In a rule above, the retrograde exemplar was Alexander; in this case, the exemplar is his adversary Diogenes, who scornfully rebuffed the great ruler. Consider Plutarch’s account of the strange encounter between two of the most dissimilar great men in history:
Thereupon many statesmen and philosophers came to Alexander with their congratulations, and he expected that Diogenes of Sinope also, who was tarrying in Corinth, would do likewise. But since that philosopher took not the slightest notice of Alexander, and continued to enjoy his leisure in the suburb Craneion, Alexander went in person to see him; and he found him lying in the sun. Diogenes raised himself up a little when he saw so many people coming towards him, and fixed his eyes upon Alexander. And when that monarch addressed him with greetings, and asked if he wanted anything, “Yes,” said Diogenes, “stand a little out of my sun.” It is said that Alexander was so struck by this, and admired so much the haughtiness and grandeur of the man who had nothing but scorn for him, that he said to his followers, who were laughing and jesting about the philosopher as they went away, “But truly, if I were not Alexander, I wish I were Diogenes.” and Diogenes replied “If I wasn’t Diogenes, I would be wishing to be Diogenes too.”19
Here’s the moral of the story: never accept a gift or a nicety from an opponent, much less from the “social justice” mob. Never embrace an entitlement—bread or circuses—offered by Machiavellian politicians. Bread and circuses prove to be the wage by which radicals purchase their ill-gotten office and by which the individual is parted from his liberty.
Acceptance of economic favors from radicals puts one into their debt and robs the goodly man of his honor and self-possession. In other words, be magnanimous, offering aid to all in your path, but accepting it only from the most trusted friends—even then only with great hesitation. Once in a great while, one meets a radical not completely inoculated against the winsome allure of extemporaneous Christian virtue. Do not hold your breath, but you may just convert a radical through your example of magnanimity.
Aristotle defines the virtue of magnanimity in the following terms, “The great-souled [magnanimous] man is fond of conferring benefits, but ashamed to receive them, because the former is a mark of superiority and the latter of inferiority.”20 He continues, down the page, “It is also characteristic of the great-souled man never to ask help from others, or only with reluctance, but to render aid willingly; and to be haughty towards men of position and fortune, but courteous towards those of moderate station, because it is difficult and distinguished to be superior to the great, but easy to outdo the lowly … it is like putting forth one’s strength against the weak.”21 In these short lines, Aristotle explains why the magnanimous Diogenes would rebuff a man so admirable as Alexander: because he alone was worthy of a challenge. He alone was worthy of Diogenes’s haughtiness.
The retrograde must reclaim classical magnanimity for himself and for his people. He must learn to emulate both the great-souled man’s virtue and his contempt for the mob. Aristotle closes by mocking pretenders to magnanimity who merely “imitate the great-souled man, without being really like him, only copying him in what they can, reproducing his contempt for others but not his virtuous conduct. For the great-souled man is justified in despising [vicious] people—his estimates are correct; but most proud men have no good ground for their pride.”22
Retrogrades, be restored to magnanimity, reclaiming righteous contempt for vicious men; but first, reclaim virtue! Remain unattached and unindebted to the mob.
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19 Plutarch, Alexander, 14.
20 Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, IV, 3, 24.
21 Ibid., IV, 3, 26.
22 Ibid., IV, 3, 21–22.