# Introduction pecies extinction, agricultural monocultures, factory farming, plastic waste in the oceans, melting of the polar ice caps, glacier melting, rising sea levels, the ozone hole, global warming, acidification of the oceans, acid rain, forest dieback, deforestation for the extraction of fields, nuclear waste and overfishing show ecological sins that must be avoided. Unlimited economic growth no longer seems possible, because the necessary materials on earth are only available in limited quantities. While the Club of Rome had pointed out the limits of earthly resources in 1972, today we know about the finiteness of the supplies of oil, sand, metals and rare earths. This brief introductory reflection contains two important key concepts: sin and limit. Both are normative: the former because it forbids actions, the latter because it calls for thrift. In this context, ecology, as introduced by Ernst Haeckel (1834-1919) in 1866, initially denoted a descriptive term: "By oecology we understand the whole science of the relations of the organism to the surrounding external world, whither, in a broader sense, we may reckon all 'conditions of existence.'" 1 This discipline underwent a transformation in the 1970s and 1980s when it became the leading science of the ecology movement. It acquired a goal and became normative, as "ecological" became synonymous with sustainable, environmentally sound, considerate, and good. And "eco" as in "organic," e.g., organic farmers or green electricity, became a mark of quality. Ecology is now understood as a task and as environmental protection, which serves the preservation of the living environment of humans and their health. Sustainability aims at the considerate and long-term use of resources, whose ecosystems are to be kept in natural balance. Ecocriticism, which is the subject of our conference, has its origins in the Anglo-Saxon world, where, according to Cheryll Glotfelty and Richard Kerridge, it emerged in the eighties and nineties, and according to Ken Hiltner even in the sixties and seventies of the last century. It is defined by Cheryll Glotfelty as the "study of the relationship between literature and the physical environment" 2 . "Ecocriticism explores the ways in which we imagine and portray the relationship between humans and the environment in all areas of cultural production." 3 Incidentally, if we take the Greek word as our starting point, ecology and economy mean roughly the same thing. Both have formed from the Greek word for "house", "oikos", supplemented by "nomos", "law" and "logos", "reason" and "word" respectively. In the following, we will ask whether and to what extent the ancient literature of the house fathers, also called It leads from the romantic author Wordsworth or from Thoreau, who lived a simple life in the woods for two years, to Google Earth or Werner Herzog's film Grizzly Man about an animal rights activist who lived with grizzly bears in Alaska for 13 summers. From this broad field, a specific theme will be selected in the following. Based on ancient and modern writings that instruct the great landowner how to deal with agriculture and forestry, with his servants, his vassals or slaves, the question arises of relationships between the organization of the great house as an agricultural production site and modern economics. economists, and their descendants in the early modern period are of interest today. The hypothesis to be confirmed is that it is precisely their normative approaches that can be a corrective to contemporary economics and thus support concerns of contemporary ecology. This hypothesis has an implication: the environment as a world of objects is constituted by the subject, i.e., by the individual's values, by the knowledge with which he interprets the world, and by his relation to the fellow human beings who belong to his world and with whom he interprets it. If one wants to understand the environment as an object, then one has to start with the subject. The subject, but also his house, is the microcosm with which the macrocosm of the environment corresponds. A central work of ancient literature on agriculture is Virgil's Georgica, which he wrote between 37 and 29 BC. The Roman author advises man to adopt an attitude of reverence when he cultivates nature with diligence. It is the will of Jupiter, he says, to see man work. Virgil deals with agriculture, fruit-growing, viticulture, animal husbandry and beekeeping. That he sees these disciplines of knowledge in a social context is shown by his description of the bee-state, which he presents as a model for the Roman state. The bees, with their loyalty and diligence, their sociability and division of labor, appear to him as heirs of the Golden Age. In Virgil, agriculture is thus related to virtues, situated in the state as whole and idealized with the model of the bee-state. The Georgica thus becomes one of the sources of early modern instructions for the large landowner, who had to organize the work in his house and on his lands. Another source was the literature of normative economics. In ancient Greece, economics was part of practical philosophy and ethics. It dealt with what should be and established norms for the order of the house, the principle of which was self-sufficiency. In the face of extensive self-sufficiency, the market only had a supplementary function. Within the framework of the community, the good will of all ensured that, in reciprocity, one shared the burdens of the other and that, in a just exchange, whoever had too much of one thing gave it to whoever had too little. This can be seen as economic ethics or as an anthropological perspective in which man is the measure of all things. Ancient economics starts from the householder and his relationship with his wife as his helper, then comes to the children, the household members, the servants, the slaves, the friends and neighbors, before looking at the wealth in movable and immovable goods, followed by the procurement of means for the household members through intrahousehold provision or through extrahousehold acquisition. 