“Security and aggression are terms of partisan interpretation.”
Ronald Syme book The Roman Revolution
Source: The Roman Revolution (1939), Ch. 7.
Quotes from bookThe Roman Revolution
The Roman Revolution is a scholarly study of the final years of the ancient Roman Republic and the creation of the Roman Empire by Caesar Augustus. The book was the work of Sir Ronald Syme , a noted Tacitean scholar, and was published by the Oxford University Press. It was immediately controversial. Its main conclusion was that the structure of the Republic and its Senate were inadequate to the needs of Roman rule, and that Augustus was merely doing what was necessary to restore order in public life. This was a situation and reasoning uncomfortably reminiscent of contemporary events in Nazi Germany and the other fascist regimes of the time.
“Without a party a statesman is nothing. He sometimes forgets that awkward fact.”
Ronald Syme book The Roman Revolution
Source: The Roman Revolution (1939), Ch. 4.
“The best party is but a kind of conspiracy against the Commonwealth.”
Ronald Syme book The Roman Revolution
Source: The Roman Revolution (1939), Ch. 9.
Ronald Syme book The Roman Revolution
The Roman Revolution ([1939] 2002), ch. 11.
Context: The political cant of a country is naturally and always most strongly in evidence on the side of the vested interests. In times of peace and prosperity it commands a wide measure of acquiescence, even of belief. Revolution rends the veil.
