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Influences Of Plato's Republic, Plato, And Marcus Aurelius

Decent Essays

A leader is “an explorer, cutting a path through the jungle for the rest of his group to follow,” (Team). The goal of a leader should be to set an example, and standard for others. The well known, Machiavelli, Plato, and Marcus Aurelius have varying opinions of what a leader should be. Only one view of a leader that I can agree with correlates with the voice of Aurelius most. Despite this, I must admit that Machiavelli's and Plato’s writings of the Prince and Republic offers a few point that can be validated. The writings of Plato’s Republic, Machiavelli’s Prince, and Aurelius’s Meditations all contain a visions of a leader, but the descriptions of Aurelius are more closely related to what a leader is. There are three impactful minds that affect how people perceive the essence of a leader, and they are Machiavelli, Plato and Marcus Aurelius. In Plato’s Republic, Plato describes what he believes a leader to possess. He describes a leader to be the person who understands the forms, and seeks the truth. He calls that person a philosopher king, or a joyful shepherd of sheep. This man/woman is able to determine what is ‘real’ and what is not. With this ability they are able to lead people with a selflessness that cannot be matched by the other two figures. Moving on to Marcus Aurelius’s outlook, the differences show through plainly. Aurelius begins with the definition of stoicism, which is a “Greek philosophy that teaches the development of self-control and fortitude as a means

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