The 7 Romantic Virtues

Part 1: Aristotle and the Romantics

The following is a list that I have been contemplating for some time now and I admit that it is still very much a work in progress. I have chosen seven virtues because its traditional, but I am sure that I could list more. Perhaps I might use my Romantic licence to rebel and have nine virtues, then again, Aristotle had twelve.

So what then is a virtue? A virtue is a positive habit. For example you might say that brushing your teeth twice a day throughout your life has made it a habitual practice, the result is healthy teeth and gums, therefore it is a positive habit, or virtue. Let's say I choose to rebel. Virtues are for goody-two-shoes. So I don't brush regularly. This is a vice, a bad habit, because the result is a dirty, disease ridden mouth and all my teeth fall out.

When I write of Romanticism, I refer not simply to a movement in art and literature but to the zeitgeist (spirit of the age) of the Romantic Era from the late Seventeenth Century to the early Twentieth Century. What some call "The Long Century" or the Victorian Era since Queen Victoria's reign encompassed most of the period.

I mark the end of the Romantic Era in Europe with the starting of World War I and in the United States with the coming of the Great Depression. However, this was not a sudden end but a gradual decline; therefore elements of the Romantic have held progressively less and less influence with each successive generation throughout the Twentieth Century. Today elements are still present, but largely forgotten, misunderstood, or marginalised.

This is important to note because the philosophical foundation underpinning the culture of the Romantic Era was essentially Aristotelian in nature. On a basic level any philosophy, be it written, cultural, or personal, can be charted along a line with Platonic Idealism at one extreme and Aristotelian Realism on the other. The Twentieth Century saw the decline of the Aristotelian and the rise of the Platonic.

Idealism focuses on what I call the Subjective Reality, the realm of individual perception, belief, and feeling which we all inhabit. Religion and mysticism fall squarely into this camp, though some lean more to the Aristotelian right than others. Due to their emphasis on individual feelings and emotions the common wisdom places the Romantics in this camp as well. If an idea is not in keeping with reality we call it "romantic", as in dismissing someone's "romantic" notions.

I'll admit that my conception of the Romantic is not the mainstream, so here is my argument. First look at what preceded the Romantic – The Enlightenment, also known as the Neo-Classical Period and the Age of Reason. The hallmark of the age was the rediscovery and application of Greco-Roman thought. With the rise of Capitalism, Republicanism, and Science it laid the foundation for the individualism associated with the Long Century. There would be no Romantic without Enlightenment.

The Classicists championed order, reason, proportion and balance. The Romantics challenged this. The establishment embraced the Classical so they embraced the Gothic. The establishment upheld reason, so they upheld emotion. Where the establishment exalted beauty, they exalted the sublime. The Romantics were almost like rebellious teenagers who never really fell too far from the tree. This is most evident when the Neo-Classical Period passed and the Romantic flourished.

The Neo-Classicists emphasised the form itself as the source of beauty and the Romantics focused on the emotional reaction to the form. Nevertheless, both schools emphasised form – that is reality.

The result in the Romantic was an artistic style that was highly imagistic. The fine art copied reality and the literature was thick with descriptive details. This was all with the intent to stir the reader's passions by embellishing reality, not superseding it.

Think for a moment of another modern Romantic cliché, the romantic dinner. The whole experience is highly visceral through the careful orchestration and appreciation of reality. Think of the physicality of the wine, the meal, the candles, the music, and of course the partner.

In contrast, Idealism is the belief that reality as we perceive it is merely the reflection of a greater, supernatural reality only understood through the heart. Thus are the emotions divorced from the form and evoked by the idea of the form rather than the form itself. During the mid-Nineteenth Century Idealism entered popular culture in America through the Transcendentalist Movement which laid the groundwork for the late Twentieth Century and current "Age of Feeling".

The major difference between the world of today and that of the Victorians is the current predominance of Platonic Idealism over Aristotelian Realism. This is not to say that there were not Idealists in the Romantic Era or that there are not Aristotelians in the current post-modern. It is merely a case of the cultural dominance of one over the other in the general zeitgeist.

When was the last time that you heard an argument in which someone made an appeal to nature? No, I am not referring to environmentalists. Once there was this idea of Natural Law. It held that the universe is governed by laws and humans living in this universe are subject to those laws. As Sir Francis Bacon observed, "Nature to be
commanded, must be
obeyed." This argument was common during the Victorian Era, so no matter what heights they achieved, they were always grounded in reality. This is ultimately an Aristotelian notion.

