There is no evasion of this moral responsibility of all the nations and especially of the most powerful nations for that peace and justice which, together with the security of one’s own nation, is the object of foreign policy. Too many people who eagerly draw up perfect blueprints for world organization are secretly influenced by the expectation that after the establishment of such legal institutions they will get rid of the continuous responsibility of a burdensome foreign policy. They have fallen into the same fallacy as the classical liberal economists, namely, that if a certain set of legal institutions should be introduced, then out of the individuals’ efforts to pursue their unrestricted self-interest the social harmony would automatically ensue. The result was, of course, not social harmony but the power struggle of collective interests, class struggles, and the like. If in the national order the merely legalistic concept of the state according to the liberal pattern is impossible, a complete juridification of the international order will be even less possible. On World Peace, Justice and Charity . Too many of the planners, moreover, have an optimistic though mechanistic psychology according to which man is the creature of his institutional environment, that is, he is a bundle of causal reactions to the primary acting environmental and objective institutional factors. But this psychology of determinism forgets that man is conditioned and motivated, but not causally determined, by these institutional factors. There remains a residual sphere beyond all causal determinations, where man is morally free and can become truly culpable, not innocently guilty as in the ancient tragedy. [Sophocles’ “;Oedipus Trilogy”] Sometimes this over-all juridification is caused by a tacit rejection of man’s moral nature. And contradictions appear, such as this, that Hitler is wholly explained causally as the effect of causes that are sociological, institutional, and so on, and yet considered personally and morally guilty. Politics is an integral part of ethics, as is law. Arbitrary power must be controlled by positive law. But, that law may be enabled to do so, it must itself be backed by power responsible to the moral ideas, to the national common good. The strife among nations can be best settled if the universal law of morality, the principles of natural law as the unwritten constitution of the international community, are commonly accepted. For then power is put in the service of the fundamental moral ideas. And there is no evasion of the principle that the greater the power, influence, and prestige of a nation, the greater is its responsibility for peace and justice. Moreover, the less can this responsibility be shifted to any legal institution, however abstractly perfect, and the nation still hope to return securely to a splendid isolation and to the sole pursuit of its own national happiness. On the other hand, only after the powerful nations are ready to accept in mutual understanding their direct and inseparable responsibility for peace, only then will the legal institution work. But just as important is the perpetual will to establish justice, that is, to work for changes of the actual status quo when it has become an obviously unjust status, the continuation of which would endanger the peace of the world. Peace is the work of justice. Hence it will always be this moral will to justice that gives the legal institutions power. Without this moral will and concordant responsibility, the institutions will be empty hulks, a derision of the idea of law. Though peace, the tranquility of the order, is the work of justice, justice itself ought to be vivified by charity, based on the common brotherhood of men and on the common fatherhood of God. These three — charity vivifying justice, justice working peace, and peace being tranquility of the order — by permeating and inspiring the legal institutions, are the real guaranty for the peace of the world. [“World Peace”, The State in Catholic Thought , IV.xxxii.vii.]
The population question is the real riddle of the sphinx, to which no political OEdipus has as yet found the answer. In view of the ravages of the terrible monster, over-multiplication, all other riddles sink into insignificance.
I had a lease on an OEDIPUS COMPLEX back in '81 ...
Higgeldy Piggeldy, Hamlet of Elsinore Ruffled the critics by Dropping this bomb: "Phooey on Freud and his Psychoanalysis --
I just love Mom."
You think Oedipus had a problem -- Adam was Eve's mother.
