The Allegory of the Chariotby Brett & Kate McKay
What is a man? What sort of man should I be? What does it mean
to live a good life? What is the best way to live and how do I
attain excellence? What should I aim for, and what training and
practices must I do to achieve those aims?Such questions have been
asked for thousands of years. Few men have grappled with them more,
and provided keener insight to the answers, than the philosophers
of ancient Greece. In particular, Platos vision of the tripartite
nature of the soul, or psyche, as explained though the allegory of
the chariot, is something I have returned to throughout my life. It
furnishes an unmatched symbol of what a man is, can be, and what he
must do to bridge those two points and attain andreia (manliness),
arte (excellence), and finally eudaimonia (full human
flourishing).Today we will discuss that allegory and its meaning.
While an understanding of the whole allegory and the pondering of
it can bring great insight, the ultimate goal of this article is in
fact to lay the foundation for two more posts to come in which we
will uncover the nature of the one component of Platos vision of
the soul that has almost entirely been lost to modern men:
thumos.The Allegory of the ChariotIn the Phaedrus, Plato (through
his mouthpiece, Socrates) shares the allegory of the chariot to
explain the tripartite nature of the human soul or psyche.The
chariot is pulled by two winged horses, one mortal and the other
immortal.The mortal horse is deformed and obstinate. Plato
describes the horse as a crooked lumbering animal, put together
anyhowof a dark color, with grey eyes and blood-red complexion; the
mate of insolence and pride, shag-eared and deaf, hardly yielding
to whip and spur.The immortal horse, on the other hand, is noble
and game, upright and cleanly madehis color is white, and his eyes
dark; he is a lover of honor and modesty and temperance, and the
follower of true glory; he needs no touch of the whip, but is
guided by word and admonition only.In the drivers seat is the
charioteer, tasked with reining in these disparate steeds, guiding
and harnessing them to propel the vehicle with strength and
efficiency. The charioteers destination? The ridge of heaven,
beyond which he may behold the Forms: essences of things like
Beauty, Wisdom, Courage, Justice, Goodness everlasting Truth and
absolute Knowledge. These essences nourish the horses wings,
keeping the chariot in flight.The charioteer joins a procession of
gods, led by Zeus, on this trip into the heavens. Unlike human
souls, the gods have two immortal horses to pull their chariots and
are able to easily soar above. Mortals, on the other hand, have a
much more turbulent ride. The white horse wishes to rise, but the
dark horse attempts to pull the chariot back towards the earth. As
the horses pull in opposing directions, and the charioteer attempts
to get them into sync, his chariot bobs above the ridge of heaven
then down again, and he catches glimpses of the great beyond before
sinking once more.If the charioteer is able to behold the Forms, he
gets to go on another revolution around the heavens. But if he
cannot successfully pilot the chariot, the horses wings wither from
lack of nourishment, or break off when the horses collide and
attack each other, or crash into the chariots of others. The
chariot then plummets to earth, the horses lose their wings, and
the soul becomes embodied in human flesh. The degree to which the
soul falls, and the rank of the mortal being it must then be
embodied in is based on the amount of Truth it beheld while in the
heavens. Rather like the idea of reincarnation. The degree of the
fall also determines how long it takes for the horses to regrow
their wings and once again take flight. Basically, the more Truth
the charioteer beheld on his journey, the shallower his fall, and
the easier it is for him to get up and get going again. The
regrowth of the wings is hastened by the mortal soul encountering
people and experiences that contain touches of divinity, and recall
to his memory the Truth he beheld in his preexistence. Plato
describes such moments as looking through the glass dimly and they
hasten the souls return to the heavens.Interpreting the
AllegoryPlatos allegory of the chariot can be interpreted on a
number of levels as symbolic of the path to becoming godlike,
spiritual transcendence, personal progress and attainment of
Superhuman status, or psychological health. There is much one can
ponder about it. Below we delve into several of the main points.The
Tripartite SoulThe chariot, charioteer, and white and dark horses
symbolize the soul, and its three main components.The Charioteer
represents mans Reason, the dark horse his appetites, and the white
horse his thumos. Well explore the nature of thumos in-depth next
time, but for now, you can read it simply as spiritedness. Another
way to label the three elements of soul are as the lover of wisdom