The Idealist, however, is always focused on the future, by which I mean their idea of the future, rather than the reality of the past or present. For them, Natural Law is irrelevant because they do not recognise any authority beyond their own whim.

For example let's look at two stereotypical Star Trek geeks engaged in an argument. They can debate points from various episodes, quote the technical manuals, and perhaps even mention scientific studies. The ideas expressed can be incredibly intricate and complex displaying a stunning intellect from both parties. They can be so consumed by their own thoughts that they forget one important point. None of this is real.

In his essay, "Why Isn't Socialism Dead?", Lee Harris observes that despite a history of failure and mass murder socialism persists because people believe in the idea of it. Even in mixed economies, socialism only works as long as there are producers who are willing and able to fund it and a central bank capable of creating fiat currency, but that is only a temporary measure before the system eventually collapses under its own debt. We have seen this occur over and over again, it is happening now, and yet socialism persists because people want to believe and they make their arguments as an appeal to sentimentality rather than an appeal to nature.

Like the Star Trek geeks, politicians, lobbyist, academics, union activists, and special interests groups can endlessly debate and argue intellectual and complex ideas that are, like the starship Enterprise, pure fiction because they are not rooted in the fundamentals of reality. Any idea that goes against the supreme Law of Nature, that is Objective Reality, is a fiction, no matter how much it is contrived otherwise.

I tend to argue points based on fundamental principles of nature. When I argue with a socialist, they usually discuss the poor and suffering people of the world, be they the exploited workers, the single mothers, or the oppressed minorities. They might then point out the wealthy business owners or the evil corporations.

All of these examples are ideas of groups. Granted, they may single out a specific person who exemplifies their point, but ultimately its just generalisation. They then advocate taking the property from the evil group that has plenty and giving that money to the government who then redistributes it to the good people who have little and are in a state of need.

I would argue that such a practice goes against Natural Law. Look at the fundamentals. All animals produce to survive. For humans, this requires a means of production (capital) with which they produce values which are traded for other values. Successful producers provide the use of their capital to others so that can produce even more. The workers, who do not own the necessary capital to produce for themselves, receive a payment of values from their employers in exchange for their labour. The poor are those who lack the necessary skill, power, or opportunity to sell their time and energy at their required level of values. To state the obvious a bit more obviously, poor people are people who don't make enough money.

Humans exist, therefore we have a right to exist. The requirements to maintain that existence are food, shelter, clothing, healthcare, and access to capital (either your own or an employers). If you've got that baseline sorted then that's you done. Anything else is a question of quantity and quality.

Admittedly, living at the baseline is pretty rubbish, but most appeals for the poor are not about existence but regard the quantity and quality of values, which is all relative. The outrage stems from the fact that some hypothetical person has more than another hypothetical person. So it can be argued that socialism is fundamentally based on the sin of covetousness which then leads to the sin of theft, also known as taxation for the purpose of the redistribution of wealth.

This is a sin because it goes against Natural Law. According to Mazlow's Heirarchy of Need, just above that baseline for existence is safety. Humans need to feel safe and secure. How safe and secure will you feel in a world where the government can use force to take your property thus leaving you with no recourse but to either submit or risk life and limb fighting back?

There are a number of ways to argue against socialism based on Natural Law. I've presented only one. My purpose here is to illustrate the difference between Platonic Idealism that places subjectivity and sentimentality over reality and Aristotelian Realism that obeys the Natural Law and bends the subjective around the objective. Romanticism looks at how the individual feels about reality while Idealism says the feelings are reality.

Natural Law also rewards the strong. The strong lions get the kill and the weak among the gazelles get the condiments. Look at political correctness and speech codes. You cannot say anything that I might find offensive. The Romantic, following the Natural Law, would respond, "I have the right to say whatever I like, and if you're too much of a pussy to deal with that, then fuck-off." Yes, nature can be brutal. I would argue that weakness, according to Natural Law, is also a sin. This is evident when we look at Aristotle's virtues in the next section.

Part 2: The Virtues

I once read a criticism of Aristotelian ethics that saw it as being those of a boring, middle-age man. This seems a far cry from the young, wild Romantics. The author focused on Aristotle's idea of the Golden Mean. It is the sweet middle-bit of human thought, feeling, and action that is not too hot and not too cold. No, it's not quite in keeping with Romantic extremism. However, when you look at the Aristotelian virtues within context the boring middle bit is more of a safe passage between two levels of self-destruction.

