Between The Platonic Republic And The Excrement Of Romulus: Self-portrait Of The Intellectual In Lipsius Policy / Entre La Republique Platonicienne Et Les Excrements De Romulus: Autoportrait De L’intellectuel Dans La Politique De Lipse
Abstract
Justus Lipsius’s Six Books of Politics is possibly the most influential early modern treatise of the art of politics. Lipsius writes against Machiavelli but draws on Tacitus, and proposes a radical brand of realism: we no longer live in Plato’s republic and must make do with «Romulus’s excrements». Through style and conception, the treatise brings to the fore an unexpected political persona: the intellectual