(charioteer), the lover of gain (dark horse), and the lover of
victory (white horse). Aristotle described the three elements as
the contemplative, hedonistic, and political, or, knowledge,
pleasure, and honor.The Greeks saw these elements of soul as
physical, almost independent entities, not so much with bodies, but
as real forces, like electricity that could move a man to act and
think in certain ways. Each element has its own motivations and
desires: reason seeks truth and knowledge, the appetites seek food,
drink, sex, and material wealth, and thumos seeks glory, honor, and
recognition. Plato believed reason has the highest aims, followed
by thumos, and then the appetites. But each soul force, if properly
harnessed and employed, can help a man become eudaimon.Reasons job,
with the aid of thumos, is to discern the best aims to pursue, and
then train his horses to work together towards those aims. As the
charioteer, he must have vision and purpose he must know where he
is going and he must understand the nature and desires of his two
horses if he wishes to properly harness their energies. A
charioteer can err by either failing to hitch one of the horses to
the chariot altogether, or by failing to bridle the horse, and
instead letting him run wild. In the latter case, Plato argued, the
best part [Reason] is naturally weak in a man so that it cannot
govern and control the brood of beasts within him but can only
serve them and can learn nothing but the ways of flattering
them.Obtaining Harmony of SoulThe masterful charioteer does not
ignore his own motivations, nor the desires of thumos and appetite,
but neither does he let his two horses run wild. He lets Reason
rule, takes stock of all his desires, identifies his best and
truest ones those that lead to virtue and truth and guides his
horses towards them. He does not ignore or indulge them he
harnesses them. Each horse has its strengths and weaknesses, and
the white horse can lead a man into the wrong path just as the dark
horse can, but when properly trained, thumos becomes the ally of
the charioteer. Together, reason and thumos work to pull the
appetites into sync.Instead of having civil war amongst them, the
deft charioteer understands each role the three forces of his soul
play, and he guides them in carrying out that role without either
entirely usurping their role, nor allowing them to interfere with
each other. He achieves harmony amongst the elements. Thus, instead
of dissipating his energies in contradictory and detrimental
directions, he channels those energies towards his goals.Achieving
this harmony of soul, Plato argues, is a precursor to tackling any
other endeavor of life:having first attained to self-mastery and
beautiful order within himself, and having harmonized these three
principles, the notes or intervals of three terms quite literally
the lowest, the highest, and the mean, and all others there may be
between them, and having linked and bound all three together and
made of himself a unit, one man instead of many, self-controlled
and in unison, he should then and then only turn to practice if he
find aught to do either in the getting of wealth or the tendance of
the body or it may be in political action or private business, in
all such doings believing and naming the just and honorable action
to be that which preserves and helps to produce this condition of
soul.The foundational nature of gaining mastery over ones soul,
Plato continues,is the chief reason why it should be our main
concern that each of us, neglecting all other studies, should seek
after and study this thingif in any way he may be able to learn of
and discover the man who will give him the ability and the
knowledge to distinguish the life that is good from that which is
bad, and always and everywhere to choose the best that the
conditions allow.A man that makes this pursuit his aim, and allows
it to guide all his thoughts and actions, will gladly take part in
and enjoy those which he thinks will make him a better man, but in
public and private life he will shun those that may overthrow the
established habit of his soul.Taking Flight and Progressing in Our
JourneyAs youll remember, in the allegory of the chariot, the
chariot falls from the heavens when the horses do not receive
adequate nourishment from the Forms, or when the horses rebel and
the charioteer does a poor job of directing them. They lose their
wings, and must stay on earth until they regrow a process which is
hastened by remembering what one saw before the fall.Plato believed
that discovering all truth was not a process of learning, but of
remembering what one once knew. His philosophy may be interpreted
literally as saying we had a preexistence before this life. But it
also has meaning in a more figurative sense. We get off track in
becoming the men we wish to be when we succumb to vice (being
overpowered by the dark horse), and we tend to succumb to vice when