4 Aristotle advises: "But what is natural must be gauged from those things which are in their natural state, not from those which are corrupt." 5 Xenophon's Economics, a dialogue Socrates conducts with others, also discusses the generation of surpluses that occur where the household is managed thoughtfully, purposefully, and with diligent work. The surpluses thereby make it possible not least for the landlord to fulfill public and private obligations, whose costs only a wealthy person can carry. Finally, the management of a house with agriculture is an appropriate occupation for polis citizens. After discussing marriage and the tasks of husband and wife in the house, Xenophon finally emphasizes the ability of the master of the house to motivate his subordinates to top performance, like a commander or politician. 6 In Aristotle, man as a zoon politikon, as a being designed for society, is the starting point of economics. Economic purposes are the maintenance of the household community, procreation and child rearing. The house forms the basis for the larger and higher community of the polis, which is why Aristotle places his discussion of economics in the first book of Politics. While the house provides for daily living together, needs of the military, law, and religion that go beyond that are carried within the framework of the polis. The smallest social grouping is the house, which is conceived as a self-sustaining unit where lacking goods are acquired by giving surplus products in exchange or by purchase. This supplementary satisfaction of needs distinguishes Aristotle from acquisitiveness, which aims at unlimited profit-making for its own sake. The latter, chrematistics, seems unnatural to him, since it does not serve to secure subsistence and stops at what is necessary for a perfect life. 7 The good oikonomos has the virtues of prudence, diligence, and thrift, while the bad one is guided by sloth, carelessness, and unrestrained desires. Aristotle therefore urges "that the care of the oikonomos be directed more to men than to dead property, and more to the excellence of the former than to the abundance of the latter, which we call wealth." 8 Among the Romans, it was first Marcus Porcius Cato, the Elder (234-148), whose book De agricultura deals with the income to be derived from an estate. Unlike Aristotle, he gives preference to the areas that bring the most profit. This, however, is contradicted by the pedagogical principles he handed down on the conduct of life, in which he rejects luxury and calls for a return to the mos maiorum: "You care a lot about food and you care very little about a proper life." Or, "I would rather compete with the bravest for valor than with the richest for riches or with the greedy for covetousness." Or, "I am reproached for not possessing many things, but I reproach those for not being able to do without them." 9 In 170 chapters, Cato gives advice on the purchase of an estate, the construction of buildings, the relationship of the lord of the manor to his subjects, the care of health and the sick, and religious worship. 10 In Marcus Tullius Cicero (106-43), it is nature, or the reason that prevails within it, that guides dutiful action. Guiding concepts here are decorum, propriety, control of the passions, right measure, honestas, honor, verecundia, sense of propriety, and ornatus vitae, a sense of beauty. In the Stoic view, what is produced on earth "is created for the benefit of men, but men are begotten for the sake of their fellow men, that they, one to another, may of themselves be mutually useful, so in this we must follow nature as a guide, making common benefit central by reciprocity of benefits." 11 In patristics, Christianity shifts interest to the afterlife and the inner life of the individual. The fact that man was granted only a limited right to use the goods of the world resulted in an ascetic attitude in housekeeping, the demand for moderation in the pursuit of profit and the rejection of unlimited profit. Expenditure in excess of need appears as abuse. Society appears as an organism characterized by solidarity, piety and authority, so that modesty, moderation in material demands and exchange justice become basic principles. Thus, the doctrine of life management is the basis for stewardship. This makes clear that dealing with fellow human beings and with the object world is borne by the subject. Thus, if one wants a certain way of dealing with the environment, then, according to ancient conception, it is not the environment but the subject that must be taken as a starting point. 12 Labor was held in such high esteem that profit without labor was considered unjustified, as in the case of the taking of interest. For Augustine, food and drink serve health and not pleasure: "What is already enough for health is still too little for pleasure. And it is often uncertain whether the necessary care for the body asks for help or whether already mendaciously lust and desire demand only service." 13 Thomas Aquinas limits the competitive thinking by the fact that each individual remained permanently bound to his profession in the organic system of the society of estates. 14 In the Middle Ages, the space of the home is also demarcated from that of the state by distinguishing between private interest, services and taxes of public law origin, although it was not until the absolutist theorist of the 17th century that a precise distinction was made between the "seigneurie publique" of the king and the "seigneurie privée" of landed property. Upon the protection of the landlord rests the tranquility and security of peasant existence. 15 Leon Battista Alberti (1404-1472) will be presented as an example of early economics in the humanist spirit. His three-part work Della Famiglia, published in 1434 and 1441, poses the question of the rise and decline of a family in dialogue form. 16 He defines housekeeping as the opposite of wastefulness and as care towards things. 