Latin civilization

“ The civilization of Rome, the latina civilitas, is a complex mind, whose successive phases of growth are the abstract humanism of ancient Greece, the civic and legal humanism of Rome, the moral and spiritual humanism of the Latin church, the æsthetic and metaphysical humanism of the Renaissance. Each phase is an integration of the preceding one and the acquisition of a new universal principle, made independent of the particular social body in which it has partially realized itself before becoming a pure, intelligible ideal, an essential element of the human mind. ”

“ Thus, the Roman Empire, having discharged its organizing function, was decrepit, and classical civilization, after exhibiting its strength in season, was decaying when the Latin priesthood and the bar{385} barians entered that closed garden of antiquity, and trampled it beneath their feet. Mediaeval religion and modes of thought, in like manner, were at the point of ossifying, when Humanism intervened to twine the threads of past and present into strands that should be strong as cables for the furtherance of future energy. ”

“ In art, in literature, in philosophy, in laws, in the mechanism of government, in the cultivated face of nature, in military strength, in aesthetic culture, the Romans were our equals. And this high civilization was reached by the native and unaided strength of man; by the power of will, by courage, by perseverance, by genius, by fortunate circumstances; by great men, gifted with unusual talents. We are filled with admiration by all these trophies of genius, and cannot but feel that only a superior race could have accomplished such mighty triumphs. ”

“ The gradual growth of Rome as a warlike state is a most impressive example of the agency of a great Moral Governor in breaking up states that deserved to perish, and in building up a power such as the world needed in order to facilitate both a magnificent civilization and the peaceful spread of a new religion. The Greeks created art and literature ”

“ The rise and fall of the Roman Empire is especially rich in the facts which bear on our own development. Nor can modern history be comprehended without a survey of the civilization which has entered into our own, and forms the basis of many of our own institutions. Rome perished, but not wholly her civilization. So far as it was founded on the immutable principles of justice, or beauty, or love, it will never die, but will remain a precious legacy to all generations. ”

“ If a complicated system of laws and government, on which the reason and experience of ages were expended, did not prevent the empire from falling into the hands of barbarians, much less was to be expected of art, for which the Romans were also distinguished in common with the Greeks. Much is said of the ennobling influence of those great creations which gave so great lustre to ancient civilization. ”

“ The Empire included men of every kind of race; as a rule, Rome left them to continue their own civilizations with the use of their own languages. Undoubtedly now the Latin element enters Southern Italy, but only so far as that Roman governors were appointed and Latin was the language of the Government. ”

“ Therefore the cosmopolitan universality of Roman history is a kind of common good which the Latin races ought to defend with all their might, having care that no other history usurp its place in contemporary culture; that it remain the typical outline, the ideal model of universal history in the education of coming generations. The Latin civilised world has need that every now and then an historian arise to reanimate the history of Rome, in order to maintain its continued supremacy in the education of the intelligent ”

“ So long as the Empire held together the unifying influence of official Latin, and the constant intercommunication between the provinces, preserved the essential unity of Latin throughout the world, but when the bonds were broken, the naturally divergent tendencies which had existed from the beginning, but had been held in check, made themselves felt, and the speech of the several sections of the Old World developed into the languages which we find in them to-day. ”

“ Although it is very probable that the historic population of Rome was the result of a fusion of several racial elements—Latin, Sabine, Etruscan, and even pre-Italian, nevertheless the Romans were essentially a Latin people. ”

“ Under the shadow of the walls of the Eternal City all the great races were associated and mingled—Latins, Trojans, Greeks, Sabines, and Etruscans. The Roman civilization was the product of all that had gone before, as it was destined to be the father of all that should follow it. The Roman had no peer either in courage or fortitude. Aspiring to universal dominion, he toughened himself to achieve it. Dooming his enemy to death or slavery, he was not less self-exacting, his own life, through the cup of poison, the sword, or the opened vein, becoming the forfeit equally of misfortune and shame. ”

“ The extraordinary material progress of the modern world during the last century has undoubtedly stimulated this tendency in a remarkable way, but it would seem as if the Latin of the common people from the time of Plautus to that of Cicero must have been subjected to still more innovating influences than modern conversational English has. During this period the newly conquered territories in Spain, northern Africa, Greece, and Asia poured their slaves and traders into Italy, and added a great many words to the vocabulary of every-day life. ”

“ Year after year the flower of the Roman youth were marched to her distant colonies and died upon foreign fields; and in return the Gauls and Thracians> Syrians and Egyptians, were brought to Italy and Rome. The art, learning, and civilization of Rome, which had thrived upon their native soil, and had each year grown more deeply rooted, were like plants pulled up and strewed broadcast over the earth, to take root where they could, or to be crowded out by the more vigorous but rank native growth. ”

“ We are also indebted to Rome for many practical skills and for important engineering knowledge, which was saved and passed on to Western Europe through the medium of the monks. On the other side of the picture, the recent great World War, with all its awful destruction of life and property, and injury to the orderly progress of civilization, may be traced directly to the Roman idea of world empire and the sway of one imperial government, imposing its rule and its culture on the rest of mankind. ”

“ After all the researches that have been made, the true origin of the Latin people, and even of the Roman city, is involved in impenetrable obscurity; the legendary traditions collected by the historians are, however, the best guides that we can now follow ”

