Democracy & the Fall of the Athenian Republic

Alexander Tyler & James Olson

About the time our original 13 states adopted their new constitution, in in
1787, Alexander Tyler, a Scottish history professor at the University of
Edinburgh, had this to say about the fall of the Athenian Republic some
2000 years prior:

"A democracy is always temporary in nature; it simply cannot exist as a
permanent form of government. A democracy will continue to exist up until
the time that voters discover they can vote themselves generous gifts from
the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for
the candidates who promise the most benefits from the public treasury,
with the result that every democracy will finally collapse due to loose
fiscal policy, which is always followed by a dictatorship."
"The average age of the worlds greatest civilizations from the beginning
of history, has been about 200 years. During those 200 years, these
nations always progressed through the following sequence:

1. From bondage to spiritual faith;

2. From spiritual faith to great courage;
3. From courage to liberty;
4. From liberty to abundance;
5. From abundance to complacency;
6. From complacency to apathy;
7. From apathy to dependence;
8. From dependence back into bondage "

Pick a number.

I believe this is talking about a true democracy? Where as we have a Representative Republic if I remember correctly. There are definitely differences in the two. Mostly being that in a true democracy the people actually vote directly on things, where as we elect representatives to vote for us. This is not the technical definition obviously but it has been a while since I studied this.

However, I can see how it could relate.

reply to post by sputniksteve


HI sputnik,

Reading it just sruck a nerve, so I thought I would post it, to see what others thought.

I think we are somewhere between 7 and 8

The author that the OP quotes is a genius.


That whole piece of work stunned me.

Saw this quote elsewhere and found it here too. It's so sad that people don't realize what is happening to them. And how strength, our freedom and liberty, is being stripped from us by fork tonged politicians promising anything to get more power.

Has anyone vetted this "quotation" or its attribution?

NO!

What's this "deny ignorance" thing? If you're going to post something you should at leaast check its accuracy. If you're going to attribute it to some guy who's been dead for two centuries, perhaps you might check to see if he actually wrote it.

Or are you just trying to lend credence to some propaganda that a more recent philosopher cooked up?