Humanities & Classics 1002
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Renaissance Forum
Humanities & Classics 1002 |
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In Reply to: PLEASE POST YOUR SECOND REQUIRED POSTING AS FOLLOWUPS TO THIS POST posted by Tom Bacig on January 13, 1999 at 21:59:54:
We all have visions of what the perfect "man" or woman should be. I would like to say that everyone aspires to some kind of greatness and hopefully everyone can achieve it. These three Renaissance men, Alberti, Castiglione and Machiavelli have different views on how humanity shall behave. Alberti believed that any common person as long as they abhored idleness and laziness could be great. It is safe to say that Alberti would agree that sloth is one of the seven deadly sins. He insisted that knowledge is power in the hands of some one who could use it to it's advantage. He believed that a liberal education was the key to a civilized humanity. The arts were Albert's specialty and like him, he thought that everyone should be well-trained in arts and sciences. He states that if we are not in search of "praise and virture," we are not worthy of life.
Castiglione, on the other hand, believed that loyalty and good virtues are the most important thing when being a courtier. The worst possible thing to do is to disgrace yourself and tarnish your reputation. This would be committing social suicide and not adhering to the norm of humanity. Castiglione relied more on physical strength than Alberti did. To Alberti the mind was power and to Castiglione the body was power. One had to be knowledgeable in warfare tactics besides the arts. Although Castiglione has a manly man idea for the men, it is rather surprising about his views on women. The virtues of women are very superficial, such as dancing and entertaining men. I wouldn't be surprised if he started the stereotypical woman idea.
Lastly, there is Machiavelli. His book "The Prince" is probably the best written because of his use of examples in history. By his argumentative stance it is easy to identify with what he is talking about because he tells you what is wrong with society and what is needed to be fixed. War is a major objective in Machiavelli's ideal prince. It is necesary to understand the importance of war and how it should be pursued. It is okay to lie to the people as long as you have the good of the country in mind. Actually, anything is okay with the good of the country in mind. If it is beneficial to most, some shall suffer.
One of the things I found that all three men had in common were their ideas on individualty and the stress of education. Both of these ideas are important in today's society and I think it is something that has been forgotten. By reading classic works by writers such as these, we can discover our ideal selves we may have lost along the way.