Friday, July 15, 2016

Peace

In the opening portion of Marsillius of Padua's magnificent work, Defensor Pacis, he states: 

Every realm must desire tranquility, under which peoples prosper and the profit of the nations is safeguarded. For she is the seemly mother of good arts. She it is who, multiplying the human race in unending succession, extends its resources and refines its manners. And if a man is perceived not to have sought her, he is marked for ignorant of such great concerns…

In the first of his letters, in the passage just set down, Cassiodorus gave expression to the advantages and fruits of the tranquility or peace of civil regimes, in order that he might - by using these, as the best fruits, to explain the greatest of all human goods, viz. the sufficiency of this life, which none can achieve without peace and tranquility - inspire the wills of men to be at peace with each other, and hence tranquility. His pronouncement was in harmony with the view of the blessed Job, when he said in chapter 22: "be at peace: thereby the best fruits shall come unto Thee."

That was in 1328, it applies equally today.