Master
Assignment
List

Tocqueville fears individualism hollows out civic life; Emerson celebrates it. Who is right — and can both be right at once?

Paine makes a theological argument against monarchy; Jefferson makes a natural rights argument. Are these the same claim in different vocabularies?

Does humanizing the Founders strengthen or weaken the case for the founding?

How does Christian's journey through Vanity Fair dramatize Rutherford's political theology?

Cato dies rather than join any faction. Is he Madison's ideal citizen — or a warning about perfectionism in politics?

More says the rule of law depends on individuals who will not bend it. Hamilton says it depends on an energetic executive to enforce it. Are these compatible claims?

Is there a form of community that is neither the Anti-Federalists' rural idyll nor Wharton's trap?

Winthrop says covenant accountability binds members in love. Hawthorne shows it can become cruelty. Is Hawthorne refuting Winthrop — or completing him?

Washington understood his character was public property. Is this self-consciousness a form of virtue or a form of performance?

Douglass uses the Declaration as a weapon against slavery. Morrison shows the Declaration's language could not reach what slavery did to the soul. Do these views need each other?

The World Controller tells the Savage he is claiming the right to be unhappy. The Savage agrees. Is unhappiness a prerequisite for freedom?

Schaeffer argues only God can claim ultimate authority. Chesterton's Sunday embodies an authority so vast it cannot be organized against. Do they make the same argument — and what is the difference?

Hamilton appeals to reason and self-interest; Henry appeals to honor and sacrifice. Which is the more reliable foundation for a republic?

Socrates dies rather than stop doing philosophy. Is this the same argument as the Puritan martyrs who died rather than stop preaching? What is the difference?

Aristotle argues eudaimonia is excellent activity sustained over time. Waugh argues a single moment of grace can redeem a ruined life. Are these compatible?

Augustus preserved the forms of the republic while destroying its substance. Using Marcus Aurelius and Cicero, argue that what he did was wrong even though it worked.

The priest Rodrigues apostatizes to save his congregation and believes Christ told him to do it. Rutherford argues we must obey God rather than men. Did Rodrigues obey — or apostatize?

Find three characters in The Great Divorce who illustrate Augustine's distinction between amor Dei and amor sui — and explain which city each finally chooses.

The Pardoner is corrupt but his sermon is true. The Knight is virtuous but his tale ends in tragedy. How does this challenge the Reformation's confidence that right doctrine produces right order?

Milton's Satan is the greatest literary embodiment of pride. Calvin says pride is the root of all sin. Using Books I and IX, show how Milton dramatizes Calvin's doctrine of the fall.

David Balfour is a Covenanter's grandson who never quite acts like one. Alan Breck is a Jacobite who lives by a code the Covenanters would condemn. By the end, which man has lived more faithfully to his tradition?

At what point does Hamlet have enough certainty to act — and does he wait too long or not long enough? Use Rutherford on conscience.

Sydney Carton sacrifices himself for someone he barely respects. The Enlightenment cannot explain this. Burke's conservatism cannot explain it either. What tradition does Carton's death belong to?

Using Burke's Reflections and Tolkien's Shire, define what is lost when a society loses its tradition — and whether it can ever be recovered.

The Inquisitor says "Man is weaker and baser by nature than Thou hast believed him." Calvin agrees with this diagnosis. Their cures differ infinitely. What is the difference?

Lewis said MacDonald's fantasy "made me for the first time certain that death opens doors." How does Phantastes do what the theological arguments of Q2 cannot?

Sinclair believed showing the human cost of the market would make readers reject the market. Sowell says markets aggregate information no planner can replicate. Can both be true?

Steinbeck intended a critique of capitalism and greed. Hazlitt would say the problem is distorted incentives. Whose diagnosis is more accurate?

Hayek and Zamyatin are making the same argument about the knowledge problem. What would Zamyatin say Hayek misses?

Rand argues self-interest is a moral good. Friedman does not moralize it. Calvin says it is a consequence of the fall. Who is right?

Tressell's Owen convinces no one. What does this tell us about the relationship between correct economic analysis and political change?

Ivan's dignity at the edge of survival: what argument about human dignity does Solzhenitsyn embed here — and how does it relate to the image of God?

Calvin says every calling is service to God. Make the case that Jayber Crow's life as a barber in Port William is excellent.

Ellison's narrator becomes invisible whenever people see him as a representative of a group rather than a particular human being. Sowell argues ideology prevents accurate economic analysis for exactly this reason. Are they making the same argument?

Hugo is arguing that law without grace produces justice without mercy. What does this mean for how a Christian thinks about welfare policy?

Ramsey says money is a tool, not a goal. Silas Marner shows what happens when it becomes the goal. What does a healthy Christian relationship with money look like?

The Good Earth shows wealth transforming those who acquire it. Sowell says free market wealth creation is morally good. Are these incompatible?

Novak argues democratic capitalism is a moral system. Tolkien's Smaug is the anti-Novak. Define what "good" wealth looks like — and what the Reformed doctrine of stewardship adds that Novak's account doesn't fully capture.

Scrooge does not reform the economic system — he reforms himself. Dickens suggests this is sufficient. Sowell says systemic incentives matter more. Who is right?

Lewis wrote his novel to warn that fascism could come to America through democratic means. Goldberg argues American progressivism contains structural similarities to European fascism. Are they making the same argument?

Lewis diagnosed the postmodern project forty years before Foucault named it. Using That Hideous Strength and Cynical Theories, describe what they have in common — and what Lewis says is the only adequate response.

Kuyper argues Christ's kingship extends over every sphere of life, including the most ordinary. Using Kuyper and Robinson, make the case that Ames's life is a model of sphere sovereignty faithfully lived.

Richard Wright said Hurston's novel was apolitical escapism. Hurston said Wright reduced Black people to victims. Whose approach better serves the people it claims to represent?

The WCF defines marriage as a covenant for mutual help. Lewis argues love — even sincere love — can be destruction unless it learns to give rather than possess. How does Orual's failure illuminate what the Confession requires?

Scalia grounds the Second Amendment in a world where institutions were absent. McMurtry depicts that world. Make the case that the right to bear arms is not primarily about freedom from government but about the practical requirements of justice.

Kennan says national interest should guide foreign policy. Reagan says America must champion democracy. Greene's Pyle represents idealism without wisdom. Describe what a foreign policy taking both seriously would look like.

Cicero argues literature makes better men and therefore better citizens. Using Cicero's argument, make the case that the fiction companion is not supplemental to this curriculum but essential to it.

Lippmann says citizens operate on a manufactured picture in their heads. Heinlein shows characters deliberately manufacturing false pictures to win a revolution for liberty. Is there a morally coherent argument that lying in the service of freedom is justified?

Choose a passage from this year's fiction that does what your argument cannot — and explain why you chose it as a potential epigraph.

Write one page: what does the fiction reveal about your topic that the primary sources do not? Include this insight somewhere in your capstone.

Lewis argues intellectual work is a form of obedience to God. Your capstone is an act of intellectual obedience. Using Lewis's argument, explain why finishing it well — not just finishing it — matters.

Lewis ends his Narnia series where the story goes on, and on, and on. Your year ends, but the reading does not. Using Lewis's final chapters and Psalm 1, write the closing paragraph of your year-end reflection: not a summary, but a beginning.