we forget who we are, who we want to be, and the insights into
those two pieces of knowledge we have already attained and
experienced. Doing things that remind us of the truths we hold dear
keeps us in flight and progressing with our lives.For more on this
important subject, I highly recommend reading: Hold Fast: How
Forgetfulness Torpedos Your Journey to Becoming the Man You Want to
Be, and Remembrance Is the AntidoteUnderstanding the Dark HorseIn
order to train and harness the power latent in the forces of his
soul, a man must understand the nature of his horses and how to
utilize their strengths and rein in their weaknesses.A mans dark
horse, or appetites, are not difficult to understand; you have
probably felt its primal pull towards money, sex, food, and drink
many times in your life.But despite our intimate acquaintance with
our appetites, or perhaps because of it, the dark horse is not easy
to properly train and make use of. Doing so requires achieving
moderation, or as Aristotle would put it, finding the golden mean
between extremes.A man who lets his appetites run completely wild
is the unabashed hedonist. He does not seek to rein in the dark
horse at all, letting him pull the chariot after whichever pleasure
crosses its path. This is the man who lives for nothing higher than
to eat good food, get drunk, have sex, and make money. He seeks
after effeminizing luxury with abandon and will do anything to get
it. With no check to his behavior, the result can be a giant gut,
pickled brains, massive debt, and a prison sentence for
corruption.A life wholly dedicated to the satisfaction of ones
bodily and pecuniary pleasures make man no different than the
animals. Aristotle called such a life bovine, and Plato argued that
the result of letting oneself be dominated by his appetites is the
ruthless enslavement of the divinest part of himself to the most
despicable and godless part. Such a man, Plato submitted, should be
deemed wretched.On the other end of the spectrum is the man who
sees his physical desires as wholly wrong or sinful troublesome or
evil stumbling blocks on the path to spiritual purity or
enlightenment. This man seeks to nullify his flesh, and cut off its
cravings for pleasure entirely. This is the man who spends so much
of his life thinking of sex as sinful, that he cant turn off that
association and enjoy it, even after he is married. He averts his
eyes from women as living porn. Food is merely fuel. He often seems
flat, sterile, and closed off to others, though often you can sense
the bottled impulses bubbling beneath the surface that hes tried so
hard to deny. And because of the lack of a healthy outlet, that
bubbling often becomes a toxic stew that will one day burst forth
in a decidedly unhealthy way.Plato believed that the appetites were
the lowest of the forces of the soul, and that allowing the dark
horse to dominate and enslave you would lead to a base, unvirtuous
life far from arte and eudaimonia. Yet he also argued that the dark
horse, if properly trained, imparted just as much energy to the
pulling of the chariot as the white horse did. The chariot that
soars highest makes use of both horses side by side. A would-be ace
charioteer neither entirely indulges his dark horse nor wholly cuts
him off. He harnesses and directs the energy in a positive
way.Between the two extremes of unchecked hedonism and the
iron-fisted squashing of bodily appetites lies a middle way. This
is the man who maintains a sense of sensuality and earthiness, who
makes room for the pleasures of body and money but puts them in
their proper place, who, as Dr. Robin Meyers puts it, is able to
find the virtue in the vice. He enjoys sex thoroughly, but does so
within the context of love and commitment. He enjoys good food and
drink, without mindlessly engorging and imbibing. He appreciates
money, and that which it can buy, but does not make acquiring it
his central aim.The dark horse, when properly trained and directed,
can lead one closer, not further from the good life. Pleasures
satisfied with discretion make a man happy and balanced, and keep
him feeling healthy and motivated enough to tackle his higher
goals. And the appetites themselves can lead directly to those
loftier aims. The desire for money, when kept in balance, can lead
to success, recognition, and independence. Lust, when properly
directed, leads a man to love, and Plato believed that beholding
ones lover was a central path to recalling the Beauty of the Forms,
and regrowing ones wings for another trip into the heavens.That is
the nature of the dark horse a force that can be used for both good
and ill, depending on the mastery of the charioteer. It is fairly
easy to grasp, if not always to live. But what of the white horse,
thumos? That is another matter. There is no word in our modern
language equivalent to this ancient concept. We have here rendered
it spiritedness, but in truth it encompasses much, much more. It is
to that subject we will turn next time.
