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Quote#Freedom

It has been said that Homer was the Bible of the Greeks. The remark…

Quote byJohn Bagnell Bury · 1861–1927

Commonly attributed — not confirmed in an authoritative edition. Cited on Wikiquote to: A History of Freedom of Thought (1913), p. 24.

English (original)

It has been said that Homer was the Bible of the Greeks. The remark exactly misses the truth. The Greeks fortunately had no Bible, and this fact was both an expression and an important condition of their freedom. Homer's poems were secular, not religious, and it may be noted that they are freer from immorality and savagery than sacred books that one could mention.

— John Bagnell Bury

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