----- Original Message ----- From: "Carrol Cox" <cbcox at ilstu.edu>
As far as I can tell, "virtue" for the last 2+ centuries means something like "Isn't it lucky that I'm not as everyone else." You can see that sense developing in Addison and it is fully dramatized in one of the greatest of English novels, Richardson's _Clarissa_. It has nothing to do with politics but rather is an implicit assertion of the superiority of "idiocy" (Greek sense) to public engagement.
---------- Though we disagree about Clarissa, your last assertion...is very interesting.
Though I would say more "equivalence" than "superiority"
Joanna