To wake the soul by tender strokes of art

A few months back (you can check the archives if so are so inclined (and bored beyond belief (lest why would you be checking blog archives? (and, come to think of it, perhaps if you are so bored, you should think about finding a hobby (I'd suggest reading good books (if you need a recommendation, you can check the archives (which (it would seem) has created a problem of infinite regress (which I suppose can be avoided by simply adding an infinite string of parenthetical asides to keep a forward momentum to the thought process, thereby avoiding the start of the aforementioned infinite regress (yes, I know that starting a different infinite process does not solve the problem (what problem?, you ask. Haven't you been paying attention? (But, I digress (no kidding, you say))))))))))), I noted that I was mentioning Addison's play, Cato, in an attempt to see if so mentioning it would finally induce me to get around to reading it. It worked. The Power of the Blog and all that.  (It is worth noting that the Power of the Blog seems to be inextricably tied to the Problem of the Blog, said problem being the temptation to pile parenthetical asides on top of one another for no apparent reason than that one's mind starts to wander and the blog seems to replicate said wandering of mind.  I have just spent two hours writing about Julius Caesar with nary a parenthetical aside in sight, and suddenly, with only lunch intervening between then and now, I find a plethora of parentheses.  The Problem of the Blog, indeed.)

The review: It was good. Not Great, but good. It is easy to see why the American Founding Fathers loved it so much. They cast themselves in the role of Cato fighting against the tyrannical ruler Caesar. The play is filled with stirring lines such as:
"It is not now a time to talk of aught
But chains or conquest, liberty or death."
[See Patrick Henry (Give me Liberty or Give me Death).]
Or, consider:
"what pity is it
That we can die but once to serve our country!"
[See Nathan Hale (I regret that I have but one life to give for my country).]

I enjoyed reading the play, but I also enjoyed thinking afterwards about why this play, which was once so immensely popular in American society that people could refer to it without attribution, assuming everyone knew the play (the footnotes in the edition I have (from the invaluable Liberty Fund) also note other such instances by luminaries such as John Adams and George Washington), should now be completely forgotten. I suspect it has to do with the death of honor (marvelously discussed in Bowman's Honor: A History).  I am not sure how well this play would resonate today.  The people who still care much about honor, who are still willing to die for liberty, are now, sadly, not the same people who go to the theater to watch 18th century plays.  How many college graduates do I know who would sincerely regret that they could only die once for their country?  How many college graduates do I know that would honestly prefer death to a lack of liberty?  If fighting wars depended on elite society, we would be in very big trouble.