By Phin Upham

The consequences of the Reformation, if viewed from the perspective of its inception, would be nearly unimaginable. To think of it as a progressive, necessary or dialectical movement would be highly arguable. To imagine that Martin Luther intended, or, for that matter would have approved of, its final outcomes is unlikely. So, if the ontological goal of the Reformation was antithetical, or at least contrary, to its outcome, what were the forces, tensions and the people that began this powerful movement that ultimately resulted in the fragmentation of the absolute moral truth and unified religious power of Europe? To what extent was the Reformation a continuation of the progressive forces of the Renaissance and to what extent was it a movement backward toward, or at least a harkening back to, the past? By contrasting and questioning its goals and consequences, one can explore the paradox that is the Reformation. In a way the irony of the Reformation is that despite its radical (in the old sense of returning to root) goal of past religious simplicity (or perhaps because of it) it resulted in pushing Europe, in many ways, into the modern world.

To understand the goals of the Reformation one must understand its motivations, for these two aspects are inextricably linked. After all, a movement with the power and the size of the Reformation had to be the result of more than one person. The dynamic forces which the protagonists of the Reformation such as Luther, Calvin and Savonarola unleashed had been building up, fermenting, and smoldering for quite some time. One major aspect of this force was the discontent aimed at the increasingly secularized church by a highly religious and pious population. As The Western Experience aptly points out, there was a tension in the Catholic Church between two different views of salvation. One view stresses the church as an intermediary. Only by good deeds, the seven sacraments, rituals, and, increasingly, Indulgences, could a good Christian reach heaven. The other view, hailing St. Augustine as an inspiration, stressed personal faith and the primacy of God as the source of grace. This second view was attractive to the highly pious laypeople (both urban and rural) who demanded a less indoctrinated,, more nourishing way to express their faith. Unfortunately the church, hungry for secular power, became increasingly intolerant of this latter view. Such intolerance was not new, but it became more pronounced. In the 13^th century Wycliffe and Jan Hus were prosecuted for the same reasons. In fact these men became inspirations to the Reformation reformers. This intolerance was implemented in the 15^th century by the martyring of such individual reformers as Savonarola, and later the Protestant movement, especially the Anabaptists. But the people’s discontent with the church entailed more than this. It was also linked to the increasingly secular and materialistic role the church chose to play in Europe. The selling of Indulgences, the constant territorial fighting in Italy, the enormous wealth of the church, the list continues. In short, the Church became inadequate in fulfilling the spiritual needs of its constituencies. But is it this simple?

Surely it was the Church’s perceived abuses and religious inadequacies that built part of the tension of the Reformation, but there were other powerful influences. But why did the Reformation have such a minimal effect on Spain? Granted, Spain’s Cardinal Ximenes did institute some reform, but he also initiated the Inquisition, a draconian measure of oppression. Could it have been that it was not the church’s faults alone, but the church’s faults in conjunction with the pressures of a dynamically changing Europe? Most of Europe was being thrown into the maelstrom of the Renaissance with all that this implies: urbanization, humanization, alienation, reorganization, et al. In Spain, though, Renaissance inspired change came more slowly, as did the Reformation. Yet other factors in Europe included the printing press, which was used to disseminate religious dissatisfaction and to ridicule church inadequacies. The effects of Christian Humanism must also not be underplayed. It was this tradition that Luther tapped when he called for a return of Christianity to its roots. All of these outside factors served to create an atmosphere with which it would have been difficult for the church to deal. Thus perhaps the disunity between the church and its surroundings was not entirely the churches doing, but also the swiftly changing world around it. Europe was emerging from the Middle Ages with new needs and insecurities. Instead of doing its best to adapt with this changing world, the church grabbed immediate gains.

