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3. THE METAPHYSICAL CLUB ~ July 8th - July 14th ~~ Part One - Chapter Three ~ (49 - 72) ~ The Wilderness and After ~No-Spoilers, please
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Message One - on each non spoiler thread - will help you find all of the information that you need for each week's reading.
For Week Three - for example, we are reading and discussing the following:
Week Three - July 8th - July 14th- Chapter Three
The Wilderness and After (49 - 72)
Please only discuss Chapter Three through page 72 on this thread. However from now on you can also discuss any of the pages that came before this week's reading - including anything in the Preface or Introduction or anything in Chapter One and/or Chapter Two. However the main focus of this week's discussion is Chapter Three.
This is a non spoiler thread.
But we will have in this folder a whole bunch of spoiler threads dedicated to all of the pragmatists or other philosophers or philosophic movements which I will set up as we read along and on any of the additional spoiler threads - expansive discussions about each of the pragmatists/philosophers/philosophic movements can also take place on any of these respective threads. Spoiler threads are also clearly marked.
If you have any links, or ancillary information about anything dealing with the book itself feel free to add this to our Glossary thread.
If you have lists of books or any related books about the people discussed, or about the events or places discussed or any other ancillary information - please feel free to add all of this to the thread called - Bibliography.
If you would like to plan ahead and wonder what the syllabus is for the reading, please refer to the Table of Contents.
If you would like to write your review of the book and present your final thoughts because maybe you like to read ahead - the spoiler thread where you can do all of that is called Book as a Whole and Final Thoughts. You can also have expansive discussions there.
For all of the above - the links are always provided in message one.
Always go to message one of any thread to find out all of the important information you need.
Bentley will be moderating this book and Kathy will be the backup.
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Here are the rules and guidelines of the HBC:
http://www.africa-eu.com/topic/show/5...
Please on the non spoiler threads: a) Stick to material in the present week's reading.
Also, in terms of all of the threads for discussion here and on the HBC - please be civil.
We want our discussion to be interesting and fun.
Make sure to cite a book using the proper format.
You don't need to cite the Menand book, but if you bring another book into the conversation; please cite it accordingly as required.
Now we can begin week three...
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Chapter Three: The Wilderness and After
Part 1, Chapter 3 - The Wilderness, Section 1
Once again, the mood of the book changes and two articles - one in the North American Review and the other in The Atlantic Monthly rally the soldiers and Holmes. He wants to believe in something; but his "belief system had still changed".
Part 1, Chapter 3 - The Wilderness, Section 2
Holmes is devastated with more losses and Abbott's death and the carnage of the Battle of Wilderness have sapped his strength and dampened his spirit and will. Holmes has grown - but the reader is unsure as to what this growth means.
Part 1, Chapter 3 - The Wilderness, Section 3
Holmes' reevaluation of his belief system is evident when he rejects the postwar Boston views. Now he is not trying to please others only - but trying to find "self- satisfaction" in his own goals and deeds. He decides that he cannot save the world - but he can save himself!
Part 1, Chapter 3 - The Wilderness, Section 4
Holmes changed dramatically and "the Civil War had done this". Holmes went from "simply believing in the individual to believing in society". Sometimes folks did not understand the view that Holmes had that some folks must fail for society to grow - and the world to adapt around them. Holmes never forgot the Civil War - because "it taught him how society worked and how the ideals that he gained from the Civil War had changed him for the better".
Part 1, Chapter 3 - The Wilderness, Section 5
Holmes by the end of the chapter is the older, more experienced self who used his newfound ideals to create an influential life for himself and others. He enjoyed a"more solitary life" and did not share his father's views that Boston was the center of intellectual thinking. He did not feel that one should impose Boston's thoughts on the rest of America or the world.
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The Metaphysical Club
by John Shook
The Metaphysical Club was an informal discussion group of scholarly friends, close from their associations with Harvard University, that started in 1871 and continued until spring 1879.
This Club had two primary phases, distinguished from each other by the most active participants and the topics pursued.
The first phase of the Metaphysical Club lasted from 1871 until mid-1875, while the second phase existed from early 1876 until spring 1879. The dominant theme of first phase was pragmatism, while idealism dominated the second phase.
Pragmatism - First Phase:
The "pragmatist" first phase of the Metaphysical Club was organized by Charles Peirce (Harvard graduate and occasional lecturer), Chauncey Wright (Harvard graduate and occasional lecturer), and William James (Harvard graduate and instructor of physiology and psychology).
These three philosophers were then formulating recognizably pragmatist views. Other active members of the "Pragmatist" Metaphysical Club were two more Harvard graduates and local lawyers, Nicholas St. John Green and Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., who were also advocating pragmatic views of human conduct and law.
Idealist - Second Phase:
The "idealist" second phase of the Metaphysical Club was organized and led by idealists who showed no interest in pragmatism: Thomas Davidson (independent scholar), George Holmes Howison (professor of philosophy at nearby Massachusetts Institute of Technology), and James Elliot Cabot (Harvard graduate and Emerson scholar). There was some continuity between the two phases.
