A Baseball Metaphor For those who don’t know much about baseball, here are three things that might help you understand the metaphor I’m about to relate. First, it’s “a game of inches”, because the difference between success and failure, safe and out, home-run and foul ball is literally inches apart. Second, there is no time constraint in baseball, unlike some other major team sports. In theory, a baseball game could […]
Read moreTag: Plutarch
“Lives of the Noble Grecians and Romans II” by Plutarch
After giving a fascinating and instructive account of the noble lives of the founders, lawgivers, statesmen, orators, famous generals and virtuous women of ancient Greece and Rome, Plutarch concludes his work with a story of such a wretched end of life, that all lives seem noble in comparison. The Wretch in a Boat A Persian king thus put to death one of his subjects: Taking two boats framed exactly to […]
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Plutarch: Life of Pericles
Pericles was a pupil of Zeno the Eleatic, and perfected a species of refutative catch which was sure to bring an opponent to grief. But the man who most consorted with Pericles and did most to exalt the dignity of his character, was Anaxagoras the Clazomenian, whom men of that day used to call ‘Nous,’ either because they admired that comprehension of his; or because he was the first to […]
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Plutarch: Life of Lycurgus
The Laws of Lycurgus Long before Adam Smith developed the idea that commerce was necessary for the accumulation of wealth, Lycurgus, the legendary Spartan lawgiver, had used this principle to curb the avarice of his countrymen, and laid down a constitution for one of the most eminent commonwealths in the ancient world. The Spartan Constitution, according to Plutarch, was also the model for Plato’s Republic. After creating the senate to […]
Read morePlutarch: Divine Will and Free Choice of the Will
[Homer] does introduce divine agency, not to destroy, but to prompt the human will; not to create in us another agency, but offering images to stimulate our own; images that in no sort or kind make our action involuntary, but give occasion rather to spontaneous action, aided and sustained by feelings of confidence and hope. Certainly we cannot suppose that the divine beings actually and literally turn our bodies and […]
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“Julius Caesar” by William Shakespeare
This Roman play by Shakespeare is based on Plutarch’s Lives of Caesar and Marcus Brutus. One might call it an adapted stage play, since the majority of the plot and dialogues derive from Plutarch. There is a significant difference between the two renditions. For Shakespeare failed to capture the complexity, magnificence, and more importantly, the moral and political philosophy of the noble Romans. Depiction of Characters Julius Caesar, the title […]
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