30 How the Church Has Changed the World Romans. Long ago, the free men of Athens had transacted their state affairs on that hill. That was where Pericles had delivered his funeral oration for the first casualties of the great war against Sparta and Thebes. But the plague arrived then, too, and soon Pericles was lost. Then the war was lost, then freedom was lost, and now it seemed that even being a Greek was lost. And what did people climb the Hill of Ares to do now? They went there for the same sad reason why Dionysius, a judge of the court that met on that hill, had gone there today. They went there to pretend that they still had life in them. They went as intellectual shoppers at a bazaar, where all the idea-hucksters of the world stopped to sell their wares, magi from Persia, drug-toking mystics from India, would-be philosophers who claimed, though they were not certain about it, that we could not be certain about anything. And then the men would take sides, with noise and a show of passion but no real conviction. And then some would get drunk. And then they would go home, as Dionysius did. A new thing in the world He sat down upon his couch, without saying a word. His wife, Calonice, came over to him, bringing him a small dish of dates and honey. “My dear, you look as if the city had been destroyed!”
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