Quote of the Day (John F. Kennedy, on Memorial Day)

“Memorial Day each year provides a fitting occasion upon which Americans may not only pay tribute to our honored dead but also unite in prayer for success in our search for a just and lasting peace.”—President John F. Kennedy (1917-1963), “Proclamation 3477—Prayer for Peace, Memorial Day,” May 18, 1962

Quote of the Day (Immanuel Kant, Defining ‘Enlightenment’)

“Enlightenment is man's release from his self-incurred tutelage. Tutelage is man's inability to make use of his understanding without direction from another. Self-incurred is this tutelage when its cause lies not in lack of reason but in lack of resolution and courage to use it without direction from another. Sapere aude! [from Horace, Epodes, 1, 2, 40] ‘Have courage to use your own reason!’ — that is the motto of enlightenment.”— German philosopher Immanuel Kant (1724-1804), "What Is Enlightenment?" (1784), in On History, edited by Lewis White Beck (1963)

Last month marked the 300^th birthday of Immanuel Kant in Königsberg, near the southeastern shore of the Baltic Sea. As I learned from Lea Ypi’s essay from April in The Financial Times, his place of birth—and the extent to which his legacy belongs to one nation, rather than all humanity—has become tied up in the epic, blood-soaked wars of the 20^th century that saw Konigsburg shift from East Prussian—i.e., German—control to that of Russia.

Unfortunately, changed European borders have, in the case of this pivotal modern philosopher, certainly proven the first half of George Orwell’s 1984 dictum that “Those who control the present, control the past and those who control the past control the future.” We are about to see, as the struggle over Crimea moves into another phase, whether the second part of that statement will hold true.

I first encountered Kant in the famous Contemporary Civilization” course at Columbia University. I came away with two points that have lingered in my mind about him ever since.

First, he was so quirkily regular in his habits, the legend went, that the residents of Königsberg set their clocks to coincide with his afternoon walk.

Second, though a constellation of thinkers were trying to come up with a more convenient way of viewing the world, it was Kant who offered the definition of “Enlightenment” with which I began this post—and which has come to characterize an entire strain of thought in 18^th century Europe and America.

Humanity can only change by beginning a public questioning of what is true and what is false.  But, Kant implied, it is inhibited by laziness and cowardice.

In moving Europe further away the sway of religion, Kant and other philosophers of his movement looked to “enlightened” rulers—i.e., “benevolent despots”—like Frederick the Great of Prussia and Maria Theresa of Austria to spread education, learning and culture.

In time, the despots became less benevolent (if they ever really were) and the continent became continually rocked by great-power struggles.

My class had read the philosopher’s stringently argued Critique of Pure Reason. What I was not aware of, however, until I read Ypi’s essay, was how difficult it was for Kant to maintain the independence of thought he advocated in his writings with the necessity of survival when Königsberg came under the influence of a foreign power: perhaps not so surprisingly, considering current events, Russia.

In 1759, Kant petitioned Russian Empress Elizabeth, asking for an academic post.  But 11 years later, once the Russians withdrew, Kant went back to his original Prussian rulers and was granted a full professorship.

In recent times, some elements in Russia highlighted that reversal, calling Kant a “turncoat.” That term might be a bit strong, but “opportunist” might apply better—and even that is hardly a compliment or term of endearment.

Did Kant feel disgusted with this ideological maneuvering? Maybe, because late in life he was writing, in no uncertain terms: “No state shall forcibly interfere in the constitution and government of another state.”

Having already seen Konigsberg change hands in his thirties, he had, by his seventies, lived long enough to see how the French Revolution had introduced the notion of an entire nation in arms—and collapsed any idea that civilian populations should be off limits in wars.

In 1795, Kent wrote the piercing essay “Toward Perpetual Peace,” warning, a century and a half before Hiroshima and Nagasaki, about how “a war of extermination in which the simultaneous annihilation of both parties . . . would let perpetual peace come about only in the vast graveyard of the human race.”

Instead, he advocated a “cosmopolitan right,” based on the belief that “a violation of right on one place of the Earth is felt in all.”

Kant’s ideas have not only influenced notions of public education, but also the formation of organizations dedicated to preserving international security and guarding against the outbreak of war, such as the European Union and the United Nations.

(For yet another view of Kant focusing on the question of his Prussian or Russian identity, please see this essay by Robert R. Clewis in the April/May issue of Philosophy Now Magazine.)

