I have picked up a couple of books to read, about the founding of our nation, our republic. One book, “First Principles – What America’s Founders learned from the Greeks and Romans and How that shaped our Country” tries to provide the reader with insight into how our first four presidents were impacted by their upbringing, their education and how this shaped our Constitution and our government.
Within just the first few pages something leaped out at me, and struck me with the context of a single word and it’s meaning from the late 1700’s versus how that word is used today.
That word is “virtue”.
Today’s definition often centers around morality, for example the “virtue of tolerance” or the “virtue of charity”. Or it may mean a trait of excellence including those of moral, social, or intellectual traits.
But, the word’s meaning in the late 1700’s through the early 1800’s had a different meaning, a different context. Virtue comes from the Latin term “virtus”. It is associated with character, valor, excellence, courage, and worth. Traits associated (rightfully or wrongly) with Roman emperors and leaders. For the people of the late 18th century “virtue” was essential to public life. It meant putting “the common good before one’s own interests”. It was the “lynchpin” of public life at that time.
Why is this important? “Virtue” runs constantly through the recorded words, the public statements of the Founders of our republic. It was repeatedly, in their written documents. As the book states “The word virtue appears over 6,000 times in the collected correspondence of the Founders and other writings of the Revolution’s generation, as compiled in the US National database – Founder’s Online – which includes over 120,000 documents.” The word “virtue” is found more often than the word “freedom”. The practice of “virtue”- of putting the public good ahead of self-interest was paramount in public life then and may explain why George Washington appeared so large in the post-revolutionary era. He was a man of “virtue”.
I could not help but think of how that word was essential to public life during the formation of our country and how that word today would ill fit our “leadership” today. Rather than virtue (either that of the late 1700’s or of today’s understanding of the word) far too many in Washington DC misconstrue notoriety with virtue, with social media presence with character, with how they might benefit themselves rather than how they might benefit “the common good”. How have we gone from a society where our candidates asked us to pledge allegiance to our country to pledge allegiance to themselves, where candidates pledged themselves to bring the country together to solve the nations issues, to candidates who say, “Only I can solve these nations problems.”
Sitting In No Man's Land 