If these were the dissatisfactions of the Reformation, then what were the solutions proposed by its leaders? Martin Luther, a guilt-stricken monk in Germany, began his famous (infamous?) role in the Reformation on October 17, 1517 when he presented his 95 theses. In them he called for a debate within the church about the selling of indulgences. He claimed that there was no textual basis for this practice. Not too earth shattering a request. But the Dominicans, who gained much from the sales, confronted Luther and challenged his beliefs. Luther responded by clarifying and broadening his criticisms of the Catholic Church and the Papacy. In his three major pamphlets he rejected the Pope’s authority, denied five of the seven sacraments, and claimed that faith and faith alone could bring salvation. He supported this view through historical and textual evidence. This view was quite radical, and the Pope excommunicated him in 1520. Luther, protected by German princes who resented Papal authority, began to convert the German princes and peasants to Lutheranism. He translated the bible and propagated his views throughout Europe. But looking past the mechanistic way that the Protestant Reformation proceeded and at Luther’s goals. Luther was not looking to tear down or deny the power of the Church in 1517. Instead he desired change from within, a reformation. But this radical view (in the old sense of returning to the root) because increasingly radical (in the modern sense of disruptive change) as he was pushed to defend his views. When forced against a wall, Luther because more and more extreme, until he called for a denial of the Papacy and a reformation of the church. But Luther still had his limits. He was looking to replace the Catholic Church’s absolute truth with his own absolute truth, but he still advocated one absolute truth which united Europe. This conservatism was expressed by his suppression of the Anabaptists who challenged the idea that all members of a society must be of one faith. Luther also showed his support for the status quo during the German peasant revolt of 1524-5. Luther came down on the side of the Princes and blasted the peasants for their attempts to carry Lutheranism and individual freedom to a new level.

Nevertheless the fragmentation of the Lutheran Reformation soon swept Luther Aside. Zwingli broke with Lutheranism , as did the Anabaptists and the Calvinists. All of these groups agreed with Luther’s more decentralized view of religion, but they carried it on to its logical ends, further than Luther was willing to go. Anabaptism, as mentioned before, even gave up the traditional claim that all members of a society must be unified in their religious beliefs.

Once begun, the Reformation took the bit in its teeth and gathered terrific momentum, radically differing from the visions and the control of its founders. Ironically, a movement that started by looking to the past, now furthered very Modern ideas. Luther had defended the rights of governments to rule over the bodies of men and attacked those who questioned it in “On Governmental Authority” which “provided a sound basis for the civil law and sword so no one will doubt that it is in the world by God’s will.” Nevertheless, fifty-four years later Mornay, a Calvinist, used the Reformation to support the Modern view that a government which is cruel and oppressive should be overthrown since all rights to rule come from God, and are conferred by the people. Mornay was calling for a radical new view of the structure of society; “the whole body of the people is above the king.” From this example we can see that the effects of the Reformation differed radically its original goals. The Reformation provided a basis for an attack on a unified truth, it provided religious backing for an the rights of the individual to chose how to live, it freed the government of Europe from Papal control, and it forced the Catholic Church to reform and reinvent itself. Luther, and other early leaders, planted a snapdragon, and got a redwood. What started as a restoration of old values ended up as a progressive and Modern Movement.

But, with hindsight, one can also question how realistic the early leaders of the Reformation were in thinking that they could control such a force. Luther and others looked back to Augustine and wanted to restore the church, in many ways, to the way it was. But ultimately this is an impossible dream. One can never truly understand or reinstate the past as it was because one can only see one’s interpretation of it, as Haegel pointed out. So it is a historical truism that whenever one tries to go back to the past, one necessarily, and inadvertently, ends up creating something new. Ezra Pound, a Modern poet, understood this when he said “Make it New.” He advocating using the past to “dislocate language into meaning” by filling the past with new meaning from the present. This is what happened to both the Renaissance and the Reformation. Both were, initially, a harkening back to the past, and both necessarily became inadvertently original. Both pushed Europe, with their ideas and institutions, into the Modern world. Thus the backward looking Reformation had unexpected outcomes. Its founders begun a movement that swept them aside and became so dynamic that it significantly shaped their future in ways that were unpredictable and undetermined. To paraphrase Coleridge, their reach extended beyond their grasp.

