Theodor Mommsen Quotes

All comparisons between America's current place in the world and anything legitimately called an empire in the past reveal ignorance and confusion about any reasonable meaning of the concept empire, especially the comparison with the Roman Empire.

As we all know from the Roman empire, big empires go down if the borders are not well-protected.

The main motivation was to explore the empire's falling. I mean 'Duck City' is like an allegory for the Western Empire or the United States. And I was thinking what happens when it falls and declines like the Roman Empire.

And Caesar shall go forth.

You know, the Brits had a way of - running an empire. And I don't think America is comfortable with an empire.

Nothing the European mind ever devised was meant to do anything but to facilitate the European's control over the world.

How is the Empire?

On Earth, God has placed no more than two powers, and as there is in Heaven but one God, so is there here one Pope and one Emperor. Divine providence has specially appointed the Roman Empire to prevent the continuance of schism in the Church.

Ancient Rome was as confident of the immutability of its world and the continual expansion and improvement of the human lot as we are today.

If the Romans had been obliged to learn Latin, they would never have found time to conquer the world.

I still have my talent. Emperors cannot take that away. As long as there is a Roman Empire, I will be read.

Take care always to remember that you are a Roman.... Have a care you are not too much of a Caesar!

For Carolina once ruined and destroyed, the extermination of her [England's] colonial dependencies will follow.

Rome shall not rule America.

Whereas the British were generally quite open about the fact that they were running an empire, few Americans politicians today would use the “e” word as anything other than a term of abuse.

We are the Romans of the modern world—the great assimilating people.

Having conceived a violent enmity to them Caligula [The Roman Emperor] took possession of the synagogues in the other cities after beginning with those of Alexandria, by filling them with images and statues of himself...

For any imperial policy to work effectively...it needs moral and intellectual guidance...It is much to be doubted that the United States can continue to play an imperial role without the endorsement of its intellectual class...

Where is this godly tower of Commonwealth, which the English boasted they would build to overshadow Kings and be another Rome in the West?

Let it be known that war with a colony is war with England.

The history of the Roman Empire is also the history of the uprising of the Empire of the Masses, who absorb and annul the directing minorities and put themselves in their place.

The United States although a superpower was never an empire..

Now Caius Caesar [Caligula] did so grossly abuse the fortune he had arrived at, as to take himself to be a god, and to desire to be so called also, and to cut off those of the greatest nobility out of his country. He also extended his impiety as far as the Jews. Accordingly he sent Petronius with an army to Jerusalem to place his statues in the temple, and commanded him that, in case the Jews would not admit of them, he should slay those that opposed it, and carry all the rest into captivity.

From the very beginning, Americans have exhibited a taste for expansion, an appetite for empire. One of the fundamental reasons for this is very clear. Like every other western empire that has ever existed, Americans may claim to have inherited the mantle of ancient Rome.

The British especially have no excuse for forgetting that empire is a most complex and persistent beast. And it has claws.