Although Peirce had departed in April 1875 for a year in Europe, and Wright died in September 1875, most of the original members from the first phase were available for a renewed second phase.
By January 1876 the "Idealist" Metaphysical Club (for James still was referring to a metaphysical club in a letter of 10 February 1876) was meeting regularly for discussions first on Hume, then proceeding through Kant and Hegel in succeeding years.
Besides Davidson, Howison, and Cabot, the most active members appear to be William James, Charles Carroll Everett (Harvard graduate and Dean of its Divinity School), George Herbert Palmer (Harvard graduate and professor of philosophy), and Francis Ellingwood Abbott (Harvard graduate and independent scholar).
Other occasional participants include Francis Bowen (Harvard graduate and professor of philosophy), Nicholas St. John Green, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., and G. Stanley Hall (Harvard graduate and psychologist).
The Metaphysical Club was a nine-year episode within a much broader pattern of informal philosophical discussion that occurred in the Boston area from the 1850s to the 1880s.
Chauncey Wright, renowned in town for his social demeanor and remarkable intelligence, had been a central participant in various philosophy clubs and study groups dating as early as his own college years at Harvard in the early 1850s.
Wright, Peirce, James, and Green were the most active members of the Metaphysical Club from its inception in 1871.
By mid-1875 the original Metaphysical Club was no longer functioning; James was the strongest connection between the first and second phases, helping Thomas Davidson to collect the members of the "Idealist" Metaphysical Club.
Link to the Hegel Club:
James also was a link to the next philosophical club, the "Hegel Club", which began in fall 1880 in connection with George Herbert Palmer's seminar on Hegel. By winter 1881 the Hegel Club had expanded to include several from the Metaphysical Club, including James, Cabot, Everett, Howison, Palmer, Abbott, Hall, and the newcomer William Torrey Harris who had taken up residence in Concord.
This Hegel Club was in many ways a continuation of the St. Louis Hegelian Society from the late 1850s and 1860s, as Harris, Howison, Davidson, and their Hegelian students had moved east.
The Concord Summer School of Philosophy (1879-1888), under the leadership of Amos Bronson Alcott and energized by the Hegelians, soon brought other young American scholars into the orbit of the Cambridge clubs, such as John Dewey.
The "Pragmatist" Metaphysical Club met on irregular occasions, probably fortnightly during the Club's most active period of fall 1871 to winter 1872, and they usually met in the home of Charles Pierce or William James in Cambridge.
This Club met for four years until mid-1875, when their diverse career demands, extended travels to Europe, and early deaths began to disperse them. The heart of the club was the close bonds between five very unusual thinkers on the American intellectual scene.
Chauncey Wright and Charles Sanders Peirce shared the same scientific interests and outlook, having adopted a positivistic and evolutionary stance, and their common love for philosophical discussion sparked the club's beginnings. Wright's old friend and lawyer Nicholas St. John Green was glad to be included, as was Peirce's good friend William James who had also gone down the road towards empiricism and evolutionism. William James brought along his best friend, the lawyer Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., who like Green was mounting a resistance to the legal formalism dominating that era. Green brought fellow lawyer Joseph Bangs Warner, and the group also invited two philosophers who had graduated with them from Harvard, Francis Ellingwood Abbott and John Fiske, who were both interested in evolution and metaphysics.
Other occasional members were Henry Ware Putnam, Francis Greenwood Peabody, and William Pepperell Montague.
Activities of the "Pragmatist" Metaphysical Club were recorded only by Peirce, William James, and William's brother Henry James, who all describe intense and productive debates on many philosophical problems.
Both Peirce and James recalled that the name of the club was the "Metaphysical" Club. Peirce suggests that the name indicated their determination to discuss deep scientific and metaphysical issues despite that era's prevailing positivism and agnosticism. A successful "Metaphysical Club" in London was also not unknown to them. Peirce later stated that the club witnessed the birth of the philosophy of pragmatism in 1871, which he elaborated (without using the term 'pragmatism' itself) in published articles in the late 1870s. His own role as the "father of pragmatism" should not obscure, in Peirce's view, the importance of Nicholas Green. Green should be recognized as pragmatism's "grandfather" because, in Peirce's words, Green had "often urged the importance of applying Alexander Bain's definition of belief as 'that upon which a man is prepared to act,' from which 'pragmatism is scarce more than a corollary'." Chauncey Wright also deserves considerable credit, for as both Peirce and James recall, it was Wright who demanded a phenomenalist and fallibilist empiricism as a vital alternative to rationalistic speculation.
The several lawyers in this club took great interest in evolution, empiricism, and Bain's pragmatic definition of belief.
They were also acquainted with James Stephen's A General View of the Criminal Law in England, which also pragmatically declared that people believe because they must act. At the time of the Metaphysical Club, Green and Holmes were primarily concerned with special problems in determining criminal states of mind and general problems of defining the nature of law in a culturally evolutionary way.
Both Green and Holmes made important advances in the theory of negligence which relied on a pragmatic approach to belief and established a "reasonable person" standard. Holmes went on to explore pragmatic definitions of law that look forward to future judicial consequences rather than to past legislative decisions.
