A friend of mine who is a philosophy professor was discussing the current decline of civilization with me and made an interesting remark: philosophy may have to go back to the gardens. He explained that until the middle ages, when Christendom created the universities, philosophy was a private thing carried out among friends in places they would not be overheard, like in gardens.

Some would write, of course; there’s a reason why we have Plato’s writings, after all. But historically philosophy was not an overly safe practice and was best done where it would not be misunderstood. And of course a common approach in those who did write was to write very obliquely, leaving it to clever readers to figure out the implications of what they said while less clever readers would take things at face value or not even notice that anything of significance was said. Of course that didn’t always work out well; unfortunately for Avicenna, Al Ghazali could understand him and exposed him.

Still, it’s something to think about as the modern world degenerates. It’s possible that philosophy will retreat into the gardens again. Like all things it will probably me mixed in its effects; it’s just possible that Shakespeare wouldn’t have written so many excellent plays if he could legally have written Catholic prose.