Rather than dwell on the Aristotelian virtues I have included a chart that illustrates the relationship between the Golden Mean and the vices of the extremes. The vices fall into two groups. One is having an excess of the quality and the other a deficiency of it. Each quality is also given a sphere of action or feeling, such as getting and spending money for both daily activities and major expenditures, and social interactions.

According to Aristotle's model, a bad person is a destructive or unproductive person. Today when we think of evil people we think of people who destroy the lives of others, and yet we pity, coddle, and protect the unproductive person. One is suffering from excess and the other of a deficiency. Neither is in the Golden Mean. Neither is good. The weak, timid, introvert is no more good than the abusive, aggressive extrovert. Where one overtly destroys the other covertly hinders.

When a man aims for the middle, The Golden Mean, but shoots either too high or too low, then he has missed the mark. This notion was so entrenched in Greek thought that an archery term was applied to ethics which literally means "to miss the mark". This word, hamartanein, is the same word used in the original Greek New Testament of the Bible and translates into English as the word sin.

As you read through the list, take time to consider people that you know, have seen in the media, and even yourself to see how the people in your world measure up.

ARISTOTLE'S TABLE OF VIRTUES AND VICES

Sphere of Action or Feeling: Fear and Confidence

Excess: Rashness

Mean: Courage

Deficiency: Cowardice

Sphere of Action or Feeling: Pleasure and Pain

Excess: Licentiousness/Self-indulgence

Mean: Temperance/Restraint

Deficiency: Insensibility

Sphere of Action or Feeling: Getting and Spending (minor)

Excess: Prodigality/Wastefulness

Mean: Liberality

Deficiency: Illiberality/Meanness

Sphere of Action or Feeling: Getting and Spending (major)

Excess: Vulgarity/Tastelessness

Mean: Magnificence

Deficiency: Pettiness/Niggardliness

Sphere of Action or Feeling: Honour and Dishonour (major)

Excess: Vanity

Mean: Magnanimity/of Noble spirit

Deficiency: Weak-spirited/lack of boldness and resolve

Sphere of Action or Feeling: Honour and Dishonour (minor)

Excess: Ambition/empty vanity

Mean: Proper ambition/pride

Deficiency: Unambitiousness/undue humility

Sphere of Action or Feeling: Anger

Excess: Quick-tempered

Mean: Patience/Good temper

Deficiency: Lack of spirit/unirascibility

Sphere of Action or Feeling: Self-expression

Excess: Boastfulness

Mean: Truthfulness

Deficiency: Understatement/mock modesty

Sphere of Action or Feeling: Conversation

Excess: Buffoonery

Mean: Wittiness

Deficiency: Boorishness, crass, or insensitive

Sphere of Action or Feeling: Social Conduct

Excess: Obsequiousness (being kiss-ass)

Mean: Friendliness

Deficiency: Cantankerousness

Sphere of Action or Feeling: Shame

Excess: Shyness

Mean: Modesty

Deficiency: Shamelessness

Sphere of Action or Feeling: Indignation

Excess: Envy

Mean: Righteous indignation

Deficiency: Malicious enjoyment/Spitefulness

As lists of virtues go, Aristotle's is the most complete. Here are a few other lists:

Cardinal: Prudence, Justice, Restraint/Temperance

Theological: Faith, Hope, Love or Charity.

Heavenly: Chastity, Temperance, Charity, Diligence, Patience, Kindness, and Humility

Victorian: Work, Temperance, Orderliness, and Responsibility.

Bushido: Rectitude, Courage, Benevolence, Respect, Honesty, Honour, and Loyalty.

Those lists were taken from Wikipedia. Here is another taken from the book "G is for Gentleman" by Sam Martin. These are listed as "Top Ten Qualities To Nurture".

1. Competence – Knowledge breeds power.

2. Patience – And even keel will bring long life.

3. Resolve – Always follow through and you'll earn other people's respect.

4. Respect – Treat others with the same respect you hold for yourself.

5. Self assurance – Being sure of what you do allows others to be sure of who you are.

6. Spirit – Laughter is the fountain of youth.

7. Diplomacy – Making friends is harder but more rewarding than making enemies.

8. Courage – Never be afraid of failure.

9. Trustworthiness – Do what you say and say what you do.

10. Constitution – Persistence pays.

You'll no doubt notice overlaps in all of these lists, regardless of religion, culture or zeitgeist.