About the Author

Phin Upham is an investor who lives in NYC and San Francisco.  He has studied at Harvard University and Wharton Business School (UPenn) and is a term member of the Council on Foreign Relations.

by Phin Upham

The distinct virtues of the rational and the reasonable are, for John Rawls, intricately tied to his conception of man’s two moral powers. The rational and the reasonable, though they are distinct abilities, combine in the citizen in order for him to function as a full member of society. The moral and intellectual powers, namely the capacity for a sense of justice and the capacity for a conception of the good, allow a citizen to exercise his/her rational and reasonable abilities. In the simultaneous exercising of these two powers each compliments the other. Thus citizens must be reasonable about what they can expect from a system of cooperation and rationally adjust their ends accordingly.

The reasonable and the rational are distinct and free standing abilities for Rawls. The reasonable person asks others to agree to principles or standards as “fair terms of cooperation (49)” only if s/he is willing to abide by the as well, and is sure that others will abide by them. The reasonable person is not guided by altruism or by some sense of the general good, but rather by the desire to set forth a system in which all members interact as free and equal participants and all benefit in such a way that is acceptable for all. Reciprocity is key in order for all to interact in a way that results in mutual advantage.

The rational ability applies to a single unified agent (50) and how that agent, with judgment and deliberation, can choose and adopt ends specific to his/her interests. Part and parcel with the rational is the choosing of means in order to most effectively bring about the chosen ends. Purely rational agents “lack… the particular form of moral sensibilities that underlies the desire to engage in fair cooperation as such, and do so on terms that others might reasonably be expected to endorse (51).” One can see the distinction between an agent acting rational and an agent acting reasonably through the following example I suggested in class: four individuals are on a raft that will not reach shore for six months. There is an unquantifiable hope of any sort of rescue. On the raft is food enough for two people for six months (or for four people for three months). The rational agent might conclude that him/herself and only one other person ought to get the food in order to maximize his/her own survival. A reasonable agent might conclude that the only arrangement truly acceptable to all four crew members is an equal division of all the food among all four crew members. Thus this arrangement is fair, though, unless rescue arrives, it will surely result in the death of all four persons. This example could be arranged to make the reasonable person seem much more sympathetic (by increasing the chances of a rescue, or having all agree on a lottery system to choose the two crew members that will survive) but it nevertheless serves to illustrate Rawls’ distinction between the reasonable and the rational.

Though the rational and the reasonable can, in theory, stand alone, and are distinct and basic, nevertheless, in a full citizen they support each other and act in tandem. Purely rational agents, says Rawls, approach being psychopathic when they only think of benefiting themselves. They lack a sense of justice and fail to recognize the rights of others to claim independent validity (52). Purely reasonable agents, on the other hand, would have “no ends of their own they wanted to advance by fair cooperation (52).” It is hard to imagine how one could function, much less be considered a full individual, without some personal ends which you wished to satisfy. But in a reasonable society, both the reasonable and the rational act to support and compliment each other in such a way that “all have their own rational ends they hope to advance, and all stand ready to propose fair terms that others may reasonably be expected to accept (54).” In this way the reasonable limits the rational and the rational provides a foundation upon which the reasonable can act effectively.

The two moral powers are at the root of an agents ability to think reasonably or rationally. The ability to think rationally rests on the second moral power which is the capacity for a conception of the good. From the original position (OP) this conception of what is the good for you becomes vital. From the OP one knows that the person they represent has definite goals and desires, but the content of these desires is hidden. Thus the rational thing to do is assure that those you represent have he free opportunity to exercise their moral powers in a meaningful way by guaranteeing basic liberty. By creating such a society we can “think of ourselves as affirming our way of life in accordance with the full, deliberate, and reasoned exercise of our intellectual and moral powers (313).” The ability to think reasonably stems from our first moral power which is the capacity for a sense of justice. From the OP the agent cannot invoke a sense of justice since the choices they are hoping to make are the very things that will develop a corresponding sense of justice in those that the agent is representing. Thus the agent in the OP can appeal only to the persons determinant conception of the good. But since the agent can assume that those s/he will represent form this corresponding sense of justice s/he can be sure that all those under this society will cooperate and effectively act with reciprocity. The first moral power thus cannot be fully invoked except by citizens in a society. From this societal standpoint you can derive reciprocity, stability, and synergy form the assurance that all share your actualization of the first moral power.