"Well, then, your government would do well to choose from the past something better than the things that I have noticed on your monuments, and which have no heraldic meaning whatever. As for you, viscount," continued Monte Cristo to Morcerf, "you are more fortunate than the government, for your arms are really beautiful, and speak to the imagination. Yes, you are at once from Provence and Spain; that explains, if the portrait you showed me be like, the dark hue I so much admired on the visage of the noble Catalan." It would have required the penetration of Oedipus or the Sphinx to have divined the irony the count concealed beneath these words, apparently uttered with the greatest politeness. Morcerf thanked him with a smile, and pushed open the door above which were his arms, and which, as we have said, opened into the salon. In the most conspicuous part of the salon was another portrait. It was that of a man, from five to eight and thirty, in the uniform of a general officer, wearing the double epaulet of heavy bullion, that indicates superior rank, the ribbon of the Legion of Honor around his neck, which showed he was a commander, and on the right breast, the star of a grand officer of the order of the Saviour, and on the left that of the grand cross of Charles III., which proved that the person represented by the picture had served in the wars of Greece and Spain, or, what was just the same thing as regarded decorations, had fulfilled some diplomatic mission in the two countries.
The beauteous Epicaste saw I then, Mother of Oedipus, who guilt incurr'd Prodigious, wedded, unintentional, To her own son; his father first he slew, Then wedded her, which soon the Gods divulged. He, under vengeance of offended heav'n, In pleasant Thebes dwelt miserable, King Of the Cadmean race; she to the gates Of Ades brazen-barr'd despairing went, Self-strangled by a cord fasten'd aloft To her own palace-roof, and woes bequeath'd (Such as the Fury sisters execute Innumerable) to her guilty son.
He ended, and his speech found no reply. One godlike Chief alone, Euryalus, Son of the King Mecisteus, who, himself, Sprang from Talaion, opposite arose. He, on the death of Oedipus, at Thebes Contending in the games held at his tomb, Had overcome the whole Cadmean race. Him Diomede spear-famed for fight prepared, Giving him all encouragement, for much He wish'd him victory. First then he threw His cincture to him; next, he gave him thongs Cut from the hide of a wild buffalo. Both girt around, into the midst they moved. Then, lifting high their brawny arms, and fists Mingling with fists, to furious fight they fell; Dire was the crash of jaws, and the sweat stream'd From every limb. Epeüs fierce advanced, And while Euryalus with cautious eye Watch'd his advantage, pash'd him on the cheek He stood no longer, but, his shapely limbs, Unequal to his weight, sinking, he fell. As by the rising north-wind driven ashore A huge fish flounces on the weedy beach, Which soon the sable flood covers again, So, beaten down, he bounded. But Epeüs, Heroic chief, upraised him by his hand, And his own comrades from the circus forth Led him, step dragging after step, the blood Ejecting grumous, and at every pace Rolling his head languid from side to side. They placed him all unconscious on his seat In his own band, then fetch'd his prize, the cup.
Euripides is said to have written 92 dramas, including 8 satyr-plays. The best critics of antiquity allowed 75 as genuine. Nauck has collected 1117 Euripidean fragments. Among these, numbers 1092-1117 are doubtful or spurious; numbers 842-1091 are from plays of uncertain title; numbers 1-841 represent fifty-five lost pieces, among which some of the best known are the _Andromeda, Antiope,[1] Bellerophon, Cresphontes, Erechtheus, Oedipus, Phaëthon_, and _Telephus_. Entry: EURIPIDES
Herodotus was born in 484 B.C.; and his history was probably not completed before the beginning of the Peloponnesian War (431 B.C.). His subject is the struggle between Greece and Asia, which he deduces from the legendary rape of the Argive Io by Phoenicians, and traces down to the final victory of the Greeks over the invading host of Xerxes. His literary kinship with the historical or geographical writers who had preceded him is seen mainly in two things. First, though he draws a line between the mythological and the historical age, he still holds that myths, as such, are worthy to be reported, and that in certain cases it is part of his duty to report them. Secondly, he follows the example of such writers as Hecataeus in describing the natural and social features of countries. He seeks to combine the part of the