Much as I grumble about not being able to teach classical studies (in this country, at least...) I should be thankful that there is a route into teaching, and that I may, perhaps, be eligible to get into teaching, and be of better service to my local community than performing unskilled labor. (Not that there is anything wrong with good old fashioned hard graft - to the contrary, as Hesiod said: it is a disgrace not to work (Works and Days 309 cf. Xenophon, Memorabilia 1.2.56). However, I am becoming less and less enthused about the law. It is terribly complicated, unneccesarily so. It is infuriatingly bureacratic, unneccesarily so (perhaps). I have been reading Isocrates recently (Norlin's translation, with the facing text in ancient Greek). In Isocrates' Antidosis he models his speech (which contains a patchwork of other speeches of his) on Plato's Apology (Isocrates, Antidosis 5, 15, 21, 26, 30, 33, 50, 92, 100, 144, 154, 177 etc.). I also noticed (though it was not noted in the current text) that parts of it dimly alluded to the opening of Plato's Euthyphro. These allusions quite often concern the sentiment that both Socrates (via Plato) and Isocrates emphasised the fact that they had not been in court, that they had not been a counsellor. Isocrates, as a matter of fact, was involved in speaking in the public assembly, regarding one case to do with an exchange of property, and he certainly declaimed much throughout his lifetime. Even if Isocrates modelled himself on Plato's Socrates, the two led actually quite different lives, though they both shared a similar philosophical outlook.
In essence, reading these texts has made me question my motives for wanting to get into law. Why? Lord Sumption once said that he got into law (instead of medieval British History) because he didn't want to be poor. This is fair enough I suppose, but what do I prefer? Do I prefer history, or law? Well, history, in fact, and I don't actually care about the money. I would sooner be poor and do something I love than depressed having to work all hours God sends doing something I would rather not. I had considered studying law, during my first two years at university, yet I chose not to. Why? Because it is not my passion it is not what I love. I chose history.
There is a guy at work (that is, one of the crew of the Bounty, somewhere between that and William Golding's Lord of the Flies) that has been offered a job for £35,000 a year as a head chef. I asked him why he didn't take it, and why he chooses to remain on minimum wage. His answer was curious: because he knew he would be depressed doing such work, and would rather settle for less money and lead a relatively happy life, than be paid quite well and have to deal with all that that job entails. Is health, happiness and well-being more important than pecuniary considerations? I think that the recent pandemic has shown that for many people, at least, if not Her Majesty's Government, well-being is more important than money ('the economy, the economy!').
Besides, experience counts for much. In my experience, becoming more well educated is not lucrative, at all. It's a long shot gamble that enriches one in knowledge and wisdom, but leaves one ultimately feeling hollow and used, as a kind of guinea pig in a thankless system. I am not alone in this view. I have met many students that feel the same way throughout my life. I will leave, Dear Diary, on one note. An actor from Brazil said that her mentor and acting tutor maintained that it was not the most gifted students that he prized most highly, but those that stuck at it, were the keenest students and practised so much they became better. Isocrates echoes a this sentiment in his Antidosis (191):
"We know that men who are less generously endowed by nature but excel in experience and practice, not only improve upon themselves, but surpass others, who, though highly gifted, have been too negligent of their talents." (trans. Norlin, 1929, p.295).
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