Rawls’ understanding of the rational and the reasonable nature of citizens and how the accompanying two moral powers allows for a citizen to function fully within a universally beneficial and successful society is significant. A citizen will rationally demand that a society provide him/her with certain primary goods and will allow him/her to pursue and actualize his/her ends, but simultaneously a citizen will reasonably ask for obligations, norms, and goods that s/he will be willing to give to others equally. So the rational and the reasonable nature of citizens combine to form a fully functioning citizen with healthy and fulfilled moral powers.

About the Author

Phin Upham is an investor who lives in NYC and San Francisco.  He has studied at Harvard University and Wharton Business School (UPenn) and is a term member of the Council on Foreign Relations.

an article by Phin Upham

(From Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged, p.443-449

At the Trial of Henry Rearden: )

One of the judges, acting as prosecutor, had read the charges.

“You may now offer whatever plea you wish to make in your own defense,” he announced.

Facing the platform, his voice inflectionless and particularly clear, Hank Rearden answered:

“I have no defense.”

“Do you-” The judge stumbled; he had not expected it to be that easy. “Do you throw yourself at the mercy of the court?”

“I do not recognize this courts right to try me.”

“But, Mr. Rearden, this is the legally appointed court to try this particular category of crime.”

“I do not recognize my action as a crime.”

“But you have admitted that you have broken our regulations controlling the sale of your Metal.”

“I do not recognize your right to control the sale of my Metal.”

“It is necessary for me to point our that your recognition was not required.”

“No. I am fully aware of it and am acting accordingly.”

…

“But Mr. Rearden the law provides specifically that you are to be given an opportunity to present your side of the case and defend yourself.”

“A prisoner brought to trial can defend himself only if there is an objective principle of justice recognized by his judges, a principle upholding his rights, which they may not violate and which he can invoke. The law, by which you are trying me, holds that there are no principles, that I have no rights and that you may do with me whatever you please. Very well. Do it.”

…

“Do you mean that what you expect from me is some sort of voluntary action?’

“Yes”

“I volunteer nothing.”

“But the law demands that the defendants side be represented on the record.”

“Do you mean that you need my help to make this procedure legal?”

“Well no…yes…that is, to complete this form.’

“I will not help you.”

…

“I want” said Rearden gravely, “to let the nature of this procedure appear exactly for what it is. If you need my help to disguise it – I will not help you.”

“But we are giving you a chance to defend yourself – and it is you who are rejecting it.”

“I will not help you pretend that I have a chance. I will not help you preserve an appearance of righteousness where rights are not recognized. I will not help you to preserve the appearance of rationality by entering into a debate in which the gun is the final argument. I will not help you pretend that you are administering justice.”

…

“I do not cooperate at the point of a gun.”

The central subject in Kafka’s haunting novel The Trial is man’s interaction with societal mechanisms. Kafka explores a world in which institutions have no purpose, no moral fiber, and are empty, degenerate machines, chewing up and spitting out their human fuel. Ayn Rand’s novel Atlas Shrugged presents a man enmeshed in a similarly unfair trial. Her protagonist makes the existential choice to opt out of the system regardless of consequences. His refusal rests on the supposition that men are not only fodder, but fuel, and thus even grudging cooperation strengthens the very force you are being oppressed by. The recognition of illegitimate authority adds to its validity. Legal institutions were formed to maintain societal order and to establish some form of justice. Men impose restrictions on themselves, and develop the rule of law for these reasons. But when everything is stripped away from the law, its purpose, its dignity, its morality, only its power remains – the law and its power become terrifying. This power is derived from the cooperation of every member of society, yet it seems to take on an inexorable life of its own. Kafka reveals the essence of bureaucracies and illuminates the inescapability of the terrifying human condition.

