Athens Taught Its Conquerors How Power Corrupts

Greek philosophy did not emerge from calm reflection. It was forged in the wreckage of the Peloponnesian War, a conflict that shattered Athens and left its thinkers searching for order. Plato watched his city execute his teacher. Aristotle fled Athens fearing the same fate. This book traces how their ideas-the Forms, the ideal state, ethics as a science-were responses to political collapse. It sho...