17 For him, housekeeping also means, in Aristotelian terms, using as much of what one has as is necessary and keeping the middle ground between too little and too much. 18 To the individual he assigns the task of keeping his body healthy and strong, of bringing his soul into a cheerful mood through virtue, and of spending his time sensibly, i.e. avoiding wasting time. Alberti holds up work as a value against idleness, with his humanistic approach characterized by secularization, the pursuit of happiness, and the pursuit of utility. In the foreground is the demand to teach virtue, to control oneself and to reject one's own cravings and desires. 19 Frugality serves to have money when, for example, it is important to help a sick person, who is more important than money. 20 Frugality harms no one, rejects desires and preserves the family, while wastefulness attracts mendacious flatterers who disappear like fish as soon as the bait is gone. 21 Regarding the relationship between body and mind, Alberti emphasizes that with the mind, memory and reason, divine gifts are given to man to distinguish what he should avoid and what he should strive for in order to preserve himself rightly. Self-control serves to restrain excessive desires through shame, moderation, and desire for praise. 22 For Alberti, man is by nature fitted to use things and born to be happy. Happiness, some think, is having nothing to spare, and striving for wealth. Others see happiness in the state of feeling no displeasure, and indulge in pleasures and delights. Others, less sensually oriented, see happiness in being honored and appreciated by others. Real happiness, however, can be achieved for oneself and one's own only through good, righteous and virtuous works. The latter are those in which there is no suspicion, no involvement of anything dishonorable. 23 Only in passing should we mention the Protestant and Calvinist economists who, against the background of the doctrine of predestination, cultivated Puritanism, in which occupational success justified the assumption of the divine redemption of the believer in the hereafter, whereby the Lutheran had to prove himself in the respective occupation and in Calvinism occupational changes were possible. In Puritanism, secular thinking is imbued with religious considerations, as when, for example, John Milton makes the rise and fall of civil societies dependent on the virtue of discipline: "Discipline is not merely the removal of disorder, but, if divine things can somehow be given visible form, so as the visible embodiment of virtue." Virtue, then, for Alberti, is the basis of happiness, whereby the dominion of the mind over the body avoids waste. The "domestic fathers' literature", as the economists of the 16th to 18th centuries are also called, since they describe the cosmos of the early modern whole house, proceeds equally from humanistic approaches such as Alberti's and Christian sermons. Here, alongside religious and moral duties, there is advice on farming, viticulture and gardening as well as animal husbandry, weather rules, astrological explanations and epistolary formulations. Popular in Germany was the priest Johannes Coler (1593-1603) with Oeconomica ruralis et domestica, which rejects the widespread disdain for agriculture and refers to the home as a monarchy in miniature, where wife, servants and children should follow the landlord. The Georgica curiosa (1682) by the landed noble Wolf Helmhardt von Hohberg demands reason, justice and kindness from the landlord instead of excessive harshness. He discusses in detail how the householder should behave towards God, his own passions, his wife, his children and his servants. Only then does he discuss agriculture, animal husbandry, bees, forestry and hunting. A late work is Der Hausvater by O. von Münchhausen (1764-1773). Characteristic of these texts is that they start from man and deal with the objects of nature only after they have presented his values and attitudes. Diligence, moderation and self-control appear here as the main virtues. 25 This ascetic lifestyle, a rational shaping of the whole of existence oriented to God's will, attempts to transform everyday life into a rational life in the world and yet not of this world or for this world, although chrematism, rejected since Aristotle, with its hunger for economic gain then awakens in the Puritan context as an economic virtue to a new flowering. 26 In Spain, the genre of domestic fathers' literature is divided into two parts: On the one hand, there are texts that orient the figure of the householder to that of the prince in the princely mirrors; on the other hand, one finds morally and politically oriented texts on agriculture. To the former genre belongs El perfecto señor (1626, 1653) by Antonio López de Vega. Love of God and fear of God come first in his explanations of the spirit of the householder. This is followed by disciplines of knowledge such as rhetoric, history and philosophy, which he is supposed to deal with without becoming conceited. Moral philosophy and practice, however, seem more important to him. But here, too, the reason of the subject dominates when the object world is met with virtue and discipline. 27 In dealing with subordinates, he is to consider "que la comodidad, i riqueza de los vassallos, haze ricos à los señores; i su maltratamiento, i pobreza los empobreze." 28 "En la Economica de su familia," 29 he said, great caution was needed. "Cuide, cuide, i sepa del orden, con que en su casa se procede: la cantidad, i calidad de sus rentas: quando, i como se cobran, i destribuyen: si estan quixosos los criados (en cuya informacion consiste gran parte de la reputacion de los Señores) i si cada uno acude con cuidado, i suficiencia, a lo essencial de su ministerio." 30 He said that less important tasks should be entrusted to the care of his superintendents. When he hires new personnel, he should first pay attention to their virtues, since only tyrants prefer vicious persons. In hiring servants, it is said, "la nobleza del alma estime, i busque sobre la del cuerpo." 