The Decline of a Nation

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Quote:
"As nightfall does not come all at once, neither does oppression.
In both instances, there is a twilight when everything remains
seemingly unchanged. And it is in such twilight that we all must
be most aware of change in the air - however slight - lest we become
unwitting victims of the darkness."

Justice William O. Douglas (1898-1980), U. S. Supreme Court Justice

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http://www.ourcivilisation.com/decline.htm

Corruption Progresses a Generation at a Time
The corruption of tradition progresses a generation at a time, with each succeeding wave of offspring corrupting more tradition, which in turn means showing less restraint and thus less understanding than the last generation



Or as the ancient Roman poet Horace (BC 65-8) said:

"Our parents, worse than our grandparents, gave birth to us who are worse than they,
and we shall in our turn bear offspring still more evil."

And the result is a community growing ever more demented and impotent



5. Consider the community's general attitude to truth; a civilization rises because it pursues truth, it falls when it suppresses truth

6. Consider the attitude of children towards their parents. When a civilization is waxing progeny revere their parents whom they dare not disobey, but when a civilization is waning it is the parents who revere their children whom they fear to upset—see the law of reverse civilization.




When a civilization declines it goes into reverse with all the wealth, power and wisdom realised by its rise being discarded at an ever increasing rate until dissolution.
2. The essential requirements of:

i. Peace will be disturbed by increasing interruptions of:

• Noise.
• Indecency (see f-word and loss of shame)
• Violence from within and from without the community



Our civilization has been declining since the late Eighteenth century (see "A Study Of History" by Professor Arnold Toynbee), which means that since then the majority of citizens of western civilization have been selfish — for selfishness is the influence that rejects moral restraint, along with its associated beliefs. In place of the guide of tradition the selfish rely upon feelings to recognise right from wrong and fact from fancy. Now, after more than two centuries of discarding and reversing traditions, most citizens are fools who can neither tell right from wrong nor fact from fancy.




Growing Communal Dementia is because of increasing public confusion as a result of the widespread abandonment of the community's founding morality along with its associated beliefs, which are the wisdom of society.

2. Faltering Communal Strength is a direct result of the growth of selfishness among its citizens, for a community's strength is built upon its members' willingness to make private sacrifice for the common good.


1. Wisdom cannot be restored because it has to be founded upon a morality, which no longer exists. And inspiring a people with a morality can only be the accidental work of events because it must precede understanding. This means that just as a man cannot choose his morality nor can a community, so once lost a morality can never be regained.

2. Strength cannot be restored because it needs a pool of unselfish citizens who no longer exist, and it is impossible to change the existing selfish into unselfish people.



"But the emergence of Hitler, the conditions for his rise and his triumph, depended on circumstances far beyond the narrower framework of conditions in Germany. We need not mention Versailles, nor Munich, nor Moscow. We may confine ourselves to the common inner characteristics of which these and countless other comparable stages on the road were only symptoms: The turning away of almost all European powers from reason and realism; the disenchantment with traditional values and ethical standards, accompanied by a lack of will to defend any moral and legal principles whatever; a short sighted striving for advantage and security as well as, in particular, a susceptibility to illusion —the fatal characteristic of the epoch." —J.C. Fest 'The Face Of The Third Reich'.

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European Reason Failing In The 1930s
These sentiments not only applied to the European governments leading up to the Second World War, but naturally to the people they represented. The very rise of the Third Reich is the story of a Nation losing sense, for the people who flocked to the Nazi rallies demonstrated a complete and utter disregard for reason and morality. Nazism was never a concept, but a series of promises and slogans that were merely irrational excuses to indulge in prejudice and wishful thinking. The population of Nazi Germany had decided to give control of their actions to their feelings, rather than their intelligence.


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The Importance Of Religion
Naturally distinguishing good from evil is crucial for any community which is why religion is the foundation of a community, because that is the concern of religion. It is the church's prerogative to tell citizens what behaviour is good, or virtuous, and what is sinful, or evil. The church's commandments are presented as divine instructions on how to avoid a private eternity in hell after death, but are in fact practical directions for the best way for citizens to improve their life. By being good, individuals are improving the lot of their society and so improving their own and everyone else's life. While being sinful (evil), does not just threaten the well being of their souls but the well being of their community and hence themselves. (See the example of marriage).

The Decline Of A Community Is Its Descent Into Evil
All the institutions, customs and manners that make up the tradition of a community are inspired by its communal understanding, which in turn is guided by its recognition of good from evil. So a society that is extending and refining its traditions is extending its ability to distinguish good from evil, and prospering. While a community that is corrupting its traditions — discarding, or reversing the nature of, its manners, customs and institutions— is not only losing wisdom and facing dissolution, but it is embracing evil.
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Romans
1


The Guilt of Mankind
18 ¶ For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who hold the truth in unrighteousness;

19 because that which may be known of God is manifest in them; for God hath showed it unto them.

20 For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse:

21 because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened.

22 Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools,
23 and changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and four-footed beasts, and creeping things.

24 ¶ Wherefore God also gave them up to uncleanness, through the lusts of their own hearts, to dishonor their own bodies between themselves:

25 who changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator, who is blessed for ever. Amen.

26 ¶ For this cause God gave them up unto vile affections: for even their women did change the natural use into that which is against nature:

27 and likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust one toward another; men with men working that which is unseemly, and receiving in themselves that recompense of their error which was meet.

