VI. The Republic: Plato vs. Montesquieu

VI. The Republic: Plato vs. Montesquieu
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“It is not a case of what Virtue is, but how to educate it? — It is not the case of what our democracies are practising, but what they’re destroying?”

Abstract

Empowering Plato’s Virtue


Virtue, a word embedded into our life more than two and half thousand years, expressed usually in all languages of the world with auxiliary nouns, such as: fortitude, prudence, temperance, wisdom, rationality and justice, seems to have its dualism. But there are sure, more words than these, in using, when we concentrate into virtue. Evidently, there is sure a crisis of virtue, and this is because, our world is not governed by virtue of these auxiliaries but by their antonym. Our world, today, and at least for the last three hundred years, have frustrated these values of human being. We are talking here, about, human virtue, not about institutional-human-virtue, which has replaced human virtue, in the last three centuries. Hence, the game goes like this: Human virtue against institution’s virtue. This critical phenomenon will concern us into this essay. We will therefore balance two thinkers (and more) of civil society, to define what human’s virtue is, and what institution’s virtue claims? We will explore therefore the main constructors of western virtue: Plato vs. Montesquieu. Montesquieu’s virtue appears to be institutional whereas Plato’s one appears to be human. But since we live Montesquieu’s virtue, what is wrong with this virtue? To answer this question we must approach his republic and the republic of Montesquieu is clearly false: It is false because the republic of Plato was discussed in city’s circumstances, sometimes as a reality and sometimes as a reflection i.e. on how to manage a city based on the values of a Republic.


Therefore, Republic for Plato was simply the State composed by its citizens. Additionally, while speaking under a city of around 350 000 inhabitants of Athens, the State by Plato was conceived as a ...“society [that] arises out of the wants of man. His first want is food; his second a house; his third a coat. The sense of these needs and the possibility of satisfying them by exchange, draw individuals together on the same spot; and this is the beginning of a State, which we take the liberty to invent, although necessity is the real inventor. There must be first a husbandman, secondly a builder, thirdly a weaver, to which may be added a cobbler. Four or five citizens at least are required to make a city. Now men have different natures, and one man will do one thing better than many; and business waits for no man. Hence there must be a division of labour into different employments; into wholesale and retail trade; into workers, and makers of workmen’s tools; into shepherds and husbandmen. A city which includes all this will have far exceeded the limit of four or five, and yet not be very large. But then again imports will be required, and imports necessitate exports, and this implies variety of produce in order to attract the taste of purchasers; also merchants and ships. In the city too we must have a market and money and retail trades; otherwise buyers and sellers will never meet, and the valuable time of the producers will be wasted in vain efforts at exchange. If we add hired servants the State will be complete. And we may guess that somewhere in the intercourse of the citizens with one another justice and injustice will appear ....In order to give clearness to his conception of the State, Plato proceeds to trace the first principles of mutual need and of division of labour in an imaginary community of four or five citizens. Gradually this community increases; the division of labour extends to countries; imports necessitate exports; a medium of exchange is required, and retailers sit in the market-place to save the time of the producers. These are the steps by which Plato constructs the first or primitive State, by introducing the elements of political economy by the way . (Emphasis added)

Additionally, two notions must be emphasized in the discussion of Plato: The first one has to do with a city which consists of very small number of people or a city with not very large number which was discussed in our first chapter and has been also emphasized at the beginning of this chapter, as a sentence; and the second one, is that, the city has been considered by Plato as a common organisation, the same as a family. Another element that must be in our contemplation is the introduction and clearness of the economy of the city, by Plato, which is considered as common organization.

On the other hand, Montesquieu’s republic which has been adopted by the fathers of American empire as a basic element, and later on with slightly different application by the entire world, operates on the opposite side: [I]n a republic when people as a body have sovereign power, it is a democracy. When the sovereign power is in the hands of a part of a people, it is called an aristocracy — (Emphasis in original). Without furthering his analysis on his aristocracy which is a definition of the Athenian regime following Aristotle we will examine the republic of Montesquieu based on democracy because aristocracy is considered by us as a myth that destroys the human consciousness.

