The King, Socrates, And I

Recently I had the opportunity to see my old high school preform The King and I on stage, complete with excellent acting and harmonic musical numbers. While the theatrics were top notch, the cast also did an excellent job conveying to the audience the various themes the play had to offer, one of which I have always been particularly passionate about: Knowledge. But what exactly is The King and I? Who originally composed it? What were it's origins? These questions are good ones but outside my scope of knowledge, so I went to Wikipedia for a quick reference, and here is what I found:

"The King and I is a musical, the fifth by the team of composer Richard Rodgers and dramatistOscar Hammerstein II. It is based on the 1944 novel Anna and the King of Siam by Margaret Landon, which is in turn derived from the memoirs of Anna Leonowens, governess to the children of King Mongkut of Siam in the early 1860s. The musical's plot relates the experiences of Anna, a British schoolteacher hired as part of the King's drive to modernize his country. The relationship between the King and Anna is marked by conflict through much of the piece, as well as by a love that neither can admit. The musical premiered on March 29, 1951, at Broadway's St. James Theatre. It ran nearly three years, then the fourth longest-running Broadway musical in history, and has had many tours and revivals."

(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_King_and_I)

So Anna, a British woman, becomes the teacher to the children of the King of Siam. This position in the King's palace implies many things which are not said outright in the play. Because the whole state rests squarely on the King's shoulders, he is responsible for the lives of everyone in his kingdom, all of whom think the King is all-knowing. The King, painfully aware of this, hires Anna to instill in his children (and secretly in himself) the advanced science of the Western World. The King, trapped in a paradoxical situation, has to struggle with his people believing in his infinite wisdom, but also has to deal with the fact that he is painfully ignorant. While battling this internal conflict, the King is suddenly inspired with a balled of introspection, a verse of which runs thus:

"There are times I almost think

I am not sure of what I absolutely know

Very often find confusion

In conclusion, I concluded long ago"

Read more: The King And I - A Puzzlement Lyrics | MetroLyrics

If only the King knew just how wise he was being in knowing he did not know everything. Was it not Socrates who said: "Then the wise or temperate man, and only he, will know himself, and be able to examine what he knows or does not know, and see what others know and what they think they know and do really know, and what they do not know and fancy that they know when they do not.... And this is wisdom and temperance and self-knowledge -- for a man to know what he knows, and what he does not know. [The opposite of wisdom is, thus, to fancy that you know what you do not know (166c-d) because you are unable to distinguish between knowledge and ignorance.]" 

(http://www.roangelo.net/logwitt/charmides.html#Wisdom-is-knowledge-both-of-what-one-know-and-of-what-I-do-not-know)

The King, in questioning his knowledge, was on the road to wisdom. He came to the same conclusions Socrates did, and he arranged a plan for modernizing Siam by becoming wiser himself, teaching his children, and collecting wise advisors like Anna (although this advisory relationship was hidden). Because the King knows his ignorant condition, he is far better equipped to deal with the British ambassador when he came knocking. Without Anna's help, the King would have embarrassed himself in the eyes of the nations. In the end, the King becomes incapable of pretending omnipotence, and becomes fatally sick. Before his death, the King pronounces his young son, to be the new King. His son, was this whole time under the tutelage of Anna, and thus it was that his son, having learned much about British science, became the new King, and was able to govern Siam with what he learned from Anna. Again, the King acted wiser than he thought. 

Athenian Empire Killed Athenian Democracy

The greatest threat to Athenian democracy was Athenian empire. As Athenian influence expanded and was maintained by force of empire, Athens internal democracy became unsafe. Athens, rather than making Greece safe for democracy, imperiled democracy's very existence. Ultimately, Athens grew into Empire by creating international government, where the power was placed in Athen's favor, allowing Athens to eventually absorb other states. This tremendous injustice, while spurring Athens on to imperial omnipotence, also predicted her downfall and eventual subjugation.

How this came to pass is as long as history, but much of the pieces came into place around 449 B.C. while in the aftermath of the Persian Invasion. The war with the Persians forged new powers in Greece and Athens became one of the foremost states alongside Sparta. Most of the lesser city-states were aligned behind the two monolithic giants in a primitive League of Nations called the Delian League. Perhaps a just political union between the separate Grecian cities would be a good thing, but the Delian League was not a servant of justice, but an Athenian tool to coerce the other political bodies in the league by exacting tributes from the rest.

