Posted on 11/17/2015 8:34:22 AM PST by SeekAndFind
Edward Gibbon's "The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire" is one of the great works of written history. It comes in six volumes and was published over 12 years starting in 1776. It covers how the Roman Empire fell from its glory over centuries, eventually crumbling to nothing.
Over the weekend prominent historian Niall Ferguson, the presenter of the TV series "Civilization," has drawn an analogy between the bloodshed in Paris last Friday and what was the beginning of the end for the Roman Empire.
Ferguson declares he is here "to tell you that this is exactly how civilizations fall."
He continues:
Here is how Edward Gibbon described the Goths' sack of Rome in August 410 AD: " ... In the hour of savage licence, when every Âpassion was inflamed, and every restraint was removed … a cruel slaughter was made of the ÂRomans; and ... the streets of the city were filled with dead bodies ... Whenever the Barbarians were provoked by opposition, they extended the promiscuous massacre to the feeble, the innocent, and the helpless ... ".
Now, does that not describe the scenes we witnessed in Paris on Friday night? True, Gibbon's History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, published in six volumes between 1776 and 1788, represented Rome's demise as a slow burn. Gibbon covered more than 1400 years of history. The causes he identified ranged from the personality disorders of individual emperors to the power of the Praetorian Guard and the rise of Sassanid Persia. Decline shaded into fall, with monotheism acting as a kind of imperial dry rot.
He later says that modern Europe is starting to display some of the characteristics of Rome at its apogee. He says:
... Europe has allowed its defences to crumble.
(Excerpt) Read more at businessinsider.com ...
America forgot God. The God who richly blessed her. In her prosperity she became comfortable and proud. She needs to humble herself, repent, and turn to Christ. Mr. Obama’s ethnicity is irrelevant. He is not the problem, but a reality check of what our nation has become. He has a lot of Caucasians in office who agree with him. America is mostly white. They are the ones large and in charge. This is a heart issue not ethnic.
That was a very insightful link, thanks.
My oh my, history DOES repeat itself.
/johnny
History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - by Edward Gibbon
I’ve heard a lot about this book. Is it a boring read, and how difficult is it to follow the names as one reads it?
Go read what black leaders say, go see the assaults by blacks on whites, go see the discrimination in favor of blacks over whites in employment and entrance into schools. Go see the termination of white governance over the University of Missouri and the replacement of such governance by blacks. Experience refutes your contentions at every turn. We broke from England, we organized our Constitution, we created the greatest economy the world has ever seen and in 2008 we abdicated-a disaster! Race is the single most important issue facing America today and we face it and all its unpleasantness or we go under.
If you decide to read the series, it’s a comittment. You pretty much have to slog through it. This kind of work is not something you casually ready quickly. The grammar and syntax is somewhat different from today, so you have to actually think about it as you read. (At least, I find it to be so for me). It’s like reading Locke, Bastiat, or de Toqueville. You can’t just skim through. I think it’s worthwhile, because the concepts imparted in the series have been pondered by a great many people over the years. While some argue and disagree over particulars, and some conclusions he made, it really does have some fascinating history in it that is ever more relevant in our world today.
There's an even simpler reason: civilizations fall when there's more money to made in decline rather than expansion.
To ascribe what is occurring right now in Europe & the US to malice, lack of will, ignorance, naivete, etc is to miss the real motivation, which is there's $trillions to made playing the middle.
When Hussein reads a script that says disallowing refugees is "un-American", what is handlers really mean is (a) Dems get votes, thus huge kick-backs from influence peddling; and (b) Reps get low IQ workers that will do what they're told for under-market wages.
It's a win-win situation for the uni-party. They couldn't possibly give a sh!t whether the citizenry suffers an aggregate decline in its quality of life.
Hard to argue that
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