The Classical Teacher Parent Edition - Late Summer 2019

Saving Western civilization one student at a time.

Late Summer 2019 HILAIRE BELLOC and the Humanizing Power of History

by Joseph Pearce The Only Great King

by J. Shane Saxon

G. K. CHESTERTON and the Historical Defense of Christianity

by Martin Cothran

LETTER FROM THE EDITOR

Should Schools Teach History?

by Martin Cothran

M

y wife and I recently visited my son and daughter-i n-law in Philadelphia. My wife had been to Philadelphia when she was in school, but I had never been there. Among other things, we saw the Liberty Bell and Congress Hall, which served as the seat of government for the first years of our republic.

The thing I noticed most about this little tour was how ma ny people f rom ot her countries were there to visit these places. In fact, we seemed to be among the few Americans in any of the places we visited.

Most spoke in a foreign tongue, and even though it was midOc tober we saw no sc ho ol groups at all.

It occurred to me all of a sudden that people from other countries may be more interested in our nation's history than we are.

It brought to mind news stories I had read only a month or two before about Colonial Williamsburg having to drastically cut its budget and lay off a number of its staff. Mitchell B. Riess, president and CEO of the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation, revealed that the historical site attracts only half the number of people it attracted thirty years ago.

He attributed part of the cuts to business decisions made in previous years, as well as "changing tastes." But he also mentioned a frightening fact: "[L]ess American history is being taught in schools."

Our Philadelphia experience also made me think of the Sergeant York Home in northern Tennessee, a tourist destination that honors the greatest American war hero of World War I. When we drove by it twenty years ago it appeared to be a popular tourist destination. But when we drove by it recently the gift shop was closed, and though the grounds were open they were in a sad state of disrepair.

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Letter from the Editor

Our little vacation brought to mind all of the historical places my parents took us when we grew up: the Smithsonian Institution, the Lincoln Memorial, the White House, and the California Missions. My family enjoyed them because we had been taught about them in school and consequently they were objects of wonder to us.

Karol Markowicz wrote a frightening article in the New York Post a couple years ago.

She wrote that, according to the 2014 report by the National Assessment of Educational Progress, "an abysmal eighteen percent of American high school kids were proficient in U.S. history." And further, she said, "a 2012 story in Perspectives on History magazine … found that eighty-eight percent of elementary school teachers considered teaching history a low priority."

I recently searched "teaching of history in schools" online. Many of the hits were links to articles with titles like, "Why We Should Teach History in Schools."

Is this really an issue? Is the teaching of history in schools really open to question?

That we should teach history—our own as well as the history of the Western world that formed us—to our children should not be controversial.

I had a sort of vision during my Philadelphia visit—a vision of a future society poking around blindly in the ruins of a once-great civilization, wondering what it was that made it great and why it was worth remembering.

That is a chilling vision, but one that reminded me of the importance of what we do here at Memoria Press, where history is still important.

MemoriaPress.com

Late Summer 2019

FEATURED ARTICLES Letter from the Editor by Martin Cothran............................................................2 How Latin Builds Vocabulary by Bonnie Graham ...............................................4 Why Logic? by Martin Cothran ...........................................................................6 G. K. Chesterton and the Historical Defense of Christianity by Martin Cothran .......8 Hilaire Belloc and the Humanizing Power of History by Joseph Pearce ..........10 The Liberating Arts by Cheryl Swope ...............................................................14 Dulce Domum: The Longing for Home in Literature by Renee Mathis ...........16 Frederick the Great, Catherine the Great, & the Arts by Dr. Carol Reynolds ......18 The Only Great King by J. Shane Saxon ..........................................................20

Š Copyright 2019 (all rights reserved) Publisher | Memoria Press Editor | Martin Cothran Assistant Editor | Dayna Grant

Managing Editor | Tanya Charlton Copy Editor | Ellen R. Hale Graphic Designers | Aileen Delgado & Jessica Osborne

MEMORIA PRESS MemoriaPress.com

ONLINE ACADEMY MemoriaPressAcademy.com

LATIN

HOW LATIN BUILDS VOCABULARY

by Bonnie Graham

F

or many who study Latin, the ultimate goal is to read the classic literature of Rome—one of the foundational elements of Western civilization— in the original language. But, while on the path to reading Caesar, Cicero, Vergil, et al., the study of Latin subtly but surely enhances the way students express themselves in English, and, most noticeably, expands their English vocabulary.

DERIVATIVES No other foreign language equals Latin in helping a student develop a rich English vocabulary. It has been estimated that fifty percent of English words are derived from Latin, with that share exceeding sixty percent for more difficult, polysyllabic words.

Certainly we see these derivatives from Latin all throughout our language. Indeed, English is so indebted to Latin that classical scholar Berthold Ullman remarked a century ago that our language would more properly be named "Latin-English."

Studying Latin is an introduction to etymology— how words are formed and how original meanings are extended. Knowing the original Latin meanings of English derivatives allows students to use these Bonnie Graham is currently writing a Memoria Press study guide for Henle Second Year Latin. A homeschooling mother for 13 years and a Latin tutor, she is fascinated by Caesar's De Bello Gallico, the writings of Caesar scholar T. Rice Holmes, and the Latin language.

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words effectively, and thus to elevate their daily speech and writing. Latin builds familiarity with how English words are formed from prefixes, base words, and suffixes. When students can see how a word was born—its components and its original meaning—they understand it more profoundly. Latin stirs a perpetual curiosity about words and teaches students how to analyze words and make them their own.

Part of Latin study is understanding how compound verbs are created from simple verbs by adding prefixes. By knowing the meanings of the prefixes, which are generally from Latin prepositions, students understand a host of new verbs. Consider this Latin verb and its principal parts: jacio, jacere, jeci, jactus (to throw, hurl, cast).

Just a few of its many compounds are conjicio, dejicio, ejicio, objicio, and projicio. Even before consulting a dictionary to confirm their ideas, students can figure out rough literal meanings for the English derivatives conjecture (throwing [ideas] together), dejected (cast down), ejected (thrown out), objection (something cast against), and projectile (something hurled forth).

As noted already, polysyllabic English words are particularly apt to have Latin roots. Students enjoy breaking these down, as the literal meanings are often surprisingly vivid. Annihilate, from ad and nihil, is "make to nothing." Desperate, from de and spero, MemoriaPress.com

is "away from hope." Exaggerate, from ex and agger, is literally "build up a great heap," i.e., to overstate.

Magnanimous, from magnus and animus, means "great-souled." Compassion, from cum and patior, means "a suffering with"—for to have compassion for someone is to suffer with them.

MEANING ACCORDING TO CONTEXT Latin study advances one's skill in using context to discern the nuances of a word's meaning. For example, Latin students often encounter the multipurpose noun res (thing) and must determine its specific meaning in each instance. To do so, they must consider the context and mentally sift through options like "matter," "affair," "fact," "event," "case," "action," "news," "operation," "circumstances," and "development." Similarly, for the adjective magnus, the meaning "great" is often suitable, but for variety and precision the student may choose a different English word to suit the context, e.g., "important," "momentous," "loud," "heavy," "distinguished," "utter," "vast," "extensive," or "lofty." This kind of analysis enhances the student's facility with words and builds vocabulary.

