THREAD on Strauss’ Epilogue: I promised awhile ago a thread on why one should read Leo Strauss. I’ll probably make a more general thread on that, but 1st, here is one on “An Epilogue”—an essay Strauss wrote for an edited volume called “Essays on the Scientific Study of Politics”

This essay is Strauss’ critique of contemporary political science. Why’s that important for anyone outside the university? Because how we study political phenomena determines how we judge, and ultimately act, on political things.

What Strauss does here is comparable to Schmitt’s Concept of the Political. Schmitt shows how the modern liberal order attempts to conceal and abolish the essence of the political. Strauss shows that it also distorts the study of political things.

First, Strauss describes the old political science, the kind that prevailed from Aristotle to the end of the 19th c. The old pol. sci. (which was not distinguished from political philosophy) was a practical science. It’s purpose was architectonic—to order all other arts.

This pol sci depends on man being a political and rational animal. He is fundamentally different from other animals because he is receptive of praise and shame. He knows, to a greater or lesser degree, something about right and wrong beyond mere self preservation and breeding.