For this reason we have to approach the best part of a city which is democracy. In a democracy says Montesquieu, the people are, in certain respects, the monarch; in other respects, they are subject. They can be the monarch only through their votes which are their wills. The sovereign’s will is the sovereign himself. Therefore, the laws establishing the right to vote are fundamental in this government . Although Montesquieu’s contemplation is on how to divide the powers of a government Plato’s one is different: He proceeds by giving a definition on the order of things regarding an individual in a State: First ethics, then politics — this is the order of ideas to us; the reverse is the order of history . (Emphasis added) Later Aristotle shares the same truth about his order of things, on how to lead the city.

On the other side, Plato is wrong about the order of history which later has been clarified carefully by Hegel; for this can be justified by contemplating about politics: Politics is an art according to Aristotle and as an art can make history without interfering in history therefore politics is contemplation, rationalisation, reflective ideas, moralisation and subject to history, not the opposite; but he’s right about the order of the State, because he embraces the highest value of a state, which is later on the triumphant ethics of Aristotle, which is first ethics and afterward poltics. In addressing his ethics on who should have the power of a city Plato poses the question: Who are to be our rulers? First, the elder must rule the younger; and the best of the elders will be the best guardians. Now they will be the best who love their subjects most, and think that they have a common interest with them in the welfare of the state. These we must select; but they must be watched at every epoch of life to see whether they have retained the same opinions and held out against force and enchantment . (Emphasis added)

By reading carefully Plato we can clearly identify that he’s ideas are at the very close of our nature: No one of us can know a priory its ability, the extension of emotional behaviour or how much rational we are! This is why Plato is concerned about the power possessed by the elders, who have to be at the core and watch of our society. The reason that guides Plato to these conclusions is contained in the following explanation: [F]or time and persuasion and the love of pleasure may enchant a man into a change of purpose, and the force of grief and pain may compel him. And therefore our guardians must be men who have been tried by many tests, like gold in the refiner’s fire, and have been passed first through danger, then through pleasure, and at every age have come out of such trials victorious and without stain, in full command of themselves and their principles; having all their faculties in harmonious exercise for their country’s good. These shall receive the highest honours both in life and death. (It would perhaps be better to confine the term ‘guardians’ to this select class: the younger men may be called ‘auxiliaries.’ ) (Emphasis added)

By contrasting Plato’s and Montesquieu’s republic until this point, we can identify similarities and differences: Accordingly, the main similarity until now is of who possesses the power in a city, which according to Montesquieu; power is held by the people who are defined as a sovereign body whereas Plato defines power on the elders based on their merits of the city who have been tried in many emotional and thinking exercises. Therefore Plato is more specific in his definition regarding of who possesses the power of a city, whereas Montesquieu’s one falls in the monarchs or group of people hands, which means that, once they get power they will rule the voter, which in this context have become subject; and cannot be controlled in the way that Plato proposes. The question therefore that derives from the above discussion is: Who of our idealists is more organic and meritocratic? Organic, in the sense of closer to the core of our society which is defined in our first chapter, which is our family; and meritocratic, in the sense of who has reached the highest level of wisdom, which according to Plato is a precondition of adhering to politics of the State. Therefore, Plato is talking about wisdom-rationality which later has been defined by Aristotle as phronesis, followed later on by Kant, Nietzsche, Foucault, and especially Flyvbjerg et.al. Whereas, Montesquieu is talking about the procedure of how to get on power of the city, which in our context is simply politics or procedure which can be in different ways and can bring obviously commutative results. Nothing else, nothing more.

On the other hand, Plato is trying to tell us that the person adhering to politics must possess knowledge, which according to Flyvbjerg following Aristotle and especially Francis Bacon’s Enlightenment is rationality, consequently power — hence [again] rationality. The crucial point of Plato’s discussion is the value-rationality: The elders shall receive honour in life and death, which for Montesquieu is not part of his division of powers. Regarding the virtues of the republic, Plato says that virtue, like art, must take means to an end; good manners are both an art and a virtue; character is naturally described under the image of a statue; and there are many other figures of speech which are readily transferred from art to morals .

On the other side, Aristotle made a clear distinction on this matter: Virtue is concerned with action (complimentary notions, intermediate pleasures and pains concerned with ends) and art with production (concerned with knowledge and ends) ...or virtue implies intention and constancy of purpose, whereas art requires knowledge only ....By human virtue we mean not that of the body but that of the soul; and happiness also we call an activity of soul....Virtue is a mean, with regard to what is best and right an extreme . Aristotle refers to Hesiod on defining of what virtue confront in its operation: “Virtue,” “is honourable but difficult, vice is easy and profitable.” Evidently, Plato and Aristotle are concentrated on the same matter of things, which seems to be an endless fear accompanied with courage, and pursue of honour in human life:...“while he will fear even the things that are not beyond human strength, he will face them as he ought and as the rule directs, for honour's sake; for this is the end of virtue....The end of every activity is conformity to the corresponding state of character ”. (Emphasis added)

Montesquieu’s virtue starts on the principles of democracy: Popular state must have an additional spring which is Virtue , says Montesquieu. In the 16th century says Montesquieu English in their attempt to establish a popular government failed because they who took part in public affairs had no virtue at all, as their ambition was excited by the success of the most audacious one faction was repressed only by the spirit of another, the government was constantly changing; the people, stunned sought democracy and found it nowhere. Going deeper in history, Rome in its operation had a weak remnant of virtue which caused the fall of the republic says Montesquieu. Whereas the political men of Greece who lived under popular government recognized no other force to sustain it than virtue . Astonished with the politics of his time Montesquieu says: Those of today speak to us only of manufacturing, commerce, finance, wealth and even luxury . (Emphasis added)

Montesquieu gives us the explanation of the problems that a democracy confronts in its operation without virtue: “When that virtue ceases, ambition enters those hearts that can admit it, and avarice enters them all. Desires change their objects: that which one used to love, one loves no longer. One was free under the laws, one wants to be free against them. Each citizen is like a slave who has escaped from his master’s house. What was a maxim is now called severity; what was a rule is now called constraint; what was vigilance is now called fear” . (Emphasis in original)

Montesquieu in his dialog enters explicitly to economics on how they would operate without virtue: “Formally the goods of individuals made up the public treasury; the public treasury has now become the patrimony of individuals. The republic is a cast-off husk, and its strength is no more than the power of a few citizens and the license of all . (Emphasis added) Furthering his analysis on the institution of the republic, Montesquieu accepts explicitly that “they can have a place only in a small state, where one can educate the general populace and raise a whole people like a family . (Emphasis added)

In contrast with large societies Montesquieu gives his definition: “...In large societies, the number, the variety, the press and the importance of business, the ease of purchases, and the slowness of exchanges, all these require a common measure. In order to carry one’s power everywhere or defend it everywhere, one must have that to which men everywhere have attached power . At this point Montesquieu is attaching Plato’s conception regarding small and large democracies. On questioning of what is virtue in a political state Montesquieu says: “Virtue, in a republic, is a very simple thing: it is love of the republic; it is a feeling and not a result of knowledge; the lowest man in the state, like the first, can have this feeling. Once the people have good maxims, they adhere to them longer than do those who are called honnêtes gens.” (Emphasis in original). Here, Montesquieu takes a different statement comparing Plato’s one: Virtue says Plato must take mean to end whereas for Montesquieu virtue is love to the republic which is not result of knowledge.

One thing should be under our examination at this point: For Montesquieu virtue is feeling, consequently love; for Plato, virtue is reason, because virtue must take mean to an end. If love is result of virtue according to Montesquieu and this love should be expressed to the republic without using reason, then, this love is organic, because is the same love as towards your family. But Montesquieu is talking at this point for love towards civil institutions and not towards your family. This means that once you love your institutions without reason you risk of being unconscious, because you love with emotion and not with reason. But can a person use reason towards such a love? Is this love the same as that which one loves his home or the members of his family? In taking Plato’s “end” one can discover that, that person is using reason, i.e. taking into consideration the results of your action. Therefore, if in a family one is very clean and this is called virtue then to clean your house you must take into consideration your end. End at this point is cleanliness which is results of your virtue.

On the other side, Montesquieu is telling us that one can love without knowing the end. Maybe Montesquieu has been influenced by the dialogue of Thrasymachus and his brother — Glaucon, who were trying to divide the virtues of justice and injustice: Thrasymachus says that “might is right” which has been opposed by Glaucon by saying “might is still right, but might is the weakness of the many combined against the strength of the few” or “that virtue is self-love or the love of power; or that war is the natural state of man; or that private vices are public benefits” . (Emphasis added) Therefore, this is enough to consider it further, because all of them have been later rejected by Aristotle and even for Montesquieu the distinction of virtue was not clear. This distinction can be seen explicitly in the next paragraph.

