{"id":4629,"date":"2025-03-22T07:26:02","date_gmt":"2025-03-22T12:26:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/educationalrenaissance.com\/?p=4629"},"modified":"2025-03-25T06:07:11","modified_gmt":"2025-03-25T11:07:11","slug":"on-the-beginning-and-end-of-civilizations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/educationalrenaissance.com\/2025\/03\/22\/on-the-beginning-and-end-of-civilizations\/","title":{"rendered":"On the Beginning…and End of Civilizations"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\u201cCivilization is social order promoting cultural creation. Four elements constitute it: economic provision, political organization, moral traditions, and the pursuit of knowledge and the arts. It begins where chaos and insecurity end. For when fear is overcome, curiosity and constructiveness are free, and man passes by natural impulse towards the understanding and embellishment of life.\u201d  Will Durant <\/p>\n\n\n\n

So begins the first chapter of the first volume of an eleven volume series<\/a> by Will Durant entitled, \u201cThe Story of Civilization.\u201d This series, which Will and his wife Ariel wrote over the course of four decades (1935-1975), covers the history of western civilization, from the ancient Near East to the Napoleonic conquests.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Durant begins his series by noting the preconditions and causal factors for a civilization to emerge in the first place. For example, if a region is frozen over by ice or if its soil is barren of nutrients, social order promoting cultural creation becomes very difficult. But as soon as these geological and geographical preconditions are met, the four causal factors for a civilization (economic provision, political organization, moral traditions, and education) can begin to do their work. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

To illustrate the necessity of each of these factors, Durant turns first to economics. He writes, \u201cA people may possess ordered institutions, a lofty moral code, and even a flair for the minor forms of art\u2026and yet if it remains in the hunting stage\u2026it will never quite pass from barbarism to civilization\u201d (2). In this way, the economic transition to agriculture is a key form of development for a people as well as the building of towns and cities. For in cities, the wealth and brains of the region gather\u2013to invent, to trade, to debate, and to create.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the context of the civitas<\/em>, the gathering of citizens, the other causal factors for the development of a civilization begin to gain traction. Political organization occurs through the creation of laws and formation of government. Moral traditions, rooted in values for the good of the community, develop. And the pursuit of knowledge and the arts launch a broader pursuit of truth and beauty that transcends mere survival. The harshness of life, from infant mortality to severe weather to social conflict, is offered meaning through moral narratives of purpose, hope, and redemption.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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As the process of civilization unfolds, the civilization itself becomes its own form of independency, in some ways moving from effect to cause. Durant writes, \u201cIt is not the great race that makes the civilization, it is the great civilization that makes the people; circumstances geographical and economic create a culture, and the culture creates a type\u201d (3). This type becomes the anchor of the civilization, the north star to which it it perpetually points. It is the set of ideals, the defining characteristics, of the city, the family, and the individual. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thus we can see how civilizations begin, and can use this criteria to generally predict how they might end. The disappearance of any of the aforementioned conditions threaten to destroy them. For example: a geological catastrophe, a deadly pandemic, the failure of natural resources, mental or moral decay, the decline of social discipline, a lack of leadership, a pathological concentration of wealth, financial exhaustion, or declining fertility rates.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Of course, the end of a civilization is not necessarily sudden or dramatic. Though Rome was sacked in 410 C.E., it was another fifty years before the empire fell. Nevertheless, the end of a civilization is in sight when its enduring values are lost. The set of ideals that define a civilization is its precious inheritance, a treasure that is to be faithfully passed on from generation to generation. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

But what if this type, this set of ideals, is lost? <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Five Crises Facing Western Civilization<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

In How to Save the West<\/a><\/em> (Regnery Publishing, 2023), classicist Spencer Klavan identifies five major concerns that threaten the future of Western civilization specifically, moving this question from a theoretical exploration to an actual crisis. While he admits that it is a relatively recent practice to talk about “the West,” as a distinct historical phenomenon, historians and scholars are “…observing, in good faith, threads of continuity that stretch back through time and space” (xx). He therefore goes on to offer a working definition of “Western” as “the vast and complex inheritance of ‘Athens,’ the classical world, and ‘Jerusalem,’ the Jewish and Christian monotheists of the near east (xix).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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This “inheritance,” I suggest, functions as the type, which Durant refers to as the foundation for a civilization. In the case of Western civilization, it is the set of ideals and masterpieces treasured through the generations that fit within a broader Great Conversation, full of wrong turns and dead ends, that nevertheless pursue a common vision for goodness, truth, and beauty. This conversation is not bound by race, ethnicity, or even geography. Nor is it restricted to a particular gender or social class. Rather, it is an unfolding story of humanity’s united search for meaning, composed of luminaries as diverse as Cicero and Frederick Douglass, Aeschylus and Shakespeare, Hildegard von Bingen and Abraham Lincoln. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