For another example, the participle dejectus, from the verb dejicio, in one passage may refer to a cavalryman "thrown down" from his horse, but in another passage may mean more figuratively, "dejected, downcast, disappointed." The skill of using context to assess a word's meaning transfers easily to English.

SHAKESPEARE & LATINISMS A familiarity with Latin aids the reader of classic English literature. The writings of Shakespeare, Jane Austen, and John Milton, to name a few, are replete with words of Latin origin. Shakespeare, for example, uses many Latinisms, words that vividly suggest the original Latin meaning. These words are not now readily found in a dictionary, but a student who is at the level of beginning to read Caesar is able to make an educated guess at the meaning of these Latinate words. A few examples illustrate this: • When King Lear speaks of "cadent tears," this evokes the word cadens, the present participle of cado (to fall). The student concludes that this means "falling tears."

• When Iago tells Othello, "riches fineless is as poor as winter/to him that ever fears he shall be poor," the Latin fines (borders, limits) readily suggests that this means "riches without limits."

• Hamlet's statement to Horatio, "what to this was sequent, thou know'st already," suggests the Latin present participle sequens (following).

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• In Henry VI, Part 3, York's words, "as the south to the septentrion," call to mind Caesar's evocative description of one frontier of Gaul as facing ad Septentriones, toward the seven stars near the North Pole, i.e., "to the north."

• In Richard III, when a weeping Queen Elizabeth says, "All springs reduce their currents to mine eyes," the verb is used in the sense of the Latin reduco (lead back).

The Latinate names that Shakespeare invented for some of his characters are hidden gems that students take pleasure in discovering. The name of the ill-natured Malvolio, in Twelfth Night, comes from Latin words for "ill-wishing." In The Winter's Tale, the king's daughter— unaware of her true heritage and living far away from home as a shepherdess—is aptly named Perdita, the feminine form of an adjective meaning "utterly lost." And one of Shakespeare's loveliest heroines, Miranda of The Tempest, fittingly bears a name that means "she who is to be marvelled at, she who is to be admired."

Shakespeare's Latinate words make for a sublime richness of meaning. As students recognize them and countless derivatives all throughout English, they wake to see Latin everywhere. Being able to see that Latin is ubiquitous is a delightful, enriching legacy of Latin study.

LATIN & SAT SCORES On a very pragmatic note, those who study Latin (in comparison to other languages) consistently receive higher scores on the SAT in reading, writing, and in overall score.

Though high test scores are not the primary purpose or focus of Latin study, they are a welcome benefit! In the chart below, you can see the mean scores of high school graduates from 2016, grouped by the foreign language subject test they took on the SAT. Latin students scored highest overall, and these scores have been consistent for several years.

Total

Critical Reading

Writing

(plus Math, out of 2400)

Latin

685

682

2050

German

645

651

1957

French

643

650

1944

Spanish

588

595

1779

Source: 2016 College-Bound Seniors. Copyright © 2016. The College Board. www.collegeboard.org

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LOGIC

WHY LOGIC?

by Martin Cothran

W

hen you begin to study a subject, it is always helpful to know two things: first, what it is you intend to study and, second, why it is important to study it. When it comes to the study of logic, you must have some idea what logic is, and what a study of logic consists of. If you don't understand what it is, you will not understand why it is important to study. I think we can all agree that it is important to understand the truth of things, but many people—even many classical educators—do not realize that logic is an instrument of truth, and thus they do not understand the importance of studying logic.

Another part of the problem stems from a widespread misunderstanding of logic by educators themselves. Unfortunately, this is equally true of Christian educators―even those involved in the classical education movement. There are at least three respects in which logic is misunderstood by educators. The first has to do with the place of logic in the classical curriculum, the second has to do with the nature of logic itself, and the third concerns the difference between logic and other things that many times fall under that title.

Martin Cothran is the editor of The Classical Teacher and author of Traditional Logic Books I & II, Material Logic, and Classical Rhetoric.

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Why Logic?

THE PLACE OF LOGIC IN THE CLASSICAL CURRICULUM Several years ago I read an article on classical education in a popular magazine. The article was written by one of the leaders of the classical Christian education movement. The author stated that, in following the classical trivium, students should study modern logic. I confess to being completely baffled by this statement. Of all the things a student should do in pursuing the classical trivium, one of the last would be to study modern logic. The problem is not that modern logic is not useful, or even that it isn't worth pursuing. The problem with modern logic is simply that it has little to do with the trivium.

The trivium is language study. Grammar, the first of the three components of the trivium, is the study of the structure of language and how language is expressed in writing and speech.

Rhetoric, the last part of the trivium, is the study of the rules of persuasion, as well as their written and spoken use. Logic fits in between these two, and is the study of the structure of thought and how thought is expressed in words.

Modern logic, on the other hand, is largely mathematical. A course in modern logic (and I have MemoriaPress.com

taught it) would begin with the study of arguments as they are used in everyday language, but quickly descend into the study of how to manipulate variable symbols. However, since words are not variable symbols like those studied in modern logic (which can stand for anything), but rather signs that each have a particular signification, modern logic has limited use when it comes to the study of language. It is simply not the kind of logic used in linguistic reasoning.

Traditional logic is studied because traditional logic is an intrinsic part of language study.

mistakes in the material or content of reasoning and from certain psychological mistakes.

If we were to draw an analogy with a cooking recipe, we would say that several things could go wrong: First, we could make mistakes in the procedural aspect of cooking—mixing the ingredients improperly, or cooking them too long, etc. This is a formal mistake, like putting one of our terms in the wrong place in a statement or putting our statement in the wrong place in our argument.

Or we could have the wrong ingredient, or one that has gone bad. This is an informal material mistake, like including a false premise in our argument.

WHAT DOES LOGIC CONSIST OF? Or we could have our attention diverted from the The older system of traditional logic process entirely, by getting a phone call in the recog n ized t wo bra nc hes of log ic: middle of cooking, or having to deal with formal logic (like that covered in our a child who skinned his knee. This Traditional Logic program), and is an informal psychological mistake, If we could informal or material logic (like like having our attention diverted t hat covered i n our Material from proper reasoning by the better understand Logic program). latest survey, or news story, or logic, we would Formal logic focuses on the emotional appeal. procedural aspect of reasoning, Formal fallacies are covered in know why it it s m e c h a n ic s—h ow we a formal logic program. Informal is so important properly get from two premises material fallacies are largely or assumptions to a conclusion. covered in material logic. Informal to study.

Mater ia l log ic foc us es on t he psychological fallacies largely fall into philosophical or metaphysical aspects the domain of rhetoric. of words, statements, and arguments that can affect our ability to arrive at truth.

