Category: 10th Grade English

Livy, also known as Titus Livius, was a Roman Historian, which means he wrote about Roman History.   Some of Livy’s works include some accounts of Rome that expand over seven hundred years. Sadly, some of those accounts did not survive to this day. He provides us with insight on Early Rome, but we cannot fully rely on them. If he cannot tell us much on ancient events or he does not know what happened, he either leaves out that part, or he fills in the blanks with his own thoughts of what happened.

Ovid, also known as Pūblius Ovidius Nāsō, was a Roman poet. He lived during the reign of Augustus. He also wrote “a monumental history of Rome and the Roman people”. This is titled Ab Urbe Condita. Sometime in 8 BC, Ovid was banished to the Black Sea region by Augustus. About the same time he began writing a book called Metamorphoses. In this book, he tells of the story of creation (the way he thinks it goes), all the way through time up to the death of Julius Caesar. There is a main theme in this book. It is the “change of the gods”.

Both of these authors start the story with creation and provide background to it. Later, they use this background to describe how Rome came to be an important part of western  civilization. They both added their own accounts of origins of the city of Rome. Although their accounts are different, there are some similarities. Their stories of creation are basically the same as the great poet Hesiod’s in his book the Theogony. They are not exactly the same, however, they do follow the same storyline as the Theogony. They both include the corruption of man, but they follow different paths. Each of the author’s books each explained different ways of dealing with the corruption of mankind, but in different ways, however, they both end up in building up great hope for Rome.

Livy wrote his own account of the foundation of Rome. He explains that there was once two brothers, abandoned, and alone. Their names were Romulus and Remus. All they had, was each other. They were eventually found as baby’s  by a mother wolf. They were raised in her protection and care as her own. They one day, they two brothers left the wolf and set out to build their own city. Not long after they left, they found the perfect place to build a city, but there was only enough room for one city. They soon decided that one of them could build and name the city, but the other brother would have to help the other one. After a long time of arguing about who should name the city, Romulus grew tired of the arguments and killed Remus. He therefore named the city Rome. In Ovid’s story, the god Jupiter saw the wickedness of man and sent a flood to destroy them all. The only survivors were two people named Deuclion and Pyrra. They repopulated the Earth by tossing stones over their shoulders which then turned into human beings.

In both stories, the basis for an optimistic view is hope.

 Livy, also known as Titus Livius, was a Roman Historian, which means he wrote about Roman History.   Some of Livy’s works include some accounts of Rome that expand over seven hundred years. Sadly, some of those accounts did not survive to this day. He provides us with insight on Early Rome, but we cannot fully rely on them. If he cannot tell us much on ancient events or he does not know what happened, he either leaves out that part, or he fills in the blanks with his own thoughts of what happened.

Ovid, also known as Pūblius Ovidius Nāsō, was a Roman poet. He lived during the reign of Augustus. He also wrote “a monumental history of Rome and the Roman people”. This is titled Ab Urbe Condita. Sometime in 8 BC, Ovid was banished to the Black Sea region by Augustus. About the same time he began writing a book called Metamorphoses. In this book, he tells of the story of creation (the way he thinks it goes), all the way through time up to the death of Julius Caesar. There is a main theme in this book. It is the “change of the gods”.

Both of these authors start the story with creation and provide background to it. Later, they use this background to describe how Rome came to be an important part of western  civilization. They both added their own accounts of origins of the city of Rome. Although their accounts are different, there are some similarities. Their stories of creation are basically the same as the great poet Hesiod’s in his book the Theogony. They are not exactly the same, however, they do follow the same storyline as the Theogony. They both include the corruption of man, but they follow different paths. Each of the author’s books each explained different ways of dealing with the corruption of mankind, but in different ways, however, they both end up in building up great hope for Rome.

Livy wrote his own account of the foundation of Rome. He explains that there was once two brothers, abandoned, and alone. Their names were Romulus and Remus. All they had, was each other. They were eventually found as baby’s  by a mother wolf. They were raised in her protection and care as her own. They one day, they two brothers left the wolf and set out to build their own city. Not long after they left, they found the perfect place to build a city, but there was only enough room for one city. They soon decided that one of them could build and name the city, but the other brother would have to help the other one. After a long time of arguing about who should name the city, Romulus grew tired of the arguments and killed Remus. He therefore named the city Rome. In Ovid’s story, the god Jupiter saw the wickedness of man and sent a flood to destroy them all. The only survivors were two people named Deuclion and Pyrra. They repopulated the Earth by tossing stones over their shoulders which then turned into human beings.

