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Humanitas AI simulator
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Humanitas AI simulator
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Humanitas
Humanitas (from the Latin hūmānus, "human") is a Latin noun meaning human nature, civilization, and kindness. It has uses in the Enlightenment, which are discussed below.
The Latin word humanitas corresponded to the Greek concepts of philanthrôpía (loving what makes us human) and paideia (education) which were amalgamated with a series of qualities that made up the traditional unwritten Roman code of conduct (mos maiorum). Cicero (106–43 BCE) used humanitas in describing the formation of an ideal speaker (orator) who he believed should be educated to possess a collection of virtues of character suitable both for an active life of public service and a decent and fulfilling private life; these would include a fund of learning acquired from the study of bonae litterae ("good letters", i.e., classical literature, especially poetry), which would also be a source of continuing cultivation and pleasure in leisure and retirement, youth and old age, and good and bad fortune.
Insofar as humanitas corresponded to philanthrôpía and paideia, it was particularly applicable to guiding the proper exercise of power over others. Hence Cicero's advice to his brother that "if fate had given you authority over Africans or Spaniards or Gauls, wild and barbarous nations, you would still owe it to your humanitas to be concerned about their comforts, their needs, and their safety." Echoing Cicero over a century later, Pliny the Younger (61–112 CE) defined humanitas as the capacity to win the affections of lesser folk without impinging on greater.
The concept was of great importance during the re-discovery of classical antiquity during the Renaissance by the Italian umanisti, beginning with the illustrious Italian poet Petrarch, who revived Cicero's injunction to cultivate the humanities, which were understood during the Renaissance as grammar, rhetoric, poetry, history, and moral philosophy.
In 1333, in Liège, Belgium, Petrarch found and copied out in his own hand a manuscript of Cicero's speech, Pro Archia, which contained a famous passage in defense of poetry and litterae (letters):
Haec studia adolescentiam alunt, senectutem oblectant, secundas res ornant, adversis perfugium ac solacium praebent, delectant domi, non impediunt foris, pernoctant nobiscum, peregrinantur, rusticantur.
These studies nourish youth, entertain old age, enhance prosperity, offer refuge and solace too in adversity, delight us at home, not hindering us out of doors, spend the night with us, go abroad, and live in the countryside.
Petrarch liked this quotation and referred to it often, and where Cicero used the phrase "litterarum lumen", "the light of literature", Petrarch in the margin wrote lumen litterarum alongside and drew a sketch of a lamp or candle. The Liège manuscript is lost and so is Petrarch's copy, but Petrarch's copy "can be shown to be behind all but one of the later manuscripts" and preserves Petrarch's marginal annotations. Petrarch, in many respects a medieval man, regretted that Cicero had not been a Christian and believed that he certainly would have been one had he not died before the birth of Jesus. To Petrarch and the Renaissance umanisti who immediately followed him, Cicero's humanitas was not seen as in conflict with Christianity or a Christian education. In this they followed the fifth century Church fathers such as Jerome and Augustine, who taught that Greek and Roman learning and literature were gifts of God and models of excellence, provided, of course, they were filtered and purified in order to serve Christianity.
Humanitas
Humanitas (from the Latin hūmānus, "human") is a Latin noun meaning human nature, civilization, and kindness. It has uses in the Enlightenment, which are discussed below.
The Latin word humanitas corresponded to the Greek concepts of philanthrôpía (loving what makes us human) and paideia (education) which were amalgamated with a series of qualities that made up the traditional unwritten Roman code of conduct (mos maiorum). Cicero (106–43 BCE) used humanitas in describing the formation of an ideal speaker (orator) who he believed should be educated to possess a collection of virtues of character suitable both for an active life of public service and a decent and fulfilling private life; these would include a fund of learning acquired from the study of bonae litterae ("good letters", i.e., classical literature, especially poetry), which would also be a source of continuing cultivation and pleasure in leisure and retirement, youth and old age, and good and bad fortune.
Insofar as humanitas corresponded to philanthrôpía and paideia, it was particularly applicable to guiding the proper exercise of power over others. Hence Cicero's advice to his brother that "if fate had given you authority over Africans or Spaniards or Gauls, wild and barbarous nations, you would still owe it to your humanitas to be concerned about their comforts, their needs, and their safety." Echoing Cicero over a century later, Pliny the Younger (61–112 CE) defined humanitas as the capacity to win the affections of lesser folk without impinging on greater.
The concept was of great importance during the re-discovery of classical antiquity during the Renaissance by the Italian umanisti, beginning with the illustrious Italian poet Petrarch, who revived Cicero's injunction to cultivate the humanities, which were understood during the Renaissance as grammar, rhetoric, poetry, history, and moral philosophy.
In 1333, in Liège, Belgium, Petrarch found and copied out in his own hand a manuscript of Cicero's speech, Pro Archia, which contained a famous passage in defense of poetry and litterae (letters):
Haec studia adolescentiam alunt, senectutem oblectant, secundas res ornant, adversis perfugium ac solacium praebent, delectant domi, non impediunt foris, pernoctant nobiscum, peregrinantur, rusticantur.
These studies nourish youth, entertain old age, enhance prosperity, offer refuge and solace too in adversity, delight us at home, not hindering us out of doors, spend the night with us, go abroad, and live in the countryside.
Petrarch liked this quotation and referred to it often, and where Cicero used the phrase "litterarum lumen", "the light of literature", Petrarch in the margin wrote lumen litterarum alongside and drew a sketch of a lamp or candle. The Liège manuscript is lost and so is Petrarch's copy, but Petrarch's copy "can be shown to be behind all but one of the later manuscripts" and preserves Petrarch's marginal annotations. Petrarch, in many respects a medieval man, regretted that Cicero had not been a Christian and believed that he certainly would have been one had he not died before the birth of Jesus. To Petrarch and the Renaissance umanisti who immediately followed him, Cicero's humanitas was not seen as in conflict with Christianity or a Christian education. In this they followed the fifth century Church fathers such as Jerome and Augustine, who taught that Greek and Roman learning and literature were gifts of God and models of excellence, provided, of course, they were filtered and purified in order to serve Christianity.