The brutal Law system in The Trial is an endless bureaucracy with no hope of reform and no escape. It looms above its victims and devours their lives. The despondent mass of the accused waiting hopelessly in the law office demonstrates this inescapability, as does Block’s pitiful dependence on the lawyer which is so extreme that he often sleeps at the lawyer’s house. The bureaucracy often takes on machine-like characteristics: “They have all sorts of machinery which they will automatically set in motion against you, depend upon that”(96) warns K’s uncle. Machine-like, it logically carries out the illogical. In this way a bunch of senseless, greedy, lecherous officials make up and serve a powerful and effective system. The monstrous Law system is not only powerful, but unfathomable. “The ranks of officials in this judiciary system mounted endlessly, so that not even the initiated could survey the hierarchy as a whole. And the proceedings of the court kept secret from subordinate officials”(119). One always wonders if there are other, more just and rational levels to the Law. One hopes K will reach these levels but knows he cannot. K’s appropriate place in the Law is a mystery. Should he fight it? Should he ignore it? Would either choice result in a different final outcome? After all, the Law system never lets the charge or the crime be known to the accused. The police place the accused under arrest clandestinely. The painter presents the Law as a trap without escape, with only temporary delays. “There are three possibilities, that is, definite acquittal, ostensible acquittal, and indefinite postponement”(152-3) says the painter before explaining he has never seen, nor does he think possible, a definite acquittal. The remaining possibilities can be reached through “personal influence,” another corrupt feature of the Law. Most importantly, the painter believes that K can never be free from the Law. It will always hover over him, like a steel-winged harpy.

In addition to being an illogical, corrupt, and powerful quagmire, the Law is immutable.

While – and this was very characteristic – almost every accused man, even quite simple people among them, discovered from the earliest stages of passion for suggesting reforms which … wasted time and energy. … One must lie low … [if challenged] the organization would simply right itself by some compensating reaction in another part of its machinery – since everything interlocked – and remain unchanged, unless, indeed, which was very probable, it became still more rigid, more vigilant, severer, and more ruthless. (121)

Every time K struggles to escape from the Law, the net draws tighter. Finally he is killed.  His last words, “Like a dog!”, appropriately describe his treatment. There is even talk that the law is beyond human judgment, that the Law (and perhaps K’s guilt) are beyond the human scope. This allusion to divine order is suggested as an interpretation to the doorkeeper’s story in the chapter “In the Cathedral.” The priest says “Many aver that the story confers no right on anyone to pass judgment on the doorkeeper. Whatever he may seem to us, he is yet a servant of the Law, that is, he belongs to the Law and as such is beyond human judgment “(220). Some untouchable great lawyers are mentioned by Block on page 178. They are spoken of with nearly religious awe, and they are as unreachable as the high court itself. It is so unfathomable, so incomprehensible, and indeed, so illogical that is seems a joke and a miracle that it is functional and effective in its odd way.

The Law system is a darkly funny thing. The “law books” K finds when he returns to the site of his first interrogation contains a poorly done pornographic picture with the ludicrous name “How Grete Was Plagued by Her Husband Hans.”  Even the air in the offices is putrid to K. On the other hand the air outside the offices is putrid to the Law worker, showing the enormous divide between the Law and the natural order. The deciding factor in a trial is not guilt or innocence, but, according to the painter, personal influence and your lawyer’s connections. This is not only unjust but goes diametrically against the principle of blind justice and the value of a justice system itself. The Law system’s corruption verges on the hilarious when K finds his warden being whipped because K complained about him. This further shows the strange and peculiar illogic of the Law.

