Day 1: 2/13/2019
After a very intricate table of contents, there is a section entitled List of Authors Quoted. It goes on for 32 pages, and some pages have as many as 30 authors on them. So it looks like a total of almost 1,000 authors who are quoted in the course of this book. What a monumental bit of work that is, eh?
By the way, in the first 10 pages, Buckle has quoted from works in French, German, Latin, and Greek. Which is pretty impressive. Unfortunately, he doesn't translate his quotations. That's kind of irritating. Copleston did the same thing in a history of philosophy. And my life isn't long or empty enough to try to translate all of those bits.
More tomorrow. Speaking of which, I've decided that this is just going to be one long, continuing blog entry. That way any reader (hi) who isn't interested in My Buckle Journey won't have to constantly encounter it as they check in on the blog. Just one more service we offer.
BTW, this entry was dictated--and all future entries will probably be dictated as well. I intend to proofread afterwards, as dictation often results in exceptionally stupid errors, but you know how that goes.
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Day 2: 2/14/2019 (Valentine's Day!)
In one of the footnotes on page 12 there is a reference to Copleston's An Enquiry into the Doctrines of Necessity and Predestination. I feel like Fred is following me...though, needless to say, this is not the same Copleston. This one--Edward--lived from 1776 to 1849. Fred was 1907 to 1994. Haven't been able to find out if they were related.
And speaking of footnotes, check this out:
That's a whole lot of footnote. More footnote than legnote. I am now wondering if David Foster Wallace was a Buckle fan. Also speaking of footnotes, at the bottom of page 17, there's a reference to Bishop Berkeley. Nice to see him again. I am guessing that he was a contemporary of Buckle. The quote in the footnote is interesting too. In part, it says: "...the external world may be as false when we are awake as when we dream." There's a disturbing thought, ennit?
Oh, and by the way...George Berkeley lived from 1685 until 1753, and Buckle was 1821 to 1862, so they were far from contemporaries...at least so far as Time goes.
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Day 3: 2/15/19
Today in Buckle land...
Two quotes I liked for one reason or another:
Mostly just for the irony, I suppose...though it is nice to think that there was a time when an intelligent man could just assume that the government didn't lie and that its goal was to protect innocent people.
Other stuff of interest: some comments vis à vis free will vs. predestination (and the inevitable questions about God and The Divine Will) which then went into an unexpected direction...a discussion of crime, which then became a discussion of suicide. (Technically a crime, though that seems like cold shit to me.) Buckle talked about how the number of suicides stayed pretty constant over the years (wonder if that is still true?), and said that basically there was a social law which said so many people will kill themselves in every given year. He extended the same kind of thinking to crime in general, and said that "...the individual felon only carries into effect what is a necessary consequence of preceeding circumstances."
Those are some pretty scary thoughts. BTW, I don't think that Buckle is attempting to say that there is no such thing as free will. This basically all fits in with his concept of generalization, which leads to seeing certain rules of conduct in society. Not rules in terms of what is legislated from above, but rules in terms of how humans actually do behave. Disturbing stuff in that it makes you wonder if there's any chance that we'll ever get to a point where we don't rob, rape, and murder each other.
ANYway...it is so easy to read this book that I am seriously tempted to bump up my per diem goal to 15 or even 20, but I think I'll leave that alone for now. Unless I change my mind, of course.
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Day 4: 2/16/19:
Today was a busy day. Got up at 6, made breakfasts and lunches, took a shower, then it was time to get into the car and drive to Elizabethtown for Joe's Special Olympics basketball regional tournament.
I did think to take my little Shake-speare volume with Richard III, but didn't remember to bring my Buckle. It wasn't easy to find any reading time, anyway. The choices of places to wait for Joe's game were a completely empty room where I could sit on the floor, or the gymnasium where the games were being played. So I got a little reading done, but not much. Joe's team won their first game, which meant that we had a four hour wait before game 2. We hung out, and I got a little more reading done, but not much. Joe's team won the second game (hooray!), and at 3 we headed back for Louisville. When I got home, the kids went to their mom's house, I made dinner, and then I started feeling really depressed due to various things. (Nothing outré...depression is a regular companion.) I tried to read some Richard, but just wasn't feeling it, and decided to go to bed and do some reading there. It was only eight o'clock. Then the phone rang, and my #1son Jimmy talked to me for about an hour. When we hung up, I realized that I had not read my Buckle for the day. I went and got it, having to traverse the cold house (since I had already turn the heat down for the night), and read my 10 pages.
And you know what? It made me feel a little better. In fact, I read what might be my favorite line thus far in Buckle's History of Civilization in England: "It is now known that marriages bear a fixed and definite relation to the price of corn...."
He then goes on to talk about such things as there being a pretty stable number of letters which are sent each year without addresses, etcetera.
So the moral of the story is, no matter how busy you are, no matter how depressed you are, no matter how cold your house is, read your Buckle everyday.
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Day 5: 2/17/19:
Still haven't caught up with Richard III, but I did do my Buckle for the day early on. It is most enjoyable. Here's my favorite line today:
"...without wealth there can be no leisure, and without leisure there can be no knowledge."
There were also several "primitive people shouldn't be romanticized because they were just kind of stupid, had no culture to speak of, and were absorbed in their struggle to survive" bits, which is kind of rude, of course, but which (1) pretty much rang true and (2) was actually kind of refreshing in this day of political correctness. And it wasn't like he was saying that they were bad or worthless or anything like that. Not at all. He was basically saying that EVERYbody starts out that way, and it's not until circumstances permit them to create a leisure class...or at least leisure time...that civilization and knowledge really kick in.
