Eric Wilson - 2013
Dr. Brooks recent article “Return of the Manual Arts” really made me think and inspired this week’s article from me.
Dr. Brooks recent article “Return of the Manual Arts” really made me think and inspired this week’s article from me.
What we learned in Forms and Government:
With any cursory study of history you will discover that our founding fathers were heavily influenced by the Greeks.
The American political system is profoundly influenced by ideas from ancient Greece and Rome. Our ideas about democracy and republican government come from these ancient governments. Our values of citizen participation and limited government originate in these ancient societies.
Unlike the centralized rule that the Persian Empire used during the period from 300 – 400 BC, the Ancient Greek Empire was made up of city states that relied heavily on citizen participation in politics. Many non-Greeks during this period could not understand why there was a need for the common people to have a say in how government issues were handled. It was Ancient Greece that paved the way for the representative democratic style of government.
“They were steeped in, soaked in, marinated in, the classics: Greek and Roman history, Greek and Roman ideas, Greek and Roman ideals. It was their model, their example. And they saw themselves very much like the Greeks and the Romans, as actors on a great stage in one of the great historic dramas of all time, and that they, individually and as a group, had better live up to these heroic parts in which history had cast them. That’s a powerful motivation.” – Historian David McCullough, in a speech at DePauw University
Other lessons we have lost:
Ancient Greece was about more than governments and places – Greece was a people. Their core strength – and ours as a nation – was less about physical products and forms, and more about a mindset. There is still a lot more we can take away from this spirit and attitudes.
Learning from the past, we would do well to gain knowledge from the ancient Greek farmers. Victor Davis Hanson wrote “The typical Greek farmer has no boss, stands firm in battle ‘squarely upon his legs’, a man who judges the sophist in the assembly by the same yardstick he prunes vines and picks olives, and so cannot be fooled. He has no belly for the prancing aristocracy and even less for the mob on the dole. Because he suffers no master, he speaks his due, fights his own battles, and leaves an imprint of self-reliance and nonconformity, a legacy of independence that is the backbone of Western society. Their achievement was the precursor in the West of private ownership, free economic activity, constitutional government, social notions of equality.”
This was self-governance and was a mindset – not a system. These are what principles should be – not a form but an idea that is pressed into the heart. Such men and women learned from the hard taskmaster of error and wanted to be left alone from government and rejected centralized control. The mindset tends to eliminate both arrogance of the wealthy and the indolence of the poor. This mindset cultivates virtue, promotes personal responsibility, fosters initiative and innovation, and instills a love of freedom.
America is grounded in (or at least it should be) this idea of "self-government." What does this mean? To say that self-government is only the ability of citizens to vote and to elect their representatives is to have an incomplete notion of self-government. In fact, civil government is the least important aspect of government. Government should be first that of the individual to govern himself. A Self-Governing Leader looks first inward – to themselves – rather than looking for someone else to direct them. They have a propensity to view the talents and treasures at their command as a trust rather than a means. It comes with a sense of personal responsibility and being a self-governing leader.
May we, as individuals, stand squarely upon our legs, love our neighbors, and judge them as we would judge ourselves, be not afraid to get our hands dirty and return to the manual arts, and leave an imprint of self-reliance and nonconformity – a legacy of independence – that is the backbone. May we become the self-governing leaders in our marriages, our families and homes, and our communities.