Athens then became very rich, but increasingly unpopular until Sparta broke off to form the Peloponnesian League, brining many of the other states in the former league with them. In addition, many of the states subject to Athens and not inducted into the Peloponnesian League dissolved the political bands which connected them to the Delian League by revolting. With such tumult and injustice in Greece, the immediate recourse was to war: The Peloponnesian War. Which war forced Athens to suffer through deadly plagues, appalling ravages, and catastrophic defeats. The conclusion of the war found Athens soundly defeated and her former democracy corrupted and degenerate. In the end, Sparta acting as overseer, replaced Athenian Democracy with whatever governance Sparta saw fit to institute. After this new development, Athens fate was not always in Athenian hands, for after Spartan rule came Thracian, then Macedonian, Alexandrian, later followed by the Romans, Byzantines, and Ottoman Turks, among other subjugators throughout time.

History is a boneyard of dead empires and conquered peoples. Moreover, there seems to be no set cast, for one is king one day and vagabond the next. The tyrant ends his days being tyrannized it seems. It is a mystery, where the Western World would be if Athens, instead of exercising cruel dominion over her fellows, acted is justice with them. What if Athens, instead of enveloping nations against their wills, only took those into the fold that came willingly? Would the world be more politically stable?

Greece And Civilization: Who Needs Gun Control?

Swords and other weapons were worn by ancient Greeks in like manner as they would wear their normal clothes; in fact, weapons were necessary accessories to any fashion statement. Did the people tout around weapons because they were eccentric, or because they were prudent? Thucydides, an Athenian general and historian during the Peloponnesian War, said that the reason why arms were a part of daily life in Athens was because they were an indispensable tool to maintain life and protect property. Once Athens became more civilized however, weapons became an inconvenience and almost unnecessary altogether. Thus weapons fell out of use in Athenian fashion. The reason Athens stopped carrying weapons was due to the fact that they simply didn't need them any longer and their persons and their property were safe whether they carried a sword or not.

However, Melissa Lane writing for The Newyorker, shared a different interpretation of what Thucydides said on the use of weapons in Athens: "...Thucydides reported that the Athenians were the first to lay aside their weapons. Whereas men in all Greek societies used to carry arms at home, this had been a sign of an uncivilized era of piracy in which the most powerful men could dominate all the rest. Laying aside the everyday wearing of weapons was part of what Thucydides believed had allowed Athens to become fully civilized, developing the commerce and culture that made her the envy of the Greek world. The Romans, too, banned the carrying of weapons within the pomerium, the sacred boundary of the city."

http://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/how-the-greeks-viewed-weapons

Her definition reports that Athens laid down their weapons, and then became civilized. Whereas, what actually happened was that Athens became civilized and then had no need of weapons. The machine that is The Left, would have America believe that we need to give up our guns, and then become civilized, when the opposite is true. We need to become more civilized, and then give up our guns because we don't need them. When murder and crime goes up, so does the need for weapons. If people think we should do away with guns because they cause barbarism, they need to question their premiss because reality tells a different story. In all truth, barbarism creates a need for guns. The questions debated in the public forums then, should not be pro-gun control or antigun gun control, but what is the best way to eliminate barbarism. Once the need for arms no longer exists, the people will exercise their own gun control privately. 

Immortal Glory: The 25 Building Blocks That Will Exalt A Nation

In relation to the other ancient powers, Greece was less than a third world country. Where the Egyptians, Babylonians, and Persians lived in splendor and plenty, the Greek suffered amidst wretchedness and famine. Where the civilized ate cake and drank wine, the Greek was lucky to scrounge stunted grain and brackish water. Where other lands had Pyramids and Hanging Gardens, Greece had not even a hovel. If Greece were placed on a scale against any of these other powers, Greece would be catapulted up into the air. How did Greece against all odds rise to empire despite the whole wealthy world against them? Is it possible that other nations, states, and persons could  replicate the process? How? Perhaps we could venture to answer this question by using our understanding of Grecian history as a guide.

