/lit/ - Literature

>>21216081
Rationality, harmony, objectivity: this is the triple manifestation through which Greek Culture, the essence of our civilization, is defined, as the essence of intelligence, or its superior part.
Whenever our civilization has contradicted the spirit of rationality, harmony and objectivity, our civilization has fallen. It has decayed wherever the Inquisition, or any other similar tyranny, has shackled individual thought. It was liberated where the Reformation was established—not that the spirit of the Reformers was per se more tolerant than that of the Catholics; but the necessity of free examination opened, in spite of itself, the doors to Reason. And where Reason enters, Greece enters; and where Greece enters, civilization enters.
It is evident that this rationalism cannot exist without a certain individualism, that is, without a certain freedom of the individual to think and express what he thinks. We must not, however, confuse this individualism with political individualism, which is what is now immediately understood by individualism. There can be individualism without actually being freedom. Frederick the Great of Prussia allowed the widest freedom of thought; but one in which he was absolute king cannot be described as a liberal regime.
Let us therefore fix this, and only this: Greek Culture, essence of our civilization, is characterized by Rationalism. Rationalism is defined by the spirit of rationality in ideas and in their exposition, of harmony in feelings and in their interrelationships, of objectivity in impressions and in the way of analyzing them.

(4/?)