Virtue – The Modern Frame

The Modern Culture of Achievement

As the concept of a calling became unmoored from its historically religious roots it gradually gave way to the secular concept of success.¹ Over time, success effectively became the end-goal or purpose of everyday life and existence.² This is the framework in which the modern culture of achievement was born. It is not a coincidence that this culture originated, developed, and matured to the greatest extent in America–a country wedded more than any other to the economic system of capitalism. The dream of success became the preoccupation of many and was reinforced in what I have called the “mainline thought” of self-help or success literature as it existed in the early to mid-twentieth century.³ It is within the overlap of the Social and Economic spheres, as well as the particulars of success literature itself that the image of the modern culture of achievement finally comes into view.

The Origins of the Modern Culture of Achievement, Part III

The previous essay dealt with some of the origins of what will become the mainline¹ thought in self-help or success literature throughout the twentieth century and beyond. In addition to this developing main-current we will find the emergence of offshoots and others, which at first begin slowly, and accelerate over time, up through the present day. Sometimes they are a departure in approach, sometimes they are a more focused look at a specific subject or category–such as personal finance, sales-techniques, human relationships, or something else. Nevertheless, the end-goal or purpose remains the same: success.² As such, what underlies the totality of this literature is a clear sense of utility or pragmatism–it is paradigmatic of the instrumental stance. This is not literature to be contemplated, it is a literature to be used.

The Origins of the Modern Culture of Achievement, Part II

The dawn of the twentieth century witnessed the birth of a unique development in the history of success literature. Ideas and concepts that can be found in both the Transcendentalist and New Thought movements steadily came to be applied to the end-goal of success and wealth creation. This unique synthesis also led to the development of a peculiar science, or what I will refer to as a theology, which was intended to support it.¹ In the wider scheme, technological innovations and continuing industrialization led to an expanding scope of economic and sociological change. Among these changes is the growing use of the telephone and electricity, the development of the automobile and airplane, the age of radio and broadcasting, the rise of the motion picture and the film industry of Hollywood.² The growth of corporations and mass production yielded an ever-expanding set of commodities and consumer goods, in turn leading to the arrival of the professional salesman–a unique sociological type which provided perhaps the first popular audience for the burgeoning industry of success literature.³

The Origins of the Modern Culture of Achievement, Part I

Like most of what I have written about on The Modern Frame, the development of a culture of achievement in modernity, or what I have sometimes called an “ethic of success or wealth”, is a complex subject. It is sometimes referred to as a postmodern phenomenon since much of self-help literature and the like did not become hegemonic until the latter half of the twentieth century.¹ What I refer to is a very broad and general cultural phenomenon where individuals and groups increasingly come to view success–most commonly rooted in monetary success, i.e., wealth creation–as the end-goal or purpose of everyday life and existence. Though there are exceptions, throughout history the rich and powerful have generally been envied by those less fortunate. With the rise of capitalism, we find a broadening of the scope and possibilities for wealth and power. More and more people are able to achieve levels of wealth hitherto unknown. Advances in technology, such as newspapers, pamphlets, mass printing of books, et al., made possible the emergence of a unique body of literature–success literature–which proposed for the first time in history to disclose the so-called wisdom and knowledge of those who claimed to know the way to success, wealth, and prosperity.

Happiness: A Brief Contrast

Eric G. Wilson’s little volume, Against Happiness, is a good introduction to the subject,¹ except I would argue it isn’t about happiness. Or if it is, it’s about a superficial and degenerate form of it. What is today called happiness would have in premodern times been referred to as a kind of joy–a form of psychological satisfaction or pleasure.² In the first book of The Histories, Herodotus tells of Solon’s answer to Croesus upon being asked who the happiest man in the world is. Croesus, the famously wealthy king of Lydia, fancies himself the man. But Solon names three unknown men–Tellus, Cleobis, and Biton–all of whom are dead.³ The question of how the dead may be happier than the living–and Solon is not attributing their happiness to one enjoyed in an afterlife–is one which highlights the major difference between modern and premodern–especially ancient–views of happiness. To be sure, one cannot do justice to the subject in the form of a short essay, however accurate. It is thus my purpose here to confine myself only to the major differences in the concept of happiness between the understandings of the ancient world, and that of the contemporary modern world.

Human Life as Enacted Narrative

We both reveal ourselves to, and encounter others, through action–through words and deeds. An important aspect of human action that has not yet been considered is its historic character. By historic I do not necessarily mean important, but enduring, permanent. What one does, echoes in eternity–not in the sense of the eschatological, though that may prove true–but in that of the final; once something is done, it cannot be undone. To wrong another person is to do something that cannot be erased;¹ so too to be kind, or just. But considerations of merit aside, I refer also to those actions which may be considered the most insignificant just as much as those which may be pivotal to the narrative arc of one’s life. What emerges within the movement of a given life–built up from one’s words and deeds through time–is a kind of enacted narrative, a life story. And it is through bringing unity to the narrative of one’s life which partly answers the question: “What is the good life for man?”²

Human Action

Human action takes place within the space of the human world. But while the human world is the stage upon which human actions are performed, it also provides the context which renders our actions intelligible to others as well as ourselves. There is no such thing as an abstracted human action, existing apart and independently from its context–such a thing is unintelligible. Human actions, therefore, must possess the property of intelligibility.¹ In order to avoid potential misunderstandings, it is important to remember that I am talking about those actions which are distinctively and characteristically human. Breathing could be construed as an action: the taking in of oxygen and expulsion of carbon dioxide by the lungs. But breathing is not a human action because it does not properly take place within the human world.² Speech, however, is an example of human action, since to speak a language is to communicate within a given context of a shared social understanding. We must begin with considerations of human action if we wish to sufficiently understand not only the notions of virtue and practical rationality (ethics), and the narrative character of human life, but also to place ourselves in a position to evaluate competing views in ethics, personal identity, and others.

Beyond the Instrumental and Non-Instrumental: Some Thoughts on The Person

At this point the notion of goods as they relate to the instrumental and non-instrumental can be added to our considerations. I have spoken of two distinct “stances” or approaches to the world as adopted by homo sapiens. One views things¹ in terms of their purported usefulness or utility, of their instrumental value for the sake of some further end or goal. The other views things for their own sake, as ends in themselves, as such. Furthermore, it is the human person–conceived as a unique subject existing beyond or outside the instrumental and non-instrumental²–which adds yet another level of complexity to our understanding of these stances, particularly the instrumental.³

A General Overview

The modern contemporary world has its own characteristic understandings, paradigms,¹ and circumstances. We think in terms of the ideas that modernity has thrust upon us, and most of us have no choice in the matter because we do so without knowing it. The ideas and ways of understanding the world and ourselves that are unique to our time in the West is what I call “the modern frame”.