on the Inside

Eric Voegelin Society Annual Meeting in Washington
The annual meeting of EVS will take place Sept 2-5 in Washington, D.C. The schedule of events has been posted at the evforum online for those wishing to view the topics and names of the panelists.

Thomas Trumping Sigmund?
It seems Sigmund Freud has been displaced in our time. One alternative is an older approach, the facultative psychology exemplified by St. Thomas Aquinas. Freudian psychoanalysis was fun while it lasted, and we look at its use in the novel and movie, The Caine Mutiny, in Commentary.

"But think about old friends the most. . ."
Poetry editor Glenn Hughes concludes our season with W.B. Yeats' "The Lover Pleads with his Friend for Old Friends."  In a Yeats poem the unnamed lady is usually Maud Gonne, but perhaps in this case the poet's plea might be extended to other departures, such as that of friends who find worldly success.

"I Drink Therefore I am"
John von Heyking offers his review of Roger Scruton's new book on the virtues of wine: "The moral significance of wine is that, because its joyous taste is received like a revelation, it encourages an attitude of gratitude toward others and toward things." Also put into perspective are the Puritan and his opposite, the addict. With glass in hand, enjoy this in Book Reviews.

 The Judgment of the Dead  -Part 2

"Only the Good Souls are in Hell" —Nikolai Berdiaev

We conclude Eric Voegelin's account of the Gorgias. Voegelin uses language equivalent to Christian mysticism to describe the immortalization that can take place while we still live.

Life can mean either earthly existence, or freedom of the soul from the frenzy of the body. The shifting between these several meanings is the source of the richness of the Gorgias.

Let us begin with the meaning of the symbols on the level of history. In the historico-political process those who live lustfully like Callicles are the "dead," entombed in the passion and frenzy of their body; they are judged by the "living," that is, by the philosophers who let their souls be penetrated by the experience of death and, thus, have achieved life sub specie mortis in freedom from somatic passion. The transfer of authority means the victory of the life of the soul over the deadliness of earthly passions.

This tension between the life of the soul and the tomb of the body, however, has only "recently" developed in history. Formerly, in the age of the myth, the distinction between life and death had not been so clear; at that time earthly existence could easily be mistaken for the life of the soul. The soul had first to be separated from the body through the experience of death. Only when Thanatos had entered the soul could it be distinguished clearly from the sema of the body; only then could its nonsomatic nature, the co-eternity of its existence with the cosmos and the autonomy of its order, become intelligible.

 HELP SAVE THE ERIC VOEGELIN INSTITUTE

A letter from Ellis Sandoz

Dear Friend,

I write with urgency to you to ask for your help. As you may know, the Eric Voegelin Institute has recently fallen under the budget axe at LSU. After receiving state support for administrative help and some operating money for 20 years, we now are being completely cut off and must function solely on private donations.  Our only staff position has been eliminated from the state budget and can only be filled part time from private funds.  I will continue as Director but receive no state money for so serving and will teach full-time as Moyse Distinguished Professor of Political Science.

With only very limited funds available, finishing work on our Voegelin documentary film, our unique ongoing monograph series, and such other important research as conferences, fellowships, and lectures may have to be delayed or abandoned. For details on our operations see our Web site  www.ericvoegelin.org/

To avert the worst, we need your help and need it now!  Be generous.  Your gifts are tax deductible and should be given to EVI thru the LSU Foundation marked for operations or endowment--as you prefer.  A barebones minimum of $25,000 in cash is needed in order to operate the Institute each year and to pay administrative costs.

Over the decades since its establishment in 1987, the Voegelin Institute has an enviable track record. Of note, we have published the 34 volume Collected Works of Eric Voegelin, a multi-million dollar project and monumental task now completed. It is a major contribution to the political philosophy of liberty, resistance to tyranny, and support of a free people.

Our illustrious monograph series in Political Philosophy and in Religion and Politics now includes 28 volumes, with others in press, also continues this work. Additionally, we have organized, conducted, and participated in numerous colloquia in America and abroad on the foundations of political order, rule of law, individual liberty, political leadership, and the traditions of free government.  These are the hallmarks of Eric Voegelin's philosophy and we continue to explore their texture and meaning for our own difficult times. This work is ongoing.

To help ensure the continuation of these vital activities, please consider promptly contributing to LSU's Eric Voegelin Institute. Your tax deductible donations of $250 or more will qualify for a complimentary copy of Voegelin's AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL REFLECTIONS.  Since all EVI activities (not just the projects) now are wholly dependent on private donations, be generous–give early and often!   Be sure to include your mailing address so the book can be rushed to you.   Thanks in advance.

To make your tax-deductible donations in support of the Eric Voegelin Institute's important work, click the link below and follow the instructions.

https://www.lsufoundation.org/contribute.php?opt1=7&opt2=73

You may also send checks payable to "LSU Foundation--Eric Voegelin Institute" to the following address:

LSU Foundation

3838 West Lakeshore Dr

Baton Rouge, LA, 70808

Many thanks,

Ellis Sandoz

Director, Eric Voegelin Institute for American Renaissance Studies

Louisiana State University, 240 Stubbs Hall

Baton Rouge, LA  70803

225 578-7888; 229-8902

8/2010

Chesterton (and the rest)

Lost in the Original

by Max Arnott

When we enter middle age we shed the illusions of youth (such as the merit of keg parties). As we approach the far border of that period we begin occasionally to lose faith in our disillusionment.

When I took Latin in high school, there was a certain unspoken consensus that the main point of dealing with original texts was to allow for translations. Some who read this may remember, for example, the intricate process of turning Latin conditional clauses into English conditionals. Cicero had many merits, but the greatest, it was clear, was to provide a bottomless well of Latin unseens.

As I said good-bye to youth and my waistline, I more and more reacted to this notion.

I began to deprecate translation as such. Real students read without a translation. Really good students never used a translation at all. And there was a fundamentalist school that argued it was better to misunderstand in the original Latin than to understand with the aid of an English crib.

Common Sense and the Common Sense Tradition -Part 1

  by Scott Philip Segrest

Scott Segrest is Instructor in American Politics at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, New York. This essay is taken from Professor Segrest's new book, America and the Political Philsophy of Common Sense, available now from the University of Missouri Press. This appears here with permission and will be shown in three parts.

I.  What is Common Sense?

The philosophical and political import of common sense is strikingly suggested in a passage from Eric Voegelin's Autobiographical Reflections. The passage has the additional merit of highlighting the surprising philosophic richness of American culture and outlook. As a young German scholar studying in America at Columbia University around 1922, Voegelin found himself "overwhelmed by a new [cultural and intellectual] world of which hitherto I had hardly expected the existence." He took courses with John Dewey, among others, and repairing often to the university library "started working through he history of English philosophy and its expansion into American thought." His account of what he learned in the process is illuminating: