In 1776, an interesting year, a man named Edward Gibbon wrote a series of books entitled The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. In the final volume he explained his theory of the five reasons why the great Roman Empire fell. While you read the list keep in mind that it was written 234 years ago and described a period of 1,300 years before. Also ask yourself if any of them apply to today’s culture.

1. The Love of show and luxury.
2. A widening gap between the rich and the poor.(referring to wealth envy)
3. An obsession with sex.
4. Freakishness in the arts posing as originality.
5. Increased desire to live off the state.

Is our culture today greater than the Great Roman Empire? Are we stronger than they were? Are we prepared to stand up against the fall of our society? Benjamin Disraeli explained The Cycle of the Body Politic in the 1800s. It describes the progression of a society and has been proven to be true in many cases. Here is my summary:

- People start in bondage.
- From bondage they find spiritual truth which ultimately cannot be denied.
- Because of this spiritual truth people find courage.
- This courage causes them to fight for their freedom.
- Out of freedom comes an abundance of things and money.
- Abundance creates a lack of appreciation and selfishness.
- Selfishness turns into complacency. The lack of ambition to change a bad sitution.
- Complacency over time creates apathy. Not caring about the bad sitution altogether.
- Apathy breeds fear of the fellow man.
- Fear creates dependency on the state or someone who promises protection.
- Before long dependency will enslave the people and they're back to bondage.

We can look at the cycle of the body politic and see our country, can't we? We can debate where we are on this cycle. There are glimpses of each of these stages nationwide but none of them are as predominant as the last stage; the fifth reason why Rome fell. Dependency on the state. In America today, 4 out of 10 people are receiving governement assistance in some form. That's 40% of the people that are dependant upon the state. When that number reaches 51%, it's all over.