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Day 6: 2/18/19:
Starting to sprawl out here now. Started by talking about the distribution of wealth, which led to a discussion of the conditions of the workers, which led to a discussion of climate and nutrition. That then became a discussion of the function of food, which Buckle says is two-fold: (1) to keep body heat going and (2) to keep up with tissue decay. Hmmm. First off, that's a lot of ground for ten pages. Second off, I'm wondering if this is mid-19th century science which has since become spurious. Buckle makes reference to azotized food, for instance, of which I had never heard. When I went looking for information, all of the references I could find where to works from the mid 1800s, which leads me to think that it's outdated information. BTW, "azotized" means "nitrogenated." According to Buckle, non-azotized food repairs our tissues, and azotized food renews our body's heat. Sounds kind of bullshitty to me, but I don't know much about science book. Funny, though, that even as part of me was thinking, "This is outdated bullshit," another part of me was thinking, "Fuck, I need to make sure that I'm getting enough azotized food." And non-azotized, too, of course. And in case you're thinking the same thing, here's some useful information from The Dublin Medical Press, A Weekly Journal of Medical Affairs, July 6, 1842, specifically REPORT ON THE PRESENT STATE OF OUR KNOWLEDGE RESPECTING RESPIRATION AND ANIMAL HEAT, AND ON PROFESSOR LIEBIG'S NEW CHEMICO-PHYSIOLOGICAL THEORY. BV RORERT DUN MAS THOMSON, M.D.:
"Nutritive or azotized food consists of vegetable fibrin, vegetable albumen, and casein, animal flesh and animal blood. In the respiratory or non-azotized food, are included,—fat, starch, gum, the different kinds of sugar, pectin, wine, beer, and spirits."
So maybe I'm okay on both counts if I just eat meat and drink whiskey. Here's hoping.
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Day 7: 2/19/19:
Today's reading did a nice little loop de loop from foods that contain carbon versus foods that contain oxygen, to climate of regions dictating the type of food which grows and the type which humans need to consume, to the amount of labor available because in areas where food is easily obtained there are more laborers, to economic inequalities. Quite a nice trip around the barn, I'd say. There were also some interesting little moments, such as when Buckle seemed to make a reference to shit. He says "Now it has been ascertained by careful analysis, that in the polar food there is an excess of carbon; in the tropical food an excess of oxygen. Without entering into details, which to the majority of readers would be distasteful, it may be said generally, that the oils contain about six times as much carbon as the fruits, and that they have in them very little oxygen...." He also at one point makes reference to the Irish, and the dependence of the Irish on the potato. In a footnote he quotes someone or other iwho says that "the daily average consumption of an able-bodied laborer in Ireland is estimated at nine and a half pounds of potatoes for men, and 7 and 1/2 for women." 9 1/2 pounds...that seems like an awful lot of potato matter. It's a hell of a lot more than those people in The Turin Horse got to eat, for sure.
Anyway...it's a pretty cold day today in Louisville (36º), so I think I'd better go get me some heavy carbon-y food. With all that follows. 1
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1 VLADIMIR 2 : With all that follows. Where it falls mandrakes grow. That's why they shriek when you pull them up. Did you not know that? Waiting for Godot by Samuel Beckett 3
2 Who is responding to Estragon's excitement over the fact that if they hang themselves from the tree (willow?) that they are looking at, it will give them erections.
3 Speaking of Samuel Beckett, I really do need to read all of his stuff in the near future. Maybe after My Shake-speare Project I'll do My Beckett Project. That would be kind of cool. And long overdue.
Day 8: 2/20/19:
Big Day for My Heart and Brain. Starting with this:
"We find the upper classes enormously rich, and the lower classes miserably poor. We find those by whose labour the wealth is created, receiving the smallest possible share of it; the remainder being absorbed by the higher ranks in the form either of rent or of profit. And as wealth is, after intellect, the most permanent source of power, it has naturally happened that a great inequality of wealth has been accompanied by a corresponding inequality of social and political power. It is not, therefore, surprising that from the earliest to which our knowledge of India extends, an immense majority of the people, pinched by the most galling poverty, and just living from hand-to-mouth, should always have remained in a state of stupid debasement, broken by incessant misfortune, crouching before their superiors in abject submission, and only fit either to be slaves themselves or to be led to battle to make slaves of others."
That one hit me so hard that I had to break it out as a separate post. And Tweet at it, too. I mean...is there a better expression of the woes of the modern American poor than this...which was written 163 years ago about people in India...by a man who was only 35 years old? ...mind...boggling....
Buckle also went into some detail about the horrific treatment that the poor of India could expect from the monied folks. Amazing tortures and torments were just fucking routine. At one point he quoted a thing which said that the life of one of these poor people was equivalent to the life of a dog or a crow, and I couldn't help but think of how many times I've heard the story of a white policeman gunning down a black guy and receiving no penalty whatsoever for it.
There was also a little bit of light heartedness in my ten pages for the day: In a footnote after a discussion of wages in different countries, Buckle makes reference to a traveler's diary in which some minutiae regarding wages is listed and says, "I wish that all travelers were equally minute in recording the wages of labour; a subject of far greater importance than those with which they usually fill their books." Burn. Like, "Fuck your pictures of Mickey, I want to know what the concession workers were getting paid, bitch!"
But my favorite line of the day was this:
"...there is no instance on record of any class possessing power without abusing it."
I mean,
...or what? 1
1 I was going to make that in a fucking nutshell, but I want to try to keep this thing at PG-13 if possible.
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Day 9: 2/21/19:
More songs about dates and dhourra.
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Day 10: 2/22/19:
I missed my first Buckle reading day. And even more dire, I missed my first "Daily Reading" Day in 695 days. I have a pretty good excuse, though: I had a heart attack, and was in the ER for most of Thursday. And now, without further ado (or, I'm glad to say, without further Adieu):
Day 11: 2/23/19:
I'm going to try to get all caught up. And...yep. That was easy. It would most definitely not be no big ting to knock back twenty pages of this book per day.
A few things of note:
In a footnote, Buckle says, "A very eminent naturalist, Mr. Darwin, says...." Which is when it hits me: Buckle wrote this book two years before Darwin hit the big time with On the Origin of Species. Yowza.
Something else: Buckle makes reference to the Brazilian native peoples as "wandering savages" and even goes so far as to say that they "like every people in the infancy of society, are averse to enterprise...." And there's a part of me which objects to that, says "Who are we to judge another society, blah blah blah." But there's another part of me that says, "You know, that's not very nice, but vero nihilism verius, y'know?" I mean...primitive people spend their lives trying to maintain their lives. There's no time for civilization...little or no time for The Arts...and hey, let's face it: their lives are nasty, brutish, and short. It's not racist to say that, is it? Also, Buckle makes comments such as, In this situation Nature prevented Man from becoming more civilized...and the implication of such a statement is that Man is pretty much the same everywhere, and that it's circumstances which account for differentiation...and that's the opposite of racism. So there's that.
