Chapter 1, East and West Summary and Analysis

In this critical chapter, the author establishes her assessment of the unique and eternal achievements of fifth Century BCE Athenian culture. In this chapter, she also introduces several basic dichotomies that will prevail and define her understanding of the various writers and events of the period in the ensuing chapters.

Her assessment of the intellectual and cultural achievement of Athenian culture is clearly stated: "Something had awakened in the minds and spirits of the men there which was so to influence the world that the slow passage of long time, of century upon century and the shattering changes they brought, would be powerless to wear away that deep impress. Athens had entered upon her brief and magnificent flowering of genius which so molded the world of mind and of spirit that our mind and spirit...