Answer three questions about this article.

Most important for me is a reminder that Intelligence is the most important thing we can obtain for ourselves in this life and that we are responsible to find it.  How we find it is the daily seeking to live our lives in accordance with God's plan for us.  That means that we begin each day focused upon the best choices we can make for the allotted time we have to live and love those around us.  Educationally we will strive to improve ourselves in different venues that bring us together intellectually and spiritually.   Value for me is the message of finding intelligence means finding ourselves.  

The most important premise of this article is the importance of educating oneself. This can help in my family's education by being aware of it. When we understand that the only way to solve the problems of the day is to be intelligent, it will inspire our family to dig deeper in various studies. The value in reading this article is to become aware.

I will preface this with the feeling that my thoughts seem quite scattered. Here are the thoughts that ran through my head when reading The Moral Obligation to be Intelligent.  First of all, I found it fascinating to think that intelligence would equate evil.  John 8:32 specifically says that truth will cause freedom.  Perhaps freedom is in itself a moral obligation.  I feel that many are focused on the importance of being intelligent and in that focus, the mark is missed.  As a student raised in the public school system, our obligation was to make perfect grades in school and do as instructed by the educators.  Is this a quest for intelligence set forth by parents or rather a focus on performance?  During those years of education, I succeeded.  I was a good student, but looking back, there was not cultivation of intelligence.  (My parents were fantastic and showed much compassion, the blame cannot be laid on them but rather the cultural mindset of what "success" appeared to be).  Through this experience and now with my own children, I want to make knowledge a constant quest, to never stop learning or desiring to know more.  Not to be superior but to be faithful in all things God has given to us.  To constantly be searching to better myself in all areas of wisdom.  The importance, for myself to not be concerned with others opinions, but to search for the truth and how it applies to my own family, is growing daily.   In today's world, we are consumed with knowledge being power but only if someone tells us what is to be believed.  Making facebook, twitter, and the likes as biases for facts that are talked/gossiped about  (at least in the community we live in :)), only confirms that we are not obligated to intelligence.  But rather have become a people focused on the present and the instant gratification of our needs. The responsibility that we have to be constantly learning and growing is monumental.  I must have a desire to grow and learn and to use the abilities that God given us, but not forsaking justice, kindness, compassion in a quest for intelligence. 

"Is intelligence a virtue?" That is the most valuable question that I got from reading this article. My youngest daughter asked her sisters the other day "What does virtuous mean?" Now it is time to dig deeper. 
 I thought the examples given of literary figures in history were interesting and would like to examine some of them more closely. I am not very well read so some of the characters Erskine referred to were not familiar to me. The reading of this article will be helpful to me and my family as we discuss characters from literature, movies or maybe even the news. I will pose the same question to them. "Do we have a moral obligation to be intelligent?" 

I have always put a high value on intelligence. As a child going through public school, I was internally motivated not only to be intelligent, but to proved my intelligence. My thoughts surrounding intelligence (what it is and what it is not), its value and varying types of intelligence have changed enormously in my adult life, especially since beginning home educating my children. While I have not read all of the literature that Erskine cites, his examples of intelligence equating to evil is almost shocking. I was immediately pressed to come up with examples where this is not the case, and thought of Anne of Green Gables, who, by the end of the series proved herself to be both intelligent and good. Then I remembered, however, that even Anne asks the question, "Which would you rather be if you had the choice--divinely beautiful or dazzlingly clever or angelically good?" It appears that even she thought, at least in her youth, that intelligence and goodness are mutually exclusive. 

Perhaps literary characters often have to be one or the other.  As they are portrayed, they are often slightly two-dimensional when compared with a real person. Flaws are emphasized, virtues exaggerated, as they become representations of a specific trait. But when I think of my family and my hopes for them, I resonate with one of Erskine's last assertions that, "We really seek intelligence not for the answers it may suggest to the problems of life, but because we believe it is life,--not for aid in making the will of God prevail, but because we believe it is the will of God." When the worship of intelligence is born from faith - faith in a God who embodies all intelligence - than perhaps we can visualize what true intelligence is. It is not cunning, it does not create fear. Those who worship intelligence simply for intellect's sake, may be missing the point. When combined with goodness and extolled as a virtue, cultivated and shaped just as any other virtue ought be, intelligence may indeed be the ultimate virtue through which we are able to best develop all other virtues, both as individuals and societies.