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Day 12: 2/24/19:
Well, those twenty pages went down so smoothy yesterday that I went back, Jack, and did it again today. And there was some good stuff. For instance, take a look at this indictment of the Trump Administration:
"The proceeding evidence, collected from sources of unquestioned credibility, proves the force of those great physical laws, which, in the most flourishing countries out of Europe, encouraged the accumulation of wealth, but prevent its dispersion; and thus secured to the upper classes a monopoly of one of the most important elements of social and political power. The result was, that in all those civilizations the great body of the people derived no benefit from the national improvements; hence, the basis of the progress being very narrow, the progress itself was very insecure. When, therefore, unfavorable circumstances arose from without, it was but natural that the whole system should fall to the ground. In such countries, society, being divided against itself, was unable to stand. And there can be no doubt that long before the crisis of their actual destruction, these one-sided and irregular civilizations had begun to decay; so that their own degeneracy aided the progress of foreign invaders, and secured the overthrow of those ancient kingdoms, which, under a sounder system, might have been easily saved."
That's pretty amazing, huh?
And a little bit later, Henry Thomas gave me the chance for a chuckle when he noted that
"The operation of natural causes being brought to an end, supernatural causes are supposed to begin. Hence it is, that whatever increases in any country the amount of dangerous disease, has an immediate tendency to strengthen superstition, and aggrandize the imagination at the expense of the understanding. This principle is so universal, that, in every part of the world, the vulgar ascribe to the intervention of the deity those diseases which are peculiarly fatal, and especially those which have a sudden and mysterious appearance."
I found this was particularly funny when I thought, you know it's true--no one ever says to someone who has a cold, "God gave that to you because you _____." But that is some people think about cancer and AIDS etc. The Big Ones.
P.S. A few pages after that in a footnote Buckle quotes Charlevoix as saying "pestilences are the harvests of the ministers of God." BURN!
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| Up to page 130, BTW. |
Day 13: 2/25/19:
Well...turned in another 20 page day...and again, without really thinking about it. And without spending an inordinate amount of time at it, either. I think it'd actually be pretty easy to keep at that pace, and see only one problem with that plan: I have started looking for Volume II, which I know I had set aside to read in the near near, and I can't figure out where I put it. Sigh. Of course it'd be easy to read it online or buy a cheap Kindle version, but I want to read my 1894 edition, man. Time to get out the pickaxe and compass and start digging, I guess.
Also, just for the sake of illustration, I took a little tally and in the past 20 pages Buckle has talked about these subjects: how climate affects the imagination of the people who live in a certain area, how imagination and reason work at cross-purposes, how the depiction of the Gods differs in Greece versus India, how all of this affects that civilization's idea of the human being, how this was then exemplified in architecture, and then there is a pretty long discussion of the relative sizes of the livers of different animals, (which relates back to an earlier point about the type of food in a given region). So, we've got meteorology, religion, architecture, zoology, and biology...and probably one or two more that I overlooked when I glanced through what I had just read. Pretty awesome, ennit?
Also, here's a bit I particularly liked and which encouraged some thoughts to hatch in my head:
"...in Greece, Man being less humbled, and, as it were, less eclipsed, by the external world, thought more of his own powers, and human nature did not fall into that discredit in which it elsewhere sank. The consequence was, that the deification of mortals was a recognized part of the national religion at a very early period in the history of Greece; and this has been found so natural to Europeans, that the same custom was afterwards renewed with eminent success by the Romish church."
The part which particularly caught my eye / brain was the reference to "the Romish church." (Which sounds like an insult, but I don't know if it is or not.) Having grown up Lutheran, I never really knew what to do with the idea of Saints when I encountered them in Catholicism. The whole idea seemed a little sketchy to me. But then I started to hear some of the stories of the saints, and they were sooooo cool and weird that I grew fond of them. Buckle's comments here kind of put them into a new light for me, though. He seems to be saying that the Greek depiction of deities as more human was a way of increasing the power of the human being (by bringing the gods into man's purview)...as opposed to, for instance, the Hindu gods, who are much less human, much fiercer, and thus decrease the power of the human being by contrast...and that the Catholic Saints function in the same way, bringing the idea of God into a more manageable context for the human being. I like the idea. Thinking about this also makes me want to read Butler's Lives of the Saints. A nice, illustrated version, of course. Preferably a hundred years old minimum. We'll have to see if that happens.
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Day 14: 2/26/19:
No lack of love for HTB, but a busy day, so only ten pages and no notes. Nice picture for that coming GIF, though.
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Day 15: 2/27/19:
Buckle like this so much that in his subsequent sentence he suggests that every metaphysician and theologian should "get this sentence by heart: 'That we have first raised a dust, and then complain we cannot see.'"
I love it that he felt compelled to reiterate the line. And I felt that it was as much Mea Culpa as it was J'Accuse!
Buckle may throw stones, but he don't live in no glass house, man.
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Day 16: 2/28/19:
Some most excellent moments in today's reading. Let me tell ya 'bout it?
"There can be no doubt that a people are not really advancing, if, on the one hand, their increasing ability is accompanied by increasing vice, or if, on the other hand, while they are becoming more virtuous, they likewise become more ignorant."
As the immortal Lou Reed proclaimed from the stage (as preserved on the live album Take No Prisoner), "Now you figure out were I am." Except in this case it would be "we are." And our survey said:
▢ Advancing
☑️ Not really advancing
Mmm-hmm.
Here's another bit, this one yet another most excellent great footnote:
"By this mode of reasoning we might demonstrate any proposition; since in all large fields of inquiry there are a sufficient number of empirical coincidences to make a plausible case in favor of whatever view a man chooses to advocate. But this is not the way in which the truth is discovered...."
Can I get an A-men?
A-fuckin-men!