While Klavan does frame his concerns in terms of a looming crisis at hand for the West, as a classicist, he helpfully reminds his readers that at every turn, a civilization can appears to be on the verge of collapse:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The intoxicating rise of Athens in the fifth century B.C. came to an abrupt and gory end in the Peloponnesian War. No sooner had the ancient Israelites made their way to God’s promised land than they strayed after foreign gods and suffered under foreign oppressors. The Western Roman empire crumbled into warring tribal oppressors; France’s revolution devolved from utopian optimism into terror and bloodshed; Communist uprising in Russia led to socialist dictatorship and millions of deaths” (xiv). <\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

At the same time, here I am, in the twenty-first century, writing about Western civilization…in the West. Obviously certain events occurred which led for the transmission of the heritage to continue, for the ideas and values to be passed on. Whether it to be Jerome writing the Vulgate translation of scripture, Charlemagne sponsoring new schools, Celtic monks building libraries in medieval Europe, Johannes Gutenberg creating the moveable-type printing press, or American colonists creating a new republic, the civilization has endured.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nevertheless, Klavan identifies five modern crises that could lead to its undoing, briefly stated as follows: <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Crisis of Reality:<\/strong> A rejection of the eternality of objective truth and moral facts in favor of relativism, expediency, and virtual reality<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Crisis of the Body:<\/strong> A rejection of the physical body with a turn to the inner self and posthuman technologies<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Crisis of Meaning: <\/strong>A rejection of metanarrative, a transcendent explanation for existence that is grounded in objective truth <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Crisis of Religion:<\/strong> A rejection of belief in God in exchange for a misplaced confidence in modern science <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Crisis of the Regime:<\/strong> A rejection of the principles for a republic to endure, such as rule by law, popular sovereignty, and checks and balances<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Solution: Educate One Child at a Time<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

It is beyond the scope of this article to explore each crisis in detail, much less to review the solutions Klavan suggests. A strategy for saving the West from the crises above is complex, multi-layered, and requires a deeper dive into ideas and philosophy. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the risk of appearing simplistic, however, I want to suggest one straightforward strategy that could slow down these trends, if not reverse them: educate one child at a time according to enduring biblical values.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The 19th and early 20th century British educator Charlotte Mason famously championed the idea that children are persons. Created with immense potential as divine image-bearers, they enter the world eager to explore, create, build, think, and love. Education, then, is the process of helping children encounter the relations of the world they are born into–relations with God, others, creation, and knowledge. In this way, Mason famously called education “the science of relations.” By simply teaching children in a way that exposes them to enduring stories, poetry, nature, music, art, math, and science, we are forming them in a biblical view of reality that will enable them to respond accordingly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After all, the underlying thread of the five crises described above is simple: a rejection of goodness, truth, and beauty. By offering an education that introduces children to these ideas, we shape their views of knowledge, reality, morality, and desire. This, in turn, will shape them into people who not only keep the economy going (one of the four factors of a civilization), but can run government, pass on moral traditions, and uphold an unrelenting pursuit of knowledge.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mason writes, <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n

We owe it to them to initiate an immense number of interests. ‘Thou hast set my feet in a large room;’ should be the glad cry of every intelligent soul. Life should be all\u00a0living<\/em>, and not merely a tedious passing of time; not all doing or all feeling or all thinking\u2013\u2013the strain would be too great\u2013\u2013but, all living; that is to say, we should be in touch wherever we go, whatever we hear, whatever we see, with some manner of vital interest. We cannot\u00a0give<\/em>\u00a0the children these interests; we prefer that they should never say they have learned botany or conchology, geology or astronomy. The question is not,\u2013\u2013how much does the youth\u00a0know<\/em>? when he has finished his education\u2013\u2013but how much does he\u00a0care<\/em>? and about how many orders of things does he care? In fact, how large is the room in which he finds his feet set? and, therefore, how full is the life he has before him? (School Education, p. 170).<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Notice the end goal for Mason: living a full life. Is this not the proper end of education and civilization itself? <\/p>\n\n\n\n

And how do we go about this education for a full life? Mason gives us a clue:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n

I know you may bring a horse to the water, but you cannot make him drink. What I complain of is that we do not<\/em> bring our horse to the water. We give him miserable little text-books, mere compendiums of facts, which he is to learn off and say and produce at an examination; or we give him various knowledge in the form of warm diluents, prepared by his teacher with perhaps some grains of living thought to the gallon. And all the time we have books, books teeming with ideas fresh from the minds of thinkers upon every subject to which we can wish to introduce children. (School Education, p. 171)<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Conclusion<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