geographer or intelligent traveller with his proper part as historian. But when we turn from these minor traits to the larger aspects of his work, Herodotus stands forth as an artist whose conception and whose method were his own. His history has an epic unity. Various as are the subordinate parts, the action narrated is one, great and complete; and the unity is due to this, that Herodotus refers all events of human history to the principle of divine Nemesis. If Sophocles had told the story of Oedipus in the _Oedipus Tyrannus_ alone, and had not added to it the _Oedipus at Colonus_, it would have been comparable to the story of Xerxes as told by Herodotus. Great as an artist, great too in the largeness of his historical conception, Herodotus fails chiefly by lack of insight into political cause and effect, and by a general silence in regard to the history of political institutions. Both his strength and his weakness are seen most clearly when he is contrasted with that other historian who was strictly his contemporary and who yet seems divided from him by centuries. Entry: B
The argument shows plainly enough the didactic intention of the whole, and points the moral of the evils of civil discord. The story is taken from Book II. chap. xvi. of Geoffrey of Monmouth's history. It was first printed (1565) in an unauthorized edition as _The Tragedie of Gorboduc_ "whereof three Actes were wrytten by Thomas Nortone, and the two laste by Thomas Sackvyle." Norton's share has been generally minimized, and it seems safe to assume that Sackville is responsible for the general design. In 1570 appeared an authentic edition, _The Tragedie of Ferrex and Porrex_, with a preface from the printer to the reader stating that the authors were "very much displeased that she (the tragedy) so ran abroad without leave." The tragedies of Seneca were now being translated, and the play is conceived on Senecan lines. The plot was no doubt chosen for its accumulated horrors from analogy with the tragic subjects of Oedipus and Thyestes. None of the crimes occur on the stage, but the action is described in lofty language by the characters. The most famous and harrowing scene is that in which Marcello relates the murder of Porrex by his mother (Act IV. sc. ii.). The paucity of action is eked out by a dumb show to precede each act, and the place of the Chorus is supplied by four "ancient and sage men of Britain." In the variety of incident, however, the authors departed from the classical model. The play is written in excellent blank verse, and is the first example of the application of Surrey's innovation to drama. Jasper Heywood in the poetical address prefixed to his translation of the Thyestes alludes to "Sackvylde's Sonnets sweetly sauste," but only one of these has survived. It is prefixed to Sir T. Hoby's translation of Castiglione's _Courtier_. Sackville's poetical preoccupations are sufficiently marked in the subject matter of these two works, which remain the sole literary productions of an original mind. Entry: THOMAS
BOSSI, GIUSEPPE (1777-1816), Italian painter and writer on art, was born at the village of Busto Arsizio, near Milan. He was educated at the college of Monza; and his early fondness for drawing was fostered by the director of the college, who supplied him with prints after the works of Agostino Caracci for copies. He then studied at the academy of Brera at Milan, and about 1795 went to Rome, where he formed an intimate friendship with Canova. On his return to Milan he became assistant secretary, and then secretary, of the Academy of Fine Arts. He rendered important service in the organization of this new institution. In 1804, in conjunction with Oriani, he drew up the rules of the three academies of art of Bologna, Venice and Milan, and soon after was rewarded with the decoration of the Iron Crown. On the occasion of the visit of Napoleon I. to Milan in 1805, Bossi exhibited a drawing of the Last Judgment of Michelangelo, and pictures representing Aurora and Night, Oedipus and Creon, and the Italian Parnassus. By command of Prince Eugene, viceroy of Italy, Bossi undertook to make a copy of the Last Supper of Leonardo, then almost obliterated, for the purpose of getting it rendered in mosaic. The drawing was made from the remains of the original with the aid of copies and the best prints. The mosaic was executed by Raffaelli, and was placed in the imperial gallery of Vienna. Bossi made another copy in oil, which was placed in the museum of Brera. This museum owed to him a fine collection of casts of great works of sculpture acquired at Paris, Rome and Florence. Bossi devoted a large part of his life