Well...that's a bit much, but okay, at least you're involved.
One more time:
"An immense majority of men must always remain in a middle state, neither very foolish nor very able, neither very virtuous nor very vicious, but slumbering on in a peaceful and decent mediocrity, adopting without much difficulty the current opinions of the day, making no inquiry, exciting no scandal, causing no wonder, just holding themselves on a level with their generation, and noiselessly conforming to the standard of morals and of knowledge common to the age and country in which they live."
Does that slay or what?
Oh, Buckle. How I do love thee.
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Day 17: 3/1/19:
I got back to a twenty page day today. Mostly just because I went to bed not feeling very tired, so I thought I'd read a few more pages after I finished my ten. Found a pretty astonishing paragraph, too:
"We hear much of martyrs and confessors—of those who were slain by the sword, or consumed in the fire ; but we know little of that still larger number who by the mere threat of persecution have been driven into an outward abandonment of their real opinions; and who, thus forced into an apostasy the heart abhors, have passed the remainder of their life in the practice of a constant and humiliating hypocrisy. It is this which is the real curse of religious persecution. For in this way, men being constrained to mask their thoughts, there arises a habit of securing safety by falsehood, and of purchasing impunity with deceit. In this way, fraud becomes a necessary of life; insincerity is made a daily custom ; the whole tone of public feeling is vitiated, and the gross amount of vice and of error fearfully increased."
Well, he's writing about religious persecution and intimidation, but it sounds like the Republican Party during the Trump era to me. I mean...every day I watch the news and think, "Why the hell would the Republicans not want to ditch this guy?" And every day they go out of their way to stick with him. Maybe that will change now in light of the Michael Cohen testimony...but I really wouldn't be surprised if it didn't. And maybe I'm naive...maybe it's always been this way.
Sad.
"In perfectly barbarous countries, there are no intellectual acquisitions; and the mind being a blank and dreary waste, the only resource is external activity...."
This is pretty snotty, of course, but that doesn't make it untrue. I like the way that Buckle looks down on external activity. It's what people with insufficient intellectual capacity do to keep themselves amused is how I read him. I like that in a man.
Well, he's writing about religious persecution and intimidation, but it sounds like the Republican Party during the Trump era to me. I mean...every day I watch the news and think, "Why the hell would the Republicans not want to ditch this guy?" And every day they go out of their way to stick with him. Maybe that will change now in light of the Michael Cohen testimony...but I really wouldn't be surprised if it didn't. And maybe I'm naive...maybe it's always been this way.
Sad.
This is pretty snotty, of course, but that doesn't make it untrue. I like the way that Buckle looks down on external activity. It's what people with insufficient intellectual capacity do to keep themselves amused is how I read him. I like that in a man.
"It is, therefore, clear that Russia is a warlike country, not because the inhabitants are immoral, but because they are unintellectual. The fault is in the head, not in the heart. In Russia, the national intellect being little cultivated, the intellectual classes lack influence; the military class, therefore, is supreme."
Burn. Take that, Putin...you motherfucker.
And this seems unfair, but it's pretty funny, so I will quote it anyway: ...in England, where these opportunities are more numerous than elsewhere, it nearly always happens that if a father has a son whose faculties are remarkable, he brings him up to one of the lay professions, where intellect, when accompanied by industry, is sure to be rewarded. If, however, the inferiority of the boy is obvious, a suitable remedy is at hand: he is made either a soldier or a clergyman; he is sent into the army, or hidden in the church. And this, as we shall hereafter see, is one of the reasons why, as society advances, the ecclesiastical spirit and the military spirit never fail to decline As soon as eminent men grow unwilling to enter any profession, the lustre of that profession will be tarnished: first its reputation will be lessened, and then its power will be abridged."
It is really hard not to think of the teaching profession as I read these words. Because of the low pay, impossible working demands, lack of respect, and other features, the only reasons to go into teaching are idealism and lack of ability to do anything else. I have seen quite a few in each of these categories in my time in the schools...but a lot more in the latter than in the former.
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Day 18: 3/2/19:
Well, first things first: a maxim.
Which is not particularly profound, I suppose, but it still hit me in the growing place. Because what it suggests to me is that wisdom...or faith...or love...or whatHAVEyou...is nothing until it is tested in the world. And that is certainly a truth which has chipped my front teeth.
ANYway.
From page 203 to page 209, Buckle delineates how the invention of gunpowder lead to a more peaceful and intelligent Society. Oh, yeah.
In brief, he notes that before gunpowder, the primary weapons were swords, and bows and arrows. Every English man was essentially required to serve in the military in an ad hoc capacity. When gunpowder was invented, however, the cost of the weaponry was prohibitive, therefore not every man could own a gun and ammunition. This eventually led to the creation of a standing army, In additon to being costly, the weapons were also difficult to use, and required training to master and practice to maintain one's accuracy. Note, he tells how in the early days it took 15 minutes to load and discharge a musket. At any rate, once a standing army arose, most men, 99 out of 100 according to Buckle, had to find another profession, which led to more intellectual and peaceful pursuits. This summary is a bit of a simplification, but it gives the gist of Buckle's brilliant argument.
I am also becoming more and more aware of the brilliance of Buckle's footnotes. There was one in today's ten pages which really rubbed me the right way: "The economical views of Montesquieu (Esprit de Lois, livre xx. chapter xii. in Euvres, p. 353) are as hopelessly wrong...." Ha ha, not just wrong, mind you, but hopelessly wrong. That's my Buckle, for sure.
Day 19: 3/3/19:
A very positive and uplifting section of Buckle today, beginning with this praise for Adam Smith:
"Wealth of Nations...is probably the most important book that has ever been written, and is certainly the most valuable contribution ever made by a single man towards establishing the principles on which government should be based."
Guess I really do need to get around to reading that one, then.
Meanwhile, in footnote news, check this out:
So let me get this straight...Buckle went through 17 years's worth of Parliamentary History...thousands upon thousands of pages...looking for every reference he could find to Adam Smith...essentially to verify one sentence in his book? Holy shit, they don't make 'em like that anymore, do they?