All the ancient sources agree that primeval greece was barbarous unto contempt; in fact Greece could have defined the meaning of barbarism itself. The 1828 Webster's Dictionary, however, defines "Barbarism" as "3. Rudeness of manners; savagism; incivility; ferociousness; a savage state of society."  (http://webstersdictionary1828.com/Dictionary/Bbarbarism) 

What did a barbarous Greece look like? Not pretty. There were no vineyards, houses, or fields; thus, there were few people, doomed to live in misery. There were however, lots of clubs and spears for these were the implements the people used to rob and murder each other. When anyone got anything of value, bandits were not far behind. When owning a week's worth of food will get you killed, it's better to just eat for today and pray for tomorrow. Attica (the future home of Athens) was especially poor and undesirable. While other lands abounded in natural resources, Attica was sparse and barren. Because none cared to rob and slaughter such poor men in a desolate land, Attica's population boomed. Eventually Attica could no longer support her population, and some were sent to populate Ionia. Then it was that civilization started and once brother stopped killing brother, families grew rich and happy together. Men were then able to keep the fruits of their labour without fear from their neighbor's greedy sword and became an industrious people: they built houses, formed pottery, plowed fallow lands, fished, and traded. At first their wealth remained local, but soon Phoenician traders became attracted to the growing markets in greece and it was from these traders that Greece learned her letters among many other arts. Once the Greek was able to read and write, they were able to compile their oral traditions into papyrus scrolls in order to preserve their thoughts, ideas, conquests, failures, arts, and religion. Because of this, the works of Homer were preserved and we know something of the earliest exploits of the Greeks: The Trojan War.

Prior to the Trojan war, the Greeks were not considered one people, but lived in very small communities. But with the passing of time, the political atmosphere was ripe for a unified effort, which took shape in the abduction of a Grecian woman by the name of Helen. The Greeks then banded together for the first recorded time and destroyed Troy. Years latter, Persia claimed a right to invade Greece, for they considered any attack on Asia and Troy to be an offense to them. Herodotus, the ancient historian, then gives account of the Persian War.

Prior to the Persian war, the Greeks had returned to their homeland and once more separated into their separate tribes and cities; but the Persian war was again to unite Greece to a public cause. Not all the Greeks joined the cause of Greece however, for the Persians were at that time the supper power of the world, having conquered Babylon, Assyria, Egypt, and a good part of western India. Greece was among the very few places in the civilized world left unconquered, causing many Grecian states to submit willingly to Persian rule. But some states were not to be conquered, for their Patriotism was fierce. Can you  guess which to cities resisted Persian invasion? Athens and Sparta. Athens supplied a navel defense against the Persians and Sparta Prepared a land force against the same. The battle of Marathon was Athen's war against the Persians and the battle of Thermopylae was the Spartan's. Both won great renown and their people, forged in adversity became powerful and Robust. Thus Sparta and Athens became the primary states in Greece and all lesser states became subject to them.

with the passing of the Persian invasions, Greece entered a new stage of turmoil, for Athens and Sparta were both entering imperial governments, and Greece they supposed, was not big enough for the two of them and the Peloponnesian War was ignited. Sparta won the conflict, but didn't stay on top for long. Wikipedia recounts the aftermath of this Grecian strife as: "Both Athens and Sparta were later overshadowed by Thebes and eventually Macedon, with the latter uniting the Greek world in the League of Corinth (also known as the Hellenic League or Greek League) under the guidance of Phillip II, who was elected leader of the first unified Greek state in history." (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greece#History)

Thus Greece became a unified body and grew in power and prestige. Phillip II, unified the Greeks, but his son Alexander The Great would lead Greece to become the new supper power. He launched an invasion of the Persian Empire backed by the combined might of all the Greeks, spreading a Greek empire to the ends of the earth. Greeks filled the known world with their culture. As a result, the Western World found her identity. Empires won quickly and by conquest, do not last long. When Alexander died, his empire followed him to his grave. All the same though, Greece became a force to be reckoned with and changed the corse of history permanently.

