Tag: learning from history

Please Read This Essay!

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Why did the Gauls not stay after they had sacked Rome in the 4th century BC? - Quora

This will be the first time I’ve ever run a post two days in a row. I only do it because, to me, the historical parallel fairly screams to me, “Learn from this, America!”

When the Gauls Burnt Rome

Rome was nearly erased from history when the city was taken and burned by the Gauls. How did it happen? The Romans had forced Camillus, their most capable leader, into exile; ignored reports that the Gauls were coming after them in great strength; refused to suspend their own political bickering; and were found completely unready for the crisis.

The Romans were only rescued because they repented of their folly, put their trust in their religious beliefs–and called back Camillus. He took charge and totally defeated the Gauls. Restored to his place, he then succeeded in defeating a proposal to abandon the shattered city and live elsewhere.

Is it saying too much to say that God had reserved Camillus for this very purpose?

And is it too much to say that President Donald Trump is our Camillus?

We need to put him back in office.

And we need to repent and turn back to God.

Stop doing stupid, evil, self-destructive stuff!

‘Another Warning from History’ (2018)

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Image result for images of thucydides

It’s too bad so few of us read history (or anything else) anymore. We might learn from the experience of others.

Another Warning from History

Our country’s founders read Thucydides. From his experience they knew that hysteria and naked lust for power made an exceedingly poor basis for public policy. Thucydides warned them, and they took it to heart.

Does anyone appreciate what almost happened to us in those Brett Kavanagh Supreme Court confirmation hearings? We almost tossed our entire legal doctrine out the window! Presumption of innocence, the requirement for evidence, and simple decency–Democrats were willing to chuck it all, as long as they could get their way.

Now these people are actually in power over us. They don’t like our country, they don’t like us, they don’t like our history, they don’t like our way of life, and if they were honestly elected by the American people, I’m the Sultan of Swat.

Yes, we could wreck our country. All it takes is hysteria and power-lust.

 

‘A Grim Little Insight from History’ (2016)

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See the source image

During the heyday of the Roman Empire, it was possible to send a letter–or even a parcel containing a pair of knitted socks!–from Mesopotamia to a fort on Hadrian’s Wall in Scotland. After Rome fell, it would not again become possible to do that for another fifteen hundred years.

Why did Rome fall?

A Grim Little Insight from History

Note the comments by Cicero and Abraham Lincoln, posted by “Watchman.”

***On a higher note, last night we listened to President Trump’s speech at the UN. Wow! How badly and for how long we’ve needed a president like that! The only thing he could’ve said that would’ve made it even better would have been, “And as of now, the United States will no longer fund this ridiculous institution.”

I Review ‘Fawkes’

Posted By: leeduigon(patty)Posted On:

Image result for images of fawkes by nadine brandes

In 1605 there was a plot to blow up the English Parliament, with King James I, and replace the Protestant government with Catholics. The idea was to hide many barrels of gunpowder under the Parliament house and blow it sky-high. This has come to be known and memorialized as the Gunpowder Plot. One of the plotters, Guy Fawkes, was actually caught just before he could light the fuse.

Sounds like it’d made a great historical novel.

But Nadine Brandes has written it as a Young Adults fantasy novel, and I am somewhat embarrassed to admit that I just don’t get it.

https://chalcedon.edu/resources/articles/book-review-fawkes-by-nadine-brandes

We love to read, we want to pass that on to our children: there’s no limit to what the voracious reader can learn. But we don’t want to be reading a load of baloney, just so we can say we turned a lot of pages.

I think the reason this fantasy didn’t quite make it is because there was no reason to write it as a fantasy in the first place.

Too bad. We would like to understand how the conditions of religious life in England in those days, ostensibly Christian religion, could have led to the Gunpowder Plot. We would like to use its history as a guide to avoiding those mistakes!

But we’ll need other books for that.