LOGIC VS. CRITICAL Even many classical educators are simply

THINKING SKILLS not aware that there is any other aspect to logic While many people use the word "logic" in a than the formal aspect. One of the reasons for too‑restricted sense in referring only to formal this lack of awareness is that modern logic, which logic, many others associate it with any kind of largely displaced traditional logic in colleges abstract thinking. This also is a mistake, although and universities in the twentieth century, only a mistake in the opposite direction. The origin of recognizes the formal aspect of logic, since it is this error lies in the contemporary emphasis on based on anti-metaphysical assumptions that "critical thinking skills." Although all logic is a part conflict with the traditional metaphysics treated in of critical thinking skills, all critical thinking skills material logic. are not a part of logic. The various discrete thinking The traditional system of logic recognizes that processes studied in such "critical thinking skills" logic is larger than just form, or structure, and programs commonly cover spatial and figural skills that the content can and does affect the process of and mathematical reasoning, as well as reading, reasoning from premises to conclusion. writing, and vocabulary skills. Once again, these But if this is all true, then what do we do with skills are not without value, but it would be a fallacies, the teaching of which has become so mistake to confuse them with logic itself. One common in classical education circles? We need striking fact about such programs is that they seem to recognize, first, that there are both formal and comprehensive but include almost nothing that is informal fallacies. Formal fallacies are those that covered in traditional discussions of either formal result from the violation of the formal rules of or material logic. reasoning, those studied in formal logic. These These are the three major misunderstandings in the are covered in a formal logic course. But informal thinking about logic. If we could better understand fallacies are mistakes in reasoning that result from logic, we would know why it is so important to study.

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Why Logic?

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O

G. K. CHESTERTON AND THE HISTORICAL DEFENSE OF CHRISTIANITY

ne of the hallmarks of civilization is the prevalence of civil disagreement. This tendency certainly characterized England in the early twentieth century. It was a time marked partly by the debates that took place between the great men of thought and letters before an intelligent public. It was a time before Facebook and Twitter, before the internet, when essays and books were the ground upon which intellectual duels were fought.

Among these great intellectual contests were the historical debates between Catholic historian and essayist Hilaire Belloc and science writer H. G. Wells, between Belloc and historian G. G. Coulton, between G. K. Chesterton and the great playwright George Bernard Shaw, as well as Chesterton and Wells, and Chesterton and Coulton. Blood was occasionally drawn (when Belloc was through with his enemies, they at least knew they had been in a fight, and sometimes wore the mental marks of it), but they were never fights to the death.

Particularly in Chesterton's case, his enemies liked him as much as his friends.

In one such battle, Chesterton was pitted against the newspaper editor Robert Blatchford. Blatchford was the editor of the British newspaper The Clarion, and had written a book called God and My Neighbour, a book arguing for atheism and against Christianity which enjoyed a brief popularity among its British audience.

Blatchford challenged the readers of his newspaper to respond to his arguments, the responses to which he promised to run in the daily editions of The Clarion.

The challenge was joined by a number of prominent writers and thinkers. Chesterton was—and wasn't— one of them. He was a writer and thinker, and he did respond, but, being only a twenty-nine year old relatively unknown journalist at the time, with one book and a handful of articles to his name, he could not have boasted much in the way of prominence.

But whatever obscurity in which Chesterton might at that point in time have languished was dispelled by the time the debate was over.

The controversy spilled out of the pages of The Clarion and into other periodicals of the time, and Chesterton's four essays were later published in a small booklet titled The Religious Doubts of Democracy. They remain among the most stirring of his many defenses of Christianity.

Martin Cothran is the editor of The Classical Teacher and author of Traditional Logic Books I & II, Material Logic, and Classical Rhetoric.

BY MARTIN COTHRAN

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G. K. Chesterton and the Historical Defense of Christianity

(Sistine Chapel Ceiling - Libyan Sibyl & Isaiah Photograph by Jörg Bittner Unna, CC-BY-3.0 License)

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In one of these exchanges, Chesterton prosecuted a line of argument that became a theme in much of his later writing: the idea that the similarity of the Christian story to that of many pagan myths was not evidence that Christianity was a myth, but rather another proof of its truth.

Blatchford had claimed that the many similarities between various elements of pagan mythologies and Christianity—virgin births, resurrections, etc.—were proof that Christianity was just another warmedover myth. "Mr. Blatchford and his school," said Chesterton, "point out that there are many myths parallel to the Christian story; that there were Pagan Christs, and Red Indian Incarnations, and Patagonian Crucifixions, for all I know or care."

But to Chesterton, the conclusion these facts supported was precisely the opposite of that to which Blatchford had arrived: They were not evidence against the historicity of the Gospels, but evidence for it.

"If I gave each of my reasons for being a Christian, a vast number of them would be Mr. Blatchford's reasons for not being one." Blatchford, in fact, was blind to the implications of his own evidence, mistaking something that confirmed Christianity for something that contradicted it.

a woman. But will it seriously be maintained that, because these two stories are common as legends, therefore no two friends were ever separated by love or no two lovers by circumstances? It is tolerably plain, surely, that these two stories are common because the situation is an intensely probable and human one, because our nature is so built as to make them almost inevitable.

In fact, so powerful is this implication that later thinkers like C. S. Lewis and J. R. R. Tolkien—both of whom were greatly influenced by Chesterton—would take it up in their own thought and writing. Tolkien would later argue in his great essay on fairy tales that the Christian story was the Great Fairy Tale, the Story of Stories, the myth that transcended all other myths by actually happening in history. In this occurrence, said Tolkien, "history and legend have met­—and fused."

Lewis' own Christian conversion was facilitated by his acceptance of Tolkien's account, articulated to him

by Tolkien himself during their walks together along the River Cherwell at Cambridge. In many ways a rationalist, Lewis came to the faith, not primarily through reason, but through a myth—one which also happened to be true.

The Blatchfordian position really amounts to this— that because a certain thing has impressed millions of different people as likely or necessary, therefore it cannot be true …. [Blatchford] points to humanity crying out for a thing, and pointing to it from immemorial ages, as proof that it cannot be there.

Of course there are elements in Christianity that are found in pagan mythology. But, if Christianity is really true, then isn't that exactly what we should expect?

Thus, in this first instance, when learned sceptics come to me and say, "Are you aware that the Kaffirs have a sort of Incarnation?" I should reply: "Speaking as an unlearned person, I don't know. But speaking as a Christian, I should be very much astonished if they hadn't."

In other words, if Christianity were, in fact, true, would we not expect to see foreshadowings of it?

If there was a creature destined to find his ultimate satisfaction in the story of One, born of a virgin, Who would come back from the dead, would we not expect that that creature would yearn for the thing for which he was built—for redemption and fulfillment—and shape this longing into story?

If so, then what sense does it make to use these stories as evidence against the truth of such events?

The story of a Christ is very common in legend and literature. So is the story of two lovers parted

by Fate. So is the story of two friends killing each other for

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HILAIRE BELLOC

by Joseph Pearce

and the Humanizing Power of History 10

Heading Goes Here

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History … should above all explain: it should give “the how and the why.” It is the business of history to make people understand how they came to be; what was the origin and progress of the state of which they form a part; what were the causes which influenced each phase of change from the beginning almost to our own time.

- Hilaire Belloc1

T

he truth will set us free. So says Christ. Yet if this is so, which of course it is, it follows that falsehood will enslave us. Falsehood in history prevents us from understanding our past and, in consequence, our present.

