Nock was an individualist, writes Frank Chodorov, and he got that way not as the result of study but by force of temperament. As he would put it, the “furniture” of his mind was so arranged because no other arrangement would fit his mind. A man thinks what he is, Nock would say, and no amount of education can make him think otherwise; the only function that education can perform is to give him the tools with which to bring out of him what “he already knows!” He would have no truck with the doctrine of environmentalism, which he described as a false god set up by self-appointed and self-centered priests.
He took to laissez faire economics, not because of its utilitarian support, but because of his abhorrence of political intervention. He was an anti-statist because he revolted at the vulgarism of politics and its devotees; in his classic, Our Enemy the State, he likens the state to a “professional criminal class.” He scorned reform movements because they all involve the use of political power which, on examination, will be found to be at the bottom of the condition the reformers would correct. He was for letting people alone because only under a condition of freedom could they improve themselves, if they have any capacity for improvement in them. FULL ARTICLE
{ 9 comments }
“…never complain, never explain, never argue,” he often said, “and you will get more fun out of life.”
Great words to live by.
Great words indeed, but damn near impossible.
This site is filled with complaints, explanations, and arguments as is practically every conversation I’ve ever overheard.
Cheers
“He insisted that no fault with public education can be found if the underlying principle of modern demcracy is accepted as an axiom. That principle holds that not only are we born equal in law, but that we are also endowed with equal capacities; it follows that we are equally and perhaps indefinitely perfectible; all we need to prove this are equal educational advantages. Public education for all, then, is the way to the perfect society.â€
That is brilliant!
“The best we can do under the circumstances is to fit the standard of education to the lowest common denominator, and to keep on lowering it as more and more are invited or forced into the school system.â€
Actually, what we have stratified education. Top students go to the top10 schools and get opportunities others don’t. The lowest level is local junior colleges. No one is fooled. Everyone knows the hierarchy, but we all pretend it doesn’t exist. But the result is that we spend far more on education than we would in a free market and less on other pleasures.
I’m not sure about his idea of not trying to change people’s ideas. Maybe he was more Presbyterian than Episcopalean. His essay on the remnant suggests that he leaned toward predestination.
Mises tried and I wonder if Nock was happier than Mises. Could be. Mises was very frustrated with the stubborness of people’s love for socialism.
I find that the older I get the more I have Nock’s attitude about trying to change people. I tend to focus on the remnant, too.
PS, It seems that Menger took Nock’s attitude toward change, also, in his later years. That observation is based on the excerpt from Mises’s biography posted recently in which Mises wrote that Menger retired and refused to engage in the battle against socialism the last 20 years of his life even though he retained a sharp mind.
@Mac,
Agreed. I can’t say that I always abide by Nock’s credo.
Regarding the pointlessness of trying to effect change… I changed. I have since become an avid reader of numerous authors like Mises, Rothbard, etc,… Since then, I have shared what I have learned with other people and have seen some experience radical changes in their views. So for me, the question is not whether people can change, but whether or not they are willing to change. Moreover, look at the difference in just the last few years with regard to people’s willingness to listen to people like Ron Paul. I admit though that at times I get impatient and want change to come faster, but then I think about Mises and what it must have been like for him, slogging along on his own amidst a see of statism and virtually unquestioned Keynesianism. He may not have lived to see the results of his labors, but his efforts planted many seeds which are now bearing fruit…
I second fundamentalist’s comment. I just add that the sentence which follows his quote hit me right between the eyes: It would be undemocratic to set the standard above the reach of the most unfortunate moron.
This exactly describes the attitude of many of my Japanese colleagues here where I work. Now I understand where they got it from! Unfortunately, they have not inherited the American strain of libertarianism in equal measure.
Thanks to whoever posted this. I had never heard of Nock until I read about him here and on Gary North’s website.
Fundamentalist,
Regarding your reference to Mises’s comment concerning Menger, somewhere in Hülsmann’s outstanding biography of Mises, Hülsmann states that an affair Menger had with his housekeeper or maid (I do not remember the exact details) negatively impacted Menger’s ability to continue his active teaching at the University of Vienna in his later years. This premature “retirement” of Menger had a detrimental influence on the dissemination of Mengerian economics to students at the university.
As a follow-up to my above comment, here is footnote 70 on page 140 of Professor Hülsmann’s biography of Mises:
It appears that the main reason why Menger retired at the comparatively young age of sixty-two was that he had caused a scandal through an affair with his housemaid. The affair became public because of the birth of Karl, whom Carl Menger acknowledged as his son. Karl cost Menger his career, and he thereby also changed the history of the Austrian School of economics, which under Carl’s guidance certainly would have taken a different course than it did under his successor, Friedrich von Wieser. But Karl’s birth also led to a rapprochement between the Austrian School and the mainstream through a more direct route: Karl Menger himself would eventually become a famous mathematical economist.
Comments on this entry are closed.