But the justice system’s power comes from the cooperation of society. The people cooperate because they feel it will in the long run be beneficial for them to have an institution in place. Kafka strips away the justice of the Law system, its decency and its morality. Should K still cooperate? Should he fight? K is not only trapped by his cooperation, but also by the societal structure. He feels obligated to follow the law for friends, family, etc.. “Had he stood alone in the world he could easily have ridiculed the whole affair … But now his uncle had dragged him to this lawyer, family considerations had come in; he was no longer completely independent of the course the case took”(126). The Law system, itself, through cooperation, became a punishment. Perhaps Block’s case was not being worked on, nor was it ever going to finish. Still, its desired result was achieved. Block lives under self-imposed punishment; he ate and slept often at his lawyer’s. His case ruined his life: “The client ceased to be a client but became the lawyer’s dog”(193). This is Block’s punishment; the Law system has ceased to be a means to an end. It has become an end in and of itself; “The verdict is not suddenly arrived at, the proceedings only gradually merge into the verdict”(211).

“In The Cathedral” is the heart of The Trial. Different interpretations of a story are discussed. But all of them assume that the boy should have tried to approach, or even enter, the Law building. This is the boy’s central mistake. It was his goal that guaranteed his doom, not only his method. This point is made by Block (more lawyers make more work, not less) and by K’s final decision to give up. K pulls his captors past a policeman, and he allows them to kill him. His last words, “like a dog!” were perhaps more true than he realized. He was a dog because he recognized the unjust Law as his master from the beginning, not because he died a bad death or because he obeyed the system. Nevertheless his free will and choice made no difference in his eventual death because the law system itself was unstoppable; inexorably bloated by societies cooperation and acceptance. For K, who is virtually a slave, free will is significant but ineffectual. Kafka points this central dilemma and chooses to make ineffectual struggling a central reality in the book. Given that K’s struggle cannot be won, Ayn Rand presents would another, admittedly unrealistic, but intellectually genuine, course of action. Her heroes would have turned and walked away from the Law Building rather than wait outside of it. K may not be able to change the outcome of his struggle, but by refusing to accept the systems authority over him, he also denies its justice. By opting out of his society and its systems he undermines its power, which is derived from the cooperation of all members of society, and keeps his own integrity intact. But Kafka is more interested in the tragic-comic nature of life, and thus the horror and humor of The Trial derive from a clinical and rational study of hopelessness. Kafka’s characters struggle to survive when they are already doomed.  He is interested in the deliberate and unstoppable destruction of a man. Man’s essential free will and initiative become unavailing before the awesome powers of a bureaucracy which has become Godlike. And here is the difference between the two perspectives. Kafka sees fallen man facing the imperfectability of the world and of himself, while Ayn Rand is still in paradise.

About the Author

Phin Upham is an investor who lives in NYC and San Francisco.  He has studied at Harvard University and Wharton Business School (UPenn) and is a term member of the Council on Foreign Relations.

“Reason is the slave of passion.”

-David Hume

by Phin Upham

“Anecdote for Fathers” is a delicate, beautiful and profound poem which achieves its object without preaching or moralizing. Wordsworth shows us why he is so rewarding by exploring the interplay between the natural emotions and the intellect through a typically commonplace, specific and revealing example. The poem points out that one makes choices and decisions using one’s passions, one’s emotions, and that reason is used to merely justify, and in some ways hide, this. Furthermore, the poem portrays culture as sometimes limiting and simplifying the natural in order to attempt to understand and interpret it. Wordsworth shows us these highly theoretical points through a first person narrative about a fathers trip with his young son. In the child one is able to see the essence of man, before reason and words clutter and hide it. Thus through the boy the reader is able to see that passions and emotions precede, and are covered by, reason.