In both stories, the basis for an optimistic view is hope.

 Cicero’s full name was Marcus Tullius Cicero. According to Wikipedia, “Marcus Tullius Cicero was a Roman statesman, lawyer, scholar, philosopher and Academic Skeptic, who tried to uphold optimate principles during the political crises that led to the establishment of the Roman Empire.” He was born on January 3rd, in the year one hundred and six BC. Catiline’s full name was Lucius Sergius Catilina. According to Wikipedia, “Lucius Sergius Catilina, known in English as Catiline, was a Roman patrician, soldier and senator of the 1st century BC best known for the second Catilinarian conspiracy, an attempt to overthrow the Roman Republic and, in particular, the power of the aristocratic Senate.”

How important was the rhetorical Context of Cicero’s orations: his listeners’ fear of Catiline’s conspiracy and army? Rhetorical means “relating to the art of rhetoric”. Rhetoric means “the art of effective or persuasive speaking or writing, especially the use of figures of speech and other compositional techniques.” Rhetoric was actually very important in Cicero’s speeches. If he did not use rhetoric in his speeches, then he would not have impacted the world as he did with rhetoric. So the rhetoric he used in his speeches impacted the world in his day some-what. It was said that he was one of the most efficient users of rhetoric in history and he was regarded for his rhetoric abilities. Cicero was a Roman politician and served as counsel in the year sixty-three BC. In his speeches, he was consistent with a goal that he delivered in his speech and the speech was pretty much based off of that one goal. The victim was entirely outmatched against Cicero’s rhetoric and every victim knew that he or she was defeated even before the accusations began. Cicero was a powerful man just by his very unique rhetoric. Just the thought of being pursued by this man made the victim daunted.

In one of Cicero’s accusations, he confronted a man named Catiline. It was believed that Catiline was attempting to overthrow the city, which he was. He even considered Catiline as being the source of all evil in Rome and he said it in front of the Roman senate. He actually delivered four, completely different orientations, all of which hade a different goal, but they were all focusing on the one goal of getting rid of Catiline and all his followers and his conspiracy from the city forever.

In this speech, Cicero used rhetoric as he did in any other speech. In this speech, he used his rhetoric to emotionally move and persuade his audience so that they will take action against Catiline and his conspiracy. In his speech, Cicero used rhetoric to persuade Catiline to leave Rome, which he did. Not by force, but by the persuasion of Cicero’s rhetoric.

If it was not for Cicero’s rhetoric, then Catiline would have been successful in his attempt to overthrow the city. Cicero’s rhetoric was indeed unique and it was because of this that may have saved the lives of lots of people.

Cicero’s full name is Marcus Tullius Cicero (106 BC-43 BC). He was a statesman, lawyer, scholar, philosopher and Academic Skeptic in the Roman society. It is believed by a lot of people that Cicero was one of the greatest rhetoric (According to Google, rhetoric means “the art of effective or persuasive speaking or writing, especially the use of figures of speech and other compositional techniques”) masters in history. He had a very unusual kind of power. This pow.er was that in the arguments in which he participated in, he was very persuasive. This is a very unusual kind of power. He was also a lawyer and a politician. While he was a lawyer, he had a verbal confrontation in which he attacked a guy. His name was Catiline. Catiline at that time was a part of the Roman senate. However, he had his very own organizations. It was because of this that there were suspicions drifting through the city that he might overthrow the city.

In this political orientation delivered by Cicero, he used his rhetoric skills to address Catiline. The goal of Cicero in this orientation was to make Catiline want to leave the city, though he does not make this obvious in this speech. The entire orientation was focused on this one point. With a master of rhetoric being a lawyer and “attacking” people must have really intimidated them. If I were Catiline, then I would try to persuade Cicero to believe why I did what I did, which in this case is building his own organization. Cicero made accusations against Catiline which may or may not have been true. But, basically, Cicero considered Catiline a huge threat toward the Romans and the Roman Republic. Cicero’s accusations against Catiline were actually not specific nor direct. In this way, he did not refer specifically to any wrongdoings that Catiline might have done. If I were Catiline, then I would try to get Cicero to specify his accusations and provide solid proof for them.

