Tea at Trianon: A Forgotten Virtue

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Saturday, January 20, 2024

A Forgotten Virtue

Understanding, which is also one of the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit. From Catholic Exchange:

In older Catholic thought, there were several different types of virtues. Chiefly there were the three theological virtues: faith, hope, and charity. There were the four moral or cardinal virtues: prudence, justice, fortitude, and temperance. These two sets of virtues are still talked about often. But there remains a third type of virtue, the intellectual virtues. The intellectual virtues enable one to think and reason properly. They are as follows: understanding, science, wisdom, art, and prudence. The first three, understanding, science, and art, are virtues of the speculative intellect. They help us know things well and make reasoned deductions from what we know to increase our knowledge. The last two, art and prudence, are virtues of the practical intellect, they help us apply our knowledge to making and doing things.

Among all the intellectual virtues, the most foundational is understanding (in Latin, intellectus). Understanding is the intellectual virtue that enables one to grasp first principles and basic reality. It is understanding that allows one to perceive the differences between things in the world. Understanding allows one to just know that the principle of non-contradiction is true (a thing cannot both be and not-be at the same time and in the same way). It refines one’s ability to size up a situation and recognize the key details. Without this virtue, our perception of reality is warped and simply incorrect.

The intellectual virtue that modern education focuses on is science. The modern emphasis on critical reasoning, argumentation, and logic is basically a modern notion of the intellectual virtue of science. Traditionally, science was the intellectual virtue of reasoning, of moving from principles to conclusions correctly. People will often attack their intellectual opponents by pointing out logical errors or gaps. While the virtue of science is genuinely important, it relies on the previous virtue of understanding – one’s reasoning will be faulty or useless if one’s perception of reality is wrong.

We cannot really argue with someone who claims that choosing to play competitive sports is analogous to choosing to transition one’s gender. These are just two very different things. It is not by the virtue of science that we know this, but by the virtue of understanding. We just perceive and recognize that these are incomparable. Failures in the virtue of understanding cannot be solved by the exercise of the virtue of science, we must address this different and more fundamental error. (Read more.)