The fears of our forefathers
are creeping towards reality.
These fears, which our Founding Fathers had in mind when they placed
their limitations on our government, also produced one of the most beautifully
haunting series of paintings in American art. Thomas Cole, a famed painter and founder of the “Hudson
River School” of artists, created a cycle of paintings labeled The Course of Empire in the 1830s. His work was inspired in part by a
verse of Lord Byron’s nearly contemporaneous poetry.
There is
the moral of all human tales;
Tis but the
same rehearsal of the past.
First
freedom and then Glory - when that fails,
Wealth,
vice, corruption - barbarism at last.
And History,
with all her volumes vast,
Hath but
one page...
The cycle of five paintings
depicted a landscape’s transition from the state of nature, through a pastoral
era, to the Consummation of Empire. In this grandiose scene, the emperor
and his retinue stand in their pomp on a bridge. In the background, we see the ships of commerce and the
decadent temples and buildings they paid for. The next scene is entitled Destruction, as armies battle over the same bridge, which has begun
to give way under their weight.
Only warships ply the waters now.
Finally, Desolation prevails
as nature begins to reclaim the abandoned ruins.
Cole was painting with American
hubris in mind. His notes lay
plain his fears of the coming tragedy of the Civil War. “Americans are too fond of attributing
the great prosperity of the country to their own good government instead of
seeing the source of it in the unbounded resources & favorable political
opportunities of the nation. It is
with sorrow that I anticipate the downfall of this republican government; its
destruction will be a death blow to Freedom, for if the Free government of the
U[nited] States cannot exist a century where shall we turn?” The United States
did survive, but only after a titanic clash that left scars to this day. It should give us pause to hear the
growing stridence of voices calling for radical solutions to the problems
facing America and other established democracies. Furthermore, our discord undermines the power of example as
we hope to lead others away from illiberal politics and state capitalism toward
our more liberal model.
It was a combination of our form of government inherited from Britain [England] and our vast natural resources and river system protected by two oceans and the Royal Navy that led to our great prosperity. The war waged by the North to impose its will upon the South does indeed reverberate to this day and to what outcome no one knows.
ReplyDeleteSincere congratulations on the achievement.
ReplyDeleteBest
ADTS
Second ADTS's congragulations.
ReplyDelete"It should give us pause to hear the growing stridence of voices calling for radical solutions to the problems facing America and other established democracies."
What does this mean?
- Madhu
Or congratulations. Sorry, I will never proofread comments. It just seems like a waste of time for me. Which I just wasted more of....
ReplyDelete- Madhu
Wonderful cover. Can you explain what the "end of history" is though? I'm not sure if everyone knows...it may make a nice blog.
ReplyDeleteJAT
All,
ReplyDeleteThanks much for the congrats.
JAT,
I offered this as a brief explanation in a note in the first chapter. I'll post Monday or Tuesday with a longer explanation.:
The "end of history," a concept made famous by Francis Fukuyama's 1989 essay refers to the idea that the political history of humanity is progressing toward a single form of government, that being liberal democracy in Fukuyama's argument. This idea builds off of the ideas of philosophers such as Georg Hegel that argued that human history was a struggle between slave and master, thesis and antithesis, which would progress in waves until a stasis was found and history - in effect - ended. This is not to suggest that time would end, but just that the major events of history would fade away when slave and master became one. Karl Marx built upon this idea with his concept of dialectical struggle. The end of the Cold War made it seem that liberal democracy was poised to sweep the world, creating a lasting peace in which people, through their electoral power, would become their own masters and end the history of struggle.
Peter, have you read David Bell's "The First Total War"?
ReplyDeleteJust to be nitpicky, I'd put forth that Hegel per Kojeve per Fukuyama argued human history was a struggle, by people, for recognition, as people, by other people. But I'm looking forward to reading the upcoming post. ;-)
ReplyDeleteBest
ADTS
I will also just note that I find the Hegel-Kojeve-Fukuyama recognition heuristic very powerful, and that it may relate well to both the Kipling/Tommy post on this blog, as well as the (by now prolific) "Disruptive Thinker" posts and debate(s) on SWJ (and pertinent to still other topics as well?).
ReplyDeleteBest
ADS
Peter,
ReplyDeleteFantastic choice from Cole's Course of Empire. Cole and the Hudson School in general expanded the era's thinking on Man in Nature vs. Man Against Nature which underscored and influenced the politics, philosophy, and science of the 19th century and beyond, particularly vis perceptions of what might be "new" about America as opposed to Europe and were in concert with the ideas, broadly, explored by Emerson, Hawthorne, Thoreau, James Fenimore Cooper and, arguably, Melville. All were rather theatrical in various ways. An era of big ideas and actions.
Your first is still in my queue but looking forward to this latest.
Best/Dave