680 THE IMPENDING REVOLUTION. 



and one mighty cry of anguish and suffering floated out 

 upon the air, and God blew His breath upon Persia and 

 she died. Alexander, the mad boy of Macedon, charged 

 across the Granicus, and the brazen empire sprang into life 

 at a single bound. 



Civilization started westward, and Greece became the 

 wonder and admiration of the world. Glorious Greece ! 

 The land of beauteous isles, of classic lore and epic song ! 

 u Where burning Sappho loved and sang." Great in 

 architecture. In literary attainments and military achieve- 

 ments unexcelled. 



But she, too, forgot the toiling masses who contributed 

 to her greatness. The love of labor, which at first 

 eradicated vice, was turned to hatred and vice by the 

 absolute robbery of labor. Usury and extortion were 

 fastened upon the people. The bread winners sank 

 beneath a burden of woe till their tears baptized the land, 

 and the cry of the poor filled the air. Then God blew his 

 breath against Greece and she died. Four per cent, of the 

 people owned all the land, and ninety-six owned none, 

 and were serfs, tenants and slaves. 



Then came Rome, the mightiest effort of man. Fed 

 upon the ferocity of the wolf and guided by the genius and 

 intellect of man, she became the grandest empire of the 

 world. She gave to mankind a code of laws that has been 

 the wonder and admiration of the nations of the earth. 

 She spread civilization westward, whence its march ever 

 since. Superior in intellect, victorious in war, and rich in 

 inexhaustible resources, she became the mightiest empire 

 on earth. Rome in her highest glory was simple in habit, 

 and generous in her laws. Equality of fortune and generous 

 distribution of land was the law of common consent and the 

 legal enactment of the state also. "Citizen" was the 

 highest type of nobility. At one time, under this gen- 

 erous system of laws, eighty-five per cent, of her people 