Properly understood, history is a chronological map that shows us not only where we have come from, but also where we are, and how we got here. It is also possible to project where we are likely to be going in the future by drawing the line of knowledge on the chronological map from where we have come from to where we are now, and extending the line into the realm of future possibilities. In this sense history can also be a prophet. This, however, is only true if the chronological map is accurate. If it has been drawn by those with prejudiced perceptions or a prejudiced agenda it will only succeed in getting us lost. There are few things more dangerous than an inaccurate map, especially if we find ourselves in perilous terrain.

Perhaps at this juncture we need to proceed from Christ to Pilate, to pass from Christ's assertion that the truth will set us free to Pilate's question: What is truth?

In the context of the study of history, the truth requires the knowledge of three distinct facets of historical reality, namely historical chronology, historical mechanics, and historical philosophy; i.e., when things happened, how things happened, and why things happened. The last of these, though it is dependent factually on the other two, is the most important. If we don't know why things happened history remains devoid of meaning; it makes no sense. As such, historians must have knowledge of the history of belief. They must know what people believed when they did the things that they did in order to know why they acted as they did. They must have empathy with the great ideas that shaped human history, even if they don't have sympathy with them. This whole issue was addressed with great lucidity by Hilaire Belloc, perhaps the most important historian of the twentieth century (with the possible exception of Christopher Dawson): The worst fault in [writing] history … is the fault of not knowing what the spiritual state of those whom one Joseph Pearce is the series editor of the Ignatius Critical Editions, the Tolkien and Lewis Chair in Literary Studies at Holy Apostles College and Seminary, and the author of several biographies of Christian literary figures.

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describes really was. Gibbon and his master Voltaire, the very best of reading, are for that reason bad writers of history. To pass through the tremendous history of the Trinitarian dispute from which our civilization arose and to treat it as a farce is not history. To write the story of the sixteenth century in England and to make of either the Protestant or the Catholic a grotesque is to miss history altogether.²

Clearly frustrated at this supercilious approach toward the past that blinded many historians, Belloc offers a practical example of its effects upon scholarship: There is an enormous book called Volume 1 of a Cambridge History of the Middle Ages. It is 759 pages in length of close print …. It does not mention the Mass once. That is as though you were to write a history of the Jewish dispersion without mentioning the synagogue or of the British Empire without mentioning the City of London or the Navy ….³

In order to avoid the chronological snobbery that presumes the superiority of the present over the past and which causes this lack of proportion and focus, historians must see history through the eyes of the past, not the present. They must put themselves into the minds and hearts of the protagonists they are studying; to do this adequately they must have knowledge of philosophy and theology in order to understand their own academic discipline and in order to remain disciplined in their study of it. An ignorance of philosophy and theology means an ignorance of history.

Hilaire Belloc's principal legacy as a historian falls into three areas. First, is his seminal struggle with H. G. Wells over the "outline of history"; second, his groundbreaking approach to the history of the Reformation; and finally his telescopic and panoramic study of the great ideas that have shaped history. In addition, as a man of omnivorous taste and multifarious talent, he also wrote on French and European history, military history, economic history, and English history.

Since such a panoramic scope is too broad to be covered adequately in a solitary essay, we'll be focusing on Belloc's famous, or notorious, battle with H. G. Wells.

Belloc's war of words with H. G. Wells over the latter's publication of The Outline of History was one of the most controversial and notorious academic battles of the twentieth century. Belloc objected to his 11

adversary's tacitly anti-Christian stance, epitomized by the fact that Wells had devoted more space in his History to the Persian campaign against the Greeks than he had given to the figure of Christ, but it was the underlying philosophy of materialistic determinism in Wells' History which was most anathema to him.

Wells believed that human "progress" was both blind and beneficial; unshakeable, unstoppable, and utterly inexorable. He believed that history was the product of invisible and immutable evolutionary forces that were coming to fruition in the twentieth century. Human history had its primitive beginnings in the caves,⁴ he said, but was now reaching its climax in the modern age with the final triumph of science over religion. The emergence of science from the ashes of "superstition" heralded a new dawn for humanity, a brave new world of happiness made possible by technology. Obviously, such an approach precluded any serious or objective consideration of the great ideas that had forged human history, since, in Wells' view, these ideas were shaped by the superstition and ignorance that had been superseded by humanity's "progress" towards modernity.

Wells' Outline had been, to Belloc, like a red rag to a bull. It was, therefore, no great surprise that he charged.

Belloc accused Wells of prejudiced provincialism, claiming that "in history proper," Wells "was never taught to appreciate the part played by Latin and Greek culture, and never introduced to the history of the early Church."

Furthermore, he suffered "from the very grievous fault of being ignorant that he is ignorant. He has the strange cocksuredness of the man who only knows the old conventional text-book of his schooldays and mistakes it for universal knowledge."⁵ The controversy reached a conclusion and a climax in 1926, when Belloc's articles refuting Wells' history were collected into a single volume and published as A Companion to Mr. Wells's Outline of History. Wells responded with Mr. Belloc Objects, to which Belloc, determined to have the last word, replied with Mr. Belloc Still Objects.

The lasting legacy and lingering lesson of the war of words between Belloc and Wells is its exemplification of the fact that one's philosophical presuppositions will invariably color one's understanding of the "outline of history." Belloc understood the beliefs of the past and, as such, could discern why people acted as they did; he could see why things happened as well as when and how

The orgy of irresponsible innovations and inventions— which … now threatens to become a Gadarene stampede of headlong and irresistible impetus—was regarded as something beneficial and called "progress," which it certainly is, being downhill and completely without brakes: the most rapid and disastrous "progress" ever witnessed.⁶

Campbell's words had the benefit of hindsight, being written in 1949, a quarter of a century after the BellocWells controversy, and a few short years after the fruits of "progress" had led to the atrocities of Hitler and Stalin and the dropping of nuclear bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Belloc had foreseen that a credulously optimistic faith in "progress" could lead to "sheer darkness" and "strange things in the dark," whereas Wells believed that "darkness" was a thing to be found in the "dark ages" of the past and the future held the promise of "enlightened" scientific thinking. It would take the horrors of the Second World War to open his eyes to the evils that could be unleashed by science in the service of "progressive" ideologies. Shaken out of his "progressive" dementia, Wells' last book, written shortly before his death in 1946 and entitled, appropriately, The Mind at the End of Its Tether, was full of the desolation of disillusionment. In the end, Wells' "progressive" optimism, already defeated in debate by Belloc, was defeated in practice by reality itself.

In the wake of the controversy with Wells, Belloc became increasingly preoccupied with historical questions. "In history we must abandon the defensive," he had written in 1924, at the height of the war with Wells. "We must make our opponents understand not only that they are wrong in their philosophy, nor only ill-informed in their judgment of cause and effect, but out of touch with the past: which is ours."⁷ Hilaire Belloc shows us that a true vision of the past enables us to understand the present. It situates us; it orientates us. Today, more than ever, our culture needs to heed the humanizing power of history.

Hilaire Belloc, A Shorter History of England, London: George G. Harrap & Co., 1934, p. 7 Hilaire Belloc, A Conversation with an Angel and Other Essays, London: Jonathan Cape, 1928, pp. 166-7 Robert Speaight (ed.), Letters from Hilaire Belloc, London: Hollis & Carter, 1958, p. 75 The finest riposte to Wells’s discussion of man’s so-called primitive beginnings in the caves was given by G. K. Chesterton in The Everlasting Man which was Chesterton’s own inimitable response to Wells’s Outline of History.