Greece went from the epitome of poor to the masters of the universe, but how? Through philanthropy?Did any nation raise Greece like a mother raises a child? No, at best Greece had a few trading partners in the Phoenicians, but the Phoenicians didn't go to Greece because they were generous, but because Greece had something to offer them. Moreover, Greece was invaded multiple times! yet she somehow came out on top! How does a bunch of waring tribes become a super power? Here is a list of building blocks from the Greek's example on how to become a super power:

1. Individuals stopped plundering each other. 
2. Man did not fear relentless slaughter
3. Population boomed
4. Man did not fear being plundered
5. industry boomed 
6. Man became rich
7. Trade boomed
8. Technology boomed 
9. Education became available
10. Some men became more powerful than others
11. Power centralized
12. The waring and plundering cities stopped robing each other
13. Cities united for a common cause
14. The anatomy of power was refined 
15. Population, industry, trade, wealth, technology, and education were revolutionized
16. Prosperity invited inner tumult and external invasion (Persian Invasions)
17. The people are refined and higher morals established 
18. Population, industry, trade, wealth, technology, and education are revolutionized
19. Power struggles
20. The anatomy of power is further refined 
21. Justice prevails over injustice
22. The cities and states become unified under one government
23. Population, industry, trade, wealth, technology, and education are revolutionized
24. Influence exponentially expands 
25. A super power is formed

Each instruction is built on top of the first. A population is not built from plunder and murder! A population, on the contrary, is built upon safety and a surplus of food (wealth). If once the blocks of civilization start to tower high, and a block on the bottom is removed, then the tower will fall. If a super power becomes tyrannical, blocks are removed and the power reduced. This was how Greece went from chump to champ.

While Greece did win a place in history, she did stumble a few times. If a nation is built off of not killing each other,  destroying Troy is not a constructive (nor humane) path to victory. In a similar manner, conquering the world and subjecting other peoples dose not open the door to salvation. Furthermore, overly centralized governments typically spell ruin for any nation who supports them. As is clear, Greece had shortcomings, but she still able to construct, and out of those 25 building blocks was able to erect a monument that will stand as long as man can read.

I often imagine that I can use the past to become a powerful seer, and am able to divine the future based on my knowledge. In doing this I wonder what the fates of nations will be. Perhaps the current superpowers will topple because they removed a vital block. Perhaps there are nations currently small and weak, whom will someday be grand super powers because of their diligence in placing block upon block. I don't believe I imagine in vein, for the signs are clear: If America dares remove her foundation, she will fall. If the barbaric nations build block upon block, they will inherit the world.

Sources:
http://classics.mit.edu/Homer/iliad.html
http://classics.mit.edu/Homer/odyssey.html
http://classics.mit.edu/Herodotus/history.html
http://classics.mit.edu/Thucydides/pelopwar.html
http://webstersdictionary1828.com/Dictionary/Bbarbarism
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greece#History

You, Thieves, and Hot Dogs: A Fable

Imagine that you are taking a stroll through the park when you are suddenly assailed by thieves, but before you are pilfered, the leader engages you in conversation in the most cavalier fashion: "I thank you generously for your contributions today, as you see, we are poor men, who would otherwise perish if it twern't for your kind soul."

And with that, he and his thugs proceed to brain you with a baseball bat and borrow your wallet. Afterwards the leader examines the contents of your wallet, he takes forty percent, and leaves the rest saying: "For milk and groceries. You are welcome. Come back in two weeks."

You walk away dazed, praying that the stolen money might actually do some good for the "poor" men, and not just enable them to live riotously. As you walk, you begin to recover some of your senses, including your sense of smell. Your clever nose quickly detects a park vendor selling hot dogs.  You realize that the beating has made you terribly hungry. You walk up to the cart decked in sausage links, and ask the man politely at what price his bratwursts are. You pay, and walk away happier than you arrived.

As you walk cradling your meal in your hands, you see a crowed surrounding a shouting man standing on a soap box. Normally, you might rather continue homeward, but a piping hot brat waits for no man, so you settle down on a park bench to eat and listen. The speaker shouted thus: "Everyone listen to me! A great evil has taken over our park!"

"Good!" you think to yourself while savoring the perfectly toasted bun. "Those park pirates are going to get it now!" Between the sweet relish and sweet revenge, you barely even feel the bump on your head anymore.