31 After the order of the house, the area outside comes into view. In the first place there is the prince, to whom loyalty and zeal for Volume XXII Issue II Version I 46 ( ) service must be shown. 32 Other persons are to be treated differently according to their place in the social hierarchy. He should avoid "la inhumanidad ordinaria a los grandes, i el desprecio con que tratan los inferiores." 33 In dealing with riches, one virtue is central: "La que deve tener por mas propia de su estado, es la Liberalidad." 34 It is accompanied by modesty. In public occasions it is restrained: "Sepa medir, i proporcionar a su persona, sobre lo conveniente, lo grande: pero huya los excesos inimitables [...] i tocando estremos, a que no pueden llegar otros, la embiciosa emulacion sabrà calumniarlos." 35 The Nobleza virtuosa (1619) by Pedro Henrique Pastor also links nobility to virtue: "Sola la virtud es el propio bien del hombre, pues todas las demas cosas humanas se consumen, y ella da muestras de naturaleza eterna." Here, then, López de Vega is squarely in the Aristotelian tradition of domestic fathers' literature, which demands moderation and limitation. 36 In detail, the cardinal virtues, honoring the father, obedience to the king and the relationship with the wife, children and vassals are dealt with. 37 With the latter, he said, it is important to be well advised and guided: "A los pueblos, y vassallos particulares, que conocieres de malas inclinaciones, animos inquietos, y deseosos de novedades, procurad ponerles freno, con quitar las ocasiones, y limitarles el poder." 38 Generous may the householder be in forgiving accidental and not malicious culpable behavior, or when dues are not paid on time. Privileges once granted to vassals are not to be withdrawn and special services are not to be demanded. In dealing specifically with the poor and ignorant farm laborers, the landlord is to listen patiently to their concerns. 39 Gabriel Alonso de Herrera, on the other hand, starts with agriculture. In his Agricultura general (1513), he praises rural life as if it were the Golden Age: "Mas labrar el campo vida sancta, segura, llena de inocencia, agena de pecado. Quién podrá en breve decir las excelencias y provechos que el campo acarrea? El campo quita la ociosidad dañosa, en el campo no hay For Henrique Pastor, too, the starting point of advice is virtue. 32 Cf. Francisco José Aranda Pérez, Familia y sociedad o la interrelación casa-república en la tratadística española del siglo XVI, in: James Casey, Juan Hernández Franco (ed.), Familia, parentesco y linaje, Universidad de Murcia 1997, p. 177-186 rencores ni enemistades; mas se conserva la salud, por donde la vida mas se alarga." 40 When there were no cities, he said, there was also less disease and less need for medicine. Agriculture combined "provecho, placer y honra." 41 Cato is cited, for whom it was considered the highest praise when someone was called "ser buen labrador." Gladly, the Romans took from among the labradores their capitanes, who "conservaron su inocencia, vivieron sanctamente." 42 Herrera, like Virgil, first discusses soil conditions and fertilization, then devotes himself to cereals, viticulture, forestry and livestock. Agriculture, he says, is the oldest of the mechanical arts that exist, since it goes back to Adam. Later, the arts were developed and perfected, but Herrera emphasizes that the first inventors of an art, like the beginnings, are of particular importance, citing Aristotle. Herrera does not claim to be the inventor of agriculture, but at least he is the one who, starting from Greek and Latin models, presents it in Spanish. It is irrelevant that the ancient guidelines do not refer to Spanish climatic conditions or soils, but to Italian or Greek ones, they are just as valid as the ancient rules of medicine. And on the question of the primacy of the old or the new, Herrera gives preference to the former: "De creer es que supieron los romanos labrar el campo tan bien como nuestros españoles; y aun pienso yo que algo mejor, porque mas se preciaban dello; y no hay quien tan bien ni tan perfectamente haga alguna cosa como el que se precia y honra della." 43 Lope de Deça, in his "Govierno polytico de Agricultura" (1618), emphasizes the dignity, utility and necessity of agriculture, considering it superior to all other arts and accomplishments, "pues ella sola es la natural, digna de nobles, de virtuosos, y de sabios." 44 And he invokes Xenophon, for whom agriculture is an activity appropriate for kings. Drawing on Aristotle, he contrasts natural agriculture with the unnatural multiplication of money through the taking of interest. Lope de Deça therefore sees an important reason for the decline of agriculture in the sharp increase in rents, which ruined the tenant, especially in the event of crop failure or failure of livestock. It benefited the "Arçobispados, Obispados, Dignidades, Canongias, Curatos, Beneficios, Prestamos, Encomiendas de las Ordees militares tercias Reales, y otras ansi." 45 A people, he said, is morally good by its agricultural workers and corrupted by those who practice shameful occupations. Agricultural activity "aprovecha tambien mucho para la fortaleza, y robustez, y su operacion, no afemina como la de las artes baxas, y mugeriles." 46 Quoting Aristotle again, he praises agriculture: "Los primeros fundadores de una republica, de una ciudad, de una comunidad, de una casa particular. Lo primero trataron, y han de tratar del sustento de los hombres, y animales." 47 Moreover, from the newly acquired lands come guests who did not contribute to agriculture, but "a sus negociaciones, y al cebo de la plata, y oro, buscando artes, y artificios [...] Esta gente al fin es mucha, y comen sin sembrar, ni criar." Lope de Deça attributes several reasons why agriculture in formerly fertile Spain was powerless in his time. Because Spain had gained so many lands and colonies with Flanders, Italy, and America, many Spaniards had left to steer and manage these areas, which were now lacking in Spain. 