Publisher's Synopsis
Excerpt from Social Forces, Philanthropy: Williams College, 1867, an Oration
The great of old The dead but sceptered sovereigns who still rule Our spirits from their urns.
Antiquity veils the common-place and' transient features of its epochs and leaves only symbols of strength, grand statues with the logic of events fixed forever on their chiseled lips. In these microcosmic deductions the history of society is re?ected, and the action of the social forces in our own times is made clearer by their analysis. Phidias was more than a sculptor, for his genius transcending the range of art has embodied in beautiful emblems the growth and essence of Grecian character: Greek culture was the ?ower and fruit of the inner life of man. Individuality was the first love, and its maintenance a duty. The esthetic nature shot into maturity ?ushed with the radiance of faultless beauty Science, religion and government, invited catholic Opinion and inspired the Greek with the dignity of manhood. The citizen carried'into popular action, private principles and a just sense of personal liberty. Civil and military discipline regulated enthusi asm and rendered national movements harmonious and delibera tive. Law, the expression of human character, secured every advance towards human freedom. In the firm alliance of public sentiment to liberal ideas of human rights and privileges, and a devotion to liberty in prosperity and disaster, the forces which wrought from barbarism an Athenian civilization, have left the noblest triumph of their power, the best gift of Hellenic culture to the historic experience of man.
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