I have recently taken up Gibbon’s The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. Written nearly two and a half centuries ago, it is a massive book, and remains an astonishing, insightful, quite relevant, and sometimes humorous work. Over the next year, I intend to write a series of posts that will, I hope, enlighten for myself and the few that read this, both the history of Rome and its parallels with America today.
As we move into the new year, one wonders what it will bring. Will it be a year of peace and good will among men?… I doubt it.
The American Eagle soars across the globe, as did the Roman Eagle across the Mediterranean 2,000 years ago. America’s propensity for war, and perceived national gain by war, is to me an astonishing hallmark of the United States, this nation of “Free People.”
Gibbon writes “…as long as mankind shall continue to bestow more liberal applause on their destroyers than on their benefactors, the thirst of military glory will ever be the vice of the most exalted characters.”
On this past New Years Eve, gathered with a few friends and family in front of the wide-screen to watch the ball drop in Times Square, a young female news announcer announced to several marines at her side and the world at large, “Thank you guys for “kicking butt” over there.” “Kicking butt?” Like war is some sort of an athletic game? What an idiot. No journalist, her. Just another popinjay spouting jingoism’s for America’s war machine.
Ah, me! Perhaps I am just getting old, but the sheer idiocy of the majority of the media in this country both frightens and enrages me. Perhaps I should heed Gibbons’ Persian prince who “…never departed from the Sultan’s presence without satisfying himself whether his head was still on his shoulders,” and so employ the philosophy that it was the “part of the wise man to forget the inevitable calamities of human life in enjoyment of the fleeting hour.”
I just may give that a go this year.
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