But this spirit of dedication was slowly eroded in the Age of Commerce by the action of money. People make money for themselves, not for their country. Thus periods of affluence gradually dissolved the spirit of service, which had caused the rise of the imperial races. During this time affluence builds to such a degree that what was once luxury becomes commonplace. Then the pursuit of knowledge and credentials take center stage and pave the way for the “Age of Intellect.” As stated in Fate of Empires, “the impression that the situation can be saved by mental cleverness, without unselfishness or human self-dedication, can only lead to collapse” leading to the final stage, the “Age of Decadence.” In the parabolic trajectory of an empire, what comes next is “High Noon,” the transition from conquest and commerce to affluence. “Service” is replaced by “selfishness.” A defensive mindset takes hold of the nation, manifested in such tangible signs as Hadrian’s Wall and the Maginot Line. Conquest and military readiness are seen as immoral by a stagnant, wealth-focused citizenry. Money being in better supply than courage, subsidies instead of weapons are employed to buy off enemies. To justify this departure from ancient tradition, the human mind easily devises its own justification. Military readiness, or aggressiveness, is denounced as primitive and immoral. Civilised peoples are too proud to fight. In the eighth and ninth centuries, the caliphs of Baghdad achieved fabulous wealth owing to the immense extent of their territories, which constituted a single trade bloc. The empire of the caliphs is now divided into some twenty-five separate ‘nations’.

The conquest of vast areas of land and their subjection to one government automatically acts as a stimulant to commerce. Both merchants and goods can be exchanged over considerable distances. Moreover, if the empire be an extensive one, it will include a great variety of climates, producing extremely varied products, which the different areas will wish to exchange with one another. We see this today in the growing conflict in European countries such as France and the Netherlands, where large numbers of immigrants are stoking violent cultural clashes. German chancellor Angela Merkel recently made headlines when she stated that attempts to create a multicultural society had "utterly failed" and immigrants must do more to integrate into society. No model can describe reality in an absolute way, and this model, like any other, is an approximation of truth. But it can give us a glimpse to certain realities.

Big takeaways

Because of their prominent locations within the empire, their influence greatly exceeds their percentage of the population. Here diversity plainly leads to divisiveness. It is very difficult to do one's duty. I was considered a barbarian because at the storming of the Praga 7,000 people were killed. Europe says that I am a monster. I myself have read this in the papers, but I would have liked to talk to people about this and ask them: is it not better to finish a war with the death of 7,000 people rather than to drag it on and kill 100,000. As in the case of the Athenians, intellectualism leads to discussion, debate and argument, such as is typical of the Western nations today. Your podcast conversations with Michael Anton are the very best on the Internet. I hope there will be many more. Whenever I listen to Anton I have the impression that his actual views are stronger than what he says publicly. Maybe I’m wrong. In part two he tries to illustrate his principles in history, chiefly in Rome and China. The family under the older republic was agnatic, i.e., it took pride in descendants as well as ancestors, and Rome was strong as long as that interest continued. When in the later republic and the empire, the individual considered himself in opposition to the race, and adoption or childlessness took the place of propagation in many cases, Rome was doomed, because a ruthless competition for lust and pleasure wore out the individual or brought him in opposition to society, and the dissolution of the Roman state became only a question of time.

According to Glubb, they normally do this not "from motives of conscience, but rather because of the weakening of a sense of duty in citizens, and the increase in selfishness, manifested in the desire for wealth and ease." He spent the remainder of his life writing books and articles, mostly on the Middle East and on his experiences with the Arabs. Commerce, by its nature, also promotes the dissemination of knowledge, arts, and luxury, and the development of technology. At this Age of the empire, commercial initiative is celebrated side by side with courage, patriotism, and devotion to duty. Education forms strong people, aiming to serve their nation to the best of their abilities. After the war, Glubb was sent by the British to Iraq, sometime Mesopotamia, then under administration by the British as a League of Nations mandate. In 1926, he took service directly with the new government of Iraq. The British also administered the contiguous Emirate of Transjordan (which later, in 1946, became the country of Jordan), and in 1930 Glubb joined the Arab Legion, a small body of men formed by the British as the nucleus of an army for the Transjordan. In this capacity, he became intimately familiar with the land, its people, and its rulers, the Hashemite kings of the region, who still rule Jordan. In 1939, he took over command of the Arab Legion, which had grown greatly and became the actual army of the Transjordan, then of Jordan itself, and ultimately the largest armed force in the area. This made Glubb in effect the chief military officer (whom they called “Glubb Pasha”) of Jordan, responsible directly to the King, and he had considerable influence in government. He led the Legion against Israel in the 1948 Arab-Israeli war, and left command, to return to England, in 1956. Ancient Greece is a peculiar example given their high development of reason, the shortness of its duration, and the suddenness of its vanishment. The Greeks achieved one of the most influential but short-lived civilizations by focusing exclusively on reason and population control (birth control, eugenics). Eventually, this “great breed” died out.

I tend to have a pretty long gestation period for ideas before I start writing them down – mostly because I’m constantly so busy that dropping everything to start a new book every time I get inspired is impractical, to say the least. My latest idea, which is about four books down the pipeline, came from revisiting both Hellraiser and Jane Eyre in the same fortnight and, much as I want to cheat on the novel I’m currently writing (and the other one I’m currently editing) with it, my to-do list would become sentient and papercut me to death if I tried. Which would also be interesting premise for a story…