5 Quoted in Michael Coren, The Invisible Man: The Life and Liberties of H. G. Wells, London: Jonathan Cape, 1993, p. 32 6 Roy Campbell, ‘Books in Britain’, Enquiry, London, Vol. 2, No. 3 (September 1949); quoted in Joseph Pearce, Bloomsbury and Beyond: The Friends and Enemies of Roy Campbell, London: HarperCollins, 2001, p. 292 7 Hilaire Belloc, Preface to Dom Hugh G. Bevenot, OSB, Pagan and Christian Rule, London: Longmans, Green & Co, 1924, p. ix 1 2 3 4

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they happened. Wells, on the other hand, regarded the beliefs of the past as superstitious and dismissed them.

His chronological snobbery prevented his analysis of history from rising above the when and how.

Belloc's war with Wells also represented an encapsulation and embodiment of the clash between "progress" and tradition, a clash which was summarized succinctly by the poet, Roy Campbell:

BOOK REVIEW

by Martin Cothran C. S. Lewis occupies a unique place in contemporary Christianity. It would be safe to say that no other Christian thinker commands the admiration and respect that Lewis still enjoys more than fifty years after his death. His popularity stems from two sources: The Chronicles of Narnia and his books of Christian apologetics.

T he mo st fa mou s of h i s work s of apologetics is certainly Mere Christianity, which was adapted from a series of his radio talks on theology, Christian ethics, and apologetics broadcast over the BBC between 1941 and 1944, when Britain was embroiled in WWII against Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy.

The appeal of the book lies in its employment of an almost casual common sense in dealing with ideas that would normally be found in complex theological tomes. Rather than try to communicate them in the turgid prose of university professors, Lewis makes the reader feel like he is listening to the meditations of an old friend before a warm fire.

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His personal style has often been contrasted with the more literary prose of G. K. Chesterton, a writer who was very influential on Lewis' thinking, but less so on his style. Richard Brookhiser said: "Chesterton addresses a classroom or a rally. Lewis addresses you. Chesterton charts the world. Lewis grasps your lapel."

Lewis believed that a large part of the problem with modern scholarship was that it was written for other scholars. This in turn resulted in overly technical, jargon-ridden academic prose that, far from assisting in the communication of complex thoughts, served rather to hide the lack of a clear understanding about what was being discussed.

In Mere Christianity you will find Lewis' moral argument for the existence of God, as well as a defense of Christian morality. His explanations of the doctrine of the Trinity and the dual nature of Christ could be among the best that have ever been written.

Mere Christianity is best read after reading Peter Kreeft's Fundamentals of the Faith, which covers many of the same topics, but in a more accessible fashion.

Book Review

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SIMPLY CLASSICAL

THE LIBERATING ARTS

by Cheryl Swope

S

ome parents and educators have the misconception that classical education is only for "smart kids." It is easy to understand why someone might think this way. Latin at age eight? Homer by fourteen? With such standards, one might reason, surely classical education is only for born geniuses—the brightest and best of our children. But what about those children who are not born geniuses? What about those who, far from being intellectually gifted, are living with cognitive challenges, language disorders, or physical disabilities? Does classical education have anything to offer them? Can classical education benefit any child?

No doubt Helen Keller's concerned parents asked the same question back in 1887.

Their young daughter was deaf, blind, and severely "behaviorally disordered."

Distraught and fearful for the little girl's future, as most parents would be, the Kellers hoped that Helen might somehow receive an education. In the late 1800s, this meant a classical education.

Helen Keller began her adapted classical education at the age of six with her private teacher, Annie Sullivan.

Although no one could predict the eventual outcome, the Keller family embarked on this ambitious, beautiful journey nonetheless. And the world received captivating evidence that classical education truly can benefit any child.

As soon as language unlocked Helen's young mind, Annie Sullivan taught Helen the same academic content other classically educated children learn, but through patient, untiring finger-spelling into Helen's hand. From ages eight to ten Helen studied geography and history. She read of Greek heroes and the classical ancient civilizations. She enjoyed beautiful language through good literature. She read poetic selections Cheryl Swope is the author of Simply Classical: A Beautiful Education for Any Child and Memoria Press' Simply Classical Curriculum, as well as editor of the Simply Classical Journal.

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The Liberating Arts

from the Old and New Testaments, Lambs' Tales from Shakespeare, Dickens' A Child's History of England, Little Women, Heidi, The Swiss Family Robinson, and countless other books which can still be found on the library shelves of any classical school today. Helen treasured her books: "I accepted them as we accept the sunshine and the love of our friends."

From the ages of eleven to thirteen, Helen learned Latin from a Latin scholar and French in raised print. She studied more advanced histories of Greece, Rome, and the United States, as Annie continued to spell lessons into her hand. By age sixteen, Helen read works in the original Latin and German, and at age twenty she enrolled at Radcliffe, where she read literature in French, studied world history, read poetry critically, and learned advanced English composition.

Looking back over her education, Helen wrote, "From 'Greek Heroes' to the Iliad [read in Greek] was no day's journey, nor was it altogether pleasant. One could have traveled round the world many times while I trudged my weary way through the labyrinthine mazes of grammars and dictionaries …." Helen received a remarkable classical education because her parents and her teachers bonded together to help her, and she persevered. Although her disabilities remained with her all her life, so did her love for literature: "When I read the finest passages of the Iliad, I am conscious of a soul-sense that lifts me above the narrow, cramping circumstances of my life. My physical limitations are forgotten—my world lies upward, the length and the breadth and the sweep of the heavens are mine!"

If classical education could give Helen Keller the tools to overcome great obstacles and embrace the "sweep of the heavens" so many years ago, why do less-severely MemoriaPress.com

challenged children with special needs fail to receive such a bountiful classical education today? The answer is simply historical timing. At the turn of the century, as special education grew in acceptance, classical education began to wane. In the 1930s, "the height of classical study in the United States in sheer numbers," nearly one million students studied Latin annually. By the 1970s, so-called progressivism and experimentalism had come to dominate education. About this same time, just as classical education had all but disappeared, the landmark special education legislation Public Law 94-142 passed in the United States. This law mandated public education for all handicapped children. Public, yes, but often much less effective and far less beautiful.

Today, much of "regular education" has strayed so far from the pursuit of that which is significantly true, good, and beautiful that many children with challenges and special needs who have been placed in remedial or even age-based classrooms receive little that is inspiring, excellent, or formative. In the past, even "basic" education meant purposeful instruction in the three arts of language: grammar, logic or dialectic, and rhetoric. A good liberal arts education also involved the four arts of mathematics: arithmetic (discrete number), geometry (continuous number and number in space), music (number in time), and astronomy (number in space and time). These seven liberal arts developed the mind and provided the student with essential tools for learning. Intrinsic to his education, the student also studied history, good literature, and art, all for the formation of a strong mind and noble character. Throughout the centuries, catechesis—teaching the Christian faith—has also been urged alongside the liberal arts, for matters of the soul.