48 Foreign trade had led to a corruption of morals, "con que parece esta adulterada la noble senzillez de los Españoles, y en que buscan descansada, y viciosa vida, y huyen del trabajo virtuoso, y como fue sentencia dada por Dios a nuestros primeros padres, que auiamos de trabajar para comer, y queremos comer sin trabajar." 49 The natural and necessary has given way to luxury: "Tantos hombres de todas edades como estan ocupados en servir superflumente en cosas mas superfluas, y no necessarias. [...] Donde bastauan dos sastres son aora menester veynte para la superfluydad, y multiplicacion de vestidos, y guarniciones que ha inuentado la vanidad, y va inuentando cada dia." 50 An innumerable amount of "ministros de la gula" were devoted to "superfluas artes, en desprecio de las buenas costumbres antiguas Españolas." 51 If in the past hunger was satisfied, now it is fanned. If in the past the body of the agricultural worker was strong and healthy "no corrompido con el arte, y deleyte" 52 , now numerous diseases appear as "castigos todos de la glotoneria, y luxuria" 53 . Also mentioned are perfumers and musicians who practice useless arts and those that serve pleasure. And if so many occupy themselves with superfluous and harmful things, they are naturally lacking in agriculture, which is as salutary as it is useful. Quoting Seneca and anticipating Rousseau, he particularly emphasizes the harmful effect of going to the theater. When children of agricultural workers studied law at universities, he says, this had no effect other than to multiply lawsuits. What is then elaborated on the loss of the former peace appears as an anticipation of Hobbes' "Homo homini lupus.": "Ninguno tiene alli ganancia sino con daño del otro. [...] No es otra su vida que la de los Gladiatores vivir, y pelear. Es una junta de fieras." 54 Miguel Casa de Leruela, in Restauración de la antigua abundancia de España (1631), also deals with the decline of Spanish agriculture, attributing it to the lack of livestock: "la Carestia intolerable de precios, la Necesidad comun de las cosas, y la Despoblacion general de España, son efectos de la ruina de los ganados." 55 The production of the staple food, bread, required animals to support agriculture. Casa de Leruela evokes the namesake Greek god Pan: "Por esto invocaba la filosofia antigua al Dios de los Pastores Pan, que quiere dezir Todo, y le aclamaba Señor de la materia universal." 56 He considers the consequences of the lack of cattle more devastating than those of idleness. Like Lope de Deça, he sees the causes in excessive rents and levies, which cause peasants to lose interest in agriculture, while greed and luxury reign on the side of the money recipients. The situation is comparable to ancient Rome, where Cato had already attributed the downfall of great empires to greed and effeminacy. Greed was insatiable: "Es ley penal de la Avaricia, que quanto quiera, que robe mucho siempre padeze necesidades. [...] Y assi para el desempeño de los naturales destos Reynos, se han de moderar no solamente el luxo iniciativo de la avaricia, la qual no guarda ley, estando la vanidad a sus anchuras." 57 This was a situation "contra las leyes de naturaleza, que ordenan a las comodidades, que alcancen a quien persiguen la labor, y el trabajo." 58 Two aspects of the Spanish texts will be subjected to special consideration in the following, first the positively evaluated early agricultural primitive state evoked by Alonso de Herrera. Then, based on the critique of luxury in Casa de Leruela and Lope de Deça, precursors and their further developments will also be discussed. # Volume XXII Issue II Version I # ( ) The ideas of a primordial state can be positive or negative. In the antiquity, Hesiod saw a golden age as the first world age, which was followed by a silver, a bronze and an iron age. In the order of precedence, then, a descent is evident, as he saw the latter, his own, marked by brutalization of morals. Cervantes' Don Quixote sees in the Golden Age an epoch of innocence, in which the words "mine" and "thine" were still unknown, there was no deceit, but truth, simplicity and peace prevailed. He wants to restore this time through his chivalrous deeds. Juan Luis Vives, in De causis corruptarum artium (1531), emphasizes that man, although created for the community, is, because of his self-love, "severe and harsh against others, which would be the cause of the greatest disturbances in life, since everyone would gather together as much as he could either by his ingenuity or his physical powers, for himself and for his own advantage." 59 Hobbes criticizes the Aristotelian conception of man as a zoon politikon. For the fact that this situation has been overcome, Vives blames the introduction of justice, which put a stop to greedy hands and kept injustice away from coexistence. Here, a position is indicated that wishes to overcome a dangerous state of nature characterized by antagonistic interests by introducing socially guaranteed justice. The most prominent representative of this position in the 17th century is Hobbes, whose negative evaluation of the state of nature will therefore be presented in more detail below. 60 According to Aristotle, man's goal is eudaimonia (bliss), which can only be achieved in the polis. Therefore, Aristotle concludes, man is a communal being from his goal, i.e., from his nature. 61 To this Hobbes counters: if men were by nature political beings, then by their nature, i.e., by birth, they should be able to form a society with suitable, contractually established rules for living together. According to Hobbes, this is not the case since people would be born as children who lack the reasonable insight into the meaning of such contracts. Because only education leads to this reasonable insight, man is not by nature a communal being. 