Rhetorical Gestures (was Re: Spivak sez...)

Doug Henwood dhenwood at panix.com
Mon Oct 18 13:52:14 PDT 1999


Charles Brown wrote:


>What I mean is that Kant was no more progressive than Franklin and Jefferson.

Jefferson? Whose vision of paradise was one of yeoman farmers and slaveowning gentry? And who wrote these lovely words: "Providence has in fact so established the order of things that most evils are the means of producing some good. The yellow fever will discourage the growth of great cities in our nation; & I view great cities as pestilential to the morals, the health, and the liberties of man. True, they nourish some of the elegant arts; but the useful ones can thrive elsewhere, and less perfection in others, with more health, virtue, and freedom would be my choice." That Jefferson?

Doug



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