A virtue is a positive habit that will lead to flourishing. This pursuit of happiness is the goal of the Romantic, so it pays to be virtuous, even for "evil" Romantics. However, the Romantic has another important path.

Romanticism is a value focused lifestyle. Ayn Rand noted that philosophically Romanticism is the quest to glorify man's existence and psychologically it is the desire to make life more interesting. This is accomplished through the act of creation.

Think of the hero's journey. He begins in his safe home and ends in his safe home. Both are static states. Life is safe, routine, and comfortable. In between these two stasis points is chaos. That is where the story is. That is where life is interesting. That is where his existence becomes glorified. It is through this process of either defending or creating values.

Chaos is a tricky place to be. The hero may succeed in passing through it or he may be destroyed. This is where the Golden Mean applies. Too much stasis is boring and too much chaos may destroy you. Nevertheless, the Romantic hero must pass through chaos to gain his prize. So what virtues are required for him to make it safely through?

Before I answer that, there is one more important consideration regarding virtues. A virtue is a positive habit – it is an action. Every person acts rationally according to their Subjective Reality, therefore your actions are born from your core beliefs about the world. These beliefs determine your orientation to reality.

So if you believe that there is such a thing as plaque, that it causes tooth decay, eventual tooth loss, the only way to stop it is brushing twice a day, and the ramifications of these facts are accepted on a deep emotional level, then you will take care to brush twice a day till eventual it becomes part of your programming. Brushing becomes a virtue. As a consequence you have lovely teeth to be proud to have and show.

When we describe the orientation of one object to another, such as an aeroplane's orientation to the horizon, we use the word attitude. As we act in the world, others perceive our actions and interpret our orientation to reality. This is also called attitude.

When an employer criticises an employee's attitude and demands that he change it, what he is really asking him to do is to suddenly change his core beliefs. Needless to say this rarely permanently works despite the employee's attempts to change.

Likewise any attempt to acquire certain virtues requires a change in core beliefs and the creation of new patterns of behaviour --new habits -- and this new orientation to reality is perceived by others as attitude. From the individual's perspective this change of belief will be felt as mood, a general baseline emotional foundation.

In writing this I must admit to a failure. I attempted to list corresponding beliefs that lead to the virtues and the attitudes manifested for each. I still believe the theory to be sound, however beliefs are like a chemical mix with different variations all leading to the same result. Likewise there is a degree of interpretation involved in assessing attitude. Some people are inspired by the hero while others are intimidated. So I will leave it to you my dear reader to ask yourself what you believe and whether those beliefs promote the virtues to which you aspire to make habitual. Nonetheless, I have included some beliefs and attitudes where they seem appropriate.

If I were to ask you to imagine a Romantic and list his qualities, what would you list? It's a difficult question given the broad use of the word Romantic. Let's bypass the Byronic Hero in favour of something more mainstream as well a giving the traditional Romantic hero, in the Jean Valjean vein, and the anti-hero a miss. In this case let's focus on the popular conception.

This Romantic hero is individualistic, confident, dashing, charming, witty, tough, strong, competent and skilled. These are the qualities to which the real life Romantic should strive. He or she is that person often described as being "larger than life". Some people have these almost by nature while others have to develop these habits. That is my purpose for outlining these virtues here.

I have also differentiated between some masculine and feminine virtues. The central lie of the feminist movement is that men and women are the same. Equality does not mean uniformity. Due to evolution, men and women are different with different goals, interests, and inclinations. This applies to the virtues in that the requirements of the Romantic man are different from those of the Romantic woman.

Granted the last two decades has seen the rise of the female adventure hero who is a woman with the qualities associated with the male hero. The grand icon of this being Lara Croft. However, there are very, very few examples of this type of character in real life.

Virtues or attitudes to be predominantly masculine or feminine are indicated by an m or f.

The 7 Romantic Virtues

Belief : In order to control nature you must first understand it.
Virtue: Wisdom

Attitude: Competence

Belief : I am worthy of existence.
Virtue: Pride (self-confidence)
Attitude: m. Coolness/sang froid. f. Beaut

Belief : I live in a world of abundance.
Virtue: Magnanimity
Attitude: Acceptance

Belief : The world is an interesting place filled with new discoveries and new experiences.
Virtue: m. Passion f. Sensuality
Attitude: m. Dashing, Inquisitive f. Stylish, Creative

Belief : My existence is an end in itself. No on can claim my existence nor can I claim the existence of others.
Virtue: m. Enterprise f. Self-reliance
Attitude: m. Ambition f. Steadfastness. Faithfulness

Belief : It is vitally important to be strong and yet it is also important to care for others.
Virtue: m. Chivalry f. Grace
Attitude: m. The air of command that engenders confidence in others.
f. Warmth, kindness.

