United States or Italy ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
How humbling to his pride it would have been had he known then perhaps he does know now that he had actually again and again walked, as it were, round and round the true theory of the circulation of the blood, and yet never seen it; that that discovery which, once made, is intelligible, as far as any phenomenon is intelligible, to the merest peasant, was reserved for another century, and for one of those Englishmen on whom Vesalius would have looked as semi-barbarians.
De Quincey has gathered into an immortal story the dramatic details of an exodus that had its beginning and end just at the time when these half huntsmen, half traders were creeping down from the farther ridges of the Alleghanies into the wilderness, where the little French settlements were clinging like clusters of ripened grapes to a great vine the story of the flight of the Kalmuck Tartars from the banks of the Volga, across the steppes of Europe and the deserts of Asia to the frontiers of China the story of the journey of over a half million semi-barbarians, half of whom perished by the way from cold or heat, from starvation or thirst, or from the sabres and cannon of the savage hosts pursuing them by day and night through the endless stretches the story of the translation of these nomad herdsmen on the steppes of Russia through "infinite misery" into stable agriculturists beneath the great wall of China.
From the report of Ibrahim, the Germans' servant, it would seem that the people of Tintalous believe that Christians eat human beings; and further, from what I hear, this strange prejudice possesses the minds of the lower classes in many countries of Soudan. Such are the opinions of the semi-barbarians of Africa respecting us and our boasted civilisation!
I say nothing here of this monstrous claim, of this ingenious falsehood, on which the monarchical power of the Papacy rests. It is the great fraud of the Middle Ages. And yet, but for this theocratic idea, it is difficult to see how the external unity of the Church could have been preserved among the semi-barbarians of Europe.
The military glory of the Roman conquerors was unknown, and also that of modern European monarchs. The peasant was bound to serve under the banner of a military chieftain only for a short time: then he returned to his farm. His great military weapon was the bow, the weapon of semi-barbarians.
It was not in the power of any man to civilize semi-barbarians in a single reign; but if he attempted impossibilities he did not live in vain, since he bequeathed some permanent conquests and some great traditions. He left a great legacy to civilization.
Moderation Moors cannot comprehend, they can neither drink moderately, nor eat moderately; they must either abstain altogether or eat or drink like beasts. Of course I speak of their general character. But such is the case with too many amongst us, as well as these semi-barbarians. We encamped amidst palms and barley-fields. High wind from the east.
"Dog! you have put your hands of the devil into my bag of barley." Hhaha man. "Dog and Jew, you lie!" Shedma man. "Jew and Frenchman! there's some one now in your wife's tent." Hhaha man. "Religion of the Frenchman! your mother has been dishonoured a thousand times." The maternal honour is the dearest of things amongst these semi-barbarians.
Assuming the same licence, and regardless of the customs of his country, he appointed magistrates to hold their offices for terms of years. He granted the insignia of the consular dignity to ten persons of pretorian rank. He admitted into the senate some men who had been made free of the city, and even natives of Gaul, who were semi-barbarians.
It had secured a reciprocity of duties between a lord and his vassal; it had restored loyalty, truth, and fidelity among semi-barbarians; it had favored the cultivation of the soil; it had raised up a hardy rural population; it had promoted chivalry, and had introduced into Europe the modern gentleman; it had ennobled friendship, and spread the graces of urbanity and gentleness among rough and turbulent warriors.
Word Of The Day