The age of tolerance ?
Posted: Wed Mar 17, 2004 7:57 pm
Salvete,
Another inspiring extract from the introduction to "La Couronne et la Lyre" by M. Yourcenar, a book which I am currently reading :
Valete,
Q. Pomponius Atticus
Another inspiring extract from the introduction to "La Couronne et la Lyre" by M. Yourcenar, a book which I am currently reading :
In the 1st century BC, Meleagros of Gadara, a Greek or a Hellenised Semite, composed for himself an epitaph, in which, as was usual, he expresses himself greeting the passengers walking along his tomb : "Khaire ! if you are a Greek; if you are a Syrian, Salam ! If you are Phoenician, Haudoni !". Greek history was far from an idyll, but we see how the Greeks ignored at least one of the cancers of modern days. The phrase of Meleagros, or an equivalent, should be placarded on all the walls of the Near-Orient nowadays. (my translation)
Valete,
Q. Pomponius Atticus