In his extensive and deeply intellectual essay “The Athenian Mirror: Reflections on Democracy in Crisis,” Roger Kimball pays homage to the Athens of the time of Pericles.  Kimball reflects on what has been called one of the greatest orations of all time: Pericles’s Funeral Oration, given on the first anniversary of the war with Sparta to memorialize those Athenian warriors who had fallen in that ultimately disastrous war, which went on for another 27 years after his speech.

We see in Pericles the commanding general and First Man of Athens, a leader who was immensely proud of his state and what it stood for, and why it was worth dying for, as so many at that time had already done.  We have seen woefully little of that kind of pride of nation in our leaders before and after the two Trump presidencies, especially with the Obama-Biden brand of visceral hatred of everything at least half the nation they led believes in.

Though it is difficult for me to be objective about my favorite president, Ronald W. Reagan, I feel that he showed us those Periclean qualities for his eight years in office: an unbounded love of and pride in America, his enthusiastic optimism for the country he served and loved, his unabashed attitude that it was “Morning in America!” and that “You and I have a rendezvous with destiny” — emotions those of us who love our nation thirsted for in the dark years of hatred and tyranny brought to us by the Democrats, primarily the hater-in-chief, Barack Hussein Obama.

Kimball begins his discussion by noting some observations from the great classicist Victor Davis Hanson, in which he notes

“that the unabashed confidence of Pericles in his own civilization and national ethos . . . were once gold standards for unapologetic Western democratic rhetoricians.” And not only rhetoricians, but for Western democracies tout court. Pericles, Hanson observes, reminds us that “should a great culture not feel that its values and achievements are exceptional,” then no one else will either.

Then, before examining some passages from the famous speech, he asks what Pericles stood for.  And what lessons does the leader of the first experiment in democracy have for us?

Athenian democracy was not just a system of government, but a way of life.  Kimball explains that there were two keynotes to that way of life:

freedom and tolerance, on the one hand, and responsible behavior and attention to duty, on the other.

The two go together. We Athenians, Pericles said, are “free and tolerant in our private lives, but in public affairs we keep to the” law” — including, he added in an important proviso, “those unwritten laws,” like the lawlike commands of taste, manners, and morals — “which it is an acknowledged shame to break.” Freedom and tolerance, Pericles suggested, were blossoms supported by roots that reached deep into the soil of duty. Burke again: “Manners are of more importance than law. ... The law touches us but here and there and now and then. Manners are what vex or soothe, corrupt or purify, exalt or debase, barbarize or refine us, by a constant, steady, uniform, and insensible operation like that of the air we breathe in.”

I found these words of Pericles especially timely in view of what seems to be a growing number of our fellow Americans who eschew, or pretend to eschew, politics altogether and have little or no tolerance for any viewpoint but the narrative they are indoctrinated to espouse:

We do not say that a man who takes no interest in politics is a man who minds his own business we say that he has no business here at all.

Kimball also notes the troubling tendencies in the West today related to the spread of egalitarianism.  The core of this idea would have been anathema to Pericles, as “it threatens to overwhelm that other great social impulse, the impulse to achieve, to excel, to surpass: ‘always to be best and to rise above others,’ as Homer put it in one classic expression of the agonistic spirit.”

Those impulses, so critical to the overwhelming success of the Athens of Pericles, certainly define President Reagan, who, in my opinion, loved his country more openly and optimistically than many who preceded him.  To my mind, they also characterize our current president, Donald J. Trump.

There are so many examples of President Reagan’s unbounded love for his country that it would be impossible even to begin a full discussion of them.  Obviously, his confidence in the exceptional nature of his country shone through in his famous speech at the Brandenburg Gate — “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!”  But perhaps his most iconic speech was the one he gave for Barry Goldwater in 1964 — “A time for choosing,” a portion of which a family member, knowing of my dedication to the memory of President Reagan, had framed and is presently hanging on the wall of my den.  The text is here, and it makes for electrifying — one is tempted to say “Periclean” — reading.  Here is the portion that lent its content to become the commonly known title:

You and I have a rendezvous with destiny.

We’ll preserve for our children this, the last best hope of man on earth, or we’ll sentence them to take the last step into a thousand years of darkness.

Several speeches of President Trump would, in my opinion, certainly meet the high bar history has set in comparing any leader to Pericles.  The one I would select was from his first term and was given in Warsaw.  I would submit the Warsaw speech as the most Periclean of all his utterances.  Here is one of my favorite passages:

We write symphonies. We pursue innovation. We celebrate our ancient heroes, embrace our timeless traditions and customs, and always seek to explore and discover brand-new frontiers.

We reward brilliance. We strive for excellence, and cherish inspiring works of art that honor God. We treasure the rule of law and protect the right to free speech and free expression.

We empower women as pillars of our society and of our success. We put faith and family, not government and bureaucracy, at the center of our lives. And we debate everything. We challenge everything. We seek to know everything so that we can better know ourselves.

And above all, we value the dignity of every human life, protect the rights of every person, and share the hope of every soul to live in freedom. That is who we are. Those are the priceless ties that bind us together as nations, as allies, and as a civilization.

Pericles said this about the Athenian form of government:

Our form of government does not enter into rivalry with the institutions of others. Our government does not copy our neighbors’, but is an example to them. It is true that we are called a democracy, for the administration is in the hands of the many and not of the few. But while there exists equal justice to all and alike in their private disputes, the claim of excellence is also recognized; and when a citizen is in any way distinguished, he is preferred to the public service, not as a matter of privilege, but as the reward of merit. Neither is poverty an obstacle, but a man may benefit his country whatever the obscurity of his condition.

I respectfully submit that we have had one president who more than met his standard, and we have a current president whose oft-repeated dedication to and love for his country also qualify him for that honor.

Image: Gage Skidmore via Flickr, CC BY-SA 2.0.