Got Thumos?
Last week we explored Platos allegory of the chariot, which the
ancient philosopher used to explain the tripartite nature of the
soul or psyche. In the allegory, a chariot (representing the soul)
is pulled by a rebellious dark horse (symbolizing mans appetites)
and a spirited white horse (symbolizing thumos). The charioteer, or
Reason, is tasked with harnessing the energy of both horses,
getting the disparate steeds into sync, and successfully piloting
the chariot into the heavens where he can behold Truth and become
like the gods.We presented the allegory not simply because of the
insights it can offer into the nature of man and how we may
progress in our lives, but even more importantly, to lay the
foundation for a discussion of thumos.While the other components of
Platos vision of the soul have ready modern equivalents, there is
no word in our language that truly corresponds to thumos. This is
most telling. When a culture lacks the word for something, it is
because they lack the concept of it.The Greeks believed thumos was
essential to andreia manliness. It is mentioned over seven hundred
times in the Iliad and the Odyssey. Philosopher Allan Bloom called
it the central natural passion in mens souls. If we have lost the
ability to recognize, appreciate, cultivate, and utilize one of the
three main components of our nature, we should not be surprised
when negative consequences follow. When one hears of a lack of
virility, fight, energy, and ambition in modern men, of a malaise
of spirit that has settled over our sex, what is really being
spoken of is a shortage of thumos. For millions of men, thumos lies
dormant, an energy source left untapped. It is as if each of us had
a potential Kentucky Derby-caliber thoroughbred waiting in the
stable, ready and eager to run, but we kept him locked away, only
trotting him out for pony rides at childrens birthday
parties.Recovering an understanding of thumos, and its role as the
vital life and energy source of mens souls, will be our task
today.What Is Thumos?As we mentioned last time, Plato envisioned
the three components of ones soul as independent entities. Thumos
was thought to be the most independent of the bunch. The Greeks
believed it was found in animals, humans, and the gods. Thumos
could act separately from you, or in cooperation with you as an
accompaniment, tool, or motivation behind some action. Because it
was a distinct part of yourself, you could talk to it, tell it to
endure, to be strong, or to be young (thumos was associated with
the passion and power of youth, but older people could have it
too). In the Iliad, Achilles speaks to his great-hearted thumos
when anxious about the fate of Patroculus. He also delights his
thumos by playing the lyre.The Greek philosopher Empedocles called
thumos the seat of life. If it left you entirely, you would faint,
and permanent separation meant death.Thumos likewise constitutes
the seat of energy that can fill a person, and serves as the active
agent within man. It is the stimulus, the drive, the juice to
action the thing that makes the blood surge in your veins.
Philosopher Sam Keen got at the idea with his concept of the fire
in the belly.The Romans held a similar belief, equating energy with
virtus, or manliness. The whole glory of virtus, Cicero declared,
resides in activity.What is the nature of this energy and where
does it lead? The Greeks saw thumos as serving several distinct,
yet interrelated functions. As with honor, it is a concept that was
once so implicitly understood that it did not have to be explained,
and attempting to describe it at a great remove makes what was once
a natural, lived experienced seem much more complicated. The best
we can do is illustrate it from its different angles, and hope that
the pieces resonate and come together into a recognizable
mosaic.Note: In this post we use phrases like, The Greeks believed
This is not to imply that the ancient Greeks were monolithic in
their philosophy different ideas on manliness and thumos existed.
