How to Fail & Take It

In his modest way, Raphael Demos is an American success story. A Greek immigrant who worked his way as a janitor to his Harvard Ph.D., Demos now holds Harvard's imposing Alford professorship of natural religion, moral philosophy and civil polity (one predecessor: Josiah Royce). But in the current Harvard Alumni Bulletin, Demos has an un-American doctrine to advocate: it is high time, he thinks, that educators paid some attention to failure stories.

"In life, there is misery as well as happiness, failure no less than success; and an education which equips us for only one side of life is certainly inadequate," writes Demos. "Life is competitive; as in sports, one man's victory is another man's defeat; there is not enough in the way of wealth, position, and honor to go around. Somebody is bound to lose . . ."

Just how would he go about educating for failure? Demos would draw on history, tragic literature and philosophy:

"History teaches that success will pass, and also that failure will pass; that progress is never secure . . .

"[Tragedy] underlines the truth that human hopes must measure themselves against unfeeling necessity . . . Tragic wisdom is the knowledge of evil . . . By purging man of the original sin of self-sufficiency, tragedy makes him sociable and compassionate . . so that he can love without craving, strive without fretfulness, rise to success without falling into pride, fail without losing heart . . .

"Philosophy jolts people out of their easy complacency by revealing how precarious are the foundations of customary belief: Philosophy is self-knowledge and selfcriticism; it is the transition from wishfulness to wisdom, from innocence to maturity . . . In Plato's words, the philosopher has a view of all time and all existence. With such a perspective, he can put success in its place and failure in its place, and so be unshaken either by misfortune or good fortune . . ."

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