“ Thus early had false notions of material civilization corrupted the genuine meaning of a word which should always stand, not for political supremacy, but for moral excellence. Rome, the heart of the dominant empire which had vanquished and absorbed at least two civilizations of higher degree than its own, the Hebrew and the Greek, has transmitted to the word civilization the spirit of its intensely local autonomy. ”

“ The political and social problems which confronted Rome are those which America, England, and France face today, and nothing brings out more clearly the close relation which our civilization bears to hers than the identity of these ancient and modern problems. ”

“ Only those facts and events which illustrate the real character of the Roman people, which show the progressive development of Rome as a world power, and which explain the influence that Rome has exercised upon modern civilization, have been emphasized. ”

“ If religion wanes before the dazzling forces of a brilliant material civilization, and scarcely holds her own, when all profess to be governed by Christian truth, so that in a moral and spiritual view, society rather retrogrades than advances, I am amazed that it made so considerable a progress in the Roman empire, and increased from generation to generation until it shook the throne of emperors. ”

“ How the armies of Rome mastered the nations of the world is known to every reader of history, but the story of the conquest by Latin of the languages of the world is vague in the minds of most of us. If we should ask ourselves how it came about, we should probably think of the world-wide supremacy of Latin as a natural result of the world-wide supremacy of the Roman legions or of Roman law. But in making this assumption we should be shutting our eyes to the history of our own times. A conquered people does not necessarily accept, perhaps it has not commonly accepted, the tongue of its master. ”

“ The conquest of the known world by this practical and constructive people could not have otherwise than decisively influenced the whole course of human history, and, coming at the time in world affairs that it did, the influence on all future civilization of the work of Rome has been profound. The great political fact which dominated all the Middle Ages, and shaped the religion and government and civilization of the time, was the fact that the Roman Empire had been and had done its work so well. ”

“ As long as the Roman empire existed in its integrity, and the capital city retained its influence as the patron to whom all literary men must look for support, and as the model of refinement and civilization, the language maintained its dominion. Provincial writers endeavoured to rid themselves of their provincialisms. At Rome they formed their taste and received their education. ”

“ Yet the Latin language is still the necessary foundation of one half of human knowledge, and the forms created by Roman genius underlie the whole of our civilisation. So long as mankind look before and after, the name of Rome will be the greatest of those upon which their backward gaze can be turned. ”

“ If genius can soar, under Pagan, as well as under Christian influences, it would appear that civilization, in an intellectual point of view, may be the work of man, unaided by inspiration. It is the triumph of the native intellect of man which I wish to show.
[Sidenote: Romans borrow from the Greeks.]
Although it is my chief aim to present the magnificent civilization of the Roman empire under the emperors, I must cite the examples of Grecian as well as Roman genius, since Greece became a part of that grand empire, and since Grecian and Roman culture is mixed up and blended together. ”

“ Literature. The last century of the republic saw the completion of the amalgamation of Greek and Roman culture which had begun in the previous epoch. The resulting Graeco-Roman culture was a [pg 199] bi-lingual civilization based upon Greek intellectual and Roman political achievement which it was the mission of the empire to spread to the barbaric peoples of the western provinces. The age was marked by many-sided, keen, intellectual activity which brought Rome’s intellectual development to its height. Yet this Graeco-Roman culture was almost exclusively a possession of the higher classes. ”

“ It is a most interesting inquiry why art, literature, science, philosophy, and political organizations, and other trophies of the unaided reason of man, did not prevent so mournful an eclipse of human glory as took place upon the fall of the majestic empire of the Romans. There can be no question that civilization achieved most splendid triumphs, even under the influence of pagan institutions. ”

“ This book, like the volume on "Society and Politics in Ancient Rome," deals with the life of the common people, with their language and literature, their occupations and amusements, and with their social, political, and economic conditions. We are interested in the common people of Rome because they made the Roman Empire what it was. They carried the Roman standards to the Euphrates and the Atlantic; they lived abroad as traders, farmers, and soldiers to hold and Romanize the provinces, or they stayed at home, working as carpenters, masons, or bakers, to supply the daily needs of the capital. ”

“ The ancient Romans put enormous stress upon the will. They formulated the laws by which men are still regulated in civilized social life. A hint of this we get in the Latin language, by the small use made of the pronoun. Ideas, too, are expressions of translated social energy. ”

“ It is not from a survey of the material grandeur, or the arts, or the military prowess of Rome that we get the highest idea of her civilization. These indicate strength and even genius; but the checks and balances which were gradually introduced into the government of the city and empire, by which society was kept together, and a great prosperity secured for centuries, also show great foresight and practical wisdom. A State which favored individual development while it promoted law and order ”

“ The new scale of living. In the course of their campaigns in Sicily, Africa, Greece, and Asia Minor, the Romans came into close contact with a civilization older and higher than their own, where the art of living was practised with a refinement and elegance unknown in Latium. In this respect the conquerors showed themselves only too ready to learn from the conquered, and all the luxurious externals of culture were transplanted to Rome. ”

“ What is the date before which we shall call the language of the Western Empire Latin, and after which it is better to speak of French, Spanish, and Italian? Such a line of division cannot be sharply drawn, and will in a measure be artificial, because, as we shall attempt to show in the chapter which follows on the "Latin of the Common People," Latin survives in the Romance languages, and has had a continuous life up to the present day. ”