The speaker exclaims, "It is the evil of money grubbing hot dog vendors! They are strangling the poor with their twisted meats! They don't pay fair wages! They are deliberately poisoning us with processed meats! They have a monopoly on in-park food! You are tricked into buying their products through clever marketing schemes! They won't just give away hot dogs to disabled kids and single mothers! The hot dogs are greasy and the sellers are greedy! Hot dogs are built on minority privilege and class rule! Hot dogs stifle creativity! Vendors cut down rare trees in the Amazon to build their carts and hire seven-year-olds to work the meat grinders! Hot dog profits have rigged the 'Parks and Recreation' elections! Hot dog vendors only care about themselves and their own dirty self-interest; they don't care if hot dogs make you happy!"

The speaker finally took a breath and continued in a more rabble rousing manner: "What we need to do is to overthrow the cart! Let's seize the evil vendor's ill-gotten gains! Let's use that money to give to the poor desolates that sadly walk this park and whom will otherwise perish if it twern't for your kind souls!"

With that last remark your blood is boiling, for you knew that slogan all to well. All the speaker said may or may not have been true, but you knew this: that the vendor did you a service, and you paid him a service in return; but the stinking highway men, who claimed to be poor, clubbed you and stole a service from you without giving anything in return. You traded with the vendor using your freewill and were happier after you made the exchange. The poor thieves pounced on you like jungle cats and left you like a dying antelope.

Knowing all this you shout objection to this absurd plan only to be beaten again and stolen from, this time by the mob. Broken and bruised you make your sad way home, hoping that the vendor might be somehow spared the wrath of the vulgar mob. But, alas, the next morning as you walked through the park on your way to work, the vendor was gone and the cart lay on it's side. Empty.

Never again were delicious sausages sold in the park, and the mob, speaker, and the thieves ate all the hot dogs in a matter of hours. You resolved to avoid the park from then on, for all who walked through the park starved, were beaten, and stolen from until the park was made infamous and none wandered there. The poor thieves, bereft of victims, died from starvation or rolled out in search for fresh parks and fresh vendors across town.

The park was as desolate as the vendors cart: Empty.

Inequalities Occasioned By The Policies Of Education

Perhaps the reader, under the influence of their own excellent education recognizes the curious and archaic syntax of the title as belonging to a culture and time not their own; they may even go so far as to attribute it's phrasing to it's rightful author, Adam Smith, who penned the celebrated Wealth of Nations. Adam Smith, despite the common misconception, actually addressed inequality in his book, and gave several reasoned solution to eliminating poverty. He claimed that while some jobs do deserve better profits or wages, the reasons why some jobs are paid inproportionately better than others is due to bad policy making:

"…the policies of Europe, by not leaving things at perfect liberty, occasions other inequalities of much greater importance.

It does this in the following ways. First, by restraining the competition in some employments to a smaller number than would otherwise be disposed to enter into them; secondly, by increasing it in others beyond what it naturally would be; and, thirdly, by obstructing the free circulation of labor and stock, both from employment to employment and from place to place." (Smith, 1776) In short, Smith attributed inequality to an artificial surplus or shortage of competition; and later he continued to say that this problem is created by governmental policies and conspiring men.

I would venture to add additional insight to the matter of inequality by introducing educational policy into the argument. If man was at perfect liberty to peruse his own education and to appoint his own teachers and to design his own curriculum, there would be no inequalities to speak of (excepting those inequalities inherit in nature) but were it for the policies that surround the public education. Our current institution for the education of youth and young adults, namely, high schools and collages, train all their students to know and be able to do the same things as the rest. Thus when a student enters the marketplace intending to sell his services and knowledge, he finds a clone of himself filling his job. Moreover, the schools create a surplus of professionals in one field while leaving other fields desolate, whereas if the student where at liberty to create his own education, he would find the training he needed to go into fields where his services would be in more demand. We do to some extent see this in computer and technology fields which have been demanding more manpower and receiving it, but all the same we have too many young people directed to other fields in which their is already hearty and established competition.

If man were free, justice and equality would be the result. If students were at liberty to build their own education, then everyone would enter the field that would be both to their liking and their wallet's liking without the propaganda and pressure of teachers and faulty policies persuading or coercing students into fields that the student will make no living in.

