mind as the money of a free country, as a goal of achievement, as a symbol of success, as a sign of ability, or as a mark of an individual’s creative power? Whether you view the dollar sign ($) as a symbol of depravity or of achievement, do you know historically where that sign ($) comes from? It stands for the initials of the United States, the monogram of the U over the S. The United States is the only country in history that has used its own monogram as a symbol of its own currency, its own money. That’s how proud our Founding Fathers were of the money Americans make. Yes, America coined the term “make money.” All other societies in history stole or taxed it from other lands they conquered. The United States of America “was the only country in history where wealth was not acquired by looting, but by production, not by force, but by trade, the only country whose money was the symbol of man’s right to his own mind, to his work, to his life, to his happiness, to himself. If this is evil, by the present standards of the world, if this is the reason for damning us, then we – we, the dollar chasers and makers – accept it and choose to be damned by that world. We choose to wear the sign of the dollar on our foreheads, proudly, as our badge of nobility, – the badge we are willing to live for and, if need be, to die.” (Ayn Rand, “Atlas Shrugged”)
That’s how proudly our Founding Fathers felt about America’s currency and its people, fellow Americans, who carry on that tradition, those who earn it, make it, “make money.”
The USA is the land where people have the freedom to make money. Unfortunately 40 percent of that earned money is looted and stolen (the Law calls it taxes) by a force which puts the ancient Roman emperors and Middle Ages feudal lords to shame. Just think, 40 percent of all the money Americans make is legally stolen by local, state and national governments in the form of taxes or “insurance” (Social Security and unemployment). In all reality, the average American wage-earner, money maker, has to work 40 hours a week from January 1 to May 8 just to pay all his taxes. May 8 is Tax Independence Day this year (next year, add a day or two). From that day in May to December 31, each American citizen “gets to keep” the rest of his earnings to support himself and his family. Yes, we Americans have the freedom to earn but not the freedom to spend our “earned money.”
How ironic that those people who hold the view that “money is the root of all evil” believe in taxes and enjoy the knowledge that 40 percent of every American’s earnings is taken away by the government to be “redistributed” for “higher goals” (whatever government decides that to be depending on whatever way the prevailing political winds are blowing).
For those Americans who hold the view that money is not evil; but a sign of their ability to earn it, that money is an Aladdin’s Lamp which they have earned, then taxes are a tyranny that is very hard to stand and submit. Taxes are literally a tax on their ability to achieve happiness. As I, Michael Marx, said long ago: “There is no such thing as a good tax.”

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“Punishment and the Principle of Equality”

Published by Michael Marx on June 29th, 2011

Life for life, Eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot. Burning for burning, wound for wound, stripe for stripe.
Old Testament. Exodus 21:23
But what is the mode and measure of punishment which public justice takes as its principle and standard? It is just the principle of equality, by which the pointer of the scale of justice is made to incline no more to the one side than the other. It may be rendered by saying that the undeserved evil which any one commits on another is to be regarded as perpetrated on himself. Hence it may be said: “If you slander another, you slander yourself; if you steal from another, you steal from yourself; if you strike another, you strike yourself; if you kill another, you kill yourself.” This is the right of retaliation (jus talionis); and, properly understood, it is the only principle which in regulating a public court, as distinguished from mere private judgment, can definitely assign both the duality and the quantity of a just penalty. All other standards are wavering and uncertain; and on account of other considerations involved in them, they contain no principle conformable to the sentence of pure and strict justice…. But how then would we render the statement: “If you steal from another, you steal from yourself?” In this way, that whoever steals anything makes the property of all insecure; he therefore robs himself of all security in property, according to the right of retaliation.
Immanuel Kant, “The Science of Right.”