to the study of the works of Leonardo; and his last work was a series of drawings in monochrome representing incidents in the life of that great master. He left unfinished a large cartoon in black chalk of the Dead Christ in the bosom of Mary, with John and the Magdalene. In 1810 he published a special work in large quarto, entitled _Del Cenacolo di Leonardo da Vinci_, which had the merit of greatly interesting Goethe. His other works are _Delle Opinioni di Leonardo intorno alla simmetria de' corpi umani_ (1811), and _Del Tipo dell' arte della pittura_ (1816). Bossi died at Milan on the 15th of December 1816. A monument by Canova was erected to his memory in the Ambrosian library, and a bust was placed in the Brera. Entry: BOSSI
The Greeks bore a piece of armour upon a spear in early times; afterwards the several cities bore sacred emblems or letters chosen for their particular associations--the Athenians the olive and the owl, the Corinthians a pegasus, the Thebans a sphinx, in memory of Oedipus, the Messenians their initial M, and the Lacedaemonians A. A purple dress was placed on the end of a spear as the signal to advance. The Dacians carried a standard representing a contorted serpent, while the dragon was the military sign of many peoples--of the Chinese, Dacians and Parthians among others--and was probably first used by the Romans as the ensign of barbarian auxiliaries (see fig. 3). Entry: FLAG
INGRES, JEAN AUGUSTE DOMINIQUE (1780-1867), French painter, was born at Montauban, on the 29th of August 1780. His father, for whom he entertained the most tender and respectful affection, has described himself as _sculpteur en plâtre_; he was, however, equally ready to execute every other kind of decorative work, and now and again eked out his living by taking portraits or obtained an engagement as a violin-player. He brought up his son to command the same varied resources, but in consequence of certain early successes--the lad's performance of a concerto of Viotti's was applauded at the theatre of Toulouse--his attention was directed chiefly to the study of music. At Toulouse, to which place his father had removed from Montauban in 1792, Ingres had, however, received lessons from Joseph Roques, a painter whom he quitted at the end of a few months to become a pupil of M. Vigan, professor at the academy of fine arts in the same town. From Vigan, Ingres, whose vocation became day by day more distinctly evident, passed to M. Briant, a landscape-painter who insisted that his pupil was specially gifted by nature to follow the same line as himself. For a while Ingres obeyed, but he had been thoroughly aroused and enlightened as to his own objects and desires by the sight of a copy of Raphael's "Madonna della Sedia," and, having ended his connexion with Briant, he started for Paris, where he arrived about the close of 1796. He was then admitted to the studio of David, for whose lofty standard and severe principles he always retained a profound appreciation. Ingres, after four years of devoted study, during which (1800) he obtained the second place in the yearly competition, finally carried off the Grand Prix (1801). The work thus rewarded--the "Ambassadors of Agamemnon in the Tent of Achilles" (École des Beaux Arts)--was admired by Flaxman so much as to give umbrage to David, and was succeeded in the following year (1802) by the execution of a "Girl after Bathing," and a woman's portrait; in 1804 Ingres exhibited "Portrait of the First Consul" (Musée de Liége), and portraits of his father and himself; these were followed in 1806 by "Portrait of the Emperor" (Invalides), and portraits of M, Mme, and Mlle Rivière (the first two now in the Louvre). These and various minor works were executed in Paris (for it was not until 1809 that the state of public affairs admitted of the re-establishment of the Academy of France at Rome), and they produced a disturbing impression on the public. It was clear that the artist was some one who must be counted with; his talent, the purity of his line, and his power of literal rendering were generally acknowledged; but he was reproached with a desire to be singular and extraordinary. "Ingres," writes Frau v. Hastfer (_Leben und Kunst in Paris_, 1806) "wird nach Italien gehen, und dort wird er vielleicht vergessen dass er zu etwas Grossem geboren ist, und wird eben darum ein hohes Ziel erreichen." In this spirit, also, Chaussard violently attacked his "Portrait of the Emperor" (_Pausanias Français_, 1806), nor did the portraits of the Rivière family escape. The points on which Chaussard justly lays stress are the strange discordances of colour--such as the blue of the