narratives of decline: antiquity

I did not receive the litany of excuses I had been anticipating. Still time though. We read about the historical and cultural milieu of early Christianity today. Mystery religions, Neoplatonism, Plotinus, and Jesus as Jew. I thought Plotinus would prove tough, despite using excerpted snippets with commentary, but it went pretty well. Perhaps because I could clearly show how he was drawing on Plato by literally drawing on the board. I had the students read the Plotinus carefully then attempt to draw his ontological outline of reality for themselves, then I diagrammed Plotinus and Plato side by side. They respond well to visual information.

While reading about the changing Roman reception of the various mystery religions I stumbled upon something nice that spoke directly to some of my recent concerns. It's Roman, not sure who the author is, from the third century:

You must know that the world has grown old, and does not remain in its former vigour. It bears witness to its own decline. The rainfall and the sun's warmth are both diminishing; the metals are nearly exhausted; the husbandman is failing in the fields, the sailor on the seas, the soldier in the camp, honesty in the market, justice in the courts, concord in friendships, skill in the arts, discipline in morals. This is the sentence passed upon the world, that everything which has a beginning should perish, that things which have reached maturity should grow old, the strong weak, the great small, and that after weakness and shrinkage should come dissolution.

I heard that.