And here's a bit more of the uplifting and positive:
"The actions of bad men produce only temporary evil, the actions of good men only temporary good; and eventually the good and the evil altogether subside, are neutralized by subsequent generations, absorbed by the incessant movements of future ages. But the discoveries of great men never leave us; they are immortal, they contain those eternal truths which survive the shock of empires, outlive the struggles of rival creeds, and witness the decay of successive religions." (225 to 226)
You see Buckle's absolute faith in Reason...and a bit of the disdain he feels towards religion, though I'm not sure how far he'd go with that. It's cropped up a time or two, but has never assumed the proportions of a complete condemnation. I'm very interested in finding out what Buckle's views on Christianity were, though, and hope that he gets around to this at some point.
And oh! oh! oh! (what a feeling), I think this is the first Shake-speare allusion I've found in Buckle: "But the discoveries of great men never leave us; they are immortal, they contain those eternal truths which survive the shock of empires, outlive the struggles of rival creeds, and witness the decay of successive religions. All these have their different measures and their different standards; one set of opinions for one age, another set for another. They pass away like a dream; they are as the fabric of a vision, which leaves not a rack behind." (From The Tempest: "The solemn temples, the great globe itself, / Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve, / And, like this insubstantial pageant faded, / Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff / As dreams are made on; and our little life / Is rounded with a sleep.")
Mmm-hmmm.
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Day 20: 3/4/19:
A first for me and Mr. B:
That's right: I found a 125 year old typo. Of course now I really want to know if anybody has corrected it over the years. A little side mission to Cambodia, perhaps? We'll see. Let's just say it could happen, given the entrenchment of the OCD forces in this man's army.
And in today's Footnote News...hmmm, that really deserves a logo, doesn't it?
Ahem.
In today's
At the bottom...or, more properly, at the FOOT of page 248, Buckle was discussing the relative merits of the writing styles of one Dr. Trail and another Lord Brougham, and concluded that "Dr. Trail's style is clearer, and his sentences are less involved, than Lord Brougham's; and he had moreover the great advantage of understanding the subject upon which he wrote." Oh, Mr. Buckle, you scalliwag! How I do love thee!
And with that I hit page 250 of Volume I...which is just a breath away from the halfway point. My goodness...this is all going by much to quickly.
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| 250 |
I mean, just look how these pages have flown by:
Speaking of religion...
There's a section in today's 20 pages which starts off sounding like it's going to lay waste to the idea of religion...but then it distinguishes between barbaric religions and more sensible religions. On the more sensible side there's less focus on "marvels," less discouragement of questioning and even doubt, and fewer Gods--in fact, just the one will do, thank you. Which sounds like a nod towards Christianity being ok. Not so much for Judaism, apparently, as THB points out that those pesky Jews were constantly straining to return to polytheism. He makes note of this by saying, "Notwithstanding the most severe and unremitting punishments, they, at every opportunity, abandoned that pure theism which their minds were too backward to receive, and relapsed into superstitions which they could more easily understand,—into the worship of the golden calf, and the adoration of the brazen serpent."
And I had to draw up short at that, because unless I've missed something, it looks like Buckle is just wrong about one of the details here. The reference to worshipping the golden calf is most certainly in line with his assertion that the Jews were at least sometimes inclined to slide back into polytheism...but the "adoration of the brazen serpent"? Like uh-uh. That was a story about God directing the Israelites to look to the bronze serpent on a pole in order to be healed of something or other.
Or so I thought. Heh heh. You know, every once in awhile I'll ask Joe about something and he'll give me an answer that I think is totally wrong, and when I press him he sticks to his guns. And then I go Google it (or whatever 20th Century equivalent is at hand) and, of course, Joe is proven right. I just Googled "Old Testament story about the bronze serpent" and I didn't land on the story I expected to find. Instead I landed on 2 Kings 18:4, which says, "He removed the high places, smashed the sacred stones and cut down the Asherah poles. He broke into pieces the bronze snake Moses had made, for up to that time the Israelites had been burning incense to it. (It was called Nehushtan.) Yep. There's another Bronze Serpent story. And in this one, the Jews are worshipping it. Slipping into Pantheism. Well, shit. The reference could have been clearer, man. But I yield.
ANYway. From there, Buckle gives some more examples of Jews not sticking to their Monotheistic Gun, and caps it by saying, "...this they did because they were in that state of barbarism, of which idolatry is the natural product." Which isn't very nice, but I guess you have to give him this one. It also generalizes quite nicely, doesn't it? The mind which has not advanced intellectually has a natural tendency towards idolatry. There are some implications here for Romantic Love, I think, but as I have nothing to do with that particular subject, I am not going to joust with my ten foot pole.
And then...following on this attack...Buckle takes aim at Catholicism. Check this out: "...the Catholic religion is more superstitious, and more intolerant, than the Protestant...." And then he really brings the heat: " The adoration of idols was succeeded by the adoration of saints; the worship of the Virgin was substituted for the worship of Cybele; Pagan ceremonies were established in Christian churches; not only the mummeries of idolatry, but likewise its doctrines, were quickly added, and were incorporated and worked into the spirit of the new religion; until, after the lapse of a few generations, Christianity exhibited so grotesque and hideous a form, that its best features were lost, and the lineaments of its earlier loveliness altogether destroyed." Holy fuck! Catholicism grotesque? Yowza.
Well. Where do I go from there? I do see Buckle's point, of course. But this time I'm not going to Google for confirmation. I think he's wrong, and I think he has misunderstood Catholicism in the way that it is commonly misunderstood by Protestants. I do not believe that Catholicism is a religion in which idols are worshipped. To me, that would be like saying that Protestantism is not monotheistic because it worships a Triune God. On the surface that may sound like a correct assessment, but an understanding of the concept of the Trinity undermines that flacid and superficial assessment.
Which still leaves me uncomfortable. Because I love Buckle, and I think he is monstrously brilliant. So why would he have this blind spot? He spent his life fighting to acquire every scrap of information he could find...so how could he neglect to study Catholicism deeply enough to appreciate what it was saying? I can understand how he might feel antipathy towards it either because (1) he was a Heavy Duty Protestant Guy or (2) because he disdained religion...but I don't know if either of those possibilities is true at this point. Either way, though, I think it's still a big problem. Religion is way too big a part of the history of civilization in England for it to be glossed over with some superficial glances.