In some special education teacher training programs, not only do progressivism and pragmatism reign, but fatalistic, dehumanizing behaviorism dominates. The child's mind and soul are forgotten.

The humanity of the child with special needs—the humanity of any child—must determine the education he receives. Some suggest that as many as one in four children have special educational needs. Each of these children is a human being, created in the image of God. Shall we assign all of these students to a menial, servile education and deny them the riches of a beautiful, humane, liberating education? And, worse, shall we base our deterministic placements on early testing, with no regard to what the child might be able to overcome with the aid of an excellent teacher?

Regardless of his challenges, any child is called to do more than receive services; he is called to love his neighbor. Even if he is never able to hold a full-time paying "job," classical education can help the child with special needs bring purpose, love, or comfort to those around him. He is a student with lessons to learn, teachers to respect, and parents to honor. Perhaps the child will eventually prove incapable of progressing to advanced levels in one area or in every area; however, if taught slowly, patiently, and systematically, even those children who are identified with or suspected of having "special learning needs" can receive a substantial, elevating, and beautiful education. Any child is a son or daughter, brother or sister, grandchild, or friend, with the high calling of gracious and tender service, as God works through the child for His loving purposes.

Classical education can address any child's challenges and cultivate in him a lifelong appreciation for lasting truth, beauty, and goodness. Be encouraged. Any child can receive these great benefits of classical education: greater self-knowledge, timeless tools for learning, a more disciplined mind, a love of study, and a dedicated life of service. Classical education is an excellent education and a beautiful gift to your child, so he can say with Helen Keller, "My world lies upward, the length and the breadth and the sweep of the heavens are mine!"

Simply Classical: A Beautiful Education for Any Child

REVISED EDITION

by Cheryl Swope | $24.95 Ready to be encouraged? We are now offering this second edition of Simply Classical: A Beautiful Education for Any Child with revised content, updated resources, and new information for classical schools and cottage schools.

You will find more tips for teaching all children classically, more stories of real children, and more inspiration for your own journey.

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LITER ATURE

Dulce Domum: The Longing for Home in Literature

by Renee Mathis

“If we find ourselves with a desire that nothing in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that we were made for another world.� - C. S. Lewis

S

weet Home. It's more than just a lovely sentiment cross-stitched on a pillow. You might say it's engraved, embedded, etched on our very souls. From the time we are little and draw a crayon square with a triangle on top to the day we leave home for college or set up our first apartment or purchase a house for the first time or bring that first baby home, we are ever consumed with a desire for a place of our own—indeed a place to make our own.

Renee Mathis and her husband, Steve, homeschooled their five children, two of whom are now married with children of their own.

Renee enjoys sharing her love of writing and literature with her students. This article was first published by the CiRCE Institute.

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Dulce Domum: The Longing for Home in Literature

This desire for a place to call home provides one of the strongest themes for authors, poets, and artists of all kinds to weave throughout their works. We may laugh at the sugary sentimentality of a glowing thatched cottage, covered in flowery vines and surrounded by a picket fence, but the desire for a place to call one's own is no laughing matter.

Homer knew this. Odysseus wants nothing more than to go home. He is tired and he is tried. He has been thwarted at every turn in his attempt to return to Ithaca, to the waiting arms of his dear Penelope and now-adult Telemachus. When he does reach Ithaca, he must free his home from the suitors who have invaded. As we read, we ache for this man who wants desperately to re-establish order in his home.

Virgil understood this desire as well. In fact, one popular children's version of The Aeneid is appropriately called In Search of a Homeland.

Pious Aeneas leads his Trojan refugees out of the fiery furnace of a fallen Troy into the unknown MemoriaPress.com

waters and lands of Italy. Despite his own series of misadventures along the way, he doggedly pursues his duty and his calling to found a new city. Citizens of Rome needed a history of their fatherland and Virgil provided it. Sometimes home is more than where you live; it is also where you came from.

In The Wind and the Willows, Kenneth Grahame ties these threads together, proving yet again that a good children's book is one that can be read by anyone. In a chapter entitled "Dulce Domum" he tells how Mole returns to his home after a frightening turn in the woods. Mole's home, with its forecourt and fountains, its stat uar y a nd fish pond, gives u s q u it e a n i n s ig ht i nt o h i s character. And who could forget the description of Badger's kitchen, where "heroes could fitly feast … and where weary harvesters" would feel right at home, where plates wink from shelves, and the "ruddy brick floor smiled up at the smoky ceiling"? The climax of the tale occurs in "The Return of Ulysses," when Badger, Mole, and Ratty come to the rescue of Toad, whose home has been invaded by those forest fiends, the stoats and weasels. The friends band together in a glorious reclamation of Toad Hall.

Charlotte Brontë imbues Jane Eyre with many examples of homes, both good and bad, and their various influences on the title character. Even the names of each home give us a clue as to their purpose and atmosphere. Who could forget the imposing Gateshead, home of the cruel cousins and wicked Aunt Reed? Lowood, the miserable (and miserably run) school for girls, emanates a miasma that eventually results in its closure. Thornfield Hall echoes the curse of Eden as it is surely no paradise for Jane. While she does make the acquaintance of a certain Mr. Rochester, her exile sends her to the unassuming Moor House, where she learns more of herself and her family's story. Finally, joyfully, Jane's fortunes take a turn for the better as she and Rochester move into Ferndean. In spite of her wanderings, we know Jane has at last found safety and security when she tells Rochester, "…wherever you are is my home,—my only home."

Mark Twain shows us how even the homeless can teach us a thing or two. Huckleberry Finn might very well be the definition of the "anti-hero," and

his various stops up and down the Mississippi River could be described as "anti-homes." The well-meaning Widow Douglas' home is too civilized, Pap's cabin is too dangerous, the Shepherdsons' home is too bulletriddled, and Aunt Sally's farm is too confining. We can empathize with Huck when he says that "you feel mighty free and easy on a raft," yet we know the raft can never be his permanent home. But where might that be? Huck is determined to find out as he "lights out for the territory." Will he ever find a home?

Perhaps that uncertainty is what keeps him forever young in the imaginations of readers everywhere.

Where does it come from, this longing for home? The answer is found in a story much older even than the epics of Homer. It's the Old, Old Story.

Creation set the stage for our first home, but the Fall resulted in a disordered home, and so we eagerly await our Redemption and the establishment of our new home: the new heaven and the new earth.

Until that day comes, may we all find rest and peace, along with Mole, "… in a place which was all his own, these things which were so glad to see him again and could always be counted on for the same simple welcome."

"Sweet Home" is more than just a lovely sentiment crossstitched on a pillow.

It is engraved, embedded, etched on our very souls.

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"This world is not my home I'm just a-passin' through My treasures are laid up somewhere beyond the blue; The angels beckon me from heaven's open door And I can't feel at home in this world anymore."

- Albert Brumley

Classical Literature

Literature Guides

Dulce Domum: The Longing for Home in Literature

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FINE ARTS

Frederick the Great, Catherine the Great, & the Arts

by Dr. Carol Reynolds

T

he appellation "the Great" tends to be awarded to prominent figures who exhibit an extraordinary degree of military prowess or achieve outstanding success in political or intellectual endeavors. Indeed, two legendary eighteenth-century monarchs, Frederick II of Prussia and Catherine II of Russia, earned this appellation precisely for such reasons.

