Ludwig von Mises concluded, the Roman Empire began to weaken and decay because it lacked the ideas and ideology that are necessary to build upon and safeguard a free and prosperous society: a philosophy of individual rights and free markets.

As Mises ended his own reflections on the civilizations of the ancient world:

“The marvelous civilization of antiquity perished because it did not adjust its moral code and its legal system to the requirements of the market economy.

A social order is doomed if the actions which its normal functioning requires are rejected by the standards of morality, are declared illegal by the laws of the country, and are prosecuted as criminal by the courts and the police.

The Roman Empire crumbled to dust because it lacked the spirit of [classical] liberalism and free enterprise.

The policy of interventionism and its political corollary, the Fuhrer principle, decomposed the mighty empire as they will by necessity always disintegrate and destroy any social entity.”

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