Guess I'll have to see if there's more on this...and ponder these things in my heart.
Disturbing reading today, though!
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| 270 |
Day 22: 3/ 6/19:
I had a clear memory of going down to the basement, finding my three volumes of Buckle's History, and deciding to bring the second volume upstairs and commence to reading it in the near near. I was pretty sure that I had either put it on the second set of bookshelves in the dining room or on the fourth set of shelves in the living room. So I didn't worry about it. And then when I decided to return to Buckle when I finished A History of Philosophy, I thought that it had been so long since I'd read volume I that I might as well re-read that instead of picking up with the second volume, as I'd first planned. And I had volume I at hand, so I didn't really start thinking about finding where I'd put volume II until a day or two ago. I looked on the second set of shelves in the dining room. Not there. I looked on the fourth set of shelves in the living room. Hmm, not there, either. Obviously I wasn't looking hard enough. But hey, I was already at work on trying to clean up and locate important papers, so I just shifted my attention slightly. Went through the second set of shelves in the dining room very carefully. Nope. Went through every book on the fourth set of shelves in the living room. Nope. Went through every book on the third set of shelves in the living room. Nope. First set? Nope. Second? Fifth? Nope. Sixth? Surely not. Nope. So I started thinking that it was hopeless, and hey, maybe I should just go ahead and buy that $250 set I found on Biblio.com, right? Of course, I could just buy a Kindle version for a buck. Then this morning I thought, I should check the basement. I've moved a lot of books down into the basement. It's easier than packing them up and making the trek to Half-Price, it's not as traumatic, and it gets them out of the way for the time being. I was sure that volume II wouldn't be down there, but I thought maybe I could at least get volume III. I had to go through two sets of shelves, each of which were stacked two deep. But I found volume III. And guess what? Volume II, too. So much for clear memories at my age, I suppose. But let's not dwell on the past. Here's to our glorious 👑Buckle👑:
As for today's reading (yes, 20 pages)...some most excellent stuff, some most biting stuff today. This time the jaws that bite left Catholicism alone and got hold of the politicians, who are always fair game in my book. To wit:
"...every government has inflicted on its subjects great injuries; and has done this nearly always with the best intentions."
And even more: "...political legislation[s]...compose an aggregate so formidable, that we may well wonder how, in the face of them, civilization has been able to advance."
That's pretty strong, eh wot?
But here's my favorite: "...the one main condition of the prosperity of a people is that its rulers shall have very little power, that they shall exercise that power very sparingly, and that they shall by no means presume to raise themselves into supreme judges of the national interests, or deem themselves authorized to defeat the wishes of those for whose benefit alone they occupy the post entrusted to them."
Am I wrong in thinking that Buckle would be an Old School Republican if he were a modern American? I am 100% sure that he would have no time for a flaccid idiot in chief like The Real Donald J. Trump, but I can't see him going Bernie Sanders, either.
Day 23: 3/ 7/19:
I knocked back the second half of A Midsummer Night's Dream today, so I will probably settle for 10 pages of Buckle. Though the night is young, and so are we...so are we!
Today's highlights:
This charming 
:
And in addition to the charming-ness of this bit of artlessness, I think it also points out, by default, the immensity of the task which Buckle took on in the writing of his book...or the first three volumes of it, anyway. Can you imagine putting all of this information together...from literally thousands and thousands of sources...without a computer? Just putting information into notes and then pulling them all together? You would have to have an incredible mind to be able to manage a feat like that.
Also, in If I Had a ♥️ I Would Love You Department:
I showed that to Joe, who was once a HUGE Vikings fan (we gave it up after Ragnar died and the cruelty factor starting climbing into the stratosphere--which seemed to happen concurrently), thinking that he would be thrilled, but I don't think he really cared. Say La Vie.
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| 300 |
Day 24: 3/ 8/19:
A really big day...biggest reading day yet, actually, at THIRTY--count 'em--THIRTY PAGES. Reason being (1) I really liked this book a lot and (2)
...I had an appointment at the Cardiologist's Office. And I didn't have time to drop Joe off at work and go back home and then come back, so I was way early. And they weren't on-time. So I ended up with a good hour+ of time, and it was just me and my Buckle strolling down the cardiac avenue.And there was lots of good stuff in those pages, for sure. About ten of them were devoted to Buckle being a smart ass about some of the absurdities of accepted history in years gone by...and why that was a thing back when. (It had a lot to do with the only literate people being those in religious orders...but also had something to do with the codification into written language of history--and yes, that is counter-intuitive and counter-common sense, but HTB makes a good case there.)
There were also a number of, "Yep, that was then and it's still so now" moments, such as
and some of that old Buckle Bite in lines like this: "...no man could live in the fifteenth century without having his mind enfeebled by the universal credulity." Which also counts as another That Was Then and It's Still So Now comment.
Overall, I'm definitely feeling a great deal of animosity toward religion from Buckle...with a bit of a softer attitude toward Protestants, as he definitely sees them as (at least initially) motivated more by reason. And I see his point, for sure. But in my mind the beauty of Catholicism (keeping in mind that I am not nor have I ever been a Catholic, though I have spent a fair amount of time hanging out with them) has nothing to do with rationality. In fact, I would have to say that reason is the opposite of religion...not in an oppositional way, but more in a If You Want To Visit The Great Lakes, Drive North, But If You Want To Visit The Panama Canal, Drive South way. (And I am all about that Panama Canal, man. Fuck the Great Lakes.)
But I've got a lot more pages to read before I can really pronounce my opinion on this with any hint of certainty. (Although not that many more pages to read in volume I: I am 175 pages from the end of that. Which seems amazing, but I guess it isn't, as it has been almost a month since I started it. Still...I'm happy with it.)