But over time, the "greatness" of such achievements may be eclipsed by a different type of accomplishment.

In fact, the high reputations of both of these monarchs persist in large part because of their involvement with, and support of, the fine arts.

Frederick II (who reigned 1740-1786) inherited a burgeoning army forged by his iron-fisted, cruel father, Frederick I, who built a modern kingdom in what Dr. Carol Reynolds is a widely acclaimed author, speaker, and educator.

She regularly leads arts tours throughout Europe and the Mediterranean, recently in partnership with the Smithsonian Institution.

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Frederick the Great, Catherine the Great, & the Arts

was essentially a backwater eastern German territory.

Despite drastic attempts to escape his father's vision, the highly conflicted Frederick II continued his father's work, surpassing it militarily and diplomatically.

Catherine II (who reigned 1762-1796), a lowly German princess born Sophie Friederike Auguste von Anhalt-Zerbst-Dornburg, married as a sixteen-yearold into the tsarist Romanov dynasty in 1745. After overseeing the murder of her peculiar and incompetent husband Tsar Peter III in 1762, Catherine II positioned herself as the direct heir of Russia's most extreme innovator—Peter the Great. Across a reign of thirtyfour years (an accomplishment in a land where tsars fell regularly to coups or disease), she waged a series of Russian-Turkish wars (1768-1775) that made Russia the dominant power in southeastern Europe.

But Catherine II's most significant territorial achievement took place off the battlefield when MemoriaPress.com

she joined forces with Joseph II of Austria and her mentor and fellow "great" Frederick II, accomplishing by diplomacy what military force would have found difficult: namely, wiping the Kingdom of Poland off the map by imposing three drastic partitions across a span of twenty-three years.

Still, looking back at both of these rulers, we cherish a different aspect of their "greatness" today: the work they did to foster the growth of the arts.

Frederick II was one of his era's finest musicians, a virtuoso flute player and composer in a time when the sound of the flute characterized wide swaths of European popular music. He embraced a new, still-experimental keyboard instrument called the fortepiano, helping it spread throughout aristocratic and bourgeois circles and laying the groundwork for the great industry of German piano manufacturing in the nineteenth century, including the firms of Steinweg (Steinway), Beckstein, and Bösendorfer.

Frederick II also engaged a stable of leading musicians, including a hot-shot keyboardist and composer named Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, whose best-known credential still is his status as one of J. S. Bach's talented sons. In that era, though, C. P. E. Bach shone as a cutting-edge genius who lifted a stagnant Baroque style into what would ultimately become the musical language of the Romantic period.

Today, the name "Catherine the Great" evokes a monarch who boldly fostered Russia's renowned passion for the arts and laid the foundation for one of the world's greatest museums: The Hermitage. From 1764 on, she bought art extravagantly, beginning with a grand collection of Flemish and Dutch masters assembled by Frederick the Great himself. (Imagine a world where someone would decide to sell a treasuretrove of not-yet-priceless works by Rembrandt, Rubens, Raphael, van Dyck, Hals, Holbein, and Titian!)

Catherine's collection first occupied galleries built onto her luxurious Winter Palace—an endless, ornamented blue and white façade designed by the Italian Baroque master Francesco Rastrelli along the banks of St. Petersburg's Neva River. She called this new wing her hermitage (or "retreat"). Quickly her collection overflowed into nearly every available corridor of the palace.

Ultimately, Catherine amassed more than four thousand paintings and forty thousand books, plus tens of thousands of drawings, engravings, medals, coins, and precious items concerning natural history.

She sent art scouts across the world and made bold acquisitions such as sculptures and artifacts from the ancient world that most collectors would not discover or desire until decades later.

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Catherine's tastes in literature were also refined.

She authored historical dramas, and cultivated literary relationships with the principal figures of the French Enlightenment, particularly Voltaire and Diderot, whose good opinion she courted. In music, she supported what was expected of a monarch of her standing, namely a fine ensemble of singers for the Orthodox liturgies held in her Royal Chapel.

She employed the best Italian Catholic composers to move to Russia and write Orthodox choral music and trendy Italian operas.

Today, Frederick's reputation as patron of music stands off to the side. Instead, the word most often associated with him—"Prussian"—evokes lines of precision marching performed by an army equipped and ready to invade. Yet his greatest contribution to history lies in his musical vision.

Without it, nineteenth-century musical life across Germany would have developed quite differently.

More specifically, a flourishing Berlin artistic culture still attests to his influence, despite the devastation of two world wars and the forty-year isolation of East Berlin behind the Iron Curtain. In fact, since the fall of the Berlin Wall, the very places where Frederick the Great displayed his virtuosity overflow with visitors, starting with Sanssouci, his Rococo palace devoted to music in Potsdam.

Catherine the Great's legacy lives on in the continuous expansion of her collections. The Hermitage draws more than seven million visitors a year. It fills massive complexes of galleries, including the renovated General Staff Building of the Admiralty, replete with its golden, curved façade designed in 1829 by Neoclassical architect Carlo Rossi. Here, newly installed, hangs a priceless collection of French Impressionist paintings acquired by later Romanov tsars who carried forth the spirit of Catherine II's artistic boldness.

What conclusions can be drawn from these two vignettes of "great" monarchs? The first lesson lies in history: Artistic legacies created by such rulers may resound longer and stronger than the din of victorious battles that easily become reversed in the course of history. A brilliant artistic environment attests to dynastic or institutional power in much the same way as a strong military.

A more important lesson resonates in culture.

The tsars and kings have danced, sung, played, sketched, and valued the arts for solid and serious reasons. The "greats" recognized the power of the arts as a centripetal force that binds together history, language, literature, and the sciences. It is a lesson that should inform our educational policies and goals today.

Frederick the Great, Catherine the Great, & the Arts

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the history of the British people there has only ever been one monarch called great. Alfred the Great reigned in Wessex from 871-899 A.D., but unlike other "great" rulers, like Alexander, Alfred is not known for how much territory he conquered.

In fact, G. K. Chesterton immortalized Alfred's reluctance to conquer more land in what many consider to be the last great epic poem, The Ballad of the White Horse, when Alfred says, Asia and all imperial plains Are too little for a fool; But for one man whose eyes can see The little island of Athelney Is too large a land to rule.

Alfred's humility is inspiring, but it leaves his admirers asking what characteristics made Alfred great. While historians still debate why Alfred was great, the answer is revealed in his character and by the context of his life.

About the year 793, the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle reads: "Here were dreadful forewarnings come over the land of Northumbria, and woefully terrified the people: these were amazing sheets of lightning and whirlwinds, and fiery dragons were seen flying in the sky."

These omens portended the invasion of the dreaded Danes. The Chronicle continues: "Shortly after in the same year, on the sixth day before the ides of January, the woeful inroads of heathen men destroyed gods church in Lindisfarne island by fierce robbery and slaughter." The AngloSaxon Chronicle's description of the Danish invasion reads like a passage from the apocalypse of Revelation. It says the Danes appear piloting fiery dragons through the stormy sky and in the wake of a deadly famine. Their invasion appeared to be the end of the world as the Britons knew it. Fear only increased as the Danes conquered all but the kingdom of Wessex.