On questioning of what love is in a democracy, Montesquieu responds: Love of the republic in a democracy is love for democracy; love of democracy is love of equality . In respect of equality in economic terms Montesquieu gives his definition: Love of democracy is also love of frugality. As each one there should have the same happiness and the same advantages, each should taste the same pleasure and from the same expectations; this is something that can be anticipated only from the common frugality . Montesquieu at this point is attached at Plato’s words, who says, that a city must maintain a balance in its consumption. Overconsumption says Plato, is equal to luxury of a state and luxury of a state means needing a part of the land of our neighbours; and if our neighbours policy is the same then they need the same part of land from us; and if this goes to realisation, by both parts, then this means war. On the other hand, “love of frugality limits the desire to possess...thus by establishing frugality in domestic life, good democracies open the gate to public expenditures, as happened in Athens and Rome. (Emphasis in original)

Magnificence and abundance had their source in frugality itself, says Montesquieu ”. Both Plato and Montesquieu share the same pattern of concern, in favour of frugality, but they do not share the same concern on defining our virtue, which as has been already explained, virtue is an action with the aim to an end not an action with no aim. While Plato sees that “truth should have a high place among the virtues”, Montesquieu does not discusses on this track. Both are in favour of a power which stands on top of a government which is God — that constitutes the big lie in a society. Montesquieu though discusses all the possibilities of a republic being ruled either by monarchies, despotism or democracy — giving emphasis on the latter as the best formulae of a republic — identifying thus the problems that might cause such a formulae in its hierarchies. Regarding the division of the three powers, being that a reflection solely of Montesquieu, virtue is part of his contemplation even when asking if laws should force a citizen to accept public employment: Magistracies are testimonies to virtue in a republican government , says Montesquieu.

Remember, virtue for Montesquieu is love towards the institutions, laws and hierarchies of a society. In further passages Montesquieu seems to give another connotation, which consists with love as whole towards a state by questioning: Is it a good maxim whereby a citizen can be obliged to accept a place in the army below one he has previously held? Among the Romans the captain often served the next year under his lieutenant. This is because virtue asks for the continuous sacrifice to the state of oneself and one’s aversions . Though the continuous sacrifice from the citizens of a city can be confirmed today, because they suffer from a republic based on no values, virtues or ethics — it stands doubtful therefore, if one can be free of virtue in such an establishment of powers. Montesquieu establishes even more elements in a republic: There must be censors in a republic where the principle of government is virtue . (Emphasis added)

Plato’s discussion lies on different track when he discusses the “tales” of a republic, who is in favour of not censoring, but selecting these little stories towards the children or different groups of a society under the thinking: A child must be taught through the medium of imagination as well as reason; that their minds can only develop gradually, and that there is much which they must learn without understanding . According to Plato therefore, a child being under the web of excluding or including truths and lies risks of being confused. But the big lie for Plato stands upon his Republic. On the other side, if a society develops a system of censoring truths and lies, then this society risks of becoming too scientific, because fear and courage could not be part of their life. Maybe such thinking may lead a society to give more importance to new knowledge than to past tales, which have probably no importance in the real life of a society. By comparison, therefore, both our thinkers share completely different concern, on this matter.

Then, one might ask, at this point: Should a republic censor its past history? Let us extend this question, a little bit further. If with history we mean our past time in all fields of a society and this is called empiricism; and which has never applied rational thinking in the real realm, except the normative rationalism, which has been called in this chapter many times as “a killer” of the pure consciousness, then — on which bases will censor someone his past history? Or, putting it in another way: Should a person learn from his/her mistakes or from other mistakes which has been done from other people? Or, if these mistakes of different persons are not subject of social debate for future social structures — then, how could one know the truth of a subject? Therefore, Montesquieu falls on making a great mistake on constructing his republic, because he operate under the hidden lie or the hidden stories of a society — whereas, Plato does not leave any doubt on this subject, but even Plato falls on irrationalism, because he support the idea of the big lie. Therefore, Plato seems many times to contradict between the “truth” of an argument and the “lie” — this contradiction makes Plato therefore, questionable!?