I think the most important point in this article is that we, as a culture, do not regard intelligence as a virtue, that while we revere courage, perseverance, and strength, and we give lip service to faith, humility, and meekness, we consider intelligence to be something we should not acquire too much of.  This idea may have been more true in 1915 than it is now (certainly when I was growing up being a geek was NOT cool like it is now), but it still has merit.  The American cowboy or pioneer, the hometown boy in the big city, and even the Harry Potters of our literary tradition are depicted to be simple and kind or brave and bold, not men of great intellect.  I think, however, we are trending away from this idea.  Many modern heroes are smart.  Indiana Jones is a professor and archaeologist, Digory grows up to be a professor, and Hermione is the quintessence of intelligence.  Now we love our Absent-Minded Professors who are both smart and good.  (As an aside, I think female writers more often value smart girls, while male writers often prefer the good, kind, simple girls.  Jane Eyre, Elizabeth Bennett, and Jo March are good because they are intelligent, while Lucy Pevensie, Cosette, and Alice in Wonderland are kind and good, but innocent.)  The idea of intelligence being anything but positive is probably pretty foreign in our families of homeschoolers and classical educators.  Certainly in my own family, we have had many conversations about society striving for mediocrity and young people being careful to not appear too bright.  Let's hope that we can be part of a change for the better in this area.

Gaining intelligence should go hand in hand with being good and virtuous. We should strive  to have a moral character but also pursue knowledge to be a whole person.  We should teach our family to better ourselves through studying great works as well as good character traits. 

I found this article to be very interesting because I have always considered the gaining of knowledge and intellect as part of what helps us to become a good person or even to becoming better. Having said that, I feel the most important premise of the article is that Erskine sites literature in which this was not the case, and shows where the intellect was needed to make wise decisions. How powerful it is for us to learn from history and classics so that we don't make the same blunders. I believe we can learn from the past to build a better future so I plan on using this information to help my children understand the importance of expanding their minds, always learning and pushing themselves to new heights and using that knowledge to create a better world. And just like any classic, I will probably read it again and again, and find new value in it every time I read it.

  I read this article last month in preparation for my interview with the Monarch mentors.  I just finished reading it again and took so much more from it!  I guess that's why classics are good to read time after time--you get something different from them each time you read them.  The most important premise of this article in my mind was came from asking "Why is there a moral obligation to be intelligent?"  Erskine gave several examples from English literature and history that showed intelligence wasn't valued as much as courage or bravery, or physical strength.  Yet, if intelligence had been employed, those other attributes would have been secondary in specific situations.  For example, in the case of the Titanic sinking, "while we were thrilled to read how superbly those hundreds died,...the tragedy was in the shipwreck of intelligence."  The moral obligation to be intelligent (not speeding through an ice burg-filled sea) in this case meant lives would have been saved.  Answering the question as to why we should be intelligent leads us to answers of moral obligation, but also that of spiritual obligation.  In the scriptures we read "The glory of God is intelligence (D&C 93:36).  If his glory is intelligence and we are commanded to become like him, it is our spiritual obligation to gain truth and light (the definition of intelligence, as explained in D&C 93:36).  To summarize, the most important premise of this article is that we do indeed have a moral obligation to be intelligent, as well as a spiritual obligation.   In teaching my family, this article can provide a source of inspiration for striving to improve and be filled with light and truth.  "We believe that the virtues wait upon intelligence (Erskine, p.4)"  Seeking intelligence is seeking the will of God.  It aligns with the idea that each person has an individual mission and will be given by God what he or she needs to accomplish that mission.  Each person in my family can receive that individual intelligence or truth, or guidance--whatever you want to call it.    Reading this article frequently can be valuable in keeping a focus on what matters most.  If all virtues wait upon intelligence, then striving for intelligence should be taking our greatest efforts and attentions.