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While reading the book - try to take some notes about the ideas presented along the following lines:
1. 카지노싸이트
2. Religion
3. Philosophy
4. Psychology
5. Sociology
6. Evolution
7. Pragmatism
There are very good reasons why this book is not only called The Metaphysical Club but also after the colon: A Story of Ideas in America and the purpose of our discussion of this book is "to discuss those ideas".
Don't just read my posts - but jump right in - the more you post and the more you contribute - the more you will get out of the conversation and the read.
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Remember we are discussing major ideas and events right off the bat:
Ideas:
a) Metaphysics
b) Pragmatiism
c) Transcendalism
d) The Metaphysical Club
e) The Transcendentalist Club
f) Slavery
g) Jobbism
Events:
The American Civl War
The Battle of Wilderness
People:
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Unionists and the North
Confederacy and the South
Abolitionists
Copperheads (also known as Peace Democrats and Butternuts)
Government:
The Constitution
Bill of Rights
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Chapter abstracts are short descriptions of events that occur in each chapter.
They highlight major plot events and detail the important relationships and characteristics of characters and objects.
The Chapter Abstracts that I will add can be used to review what you have read, and to prepare you for what you will read.
These highlights can be a reading guide or you can use them in your discussion to discuss any of these points. I add them so these bullet points can serve as a "refresher" or a stimulus for further discussion.
Here are a few:
* The Congress of the Civil War allowed the government to become a "progressive leader".
* The Republican party dominated the houses.
* Oliver Wendell Holmes, William James, Charles S. Pierce, and John Dewey helped to create these philosophical times.
* The North actually wanted "slavery to continue", just in the south and not in their area or neck of the woods.
* Oliver Wendell Holmes was a "Unionist".
* Daniel Webster helped to pass the Compromise of 1850.
* Abolitionists did not believe in "systems".
* Some people believed that "slavery was evil", but at the same time they also believed that "the races were not equal".
* Holmes wrote a book about his friend Emerson.
* Holmes Jr. entered Harvard at 17 years of age.
* Holmes Jr. became Editor of the Harvard Magazine, supporting "liberal views".
* Holmes ended up leaving Harvard to fight in the war.
New Abstracts:
Part 1, Chapter 3 The Wilderness, Section 1
* Holmes thought of war as a heroic adventure.
* Many of the military men did not follow Lincoln's agenda.
* Holmes began to look at war as a waste of humanity.
* The North won because Grant was not afraid to fight.
* Holmes was transferred
Part 1, Chapter 3 The Wilderness, Section 2 | Part 1, Chapter 3 The
Wilderness, Section 3 | Part 1, Chapter 3 The Wilderness, Section 4
* Lee met Grant and attacked - the Battle of the Wilderness had begun.
* Abbott was shot and killed.
* Holmes was released and went home.
* Holmes came up with the idea of jobbism.
* Holmes sat on the Supreme Court for 16 years and constantly changed his views.
Part 1, Chapter 3 The Wilderness, Section 5
* Holmes stopped believing that Boston was the center of thinking.
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1. What did the Civil War allow Congress to create as it became more active than any other time in history? In what ways?
2. How did the Abolitionists view the Unionists during the period of the Civil War? And why do you think that was?
3. Why do you think Boston was the financial center for all cotton products in the mid 19th century?
4. What were some of the ways that Oliver Wendell Holmes changed the tone of the Harvard Magazine as its editor?
5. What did the author convey were the reasons that Oliver Wendell Holmes joined the army in the first place, according to Menand?
6. Based upon what you are reading - how did the family and friends feel about the reasons their sons, husbands, uncles, nephews, cousins, fathers were dying in the Civil War? At least so many of them? What did the soldiers (on both sides) at that time think they were fighting for? (base your viewpoints on what you have read and discussed in this book and other primary sources - cite your sources). Were the soldiers happy about the way the war was going?
New Questions:
7. What happened during the Battle of the Wilderness, according to historical records? What were your opinions and feelings when reading about this battle?
8. What did the experiences Holmes had in the Civil War lead him to believe about the "cause of violence"?
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a) "The war alone did not make America modern, but the war marks the birth of modern America." Preface, pg ix
b) "They all believed that ideas are not 'out there' waiting to be discovered, but are tools - like forks and knives and microchips - that people devise to cope with the world in which they find themselves." Preface, pg xi
c) "But Delany concluded that the antislavery activists were more offended by the notion of Southerners presuming to send their agents into Northern cities to retrieve their 'property' than they were by discrimination against any black man already in their midst. And he was not wrong." --Part 1, Chapter 1, Section 2, pg 9
d) "If the American Union cannot be maintained, except by immolating human freedom on the altar of tyranny, then let the American Union be consumed by a living thunderbolt, and no tear be shed over its ashes." --Part 1, Chapter 1, Section 3, pg 14
e) "We went to bed one night old fashioned, conservative, Compromise Union Whigs & woke up stark mad Abolitionists." -- Part 1, Chapter 2, Section 1, pg 27
f) "Chief Justice Roger B. Taney remarked, had regarded blacks as 'a subordinate and inferior class of beings; who had no rights or privileges but such as those who held the power and the Government might choose to grant them." --Part 1, Chapter 2, Section
1, pg 28
New Quotes:
g) "The whole population, men, women, and children seem to be in the streets with Union favors and flags. Civil War is freely accepted everywhere by all as inevitable, by all as the least of the evils among which we are permitted to choose, anarchy being the obvious, and perhaps the only alternative." -- Part 1, Chapter 2, Section 1, pg 31
h) "Revolutions do not follow precedents nor furnish them."
