Enantiodromia

The word's a term from Heraclitus coined by Jung to mean the compulsion toward opposites, acc.Susan Cheever in her book, ee cummings, a life.

Cummings-Pound – Williams – Elliot – for that matter Stevens-the last generation to have to learn the classics, i.e. to take the classics seriously as a generative artistic/literary/creative force and to use them as basis for their own work.

In them days one was expected to read a little, if not a lot, Greek and Latin. Not that it made for a better world to do so-it didn't- but that by knowing the classics one could know what had been good and how it had gone bad and speak sensibly about each.

We'll never know what's been lost by the gradual extinction of the classics in our educational curriculum, but we can see what's been gained: an empire that's learned almost nothing from Athens and Rome, ruled by an elite class with the good sense to know enough about power to know it works best when the people they rule know slightly less than they do but are under the illusion they know more.