I wonder why Catiline never never tried to change the mind of Cicero. Maybe because they were true. Maybe because they did have solid proof and there was nothing that he could have done. Maybe because they never gave him to talk and defend themselves. There were multiple things that he could have done to defend himself, yet he did not use any of them. There were also multiple things that Cicero could have done to make Catiline not able to talk, or just not want to talk. Or maybe Catiline thought it would just be best if he remained silent.

After he was banished along with his army, some time later he attacked Rome which was what he was going to do anyway.

The reasons for Catiline’s silence is unknown to us because it was not recorded in the text. If I were in Catiline’s place, then I would confront Cicero and ask of what proof they have. And depending on the answer, things would go from there.

Works and Days was written by Hesiod. Hesiod was an ancient Greek poet. It is believed that Hesiod was active from 750 BC and 650 BC, which is about the same as Homer (writer of  The Odyssey and The Iliad). Works and Days is a didactic poem. It was written around 700 BC and contains eight hundred and twenty-eight lines.

The Eumenides was written by Aeschylus. Aeschylus was another ancient Greek poet. He specialized in Greek tragedies and very often in his life, he wrote multiple Greek tragedies, some of which survived to this day. He was often called the Father of Greek Tragedy. The Eumenides was considered as being culturally important by scholars. It was also considered as being originally published in 458 BC.

In these two plays, there are two very different world views on cause and effect ethically in history. In Greek civilization, there is confusion on ultimate sovereignty throughout the history of the Greeks. For example, Zeus is king of the gods, yet, he does not have ultimate sovereignty over the world. He owns the gods, but only part of the world. All the gods share all the world. This causes a lot of confusion on which god the people should follow because each god has a different set of rules and laws. This causes some confusion, so it is up to the people to decide which god to follow. Even though these plays are different in some ways, they also have some similarities in other ways.

In Works and Days, Hesiod tells his brother Perses how to live a good life. He hopes that once Perses knows of this advice, he will ignore the courts and share a large portion of land with Hesiod (which he inherited from his father once he died). Part of this advice is telling Perses not to listen to the courts, but rather omens sent by the gods. In The Eumenides, it says that the gods are above men, however, the gods give men the power of judgement in the courts and that men should listen to them. These two statements are very similar even though these statements come from two very different books. Works and Days and The Eumenides, which are very different on world views and many other things, but there are some similarities, which you just saw here. There are many other similarities, however, I do not know of any more.

It also says that in Works and Days, Hesiod says to his brother that he needs to directly obey the gods, which is part of his “brotherly advice” on how to “live a good and prosperous life” (He can do this by listening to the omens sent by the gods, like what I said in the last paragraph). In The Eumenides, it says that the gods gave man this power, so man should listen to the courts (exactly what Hesiod does not what Perses to do in Works and Days). This is a huge difference between Works and Days and The Eumenides. It is very confusing.

The Libation Bearers is a second part of a trilogy written by a Greek playwright named Aeschylus.

Aeschylus was born in Eleusis, Greece 6th century BC and died in Gela Italy 5th century BC. He was an ancient Greek who wrote many Greek tragedy’s, one of which is The Libation Bearers. He is commonly called the “Father of Greek Tragedy”. His plays were so good that some of them that have survived to this day have been made into movies!

In this tragedy, the dialogue is continued from the first part of the play. Remember, The Libation Bearers is the second part to a tragic play. This entire series is based on a series of blood guilt justice which takes place inside the house of the man Agamemnon. Like several different tragedies, this one takes place after the Trojan War. It is also effected by the Trojan War. A series of events after and as a result of the Trojan War.

In this tragic, the main character Orestes has come face-to-face with a very difficult decision. After his father, Agamemnon is murdered, Orestes has sworn to the god Apollo that he will avenge his father and kill the murderer that killed his father. However, a little while later, he finds out that his father’s murderer is his own mother, Clytaemnestra. And Clytaemnestra found a new lover, Aegisthus. They were in the killing of Agamemnon together. If Orestes does not avenge his father, then he will face the insane consequences of Apollo and the furies (spirits that haunt you until you die if you do not keep a promise to do something) of his father. They inflict a lot of pain and suffering on you. However, if he kills his mother, Clytaemnestra, then he will have to face her household furies. Either way, he will suffer at the hands of the furies. This is a very hard decision. He eventually seeks advice on what he must do and ends up killing his mother. After that, he says that he must flee and go far away to avoid his mother’s household furies.

Back then, there was not a system of government like there is today now. Back then, if someone killed a family member of yours, then it was your family’s responsibility to avenge that dead family member of yours. It was an “eye for an eye” world back then.