What we have done here is distilled out the core threads of thumos
on which there was a good amount of agreement, and woven them
together along with our own interpretation.The Functions of
ThumosSeat of EmotionThumos is both the source of emotion and the
emotion itself. The agent and the function are fused. Thumos births
and embodies things like joy, pain, fear, hope, and grief. Thumos
is also tied up with love. The Greeks would say you could love
someone out of your thumos.Thumos is most closely associated,
however, with anger. In Greek writings thumos seethes, rages, and
boils. It is a special kind of anger activated when a mans honor is
violated, when his reputation is on the line, when his family and
property are threatened. It drives a man to stand up for himself,
for his country, for his loved ones.The anger of thumos can not
only be directed at others and external enemies, but also towards
oneself. Thumos makes you angry at yourself when you fail to live
up to your principles and code of honor. Plato uses the example of
a man who sees a pile of corpses, looks away, and keeps on walking,
but then returns to gaze upon it again. He is angry with himself
for giving into a base inclination. Thumos can make you indignant
of your own desires, if those desires compel you to do something
contrary to the dictates of Reason.Drive to Fight
Thumos not only produces anger, but then channels that anger
into the impulse to fight. When Nestor, King of Pylos, recalls his
past exploits, he says, My hard-enduring heart [thumos] in its
daring drove me to fight. Thumos motivates warriors before and
during combat. The Greeks said courageous soldiers had a valiant
thumos during war. In Seven Against Thebes, it is said that before
battle the soldiers iron-lunged thumos, blazing with valor,
breathed out as if from lions glaring with the war-gods might.
Valor here is translated from andreia manliness. The warriors
thumos blazes with manliness in anticipation of the fight.A man of
thumos glories in a fight whether against others, the elements of
nature, or his baser desires as a way to test his mettle and prove
himself.Courage, Steadfastness, IndomitabilityOnce a man is in a
fight, thumos spurs him on, motivating him to stay in the arena and
continue fearlessly striving for victory. This gameness is a
quality of thumos man shares with the beasts. In Sam Sheridans
exploration of The Fighters Heart, he observes the centrality of
gameness in dogfighting. We almost dont care how good the dog
fights, he notes, the fight is just an elaborate test to check his
gameness. Adds a dog trainer Sheridan speaks with: Give me a game
dog any day, a dog that bites as tissue paper but keeps coming back
and Ill take him.Fearless indomitability is central to the success
of the human warrior as well, who must not lose heart as the heat
of battle intensifies, and his morale flags. To encourage their
respective armies to fight harder in the midst of combat, Ajax and
Hector stirred up the thumos and strength of each of their
men.Plato did not see human gameness as being of the same kind
demonstrated by animals, however. Rather, he argued that mans
thumos, at least when properly trained, is born of a rational type
of courage that man is andreios (manly) when his thumos holds fast
to the orders of reason about what he ought or ought not to fear,
in spite of pleasure and pain. In other words, when engaged in a
worthy fight, you neither recklessly underestimate real threats
that should be feared, nor overestimate threats that shouldnt be
feared, and are not swayed from your course by either the
satisfaction of pursuing blind revenge nor the fear of being hurt
and the love of comfort and luxury. Plato argued that andreia meant
conquering fear and pain of any sort being the kind of man who
confronts misfortune in all cases with steadfast
endurance.Evaluation, Discernment, Decision-MakingSo thumos keeps
you in a fight that your Reason has decided is indeed a worthy one.
But how do you make that determination?Plato believed, as Angela
Hobbs put it, that courage involves both emotional commitment and
evaluative belief, an intellectual and emotional appreciation of
what things are worth taking risks for and in what
circumstances.Thumos plays a role in both the emotional and
evaluative parts of that equation. As we mentioned last time, the
task of Reason as the charioteer is to take stock of his own
desires, and those of his two horses, and then to choose to satisfy
only his best and truest ones those that lead to virtue and arte,
or excellence. Reasons ally in this task is his white horse, or
thumos, which can be trained to help make this kind of
judgment.Shirley Sullivan offers examples of this function of
thumos in Greek literature:Thumos is mentioned in connection with
several intellectual activities. These include pondering, thinking,
knowing, deliberation, planning and perceiving. Often too a person
puts things into thumos for consideration. Odysseus ponders evils
in his thumos for the suitors. Zeus thinks about events in his
thumos as he watches the battle of TroyHermes deliberates in thumos
how to take Priam safely from Achilles camp. Circe tells Odysseus
to plan in his thumos the course he will take after passing the
Sirens. Telemachus tells Penelope that now that he has grown up, he
perceives and knows in his thumos good and evil. It is in thumos