Sources:

Smith, A., & Cannan, E. (1937). Inequalities of Wages and Profit. In An inquiry into the nature and causes of the wealth of nations (Canaan ed.). New York: The Modern library.

Do we Deserve Freedom?

I can clearly see the zeal and the honest patriotism with which upstanding and worthy Americans carry close to their hearts and share freely. But different men professing to be on the road to truth are often intellectually at odds with their fellow pilgrims, who, like themselves hope to arrive at truth. I therefore hope I do not come off as disrespectful nor frivolous by entertaining opinions contrary to the thoughts and impressions of my fellow truth seekers. Seeing as we are all but travelers on a darkened road, I will not hesitate to impart my sentiments freely and hope that they are received charitably. The question, indeed, the essential question that has been plaguing humanity from the cradle is, as far as I can glean, a question of whether or not humanity is fit for freedom or slavery; I pray that the magnitude of this subject is dealt with respect and not trampled upon by accursed mongers of sedition and mollycoddles. In contrast, this subject should be conducted with sobriety and rational conversation. It is the only way that we can hope to find the truth and come to a pure an prudent understanding, which is not only what we owe to ourselves, but also our fellow travelers upon this road to truth. Should I horde my opinions to myself and write for the sake of the filing cabinet, because I fear giving offense, I should feel that I failed in my responsibility to God and country. If my neighbor suffers because of my inaction, I should condemn myself for being a spineless and inanimate skeleton, no good to anyone and without value.

In good faith I must ask my audience if it is natural to indulge in the bickering and chattering of monkeys instead of engaging in the talk and dialogue proper to man's station? in contention we shut our eyes to the road of truth and begin to follow perverse paths. Are we to number ourselves among those who putter among the roads of truth and life with carefree blindness towards their own temporal salvation? As for me, I will not permit myself to be blind and inactive: no matter the adversity of knowing and preaching what has been revealed to my understanding. I will find what truth I can and I will preach it no matter how painful and prickly that truth might be.

In the light of my understanding, I can but barely illumine the road before my feet, but from what I can see I know that I know something. I know that the natural inheritance of man is to live in liberty and it is near impossible to divorce one from the other. However, it is not unknown for a man to sell his liberty; it is not unheard of for a man to consume his liberty. Remember Esau, how he had sold his natural birth right for a mess of pottage of which he devoured entirely. In like manner a man may be dispossessed of his liberal nature and end his days the servant of another. 

In the light of this knowledge, I wish to know the conduct of the American people in recent years so as to determine if the American is deserving of the freedom of which he boasts. It seems that both from the Left and the Right that we are flattered beyond measure. Trust flattery not; it will prove to be the most deadly snare. Ask yourselves whether a nation can maintain their right to bear arms when they arbitrarily bear those arms against each other? On the other hand, are fleets of bureaucrats and armies of politicians capable of eradicating armed threat? Perhaps they can limit violence by restricting guns, but I fear that the psychopath and the madman and the barbarian, if bestowed with some cunning, could use the government as a tool so terrible and catastrophic that a few unfortunate theater shootings will pale in comparison with the havoc that a Lenin, Hitler, Alexander, or Caesar could produce. Remember the dark, yet brilliant Russian novel of Fyodor Dostoyevsky, the book Crime and Punishment. Remember how the young scholar who wishing to be as great and terrible as Napoleon, slew the woman who he was indebted to, foolishly believing that because the woman was nasty and a milestone around the neck of society that he had the right to murder her. This was an atrocious crime, but it lacked the cunning and vision that Napoleon exercised when he committed his countless murders. The boy did not have the power and majesty of government to back him, Napoleon did. 

Let us not deceive ourselves about Napoleon, he played the savior more than he played the tyrant, for after the Bloody Revolution man became a degenerate thing that abused it's liberty until the brink of insanity, at which point Napoleon stepped into save them. Those people, without the aid of a despot, would have utterly destroyed themselves because of the liberty they had. It has been said before, and perhaps more elegantly, that France was undeserving of freedom at that time. I wonder the same thing of us, are we worthy of freedom? The question is shrouded in mystery, but I'm inclined to say that, on the whole, we are not. In these sentiments, I believe that if we cannot govern ourselves, then we will be governed by despotic means; lets hope that the despot is enlightened rather than tyrannical. 