If Orestes was alive today, then he would need a completely different course of action. This series began with Agamemnon offering his daughter, Iphogenia, as a sacrifice during the Trojan War. Then Clytaemnestra avenged Iphogenia by killing Agamemnon. And Orestes avenged Agamemnon. If they had a government system like the one we have today, then the murders would be taken to court. However, these murders were personal to the families. there was no government to stop them. If Orestes was alive today, then he would have taken this matter to the court, and they could have solved the problem. If Orestes had been living today, then things would have been different.

What was Aeschylus’s view of the Trojan war? Aeschylus was born in Eleusis, Greece, in the late sixteenth century BC. He died in Gela, Italy, in the mid fifth century BC. He was known in ancient Greek history as “the father of tragedy”. He has earned this title because he wrote many Greek tragic plays. It was said that he wrote many plays, however, not very many of the plays still survive to this day. A very small amount. Probably his most famous tragedy ever was a play called “Agamemnon”. In this play he includes some of his account on the Trojan War. He only provides brief accounts of his view of this devastating and famous war, however. This is a dramatic tragedy and one who wants to read it and understand it needs to do more than just read it.

The Trojan war was a very famous war. However, nobody knows if the Trojan War even existed.  However, some people spend their entire life searching for Troy, trying to prove that Troy really existed, and then trying to figure out if the Trojan war really happened. There is very little proof, however, some people believe that they are extremely close to uncovering the truth about Troy and the Trojan War. The war was said to have lasted ten years. And in the end of the war, Troy was eventually destroyed forever. It was said that the Greeks were the ones fighting the Trojans. They too, suffered a great loss of Greek warriors and men.

In the play, the main character was Agamemnon. The play showed him offering up a human sacrifice, his own daughter, Iphigenia. This sacrifice was to settle issues that are war related. In this tragedy, the play itself was not wicked, but the attitude of Agamemnon was wicked. It was wicked of him to kill his daughter and show no mercy to her. He did not even struggle to command the act of killing her. He was very wicked. Aeschylus, I think, was trying to say how the Trojan war effected the minds of people. If that is what he was trying to say, then they were wicked people during the war. This was just one of the wicked things that took place during the war. Imagine what other things were going on during the war! I think that what Aeschylus was trying to say, is that the Trojan War poisoned and destroyed the minds of people.

There was not even justice during the war! If someone killed a family member of yours, than you and your family had the right to get revenge by killing the person who killed your family member. Bloodshed was justified by even more bloodshed. In the play, men had no morals, and without morals, mankind are no more than animals. The ability to apply reason. That is the thing that sets man aside from animals. Take away reason from man, and they become animals, having no mind of their own. Do not become like those men (yes, I am talking to you). Those are some of the reasons of Aeschylus’ view of the Trojan war. 

Hesiod was a Greek poet. He was regularly thought He wrote many poems including The Theogony, in which he tells us he tells of the genealogy of the Greek gods.  Another great poem he wrote was Works and Days, in which he try’s to persuade his brother Perses to share the land which their father had given him after he died. In this poem it has two parts. The first part gives him advice on ethical instruction on the way humans should live their lives. The second part gives him advice on how humans should practically live. In this poem by Hesiod, the purpose of it was to persuade Perses into sharing the land with him. However, Hesiod included his view of “mankind’s past and future” in this poem.

Hesiod tells us through his poem that there were five ages of humankind. First, there was the golden age. It was a perfect world, man stayed young and did not grow up, and man lived like gods. Second, there was the silver age. Man had to work. However, man did not grow up until they were one hundred years old. Third, there was the bronze age. In this age, everything was made of bronze. The animals, the food, the plants, even the people! Fourth, there were the demigods. The demigods were a race of hero men. Not quite gods, yet, not quite man. Fifth, was the iron age. Hesiod tells us that the iron age is the era that we humans live in now. As we can see, the iron age is the lowest out of all the ages. He also tells us that the iron age is doomed. He says that in the future Zeus, the king of the gods, will ultimately destroy us forever.

Despite this tragic event that Hesiod thought would take place, he still said that man should still pray to and rely on Zeus to help them (weird). Hesiod is telling us that, being man, we should live our lives in justice and hard work. However, at death, it is over. The future for mankind has death written all over it.