Belief : Failure is part of the process, so it is important to learn from it and keep going.
Virtue: m. Gallantry f. Charm
Attitude: Easy-going, carefree, witty

Here are some definitions to clarify the concepts:

Virtue: A positive pattern of habitual behaviour.

Wisdom: The alignment of Objective, Subjective, and Artificial Realities. Knowing how the world, society, and people work. The result is an attitude of competence and efficacy.

Pride: Self-confidence born of accomplishment and the sense of personal efficacy. It is what Aristotle called "the crown of virtues". It is the reward for living a virtuous life. The male attitude is the coolness born of self-confidence and in the female it is beauty manifested in care of her appearance because, "she's worth it". Beauty is endeavouring to create delight in all aspects of life, from environment, to manner, to appearance.

Magnanimity: To be of great generosity or noble-spirit. I have observed among the upper classes that I have met, those who might be deemed noble, that they are not critical or judgemental and show a certain generosity of spirit. Because the Romantic believes in the state of abundance, then he knows that there is always more. There is more money, love, and success in the world. This allows the attitude of acceptance of people and the world unhindered by the insecurity that he may be overshadowed or left without.

Passion/Sensuality: Passion is the state of high-interest representing the alignment of the mental and the emotional. What NLP practitioners call "The Flow State". I marked passion as masculine because captures the idea of the male drive to action. The feminine state is also passionate, but I used the word sensuality because women tend to be more attuned to the sense of things. The male attitude is dash, defined as spirited, audacious, full of high spirits. Also chic and fashionable. This aligns with female style and creativity.

Enterprise: This has three given definitions. 1) a company, business, organization, or other purposeful endeavour. 2) an undertaking or project, especially a daring and courageous one. 3) a willingness to undertake new or risky projects; energy and initiative. This incorporates the ideas of creating and trading values as well as self-reliance and initiative. This applies to the artist, the businessman, or the inventor. The attitude here is ambition.

Self-Reliance: The ability to discover answers and get things done without an over-dependency on others. I divided the masculine and feminine here because traditionally man is the producer and woman the reproducer. However in the post-modern world enterprise can apply to women as well. As a man produces he needs a counterpart that is not overly dependent on his time and emotional energy but rather can support his enterprise. He needs her to remain faithful and steadfast. Again, these roles today can be reversed.

Chivalry: The ability to be either aggressive (violent) or kind depending on the context. The Romantic recognises the Natural Law of strength as vital, but strength must be used ethically. Chivalry can be described as an ethical use of power.

Grace (gracious): There are a few words associated with grace including: kind, warmly courteous, tactful, and compassionate. There is no sense of entitlement and there is an appreciation of others born of respect. In many ways this is the female equivalent of chivalry in that a woman attacks more with her tongue than her physicality. Likewise, in the case of chivalry kindness is the default mode and aggressions only as the situation demands. So too is it with grace. It lacks the aggression element of chivalry as men are generally more often called upon to be an aggressor then a woman. Instead woman have tact.

Gallantry: Nonchalant courage, it is facing life with in easy-going manner and any conflict or difficulty with wit and determination.

Charm: The original meaning was to bewitch, as in a magic charm. In a person it denotes the ability generate positive and favourable emotions in others. Like gallantry, it involves an easy going sense of life and requires courage and self-belief to work.

So to summarize, here are the 7 Romantic Virtues

1. Wisdom
   
2. Pride (self-confidence)
   
3. Magnanimity
   
4. Passion/Sensuality
   
5. Enterprise/Self-reliance
   
6. Chivalry/Grace
   
7. Gallantry/Charm
   

Many of these virtues are worthy of expanded explanation and I have written extensively on some of them, such as passion, chivalry, and gallantry. Suffice to say that more can be added and perhaps even refined.

Creating this list has been an off and on work in progress for over a year now which is far too long a time so I have written this essay which is also a bit too long no doubt. The next step is how to make the deep inner changes necessary to turn these concepts into actions and eventually virtues. But that is another essay for another time. If you are eager for me to show my hand, then refer to my essay entitled "Hereotypes" and that will show you the path I have in mind.