cushion against which Mme Rivière leans, and the want of the relief and warmth of life, but he omits to touch on that grasp of his subject as a whole, shown in the portraits of both husband and wife, which already evidences the strength and sincerity of the passionless point of view which marks all Ingres's best productions. The very year after his arrival in Rome (1808) Ingres produced "Oedipus and the Sphinx" (Louvre; lithographed by Sudre, engraved by Gaillard), a work which proved him in the full possession of his mature powers, and began the "Venus Anadyomene" (Collection Rieset; engraving by Pollet), completed forty years later, and exhibited in 1855. These works were followed by some of his best portraits, that of M. Bochet (Louvre), and that of Mme la Comtesse de Tournon, mother of the prefect of the department of the Tiber; in 1811 he finished "Jupiter and Thetis," an immense canvas now in the Musée of Aix; in 1812 "Romulus and Acron" (École des Beaux Arts), and "Virgil reading the _Aeneid_"--a composition very different from the version of it which has become popular through the engraving executed by Pradier in 1832. The original work, executed for a bedchamber in the Villa Aldobrandini-Miollis, contained neither the figures of Maecenas and Agrippa nor the statue of Marcellus; and Ingres, who had obtained possession of it during his second stay in Rome, intended to complete it with the additions made for engraving. But he never got beyond the stage of preparation, and the picture left by him, together with various other studies and sketches, to the Musée of his native town, remains half destroyed by the process meant for its regeneration. The "Virgil" was followed by the "Betrothal of Raphael," a small painting, now lost, executed for Queen Caroline of Naples; "Don Pedro of Toledo Kissing the Sword of Henry IV." (Collection Deymié; Montauban), exhibited at the Salon of 1814, together with the "Chapelle Sistine" (Collection Legentil; lithographed by Sudre), and the "Grande Odalisque" (Collection Seillière; lithographed by Sudre). In 1815 Ingres executed "Raphael and the Fornarina" (Collection Mme N. de Rothschild; engraved by Pradier); in 1816 "Aretin" and the "Envoy of Charles V." (Collection Schroth), and "Aretin and Tintoret" (Collection Schroth); in 1817 the "Death of Leonardo" (engraved by Richomme) and "Henry IV. Playing with his Children" (engraved by Richomme), both of which works were commissions from M. le Comte de Blacas, then ambassador of France at the Vatican. "Roger and Angelique" (Louvre; lithographed by Sudre), and "Francesca di Rimini" (Musée of Angers; lithographed by Aubry Lecomte), were completed in 1819, and followed in 1820 by "Christ giving the Keys to Peter" (Louvre). In 1815, also, Ingres had made many projects for treating a subject from the life of the celebrated duke of Alva, a commission from the family, but a loathing for "cet horrible homme" grew upon him, and finally he abandoned the task and entered in his diary--"J'étais forcé par la nécessité de peindre un pareil tableau; Dieu a voulu qu'il restât en ébauche." During all these years Ingres's reputation in France did not increase. The interest which his "Chapelle Sistine" had aroused at the Salon of 1814 soon died away; not only was the public indifferent, but amongst his brother artists Ingres found scant recognition. The strict classicists looked upon him as a renegade, and strangely enough Delacroix and other pupils of Guérin--the leaders of that romantic movement for which Ingres, throughout his long life, always expressed the deepest abhorrence--alone seem to have been sensible of his merits. The weight of poverty, too, was hard to bear. In 1813 Ingres had married; his marriage had been arranged for him with a young woman who came in a business-like way from Montauban, on the strength of the representations of her friends in Rome. Mme Ingres speedily acquired a faith in her husband which enabled her to combat with heroic courage and patience the difficulties which beset their common existence, and which were increased by their removal to Florence. There Bartolini, an old friend, had hoped that Ingres might have materially bettered his position, and that he might have aroused the Florentine school--a weak offshoot from that of David--to a sense of its own shortcomings. These expectations were disappointed. The good offices of Bartolini, and of one or two other persons, could only alleviate the miseries of this stay in a town where Ingres was all but deprived of the means of gaining daily bread by the making of those small portraits for the execution of which, in Rome, his pencil had been