Phocion the Good (Routledge Revivals)

Phocion the Good (Routledge Revivals)
Author: Lawrence A. Tritle
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 250
Release: 2014-06-23
Genre: History
ISBN: 1317750497

Plutarch’s Life of Phocion has not been closely analysed since 1840. Lawrence Tritle's study, first published in 1988, offers a new assessment of this significant and complex personality, whilst illuminating the political climate in which he thrived. Though often thought to be of humble origin, Phocion was educated in Plato’s Academy, rose to prominence in the innermost circles of Athenian political life, and was renowned as a soldier throughout the Greek world. Professor Tritle traces the origins and development of the historical tradition that so shaped an image of the "Good" Phocion, so that his actual achievements as a politician and general were all but lost. He can thus now be seen in the context of fourth-century Athens: as a major political leader, a worthy opponent of Philip of Macedon, and a champion of a politics of justice rather than of the traditional politics of enmity.

Orations

Orations
Author: Demosthenes
Publisher:
Total Pages: 448
Release: 1908
Genre:
ISBN:

Ambrose, Augustine, and the Pursuit of Greatness

Ambrose, Augustine, and the Pursuit of Greatness
Author: J. Warren Smith
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 309
Release: 2020-12-10
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1108846602

Since Aristotle, the concept of the magnanimous or great-souled man was employed by philosophers of antiquity to describe individuals who attained the highest degree of virtue. Greatness of soul (magnitudo animi or magnanimitas) was part of the language of Classical and Hellenistic virtue theory central to the education of Ambrose and Augustine. Yet as bishops they were conscious of fundamental differences between Christian and pagan visions of virtue. Greatness of soul could not be appropriated whole cloth. Instead, the great-souled man had to be baptized to conform with Christian understandings of righteousness, compassion, and humility. In this book, J. Warren Smith traces the development of the ideal of the great-souled man from Plato and Aristotle to latter adaptions by Cicero, Seneca, and Plutarch. He then examines how Ambrose's and Augustine's theological commitments influenced their different critiques, appropriations, and modifications of the language of magnanimity.