tragedy of the commonplaces
It’s the season when academics seek to snatch inspiration from the jaws of administrative despair by posting online the more promising tasks they intend to assign their students, and one that sparked my interest was keeping a physical commonplace book (giving credit while appropriating [the modifications seem too few to call it adapting] an assignment developed by another instructor). Although I am more fond of the capacious approach to the commonplace mentioned by Alan Jacobs in his brief notes (archived) on the subject, which mention Ann Blair’s very enjoyable book on scholarship and collections of quotations (among other things), I thought it would not be amiss to collect a few extracts from my morning books in the spirit of this assignment just, you know, for fun.
I sincerely wish that it may be as clearly foreseen by every good citizen […] America will have reason to exclaim, in the words of the poet: “FAREWELL! A LONG FAREWELL TO ALL MY GREATNESS.”
Naturally, this stood out to me not necessarily for what it meant to Jay and co., but for its contemporary resonance. Surprisingly, though, it appears to be the first instance of a recurring bit part for Cardinal Wolsey in the Federalist Papers, which I was not at all expecting. I was not, I should say, expecting much from the essays except a bit of rage bait. 1
…a knowledge of the proper rules of calculation is not the same thing as exercise in the everyday practical calculations of the trader, and in his turnover calculations Marx became confused, with the result that, apart from being incomplete, they contain many errors and contradictions.
To pair the founding fathers with Marx is amusing and the choice of Engels to interrupt the body of the text to make a snide remark perhaps inspires the envy of editors everywhere. The things that are said by the way are so often a direct route to the intended meaning.
The greatest men are apt to go wrong and lose their way, even on the best roads.
To close with Bayle, in search of an enlightened approach, could be considered fitting. I consider it lazy. It is probably also lazy to note that this extract and its placement should be felt to cast some doubt about the sincerity of my earlier observations and selections. But mostly I just liked it and felt that it captured the spirit of, if not Bayle’s entire dictionary, at least Popkin’s selections from it.
- See ‘contemporary resonance’.[↩]