62 Hobbes also has a different conception of happiness than Aristotle. For him, it does not consist in the tranquility of a contented mind. "For there is no such finis ultimus (ultimate end) or summum bonum (highest good) as is mentioned in the books of the ancient moral philosophers [meaning Aristotle]. Happiness is a constant progression of desire from one object to another, the attainment of one being always only the way to the next." 63 Thus, Hobbes is not concerned with the morally good life, but with bare survival. In this respect, his doctrine of the state of nature can be seen as the anthropological basis of his doctrine of the state. Humans, he argues, are comparable to mushrooms that have sprouted from the earth without any obligation on the part of one to the other. 64 But this is not to be imagined as paradise or as a golden age, but as a state of permanently threatening violent death, as a state of war of everyone against everyone, in which life is lonely, miserable, unpleasant, animalistic and short. Gluttony, competition, and scarcity of goods ensure that everyone is a wolf to everyone else. 65 The French Enlightenment thinkers of the 18th century also view the state of nature negatively. In Le mondain (1736), Voltaire makes fun of those who mourn old times, be it a golden age or the pastoral world of the Astrée. He himself prefers his present: "J'aime le luxe, et même la mollesse, / Tous les plaisirs, les arts de toute espèce, / La propreté, le goût, les ornements : / Tout honnête homme a de tels sentiments. [...] Le superflu, chose très nécessaire." In Hobbes, then, the state of nature turns out to be unnatural and something to be overcome. 66 Voltaire imagines the state of nature without property as a time of poverty and ignorance: "Ne connaissant ni le tien ni le mien. / Qu'auraient-ils pu connaître ? ils n'avaient rien, / Ils étaient nus ; et c'est chose très claire / Que qui n'a rien n'a nul partage à faire. / [...] Il leur manquait l'industrie et l'aisance : / Est-ce vertu ? c'était pure ignorance." 67 And when Voltaire imagines Adam and Eve, the image is not very flattering: "Avouez-moi que vous aviez tous deux / Les ongles longs, un peu noirs et crasseux, / La chevelure un peu mal ordonnée, / Le teint bruni, la peau bise et tannée. [...] Le repas fait, ils dorment sur la dure : / Voilà l'état de la pure nature." 68 Therefore, in the article "luxe" of his Dictionnaire philosophique, Voltaire also praises the invention of the scissors for hair and fingernails as well as that of the shirt. Summing up, he says elsewhere : "On a déclamé contre le luxe depuis deux mille ans, en vers & en prose, & on l'a toujours aimé." 69 Luxury is not something objective. A thing becomes a luxury by the fact that it is experienced by someone in a special way. While one person perceives the fresh air in the forest at home as a luxury, for another it is a trip to the Seychelles. Is luxury immoral? The fact that luxury contradicts the virtues was already proven by the Aristotelian doctrine of the middle measure. In the Christian context, luxury is repeatedly associated with luxuria and appears immoral. In his letter to the Galatians, Paul states that Christians should be guided by the spirit and not by the desires of the body. Thus, let them be guided by virtues, peace, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control, and not driven by selfishness, envy, immorality and debauchery. In Voltaire, then, luxury is the counterpart of the state of nature. We therefore come to the further development of the second aspect that emerged from the Spanish texts, luxury. # 70 Luxuria is among the seven root sins that lead to debauchery, hedonism, covetousness and sexual licentiousness. It is also popularly known as a mortal sin and stands alongside superbia, avaritia, ira, gula, invidia and acedia. For the Christian author Prudentius (348-405), luxury through gluttony, wine consumption and lust leads to the softening of the senses and is at the origin of sin. 71 Augustine also argues along these lines when he upholds the Stoic condemnation of luxury 72 , claiming that wealth promotes the indulgence of sensuality and vanity, while poverty and suffering discipline the mind. The appearance of luxury, he argues, leads to the destruction of civilization and caused the fall of Rome. 73 Thus, if one takes vital or natural needs as the standard, deviation from them is contrary to nature, as Seneca points out: "Omnia vitia contra naturam pugnant, omnia debitum ordinem deserunt; hoc est luxuriae propositum." 74 Seneca distinguishes between natural desires, which have limits, and unnatural ones, which know no limits. While the natural desire can stop somewhere, the unnatural one wanders indefinitely. 75 In the 2nd century AD, the church father Clement of Alexandria also refers to nature, which provides orientation for the entire way of life, for clothing and nutrition. 76 The right measure, the Aristotelian mesotes, is what luxury as excess of pleasure, money or honor misses. According to Aristotle, the good life is not achieved through luxury, but through a virtuous way of life, "for even with moderate means it is possible to act in accordance with virtue. This can be clearly seen from the fact that private citizens do not lag behind princes in right and virtuous action, but rather seem to be ahead of them. It is enough, therefore, if the necessary means are available." 77 According to Aristotle, the cardinal virtue of moderatio counsels choosing the middle measure, "those middles, namely, which we are convinced, as corresponding to right reason, lie between excess and deficiency." 78 We find the counter position advocating luxury again in the French Enlightenment thinkers of the 18th century. For Montesquieu, luxury is a contribution to the fight against poverty: "Il faut bien qu'il y ait du luxe. Si les riches n'y dépensent pas beaucoup, les pauvres mourront de faim." 79 In weighing the moral and social value of luxury, the latter seems weightier. From there to the elevation of luxury to morality it is only a small step. Saint-Évremond succeeds in a first reevaluation of values when he argues that frugality is conditioned by constraints and is not a virtue. 