Classical Decline
Climbing Parnassus: A New Apologia for Greek and Latin
by Tracy Lee Simmons
Wilmington, Delaware: ISI Books, 2002
(290 pages; $24.95, cloth)
reviewed by Gerald J. Russello
Knowledge of the classics was once so ubiquitous as to be unremarkable. Public figures were supposed to be well versed in the culture and languages of Rome and Greece. To take examples almost at random: President Herbert Hoover translated, with his wife, the classic mining treatise De Re Metallica; President William Henry Harrison gave the Senate a disquisition on the Roman army; the public architecture in cities across the country reflect classical models; and institutions like the Boston Latin School inculcated a respect for the classics to generations of students. And of course, with notable exceptions like the Pennsylvania physician Benjamin Rush, the founding generation simply assumed the abiding importance of the ancient languages to both public life and private conduct.
THIS ARTICLE ONLY AVAILABLE TO SUBSCRIBERS.
FOR QUICK ACCESS:
Gerald J. Russello is Editor of The University Bookman and a Fellow of the Chesterton Institute at Seton Hall University.
Get six issues (one year) of Touchstone PLUS full online access including pdf downloads for only $39.95. That's only $3.34 per month!
Get a one-year full-access subscription to the Touchstone online archives for only $19.95. That's only $1.66 per month!
bulk subscriptions
Order Touchstone subscriptions in bulk and save $10 per sub! Each subscription includes 6 issues of Touchstone plus full online access to touchstonemag.com—including archives, videos, and pdf downloads of recent issues for only $29.95 each! Great for churches or study groups.
Transactions will be processed on a secure server.
more from the online archives
32.6—November/December 2019
Historical Truth, Beguiling Stories & Three Kinds of Hearers by Anthony Esolen
22.6—July/August 2009
on a Noble Defense Doomed by Darwinian Materialism by John G. West
35.4—Jul/Aug 2022
The Death Rattle of a Tradition
Contemporary Catholic Thinking on the Question of War by Andrew Latham
calling all readers
Please Donate
"There are magazines worth reading but few worth saving . . . Touchstone is just such a magazine."
—Alice von Hildebrand
"Here we do not concede one square millimeter of territory to falsehood, folly, contemporary sentimentality, or fashion. We speak the truth, and let God be our judge. . . . Touchstone is the one committedly Christian conservative journal."
—Anthony Esolen, Touchstone senior editor
