New Humanists Ancient Language Institute

A pandemic. A changing climate. A hopelessly divided country. Christianity threatened by Islam. Universities completely out of touch with normal people. Late medieval Italy was a basket case. All the while, a small group of men was dreaming of the Roman Empire - maybe emulating Rome was the way to save Italy? In his book Virtue Politics, James Hankins elucidates the neglected political thought of the humanists of the Italian Renaissance, which he names "virtue politics." Jonathan and Ryan outline Hankins's arguments.


James Hankins's Virtue Politics: https://amzn.to/3UiQpp3


N.T. Wright's The New Testament and the People of God: https://bookshop.org/a/25626/9780800626815


Augustine's City of God: https://bookshop.org/a/25626/9780140448948


Thomas Aquinas' De Regno: https://isidore.co/aquinas/DeRegno.htm


Dante's De Monarchia: https://bookshop.org/a/25626/9781502885555


Desiderius Erasmus' The Praise of Folly: https://bookshop.org/a/25626/9780691165646


New Humanists episode on T.S. Eliot's Praise for Privilege: https://newhumanists.buzzsprout.com/1791279/9884564-t-s-eliot-s-praise-for-privilege-episode-xvi


New Humanists is brought to you by the Ancient Language Institute: https://ancientlanguage.com/


Links may have referral codes, which earn us a commission at no additional cost to you. We encourage you, when possible, to use Bookshop.org for your book purchases, an online bookstore which supports local bookstores.


Music: Save Us Now by Shane Ivers - https://www.silvermansound.com

The poet of Joan of Arc, and a notable example of a female writer in the premodern period, Christine de Pizan took a turn at the popular humanist genre of the mirror to princes in her book "The Book of the Body Politics." Jonathan and Ryan take a look at her characterization of virtue, corporal punishment, and what it takes to educate a Caesar.


Richard M. Gamble's The Great Tradition: https://amzn.to/3Q4lRnO


Christine de Pizan's The Book of the Body Politic: https://bookshop.org/a/25626/9780521422598


C.S. Lewis's The Weight of Glory: https://bookshop.org/a/25626/9780060653200


Christopher Schlecht's "Did Dorothy Sayers Get Education Wrong?": https://youtu.be/--gjw3gaG-U?si=7OLZ-SlExk8_QMp2


Joris-Karl Huysmans's Against the Grain: https://bookshop.org/a/25626/9780199555116


New Humanists is brought to you by the Ancient Language Institute: https://ancientlanguage.com/


Links may have referral codes, which earn us a commission at no additional cost to you. We encourage you, when possible, to use Bookshop.org for your book purchases, an online bookstore which supports local bookstores.


Music: Save Us Now by Shane Ivers - https://www.silvermansound.com

In his essay "On Educating Children," a follow-up to his denunciation of pedantry, Michel de Montaigne warns that "natural affection makes parents too soft" and incapable of properly disciplining their children, or even of letting their children take the risks and encounter the dangers they ought to. Book-learning, in Montaigne's essay, takes a backseat to the development of real virtue; erudition is ornament, not foundation.
Michel de Montaigne's Complete Essays: https://bookshop.org/a/25626/9780140446043
Herodotus' Histories: https://bookshop.org/a/25626/9781400031146
Rhetorica Ad Herennium: https://bookshop.org/a/25626/9780674994447
New Humanists episode "The First English Conversation, feat. Dr. Colin Gorrie": https://newhumanists.buzzsprout.com/1791279/11362004-the-first-english-conversation-feat-dr-colin-gorrie-episode-xxxii
New Humanists is brought to you by the Ancient Language Institute: https://ancientlanguage.com/
Links may have referral codes, which earn us a commission at no additional cost to you. We encourage you, when possible, to use Bookshop.org for your book purchases, an online bookstore which supports local bookstores.
Music: Save Us Now by Shane Ivers - https://www.silvermansound.com

When Tim Griffith was coaching soccer and reading ancient Roman rhetorical theory, he realized he had stumbled across a pedagogical goldmine. In this episode, Jonathan and Ryan talk with Tim about raising kids as native Latin speakers, the roles that comprehensible input vs. grammar instruction play in the language classroom, prescriptive versus descriptive grammar, and Roman rhetoric. The product of years of experience and study, Tim’s approach to teaching Latin has borne fruit in his students at New Saint Andrews College, in his curriculum projects at Picta Dicta, and in no small way in the influence he has had on the Ancient Language Institute.
Rhetorica Ad Herennium: https://bookshop.org/a/25626/9780674994447
Quintilian’s Institutes of Oratory (Volume I): https://bookshop.org/a/25626/9780674995918
Picta Dicta: https://pictadicta.com/