80 That luxury is not associated with effeminacy but that it means work is emphasized by Montesquieu in his 106th letter of the Lettres persanes. With peoples, who would have to get along still without the arts, also a skillful monkey could live in all honors. After all, comforts should not be confused with idleness: "Paris est peut-être la ville du monde la plus sensuelle et où l'on raffine le plus sur les plaisirs; mais c'est peut-être celle où l'on mène une vie plus dure." 81 A ruler may thus take care "that his sujets vivent dans les délices: il faut qu'il travaille à leur procurer toutes sortes de superfluités avec autant d'attention que les nécessités de la vie." 82 Finally, Condillac arrives at the paradoxical connection of luxury with the central Enlightenment virtue of utility: "Nous voulons vivre dans le luxe, et nous voulons que notre luxe soit utile." 83 Machiavelli did not reevaluate values, but rather separated morality from politics. While the cardinal virtues were the focus of the traditional Mirrors of Princes, Machiavelli had recommended in his Anti-Princely Mirror that the prince acts immorally in the interest of efficiency and the reason of state. Machiavelli's separation of morality and politics for the state becomes the separation of morality and economics for the individual in Bernard Mandeville (1670-1733), who grew up in the Netherlands. His addressee is not the prince but the individual. He thus shares Bayle's and Montesquieu's opinion that what is morally questionable can be socially beneficial. He therefore rejects frugality as the principle of keeping away from everything superfluous, since it leads to primitiveness. The absence of luxury in Sparta was only the flip side of the depressing military service. Spartans were characterized only by a lack of needs; the amenities of civilized countries were unknown to them, as were the arts. What happens to a prosperous country from which rapacity, greed and luxury are banished is illustrated by Mandeville in his Bee Fable, published in 1705 and variously expanded. While the state thrived on the vices of individuals, the situation changes after Jupiter makes pride, luxury, and crime disappear: The social productive force slackens, numerous professions become superfluous, and unemployed bees leave the state. 84 While mercantilism and cameralism were still compatible with the literature of the domestic fathers when they saw the prince as a domestic father, at the end of the 17th century a mechanistic world view based on the natural sciences emerged through Thomas Hobbes and John Locke. The natural sciences, with their use of experience and experimentation and with their mathematical representation of interrelationships, brought about the end of the old economics. In Locke's view, the pursuit of gain drives the acquisition of individual wealth, which in turn benefits the good of the whole. As monarchies receded, the pattern of patriarchal hierarchical domestic order also disappeared in favor of equality for people, especially housewives, and with the rise of outside provision via the market, the paradigm of self-sufficiency was lost. Urbanization, industrialization, unemployment after overproduction and long working hours became widespread. Entrepreneurs became the upper middle class. Utilitarianism leads to value relativism when it defines use or gratification without considering whether utility is life-enhancing or life-destroying. Asceticism and It was the vices of the individual that maintained societal prosperity. Thus, Mandeville reverses Virgil's bee-state, mentioned at the beginning, which was sustained by virtues. The excursion into 18th-century France and England showed how the tradition of antiquity and early modern domestic literature was ended by replacing measure with excess, necessities with luxuries, and moral standards with immoral vices. This freed the view of objects from moral implications. The environment could unobjectionably serve profit maximization. The view of economic events focused on the market and could disregard the people involved. moderation limit desires and thus slow economic The house was seen as the image of the state, but since the 18th century it dissolved and became the intimate privacy of the family, which, in contrast to the pre-modern community of production of the whole house, was only a community of consumption and where the separation of home and workplace became common. In paternalistic analogy the house father stood to the country father and up to God father. The house father was the bearer of autochthonous power as the lord of the whole house. As is well known, even today a judicial search warrant is required before the state and the police are allowed to enter the protected space of the house. 89 The economics of the 19th and 20th century replaced the concept of happiness with that of utility and is oriented more to the increase of the gross domestic product than to responsibility toward future progress. Poverty appears to be surmountable through abundance on the market, so that abundance becomes an economic policy goal and an equally autonomous homo oeconomicus with unrestrained acquisitiveness and striving for wealth corresponds to the autonomous market. It becomes apparent that all virtues handed down in former economics no longer play a role. Forgotten is the saying attributed by Xenophon to Socrates: "You seem to me to believe that happiness consists in indulgence and living well, but I believe that it is divine to need nothing, but that the closest thing to the divine is to need as little as possible." Forgotten also the sentence of Seneca: "If you want to make someone rich, you must not increase his wealth, but decrease his desires." Or, "one is rich not by what he possesses, but more by what he knows with dignity to do without." 85 What would be needed is a transition from a growthoriented economy to one of economic equilibrium, without loss of humanity. 