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superlative virtuevirtue to Henri IV or Louis XIII (the claim applied to Marie de Médicis, “one flesh” with her deceased husband, constitutes a special case that is examined in Part II). They invisibly support the favorite argument of the earliest odes in the sequence that even if Henri were not the legitimate successor, he would deserve to rule because of his superlative virtuevirtue. In short, Henri’s demonstrated virtuevirtue makes him the best man for the job, and his leadership most promises to reestablish justicevirtuejustice and to bring about the goodcommonwealththe good life for the whole nationnation.

      But what does it mean that the megalopsychosmagnanimitymegalopsychos is the “one best man”? First, Henri is not just a man of great virtuevirtue, but of the greatest virtuevirtue. The logic of magnanimitymagnanimity underlying the royal odes demands that the kingdom’s other great-souled men—whom Malherbe calls by various names, “nos rebelles couragevirtuecourages” [our rebellious braves] and “ces âmes relevées” [these towering souls] (“À la reine sur sa bienvenue en France,” vv. 9 & 206)—yield to the great-souled man whose virtuevirtue is superlative. Because every megalopsychosmagnanimitymegalopsychos has the right concern with honor, correctly estimates his own greatness, and deserves whatever recognition he may receive, he is less likely to be deluded about the true worth of others. In his own case, which is the most difficult, he makes the right judgment in the right way. So, the recognition by one great soulmagnanimitygreat soul of another great soul is itself a sign of magnanimitymagnanimity, that is, the capacity to make correct judgments in the right way. Where the megalopsychosmagnanimitymegalopsychos is concerned, “it takes one to know one.” Although the other great-souled men of the political community have some claim to sovereignty on the basis of their outstanding virtuevirtue, the superlative virtuevirtue of the one best man requires, on the very same ground of political justicevirtuejustice, that they yield to him and offer “a willing obedience” (PoliticsAristotlePolitics 3.13 1284b30-35). At the same time, because they are not without virtuevirtue, and it is great virtuevirtue at that, they cannot be said to be completely without that quality which is “peculiar to the ruler” (PoliticsAristotlePolitics 3.4 1277b25)—only, perhaps, that they possess it to a lesser degree. The logic of magnanimitymagnanimity therefore implies not only that the kingdom’s other great-souled men understand true opinion and are able to make judgements in the right way, but also that they, too, possess phronēsisphronēsis (PoliticsAristotlePolitics 3.4 1277b25-30), “the chief intellectual virtuevirtue apart from wisdom and the condition for the possession of all the moral virtuevirtues” (Newell 165).

      Second, the politypolity thus envisioned by the royal odes differs from AristotleAristotle’s. Normally, the appearance of the one best man of superlative virtuevirtue, with his justified claim to absolute political authority, “leads to the destruction of the city understood as a community of diverse contributions and interests” (Newell 162). In the political association where “a single person is sovereign on every issue, with the same sort of power that a tribe or a polis exercises over its public concerns,” the civic community of competing claims to political authority gives way to “paternal rule over a household. Just as paternal rule is kingship over a family, so conversely this type of kingship [i.e. absolute] may be regarded as paternal rule over a polis, or a tribe, or a collection of tribes” (PoliticsAristotlePolitics 1285b30). The politypolity of the royal odes, however, is much closer to BodinBodin, Jean’s conception. In Les Six Livres de la République, the kingdom’s civic community, though deprived of sovereignty, is nonetheless identified with the civic body of the monarch. According to the doctrine of the king’s two bodies, the state “did not exist apart from its members, nor was the ‘state’ some superior being per se beyond its head and members” (KantorowiczKantorowicz, Ernst H. 270). The monarch is the head of the body politicbody politic, comprised of various members. By the late thirteenth century, the term patrianationpatria was “synonymous with the whole kingdom or body politicbody politic over which the ‘Crown’ or its bearer ruled” (KantorowiczKantorowicz, Ernst H. 251). What the royal odes propose, therefore, is the birth of a new nationnation, that is, a new body politicbody politic, headed by the one best man. The appeal to virtuevirtue, and to magnanimitymagnanimity in particular, implies that the relinquishment of any claim to political authority by great-souled subjects need not be subjugation and abasement. The logic of magnanimitymagnanimity redirects all competing claims of political authority toward emulation pro rege et patriapro rege et patria, that is, in the service of king and country. By serving the monarch, one serves the nationnation—because the monarch as head of the body politicbody politic serves the common interestcommonwealthcommon interest of the body politicbody politic. But, argues Malherbe, those who claim to serve the nationnation against the monarch are dishonest or deluded: “Nous voyons les esprits nés à la tyrannie, / Ennuyés de couver leur cruelle manie, / Tourner tous leurs conseils à notre affliction” [We see minds born for tyranny, / Weary of plotting their cruel insanity, / Devoting their counsels to our suffering] (“Prière pour le Roi allant en Limousin,” vv. 103-105). They are serving partisan interests, as evidenced by the death and destruction they inflicted on the commonwealthcommonwealth during the Wars of Religion.