But Alfred, reminiscent of King Arthur rising from the sea, would not allow Wessex to fall. At the age of twenty-three, Alfred had distinguished himself in battle while on a campaign with his older brother Æthelred, the King of Wessex. At the town of J. Shane Saxon is an editor at Memoria Press. He has a Bachelor of English and a Master of Divinity, and is pursuing a research degree in Old Testament studies.

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Ashdown, Alfred found himself in peril without his brother, the general, who was in the camp seeking God's divine intervention. Realizing the urgency of the moment, Alfred led a charge up the hill against the Danish in a fierce skirmish occupying them long enough that Æthelred's forces could join Alfred and win the battle. Not long after, Æthelred died and Alfred took his place as king, winning the war by defeating the Danish at Edingtone.

Despite his military victories, Alfred is not remembered as a powerful king of great physical prowess. He was actually a small man and sickly (modern doctors believe he had Crohn's disease).

This puny boy-king not only defeated the Danes, he also revitalized Wessex and established lasting peace and prosperity. His greatness, and even his success in battle, is impossible to explain in terms of physical power. Instead, we observe the source of MemoriaPress.com

Alfred's strength in the vibrant life of his mind and the strength of his pious character, both products of his classical education.

The earliest stories of Alfred foreshadow what would ultimately distinguish him from other kings.

One day when Alfred was young, his mother showed him and his three brothers a book of Saxon poems and said that whoever memorized the book of poetry first would receive the book. The beauty of the ornate designs inspired Alfred, and he quickly committed the entire book to memory.

As Alfred grew older, he became obsessively dedicated to learning. His biographer, a contemporary in his court named Asser, records that Alfred was passionate about the liberal arts and that, specifically, he mastered the trivium and the quadrivium. Alfred lamented that the war with the Danes had driven out of the country all the educated men, so he gathered 1-877-862-1097

scholars in Wessex and invited them to stay at his court, examining them and exposing himself to new ideas. He even required that four scholars follow him around and read aloud to him so that he was always learning. He kept a small book that he called his "manual."

He wrote down beautiful passages from the Psalms, Augustine's Soliloquies, and Saxon poetry that struck him as noteworthy and beautiful. Alfred's manual attests to the life of his mind and proves that he knew that in order to be a great king he needed to able to do more than deal with political problems.

He needed to know intimately the true, the good, and the beautiful, so that the people of his kingdom would flourish and not just survive.

Alfred's own love for learning inspired him to revitalize the education system of his kingdom. In the hundred years since the Danes had invaded, the institutions of higher learning and religion had fallen into disrepute. Most people could not read English, much less the Latin required to understand church writings. The previous British kings had focused on temporary needs and pragmatic solutions. They invested in weapons and wealth, hoping to either bribe the Danes for peace or beat them in battle. But though he had beaten the Danes, Alfred knew that they would invade again, and if there was ever to be lasting peace the people had to rise above their circumstances.

For this reason, Alfred did not merely order his subordinates to improve the education system. He contributed to it himself. Alfred translated five books from Latin into English: Boethius' Consolation of Philosophy, Pope Gregory's Pastoral Care, Augustine's Soliloquies, Orosius' Histories Against the Pagans, Bede's Ecclesiastical History, and sections of the Vulgate translation of the Psalms and Exodus. In the preface to Pastoral Care, he wrote, "Therefore, he seems to me a very foolish man, and truly wretched, who will not increase his understanding while he is in the world, and ever wish and long to reach that endless life where all shall be made clear." Alfred believed that all men must read certain books to grow in virtue and love wisdom.

Alfred's desire for learning flowed from a heart of sincere piety. Asser, Alfred's biographer, tells of 21

a vow Alfred made to spend twelve hours every day dedicated to God. Trying to carry out this vow, Alfred became frustrated because he could not always accurately count the hours by the sun. On days where it was storming and overcast, he lost track of how many hours of service he needed to do. So, Alfred gathered wax and boiled it down into six candles, each one twelve inches long. When these six candles were all burned up, it represented the passing of one full day. This brilliant candle idea, however, continued to frustrate Alfred, as the wind would often blow into his palace and put out the candles. Alfred would not be deterred, so he took an ox horn, cutting it so thinly that it was translucent, and made a kind of lampstand. This way, every day he could dedicate exactly twelve hours to the service of God, measuring them by the burning of candles in his ox horn lampstand.

T he f r u it of Al f red's education was not just esoteric and spiritual, but evidently his classical education also shaped his military reforms.

Inspired by the Roman navy, Alfred invented h i s ow n de sig n for new galley warships to defeat t he Da nes who h ad dom i n ated the sea for the last few hu nd r e d yea r s. Muc h l i ke t he fa mous Greek, Themistocles, at the battle of Salamis, Alfred's galleys bottlenecked the Danish navy, allowing his larger force to board and eradicate the enemy.

Alfred also invented an entirely new way of waging land war. He kept a large standing army in addition to sentries guarding thirty-three small fortresses in Wessex, all within nineteen miles of each other. Based at the fortresses, the sentries could launch an attack on the Danes and then retreat to the fortress to regroup, knowing the standing army would shortly arrive to reinforce them. Alfred's strategy enabled the Britons to resist assaults on every side.

In light of all of these anecdotes from Alfred the Great's life, it's hard to believe that he was merely a shrewd politician. The chronicle of Alfred's life indicates a connection between his success and the education that formed him. The proof of this 22

connection can nowhere be seen more clearly than in the way he reformed the legal system of Britain.

Alfred personally inquired into every judge in Britain who was accused of false judgment. If any judge ever admitted that he made an error in judgment because of ignorance, Alfred would say: I greatly wonder at your assurance, that whereas, by God's favor and mine, you have taken upon you the rank and office of the wise, you have neglected the studies and labors of the wise. Either, therefore, at once give up the administration of the earthly powers which you possess, or endeavor more zealously to study the lessons of wisdom.

Alfred did not arbitrarily remove judges who opposed him, nor did he enact his own standard of law, nor did he only appoint judges predisposed to side with him. Instead, Alfred called judges to educate themselves.

He was not a king who held himself up as an example of power and wisdom.

Instead, Alfred the Great constantly pointed to the sources of his wisdom, and pushed others to seek it for themselves.

In the The Ballad of the White Horse, G. K. Chesterton casts Alfred the Great as a humble king committed to the cause of truth, goodness, and beauty.

Chesterton understood that Alfred's conflict against the Danes was not all that unlike the conflicts we face today. In fact, Chesterton's Alfred prophecies, I have a vision, and I know The heathen shall return.

They shall not come with warships, They shall not waste with brands, But books be all their eating, And ink be on their hands.

Today we fight, not a horde of invading Danes, but a slow and insidious erosion of culture. The greatness of Alfred—his piety and courage, his wisdom and humility—is a product of his classical education. But more than that, his greatness is a testament to how a classical education can form any student who pursues it faithfully. Ultimately, Alfred taught us that great kings (and teachers and doctors and mothers and judges) love to learn.

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