Unlike the previous statements, our protagonist are similar in some respects, which as it seems in further passages, it is in the context of luxury, and which is the great mistake made by today’s the powers of each society — who construct a republic. Montesquieu gives us his definition on this matter, by quoting: “Less luxury there is in a republic, the more perfect it is” . (Emphasis added) Maybe Montesquieu is influenced by thinking that equality will prevail; and every time equality is inspired by the power, there will be demonstrated unavoidably cohesion of a society. Under such thinking, Montesquieu constructs his knowledge, which is result of a government — who gives to it full power based on political virtues, which for Montesquieu is “renunciation of oneself ”. Thus, the laws of Montesquieu’s government derive from the political virtues which can be defined as love towards the laws and the homeland. Therefore, in a republic, everything depends on establishing this love, and education should attend to inspiring it. But there is a sure way to have it; it is for the fathers themselves to have it . Montesquieu here speaks without intention about natural laws, which for Plato and Aristotle are just habits. Following Aristotle and phronetic organization, the same practice has been adopted in the forth chapter of this book, when we discuss about constitutions and laws.

Montesquieu when compares his government regarding equality and simplicity of laws of his republic is quoting a great maxim: “Men are all equal in republican government; they are equal in despotic government; in the former, it is because they are everything; in the latter, it is because they are nothing . (Emphasis added) On saying that “men are equal in a republican government — because they are everything”, means, in other words, that these men are the people who can change and decide on their account, their fate. Putting it differently: To be “everything” in a republic means that, you have to have awareness of everything in your city. Without knowing everything in your city, you cannot decide for everything. Therefore, there is a clear contradiction of Montesquieu’s republic; because on the one hand, he’s saying that people’s virtue must be placed on the government’s virtue; on the other, people’s virtue must be aware of its own account. On this point, Montesquieu is neither bottom-to-top nor top-to-bottom constructor. In contrast, Plato’s virtue is in the heart of his republic, where virtue must take means to an end and the “end” is result of pure consciousness. This latter statement by Plato makes us convinced that Plato’s republic is operating under pure consciousness thinking, which can be translated as a bottom-to-top thinker. This component makes the great difference between our two thinkers: Plato’s republic is founded on bottom-to-top virtues whereas Montesquieu’s republic operates on the opposite side.

The question therefore, that derives from our discussion, could be the follow: Which virtue we have to chose: Plato’s one or Montesquieu’s one? If virtue is concerned with the end of the action and is result of intention and purpose, according part to Plato and part to Aristotle, then, purpose is thinking with the aim to an end. Then, if thinking is consciousness, then which consciousness we have to choose: People’s one or power’s one? People, in this context, are the inhabitants of our city; and power, are the people who constitute it, who have been chosen consciously by the inhabitants. Now, art is concerned with production, according to Aristotle, and production with politics; then hence the question: When production is more rational; when in the context of the production are all the participants of the city or some of them; or few of them; or one of them? And, if production is concerned with the welfare of the individual or of the city; then, how can be production maximised or rationalised: Through self-consciousness or others-consciousness? These questions lead us to the conclusion: Every time when at work is not pure consciousness by all the participants of the city, there will take place the destruction of pure consciousness from otherness and vice versa. This component makes Monesquieu thoroughly wrong and his republic falls into full unconsciousness, unawareness or pure irrationality.

Evidently, in our next section we will construct our republic based on our virtues, which are different from one another. But the question of how could a society apply pure virtues in its realm will constitute the big dilemma of our principles in a city. This is because virtue has been neglected or “unintentionally” destroyed by our governments; and is not part of our societies. Virtue accordingly, if applied in our societies, will offer the focal point of self critical awareness and foresight — in an individual life, just by exercising continually its personal values. But to evaluate someone’s virtues one has to know its functionality. Therefore, virtue has to do with values because implies intention and constancy. If intention has to do with being and otherness; constancy is concerned with the end. Then, if someone is concerned with an end of an action then this person could be called rational, because s/he knows naturally how to proceed in its thinking.

Proceeding then our thinking: Each one of us has virtues which have to be educated or cultivated. How then virtue can be educated? I would say that virtue can be educated only if a society open the gates of continual education. But to be continual education in a society, this society has to apply a completely rational monetary system, written in the hearts to its inhabitants, transparent and unmythical. Unmythical in the sense of being a science that can be absorbed by our children in their first steps, so that, to constitute later habit, i.e. natural law. Let us therefore introduce in our next section our approach of a monetary system that would be the locus of our city, based on our science — that is, phronesis, which is concerned primarily with values and practical wisdom, being a universal phenomenon. We will take as point of departure, that each one of us has values, i.e. virtues, or consciousness with the only aim to act rationally, by preceding mentally the action undertaken on its own.