-- Part 1, Chapter 2, Section 1, pg 33
i) "Brown gave the abolitionists a taste of blood, and they found it thrilling." -- Part 1, Chapter 2, Section 1, pg 29
j) "'I always wanted to have a memorandum of this experience,' as he put it, 'so novel at the time to all & especially so to me from the novelty of the service of my youth.'"
-- Part 1, Chapter 2, Section 2, pg 37
k) "If there is a worse place than Hell, I am in it." Part 1, Chapter 2, Section 3, pg 43
l) "I firmly believe that the men who ordered the crossing of the river are responsible to God for murder." -- Part 1, Chapter 2, Section 3 pg 41
m) "The North had the bigger Army, but the South, for the most part, defended, and in most battles - the advantage is with the defense." -- Part 1, Chapter 3, Section 1, pg 49
n) "Only when you have worked alone - when you have felt around you a black gulf of solitude - more isolating than that which surrounds the dying man, and in hope and in despair - have trusted your own unshaken will - then only will you have achieved." -- Part 1, Chapter 3, Section 3, pg 60
o) "The lesson Holmes took from the war can be put in a sentence. It is that certitude leads to violence." -- Part 1, Chapter 3, Section 4, pg 61
p) "'Man is like any other organism, shaping himself to his environment so wholly that after he has taken the shape if you try to change it you alter his life.' Holmes told Einstein." -- Part 1, Chapter 3, Section 4, pg 63
q) "Homes had grown up in a highly cultivated homogeneous world, a world of which he was, in many ways, the consummate product: idealistic, artistic, and socially committed. And then he had watched that world bleed to death at Fredericksburg and Antietam, in a war that learning and brilliance had been powerless to prevent." -- Part 1, Chapter 3, Section 5, pg 69
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At this point we can also discuss any aspect that came before in the Preface, Chapters One and Chapter Two since these pages were previously discussed in the non spoiler threads that came before.
In this chapter we see Holmes' view of the honor and glory of war change. For those who did not fight it was a very different experience than for those who did. Norton's view of the war as "an opportunity to toughen up an elite class of young men who had been made effete by too much prosperity" (page 51) was "exactly the kind of high-minded satisfaction in agonies actually being sustained by other people that Holmes found so exasperating in his father." (page 52)
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You know Kathy - I have heard that same philosophy and way of thinking today.
Mod
Transcendentalism:
Transcendentalism was a religious and philosophical movement that was developed during the late 1820s and 1830s in the Eastern region of the United States as a protest to the general state of culture and society, and in particular, the state of intellectualism at Harvard University and the doctrine of the Unitarian church taught at Harvard Divinity School.
Among the transcendentalists' core beliefs was the "inherent goodness of both people and nature".
Transcendentalists believed that society and its institutions—particularly organized religion and political parties—ultimately corrupted the purity of the individual.
They had faith that people are at their best when truly "self-reliant" and independent.
It is only from such real individuals that true community could be formed.
Origins
Transcendentalism first arose among New England congregationalists, who differed from orthodox Calvinism on two issues.
They rejected predestination, and they emphasized the unity instead of the trinity of God.
Following the skepticism of David Hume, the transcendentalists took the stance that empirical proofs of religion were not possible.
Transcendentalism developed as a reaction against 18th Century rationalism, John Locke's philosophy of Sensualism, and the predestinationism of New England Calvinism. It is fundamentally a variety of diverse sources such as Hindu texts like the Vedas, the Upanishads and the Bhagavad Gita, various religions, and German idealism.
Emerson's Nature
The publication of Ralph Waldo Emerson's 1836 essay - Nature is usually considered the watershed moment at which transcendentalism became a major cultural movement.
Emerson wrote in his 1837 speech "The American Scholar": "We will walk on our own feet; we will work with our own hands; we will speak our own minds... A nation of men will for the first time exist, because each believes himself inspired by the Divine Soul which also inspires all men."
Emerson closed the essay by calling for a revolution in human consciousness to emerge from the brand new idealist philosophy:
So shall we come to look at the world with new eyes. It shall answer the endless inquiry of the intellect, — What is truth? and of the affections, — What is good? by yielding itself passive to the educated Will. ...Build, therefore, your own world. As fast as you conform your life to the pure idea in your mind, that will unfold its great proportions. A correspondent revolution in things will attend the influx of the spirit.
