Urban Prospects

The Cities of Man & the Dwelling Place of the Lord
by Anthony Esolen

I am not fond of cities. Cain, a tiller of the soil, was the first man in Scripture to have founded a city. Thus does the sacred author, with a laconic suggestion, associate the height and the strength of the city with the murder of a brother. Saint Augustine was not slow to miss the point, and after the vindictive Alaric and his Goths went on their spree and put Rome to the torch, he spread his carbolic acid on the open wound, noting that the eternal city, begun in time and to end in time, was founded by another brother-murderer, Romulus. Livy gives . . .

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Anthony Esolen is a professor at Magdalen College of the Liberal Arts in Warner, New Hampshire, and the author of many books, including Life Under Compulsion (ISI Books), Real Music: A Guide to the Timeless Hymns of the Church (Tan, with a CD), Out of the Ashes: Rebuilding American Culture (Regnery), and The Hundredfold: Songs for the Lord (Ignatius Press, 2019). He has also translated Dante's Divine Comedy (Random House). He is a senior editor of Touchstone.

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