Greek Civilization:
1 and 2 weeks: Reading material:
Thucydides (c.460/455-c.399 BCE): Pericles' Funeral Oration
from the Peloponnesian War (Book 2.34-46)
This famous speech was given by the Athenian leader Pericles after the first
battles of the Peloponnesian war. Funerals after such battles were public
rituals and Pericles used the occasion to make a classic statement of the
value of democracy.
In the same winter the Athenians gave a funeral at the public cost to
those who had first fallen in this war. It was a custom of their
ancestors, and the manner of it is as follows. Three days before the
ceremony, the bones of the dead are laid out in a tent which has been
erected; and their friends bring to their relatives such offerings as they
please. In the funeral procession cypress coffins are borne in cars, one
for each tribe; the bones of the deceased being placed in the coffin of
their tribe. Among these is carried one empty bier decked for the
missing, that is, for those whose bodies could not be recovered. Any
citizen or stranger who pleases, joins in the procession: and the female
relatives are there to wail at the burial. The dead are laid in the public
sepulchre in the Beautiful suburb of the city, in which those who fall
in war are always buried; with the exception of those slain at
Marathon, who for their singular and extraordinary valour were
interred on the spot where they fell. After the bodies have been laid in
the earth, a man chosen by the state, of approved wisdom and eminent
reputation, pronounces over them an appropriate panegyric; after
which all retire. Such is the manner of the burying; and throughout the
whole of the war, whenever the occasion arose, the established custom
was observed. Meanwhile these were the first that had fallen, and
Pericles, son of Xanthippus, was chosen to pronounce their eulogium.
When the proper time arrived, he advanced from the sepulchre to an
elevated platform in order to be heard by as many of the crowd as
possible, and spoke as follows:
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…….
"I shall begin with our ancestors: it is both just and proper that they
should have the honor of the first mention on an occasion like the
present. They dwelt in the country without break in the succession
from generation to generation, and handed it down free to the present
time by their valour. And if our more remote ancestors deserve praise,
much more do our own fathers, who added to their inheritance the
empire which we now possess, and spared no pains to be able to leave
their acquisitions to us of the present generation. Lastly, there are few
parts of our dominions that have not been augmented by those of us
here, who are still more or less in the vigour of life; while the mother
country has been furnished by us with everything that can enable her
to depend on her own resources whether for war or for peace. That
part of our history which tells of the military achievements which
gave us our several possessions, or of the ready valour with which
either we or our fathers stemmed the tide of Hellenic or foreign
aggression, is a theme too familiar to my hearers for me to dilate on,
and I shall therefore pass it by. But what was the road by which we
reached our position, what the form of government under which our
greatness grew, what the national habits out of which it sprang; these
are questions which I may try to solve before I proceed to my
panegyric upon these men; since I think this to be a subject upon
which on the present occasion a speaker may properly dwell, and to
which the whole assemblage, whether citizens or foreigners, may
listen with advantage.
"Our constitution does not copy the laws of neighbouring states;
we are rather a pattern to others than imitators ourselves. Its
administration favours the many instead of the few; this is why it
is called a democracy. If we look to the laws, they afford equal
justice to all in their private differences; if no social standing,
advancement in public life falls to reputation for capacity, class
considerations not being allowed to interfere with merit; nor again
does poverty bar the way, if a man is able to serve the state, he is not
hindered by the obscurity of his condition. The freedom which we
enjoy in our government extends also to our ordinary life. There, far
from exercising a jealous surveillance over each other, we do not feel
called upon to be angry with our neighbour for doing what he likes, or
even to indulge in those injurious looks which cannot fail to be
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offensive, although they inflict no positive penalty. But all this ease in
our private relations does not make us lawless as citizens. Against this
fear is our chief safeguard, teaching us to obey the magistrates and the
laws, particularly such as regard the protection of the injured, whether
they are actually on the statute book, or belong to that code which,
although unwritten, yet cannot be broken without acknowledged
disgrace.
