The Legacy of Greece: Essays By: Gilbert Murray, W. R. Inge, J. Burnet, Sir T. L. Heath, D'arcy W. Thompson, Charles Singer, R. W. Livingston, A. Toynbee, A. E. Zimmern, Percy Gardner, Sir Reginald Blomfield
Philosophy
The Legacy of Greece: Essays By: Gilbert Murray, W. R. Inge, J. Burnet, Sir T. L. Heath, D'arcy W. Thompson, Charles Singer, R. W. Livingston, A. Toynbee, A. E. Zimmern, Percy Gardner, Sir Reginald Blomfield
Greece -- Civilization
But the victors suffered with the vanquished in the common ruin of
civilization. The whole Mediterranean world, and the devastated area in
Italy most of all, was shaken by the economic and social revolutions
which the Roman wars brought in their train. The proletariat was
oppressed to such a degree that the unity of society was permanently
destroyed and Greek civilization, after being threatened with a violent
extinction by Bolshevik outbreaks--the slave wars in Sicily, the
insurrection of Aristonikos and the massacres of Mithradates in
Anatolia, the outbreaks of Spartakos and Catilina in Italy--was
eventually supplanted by a rival civilization of the proletariat--the
Christian Church. The revolutionary last phase in the second act--the
final phase before the foundation of the Empire--has left its expression
in the cry of the Son of Man: 'The foxes have holes and the birds of the
air have nests, but the Son of Man hath not where to lay his head.' It
was one of those anonymous phrases that are in all men's mouths because
they express what is in all men's hearts. Tiberius Gracchus used it in
his public speeches at Rome; two centuries later it reappears in the
discourses of Jesus of Nazareth.
Ergo inter sese paribus concurrere telis
Romanas acies iterum videre Philippi,
nec fuit indignum superis bis sanguine nostro
Emathiam et latos Haemi pinguescere campos....
Di patrii, Indigetes, et Romule, Vestaque mater
quae Tuscum Tiberim et Romana Palatia servas,
hunc saltem everso iuvenem succurrere saeclo
ne prohibete. satis iam pridem sanguine nostro
Laomedonteae luimus periuria Troiae....
vicinae ruptis inter se legibus urbes
arma ferunt; saevit toto Mars impius orbe;
ut cum carceribus sese effudere quadrigae,
addunt in spatio, et frustra retinacula tendens
fertur equis auriga neque audit currus habenas.
(_Georgics_, i. 489 seqq.)
'Therefore Philippi saw Roman armies turn their swords against each
other a second time in battle, and the gods felt no pity that Emathia
and the broad plains of Haemus should twice be fattened with our
blood....
'Gods of our fathers, gods of our country, god of our city, goddess of
our hearths who watchest over Tuscan Tiber and Roman Palatine, forbid
not this last saviour to succour our fallen generation. Our blood has
flowed too long. We have paid in full for the sins of our
forefathers--the broken faith of ancient Troy....
'The bonds are broken between neighbour cities and they meet in arms.
Ungodly war rages the world over. The chariots launched on the race
gather speed as they go; vainly dragging on the reins the driver is
swept away by his steeds and the team heeds not the bridle.'
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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