From Pursuit: Silence in Order to Listen
Exploring Benjamin Franklin’s path to “speak not but what may benefit others or yourself”
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Show Notes
In our 12-part podcast series, Pursuit: The Founders’ Guide to Happiness, Jeffrey Rosen explores the founders’ lives with the historians who know them best and filmmaker Ken Burns shares his daily practice of self-reflection.
The “pursuit of happiness” is one of the most famous phrases in American history. When America’s founders wrote it in the Declaration of Independence, they intended it to mean happiness through lifelong learning and self-improvement.
In the last episode of the series, listeners share some big and small changes that they have made. Plus, Jeffrey Rosen, filmmaker Ken Burns, and scholar Robert P. George explore Benjamin Franklin’s virtue of silence, which he defines as “speak not but what may benefit others or yourself; avoid trifling conversation.”
Listen to Pursuit: The Founders’ Guide to Happiness on Apple Podcast and Spotify.
Watch the full performance of the Pursuit of Happiness: Song Cycles by Jeffrey Rosen.
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