"If we turn to our military policy, there also we differ from our
antagonists. We throw open our city to the world, and never by alien
acts exclude foreigners from any opportunity of learning or observing,
although the eyes of an enemy may occasionally profit by our
liberality; trusting less in system and policy than to the native spirit of
our citizens; while in education, where our rivals from their very
cradles by a painful discipline seek after manliness, at Athens we live
exactly as we please, and yet are just as ready to encounter every
legitimate danger. In proof of this it may be noticed that the
Lacedaemonians do not invade our country alone, but bring with them
all their confederates; while we Athenians advance unsupported into
the territory of a neighbour, and fighting upon a foreign soil usually
vanquish with ease men who are defending their homes. Our united
force was never yet encountered by any enemy, because we have at
once to attend to our marine and to dispatch our citizens by land upon
a hundred different services; so that, wherever they engage with some
such fraction of our strength, a success against a detachment is
magnified into a victory over the nation, and a defeat into a reverse
suffered at the hands of our entire people. And yet if with habits not of
labour but of ease, and courage not of art but of nature, we are still
willing to encounter danger, we have the double advantage of
escaping the experience of hardships in anticipation and of facing
them in the hour of need as fearlessly as those who are never free
from them.
"Nor are these the only points in which our city is worthy of
admiration. We cultivate refinement without extravagance and
knowledge without effeminacy; wealth we employ more for use than
for show, and place the real disgrace of poverty not in owning to the
fact but in declining the struggle against it. Our public men have,
besides politics, their private affairs to attend to, and our ordinary
citizens, though occupied with the pursuits of industry, are still fair
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judges of public matters; for, unlike any other nation, regarding him
who takes no part in these duties not as unambitious but as useless, we
Athenians are able to judge at all events if we cannot originate, and,
instead of looking on discussion as a stumbling-block in the way of
action, we think it an indispensable preliminary to any wise action at
all. Again, in our enterprises we present the singular spectacle of
daring and deliberation, each carried to its highest point, and both
united in the same persons; although usually decision is the fruit of
ignorance, hesitation of reflection. But the palm of courage will surely
be adjudged most justly to those, who best know the difference
between hardship and pleasure and yet are never tempted to shrink
from danger. In generosity we are equally singular, acquiring our
friends by conferring, not by receiving, favours. Yet, of course, the
doer of the favour is the firmer friend of the two, in order by
continued kindness to keep the recipient in his debt; while the debtor
feels less keenly from the very consciousness that the return he makes
will be a payment, not a free gift. And it is only the Athenians, who,
fearless of consequences, confer their benefits not from calculations of
expediency, but in the confidence of liberality.
"In short, I say that as a city we are the school of Hellas, while I
doubt if the world can produce a man who, where he has only
himself to depend upon, is equal to so many emergencies, and
graced by so happy a versatility, as the Athenian. And that this is
no mere boast thrown out for the occasion, but plain matter of fact, the
power of the state acquired by these habits proves. For Athens alone
of her contemporaries is found when tested to be greater than her
reputation, and alone gives no occasion to her assailants to blush at
the antagonist by whom they have been worsted, or to her subjects to
question her title by merit to rule. Rather, the admiration of the
present and succeeding ages will be ours, since we have not left our
power without witness, but have shown it by mighty proofs;
Lincoln’s Gettysburg Speech: （11-19-1863）
The main address at the dedication ceremony was one of two hours, delivered by Edward
Everett, the best-known orator of the time. In the wake of such a performance, Lincoln's
brief speech would hardly seem to have drawn notice. However, despite some criticism
from his opposition, it was widely quoted and praised and soon came to be recognized as
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one of the classic utterances of all time, a masterpiece of prose poetry. On the day
following the ceremony, Everett himself wrote to Lincoln, “I wish that I could flatter
myself that I had come as near to the central idea of the occasion in two hours as you did
in two minutes.”
Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this
continent a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the
proposition that all men are created equal.
Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation
or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are
met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a
portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave
their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and
proper that we should do this.
But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate—we can not consecrate—
we can not hallow—this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who
struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add
or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say
here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living,
rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who
fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be
here dedicated to the great task remaining before us—that from these
honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they
gave the last full measure of devotion—that we here highly resolve
that these dead shall not have died in vain—that this nation, under
God, shall have a new birth of freedom—and that government of the
people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.
Can you find out from the following reading the influence of Greek philosophy,
especially that of Aristotle?
The Declaration of Independence of the Thirteen Colonies
In CONGRESS, July 4, 1776
The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America,
When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to
dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to
assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the
Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions
of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the
separation.
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We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are
endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are
Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. -
Profound Impacts of the Greek Civilization on the West as seen
in Pope Benedict XIV’s speech on “Faith, Reason and the
University” delivered on September 12, 2006 at the University of
Regensburg, Germany.
As far as understanding of God and thus the concrete practice of
religion is concerned, we find ourselves faced with a dilemma which
nowadays challenges us directly. Is the conviction that acting
unreasonably contradicts God's nature merely a Greek idea, or is it
always and intrinsically true? I believe that here we can see the
profound harmony between what is Greek in the best sense of the
word and the biblical understanding of faith in God. Modifying the
first verse of the Book of Genesis, John began the prologue of his
Gospel with the words: In the beginning was the logos. This is the
very word used by the emperor: God acts with logos.
Logos means both reason and word-- a reason which is creative and
capable of self-communication, precisely as reason. John thus spoke
the final word on the biblical concept of God, and in this word all the
often toilsome and tortuous threads of biblical faith find their
culmination and synthesis. In the beginning was the logos, and the
logos is God, says the Evangelist.
The encounter between the Biblical message and Greek thought did
not happen by chance. The vision of Saint Paul, who saw the roads to
Asia barred and in a dream saw a Macedonian man plead with him:
Come over to Macedonia and help us! (cf. Acts 16:6-10)-- this vision
can be interpreted as a distillation of the intrinsic necessity of a
rapprochement between Biblical faith and Greek inquiry.
In point of fact, this rapprochement had been going on for some time.
The mysterious name of God, revealed from the burning bush, a name
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which separates this God from all other divinities with their many
names and declares simply that he is, is already presents a challenge
to the notion of myth, to which Socrates's attempt to vanquish and
transcend myth stands in close analogy. Within the Old Testament, the
process which started at the burning bush came to new maturity at the
time of the Exile, when the God of Israel, an Israel now deprived of its
land and worship, was proclaimed as the God of heaven and earth and
described in a simple formula which echoes the words uttered at the
burning bush: I am.
This inner rapprochement between Biblical faith and Greek
philosophical inquiry was an event of decisive importance not only
from the standpoint of the history of religions, but also from that of
world history-– it is an event which concerns us even today. Given
this convergence, it is not surprising that Christianity, despite its
origins and some significant developments in the East, finally took on
its historically decisive character in Europe. We can also express this
the other way around: this convergence, with the subsequent addition
of the Roman heritage, created Europe and remains the foundation of
what can rightly be called Europe.
Origins of the Greek;
Thucydides (c.460/455-c.399 BCE)
from the Peloponnesian War; Translated by Richard Crawley
The State of Greece from the earliest Times to the Commencement of
the Peloponnesian War
Thucydides, an Athenian, wrote the history of the war between the
Peloponnesians and the Athenians, beginning at the moment that it
broke out, and believing that it would be a great war and more worthy
of relation than any that had preceded it. This belief was not without
its grounds. The preparations of both the combatants were in every
department in the last state of perfection; and he could see the rest
of the Hellenic race taking sides in the quarrel; those who delayed
doing so at once having it in contemplation. Indeed this was the greatest movement yet
known in history, not only of the Hellenes, but of a large part of the barbarian world- I
had almost said of mankind. For though the events of remote antiquity, and even those
that more immediately preceded the war, could not from lapse of time be clearly
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ascertained, yet the evidences which an inquiry carried as far back as was practicable
leads me to trust, all point to the conclusion that there was nothing on a great scale, either
in war or in other matters.