Shop Picta Dicta at Roman Roads Press: https://romanroadspress.com/latin
Hans Ørberg’s Lingua Latina Per Se Illustrata: Familia Romana: https://amzn.to/3hoLz7V
W.H.D. Rouse’s Latin on the Direct Method: https://books.google.com/books/about/Latin_on_the_Direct_Method_By_W_H_D_Rous.html?id=oMXxMgEACAAJ
New Saint Andrews College: https://nsa.edu/
ALI Latin classes for adults: https://ancientlanguage.com/register-latin/
ALI Ancient Greek classes for adults: https://ancientlanguage.com/register-greek/
ALI Latin for Kids Program: https://ancientlanguage.com/latin-for-kids/
ALI Latin for Kids Self-Study Course: https://ancientlanguage.com/latin-curriculum/
Erasmus' De Copia: https://amzn.to/3Phf9MH
Paul Distler's Teach the Latin, I Pray You: https://amzn.to/4cflhPC

We threw off the monarchy... now what? Having established a republic on American soil, the Founding Fathers were faced with the question of how to educate a new generation of people who would protect American liberty. The most underrated of the Founding Fathers, Dr. Benjamin Rush, devoted considerable time and attention to this question. In this episode, Jonathan and Ryan are joined by Clifford Humphrey to discuss Rush's "Thoughts Upon the Mode of Education Proper in a Republic."


Clifford Humphrey's Are "Merely Christian" Colleges Enough?: https://www.firstthings.com/web-exclusives/2023/02/are-merely-christian-colleges-enough


Carl Trueman's Mere Christianity on Campus: https://www.firstthings.com/web-exclusives/2023/02/mere-christianity-on-campus


Clifford Humphrey's The Ends of "Mere Classical" Schools: https://americanreformer.org/2023/04/the-ends-of-mere-classical-schools/


Our American Stories' episode on Benjamin Rush: https://www.ouramericanstories.com/podcast/history/founding-father-benjamin-rush


Benjamin Rush's Thoughts Upon the Mode of Education Proper in a Republic: https://explorepahistory.com/odocument.php?docId=1-4-218#


Ian Dagg's Regime and Education: https://bookshop.org/a/25626/9783031373824


Plutarch's Greek Lives (includes Lycurgus): https://bookshop.org/a/25626/9780199540051


Joseph Addison's Cato: A Tragedy: https://bookshop.org/a/25626/9780865974432


Eric Nelson's The Hebrew Republic: https://bookshop.org/a/25626/9780674062139

New Humanists is brought to you by the Ancient Language Institute: https://ancientlanguage.com/


Links may have referral codes, which earn us a commission at no additional cost to you. We encourage you, when possible, to use Bookshop.org for your book purchases, an online bookstore which supports local bookstores.


Music: Save Us Now by Shane Ivers - https://www.silvermansound.com

Leonardo Bruni was the titan of Renaissance historians and a prolific humanist. In a long letter to an aristocratic Italian woman, Battista Malatesta, he lays out his philosophy of humanistic education, which is meant to help the student achieve glory. But laziness or ineptitude, he says, threatens the student always, and will drag her down to crawl alongside other mediocrities. Bruni insists on deep reading of the greatest orators, poets, and historians, alongside biblical and theological study.


Richard M. Gamble's The Great Tradition: https://amzn.to/3Q4lRnO


I Tatti Renaissance Library's Humanist Educational Treatises (containing Bruni's entire letter in Latin and English): https://bookshop.org/a/25626/9780674007598


Leonardo Bruni's History of the Florentine People (Volume I): https://bookshop.org/a/25626/9780674005068


Donald Phillip Verene's The Art of Humane Education: https://bookshop.org/a/25626/9780801440397


C.S. Lewis's On Stories (includes The Parthenon and The Optative): https://bookshop.org/a/25626/9780062643605


New Humanists is brought to you by the Ancient Language Institute: https://ancientlanguage.com/


Links may have referral codes, which earn us a commission at no additional cost to you. We encourage you, when possible, to use Bookshop.org for your book purchases, an online bookstore which supports local bookstores.

Music: Save Us Now by Shane Ivers - https://www.silvermansound.com