      This competition of the more virtuous subjects for honor in the service of king and country underpins the “universal audienceuniversal audience,” a normative concept of rhetorical argumentation. As Perelman and Olbrects-Tyteca explain in The New Rhetoric: A Treatise on Argumentation, a speaker evokes the universal audienceuniversal audience when he presupposes unanimous agreement, by all fair-minded and rational beings, with arguments considered “compelling,” “self-evident,” and possessing “an absolute and timeless validity, independent of local or historical contingencies” (Perelman 32). Such universality is a matter of right, not of fact, since “one can always resort to disqualifying the recalcitrant by classifying him as stupid or abnormal” (Perelman 31 & 33, their emphasis). Consequently, an elite minority, even when limited to one perfect being, may validly serve as a model for the universal audienceuniversal audience, that is, as the norm to which all men should conform: “the elite audience sets the norm for everybody” (Perelman 34). The criteria which elevate an elite group to the level of a universal norm may include rationality, a disinterested commitment to scientific truth, or a state of divine grace—all “exceptional and infallible means of knowledge” (Perelman 33). Virtuevirtue is another such criterion. It, too, is a normative quality that may define the universal audienceuniversal audience, and it is the most relevant of such criteria to the royal odes. The function of the universal audienceuniversal audience is twofold: it preserves the “universalistic” impulses of monarchypolitymonarchy, “capable of swallowing up whole cities and ‘nationnations,’” while mitigating the incompatibility of this form of rule with “any notion of civic community” (Newell 172), and it lays the foundation for the national communitynationnational community. The virtuevirtue of magnanimitymagnanimity is the defining characteristic of the national communitynationnational community envisioned by the royal odes. When these poems address the monarch, the nobility and, through them, the French nationnation as a whole, they address a composite audience made up of persons “differing in characterethoscharacter, loyalties, and functions” (Perelman 21). However, given their lofty ambition, they cannot simply reflect the attitudes and values of an existing community. Partisan interests divide these constituencies against one another. The odes must also forge a new community united by a universal value. By making an appeal to the virtuevirtue of magnanimitymagnanimity, the odes construct a universal audienceuniversal audience of great soulmagnanimitygreat souls who by right will constitute the civic community of the new nationnation. The king’s magnanimitymagnanimity (because it is superlative) precludes any share in sovereignty but (because it is a virtuevirtue) sets the norm for everybody.

      Furthermore, the competition for honor in service of king and country is a universal ethosethos because it accommodates all who desire to be virtuous and aspire to be recognized as such. In theory, therefore, even commoners are not excluded. What matters is the function one serves in the body politicbody politic, as this will determine which virtuevirtue one possesses. Of course, not all virtuevirtues count equally as a contribution to the goodcommonwealththe good of the state, and even among those that do count, there exists a sliding scale (Newell 175). Nevertheless, in Les Six Livres de la République, Chapter 6, Book 6, BodinBodin,

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