Are We a Declining Race ? 



European Morals," W. E. H. Lecky, M.A., Vol. I., 



p. 168). 



It is not at all wonderful that under such 

 conditions the Romans should have degenerated. 

 Yet the effects of indulgence in these vices are so 

 subtle, that irreparable harm is done before it 

 becomes known. Gibbon says : " It was scarcely 

 possible that the eyes of contemporaries should 

 discover in the public felicity the latent causes 

 of decay and corruption. The long peace, and 

 the uniform government of the Romans, intro- 

 duced a slow and secret poison into the vitals of 

 the empire." (" Decline and Fall of the Roman 

 Empire," Chap. II.) 



Socrates spoke in a similar manner of the 

 Athenians. In a conversation with Pericles, 

 according to Xenophon, he said that too great 

 security was attended with carelessness, luxury, 

 and disobedience : " After the Athenians saw 

 themselves raised above the other Greeks they 

 indulged themselves in indolence and became at 

 length degenerate." 



Whatever were the vices of the barbarian 

 races of Europe, licentiousness does not appear 

 to have been very conspicuous at that time, for 

 they were all chaste as compared with the 

 Romans, and it was the constant influx of new 

 blood which kept the Romans from total collapse. 

 " The diminutive stature of mankind was daily 

 sinking below the old standard, and the Roman 

 world was indeed peopled by a race of pigmies, 

 when the fierce giants of the North l^roke in, and 

 mended the puny breed." (Gibbon.) 



Amid the degradation of Rome, we meet with 



L2 111 



