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marron, I've been mulling over your glorious essay this evening.

So tell me, Masked Man: Who the hail are you?

To put that impertinent question into context, we could recall that Plato, in Gorgias, had Socrates instruct his student Chaerophon to ask the first question of the great Sophist, since they were imminently to be joined in company, along with Gorgias' students, Polus and [the fatal] Callicles....

Chaerophon was clueless what question would be appropriate to address to the celebrated orator. So Socrates said, just ask him: "Who he is."

Now this is quite a difficult, if not "fatal" question to ask any intelligent person. For as Voegelin points out, this is the question that

"...is for all times the decisive question, cutting through the network of opinions, social ideas, and ideologies. It is the question that appeals to the nobility of the soul; and it is the one question which the ignoble intellectual cannot face."

Your essay is not "an intellectual exercise." It cuts to the heart-and-soul problems of human existence. And it seems to have done so, so effectively as to have precluded meaningful debate.

That is, I notice that few people have taken the trouble to reply to you.

And the whole thing was done in glorious prose!

KUDOS to you, Masked Man [Woman]!

Thank you so much for the heads up to your response!

It cuts to the heart-and-soul problems of human existence. And it seems to have done so, so effectively as to have precluded meaningful debate.

I agree. There is nothing to debate when one shares the essence of who he is. It is a testimony - and a rare one at that, for it seems quite difficult for many either to collect their own thoughts or to open themselves fully and deeply to inspection.

Have you read the Odyssey lately?

At the end of Book 8, Demodocus the bard has been telling his tale, it's pretty good, and makes Odysseus weep. So the Phaecian king makes Demodocus stop. "Hold off--you're making our guest weep. Let's be more civil." And with that he turns to Odysseus and says, "Now then, what I'd like to know is this. What's your name?

marron also has a very nice response about them there Straussians