Progymnasmata 5

Vituperation:

Dear and gentle readers, I write for you today to exhort you not to follow the example of the tyrannous and bloodthirsty Maximilien de Robespierre, who was responsible for such carnage and corruption as the world had never seen.

The French villain, shame of the Picardan people, was practically a peasant, born in  Arras to a lawyer and a brewer’s daughter. He received his education at the Parisian university of Louis le Grand, where he was trained in the laws by the very priests he was soon to attack and behead. Had his schoolmasters known what he was soon to become, they would undoubtedly have nipped the scourge of France in the bud rather than let him become the despot who destroyed their country.

But Robespierre was not content to be a country lawyer. His vanity compelled him to claw his way to the top of French Revolutionary politics and to corrupt the minds of his fellow deputies so as to set them on the road to bloodshed. His rampant hypocrisy caused him to switch between supporting the abolition of the death penalty and calling for his moral superiors to meet their ends at the guillotine. And his physical weakness made him endlessly hungry for political power to counter his plainness and weakness. He judicially murdered the very people he claimed to protect and indiscriminately killed both the guilty and the innocent. Truly this man was as greedy as Midas and as steeped in blood as Macbeth.

Wise readers, do not emulate this wicked and avaricious man. Put the good of your people above your personal advancement and remain in the class you were born into, for indecorous social climbing can end only in disaster.

 

Encomium:

Friends, join me as I sing the praises of the incorruptible Maximilien de Robespierre, pride of the French people, architect of the First Republic, and slayer of tyrants!

Robespierre was born of provincial, aristocratic stock. This son of a country lawyer and a brewer’s daughter was truly untainted by the corruption of aristocratic heritage or inherited money. He was traditionally-educated in the law by the priests of Louis le Grand in Paris, a laudable educational institution that also produced such great French patriots as Camille Desmoulins.

Robespierre, through his unwavering commitment to the good of the people and his fortitude in the face of seemingly insurmountable odds, established a representative republic in France, formerly the seat of corrupt despotism. He used his power and his deserved position at the head of Revolutionary French politics to free the French people from the tyranny of Louis XVI and the ancien regime, establishing freedom of the press, of religious expression, and of conscience among a people recently under the yoke of censorship and oppression. With manly vigor, Robespierre wielded the sword of liberty against the enemies of freedom just as the great American Revolutionaries had done twenty years earlier.

Fellow lovers of liberty, let us emulate this great man in our opposition to oppression and our unwavering pursuit of our ideals against all odds. Robespierre is truly an example for any patriot who sees the need for change in his or her country.

Progymnasmata 4

“Early to bed and early to rise makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise” – Benjamin Franklin

It was truly wise of the great American philosopher, Benjamin Franklin, to assert that retiring and rising early brings wellness, affluence, and wisdom. As a great inventor, scholar, and philosopher himself, Franklin must often have been tempted to stay awake late at night reading and writing and to rise later as a result. Thus he gave this proverb in warning to all who suffered similar temptations that they be not swayed by them. Indeed, I knew an undergraduate student who ignored this maxim, studying late into the night and rising in the afternoon. She awoke one day to find that she had lost all of her health, wealth, and wisdom and was reduced to surrendering her soul and becoming a consultant at Goldman Sachs to survive. Truly, going to bed early and rising early in the morning is as essential to success as learning how to read. Scientific studies attest that “morning people” are on average more successful than night owls. Even modern science recognizes the genius of Franklin’s wise remarks and recommends that we heed his most excellent counsel.

Progymnasmata 3

When it came time to write this paper, Procrastination appeared before me. Dressed in sweatpants and a four-year-old unwashed tee-shirt, she pulled her unkempt hair back with a scrunchie and spoke to me.

“Hey, man! How’ve you been? I just woke up. Is that a paper you’re writing…?

“Hey, how come you never hang out with me anymore? We used to have so much fun together, sitting around, watching Netflix, staring at the wall. Sometimes we’d lie face down in bed together for hours just doing nothing! Weren’t those the days? We’d just sit around and you’d feel more and more uncomfortable about the things you had to do, but I’d calm you down! I’d say that everything was gonna be okay and that you were gonna get everything done eventually. And you did get everything done! You never missed an assignment because of the time we spent together.

“Alright that’s fair. It did make you pretty anxious. I remember you cried that one time because you were so frightened to have left something big till the last minute… but I was there for you then too! Or, as much as I could be. I tried to calm you down! I did say everything would be alright, didn’t I? And I was right! You did still get a decent grade.

