The life of form

The other day, I was musing on
the theme of the alienated lib-
rary, confessing to occasional
searches in the second-hand or
remaindered stashes for a book
allowed to slip away, to which
I should gratefully add a more
contemporary resort, the house
of republication. FS&G, for ex-
ample, will reprint for one in
need of an out-of-print trans-
nation of Virgil or Horace, by
the masterful David Ferry, not
that this will offer insurance
against all miscalculations. I
give you an entire government,
for example, it would be prop-
er to exempt from preservation.

Over the weekend, exploiting a

peach of a natural disaster, a

distinguished pair of offenses

against the nation and our law

were issued by the White House

as an almost endearing sort of

dare to utter condemnations at

a time of televised suffering,

and damages to Texan property.

Behind rude, howling winds and

cruelly penetrating tides, the

President pronounced the first

unilateral edict of discrimin-

ation against a distinct class

of citizens in the lifetime of

this nation, where even incar-

cerations of Japanese-American

innocents claimed an emergency

of a limited duration. And, as

if this stunning triumph might

not be enough, he also brushed

aside every tissue of due pro-

cess in the peremptory pardon,

of a political ally for crimes

steeped in discrimination, in-

jury, death, and social harms.

The times summon the mind to a

discipline of form on all lev-

els, such is the gravity which

distinguishes our nation's or-

deal under this government. In

aid of portraying to oneself a

restoring vindication of these

disciplines, I was reminded of

Humanism's vital connection of

rhetoric and philosophy in the

Italian renaissance, presented

to me in college in a text I'm

revisiting, cited below. There

can be no doubt, that the gen-

ius of the current government-

al assault on our nation is in

its violation of every discip-

line of form. It boasts of it.

We assert an interest, not on-

ly countervailing but defining,

in the humanity of a coherency

long demeaned as elegance, but

truly the triumph of study and

application. The marauding neg-

ligence we suffer at this gov-

ernment's hands is, at bottom,

sloth incarnate, all its venge-

ances a feast of malnutrition. 

Time to do the reading once a-

gain. Everyone knows the text

that warned him, he'd be back.

This one will do for me.