Searching for Ancient Greece - The Wise World Traveler: Becoming a Part of All that You Meet - page 175

But even more important to our Greek inheritance are the questions that ran alongside the
ideas—questions and ideas, W. H. Auden says, that are the geology of western civiliza-
tion. [144]
WHAT GAVE THE GREEKS THEIR SPECIAL QUALITIES OF MIND?
For this question, no single answer will do. An eminent scholar, Maurice Bowra, invokes
the familiar theme that altitude is attitude, that geography is destiny. [145] A flat landscape
is fertile soil for absolute power. Such were the governments of ancient Egypt and nearby
Persia, the ever-encroaching enemy of Greece. In contrast, mountains nurture independ-
ence because they afford hiding places from the tyrant; and more important, as his agents
attempt to enforce dictatorial power, they meet with resistance made bold by mountain hid-
ing places.
Another scholar, H. D. F. Kitto, offers a variant on geography's contribution. [146] Most
of Greece faces southeast. Its clear skies and sunshine encourage outdoor meeting and ex-
changes. Out in the open, men and women could feel free to talk, argue, and exchange
ideas. Personal freedom is corollary to this free exchange. Where the Egyptians and Persi-
ans (and, in fact, dictators today) erected statues of themselves to celebrate their power and
remind their subjects of that power, the Greeks erected statues to the beauty of their gods.
“Let us act like gods, whom we so much resemble,” said Aristotle. And the temples to their
gods were small, like the palaces of Greek kings. The words of Pericles (495-429 BCE),
elected leader of the Athenians, can serve as the Athenian credo:
… Our Constitution is called a democracy because power is in the hands not of a
minority but of the whole people… And just as our political life is free and open, so
is our day to day life in our relations with each other… We are free and tolerant in
our private lives, but in public affairs we keep to the law… Our love of what is beau-
tiful does not lead to extravagance; our love for things of the mind does not make us
soft… [147]
But it is never wise to take a creed at face value. Too much may be hidden in fine
words; too many exceptions may mar their beauty. The two great political powers of clas-
sical Greece were Athens and Sparta. We remember Athens for its democracy and for the
beauty of its art and architecture. But behind those achievements was a social system built
on slavery. Athens was a city-state, part urban, part countryside, a polity of about 950
square miles. Athens in its golden age (fifth century BCE) probably used 125,000 slaves:
65,000 in domestic employment, the rest hard at work in fields and mines. The overlords of
slaves were about 100,000 Athenians, of whom only 45,000 men were permitted to parti-