The installment of Grecian History required in the C. L. S. C. course
is not extensive, but has been prepared with much care, and is adapted
to its purpose. A careful study—enough to give possession of the
principal facts stated, can hardly fail to kindle the desire for
further knowledge of a people who had so many elements of greatness,
and for centuries surpassed all others in knowledge and culture. The
most advanced nations of to-day are largely indebted to the Greeks.
Modern art and literature bear witness to the indebtedness. The race
had wonderful capabilities. Their country, climate, blood, early habits
of self-control, or all these together, secured in that corner of
Europe a class of stalwart men, physically and intellectually capable
of great deeds.
Much of their early history is, of course, fabulous. The gods,
goddesses, heroes and kings, whose councils and exploits are rehearsed,
were but myths. Yet the legendary traditions respecting them have
charms that attract and hold the reader. We may utterly discredit
the story, but pay homage to the ability and versatile genius of
the writer, whose glowing words so paint the scenes described. Only
a slight basis of fact is conceded to some of the most captivating
Homeric descriptions; yet they are in an important sense true. False
in history, but sublimely true to the conceptions of the greatest of
poets, as a bold delineator, peerless in his own, or any other age. If
the ideal of the divinities thought to be interested in the affairs of
men falls far below the conceptions of a monotheist, and seems unworthy
of a philanthropic heathen, the portraiture is both complete and
captivating.
When the mists, that for centuries shrouded Greece and the neighboring
isles, are dispersed, and we recognize the certain dawn of the
_historic_ period, though the descendants of those mighty heroes and
kings that were deified as sons of the gods, shrink to the proportions
of men, they are still found to be mighty men, whose noble deeds and
achievements have been an inspiration to millions in the generations
since. Excepting only such as have the true light, and are blest with
Christian civilization, we adopt the statement “No other race ever did
so many things well as the Greeks.”
Let the book be closely studied. If the cursory, objectless reader
lacks interest, and tires in the work, the student feels more than
compensated for his toil.