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with all that that involved: loss of earnings, pocket money, distinction between
instructors and professionals, consequences of contacts between amateurs and
professionals, etc." (17) .
When in September 1936, one year before his death, Coubertin was interviewed
by a journalist on the subject of the Olympic Oath, he answered: "I have often
been criticized, always wrongly, for the so-called hypocrisy of the Olympic
Oath. Why can't you leave it alone? I am happy and proud to be its creator.
Would you rather absolute amateurism were required of Olympic athletes, something
I am the first to recognize is impossible? All I ask of the oath is this: loyalty
to sport. " (18)
IV - Olympism
The second fundamental principle of the Olympic Charter defines Olympism as
"a philosophy of life, exalting and combining in a balanced whole the qualities of
body, will and mind. Blending sport with culture and education, Olympism seeks
to create a way of life based on the joy found in effort, the educational value of
the good example and respect for universal fundamental ethical principles." The
text of the Charter gives a sociologically up-to-date vision of the Olympic principle,
uniting it with the important social benefits that it creates, aside from the
psycho-physical improvement of the adept. Coubertin gave a more private and
personal definition of the principle, describing it not as a system, but as "a state of
mind. It may be applied to the most diverse situations, and is not the exclusive monopoly
of any one race or time. Olympism is a state of mind created by the cultivation
of both effort and eurhythmy... which in a paradoxical sense are the basis
of all absolute virility" (19) . In his definition of the term, Coubertin had in mind, as
almost always, the Greek legacy, with its model of equilibrium as the objective of
all things, and particularly in forming the individual. Its golden exponent in classical
Greece was kalokagathia, the harmonic combination of beauty and goodness.
Coubertin defined the basis of his ideology as "the cult of effort, contempt for danger,
love for one's country, generosity, chivalry, and contact with the Arts and Letters".
In 1928, the celebrated founder summed up his idea of Olympism more
schematically as a "doctrine of fraternity between the body and the mind." (20)
V - The organizational structure of the Olympic Movement
On 26th November 1892, Pierre de Coubertin made the first attempt to restore
the Olympic Games. His proposal in the amphitheatre of the Sorbonne was received
with general enthusiasm and evident incomprehension (21) . The new invitation
given two years later at the Congress which took place in the same place from 16th
to 23rd June 1894, was accepted unanimously by the delegates attending, and
from that moment the historic progress of modern Olympism began (22) . The International
Olympic Committee was created, the first rules were drafted and in April
1896 Athens set the scene for the Games of the first modern Olympiad. The quadrennial
round of the great festival of world youth had begun. In 1896 the Inter-
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