POL 3330: TAKE-HOME EXAM ONE

Feel free to direct formatting/clarification questions to me via e-mail. I will not respond to inquiries directly related to the exam questions, however.

Instructions:

Responses must be typed and double-spaced with a one-inch margin and a font size of 10 or 12.

Papers must be stapled.

Please, no folders or binders.

EXAMS ARE DUE THE BEGINNING OF CLASS (9:00am SHARP!) ON WEDNESDAY THE 18TH OF FEBRUARY.

A hard copy is due in class and an electronic copy must be uploaded to turnitin.com using the course code 2549020 and the password brainhurts.

If you are late to class turning in your exam, there will be a one point deduction per minute that you are late. (This still applies if you send a friend with your exam). E-mail submissions are acceptable, but time restraints still apply.

If you use outside sources, they must be properly cited. (Please review my plagiarism policy: here.)

IF YOU FAIL TO ATTEND CLASS/FAIL TO E-MAIL IT TO ME IN TIME, YOUR EXAM WILL NOT BE ACCEPTED.

SECTION ONE: analyze each of the following quotes, taking half a page to a page to explain what the quote means and

How they fit into the theories of the given author. (Each response should be roughly one paragraph in length) (40% of your score)

1. ''...our aim in founding the commonwealth was not to make any one class specially happy, but to secure the greatest possible happiness for the community as a whole'' (Plato, The Republic, in Ebenstein, 28).

2. ''Virtue, then, is a state of character concerned with choice, lying in a mean, i.e., the mean relative to us, this being determined by a rational principle, and by that principle by which the man of practical wisdom would determine it" (Aristotle, The Ethics, Book II, Section 6).

3. ''...law may be unjust in two ways: first, by being contrary to human good...[or by}...being opposed to the Divine good" (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, 141 in Ebenstein).

4. "From the nature of despotic power it follows that the single person, invested with this power, commits the execution of it also to a single person. A man whom his senses continually inform that he himself is everything and that his subjects are nothing, is naturally lazy, voluptuous, and ignorant." (Montesquieu, The Spirit of the Laws, Book II, Section 5).

SECTION TWO: answer the following in an essay of three to five pages (60% of your score)

5. Why is a given thinker's view of human nature/the purpose of humans so central to their political philosophy? Utilize the writings of Aristotle, Augustine and Machiavelli to illustrate your answer.