[arthurus]

I used to think the analogy was to the transition of the Republic into the Empire which was definitely not the fall of Rome. It lơks more and more like we are combining the transition with the collapse of Roman Civilization which came at the hands of the first major Moslem expansion.

Cutting off the source

and

the whole thing

[Jacquerie]

The Roman republic lasted about 450 years.

Machiavelli thought there might be lessons to learn from the Roman republican experience.

He spent two years studying the Roman historian Livy.

There is much for 21st century America to learn from Machiavelli's 16th century work, Discourses on Livy.