that Hesiod tells Perses to consider the value of the competitive
spirit.Thumos is the place in which you ponder possibilities, and
at the same time, it helps you know and understand which of those
possibilities to choose. Its related to gut feelings and intuition
what Jeffrey Barnouw calls visceral thinking and it also has a
prophetic quality giving you a sense of foreboding about where a
decision may lead, or something bad to come.I personally believe
you can know a decision is right when both your mind and heart
agree when your Reason and thumos align. When you feel that
swelling of the heart, that course of excitement and inspiration
running through your veins, thats thumos telling you youre on the
right course.Ambition and the Drive for Recognition and HonorIn
contrast to the lower desires of the dark horse simply for pleasure
and material wealth, thumos seeks independence over possessions and
sensuality, and recognition and honor over security. Thumos desires
pride and prestige for its own sake. This drive for recognition
will motivate him to risk much, even his own life, for his
reputation, and also for the reputation of a group to which he is
devoted. Plato calls thumos the ambitious part [of the soul] and
that which is covetous of honor.Thumos pushes a man to despise
mediocrity and to want to excel his fellow men, to dominate, and be
the best of the best. Thumos is ultimately what drives a man to
seek glory, and above all, legacy.So now we can see that while
thumos is often translated today as spiritedness, heart, passion,
will, courage, anger, boldness, or fierceness, it is really a
combination of all those descriptions and yet still something more
something that no modern word is able to fully convey. Perhaps the
best and simplest definition Ive come across is energetic thinking
that leads to action.Harnessing the White HorseJust like the dark
horse of our appetites, the white horse of thumos can be used for
either good or ill. The Greeks called it both dark-faced, vain,
terrible, greedy, and pitilessas well as courageous, noble, kindly,
moderate, and strong. Properly harnessed and guided it has even
more potential to lead a man towards eudemonia, or full human
flourishing, than the dark horse, but if allowed to run wild, it
can lead a man to destructive ends. Its up to the charioteer to
steer his thumos in a noble path.Unused Thumos
The charioteer may err by failing to hitch the white horse to
the chariot at all, or not exercising him to build up his strength.
The Greeks said that a mans thumos could be sluggish, and certainly
there are a good number of men today who match that description. A
man lacking in thumos is the nice guy who cant stand up for himself
when others push him around. He is placid. Nothing arouses him. He
has no ideals for which he fights and no real drive or ambition in
life. He is content with mediocrity, or at least doesnt have the
will to figure out how to make things better. Hes the kind of guy
who thinks the whole idea of manliness is really rather silly and
feels he is above the kind of unenlightened competitions and
jockeying for position that occur amongst men, when really, deep
down, hes simply ashamed that he doesnt think he could make the cut
and stand among them.Unbridled Thumos
A man may also run to the other extreme of failing to rein in
his thumos at all. The Greeks called this yielding to thumos, or
letting ones thumos run beyond measure. The consequences of letting
ones white horse run wild vary. When the Greeks used thumos in a
negative sense, it was most often in the context of the emotions,
which they thought of as passions. Being ruled by ones passions
could be dangerous if it usurped the role of Reason and overruled a
mans rational faculties.Of the emotions, anger was the most
important to check and channel, and restraining anger and
restraining thumos were closely connected. One type of man with
unbridled thumos is he who wants to fight everyone about
everything. The guy at the bar who starts a shoving match if he
simply thinks you looked at him funny. Hes filled with anger, but
it has no specific target its just boiling inside him all the time,
and the littlest thing can set it off. Thumos is much like fire
control it and it becomes an enormous power, handle is loosely and
it can burn you and consume everything you touch.For the Greeks,
Achilles was the archetype of a man who yielded too much to his
thumos. Achilles thumos imparts many good qualities to this
consummate warrior; he is strong, brave, aggressive when wronged,
driven to success, and nearly invulnerable. But his white-hot anger
and concern for honor sometimes lead him to stubbornness and
dishonor. The Iliad describes him as being moved by menos [anger]
and overweening thumos, and its first two lines tellingly read:
Sing, Goddess, of the rage of Peleus son Achilles/the accursed rage
that brought great suffering to the Achaeans. When Agamemnon robs
Achilles of his war prize and lover, Briseis, Achilles bristles at
this dishonor and refuses to fight or lead his troops. Before he
slays Hector, his nemesis pleads for an honorable burial, but
Achilles roars in reply: my rage, my fury [thumos] would drive me
now to hack your flesh away and eat you raw such agonies you have
caused me! He then kills Hector, ties him to a chariot, and
shamefully drags his lifeless body around the gates of Troy.
