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The American Republic and the Long Shadow of Rome

April 4, 2013 By Leave a Comment

rome american republicby Stephen M. Klugewicz

“Beware the Ides of March!” Thus the soothsayer warned Emperor Julius Caesar on the 15th of March, 44 B.C. On that day, Caesar, who had overturned the Roman republic and made himself a tyrant, was assassinated by a group of Senators, including his friend, Brutus. In the eponymous play by William Shakespeare, the Senators begin to stab Caesar, who tries to resist the assault until he sees Brutus also wielding a knife against him. “Et tu, Brute?” Caesar utters in disbelief before collapsing. [Read more...]

Filed Under: American Republic, Rome, Steve Klugewicz April 4, 2013

The Fall of Rome

November 7, 2012 By Leave a Comment
rome

by Will Durant

A great civilization is not conquered from without until it has destroyed itself within. The essential cause of Rome’s decline lay in her people, her morals, her class struggle, her failing trade, her bureaucratic despotism, her stifling taxes, her consuming wars.

–Will Durant in Caesar and Christ [Read more...]

Filed Under: Rome, Will Durant November 7, 2012

Quote of the Day: The Sack of Rome

May 23, 2012 By Leave a Comment

by John Barnes

Brad Birzer’s article A New Dark Age mentioned the 410 sack of Rome by the Visigoths, the event that prompted St. Augustine to pen City of God. Brad’s article brought to mind the closing passage from one of my favorite works of history:

“There is a term placed on everything, even the world. On the night of August 24 of the year 410 the term was finished. One account states that it was at midnight; but a more trustworthy version states that it was about an hour after dark, and that it had begun to rain. At that time the Salarian Gate of Rome was secretly opened by Gothic slaves in the City. The troops of Alaric entered, and their entry was signaled by a giant trumpt blast such as will never be heard again till the last day.

And, on the terrible blast of the Gothic Trumpet, the world came to its end.

It had endured, in the central core of it that mattered, for eleven hundred and sixty-three years.”

-R.A. Lafferty, The Fall of Rome (1971)

Filed Under: John Barnes, Quotes, Rome May 23, 2012

A Teaching for [r]epublicans: Roman History and the Nation’s First Identity

May 7, 2012 By 1 Comment

by M. E. Bradford

roman

The Federal District of Columbia, both in its formal character as a capital and also in its self-conscious attempt at a certain visual splendor, is, for every visitor from the somewhat sovereign states, a reminder that the analogy of ancient Rome had a formative effect upon those who conceived and designed it as their one strictly national place. What our fathers called Washington City is thus, at one and the same time, a symbol of their common political aspirations and a specification of the continuity of those objectives with what they knew of the Roman experience. So are we all informed with the testimony of the eye, however we construe the documentary evidence of original confederation. So say the great monuments, the memorials, the many public buildings and the seat of government itself. So the statuary placed at the very center of the Capitol of the United States. And much, much more. [Read more...]

Filed Under: Intercollegiate Review, M. E. Bradford, Republicanism, Rome May 7, 2012

Will We Learn from Rome?

January 25, 2012 By Leave a Comment
rome

by Will Durant

The rise of Rome from a crossroads town to world mastery, its achievement of two centuries of security and peace from the Crimea to Gibraltar and from the Euphrates to Hadrian’s Wall, its spread of classic civilization over the Mediterranean and western European world, its struggle to preserve its ordered realm from a surrounding sea of barbarism, its long, slow crumbling and final catastrophic collapse into darkness and chaos—this is surely the greatest drama ever played by man; unless it be that other drama which began when Caesar and Christ stood face to face in Pilate’s court, and continued until a handful of hunted Christians had grown by time and patience, and through persecution and terror, to be first the allies, then the masters, and at last the heirs, of the greatest empire in history. [Read more...]

Filed Under: Rome, Will Durant January 25, 2012

Among the Ruins of Carthage

January 20, 2012 By 2 Comments

by Russell Kirk

carthageNowhere are Roman ruins thicker than in Tunisia. For this, from the days when Scipio took Punic Carthage until the Vandals broke into the city, was the Province of Africa, wondrously rich and populous. St. Augustine was born in Carthage — of a patrician family — and died in neighboring Hippo, when the Vandals were at the gates.  

I have just spent some days in Tunis and the country round about. In Carthaginian and Roman times, the town on the site of Tunis, across the bay from Carthage, was a slum; now it is the capital of a new state. But the greatness of this land is gone, and one comes chiefly to view the ruins.  [Read more...]
Filed Under: Brad Birzer, Carthage, Rome, Russell Kirk, St. Augustine, Western Civilization January 20, 2012

A Great Civilization is not Conquered from Without

February 28, 2011 By Leave a Comment
wisdom civilizationby Will Durant

A great civilization is not conquered from without until it has destroyed itself from within. The essential cause of Rome’s decline lay in her people, her morals, her class struggle, her failing trade, her bureaucratic despotism, her stifling taxes, her consuming wars.

Will Durant, Caesar and Christ

Books by Will Durant may be found in The Imaginative Conservative Bookstore. Essays by Dr. Durant may be found here. [Read more...]

Filed Under: Quotes, Rome, Will Durant February 28, 2011

Will Durant on the Fall of Rome

August 3, 2010 By 3 Comments
by Will Durant
fall of rome

Will Durant

A great civilization is not conquered from without until it has destroyed itself within. The essential cause of Rome’s decline lay in her people, her morals, her class struggle, her failing trade, her bureaucratic despotism, her stifling taxes, her consuming wars.–from Caesar and Christ

Books by Will Durant, and on the fall of Rome,  may be found in The Imaginative Conservative Bookstore. [Read more...]

Filed Under: Culture, Quotes, Rome, Will Durant August 3, 2010