real virtue

Maybe it is time to trot out again old Ben Franklin's proposal for a new political party, our old ones haven't worked well together for a very long time. A United Party for Virtue, composed of excellence-seekers "acting only with a view to the good of mankind," is a pretty dream. (Hap Hyp, ch8).

But could just anybody join, on their mere word of wishing to transcend sect and narrow self-interest? I know what we'd all soon be shouting at one another: "You lie!"

Still, Aristotelian virtue-- maximizing potential, pursuing purpose, selflessly embracing the common interest-- sounds really good. It sounds excellent, in fact. Arete!

(Don't know much about Aristotle? Here's a three-minute primer from a vulgar Aussie-- mildly amusing, slightly informative.)

And Poor Richard is a good model of virtue in the American grain, not "goody goody" but (as Maira Kalman illustrates) with good and industrious intentions and a whole lot of zest and sparkle and wit. Sign me up.

And btw: HBO captured him perfectly, I hope. I much prefer his spirited wisdom to John Adams' New England testiness, even though I don't much follow Old Ben's advice about public anonymity. But young Ben, I'll bet-- the printer and Almanac publisher-- woulda been a blogger, under one name or another.

Can't say much for his singing in 1776, though.

Ben Franklin

I've been enjoying Walter Isaacson's biography of Benjamin Franklin. (Einstein is on deck). I didn't know that David Hume had acknowledged Franklin as America's first world-class philosopher, but old Ben -- or Poor Richard -- was a first-rate aphorist for sure. Some of my favorites:

If you would not be forgotten as soon as you are dead and rotten, either write something worth reading or do things worth the writing.

Never leave that till tomorrow which you can do today.

Remember not only to say the right thing in the right place, but far more difficult still, to leave unsaid the wrong thing at the tempting moment.

So convenient a thing it is to be a reasonable creature, since it enables one to find or make a reason for everything one has a mind to do.

Wish not so much to live long as to live well.

Do not anticipate trouble, or worry about what may never happen. Keep in the sunlight.

Educate your children to self-control, to the habit of holding passion and prejudice and evil tendencies subject to an upright and reasoning will, and you have done much to abolish misery from their future and crimes from society.

And of course:
Beer is living proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy.