The world seems disproportionately interested in people who are capable of incredible feats, regardless of their virtue.
This is obvious from even a cursory look at the modern landscape, both in actual reality and by examining modern fictional figures. The admiration we hold for Tony Soprano and for Thomas Shelby, despite their obvious character flaws, comes largely from our infatuation with that seductive quality — agency, or the ability to make things happen. And it’s not limited to fiction. We are enamored with figures like Michael Jackson, Lionel Messi, Quentin Tarantino… people who seem to have a quality that rises so above the average fold that it transcends into some kind of godliness, and though their agency is constrained to their respective crafts, it is nonetheless that same quality — the ability to make things happen — that so enamors us. Their virtue is rarely, if at all, factored into our admiration.
In the past, too, this has been the case, and the agents of the past seem to have even more grandeur, as they participated in a time when conquest was the norm. Alexander, who conquered half the world at the tender age of 28, whose moniker is “The Great,” is lauded by historians and laypeople alike. Men’s infatuation with the Roman Empire, and its various ‘Emperors of The World,’ has become so common a prescription of modernity that there are memes about it. Napoleon, Caesar, Genghis, Hannibal… these names so infatuate us because perhaps they best exemplify what it means to be an agent. They are the great manifestations of that memorable quote: “Give me a lever large enough, and I will move the Earth.”
Likewise, while perhaps quieter and less known, we admire the general qualities of virtue. We regard as Godly those who can go through the greatest calamities and reach the highest highs, while treating these conditions with, if not perfect indifference, at least uncommon tranquility. We respect those that will not compromise their characters no matter what calamity, physical or otherwise, befalls them. We admire those whose entire purpose is to lift others and to bring order and harmony amongst their fellow humans.
This cursory analysis tells us that we value two things: agency and virtue. However, often, the people who best meet one quality are terrifyingly deficient in the other. The fictional characters of the modern era are the best examples of this. It is easy to see how Tony, while a formidable Mafia boss, is also a hypocrite, a brute, and a man with poor self control. Thomas Shelby, ‘Gypsy King,’ has so brutally severed his own humanity as to sanction, with his own hands, the death of his elder brother, to abandon his son and to risk his families’ lives for political gain.
But we need not take heed only of our culture’s imaginations; we can simply look at our own history to see the same pattern. Take the following example of Alexander the “Great”:
Amidst the intoxication of prosperity, Alexander killed Cluptus, for having preferred the exploits of his father Philip to his own; put Calisthenes to death in torture, for having refused to adore him in the Persian manner; and murdered the great friend of his father, the venerable Parmenio, after having, upon the most groundless suspicions, sent first to the torture and afterwards to the scaffold the only remaining son of that old man, the rest having all before died in his own service.
In the siege of modern-day Iran, Genghis and his Mongol army pulled survivors from underground hiding places and beheaded them, forming three separate mountains of skulls for men, women and children. Of the 170,000 inhabitants, Genghis spared 400 because they were skilled workers. His Roman predecessor, Julius Caesar, performed equally appalling acts. During the Gallic Wars, tribal elders of the opposing faction arrived to discuss peace deals at a Roman camp. Breaking custom, Caesar detained the envoys, and ordered a surprise assault on a completely undefended encampment. By his own account, 430,000 people were killed. Caesar concludes his actions with the following lines:
The Romans, with not a man lost and but few wounded, freed from the dread of a most grievous war — with an enemy whose numbers had been 430,000 souls — returned to camp.
The root of our admiration is obvious and reflexive — we love to see people do incredible things — but this admiration is tempered with the callous abandoning of modern moral principles, so much so that it seems that one cannot look back at any of these great ‘generals’ and see only greatness but also folly, cruelty and vanity.
In contrast, the virtuous man, who is formidable, kind, benevolent and capable of self-command, also reflexively stirs in us admiration; but if he then chooses to become a recluse, going to some secluded place to read and whittle and play the harmonica; if he is too humble to assume a station that would otherwise have benefited from his qualities; our admiration, like that of the ancient generals, is wanting and incomplete.
The marriage of these two principles, our mind and emotions tell us, is the height of human achievement. Marcus Aurelius may be the closest real-world approximation — a Roman Emperor who wielded supreme power, who governed justly, and spent his private hours cultivating virtue and serving others, although he was not without flaw. And then there’s Jon Snow, my preferred example. Here lies humanity, bravery, justice, friendship, humility paired with confidence, agency and achievement. Nothing describes Jon’s magnificence, his ascendency into that ‘divine’ equilibrium, than when he ascends to the role of Lord Commander, and, having the opportunity to now subjugate his tormentor Alliser Thorne to the most brutal humiliation, instead chooses to allot him a prestigious and fitting role, showing wisdom, mercy and self-command.
Perhaps the takeaway here is to create an ideal that’s worth aspiring to. Aristotle championed the view that all virtue is a middle state, and the more I read and think, the more I believe this is true. Lean too much toward agency, and you become the likely host of malignancies like vanity, inhumanity and folly; lean too much toward character without action, and you will descend into weakness, futility and shortcoming. It’s for a reason, however, that this middle state is so rare — it is perhaps beyond the ability of man to reach it, but that is all the more reason to why we should strive towards it.