Sparring with Wisdom: An Early Conversation in Fire Emblem: Three Houses

“Aphorism is aristocratic thinking: this is all the aristocrat is willing to tell you…” -Susan Sontag

I have been reading lately a lot of self-help books (for a project, I swear). Some of their advice has been genuinely useful, some laughably bad, but mostly reading these books has emphasized to me how elites imagine themselves as dispensers of wisdom and advice. Their self-help books are full of empty platitudes about “setting goals,” “being a conference commando,” “not coming to the party empty-handed,” etc. This advice is rarely a well-reasoned, researched, or learned argument about leadership, but is mostly composed of anecdotes and pithy platitudes. They are short, easily communicable bits of aristocratic wisdom. These lessons rarely fit into any coherent philosophical system, and even though they sound universal by virtue of their brevity, they are by necessity contextual. After all, the advice “don’t come to a party empty-handed” means very different things in different situations. And oh boy do elites love this kind of insipid talk. Listen to any rich person talk about how he got ahead, and you will not go far without hearing an anecdote about how some other rich or powerful person gave him some bland advice that changed his life. It’s why James Comey, despite his own failures as a leader in 2016, felt entitled to lecture us about leadership (he was wisely advised to write a biography trashing Trump instead). It’s why there is a whole industry invested in “corporate leadership.” One can sense that in the top circles of our global aristocracy, wisdom from successful people is treated as a kind of currency.

And this is not just a modern, American phenomenon. As the Susan Sontag quotation written above suggests, elites cross-culturally have often gifted fellow aristocrats and the masses with wisdom in diminutive formats. For instance, this was definitely the case in Ancient Greece and the Near East, where a long tradition of wisdom literature flourished. Delphi, the seat of Apollo, most famously had the phrase “Know thyself” inscribed on its portico. The book of Proverbs in the Bible is attributed to King Solomon, and its origins lie in the priestly, bureaucratic elite during the Divided Monarchy. Confucius’s own abbreviated proclamations in the Analects could be considered in the same vein. From ancient Athens to Confucian China to the Hamptons to Silicon Valley, elites absolutely love reflecting on and giving advice about leadership in small catchphrases.

Which brings us to Fire Emblem: Three Houses. I have not gotten very far in the game, but a very early conversation struck me as exceptionally well-written. This conversation occurs at the end of the tutorial, after you have helped three students from the nearby monastery / military academy drive away bandits. These students, as you shortly will learn, happen to be the future leaders of the three major powers of Three House ‘s world. As they reflect on the battle, they argue with each other about what it means to be a good ruler:

Edelgard: His intentions were as clear as day. You will prove a lacking ruler if you cannot see the truth behind a person’s words.

Dimitri: Hm. You will prove a lacking ruler yourself if you look for deceit behind every word and fail to trust those whom you rely on.

Edelgard and Dimitri are mimicking the sort of aristocratic evaluative language they have likely grown up with. In a playful, competitive manner they are testing out the advice they have learned from adults. But even as they upbraid their peers, both Edelgard and Dimitri are engaging in a small debate about what makes a strong ruler. Does a strong ruler distrust his subordinates, and try to peer into “the truth behind a person’s words”? Or does a ruler maintain a level of trust for those they rely on?

But this scene would not work nearly as well without Claude. Claude responds to Edelgard and Dimitri’s verbal jockeying with sarcasm: “Oh, joy. A royal debate between Their Highnesses. I wonder how being completely predictable affects one’s ability to wield power.”

In this brief statement Claude reveals the vacuity of the game Edelgard and Dimitri are playing. Statements like “a ruler must see the truth behind a person’s words” or “a strong ruler must trust those who he relies on” are ultimately meaningless, because they depend on context to be properly applied. Blindly adhering to one axiom, either radical trust or distrust in subordinates, would lead a ruler to become dangerously predictable. In a sense, Claude calls the entire game of aristocratic evaluation and aphorism into question. What is the point of all this vague advice?

But then Claude makes a further move: he provides his own verdict of Edelgard and Dimitri’s wisdom: “Personally, as the embodiment of distrust, I’d say your little exchange smacks of naiveté.”

With his previous comments Claude has demonstrated that he has some distance from the two royal characters (Claude, after all, is the only one from an oligarchic society). But despite his jaded insight into the world of aristocratic advice preening, he shows off a bit. He too can play this game. While he does not offer a sort of aphorism in response, his labeling of the entire change as “naiveté” shows he can effectively judge his peers and dispense wisdom like any other aristocrat. Claude realizes that the contest Edelgard and Dimitri are staging is silly, but he shows himself to be an able performer within it.

I must ultimately admit that I have no idea how teenagers groomed as the next generation of leaders in a Japanese fictional high fantasy story vaguely based on the European Middle Ages should sound. But this small exchange sounds exactly how I would imagine such a world. These students are aware of the huge expectations put on their shoulders, eager to navigate the vague advice they have inherited, and eager to show up their peers. This short conversation does a lot for me in explicating how these young aristocrats think, and in a small way shows how the world of Fire Emblem: Three Houses is both very different and very similar to our own.