Cicero

Roman Statesman 2,000 years ago

Two thousand years ago, Cicero, a Roman statesman, said, “A nation can survive its fools, and even the ambitious. But it cannot survive treason from within.

“For the traitor appears not a traitor - He speaks in the accents familiar to his victims, and he appeals to the baseness that lies deep in the hearts of all men. He rots the soul of a nation - he works secretly and unknown in the night to undermine the pillars of a city - he infects the body politic so that it can no longer resist. A murderer is less to be feared.”

Cicero saw life on the surface not spiritually. He was completely blind to the fact that the traitor does not know what he or she is doing in the spirit. That doesn’t lessen their crime, but knowing it changes how we draw strength within us to resist. We are not helpless victims unless we allow political predators, who are victims of their own blindness, to limit our response to them to the easy path of hatred and mindless anger.

We cannot love Name (God or Life) without loving a traitor, for Name is in a traitor like everyone else. They are not the source of their own lives. They are not gods. By loving them in the image of Name, we love Name in them and regain our strength to resist spirituality.

The Eyes of Democracy (Introduction and Index of Articles)