The Transcendental Club
In the same year, transcendentalism became a coherent movement with the founding of the Transcendental Club in Cambridge, Massachusetts, on September 8, 1836, by prominent New England intellectuals including George Putnam (1807–78; the Unitarian minister in Roxbury), Ralph Waldo Emerson, and Frederick Henry Hedge. From 1840, the group published frequently in their journal The Dial, along with other venues.
Second Wave of Transcendentalists
By the late 1840s, Emerson believed the movement was dying out, and even more so after the death of Margaret Fuller in 1850.
"All that can be said", Emerson wrote, "is that she represents an interesting hour and group in American cultivation".
There was, however, a second wave of transcendentalists, including Moncure Conway, Octavius Brooks Frothingham, Samuel Longfellow and Franklin Benjamin Sanborn.
Notably, the transgression of the spirit, most often evoked by the poet's prosaic voice, is said to endow in the reader a sense of purposefulness. This is the underlying theme in the majority of transcendentalist essays and papers—all of which are centered on subjects which assert a love for individual expression.
Major Transcendentalist Figures
The major figures in the movement were Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, John Muir, Margaret Fuller and Amos Bronson Alcott.
Other prominent transcendentalists included Louisa May Alcott, Charles Timothy Brooks, Orestes Brownson, William Ellery Channing, William Henry Channing, James Freeman Clarke, Christopher Pearse Cranch, Walt Whitman, John Sullivan Dwight, Convers Francis, William Henry Furness, Frederic Henry Hedge, Sylvester Judd, Theodore Parker, Elizabeth Palmer Peabody, George Ripley, Thomas Treadwell Stone, Emily Dickinson, and Jones Very.
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More:
Jones Very (no photo)
George Ripley (no photo)
Thomas Treadwell Stone (no photo)
Elizabeth Palmer Peabody (no photo)
Frederic Henry Hedge (no photo)
William Henry Furness (no photo)
Convers Francis (no photo)
John Sullivan Dwight (no photo)
James Freeman Clarke (no photo)
William H. Channing (no photo)
William E. Channing (no photo)
Orestes Brownson (no photo)
Charles Timothy Brooks (no photo)
Moncure Conway (no photo)
Octavius Brooks Frothingham (no photo)
Samuel Longfellow (no photo)
Franklin Benjamin Sanborn (no photo)
George Putnam (no photo)
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Emily Dickinson
Theodore Parker
Sylvester Judd
John Muir
Walt Whitman
Christopher Pearse Cranch
Louisa May Alcott
Henry David Thoreau
Margaret Fuller
Amos Bronson Alcott
David Hume
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Ralph Waldo Emerson
One thing I was struck by here is the elder Holmes' notion that war would "toughen people up" etc. How repulsive! Of course, the experience of war has different effects on different people. But the general effects are overwhelmingly negative for most.
But beyond that, it reminds me of a line I often tweet:
"Ever notice how people who praise austerity always want it applied to someone else?"
Peter, I was struck by the same thought. War is easier if someone else is fighting it for you.
Another quote just came to mind, from Abraham Lincoln:"Whenever I hear someone arguing for slavery, I have the strong impulse to have it tried on him, personally"
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Bentley wrote: "Yes, a great quote but Abraham Lincoln unfortunately when running for office and even when he became president was not that much adverse to slavery in the South to avoid succession. It is always s..."Lincoln's attitudes toward slavery have been the subject of a lot of work; clearly, they evolved. He, personally, was always opposed to slavery and always felt it to be morally wrong. However, he felt that the constitution did not allow him to forbid it in the south. Given that the constitution was adapted with slavery explicitly recognized, he had a point.
Many of the founders (e.g. Jefferson) thought slavery would die out. It didn't. I don't see how it could have.
Mod
Peter wrote: "Another quote just came to mind, from Abraham Lincoln:"Whenever I hear someone arguing for slavery, I have the strong impulse to have it tried on him, personally""
Hmmmm . . . isn't this what those plantation owners were afraid of?? That the slaves would rise up and retaliate and turn on their masters and treat them as they had been treated??
One is reminded of the Golden Rule . . . Treating others as you would want to be treated.
Tomerobber wrote: . isn't this what those plantation owners were afraid of?? That the slaves would rise up and retaliate and turn on their masters and treat them as they had been treated??..."Many southerners were surely afraid of a slave revolt. I don't think many thought that the Blacks would enslave them.... Kill them, maybe; rape the women ... Or maybe just stop being property.
"The lesson Holmes took from the war can be put in a sentence. It is that certitude leads to violence." -- Part 1, Chapter 3, Section 4, pg 61This is a profound statement, and reverberates through time and history up to today. It's about both the individual human tendency as well as whole governments of nations insistence on having to be right, and to never admit to being wrong. It is the opposite of wisdom, which relies on experience and good judgement, and knows when humility is strength.
But it seems to me that Holmes fell victim to his own opinion, and became rigid in his ideas about individual rights, preferring to see humanity en masse rather than as human stories. Menand points out that Holmes avoided intimacy, was aloof, and chose not to have children. I think this could all be blamed on his experiences of the war, where he lost so much of what he loved -- his friends, his idealism, his youth, his beliefs. I think he decided to not let himself get that invested in anything ever again.
