Edward Gibbon
Edward Gibbon
Edward Gibbon FRS was an English historian, writer and Member of Parliament. His most important work, The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, was published in six volumes between 1776 and 1788 and is known for the quality and irony of its prose, its use of primary sources, and its open criticism of organized religion...
NationalityEnglish
ProfessionHistorian
Date of Birth27 April 1737
wrath parent enemy
Fear has been the original parent of superstition, and every new calamity urges trembling mortals to deprecate the wrath of their invisible enemies.
people virtue factions
Extreme distress, which unites the virtue of a free people, imbitters the factions of a declining monarchy.
blow arms encounters
When a public quarrel is envenomed by private injuries, a blow that is not mortal or decisive can be productive only of a short truce, which allows the unsuccessful combatant to sharpen his arms for a new encounter.
years age west
[The] emperor of the West, the feeble and dissolute Valentinian, [had] reached his thirty-fifth year without attaining the age of reason or courage.
military people victory
It was [Totila's] constant theme, that national vice and ruin are inseparably connected; that victory is the fruit of moral as well as military virtue; and that the prince, and even the people, are responsible for the crimes which they neglect to punish.
kings space generations
[Whole] generations may be swept away by the madness of kings in the space of a single hour.
loss men victory
A bloody and complete victory has sometimes yielded no more than the possession of the field and the loss of ten thousand men has sometimes been sufficient to destroy, in a single day, the work of ages.
military blood age
[Every age], however destitute of science or virtue, sufficiently abounds with acts of blood and military renown.
mind mercy monk
[The monks'] minds were inaccessible to reason or mercy . . .
reign virtue monk
[All] the manly virtues were oppressed by the servile and pusillanimous reign of the monks.
law inspire vices
[The] operation of the wisest laws is imperfect and precarious. They seldom inspire virtue, they cannot always restrain vice.
law sovereign authority
[It] is the interest as well as duty of a sovereign to maintain the authority of the laws.
law people necks
A Locrian, who proposed any new law, stood forth in the assembly of the people with a cord round his neck, and if the law was rejected, the innovator was instantly strangled.
justice abuse prejudice
A jurisdiction thus vague and arbitrary was exposed to the most dangerous abuse: the substance, as well as the form, of justice were often sacrificed to the prejudices of virtue, the bias of laudable affection, and the grosser seductions of interest or resentment.