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| 330 |
Day 25: 3/ 9/19:
These are a few of my favorite things today:
Buckle really leans on this idea of the importance of Doubt. In fact, he makes no bones about it being THE essential catalyst for progress in all areas...scientific, of course, but also political, religious, and social. I don't think he has any respect for people who do not doubt...those who want no "new truth which interferes with their foregone conclusions." Trump much? (Which is unfair. I know that there are lots and lots of Liberals / Progressives / Leftists / Whatevers who do exactly the same thing. But I just hate Trump SO MUCH, y'know?
Also, I just love this line: "that natural inclination to dogmatize with which apostasy is usually accompanied." That's a good one. I guess once you've taken the big step you want to assure yourself that it was the right thing to do...in other words, that you weren't a fool...so you let the dogmatize out (woof, woof, woof).
Buckle actually says a few nice things about Catholics along the way in this section...like that it's better not to burn them or torture them for their beliefs. Hey, it's a step in the right direction. The last line I read today also seemed particularly noteworthy to me: "...such was the force of old associations, that our countrymen long continued to respect what they had ceased to venerate." That just seems very American to me. Like how people go out of their minds because some football players kneeled during the singing of the national anthem, when the truth is that most of the people in the stands could give a shit about that stupid song and are so impatient for it to be over that they start cheering before the final notes have been wrung from the throat of the singer.
Yeah. Like that.
But my favorite line in today's reading came earlier on:
"They who do not feel the darkness, will never look for the light."
Yep.
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| 350 |
Day 26: 3/ 10/19:
Did my ten pages (and a little bit more, but didn't finish another ten...though I might get on that after this) of Buckle in church this morning. But it's okay...we got there one hour early, so there was plenty of nothing going on.
Besides, church was a pretty appropriate place to be reading today's ten. To wit:
"It is necessary that men should learn to doubt, before they begin to tolerate; and that they should recognize the fallibility of their own opinions, before they respect the opinions of their opponents." (352) I mean...right? And this is exactly why religious zealots are so distasteful...and why they do such a grave disservice to the religion that they are so fervently trying to be advocates for. It is not human to have no doubts. Unless...as Buckle implies...you are dumber than a box of rocks or in denial or being brainwashed. Or all of the above.
This same idea continues into this bit, when Buckle makes reference to "every man who is not blinded by the prejudices of an imperfect education." Buckle is being a little gentler here, in that "an imperfect education" is, at least early on, hardly the fault of the individual...but it comes to the same thing: you can't be a fully developed human being unless there is room for doubt in your mind. And though he hasn't come right out and said it, I think Buckle would also say that you can't be a true Christian unless there is some doubt in your mind. To stretch a story a bit, we'd have to say that Peter didn't sink because of a lack of faith, but because he was human, and it is human to sink. That is why mountains are not casting themselves into the sea on a regular basis.
Last but not least, here (from a footnote on p. 357) is the most blatant statement against atheism I've seen so far from Buckle. Also note the insistence on toleration here--which is kind of ironic given his earlier scathing comments about Catholicism, but you've got to take what you can get. Here ya go: "...the sceptic steers a middle course between atheism and orthodoxy, rejecting both extremes, because he sees that both are incapable of proof." Now that is just an outright denunciation of atheism. And orthodoxy, too, of course. But that leaves a lot of "Christian" territory to hold onto.
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| 360 (church pew) |
Day 27: 3/ 11/19:
Didn't actually read 20 pages today, but I had thought I was going to do another 10 yesterday, only did 7 of them, so just carried it over. Also spent a bit of time today talking Buckle with Craig, who seemed at least a little bit interested in it...especially the references to Robert Boyle.
And then there was this:
"...we resort to the impious contrivance of calling in the aid of the Deity to supply those deficiencies in science which are the result of our own sloth; and we are not ashamed, in our public churches, to prostitute the rites of religion by using them as a cloak to conceal an ignorance we ought frankly to confess."
Bazinga indeed.
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| 380 |
Day 28: 3/ 12/19:
Sorry to say that this is a pretty fucking depressing day for me...but you know what? I still got out my History of Civilization in England, and I still read, and I encountered some pretty brilliant stuff, and it made me feel a little bit better about things.
Brilliant stuff:
Try not to think of Trump while you read this bit:
"If we look only at the characters of the rulers, and at their foreign policy, we must pronounce the reign of Charles II to be the worst that has ever been seen in England. ...Politically and morally, there were to be found in the government all the elements of confusion, of weakness, and of crime. The king himself was a mean and spiritless voluptuary, without the morals of a Christian, and almost without the feelings of a man. His ministers, with the exception of Clarendon, whom he hated for his virtues, had not one of the attributes of statesmen, and nearly all of them were pensioned by the crown of France. The weight of taxation was increased, while the security of the kingdom was diminished. By the forced surrender of the charters of the towns, our municipal rights were endangered. By shutting the exchequer, our national credit was destroyed. Though immense sums were spent in maintaining our naval and military power, we were left so defenceless, that when a war broke out, which had long been preparing, we seemed suddenly to be taken by surprise. Such was the miserable incapacity of the government, that the fleets of Holland were able, not only to ride triumphant round our coasts, but to sail up the Thames, attack our arsenals, burn our ships, and insult the metropolis of England."
Right? And this might be the best statement of the importance of The Press that I've ever read:
"...that great Public Press, which, more than any other single cause, has diffused among the people a knowledge of their own power, and has thus, to an almost incredible extent, aided the progress of English civilization."
Pretty much sums up why dictators and other tyrants are so opposed to a free press...and why they would refer to it as The Enemy of the People.
Also, here's a nice jab at the Men In Power: "...the history of every civilized country is the history of its intellectual development, which kings, statesmen, and legislators are more likely to retard than to hasten...." And Buckle follows up on that jib with an invocation of Macbeth: he says that Kings, statesmen, and legislators "are only to be retarded as the puppets who strut and fret their hour upon a little stage...." And I say--Fuckin' A, Bubba.