Wordsworth draws the reader into the poem from the very beginning. There is a familiarity, a confiding quality that the father is able to convey. He discusses his walk with his son in the hills of their home, Liswyn farm. Wordsworth is a genius at expressing emotions using clear and direct language. “His face is fair and fresh to see/… and dearly he loves me.” He captures our attention by making the poem one about a close relationship, and using seemingly simple speech. But underneath this veneer of simplicity and bliss there are powerful and essential aspects of human nature being revealed. It is here that Wordsworth is so deeply rewarding. The father asks his son “had you rather be/ …On Kilve’s smooth shore, by the green sea/ Or here at Liswyn farm?” The boy answers freely, not realizing that the father is, in a way, testing him. The boys answer is naïve and truthful, indeed, “careless.” Wordsworth even suggests that the father may feel the same way, though he would likely never admit it, by showing that his thoughts dwell on their old home reminisced about in the third stanza and his repeated use of the poetic “by the green sea” to describe Kilve, uses the structural device of repetition for emphasis. Nevertheless, the father requests an explanation and the boy is unable to respond. The father uses reason to make the boy “[blush] with shame.” The boy is not yet versed in the art of justifying his feelings with false reasons. He intuitively responds with a preference, but he cannot explain it. Nevertheless, the fathers insistence is functionally a teaching exercise, it is teaching the boy to, in a sense, lie, or, at least, to cover the truth. This makes the quotation at the beginning especially revealing. “Retine vim istam, falsa enim dicam, si coges” speaks of how the practice of lying may be taught. The boy responds to the fathers question in a comically inadequate way. He, feeling the pressure to find a justification, chances upon a weather-cock and claim it is the reason he prefers Kilve. In an adult, the art of covering emotions with false verbal justification is so skillfully implemented that is unnoticeable.

But the boy, though, is less skilled. Wordsworth is making the point that passion precedes reason and lies at the heart of every choice and decision one makes. David Hume who said that “reason is the slave to passion,” would have agreed with Wordsworth. The boy is being taught to enslave reason, and also to lie because whatever reason he concocts would deny that he made the choice from simply visceral emotion. There is no other justification, and there need be none. Nevertheless civilization tends to demand a more defensible stance. It is this contrast between the boy, who represents the raw essence of man, and the civilized father that makes Wordsworth’s point especially poignant.

Other, less obvious, clues are shown to further expand on this understanding. In the boy’s claim that he likes Kilve because there is no weather-cock there is more wisdom then the boy intends. A weather-cock is an essentially disturbing thing. It harnesses the complexity of nature and wind and simplifies it into a direction. Wind is so much more complex. Nature, it seems, should be experienced, not used as an instrument. Also the weather cock itself points to the falsifying of the natural. It is, of course, not alive, but only a representation of an animal. It is stiff and one dimensional, both physically and spiritually. In all of these ways, Wordsworth is subtly criticizing culture for the hiding, simplifying and limiting of nature. Is it even possible that a biblical betrayal is referred to when the father forces his son to lie. After all, he asks his son a question three times, and a cock (or at least a weather-cock) is mentioned only a few lines down. Does this not conjure the tale of Peter who, as Christ warns, betrays Jesus three times before the cock crows by lying? The appropriateness of this reference seems too perfect to be a coincidence

Wordsworth is rewarding because through a seemingly simple tale he is able to warn against, and reveal, the codification, intellectualization, and the hiding of the natural by culture and reason. By doing this the poem is playfully questioning its own validity. After all, is the poem itself not also a representation, a simplification, of nature in words. Does it not commit the very crime it admonishes? On the other hand, the anecdotal nature of the poem stands against didactic teaching.  The last stanza of the poem shows us that the father realizes, through his son, some of the truth’s previously discussed. In this way “the child is father to the man” since the child teaches his father. Through the child the poem becomes anecdote, making its point through simple and intimate example.  Thus Wordsworth shows us how much can be learned from childlike simplicity and naturalness, how much can be learned from nature itself. Wordsworth portrays wisdom being gained through emotional responses to life and the understanding of the natural, rather than through intellectualization (as, for example, Socrates would).  Wordsworth is so valuable because of his ability to express the complex through the seemingly simple.

About the Author

Phin Upham is an investor who lives in NYC and San Francisco.  He has studied at Harvard University and Wharton Business School (UPenn) and is a term member of the Council on Foreign Relations.