Quote of the Day (H. G. Wells, on Peace and a Sense of History)

“The need for a common knowledge of the general facts of human history throughout the world has become very evident during the tragic happenings of the last few years. Swifter means of communication have brought all men closer to one another for good or for evil. War becomes a universal disaster, blind and monstrously destructive; it bombs the baby in its cradle and sinks the food-ships that cater for the non-combatant and the neutral. There can be no peace now, we realize, but a common peace in all the world; no prosperity but a general prosperity. But there can be no common peace and prosperity without common historical ideas. Without such ideas to hold them together in harmonious co-operation, with nothing but narrow, selfish, and conflicting nationalist traditions, races and peoples are bound to drift towards conflict and destruction. This truth, which was apparent to that great philosopher Kant a century or more ago — it is the gist of his tract upon universal peace — is now plain to the man in the street. Our internal policies and our economic and social ideas are profoundly vitiated at present by wrong and fantastic ideas of the origin and historical relationship of social classes. A sense of history as the common adventure of all mankind is as necessary for peace within as it is for peace between the nations.”—English science-fiction author H. G. Wells (1866-1946), The Outline of History: Being a Plain History of Life and Mankind (1920)

Quote of the Day (Amos Oz, on a ‘Powerful Antidote to Fanaticism and Hatred’)

“Imagining the other is a powerful antidote to fanaticism and hatred. It is, in my view, also a major moral imperative.”—Israeli novelist, journalist, and peace advocate Amos Oz (1939-2018), speech upon accepting the 2005 Goethe Prize in recognition of his contribution to world literature, in The Amos Oz Reader, edited by Nitza Ben-Dov (2009)

The image accompanying this post of Amos Oz was taken Sept. 21, 2005, by Michiel Hendryckx.

Spiritual Quote of the Day (Pope Francis, on ‘The Only Way to Peace’)

“It is neither a culture of confrontation nor a culture of conflict which builds harmony within and between peoples, but rather a culture of encounter and a culture of dialogue; this is the only way to peace.”—Pope Francis, Sunday “Angelus” prayer at noon, Sept. 1, 2013

Spiritual Quote of the Day (Thomas Merton, Praying for ‘Prudence in Proportion to Our Power’)

“Grant us prudence in proportion to our power,
Wisdom in proportion to our science,
Humaneness in proportion to our wealth and might.
And bless our earnest will to help all races and peoples
to travel, in friendship with us,
Along the road to justice, liberty and lasting peace.” —American Trappist monk, theologian, memoirist and poet Thomas Merton (1915-1968), “Praying for Peace,” in A Thomas Merton Reader, edited by Thomas P. McDonnell (1996)

Quote of the Day (Wendell Berry, on ‘When Despair for the World Grows in Me’)

“When despair for the world grows in me

and I wake in the night at the least sound

in fear of what my life and my children's lives may be,

I go and lie down where the wood drake

rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.

I come into the peace of wild things

who do not tax their lives with forethought

of grief. I come into the presence of still water.

And I feel above me the day-blind stars

waiting with their light. For a time

I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.”—American poet, novelist, critic, and environmentalist activist Wendell Berry, “The Peace of Wild Things,” from The Peace of Wild Things (2018) 

I took this image of a blue heron in Sea Pines Forest Preserve while on vacation in Hilton Head, SC, in November 2014

Quote of the Day (John F. Kennedy, on the Quiet Ongoing ‘Pursuit of Peace’)

“Peace is a daily, a weekly, a monthly process, gradually changing opinions, slowly eroding old barriers, quietly building new structures. And however undramatic the pursuit of peace, that pursuit must go on.”—American President John F. Kennedy (1917-1963), “Final Address to the United Nations General Assembly,” delivered September 20, 1963, New York, NY

This is a style of speaking—and an attitude toward diplomacy—almost impossible to imagine these days. Just one more thing lost on that terrible day in Dallas 56 years ago today…

Quote of the Day (Karl Barth, on Jesus Putting God and Man at Peace)

“In Jesus Christ, God and man...are already at peace. Not as enemies but as true companions. In Him salvation is already present and at work.” —Swiss Reformed theologian Karl Barth (1886-1968), Jan. 20, 1963 letter, in Karl Barth: Letters, 1961-1968, translated by Geoffrey W. Bromiley (1987)

Quote of the Day (Pope Francis, on Avoiding ‘Messages of Hatred or Terror’)

“Don’t be taken in by the messages of hatred or terror all around us. Instead, make new friends. Give of your time and always show concern for those who ask your help. Be brave and go against the tide; be friends of Jesus, who is the Prince of Peace.” —Pope Francis, “Message for the Jubilee of Mercy, for Young Boys and Girls,” Jan. 6, 2016