[But] the man who dares not expose his life in the defence of his children and his property, has lost in society the first and most active energies of nature.

Greek is doubtless the most perfect [language] that has been contrived by the art of man.

That country [Carthage] was rapidly sinking into the state of barbarism from whence it had been raised by the Phoenician colonies and Roman laws; and every step of intestine discord was marked by some deplorable victory of savage man over civilized society.

The land was then covered with morasses and forests, which spread to a boundless extent, whenever man has ceased to exercise his dominion over the earth.