Because of such acts, Ajax says that Achilles has let his thumos
become savage, implacable, and even straightforwardly bad, and
Apollo labels his thumos as arrogant.The Greeks also warned that
unbridled thumos could be foolish and flighty, carrying a man after
one flash of inspiration after another. They were speaking to the
second type of man who leaves his thumos unbridled he who gets a
new idea, burns with excitement for it for a few days or weeks, but
doesnt have the drive to keep it going. He quickly gets bored and
moves onto the next thing hes super passionate about. His thumos is
always chasing after one thing or another without clear aim or
purpose.Thumos Under the Sway of the Dark HorseBesides failing to
utilize the white horse, or letting it run wild, an additional
problem the charioteer must avoid is letting his thumos get in-sync
with the dark horse, rather than the other way around.As youll
remember from last time, the white horse, when properly trained,
becomes the ally of the charioteer. Ideally, Reason and thumos work
together to pull the rebellious dark horse in line with their
mission and cadence. When there is a conflict between what Reason
knows is right, and what the appetites want to do, thumos springs
into action to defend Reasons aims. But if Reason isnt careful, the
dark horse can get the white horse to team up with it instead.When
this happens, what you get is what well call spirited hedonism
something the Greeks saw young people as especially susceptible to.
Thumos feels the desire to do great things, to be passionate, to
take on adventure and risk, and live life to the fullest, but the
dark horse takes this motivation and shunts it off into a narrow
and inferior channel the mere penchant for partying hard. Thumos
wants to really live, and the appetites convince him that nights
out getting smashed at the same bars, repeated on an infinite loop,
is real living. Part of this man bemoans the fact that he never
really seems to go anywhere or see anything, but the dark horse
quiets that concern, saying he really is living it up, while
encouraging him to get another drink.Thumos Properly Employed
Thumos, properly trained and harnessed, can be one of mans
greatest allies inspiring and guiding him, stirring him up, and
driving and urging him on towards the peaks of greatness. It can
perceive his possibilities and make them real. The Greeks believed
that a man experienced true happiness in thumos.The way to best
make use of thumos is simple: directing it towards its natural aims
that which is noble and fine, honorable and excellent. Plato
believed that thumos was made to fight on behalf of what seems to
be just, and the Greeks saw this force of the soul as essential in
making moral choices. In the poetry of Bacchylides, Apollo declares
that the way to delight thumos is by doing holy actsfor this is the
highest of gains.In order to get thumos to pursue noble aims, Plato
argued, you had to teach it to respond to Beauty, Truth, and
Goodness. This can be done, I believe, by learning to use, and
finely tuning your innate radar for such things. When you encounter
what is Good, you can feel it resonate in your soul and swell your
heart. Interestingly, one of the functions the Greeks assigned to
thumos was the producer of reverent awe. The proof that something
is Good is that it helps make you a better man it bears good fruit.
The more your thumos picks up on these signals, and responds to
them, the better it gets at doing so, and as this virtuous cycle
continues, your thumos grows ever stronger and you progress as a
man.Thumos does not simply draw you to that which is good, it
inspires you to fight for it. Thumos natural home is the
battlefield. Its most essential nature is that of an aid to
courage, strength, and indomitability for the warrior in combat.
But its spur to fight operates off the battlefield as well. It
drives a man to stand up for his ideals, cherished causes, and
moral choices. It also fuels his desire for recognition, honor, and
status the drive to become the best of the best in any arena of
competition whether sports, profession, or even simply life itself.
In any situation where you choose not to back down from your
beliefs and goals despite opposition, and refuse to give in when
others try to crush you, thumos is by your side.Thumos is also what
drives a man to fight for a life less ordinary one filled with more
risk and adventure. Thumos is that source of vitality that pushes a
man to live life as fully as possible, to drink deep from it, to
choose the strenuous life over self-indulgence and mediocrity.
