Stages
I recently received this in an email. And I quote:
About the time our original 13 states adopted their new constitution, in 1787, Alexander Tyler, a Scottish history professor at the University of Edinburgh, had this to say about the fall of the Athenian Republic some 2,000 years prior:
A democracy is always temporary in nature; it simply cannot exist as a permanent form of government. A democracy will continue to exist up until the time that voters discover that they can vote themselves generous gifts from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates who promise the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that every democracy will finally collapse due to loose fiscal policy, which is always followed by a dictatorship."
The average age of the worlds greatest civilizations from the beginning of history, has been about 200 years. During those 200 years, these nations always progressed through the
following sequence:
1. From bondage to spiritual faith;
2. From spiritual faith to great courage
3. From courage to liberty
4. From liberty to abundance
5. From abundance to complacency
6. From complacency to apathy
7. From apathy to dependence
8. From dependence back into bondage
End of quote.
It appears that we are in stage 6. We don't care about anything. Actually, many of us do care about many things--important things, at that--but we are becoming a nation who would rather live a life in bondage than sacrifice for future generations. We (myself included) have become so complacent that we forget how our complacency was afforded. We have placed convenience over conscience. A long, easy life is valued more than a short, purpose-filled life. And I probably can't even fathom the sacrifice required from generations before me, from people from stages 1 and 2, to allow me to sit at this table in this coffeehouse and type this.
Proverbs 12:28--"In the way of righteousness there is life; along that path is immortality."
posted by Chris & Alicia @ 3:43 PM
3 comments
3 Comments:
HUH. Thanks! Wow! I'm sad now! I think it is more than just the characteristics of complacency though..... we might very well be EXTREMELY different people from our ancestors. And those stages might have more to do with it than one might think!
Yeah--we are extremely different. The question is 1) how we can we become like our ancestors (in certain respects) and 2) whether we have the courage to do so. I tend to think that we would rather sit back and blame our circumstances, as if we are altogether controlled by them, than make the sacrifices necessary to change. I think these sacrifices are greater than we imagine. I think the courage, as stated in stages 2 and 3, is indeed "great" courage.
The interesting thing about the recent financial crisis is not that be had a 700 billion dollar bail out but that the public cared enough to tell the Administration and Congress that we do not believe or trust them. Maybe we are turning the page in this democracy to a new stage. Most of Congress doesn't seem concerned that they are not trusted.
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