A SECOND DECLINE AND FALL

There is an old verse somewhere, "How are the mighty fallen!" which may well apply to the Classics. Four hundred years they held complete sway over literature and scholarship. Not to know Greek was to lack culture, not to read Latin was to be partially illiterate. Yet today it is a confession, calling for excuses and apologies, to admit concentration in the Classics. One feels almost ashamed to be seen leaving a Greek course, the old classical library has fallen into the hands of the Business School, and only one table has been saved from the ruin for those who read Horace in the original-and only one is required.

But the Classics have not yet fallen undefended. This change has come in spite of arguments and defenses prepared by learned men of every sort. Scott called success without classics climbing a wall when it was possible to present a ticket at the gate. The value of a classical education has been extolled in many books and supported by the statements of business men, lawyers and even engineers who strongly advise any man considering his profession to study the ancients. Everyone quotes the story of the man who had nothing to fall back upon after becoming rich, as the threatening damnation into which the "uneducated" man will surely fall.

But defense or none, the ancient masterpieces are dropping out of sight; and education is taking a sharp turn into the realms of the practical. No longer is there time for "those costly inutilities, that supreme intellectual indulgence." Today a knowledge of the English Language "as she is spoke" and some courses in Economics often suffice for a college degree. A man's education is not infrequently judged by his ability to answer questions from an encyclopedia. The change is welcomed by some, lamented by others; at any rate, it is here.

On closer consideration, moreover, it appears very natural. America today is an active country interested in business and dollars primarily and other things in proportion. Its citizens are for the most part people who "work like horses, eat like hogs, and sleep like dogs" - a hard life in many ways, and a productive life; but not one which develops writers like Do Quincy or Poe, or readers who can appreciate the genius of another civilization portrayed in a foreign tongue. It matters not that the languages were once alive and expressed the thoughts and deeds of great nations, there is not time to read them. We have English to express our own ideas; what need of bothering with Rome or Athens and their streets?

To defend Homer, however, is as absurd today as it would be for modern theologians to argue on the number of angels who can dance on the point of a needle. It is no longer a matter of defense or attack, it is a matter of choice. There are always some who are interested enough to prefer Horace to bridge or Sophocles to A. H. Woods, to whom Athens is as real as Broadway. Literature is safe in their hands. Meanwhile the rest of us rush on regardless of the delights they offer us, to look for happiness in State Street or Back Bay. The only sad part is that fewer and fewer give heed to their voices. We may be missing something but there is no time to stop and see.