Funny...there's another swipe at Charles II and his court--but Buckle also notes that beCAUSE Charles II was such an incompetent, vulgar, fool, that it actually facilitated progress. Break it down:
"...so far from being made in spite of the vices of the sovereign, they were actually aided by them. With the exception of the needy profligates who thronged his court, all classes of men soon learned to despise a king who was a drunkard, a libertine, and a hypocrite; who had neither shame nor sensibility; and who, in point of honour, was unworthy to enter the presence of the meanest of his subjects. To have the throne filled for a quarter of a century by such a man as this, was the surest way of weakening that ignorant and indiscriminate loyalty, to which the people have often sacrificed their dearest rights. Thus, the character of the king, merely considered from this point of view, was eminently favourable to the growth of national liberty. But the advantage did not stop there. The reckless debaucheries of Charles made him abhor every thing approaching to restraint...."
...but the funny thing is that I obviously first read this in 2008, because in the margin I wrote:
That was back in the days when I thought that the Bush / Cheney Junta was As Bad As It Could Get.
And oh, oh...check this out: "In his reign, the highest dignities in the church were invariably conferred upon men who were deficient either in ability or in honesty. It would perhaps be an over-refinement to ascribe to the king a deliberate plan for lowering the reputation of the episcopal bench; but it is certain, that if he had such a plan, he followed the course most likely to effect his purpose."
And dat's da name uh DAT tune.
Oh, oh...one more ditty: "So long as this compact held good, they were indifferent as to matters which they considered to be of minor importance. They looked on in silence, while the king was amassing the materials with which he hoped to turn a free government into an absolute monarchy."
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| 400 |
Day 29: 3/ 13/19:
It's a little bit (but not ha ha) funny: the first time I read History of Civilization in England Volume I, it made me think of George W. Bush so many times that I ended up writing a "review" of it for Rain Taxi that was totally skewed to that perspective. ("Widely Unavailable: History of Civilization in England by Henry Thomas Buckle" | Rain Taxi Vol. 12, No.3, Fall 2007 (#47) And yes, I'm still surprised that they published it, since it was hardly a normal review (hence " " ), and can only conclude that editor Eric Lorberer loves me. And yes, I love him, too.) But that was then...and this is now. So much of the commentary makes me think of Trump and the Republican Party. Especially in the William II section. Here's the latest bit: " This is what the clergy would have done, if they had loved their country better than they loved their order. But they pursued a precisely opposite course; because they preferred the petty interests of their own class to the welfare of the great body of the people, and because they would rather that the country should be oppressed than that the church should be humbled." I mean...come ON, man. Is that the fuckin' nutshell, or what?
And in other news...I was today introduced...well, RE-introduced, I suppose, since I have read this book before, but since I didn't remember it, it's a de facto non-re re...to one George Whitefield, who "preached at least 18,000 times to perhaps 10 million listeners in Great Britain and the American colonies." (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Whitefield) And get this: he preached his first sermon in 1732, and he died in 1770...so that means he preached over 470 sermons a year. Yowza. That is impressive.
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| 420 |
Day 30: 3/14/19:
Well, it was just a day until the last page today. Not a BAD day, mind you, as every page of Buckle that I've read so far has been at least good, but nothing particularly remarkable. And then...Foundation. Read about it HERE if'n you want to. (I got cones if ennybuddy wants 'em.
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| 440 |
Day 31: 3/15/19:
And furthermore...
But here's the coup de grâce:
Okay...the jig is up. Clearly Buckle was a time traveler who visited The Trump Era, had a look around, and then went back to 1857 and wrote it up as if he were talking about British monarchs. Alternatively, perhaps this should give us some hope. England survived its idiot kings, and they ruled for a lot longer than Trump will be able to...so maybe things aren't as dire as they seem to be.
But they do seem to be pretty fuckin' dire.
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| 460 |
Day 32: 3/16/19:
Quite a few of today's twenty pages concerned Edmund Burke--
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| public domain |
Speaking of George, there were also some more Trump cards there, such as:
"...the throne was occupied by a prince whose first object was to keep ministers in strict dependence on himself, and who, whenever it was practicable, called into office such weak and flexible men as would yield unhesitating submission to his wishes. Every thing being thus prepared, there followed those events which were to be expected from such a combination. Without stopping to relate details which are known to every reader, it may be briefly mentioned that, in this new state of things, the wise and forbearing policy of the preceding reign was set at naught, and the national councils guided by rash and ignorant men, who soon brought the greatest disasters upon the country, and within a few years actually dismembered the empire."
O my prophetic soul!
And in a footnote appended to this bit, Buckle quotes Lord Albemarle as saying, "a court that required ministers to be, not the public servants of the state, but the private domestics of the sovereign." Talk about a Big 🔥!
🚒 Time.
And oh yeah, speaking of Mr. Shake-speare, how about this allusion / accolade...which is also an allusion to and a lament for the aforementioned Mr. Burke:
"We may contemplate with reverence the mighty ruin; but the mysteries of its decay let no man presume to invade, unless, to use the language of the greatest of our masters, he can tell how to minister to a diseased mind, pluck the sorrows which are rooted in the memory, and raze out the troubles that are written in the brain."
In terms of praise of Shake-speare, I find this particularly noteworthy in that in some of his previous comments, I got the distinct impression that Buckle considered Literature to be pretty much a waste of time...but obviously if he did feel that way, Shake-speare was considered to be an exception. A Big Exception.
Also speaking of Shake-speare, since I'm so close to the end of Volume I now (a mere 25 pages to go!), I looked at the 24 pages of advertisements for other books published by Longman's and Company and was delighted to see this:
Since I am midway through reading Romeo and Juliet, which has some really, really, REALLY dirty jokes, I can kind of understand what motivated Mr. and Miss Bowdler to set about this project. I mean...I wouldn't want my kids to be reading jokes about anal sex and erections either, y'know? Not that I apPROVE of Bowdlerization, of course. Just that I understand the impetus.
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| 480 |
Day 33: 3/17/19:
This is the end, beautiful friend. Only had 25 pages left, so I just went for it. I'm pretty anxious to keep this going into Volume II, and plan to start reading it tomorrow. It's been an amazing read. Actually much better than the first time through. I love Buckle's style, am amazed by his mind, and am entranced by his insightful comments. He also has a good sense of humor. Much as I loved reading Copleston, Buckle's book is far, far better, for sure.
One last quote:
One last page shot:
And la grande finale:
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