Honor is like respect. You can not buy it nor can you truely command it. You can earn it from others by showing the wisdom of your learning and how you conduct yourself. If you live to hear it from others it will be a waste of time for you for you do not truely possess it.
I've never heard that quote before... i've heard that "Virtue is its own reward" before. I'm not sure I'd say that honor is earned. In fact, I'm not sure that honor has to even be recognised by another person in order for you to have it. On the other hand, I think that the two really go hand in hand. So much so that I'd really have a hard time saying what was honorable and not virtuous, or what was virtuous and not honorable.
I don't believe honour is an external matter at all. To me it is entirely internal. It's something we carry in us, not something which can be given or traded. You can live alone for a hundred years and never be seen to do any good whatsoever and still have honour. It's within, not without. It's about what you are, not what people see you as. That is the honour referred to in that saying.
I think what I am thinking of here is this. Yes, you can live honorably; you can be honorable. What you think you are and how the world around you perceives you is not always the same. The majority will tell what is what. Your view of what honor is, does not always coincide with what some else thinks it is. Call it semantics, a different culture, or whatever. It should be apparent to others that your are honorable by how you live and do things. It should be recognizable by others and without you having to say diddley about it. It is a way of life to those that are honorable. I think we had something close to this in another thread.
wet1: Do they really though? I'm not sure I agree with you. Simply because lots of people agree on something doesn't make it true. For instance, let's make up a savage, bloodthirsty society. For them, we will say that it is certainly acceptable to stab someone in the back (literally) to take what you want of theirs. In this way, the strong are left in charge and the weak are culled or subservient. Now insert someone who would conform to our current understanding of what it would be to be honorable. In general that person would probably be considered weak, until he proved his strength defending himself, but would always be looked at as an odd kook, not someone with an unusual virtue. What does that mean for the honorable man? Is he now not honorable because of his society? Is the strong savage more honorable because he kills and pillages and takes what he wants by strength and guile, which is in line with what his society tells him is ok and encouraged? Adam: How is your definition of honor different from virtue then?
Does honor truly exist apart from other men? What would it mean to live honorably if my entire life was spent on an otherwise deserted island among no other people or animals? What could I do to bring dishonor to myself? I suppose I could lie to myself. I could tell myself that I feel satiated when I'm actually hungry. I could tell myself it's night when in fact the sun is shining. Yet, such lies told to one's self might be more a sign of insanity than dishonor. The same might be said of any self-depredating behavior or actions. Sane men automatically act in ways that attempt to maximize their own physical well-being. It appears to me that honor and morality arise through our relationships with other living beings, rather than existing as an innate, self-standing quality of an isolated human mind. I do know what Adam might be driving at. I'm also looking for the same source of virtue. I have a similar belief that there exists a self-standing mark of quality, or innate first virtue within a man that would continue to flourish even though he would be the last complex living creature on earth. However, I doubt that it should be termed Honor. I've come to think that the one virtue that might remain in a man cast-adrift from others is a form of self-love. If any human is worthy of my love, by deduction I as a human, must also be worthy of my own love. We are usually wary of talking openly about self-love. It gives the impression of conceit, or self-centeredness. Yet, the self-love I'm speaking of here is far from a conceit. Since I know myself implicitly, I know all the personal faults and guilts that others might only guess at. "The supreme happiness of life is the conviction that one is loved; loved for oneself, or better yet, loved despite oneself." Victor Hugo makes the point that love exists "despite" our own unworthyness to be loved. However, an honest self-love is self-regulating in nature. I shame myself for my own failings and I reward myself for my own accomplishments. I prod myself to try to understand this world and reprimand myself for failing to do so. I'm my own best friend in many respects, though I suspect that this friendship is wavering when I make myself too busy to listen to my own thoughts. I've come to think that self-love might be a necessary, thought not a sufficient condition for all of the Virtues. To go to one's grave never having come to love one's self would be a tragedy. In the words of Soren Kierkegaard: "To cheat one's self out of love is the greatest deception of which there is no reparation in either time or eternity." My ideas on this topic are far from bound and shelved. I've been thinking about this subject for a good many years. I'm forever searching for a more full understanding of how the virtues arise. I'd be pleased to hear the comments of others on this matter. Michael
Riomacleod, Let me move your words to example. The savage; the American Indian, the civilized man; the American Soldier. The American Indian thought that fighting a battle consisted of winning the war. The American Soldier viewed losing a battle as a set back but not the end of the war. The American Indian saw the soldiers as weak. The soldiers could not live off the land, were not near as good at strategy, and did not defend themselves well one on one. The American Soldier saw the Indian as weak because he was a savage. Not well supported in the field, not well organized, and not well equipped. In spite of these differences both came to respect individual members on opposite sides as being honorable. Far more common was that a man was honorable because in his society thought he had "measured up" to their codes. However there were those who never tried to measure up to the other sides code and was still considered honorable. Why? Because it was recognized that those individuals had a certain intangible called honor and valour. Much the same has occurred throughout the history of war. It has not been uncommon for the commander of one army to salute another commander before the battle engaged or during the battle as an honorable opponent