G.K. Chesterton famously stated, “Education is simply the soul of a society as it passes from one generation to another.” Through this exploration of civilizations–factors for their beginning and crises that can lead to their demise–we can understand this insight with fresh perspective. Great civilizations do not occur by accident. Certain preconditions must be met, and, on top of these preconditions, specific causal factors are at play. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Civilizations continue when they take on an existence of their own, grounded in an ideal type, which functions as the north star for the ongoing formation of its inhabitants. When this type is preserved, the civilization flourishes and human flourishing is the result. But when we lose sight of this ideal, the ground becomes shaky, moral intuitions uncertain, and truth itself up for grabs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There is, therefore, work before us now as there is in every era. For, as Will Durant puts it, \u201cFor civilization is not something inborn or imperishable; it must be acquired anew by every generation, and any serious interruption in its financing or its transmission may bring it to an end. Man differs from the beast only by education, which may be defined as the technique of transmitting civilization\u201d (4).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Four elements constitute it: economic provision, political organization, moral traditions, and the pursuit of knowledge and the arts. It begins where chaos and insecurity end. For when fear is overcome, curiosity and constructiveness are free, and man passes by natural impulse towards the understanding and embellishment of life.\u201d …","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pa7K1D-1cF","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":4789,"url":"https:\/\/educationalrenaissance.com\/2025\/04\/12\/the-story-of-civilization-the-golden-age-of-greece\/","url_meta":{"origin":4629,"position":0},"title":"The Story of Civilization: The Golden Age of Greece","author":"Kolby Atchison","date":"April 12, 2025","format":false,"excerpt":"If someone were to stop you on the street and ask, \u201cWhat is classical education?\u201d I might have just described a nightmare scenario for a classical school parent. \u201cUmm,\u201d you begin. \u201cIt\u2019s the trivium\u2014grammar, logic, and rhetoric.\u201d \u201cIt\u2019s\u2026classical art and music. Like Beethoven and Mozart. Plus math and science.\u201d \u201cIt\u2019s\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "History of Education"","block_context":{"text":"History of Education","link":"https:\/\/educationalrenaissance.com\/category\/history-of-education\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/educationalrenaissance.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/Greece.jpg?fit=1200%2C803&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/educationalrenaissance.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/Greece.jpg?fit=1200%2C803&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/educationalrenaissance.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/Greece.jpg?fit=1200%2C803&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/educationalrenaissance.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/Greece.jpg?fit=1200%2C803&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/educationalrenaissance.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/Greece.jpg?fit=1200%2C803&ssl=1&resize=1050%2C600 3x"},"classes":[]},{"id":316,"url":"https:\/\/educationalrenaissance.com\/2019\/04\/05\/why-study-western-civilization\/","url_meta":{"origin":4629,"position":1},"title":"Why Study Western Civilization?","author":"Patrick Egan","date":"April 5, 2019","format":false,"excerpt":"The classical Christian movement has at its core a commitment to teaching Western civilization. Even though we teach Western civ, its distinctive qualities are not always clear. As a result, many educators (even within the classical movement) question why we would teach Western civilization. Here I will lay out what\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Classical Tradition"","block_context":{"text":"Classical Tradition","link":"https:\/\/educationalrenaissance.com\/category\/classical-tradition\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Plato and Aristotle in the Lyceum","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/educationalrenaissance.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/Canva-Nativity-Painting-of-People-Inside-a-Dome.jpg?fit=1200%2C764&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/educationalrenaissance.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/Canva-Nativity-Painting-of-People-Inside-a-Dome.jpg?fit=1200%2C764&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/educationalrenaissance.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/Canva-Nativity-Painting-of-People-Inside-a-Dome.jpg?fit=1200%2C764&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/educationalrenaissance.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/Canva-Nativity-Painting-of-People-Inside-a-Dome.jpg?fit=1200%2C764&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/educationalrenaissance.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/Canva-Nativity-Painting-of-People-Inside-a-Dome.jpg?fit=1200%2C764&ssl=1&resize=1050%2C600 3x"},"classes":[]},{"id":3033,"url":"https:\/\/educationalrenaissance.com\/2022\/06\/04\/to-save-a-civilization-part-1-conditions-for-a-decline\/","url_meta":{"origin":4629,"position":2},"title":"To Save a Civilization, Part 1: Conditions for a Decline","author":"Kolby Atchison","date":"June 4, 2022","format":false,"excerpt":"Why did Rome fall? In our present age, this question may yield insights that extend beyond historical inquiry. Rome, in the ancient world, was not simply another European city. It represented the pinnacle of western civilization and the magnetic core of order. 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I specifically examined the story of the fall of the Roman Empire. While it is difficult for historians to identify a single point in time when the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Classical Tradition"","block_context":{"text":"Classical Tradition","link":"https:\/\/educationalrenaissance.com\/category\/classical-tradition\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/educationalrenaissance.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/st.-patrick.webp?fit=750%2C492&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/educationalrenaissance.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/st.-patrick.webp?fit=750%2C492&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/educationalrenaissance.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/st.-patrick.webp?fit=750%2C492&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/educationalrenaissance.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/st.-patrick.webp?fit=750%2C492&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":246,"url":"https:\/\/educationalrenaissance.com\/2019\/02\/01\/renaissance-education-looking-to-the-past-to-chart-a-course-for-education-today\/","url_meta":{"origin":4629,"position":4},"title":"Renaissance Education: Looking to the Past to Chart a Course for Education Today","author":"Patrick Egan","date":"February 1, 2019","format":false,"excerpt":"Education in the Renaissance centered around a rediscovery of lost ideas leading to a rebirth of civilization. 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