Page:Christian Greece and Living Greek.djvu/29

AN HISTORICAL SKETCH OF GREEK. 7 land of heroes, of liberty, came under bondage, and the powerful and creative spirit of the old Greeks weakened. The history of the Greek language is the mirror of the history of the Greek nation. Naturally enough, a depressed and suppressed nation cannot create national works. Patriot- ism, national pride, free political life, and re- ligion are necessary to inspire the creation of great monuments of literature. While the later Greeks, however, could no longer write classi- cally, they retained a keen sense for the beauties of the classical language. Instead of creating new works themselves, they became imitators of the old writers, scrupulous imitators of their words and forms. All nations have more or less a double lan- guage; nowhere do the illiterate use the same forms and words as the educated ; even the latter use only exceptionally artistic and choice lan- guage. A well-marked diglossy has existed among the Greeks at all times. When, after Alexander the Great, Greek had become the world and court language, a lan- guage for prose, the language for the educated class was created, the so-called xocv-^, the general, and the foundations of this general language