About 290 years after Christ a Roman Emperor
Named Diocletian took over
He really grabbed the bull by the hornsHe took over in a period of turmoil and severe depression
The first thing Diocletian did was call in the gold
And closed the banks and raised the taxes
He reduced the power of the Senate
Delegated its power to a lot of little government burеaus
Do you know they even had a Transportation Act back thеre?
Prescribing the fee required to rent one laden ass per mile
And at today′s rate of exchange
It would have amounted to about 1/8th cent per mile?
Which meant that in order to make a profit
A jack ass would have to carry five passengers
That was simply beyond the capacity of the jack ass
Diocletian put millions of people on the public payroll
But when this failed to do the job, the country was still in trouble
He asked more personal powers for himself
For a brief while, incidentally, they were standby powers
But then he used them, all at once
He froze wages, he froze prices, he froze jobs
He stopped profits, he dictated to the farmer what he should plant
When and how he should sell it and for how much
And he rationed food and what happened?
The labor market closed down, incentive was gone
Farm life became dependent on bureaucratic red tape
Exorbitant taxes cost the farmer his land
He kept for himself only a small plot on which
He might grow turnips for his family
He lost the rest of it to the state
And without food and with incentive gone
City life stagnated and declined
And Rome past into what history has recorded as the "Dark Ages
Lasting a thousand years
Lasting a thousand years
Just by turning to the left, the world has gone in circles
The world has gone in circles
The world has gone in circles
Just by turning to the left, the world has gone in circles
The world has gone in circles
The world has gone in circles
A nation would evolve from a monarchy
Into an oligarchy, from oligarchy to dictatorship
From dictatorship to bureaucracy
From bureaucracy to pure democracy where
Finally, the people would cry out from the chaos
And confusion of the streets "Oh! Please God give us a king!"
And God would give 'em a king and they′d have a monarchy again
And start the whole silly cycle anew
Now either we will profit from the errors of their ways
Or it follows as the night the day,
Our children are going to have to relive the dark ages,
All over again, all over again
Just by turning to the left, the world has gone in circles
The world has gone in circles
The world has gone in circles
Just by turning to the left, the world has gone in circles
The world has gone in circles
The world has gone in circles
All over again, all over again
The world, the world has gone in circles
All over again, all over again
The world, the world has gone in circles