The end of this chapter tells a very sad story of Holmes trying to read a poem about the Civil War and breaking down in tears before he could finish it. I think Holmes was forever damaged by war, and was never really able to move past his experiences in it.
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Also in terms of our own children - all of us do sometimes revert to the premise that father or mother knows best. We do want to protect them and we should have rules and standards for their well being - but where does that attitude and outlook change or does it?
Look at the NSA debacle and how supposedly doing the right thing has moved into the realm of a surveillance state and the fact that their officials are lying about it under oath to Congress. Here we have an example of an institution which thinks with certitude that these kinds of procedures are absolutely making us safer and in fact they are doing the complete opposite.
Most of the wars that our country has been involved in have had that absolute certitude emerge from the very beginning - if King George had not had that certitude - the US would probably still be part of England.
Holmes was not perfect - nor is any man or woman and I have to agree that he seemed to see the community and the society as being more important than any individual. It is obvious that he suffered greatly with the loss of so many of his good and loyal friends. The death toll from his regiment was among the highest. And dealing with loss can change a person and they do not want to be vulnerable again especially in that kind of extreme condition that the Civil War happened to be. Carnage really.
Holmes never forgot the war or those folks who died fighting it with him and that is why he could never read any histories of the war and avoided them. When somebody lives history - they are many times bent not on repeating it - even in their mind.
The war did change him and damaged him irreversibly. Janice you raise a lot of great points and thank you for discussing one of the most important philosophical beliefs that Holmes had.
And thank you Bentley for articulating it so much better than I was able to. The NSA comment is particularly apt.You also bring up another good point:
"When somebody lives history - they are many times bent not on repeating it - even in their mind."
Thus we continue to see the WWII holocaust as popular subjects in books and movies, as well as in a somewhat different approach the more recent Viet Nam war. It is interesting to me that there is not such an emphasis on remembering WWI, or Korea, or any of the Gulf & Middle East conflicts. In some ways these forgotten wars had even harsher lessons to teach... it would seem the War to End All Wars (WWI) would be one to keep in mind whenever we start marshaling troops.
The Civil War is still being remembered -- in real time re-enactments, in books, and in movies. If it can continue to impact us like this 150+ years later, I can only try to imagine the raw & bloody trauma it created in the survivors at that time.
We continue to remember and review the Civil War because it is critical that we remember our decision to never allow such a thing to happen again on our own soil, to our own citizens. Unfortunately, we are seeing extremes of divisiveness again, and it puts me in mind of that one moment where our resolve cracked, resulting in the shame of the Kent State shootings.
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The conundrum of liberty is that each individual has the right to believe what they wish . . . as long as they don't feel compelled to think others must think the same.Thus the comment that certitude leads to violence.
I find it interesting in reading about Holmes that his experience of violence that he lived through in the Civil War colored his view of the world for the rest of his life. It changed him from an idealistic young man to a cynical adult.
I felt the following quotes to be an adequate assessment of his views,
He reversed, in effect, the priorities of his youth: he took the Constitution for his text and rejected the Declaration of Independence. . . . . 'It has given me great pleasure to sustain the Constitutionality of laws that I believe to be as bad as possible, because I thereby helped to mark the difference between what I would forbid and what the Constitution permits.' p. 142&143/1223 iBook eBook Ed.
My curiosity is peaked in wanting to know where this reading journey is leading me . . . where does Holmes fit into it?
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You will have to wait and read and then find out (smile).
As quoted on page 65 Holmes's civil liberties opinions is the key to all his jurisprudence: it is that he thought only in terms of aggregate social forces; he had no concern for the individual. This conclusion makes me wonder if he did not get this idea from his stay in the military where everything is about the unit and its cohesiveness rather than about what the individual needs and wants. Is he really a free thinker or just mimicking what he has been taught.
Also about this time there were huge revivals being held for the troops to come to salvation as an individual. Many did come to these meetings and were saved. This I am sure is how many of these soldiers faced the possibility of death. These meetings would only have reenforced this need to be a part of something bigger than they were as individuals. Loyalty and honor. Could this have also influenced Holmes to think in this manner of what is good for whole is good for the individual.
When US Grant took over the Army of the Potomac things changed drastically. He was another of those men who thought of the whole rather than in small set pieces. The loss of one man or the loss of thousands meant nothing to him. His ultimate goal was to win. As one of his famous statements points out the difference between Grant and all those who preceded him when he said I propose to fight it out on this line, if it takes all summer. Here is a man that could and I do believe influenced Holmes and his way of thinking about the whole and not the individual. The men he served under and their ideas I believe set his attitudes about social justice for life.
Just thoughts that I have question about if anyone would like to add to this please feel free to contradict anything I say.
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Another option - was he still rebelling against his father?
That is another consideration - I do recall he was moved by the articles that he read which likened the soldiers' duty to that of the "crusades".
I had second thoughts about Grant and how he viewed his men and the loss of life. However, he had one goal in mind and to him the end justified the means.