I, Michael Marx, propose a system of Justice in which punishments of evil deeds are based on the Principle of Equality.
If every individual, every human being, in a society or State, knows and is taught from the day of birth, that whatever evil an individual does to another, the exact same evil will be done back to that individual, in retaliation, then the scales of Justice would be equally balanced. True Justice would be served. “Do unto others as you will have done upon yourself.”
If you take a life, your life will be taken in the exact same manner. If you strike another, you shall be struck in the exact same way. If you stab another’s hand, your same corresponding hand will be struck with the same weapon. If you burn another with flame or chemicals, then your punishment is exactly the same as the evil you perpetrated. In such a legal system, true Justice would be served; the scales of Justice which hang on every court would be truly and literally balanced. In such a system of justice, each wrongdoer determines his own sentence of punishment: the exact same hurt, pain, damage, death, that he dished out will be dished out upon him in return.
In such a society or State every individual has complete control of his own Fate in the system of Justice. Each individual knows beforehand exactly what his punishment will be, if he does evil upon another individual. In other words as Kant rationalized: if I strike another, I literally strike myself; if I kill another, I kill myself, etc. Each individual determines his own punishment, his own Fate. Each individual has no one to blame but himself.
If such a system existed very little crime would be perpetrated, especially violent crime. True Justice would be the Law of the Land. No prisons would be needed for incarceration, no guards would have to be paid by taxpayers, in fact no tax money would be needed to pay for the criminal justice system. The criminals, the law breakers, would ultimately pay for the government services their crimes require for their punishment, depending upon exactly what they did to others. The equal retaliation of Justice exerted by the State upon them they determine themselves for they provoked their own punishment by what they did unto others. They alone provoked society, the State, to punish them in equal retribution to the Principle of Equality.
In this system of crime and punishment, based on this Principle of Equality, if an individual does not break any laws, does not harm any other person or other individual’s property, then the entire criminal justice system will not cost an honest, honorable individual a penny. It’s free.
Each and every lawbreaker, slanderer, thief, rapist, murderer determines his own punishment and Fate. What could be more just?
In such a system of Justice there is only one question before a judge or a jury. Did this individual before this court do such and such an act? No excuses, called ‘defenses’ in our courts today, such as “I was drunk, or on drugs, or ate too many Twinkies, or I was temporarily or permanently insane,” will allow an evil act to go unpunished. Each individual will be made to be responsible for himself. If an individual has so-called ‘personal problems’ such as alcoholism, drug addiction, or even insanity and cannot control himself, if he hurts another individual, the exact same hurt will be justly equated upon him. As Kant noted: “All other standards are wavering and uncertain; and on account of other considerations involved in them, they contain no principle conformable to the sentence of pure and strict justice.”
The only feasible ‘defense’ there could possibly be is ‘self-defense.’ Protecting oneself from violent acts by others is a natural right of life. Putting the murderer to death after an individual is killed does not do the victim much good when it comes to the continuation of the enjoyment of living life. In such a ‘defense’ of ‘self-defense’ it would behoove the victim to have witnesses. If none are available it is up to the jury of peers to determine the truth of the matter, by studying the characters and personalities of the individuals involved, by studying their criminal records (if any), to determine if they wish to have either of these individuals in their community.
Self-defense probably will be overused. But it is hard to convince any court of law that an individual stole another individual’s car in ‘self-defense’ or raped a woman or child in ‘self-defense’ or embezzled money from his company in ‘self-defense’ or burglarized someone’s home in ‘self-defense.’
In such a criminal justice system based on the Principles of Equality few laws (compared to our millions of laws today) would be on the books and thus few lawyers would be needed. Either an individual did an act or not. Most law breakers will simply ‘take their punishment’ which they know they deserve. But best of all in this system of justice there will be much less crime, especially violent crime. Violent criminals hurt other people in the manner which they fear most. Why do certain violent criminals choose a knife over a gun, or strangulation over poison, or beating a person with a pipe instead of their fist? Because the violent act they choose is what they would like least to happen to themselves. In their minds being hurt in the manner they dish out is what they themselves would hate to have happen to them if they were on the receiving end. In such a system where they determine their own fate as to their own punishment to the crimes they perpetrate upon others, violent criminal acts will become a rarity in such a society or State that has such a system of justice. Under this system of Justice the problem of rampant crime would be solved and man would be free to roam the streets and countryside at any time day or night. Best of all Justice would truly exist.

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“Come, Love, the cause of all my joy?”

