Friday, July 24, 2015

Marriage, Philosophers, Politicians



It's too dangerous for politics to reflect philosophy because politicians cannot be philosophers. Philosophers don't want the compromising job of politician and cannot get the job even if they did.

Philosophers, as their ideas are absorbed and their lives imitated, create an atmosphere of good nature which limits the damage politicians do.

Two conclusions follow. First, beware of leaders who use ideas, religious or philosophical, to justify their actions. They don't know anything about it. Second, realize that philosophers' lives form a model politics never meant to be generalized into institutions.

In a marriage, if husband and wife are philosophers, they live as models to each other and so limit the damage they do to each other in the politics of holding the marriage together.