I appreciate your post - it raised some other ways of thinking about Holmes and the links to his past and to his future opinions. I like the fact that you raised the discussion of his civil liberties opinions. I think those should be discussed further.
Peter wrote: "One thing I was struck by here is the elder Holmes' notion that war would "toughen people up" etc. How repulsive! Of course, the experience of war has different effects on different people. But t..."
I love Holmes letter to his father, after his father writes a "patriotic rebuke" to the idea that Holmes might resign from the army: "I honestly think the duty of fighting has ceased for me -- ceased because I have laboriously and with much suffering of mind and body earned the right which I denied Willy Everett [a classmate who spent the war as a student in England] to decide for myself how I can best do my duty to myself to the country and, if you choose, to God --. "I hope thiat this will meet your approbation --," "you are so sure to be right." That about sums it up! He had definitely "earned the right".
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Sherry, thanks. I did enjoy reading that letter; thinking how well he rebuked his father and in effect others who had not earned the right.
I enjoyed the bio of Holmes in the reading. He was a favorite of my father-in-law, in fact my father-in law did a one man show on Holmes. It was great to get such a great feel for him and his contrinutions in the reading.
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I think Clayton's view of military unit solidarity as distinguished from individual identity (message 29) is very creative and provides an interesting context for understanding Holmes change of mind. However, I wonder if the book doesn't overstate this change as it may have affected Holmes' later judicial opinions, viz. The primacy of the community over the individual. It is one thing to say that when a conflict occurs between the interests of an individual and those of the community as a whole, that the community shall trump the individual and quote another to conclude that Holmes had no concern for the individual. We should look for that distinction as we read on. When I was reading about Holmes' change of opinion, the first thought that came to mind was battle fatigue, or post traumatic stress disorder. I know what we are given doesn't fully indicate that but it sounds like it may have been involved and could certainly be explained by the events he went through.
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Bentley wrote: "Really that is interesting - was your father in law in the theater?"He wasn't in the theatre, he was a PhD psychologist and a minister. He graduated from Yale divinity school. At Centre College where I graduated, he was first, Dean of the Chapel and then head of the psych department. He's always been a great story teller with a gift for words. And obviously a great fan of Oliver Wendell Holmes. He was also one of the best teachers I ever had.
Jeffrey wrote: "I think Clayton's view of military unit solidarity as distinguished from individual identity (message 29) is very creative and provides an interesting context for understanding Holmes change of min...""The lesson Holmes took from the war can be put in a sentence. It is that certitude leads to violence." (Menand, Loc 1143) This is profound. This is the experience I have of history, right up to 911 and beyond. I'm sure he was extremely traumatized by the war, who wouldn't be. But even more he had the experience of Abott who had views antithetical to his own, and yet he admired him as a human being and saw him as a hero. He didn't agree with Abott's point of view and never did, but he could not bring himself to judge him as a human being or a friend because of it.
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Henry Livermore Abbott: Born on January 21, 1842, Henry Abbott was a student at Harvard College prior to his enlistment in the summer of 1861. At the age of 19 he was commissioned Second Lieutenant of Company I, 20th Massachusetts Infantry. A widely respected officer, Abbott was promoted to Captain and then Major of the 20th Massachusetts. Henry Abbott was killed in action at the Battle of the Wilderness, May 5, 1864.
(Source:)
Abbott was a very selfless person and I think Holmes saw the goodness and the tremendous worth in him.
Bentley wrote: "I see. You mentioned that he had done a one man show so I assumed wrongly that he was in theater.Henry Livermore Abbott: Born on January 21, 1842, Henry Abbott was a student at Harvard College p..."
Amen to the above about Abbott. And my father-in-law did do a one man show and performed it all over Southern California. so for the time that he performed, he was in a theatre.
Bentley, has the reading schedule changed? I keep looking for Chapter 4's thread, but can't find it.
Abbot was truly a quiet hero for the civil war.
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certitude leads to violenceGrant had certitude about the right course of action and that certainly led to lots of violence. I don't think it was lack of concern about his troops that allowed Grant to send so many to their death. I think it was his certitude that he was doing the right thing to end the war.
Clayton's comment about the cohesiveness of military life having a great impact on your future attitudes is right on. I think back to the WWII veterans that I knew and how much of "team" players they were and how hard the 60's with their challenge to authority was for them.
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I do agree that Certitude leads to violence however.
Clayton did make an astute comment about military life and its impact on future attitudes. So you think there was a difference in the attitudes of the World War II veterans and being a team player versus the Vietnam era soldiers (challenging authority).
I have to agree that different points in our history bred different kinds of people. But then again - we had different leaders in our country - we had a different kind of war - in World War II - folks wanted to enlist and did, wanted to serve in any capacity and did, felt they were saving our country from an evil entity and they were. In Vietnam - nobody really understood what those poor men were fighting for and for whom. And they had to fight with both hands tied behind their backs and could not fight to win in an environment which was brutal for them. While at home during World War II - there was great national feeling and patriotism and backing of the soldiers and their cause - all was one - but during Vietnam there were protests and worse and the poor soldiers were caught in the middle.
