Monday, August 22, 2005

A History Lesson For Us All

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About the time our original 13 states adopted their new constitution, in the year 1787, Alexander Tyler (a Scottish history professor at The University of Edinborough) had this to say about "The Fall of The Athenian Republic" some 2,000 years prior.

"A democracy is always temporary in nature; it simply cannot exist as a permanent form of government. A democracy will continue to exist up until the time that voters discover that they can vote themselves generous gifts from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates who promise the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that every democracy will finally collapse due to loosefiscal policy, (which is) always followed by a dictatorship."

"The average age of the world’s greatest civilizations from the beginning of history has been about 200 years. During those 200 years, these nations always progressed through the following sequence:

From Bondage to spiritual faith;

From spiritual faith to great courage;

From courage to liberty;

From liberty to abundance;

From abundance to complacency;

From complacency to apathy;

From apathy to dependence;

From dependence back into bondage."

Discuss...

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6 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

I saw this somewhere once. It is soo true! We had better get our selves together or its going to end badly.

23/8/05 06:05  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

We are definitely in the "from apathy to dependence" stage right now!

23/8/05 10:32  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Yeah, rounding third and heading for home base: bondage. And not the good kind!

23/8/05 11:02  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I think it's time to be reminded of Thomas Jefferson's 10 Rules for Life:

1. Never put off until tomorrow what you can do today.
2. Never trouble another for what you can do yourself.
3. Never spend your money before you have it.
4. Never buy what you do not want because it is cheap.
5. Pride costs us more than hunger, thirst, and cold.
6. We never repent for having eaten too little.
7. Nothing is troublesome that we do willingly.
8. How much pain have the evils that never happened cost us!
9. Take things always by their smooth handle.
10. When angry, count to ten before you speak; if very angry, one hundred.

Regarding Rule #1, in my life it goes more like this: Never do today what you can put off until tomorrow.

Still these are awesome rules!!

SAJ

23/8/05 18:41  
Blogger kmg said...

Thanks for the rules, SAJ... and welcome back!!

P.S. Number 4 is a plague around here sometimes!

23/8/05 20:33  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"3. Never spend your money before you have it."

Of course, this one is a bit of a joke because Jefferson himself died VERY deeply in debt; a case of "Do as I say, not as I do." :)

Pomoze Bog.
Tsar Lazar

23/8/05 21:57  

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