86 According to Sombart, economic science should be cultural, social and human science at the same time. 87 Household science, in the face of ecological damage, should be concerned with the ought, should be teleological. For Henri Bergson (1859-1941), the pursuit of comfort and luxury in the 20th century characteristically replaced the demand for asceticism in the Middle Ages. 88 He calls for a return to simplicity. generations. 90 A newer form aligned with the old economics that has been developing in the United States for about a century under the name of home economics, while in Germany ecotrophology has emerged from the Greek words oikos and trophä (nourishment, sustenance) since the 1960s. While contemporary economics calculates price mechanisms starting from the market, ancient economics is concerned with the sustenance of people in the whole house. 91 The correspondence of microcosm and macrocosm is also evidenced by the term Anthropocene, which refers to the impact of man, Greek anthropos, on climate and environment. Since it makes the earth the product of human activity, it becomes an artifact, so that the distinction between nature and culture becomes blurred, because man sees results of his own deeds when he looks at the history of the earth. In conclusion, let us look back at our hypothesis that the normative approaches of ancient economics can be a corrective to contemporary economics and thus support concerns of contemporary ecology. It has been shown that in Virgil, as in Xenophon and Aristotle, when considering agriculture, the economist first starts from the head of the household and his values. Only then is the environment constituted as a world of objects by his value conceptions, by his knowledge, and by his relationship to his fellow men. If one wants to understand the environment as an object, then one has to start with the subject. From the Roman Cato to Alberti, the Calvinist economists or the relevant Spanish authors of the Siglo de Oro, virtues are demanded in housekeeping, work is praised, moderation is advocated, and luxury and waste are rejected. The primitive state, which from antiquity to the early modern period is understood by some as an exemplary golden age characterized by rural life and agriculture, is rejected in the French Enlightenment. Now self-interest and greed become the standard, while virtue seems irrelevant in the face of Machiavelli's separation of state and morality or Mandeville's separation of economics and morality. It no longer seems necessary for the individual's mind to control his passions and put his own house in order before he concerns himself with the wider realm outside the home. It is possible, however, that this very development is the prerequisite for the fact that modern economics is limited to the calculation of market activity, disregarding ethics as well as the happiness of the individual. It can be learnt from the old economists that the macrocosm of the environment corresponds with the subject and his house as microcosm. Earth history, which deals with the period from the formation of the Earth to the geological present, had until now referred to the present period as the Holocene, that is, as a stage that began at the end of the Ice Age about 11,700 years ago with the warming of the Earth. This history of the Earth was seen as independent of human history. Recently, however, the term Anthropocene has been introduced, which assumes effects of human history on Earth history. Now climate has become a global risk and the world community is challenged to find solutions without historical precedents. 92 There is not complete agreement on whether the geological Anthropocene begins with industrialization in England or from 1950 onward. What is certain, however, is that an unlimited ecodynamic with increasing concentrations of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, melting glaciers, rising sea levels and declining biodiversity coupled with increasing population growth, growing world trade, increasing tourism and intensified land use will lead to collapse 93 Year 202250Volume XXII Issue II Version I)E(-Global Journal of Human Social Science69 Voltaire, Dictionnaire philosophique. Portatif, Londres 1764, p. 256; cf. p. 258 70 Cf. Gal. 5, 16-24, cf. Dorit Grugel-Pannier, Luxus, p. 10171 Cf. Die Psychomachie des Prudentius, Ursmar Engelmann (ed.),77 Aristoteles, Nikomachische Ethik, Hamburg, Meiner, 1995, p. 254Herder, Basel, Freiburg 1959, p. 52f(1179 a)72 Cf. Marcus Tullius Cicero, De officiis. Vom pflichtgemäßen Handeln,78 Aristoteles, Nikomachische Ethik, Hamburg, Meiner, 1995, p. 130H. Gunermann (ed.), Stuttgart, Reclam 1976, p. 89-90 (I, 29)(1138 b)73Cf. Dorit Grugel-Pannier, Luxus. Eine begriffs-und79 Montesquieu,ideengeschichtliche Untersuchung unter besonderer Berücksichtigungvon Bernard Mandeville, Frankfurt a.M., Lang, 1996, p. 19674 Seneca, Epistolae 122, 5; cf. Dorit Grugel-Pannier, Luxus, p. 2775 Lucius Annaeus Seneca, Marion Giebel (ed.), Reclam, 2014, p. 54(16. letter)76 Cf. Dorit Grugel-Pannier, Luxus, p. 103© 2022 Global Journals Year 202251Volume XXII Issue II Version I)(85 Cf. Erich Egner, Der Verlust der alten Ökonomik. Seine Hintergründe und Wirkungen, Berlin Duncker & Humblot, 1985, p. 180 (Xenophon,-Global Journal of Human Social ScienceErinnerungen an Sokrates, 1. v., 6, 2,3,10, Memorabilien, Tusculum,München 1977 2 ;© 2022 Global Journals Year 202252Volume XXII Issue II Version I)E(Global Journal of Human Social Science -© 2022 Global Journals Ernst Haeckel, Generelle Morphologie der Organismen, Berlin 1866, p. 286. The translations from German are ours. Cf. Erich Egner, Der Verlust der alten Ökonomik. Seine Hintergründe und Wirkungen, Berlin Duncker & Humblot, 1985, p. 25 * Der Verlust der alten Ökonomik. Seine Hintergründe und Wirkungen ErichCf Egner 1985 Berlin Duncker & Humblot 35 * Vom pflichtgemäßen Handeln Marcus TulliusCicero DeOfficiis H. 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