Published by Michael Marx on June 28th, 2011

“Come, Love, the cause of all my joy?” Come, Love, the cause of all my joy, Of all my hope and happiness, Come let us sing together, Not of love’s sighs and agony But only of its jocundness And its clear-burning ardor In which I revel, joyfully, As if thou wert a god to me. And this my greatest pleasure is; That he loves me with equal fire, Cupid, all thanks to thee, Within this world I have my bliss And I may in the next, entire, I love so faithfully, If God who sees us from above Will grant this boon upon our love.
Giovanni Boccaccio, “The Decameron”
As each of us roams through our sad, unhappy, lonely lives has it not occurred to each of us at one time or another; if only I could be in love again? If only I could give my love to a beauty so perfect in every way that even the gray skies and rainy days would bring sunshine to my heart? If only I could make love the center of all things and I could anticipate all my happiness from loving and being loved? What an intense pleasure loves gives me in such a state. If only I could make love to the one I love and receive the same ardor and passion in return. What joy the kisses, the touches, the gazing eyes, the ecstasy brings to me. When being in love I find life so exciting and beautiful, even time stands still. As I look back upon my life, I realize that the happiest days of bliss were the times that Cupid’s arrow had pierced my heart and filled it with the deepest emotions of love toward another loving being who too loved only me. How I worshiped being in love as much as I worshiped the one I loved, the one who could do no wrong, no matter what. If only that love would last forever.
What a chance I took to be in love. I gave my heart, soul and body unquestioningly to the one I loved. I gave willingly, happily, in hopes that my love would, too, give as much in return. But what happened? I found that I was never so defenseless against suffering as when I was in love. What pain I felt when my love did not call or did not show. But there must be some insignificant reason for it I rationalized. Perhaps the bad weather or sickness keeps my love from me. Of course, such obstacles never kept my love away before. Now I remember, too, that I have never been so forlornly unhappy as when I have lost my love by way of death or distance or worse yet, my love ceased loving me.
I was so much in love. I would not hear a negative word from my friends and family about the one I loved. I took so many chances; I only trusted and believed my love. How would anyone know what I felt in my heart for the one I loved. My love would never deceive me. How I worshiped the very ground my love walked upon. In fact I was amazed that I loved someone else more than I loved myself. So much for Narcissus and conceit. What does anyone know compared to the emotions I feel?
Only when it was too late did I begin to understand what my friends and family meant by their criticism of my love who now has left me. Without love, I have never felt so alone, so helpless, so unhappy, so foolish. Why was I so blind I could not see this sorrow coming? Of course, the best kisses were the ones with my eyes closed. Yes, my love did seem to apply too much perfume and cologne. Yes, now I remember, my love’s beautiful eyes not only appreciated mine but also all the other beauty surrounding us. My love said the love held for me brought out the beauty from the rest of the world.
Yes, I must concede I have been duped. So many things I did not know about my love, I only found out after it was too late. Why was I so blind? How could our love go so badly? We were in love. We married. We had children created by our love. Now I understand that Spanish proverb: “He who marries from love must live in sorrow.” It is really not my love’s fault; all this sorrow from loss of love is merely a deception practiced by nature. Nature does not seem to care whether parents are “happy forever afterwards” or happy only for one day, so long as reproduction of the species is achieved. Now I have discovered in my sorrow that love is a deception practiced by nature and marriage, the attrition of love, can only be disillusioning. The passion of love that was so awe-inspiring to my soul I now find depended upon an illusion (I was so blind to reality when I was in love) and after years of marriage I find reality once more and now I must bear that sorrow whether I stay married or survive alone in the world. Such is my fate!
And now time has passed. I no longer am as beautiful and young as I once was. Will no other love have me? I have only old age and death to experience. How will I ever turn this sorrow to joy once again? “For the crown of our life as it closes; is darkness, the fruit thereof dust; No thorns go as deep as a roses’, and love is more cruel than lust. Time turns the old days to derision, Our loves into corpses or wives; and marriage and death and division make barren our lives.” No, Swinburne, you fool, this cannot be so. I only need to fall in love again and then all this pain and sorrow will be gone. Dear God, I need to be in love again. Please help me attain that state. Let me have happiness back again. Let me not see reality, let me only experience the bliss, the blindness created by love. Let me feel that once more. Come, love, be the cause of all my joy.
<Commentary by Michael Marx>

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