4 Pillars of Economic and National Growth

As we witness the turbulence of the world, we begin to realize that a nation's first decline is not one where a volcano belches fire over the capital or where an invading army tramples over the border, but where whatever used to prop up the nation has suddenly been removed causing a nation to decline and fall like a three-day-old balloon; yes, I refer to the powers and mechanics of a nation's economic engine.  While, obviously, an economy is driven by many factors, here are 4 mighty pillars that if tampered with or removed will irrevocably remove a nation's foundation and force it down the abyss:

Firstly:

The morality of a people is essential to a nation's success, for, when a people start to act perversely they will degenerate into baser forms of life and will take their nation back with them. Typically, a people's morality is defined by a harsh environment which demands a strict moral code and punishes the malefactor with frostbite, sunstroke, and starvation. As you can imagine, natural selection allows only those to live who can keep the natural law. As a nation progresses however, this strict physical law becomes insufficient to keep a people moral for the same reason a full granary makes laziness easier than an empty one; when the food supply is depleted however, nature will have her revenge. It is possible to be immoral while the physical law is held off, but in this there is nor progress or growth; only the consumption of the earlier fruits of morality. "He that hath no rule over his own spirit is like a city that is broken down, and without walls." Proverbs 25:28

Secondly:

Justice is a keystone element one step beyond the physical law, dealing not only among separate individuals, but communities. Where the first law of morality, or the physical law, may prosper one who steals the bread of another, the laws of justice will will punish him, for thieves are not tolerated in just society. Justice demands that everyone render's to their neighbor his just due. When this keystone element is respected, then one man becomes many, and the hunter-gatherer may enter into the farming stage because people are able to cooperate with each other. Nature cannot execute justice, and therefore man tries to do it himself with various degrees of success. When man serves justice well, then a nation prospers. When man abuses justice, then justice devolves from the courtroom to the street, to the knife, and finally to the original first keystone. "Thus saith the Lord; Execute ye judgment and righteousness, and deliver the spoiled out of the hand of the oppressor: and do no wrong, do no violence to the stranger, the fatherless, nor the widow, neither shed innocent blood in this place." Jeremiah 22:3

Thirdly:

Fellowship is the blessing of justice: when man strives to be just among his superiors, peers, and inferiors, they are no longer on different planes than himself, but all become his equals and his friends; class warfare is essentially the rotten fruit of poor justice. When a people become truly united, the economic results are phenomenal. When a man treats another not only with justice, but friendship, then a people grow strong and wealthy as they unite together. This fellowship is not unlike a professional sports team who win championships when they are united and melded together but lose home games when all the players feel alone and isolated. When everyone in a society realizes that they are trying to win the same game and are on the same team, the economy and nation prosper.  "Wealth maketh many friends; but the poor is separated from his neighbor." Proverbs 19:4

Fourthly: 

Perhaps one of the most concrete features of a strong nation and economy is a georgic work ethic, without which there would never exist prosperous ports and markets in a nation to amply supply it with a happy surplus of goods and services. Without a hefty work ethic, one may scrape by on a subsistence level, but never will a nation ever achieve the heights of industry and commerce without a hearty people exercising a vigorous, georgic work ethic. The word "Georgic" is used in a title that Virgil pend wherein Virgil praises the art and craft of the farmer along with his work ethic. A farmer instilled with the work ethic Virgil speaks of, does not lay idle away his time while his fields lie fallow but takes the plow to them. A nation who is industrious and works hard when combined with the earlier factor absolutely will progress in power and economic might. "Wealth gotten by vanity shall be diminished: but he that gathereth by labour shall increase." Proverbs 13:11

A nation, grand or modest, is the sum of it's supporting pillars: If these pillars are built of the finest marble by the finest artist-architects, then a nation is splendid to behold, whereas, if these pillars are made shoddy particle board and left to crumble into disrepair, then the souls that live upon them will plummet with them. Truly, nations and economies are the results of people maintaining these pillars  well.