Was the fall of Rome suicide or murder? Did the Germanic tribes walk over a corpse or did they contribute to its demise? I. Continuing for more than 200 years, from approximately 27 B.C. to A.D. 180, the Pax Romana was among the most stable, prosperous, and peaceful periods in history—certainly in the history of [...]
The title of Shakespeare’s tragedy is misleading, in that "Julius Caesar" shows us much more about Antony and the friend who betrays Caesar, Brutus, than it does about the legendary leader of Rome. Brutus: “There is a tide in the affairs of men Which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune; Omitted, all the voyage of their life Is bound in shallows and in miseries. On such a full sea [...]
In “The City of God,” Augustine systematically lays bare the empty ideology of the city of man and the Roman empire in a breathtaking counter-narrative that remains remarkably modern and relevant for today. In contrast to the city of man, the City of Love, Augustine argues, is the godly city to which Christians belong and [...]
In the Late Roman Empire, when classical civilization had fallen into decadence and decay, Christianity proved a dynamic and creative force. Amid the deterioration of political authority, the stagnation of economic life, and the decline of learning, a new civilization was emerging. I. As confidence in reason and the expectation of finding happiness in this [...]
The essence of Rome, by being conscious of one’s cultural debts, is the refusal to make a definitive synthesis or mediation. Only in Rome are there Athens and Jerusalem. Only because of Rome are there “two cities because one remains silently present.” Remi Brague’s observation about the historical essence of Rome shows that “Romanity” is [...]
Today, wherever the intelligent among us may still be found, the idea of Monarchy shimmers and beckons along the periphery of our collective intellectual subconscious; we suspect it has something that will save us from the erosions of shabby egalitarianism, from our sordid democracies and their petulant, tiresome, subversive “rights.” “Then Perceval was told that [...]
Everywhere Western man longs for Constantinople and nowhere has he any idea how to find her. To unearth this Byzantium, this “heaven of the human mind,” as Yeats dreamed her, is not to go searching through histories and legends, glorious ruins or immortal poems. “Le grand absent—c’est l’Empire” C. Dufour, Constantinople Imaginaire Everywhere Western man [...]
May 26 is the feast day of Philip Neri, known as the Second Apostle of Rome—after Peter himself—and the prophet of joy, a man who was marked by his love of the desert fathers. Philip’s approach to holiness was that all were called to it, including those in the world doing worldly and even intellectual [...]
Rome does not occasionally become relevant in our understanding of political upheaval. Rather, it forms part of our very identity as Christians and heirs of the Western tradition that it helped shape. No one saw the essential drama of Rome more clearly than William Shakespeare. In the current issue of Atlantic magazine, editor-at-large Cullen Murphy [...]
The figure of Brutus—the assassin of the tyrant—has cast a long shadow over American history. The American Founders looked to the Roman Empire embodied by Caesar as an example of how their own republic too could be undone by the ambition of one man. “Beware the Ides of March!” Thus the soothsayer warned Julius Caesar [...]
Roman death masks—called “imagines”—were actually wax models impressed directly on the face during life, and they bore a remarkable likeness to the person. Displayed during the funerals of the elite, they served as a link between the present and the past and were meant to inspire attendees to patriotic virtue. The recent defacement of statues [...]
O think me worth thine anger, punish me, Burn off my rusts, and my deformity, Restore thine image, so much, by thy grace, That thou mayst know me, and I’ll turn my face. –John Donne, from “Good Friday, 1613. Riding Westward” What is the Christian to do when faced with secular thought that speaks truth [...]
The highlight of a pilgrimage to Rome is to join Liz Lev for one of her increasingly famous tours of the Vatican Museums. Her high-energy presentation, vast knowledge, and enthusiasm are matched by her warm welcome, sense of humor, and genuine faith. […]
Plutarch’s “Parallel Lives” is a profoundly spiritual and moral work, and one which calls each and every one of us to become great men and not to remain in the shadow of the great men of history who may, in fact, have been petty instead of great. Lucius Mestrius Plutarchus, better known as Plutarch, lived [...]