A different world

The historian M. I. Rostovtzeff (1870-1952) on the fall of Rome:

What happened was a slow and gradual change, a shifting of values in the consciousness of men. What seemed to be all-important to a Greek of the classical or Hellenistic period, or to an educated Roman of the time of the Republic and of the Early Empire, was no longer regarded as vital by the majority of men who lived in the late Roman Empire and the Early Middle Ages. They had their own notion of what was important, and most of what was essential in the classical period among the constituent parts of ancient civilization was discarded by them as futile and often detrimental. Since our point of view is more or less that of the classical peoples, we regard such an attitude of mind as a relapse into "barbarism"....

From "The Decay of the Ancient World and Its Economic Explanations" by M. I. Rostovtzeff. In The Fall of Rome: Can It Be Explained? edited by Mortimer Chambers.