constantly in request. Before his departure he had, however, been commissioned to paint for M. de Pastoret the "Entry of Charles V. into Paris," and M. de Pastoret now obtained an order for Ingres from the Administration of Fine Arts; he was directed to treat the "Voeu de Louis XIII." for the cathedral of Montauban. This work, exhibited at the Salon of 1824, met with universal approbation: even those sworn to observe the unadulterated precepts of David found only admiration for the "Voeu de Louis XIII." On his return Ingres was received at Montauban with enthusiastic homage, and found himself celebrated throughout France. In the following year (1825) he was elected to the Institute, and his fame was further extended in 1826 by the publication of Sudre's lithograph of the "Grande Odalisque," which, having been scorned by artists and critics alike in 1819, now became widely popular. A second commission from the government called forth the "Apotheosis of Homer," which, replaced by a copy in the decoration of the ceiling for which it was designed, now hangs in the galleries of the second storey of the Louvre. From this date up till 1834 the studio of Ingres was thronged, as once had been thronged the studio of David, and he was a recognized _chef d'école_. Whilst he taught with despotic authority and admirable wisdom, he steadily worked; and when in 1834 he produced his great canvas of the "Martyrdom of Saint Symphorien" (cathedral of Autun; lithographed by Trichot-Garneri), it was with angry disgust and resentment that he found his work received with the same doubt and indifference, if not the same hostility, as had met his earlier ventures. The suffrages of his pupils, and of one or two men--like Decamps--of undoubted ability, could not soften the sense of injury. Ingres resolved to work no longer for the public, and gladly availed himself of the opportunity to return to Rome, as director of the École de France, in the room of Horace Vernet. There he executed "La Vierge à l'Hostie" (Imperial collections, St Petersburg), "Stratonice," "Portrait of Cherubini" (Louvre), and the "Petite Odalisque" for M. Marcotte, the faithful admirer for whom, in 1814, Ingres had painted the "Chapelle Sistine." The "Stratonice," executed for the duke of Orleans, had been exhibited at the Palais Royal for several days after its arrival in France, and the beauty of the composition produced so favourable an impression that, on his return to Paris in 1841, Ingres found himself received with all the deference that he felt to be his due. A portrait of the purchaser of "Stratonice" was one of the first works executed after his return; and Ingres shortly afterwards began the decorations of the great hall in the Château de Dampierre, which, unfortunately for the reputation of the painter, were begun with an ardour which gradually slackened, until in 1849 Ingres, having been further discouraged by the loss of his faithful and courageous wife, abandoned all hope of their completion, and the contract with the duc de Luynes was finally cancelled. A minor work, "Jupiter and Antiope," marks the year 1851, but Ingres's next considerable undertaking (1853) was the "Apotheosis of Napoleon I.," painted for the ceiling of a hall in the Hôtel de Ville; "Jeanne d'Arc" (Louvre) appeared in 1854; and in 1855 Ingres consented to rescind the resolution, more or less strictly kept since 1834, in favour of the International Exhibition, where a room was reserved for his works. Prince Napoleon, president of the jury, proposed an exceptional recompense for their author, and obtained from the emperor Ingres's nomination as grand officer of the Legion of Honour. With renewed confidence Ingres now took up and completed one of his most charming productions--"La Source" (Louvre), a figure of which he had painted the torso in 1823, and which seen with other works in London (1862) there renewed the general sentiment of admiration, and procured him, from the imperial government, the dignity of senator. After the completion of "La Source," the principal works produced by Ingres were with one or two exceptions ("Molière" and "Louis XIV.," presented to the Théâtre Français, 1858; "Le Bain Turc," 1859), of a religious character; "La Vierge de l'Adoption," 1858 (painted for Mlle Roland-Gosselin), was followed by "La Vierge Couronnée" (painted for Mme la Baronne de Larinthie) and "La Vierge aux Enfans" (Collection Blanc); in 1859 these were followed by repetitions of "La Vierge à l'Hostie"; and in 1862 Ingres completed "Christ and the Doctors" (Musée Montauban), a work commissioned many years before by Queen Marie Amélie for the chapel of Bizy. Entry: INGRES