For instance, it is evident that the country now called Hellas had
in ancient times no settled population; on the contrary, migrations
were of frequent occurrence, the several tribes readily abandoning
their homes under the pressure of superior numbers. Without commerce,
without freedom of communication either by land or sea, cultivating
no more of their territory than the exigencies of life required, destitute of capital, never
planting their land (for they could not tell when an invader might not come and take it all
away, and when he did come they had no walls to stop him), thinking that the necessities
of daily sustenance could be supplied at one place as well as another, they cared little for
shifting their habitation, and consequently neither built large cities nor attained to any
other form of greatness. The richest soils were always most subject to this change of
masters; such as the district now called Thessaly, Boeotia, most of the Peloponnese,
Arcadia excepted, and the most fertile parts of the rest of Hellas.
The goodness of the land favored the aggrandizement of particular
individuals, and thus created faction which proved a fertile source
of ruin. It also invited invasion. Accordingly Attica, from the poverty
of its soil enjoying from a very remote period freedom from faction,
never changed its inhabitants. And here is no inconsiderable exemplification
of my assertion that the migrations were the cause of there being
no correspondent growth in other parts. The most powerful victims
of war or faction from the rest of Hellas took refuge with the Athenians
as a safe retreat; and at an early period, becoming naturalized, swelled
the already large population of the city to such a height that Attica
became at last too small to hold them, and they had to send out colonies
to Ionia.
There is also another circumstance that contributes not a little to
my conviction of the weakness of ancient times. Before the Trojan
war there is no indication of any common action in Hellas, nor indeed
of the universal prevalence of the name; on the contrary, before the
time of Hellen, son of Deucalion, no such appellation existed, but
the country went by the names of the different tribes, in particular
of the Pelasgian. It was not till Hellen and his sons grew strong
in Phthiotis, and were invited as allies into the other cities, that
one by one they gradually acquired from the connection the name of
Hellenes; though a long time elapsed before that name could fasten
itself upon all. The best proof of this is furnished by Homer. Born
long after the Trojan War, he nowhere calls all of them by that name,
nor indeed any of them except the followers of Achilles from Phthiotis,
who were the original Hellenes: in his poems they are called Danaans,
Argives, and Achaeans. He does not even use the term barbarian, probably
because the Hellenes had not yet been marked off from the rest of
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the world by one distinctive appellation. It appears therefore that
the several Hellenic communities, comprising not only those who first
acquired the name, city by city, as they came to understand each other,
but also those who assumed it afterwards as the name of the whole
people, were before the Trojan war prevented by their want of strength
and the absence of mutual intercourse from displaying any collective
action.
Indeed, they could not unite for this expedition till they had gained
increased familiarity with the sea. And the first person known to
us by tradition as having established a navy is Minos. He made himself
master of what is now called the Hellenic sea, and ruled over the
Cyclades, into most of which he sent the first colonies, expelling
the Carians and appointing his own sons governors; and thus did his
best to put down piracy in those waters, a necessary step to secure
the revenues for his own use.
For in early times the Hellenes and the barbarians of the coast and
islands, as communication by sea became more common, were tempted
to turn pirates, under the conduct of their most powerful men; the
motives being to serve their own cupidity and to support the needy.
They would fall upon a town unprotected by walls, and consisting of
a mere collection of villages, and would plunder it; indeed, this
came to be the main source of their livelihood, no disgrace being
yet attached to such an achievement, but even some glory. An illustration
of this is furnished by the honour with which some of the inhabitants
of the continent still regard a successful marauder, and by the question
we find the old poets everywhere representing the people as asking
of voyagers- "Are they pirates?"- as if those who are asked the question
would have no idea of disclaiming the imputation, or their interrogators
of reproaching them for it. The same rapine prevailed also by land.
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