“But then you just stopped doing stuff with me. I was always such a good friend! I was there for you when you needed me and when nobody else was. But you just started ignoring me. Or you’d agree to do something and bail on me at the last minute. I’ve missed you, man! And I really think you owe me some time with you after the way you’ve treated me. But I’m willing to forget it all! How ‘bout we stare at the ceiling for eight hours to patch things up?

“No?’ What d’you mean, ‘no?’ You owe me! After all I’ve done for you, you owe me! If you won’t hang out with me willingly, I’ll make you. I’ll never leave you alone for one second! I’ll heckle you about every last paper you try to write and every last reading you try to do. And we’ll see how you like me as your enemy now that you don’t want me as your friend. How dare you slight me?”

But I ignored her, and thus completed this assignment.

Progymnasmata 2

I shall long remember the wise actions of Ibn Battutah, the great qadi and traveler who, when he found that the people of the Maldives required correction and edification in the sacred law, imposed harsh penalties upon those who absented themselves from Friday prayers. I saw how the wise man had those who had not prayed beaten and paraded for their crimes and I encouraged him to record the event in his rihla. He thus taught the importance of Friday prayers to the people of the Maldives, but also displayed the proper actions of a qadi. The wise man showed me the importance of enforcing the letter of sharia law in a position of authority over fellow Muslims.

It was well and good that he did this, for my cousin, who soon afterwards became qadi in Turkestan, allowed his citizens to practice Islam loosely and ignore the sacred tenets of the law. He was struck down by the plague for his infidelity.

Truly, Ibn Battutah showed himself the wisest and most generous of Muslims that day, on par with the great sultans and caliphs of the East. The inhabitants of the Maldives so punished by Qadi Battutah told me after their beatings that they gave thanks to God that the wise traveler had reprimanded them thus, for he showed his own goodness and saved those he punished from their vices. Truly, Ibn Battutah inspired all Muslims with his great wisdom and leadership. I submit this narrative of his triumph to the record of history in the hope that future qadis will read it and find in it a most excellent example.

Progymnasmata 1

Gold is soft and easily shaped. So too was Midas. The muses tell of his golden touch, of his avarice, his foolishness, his lack of foresight. They tell of the prize he begged of Bacchus, who granted his request even as he laughed at its imprudence. And they tell of how Midas found his food, his wine, and, in some versions, even his daughter turned to gold at his lightest touch.

But those who tell this tale leave much of Midas from the story. Storytellers emphasize his greed and foolishness, but Midas had virtues as well as vices. Midas earned his gift from Bacchus with his tenacity and bravery on the battlefield, qualities which made his kingdom a formidable power. Although he had absolute power over his subjects, Midas ruled benevolently. Under Midas, no man in Phrygia was imprisoned or executed unjustly.

But before he was a king, Midas was a man. He was truly a foolish man but he felt profoundly even if he thought shallowly. And the inability to understand the causes of his sorrow did not render the pain any less acute. Pitiful plaything of gods who knew him better than he knew himself, Midas found no mercy at Bacchus’ hands until he had been stripped of his dignity and his child. And even then, Bacchus let Midas live on in the belief that his humiliation and his loss had been his own fault, a shame which tortured him for the rest of his days.

Myth judges Midas for his vices, but neither myth nor Midas looks poorly upon Bacchus, though he caused Midas’ shame. All-seeing god that he was, Bacchus knew what Midas’ choice was destined to be if he were offered whatever he wished. He knew what pain would come of it and offered the gift just the same. He robbed an innocent and largely virtuous man of his honor without cause. For, unlike most mortals debased by the gods, Midas committed no sin against any deity. He was merely an ordinary man, shallow and greedy as most are, who fell afoul of a cruel god’s amusement and the judgment of history.

The muses judge Midas more harshly for his failings than they do others. Men who did far worse than wish for gold are classed as heroes. Odysseus’ hubris nearly led him and his crew to a disastrous fate on multiple occasions and Achilles’ rage led to feuds with his allies and his mistreatment of the body of Hector of Troy. Orestes murdered his mother and Agamemnon sacrificed his daughter for favorable winds. That these men are glorified and Midas is mocked defies reason. Midas too is a tragic hero whose downfall is brought about by the whims of gods and his own failings. But the paramount tragedy of Midas is that he is not recognized as such.

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