It would seem that a "spectator of all time and existence" (Plato, Republic 486a) ought to care inasmuch as his 'telescope' is located in the world, well within range of the agents of the State, the power of which has rarely been limited, and the malevolence of which has too often swamped the good things some states have done. (The State is a necessary evil.) In the 20th century alone, communists murdered some 100 million, destroyed countless churches and other religious edifices, and replaced philosophy with communist ideology.
You say you could still do philosophy in the gulag? Who are you, Boethius? I am no Boethius.
The philosopher here below must needs be a man of action, a fighter with words and weapons, to some extent at least, to defend the precincts within which alone the free life of the mind and spirit can flourish.
Companion post: The Consolations of Philosophy
Recent Comments