28 ¶ And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not convenient;

29 being filled with all unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, debate, deceit, malignity; whisperers,

30 backbiters, haters of God, despiteful, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents,

31 without understanding, covenant-breakers, without natural affection, implacable, unmerciful:

32 who, knowing the judgment of God, that they which commit such things are worthy of death, not only do the same, but have pleasure in them that do them.
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Isaiah 5:20

Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!




Thus Arnold Toynbee could rightly say, “Civilizations die from suicide, not murder.”

Toynbee, a British historian (1889-1975), is most famous for his magisterial A Study of History, 1934-1961. In this 12-volume work he examined the rise and fall of nations.

One of his more significant remarks is worth recalling: “Of the twenty-two civilizations that have appeared in history, nineteen of them collapsed when they reached the moral state the United States is in now.” Given that this is now a dated comment, how much more true is it today?

Other historians have of course remarked on the suicidal tendencies of nations. Will Durant (1885-1981), an American historian, made this observation: “A great civilization is not conquered from without until it has destroyed itself within. The essential causes of Rome’s decline lay in her people, her morals, her class struggle, her failing trade, her bureaucratic despotism, her stifling taxes, her consuming wars.”





In conclusion, it is interesting to note that early Americans were facing a land of emptiness; their future and all their well-being held no security. Therefore, these people recognized their daily need for God, and their circumstances kept them dependent on Him. However, we may note that as America grew more established and economically stable, her people began to forsake God, not recognizing their constant need for Him. The words of Jesus ring true, as he stated that "And again I say to you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God."10 More importantly, they began to disregard their need for a Savior, and turned away from God. Now religion is yet another thing that people may seek to make themselves happy, and thus is may be pursued in any way shape or form. Scripture makes it quite clear what must be done to reverse the tide of evil, yet many Christians wonder why America is in such a dire situation, while at the same time disregarding God's admonition. "If My people, who are called by My name will humble themselves, and pray and seek My face and turn from their wicked ways, the I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their land."

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The economy, the media, and all cultural activities were brought under Nazi authority

Soon the spare time of the young was absorbed by the Nazi Party as well—boys were drawn into the Hitler Youth, and girls became members of the Nazi-led League of German Girls. The goal was to indoctrinate people into the party starting at a young age. By the summer of 1933, the Nazi Party was in complete control of the country.
On January 30, 1933, Hitler was sworn in as chancellor of Germany
[[Took him ONLY 6 months!!!!!!!!!!]]


http://encarta.msn.com/encyclopedia_761556540_3/hitler.html


Propaganda is the art of persuasion - persuading others that your 'side of the story' is correct. Propaganda might take the form of persuading others that your military might is too great to be challenged; that your political might within a nation is too great or popular to challenge etc. In Nazi Germany, Dr Joseph Goebbels was in charge of propaganda. Goebbels official title was Minister of Propaganda and National Enlightenment.

As Minister of Enlightenment, Goebbels had two main tasks:

to ensure nobody in Germany could read or see anything that was hostile or damaging to the Nazi Party.

to ensure that the views of the Nazis were put across in the most persuasive manner possible.


You could only read, see and hear what the Nazis wanted you to read, see and hear.


http://www.historylearningsite.co.uk/propaganda_in_nazi_germany.htm


The essence of propaganda consists in winning people over to an idea so sincerely, so vitally, that in the end they succumb to it utterly and can never escape from it." Goebbels



"Propaganda is not an end in itself, but a means to an end. If the means achieves the end then the means is good.........the new Ministry has no other aim than to unite the nation behind the ideal of the national revolution." Goebbels


http://www.psywarrior.com/Goebbels.html

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The Man on Horseback

He makes his first appearance in Revelation 6 as a conqueror riding a white horse.8 (Strangely, he is carrying a bow rather than a sword. The term is toxon - toxon in the Greek, first used as a token of a covenant in Genesis 9:13. Could this be an allusion to the covenant that he enforces in Daniel 9:27?)

The Bible has much to say about this personage. Identified as the "Seed of the Serpent" in Genesis 3:15, there are over 33 allusions in the Old Testament and at least 13 in the New Testament. There is even a physical description of him in Zechariah.9

It is remarkable about how much is said of his career. He will be an intellectual genius,10 a persuasive orator,11 a shrewd political manipulator,12 a successful commercial genius,13 a forceful military leader, 14 a powerful organizer,15 as well as a unifying religious guru.16 Paul declares that he will ultimately set himself to be worshiped in the Temple to be rebuilt in Jerusalem:

...that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition; who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped; so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God, shewing himself that he is God.

-2 Thessalonians 2:4

("Exalteth himself above all that is called God." That includes Allah, the god of Islam. He is accepted by the world as a false Christ: Antichristo, in the Greek, means instead of Christ as well as against Christ, as we commonly assume. He apparently is initially accepted by Israel as their Messiah. And, somehow, he is also accepted by the Muslim world-perhaps as the Twelfth Imam, which they are presently anticipating. Remarkable fellow. Indeed, Satan's finest hour, it would seem.)17
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http://www.khouse.org/articles/1999/174/

[Beagler]

Thanks for these posts. Not exactly cheerful reading but it is the sad truth of our day.

[lighthouse]

no not cheery at all
but to be expected before the return of Christ
So look up

light shines the brightest when it is the darkest

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bump

[Amen]

Wow. Good compilation lighthouse. Thank you.

[Buzzardhut]

God's Judgment on America (http://rr-bb.com/showthread.php?t=78525&highlight=judgment+nation)