Date: 05-15-05 08:53
Michael Johnson wrote:
>
> Hello, I am a student at YVHS High School, and I am to
> do some Discussion Results for Julius Caesar, and I was
> wondering if you could answer some of my questions.
>
> 1) Do you think it is right to kill a leader to help the
> people that serve under him?
[Not before the leader has actually done something worthy of his killing. If we were all killed for what we MIGHT do - as Caesar was - how many of us would survive?]
>
> 2) Do you think it is right for a leader to enslave his
> people for the greater good?
[The sequence of priorities is life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. My life is more important than your liberty (and so we imprison those who are dangerous to the society); your liberty is more important than my pursuit of happiness (and so we impose taxes and restrictions ). If the very life of the whole community is in danger and that danger cannot be avoided but by "slavery", slavery is o.k. (Martial law is a dimension of this.)]
>
> 3) Can a leader be too ambitious?
[If he is too ambitious for himself, yes; I doubt that he can be too ambitious for others.]
>
> 4) If you learned of a deadly plot against a powerful but
> cruel leader would you tell him?
[You are talking about revolution, which should not be employed without the deepest consideration. That consideration given, and the leader being significantly cruel and asserting that cruelty powerfully, my answer is "No."]
>
> 5) Should a man be able to kill the leader and then become
> the leader himself.
[In an ideal world, yes; in the practical one in which we live, no, because the popular suspicion would be that the motive for the killing was personal rather than for the sake of the community.]
>
> Thank You for your time and have a good day.
[And you.]
[L. Swilley]