Thumos and Technical Skills
In whatever kind of fight a man is engaged, Plato argued that
the acquirement of technical skills mastery can act as a stimulus
to courage and an aid to thumos. Training gives a man confidence
that can bolster him in the midst of stress and opposition. For
example, the more a soldier has been trained in and has rigorously
practiced the arts of war and defense, the more he is able to fall
back on that training in the heat of the battle, and the less
likely he is to become paralyzed or give up. As Hobbs puts
it:Technical skills on their own will not make for courage; nor can
they provide thumos, if thumos is altogether lacking. They can,
however, help bolster thumos and make it more effectivePlato does
not confuse technique with virtue, but he is clear-eyed about the
need to provide the best possible environment for virtue to
develop.Thumos NeuteredWhy is it that many men seem so lacking in
thumos today?Thumos is a potent force left wild it destroys, but
harnessed it creates. The thumos of man is responsible for the
lions share of societys progress.Yet in our modern day, instead of
helping men to harness their thumos for positive ends, society has
decided it is better to neuter the force altogether. To protect
some people from getting hurt, weve tried to breed it out of men,
even if it means its positive effects will be sacrificed along with
the negative. It is like getting rid of electricity, and all the
benefits that have come with it, because some people get
electrocuted.From an early age, boys are taught to sit still, to be
quiet. Physical fighting of any kind results in suspension.
Competition is frowned upon because it means some will be left out
and feel bad. Rewards and recognition are distributed equally;
everyone is given a prize to avoid hurt feelings. As a result, boys
feel less motivated to fight to rise to the top.Weve unfortunately
come to think of elements of thumos, like anger, as entirely bad.
Instead, what we need is an understanding that anger is neither bad
nor good its all in how its directed. There is such a thing as
righteous indignation. The anger that drives one to stand up for
that which is just and right. If you snuff out the force that makes
bad men hurt the weak, you also eliminate the force that moves good
men to protect the vulnerable.Plato argued that you didnt breed
fierceness out of men, you trained it. Men of the warrior class, he
argued, should be trained to neither be watchdogs who barked at
everything even innocent noises nor watchdogs that only whimpered
and rolled over when someone invaded the house. They were gentle
with those they knew, and fierce with strangers of ill-intent.
Their thumos was ready, if needed, to fight.Thumos Seeking Role
ModelsI can imagine that much of this seems very abstract and it
may be hard to see how it applies to your own life. What can help
make it more tangible is observing how thumos has operated in the
lives of other men.Plato believed that thumos naturally seeks
heroic role models. These role models can inspire thumos, and also,
as Hobbs put it, give life shape and structure.Our own lives can
seem like an amorphous stream its just one thing after another. We
see the world through our own eyes, so its hard to get a real
perspective on how were doing and where were at in our journey.
Because we can view them as outside observers, it is much easier to
see the shape and structure of the lives of others, especially when
you can read their biography and take in the sweep of their lives
from start to finish. Its easy to identify the different seasons
they went through, their rises and falls, the important turning
points. We can see how certain choices they made led to certain
outcomes. And we can get a sense of the kind of things its possible
for a man to accomplish and what sorts of aims we might seek in our
own lives.By studying how other men throughout history succeeded
(and failed) to harness their thumos, we can get a sense of the
nature of thumos and how to guide our own white horse.With that in
mind we will conclude this series with a case study of the life of
Jack London, who stands as the perfect example of both the power
and perils of thumos. By examining the influence of thumos on a
modern man, hopefully you will be able to much more easily grasp
the nature of thumos and how you might cultivate it in your own
life.__________________SourcesPlato and the Hero: Courage,
Manliness and the Impersonal Good by Angela HobbsThe Laws of Plato
By Plato, Thomas L. PanglePsychological and Ethical Ideas: What
Early Greeks Say by Shirley Darcus SullivanOdysseus, Hero Of
Practical Intelligence: Deliberation And Signs In Homers Odyssey by
Jeffrey BarnouwRetrieving Political Emotion: Thumos, Aristotle, and
Gender by Barbara Koziak