According to Hesiod, in order to live a good life until death comes, you need to pray and listen to Zeus and live our lives according to how he wants us to live our lives. If a person does not do this, and worse, does not even ask Zeus for how his life shall be lived or something that Zeus really does not like at all, Zeus shall inflict on him terrible sanctions. However, if a person asks Zeus for help, and lives his life accordingly, he shall attain rewards from Zeus. If a man is able to please Zeus and make him happy by doing what he said, then you can attain short term rewards from him on earth. But in the future of mankind, there is only death and darkness for everyone on this earth, and Zeus is basically that darkness and death.

The Theogony was written by Hesiod. It is a poem focused on the dumb, Greek gods. It tells of their origin, birth, genealogies, etc. Hesiod was a Greek poet and is called the “father of Greek didactic poetry” very often. Genesis, the very first book of the Bible, is all true, talking about God, how the world came into order, and how man was created. It was written by God, the true god. In this essay, I will be saying the differences between the two books.

In the Theogony, it mentions gods being formed somehow and then them making more gods and it keeps going on and on and on. So, the Theogony has a lot of gods mentioned in it. Where as in Genesis, God was there in the beginning. He was not supernaturally created. He was no created by another. He is also the only god. There is only one god in the Bible. That is a huge difference between the two books.

Another one, is that in the Theogony, there were only human, immortal men to begin with. The gods created them and were done. However, man did something that the gods did not like and as punishment, the gods gave them human, immortal women as a curse. However, in Genesis, God created man, and then as man started to get lonely God created woman as a gift, a blessing. I do not know why the Theogony says that woman is a curse given by the gods to mankind, but who agrees with me that that is just weird? I am going to guess everyone who reads this essay will agree with me.

These two books are both origins of the universe, however, they are from completely different world views. The  Theogony was accepted by the Greeks, and the Bible was accepted by the Hebrews. The Bible, specifically the book of Genesis, tells how the world came into order. On day one God created the heavens and earth. On day two God created the firmament. On day three God created the dry land and vegetation. On day four God created the sun, moon, stars, pretty much everything other than the earth and heavens. On day five God created the birds of the sky and sea creatures. On day six God created land creatures and man. On day seven God rested. In the Theogony Hesiod does not know how the world came into order, but he claims that he got his words from the Muses, which he says are the daughters of the god Zeus. That is so, so not right.

The Theogony and Genesis are both very different, like different gods, different world views, etc. There are too many differences to even fit in this entire paper! However, I gave you some of the main differences between these two books. Basically, the entire books themselves and everything they have in them are different. I am so glad that I believe in the Bible and not Hesiod’s Theogony.

What is the view of the biblical materials on the role of ethics in the development of history? Well that is what I am going to be talking about in this essay. In the Bible, there are several biblical views that are present in  ethics that are in history to this day. These views are present throughout the entire Bible. For example, If you feel stressed remember this verse: ” Consider it pure joy, my brothers, and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.” – James 1:2-4. Another one is about love: “Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs.” – Corinthians 13:4-5. There are many other verses that people use to get them through the day.

A lot of Bible verses all contain one specific theme. According to ethics, sanctions will be given. If the person (the one who the sanctions are being given to) wants good sanctions, he must obey God’s law and do good. This way he gets good sanctions. If he does the opposite of this than he will receive bad sanctions, and nobody likes bad sanctions. Sanctions, good or bad, are determined on what you do, what you think, what you say, etc. People can choose whether they live a good life or a bad one. It is their decision. Nobody can make them change. Not even God can make them change, but he knows the outcome, and it either good or bad. Lets hope that it’s good. It has been a thing that has remained constant throughout all of history.

A life of wisdom and righteousness eventually leads to good sanctions and a life of evil and wickedness eventually leads to bad sanctions. It a life of wisdom and righteousness eventually leads to good sanctions and a life of evil and wickedness eventually leads to bad sanctions, then why do people still do wicked things if it brings them bad sanctions? Well, people delight in wicked things and they do not care about the sanctions. If they do know about the sanctions though then again, why do they still do it? Because, once they have been exposed to a bad thing, and the become addicted to it, they lose sight of the sanctions. They do not care about it any more. They like the bad things that they are exposed to so much, that they lose sight of Godly things.

A good sanction used in the Bible was when God gave Noah the instructions to build the ark because they were good to God and served him. There are many other good and bad sanctions used in the Bible. A bad one was when David took Bathsheba for his wife then killed her husband. Because of this God killed David’s first son. Sanctions can be good or bad. I hope you get a good one.