The World War II generation of men were different - it was a purer time and the country stood for wonderful values - when their sons and daughters grew up and were given every kind of advantage that they did not have - we saw a more spoiled lot who maybe felt entitled for what they had and were not so inclined to fight for what they did not understand. The 60's was a rough period for this country - Woodstock, the anti war movement, Vietnam protests and worse.
You have brought up some fascinating ideas for discussion and I do hope that others jump in to discuss these ideas and viewpoints. Thank you so much for your thoughtful posts.
Bentley wrote: "The World War II generation of men were different - it was a purer time and the country stood for wonderful values - when their sons and daughters grew up and were given every kind of advantage that they did not have - we saw a more spoiled lot who maybe felt entitled for what they had and were not so inclined to fight for what they did not understand. The 60's was a rough period for this country - Woodstock, the anti war movement, Vietnam protests and worse...."I'm afraid we have two different perceptions of those times, Bentley. I know my father feels that it was a simpler time before the 60's, and he may be right, as far as his own experience went... but he was a white man, a World War II Veteran who moved with the flow of population out of the rural communities and into the suburbs, who used his VA eligibility to get a college degree and accomplish goals of achievment for himself and his family that would have been impossible before the war for a boy just off the farm in Nebraska. For him, all of this was very straight-forward and simple because the white American culture at that time not only supported but also defined the outlines of the American Dream.
But I don't quite see it the same way as he did. I'm not sure what era you are calling a 'purer' time full of 'wonderful values,' Bentley. The 20's & 30's were the eras of prohibition and the Depression. After WWII, the 40's & 50's might have been a good time for middle class white men, but not so great for blacks, Hispanics, Japanese, Chinese, or other ethnic races... or for women. And I would hardly call the McCarthy era good for anyone.
As for Woodstock, and anti-war protests... it was those same parents who justified the actions of the National Guard at Kent State which resulted in a massacre of American teen-agers... which I think is the closest we've come to the government turning on its own citizens since the Civil War.
I guess each person's viewpoint depends on perspective, and personal experience. We can't even really depend on history to give us the true story, because we know that history is usually always seen through a subjective lens. I guess that's what makes Menand's book so interesting... we're not quite sure yet where his interests and loyalties lie, and thus we don't yet know what he is trying to tell us.
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And everything that you stated is also true but I do sense a decline in morals, ethics, integrity in our institutions and political honesty and a sense of right from wrong.
There were a lot of issues in the past and I agree with every statement you made but I still see decline in overall cultural attitudes here. But again I love a good debate.
I agree with you that there has been a decline of integrity, although I don't know if that, too, is a matter of perception. We have more information now, and so we are able to know things that we did not have the means of accessing before. I really don't know if our institutions were more integral and honest, or if we just didn't have any way of knowing otherwise. What I do think has happened is that we Americans as a culture (and possible the world, tho' I have no current experience to base that conclusion on) are facing a loss of cultural & personal meaning, and a decline in trust in our institutions and our government. But then, we are discovering more and more about the history of corruption and stupidity in both trusted institutions and our government. If there is one thing Menand's has managed to convey it is the fragility of certainty and opinion in science, religion, and philosophy.
The other crisis I think we face right now is what is called the 'dumbing down' of America. 카지노싸이트 and technology are, in my opinion, part of the problem of the growing lack of adequate education which embraces such subjects as the humanities, history, and art... all of which are critical to the transmission and growth of culture, society, communities, and individuals, but are being sacrificed to serve technology and science.
I love a good debate, too, Bentley, and I think that is another thing we have lost as a society. Just look at what has happened to our Congress. Debate has turned into adversity, and adversity into enmity.
The History Book Club
Books mentioned in this topic
The American Scholar: Self-Reliance, Compensation (other topics)Nature (other topics)
The Metaphysical Club : A Story of Ideas in America (other topics)
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David Hume (other topics)Jones Very (other topics)
George Ripley (other topics)
Thomas Treadwell Stone (other topics)
Elizabeth P. Peabody (other topics)
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For the week of July 8th - July 14th, we are reading Chapter Three of The Metaphysical Club.
Our motto at The History Book Club is that it is never too late to begin a book. We are with you the entire way.
The third week's reading assignment is:
Week Three - July 8th - July 14th- Chapter Three
The Wilderness and After (49 - 72)
We will open up a thread for each week's reading. Please make sure to post in the particular thread dedicated to those specific chapters and page numbers to avoid spoilers. We will also open up supplemental threads as we did for other spotlighted books.
This book was kicked off on June 26th. We look forward to your participation. Amazon and Barnes and Noble and other noted on line booksellers do have copies of the book and shipment can be expedited. The book can also be obtained easily at your local library, or on your Kindle. Make sure to pre-order now if you haven't already. Please also patronage your local book stores.
This weekly thread will be opened up on July 8th
There is no rush and we are thrilled to have you join us. It is never too late to get started and/or to post.
Bentley will be leading this discussion. Assisting Moderator Kathy will be the back up.
Welcome,
~Bentley
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If you need help - here is a thread called the Mechanics of the Board which will show you how:
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