Authors of Greece

Authors of Greece

The Project Gutenberg EBook of Authors of Greece, by T. W. Lumb
Copyright laws are changing all over the world. Be sure to check the
copyright laws for your country before downloading or redistributing
this or any other Project Gutenberg eBook.
This header should be the first thing seen when viewing this Project
Gutenberg file. Please do not remove it. Do not change or edit the
header without written permission.
Please read the "legal small print," and other information about the
eBook and Project Gutenberg at the bottom of this file. Included is
important information about your specific rights and restrictions in how
the file may be used. You can also find out about how to make a
donation to Project Gutenberg, and how to get involved.
**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts**
**eBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since
1971**
*****These eBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of
Volunteers!*****
Title: Authors of Greece
Author: T. W. Lumb
Release Date: May, 2005 [EBook #8115] [This file was first posted on
June 15, 2003]
Edition: 10
Language: English

Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, AUTHORS
OF GREECE ***

E-text prepared by Ted Garvin, Marc D'Hooghe, Charles Franks, and
the Online Distributed Proofreading Team

AUTHORS OF GREECE
By the Reverend T. W. LUMB, M.A.
With an Introduction by
The Reverend CYRIL ALINGTON, D.D.

AUTHOR'S PREFACE
Greek literature is more modern in its tone than Latin or Medieval or
Elizabethan. It is the expression of a society living in an environment
singularly like our own, mainly democratic, filled with a spirit of free
inquiry, troubled by obstinate feuds and still more obstinate problems.
Militarism, nationalism, socialism and communism were well known,
the preachers of some of these doctrines being loud, ignorant and
popular. The defence of a maritime empire against a military oligarchy
was twice attempted by the most quick-witted people in history, who
failed to save themselves on both occasions. Antecedently then we
might expect to find some lessons of value in the record of a people
whose experiences were like our own.
Further, human thought as expressed in literature is not an unconnected
series of phases; it is one and indivisible. Neglect of either ancient or
modern culture cannot but be a maiming of that great body of
knowledge to which every human being has free access. No man can be
anything but ridiculous who claims to judge European literature while
he knows nothing of the foundations on which it is built. Neither is it
true to say that the ancient world was different from ours. Human
nature at any rate was the same then as it is now, and human character
ought to be the primary object of study. The strange belief that we have
somehow changed for the better has been strong enough to survive the
most devilish war in history, but few hold it who are familiar with the

classics.
Yet in spite of its obvious value Greek literature has been damned and
banned in our enlightened age by some whose sole qualification for the
office of critic often turns out to be a mental darkness about it so deep
that, like that of Egypt, it can be felt. Only those who know Greek
literature have any right to talk about its powers of survival. The
following pages try to show that it is not dead yet, for it has a distinct
message to deliver. The skill with which these neglected liberators of
the human mind united depth of thought with perfection of form
entitles them at least to be heard with patience.

CONTENTS
AUTHOR'S PREFACE.
HOMER
AESCHYLUS
SOPHOCLES
EURIPIDES
ARISTOPHANES
HERODOTUS
THUCYDIDES
PLATO
DEMOSTHENES

INTRODUCTION
I count it an honour to have been asked to write a short introduction to
this book. My only claim to do so is a profound belief in the doctrine
which it advocates, that Greek literature can never die and that it has a
clear and obvious message for us to-day. Those who sat, as I did, on the
recent Committee appointed by Mr. Lloyd George when Prime
Minister to report on the position of the classics in this country, saw
good reason to hope that the prejudice against Greek to which the
author alludes in his preface was passing away: it is a strange piece of
irony that it should ever have been encouraged in the name of Science
which owes to the Greeks so incalculable a debt. We found that, though
there are many parts of the country in which it is almost impossible for
a boy, however great his literary promise, to be taught Greek, there is a

growing readiness to recognise this state of affairs as a scandal, and
wherever Greek was