artsykat
Junior Member
Hello, I'm Kateri, nice to meet you~!
Posts: 51 
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Post by artsykat on Nov 3, 2016 2:08:44 GMT
It's interesting to see that Sallust, like Cicero and Livy, addressed important issues about the society of the time. What I found different was that Sallust addressed the plebs and the aristocrats. He addressed the wrong and corruption in both of them. Often times, when we think of the poor stealing, we can say, "they had no choice." Yet when we think of the rich stealing, we can think that it's wrong for then to do so, because they already have more than enough. But in both instances, they're wrong do that, yet in both instances, we can find an understanding as to why they would. Of course, that doesn't make it anymore wrong. It's obviously understandable as to why the poor would steel, for food, money, shelter, ect. And it's also understandable as to why the rich would steel. (I literally just covered that in my other point xD) With great power comes great responsibility, and virtues, and morals. Without these, it's very easy to lose sight of what's good and bad, as Sallust, Livy and Cicero seem to stress.
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Post by Christopher Martin on Nov 3, 2016 17:49:13 GMT
Again, let's try to stay away from moralizing, modernizing, and proverbializing our texts.
Instead, let's delve deeper into what we can learn about Sallust and Rome in general from this text: why does Sallust write about the Plebs and Aristocrats in the manner he chose, and what does that tell us about Sallust and Rome?
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artsykat
Junior Member
Hello, I'm Kateri, nice to meet you~!
Posts: 51
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Post by artsykat on Nov 5, 2016 2:05:23 GMT
He wrote about them this way to exploit them, saying that their both in the wrong and the way they were living at that time wasn't right. "A few influential men, who had gained the support of the majority, sought absolute power, on the specious pretext of defending the nobles or the plebs. Citizens were not called "good" or "bad" according to their public conduct, because in that respect they were all equally corrupt; but those who were wealthiest, and most able to inflict harm, were considered "good" because they defended the existing state of affairs." Essentially, he's criticizing Rome, in the sense that because of the way that people were living, Rome was in a way a corrupt country. This is what I gathered, if there's more that can be expanded upon, please inform me  Also I guess it's really easy to moralize and modernize with these texts, because they feel relatable, even centuries later. But I will defiantly try to refrain from doing that in the future  |
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Post by Christopher Martin on Nov 7, 2016 6:37:36 GMT
Eh, don't be TOO hard on yourself . . . it's my job as a teacher to try to keep the conversations on track, and it's only natural that we would want to take what we learn and apply it to modern day, but again, we won't understand the past unless we learn about it on its own terms.
As far as the "good" and the "bad," I think you're right to suggest that Sallust felt like each faction mixed the good, the bad, and the corrupt. The big takeaway here is that the Historian (Sallust) can look at this period without any favoritism towards either faction and dismiss them all as corrupt . . . it seems a pretty harsh position for a Roman historian to take, but that just goes to show how corrupt Sallust really thought the system had become.
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