Page 12 - Beholding Liberty!

12 BEHOLDING LIBERTY!
tradition of the French Revolution or the American Revolution, nor were they familiar with Aristotle or Plato, despite the existence of Enlightenment, despite the existence of antiquarianism, that prepared the Revolution. Most of them were simple people in whose consciousness the need for liberation was activated and the need for the creation of a Greek state.
«I can hear the muskets plopping,
and the swords that clang beneath,
I can hear the axes chopping,
and the grinding of the teeth», Dionysios Solomos writes in stanza 44 of the Hymn to Liberty.
With the grinding of the teeth, with axes, with muskets and swords the Revolution was carried out, and of course Enlightenment, of course antiquarianism and of course the first institutions played a role, but the principal role was assigned to the indomitable spirit of an inspired people, who had in them the feeling of return to the foreground of History.
When, my colleagues, ladies and gentlemen, the first occupation of Constantinople took place, by the Franks, it was heard in one of the empires that were formed after the exit of the Byzantines from Constantinople, the heralding manifestation of the Great Idea. It was put into words before the fall of Constantinople in 1453. By Theodoros I Laskaris, when he was crowned Emperor in Ni- caea in 1208: «And our homelands we will take back, which we lost making mistakes». «And Christ the Lord, let it come true...», he added.
This moving and comforting expression of the Great Idea for centuries acted in the consciousness of the Greeks and when circumstances permitted it, there was the outbreak of the Revolution of ’21.
The tradition, then, of the Genos, the Greek Orthodox Church that functioned as the cohesive tissue, by preserving language and tradition, and as a substitute for state, the spiritual leadership of the nation, I have talked about, all those teachers of the Genos, who cultivated both in Greece and internationally the need for the Greek entity, for the existence of a Greek state, the Society of Friends, evidently, with capital letters, the enhancement of the Greek Navy and the military force of Hellenism in the face of the klephts and armatoles were factors that contributed to the outbreak of the Revolution.
Events began with the advance, with the invasion of Ypsilantis’ Sacred Band in the region of the Danubian Principalities, in Moldovlachia. When this first revolutionary outbreak occurred, it brought about a strong distraction regarding the declaration of the Revolution, which took place a month later, in south Greece.
We approach the end of 1821. The Revolution is established in South Greece and on the 1st of Jan- uary 1822 the political existence and independence of the nation is proclaimed at Epidaurus by an Assembly that votes its Constitution. In 1822 and 1823 we see the consolidation of the Revolution after the crushing defeat of Dramalis and the burning of the Turkish flagship at Chios by Kanaris. In 1824 the first downhill turn is noted. We have the first civil wars. In 1825 Ibrahim invades the Pelo- ponnese. In 1826 the Exodus of Missolonghi unfolds and the glory that it evoked, and the positive impact it had mainly on Europe, due to the Turkish atrocities.
In 1827 Karaiskakis manages to revive the struggle in Central (Sterea) Greece. Nevertheless, prob- lems continue to exist. Acropolis is surrendered. However, the element I told you about earlier, this indomitable will for struggle -which has already lasted for seven years- begins now to attract the