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Edward Gibbon Quotes - Page 12

All Quotes Abuse Accidents Age Ambition Army Art Atheism Authority Birth Character Children Christianity Church Community Constitution Corruption Country Curiosity Desire Discipline Education Effort Evil Exercise Fame Fashion Freedom Giving Glory Gratitude Greatness Greek Growth Guilt Heaven History Honor Humanity Imagination Independence Joy Judging Justice Language Liberty Loneliness Loss Lying Memories Mercy Military Monk Obedience Passion Past Philosophy Poverty Prejudice Pride Progress Reading Reflection Regret Religion Revenge Safety School Science Separation Son Study Tyranny Victory Violence Virtue Wall Weakness Wealth Wisdom Writing

Bad roads and indifferent inns, ... the continual converse one is obliged to have with the vilest part of mankind - innkeepers, post-masters, and custom house officers.

Bad roads and indifferent inns, ... the continual converse one is obliged to have with the vilest part of mankind - innkeepers, post-masters, and custom house officers.

House, Inns, Masters

Edward Gibbon (2017). “Private Letters of Edward Gibbon (1753-1794) Volume 1 (of 2)”, p.4, Litres

Does there exist a single instance of a saint asserting that he himself possessed the gift of miracles?

Miracle, Doe, Saint

Edward Gibbon (2016). “THE HISTORY OF THE DECLINE AND FALL OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE (All 6 Volumes): From the Height of the Roman Empire, the Age of Trajan and the Antonines - to the Fall of Byzantium; Including a Review of the Crusades, and the State of Rome during the Middle Ages”, p.603, e-artnow

The authority of Plato and Aristotle, of Zeno and Epicurus, still reigned in the schools; and their systems, transmitted with blind deference from one generation of disciples to another, precluded every generous attempt to exercise the powers, or enlarge the limits, of the human mind.

Plato, School, Exercise

Edward Gibbon (1840). “The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, 1”, p.55

It has been calculated by the ablest politicians that no State, without being soon exhausted, can maintain above the hundredth part of its members in arms and idleness.

Arms, Exhausted, Politician

Edward Gibbon (1831). “The history of the decline and fall of the Roman Empire”, p.61

The ascent to greatness, however steep and dangerous, may entertain an active spirit with the consciousness and exercise of its own power: but the possession of a throne could never yet afford a lasting satisfaction to an ambitious mind.

Exercise, Greatness, Mind

Edward Gibbon (1821). “The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire”, p.149

A martial nobility and stubborn commons, possessed of arms, tenacious of property, and collected into constitutional assemblies form the only balance capable of preserving a free constitution against the enterprise of an aspiring prince

Freedom, Balance, Arms

Edward Gibbon (1787). “The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire”, p.78

The urgent consideration of the public safety may undoubtedly authorize the violation of every positive law. How far that or any other consideration may operate to dissolve the natural obligations of humanity and justice, is a doctrine of which I still desire to remain ignorant.

Law, Safety, History

Edward Gibbon (2015). “The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire:”, p.732, Sheba Blake Publishing

Fear has been the original parent of superstition, and every new calamity urges trembling mortals to deprecate the wrath of their invisible enemies.

Wrath, Parent, Enemy

Edward Gibbon, J. B. Bury (2012). “The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire: Edited in Seven Volumes with Introduction, Notes, Appendices, and Index”, p.298, Cambridge University Press

Extreme distress, which unites the virtue of a free people, imbitters the factions of a declining monarchy.

People, Virtue, Factions

Edward Gibbon (2015). “History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire V3: the History Focus”, p.336, 谷月社

A warlike nation like the Germans, without either cities, letters, arts, or money, found some compensation for this savage state in the enjoyment of liberty. Their poverty secured their freedom, since our desires and our possessions are the strongest fetters of despotism.

Art, Cities, History

Edward Gibbon (1854). “The history of the decline and fall of the Roman empire, with notes by Milman and Guizot. Ed. by W. Smith”, p.359

[The] emperor of the West, the feeble and dissolute Valentinian, [had] reached his thirty-fifth year without attaining the age of reason or courage.

Years, Age, West

Edward Gibbon, Henry Hart Milman (1854). “The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire”, p.454

I understand by this passion the union of desire, friendship, and tenderness, which is inflamed by a single female, which prefers her to the rest of her sex, and which seeks her possession as the supreme or the sole happiness of our being.

Friendship, Happiness, Sex

Edward Gibbon (2015). “Delphi Complete Works of Edward Gibbon (Illustrated)”, p.5026, Delphi Classics

Freedom is the first wish of our heart; freedom is the first blessing of nature; and unless we bind ourselves with voluntary chains of interest or passion, we advance in freedom as we advance in years

Passion, Heart, Blessing

Herbert Woodfield Paul, Alfred Tennyson Baron Tennyson, Matthew Arnold, Edward Gibbon, George Savile Marquis of Halifax (1915). “Men and Letters”

The pastoral labours of the archbishop of Constantinople provoked and gradually united against him two sorts of enemies; the aspiring clergy, who envied his success, and the obstinate sinners, who were offended by his reproofs. When Chrysostom thundered from the pulpit of St. Sophia against the degeneracy of the Christians, his shafts were spent among the crowd, without wounding or even marking the character of any individual.

Christian, Character, Past

Edward Gibbon (1854). “The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire”, p.502

Passion, interest, or caprice, suggested daily motives for the dissolution of marriage; a word, a sign, a message, a letter, the mandate of a freedman, declared the separation; the most tender of human connections was degraded to a transient society of profit or pleasure.

Passion, Connections, Letters

Edward Gibbon (2016). “EDWARD GIBBON Premium Collection: Historiographical Works, Memoirs & Letters: Including "The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire”, p.2148, e-artnow

[The] liberty of divorce does not contribute to happiness and virtue. The facility of separation would destroy all mutual confidence, and inflame every trifling dispute . . .

Divorce, Liberty, Doe

Edward Gibbon (1854). “The history of the decline and fall of the Roman empire, with notes by Milman and Guizot. Ed. by W. Smith”, p.297

The division of the Roman world between the sons of Theodosius marks the final establishment of the empire of the East, which, from the reign of Arcadius to the taking of Constantinople by the Turks, subsisted one thousand and fifty-eight years in a state of premature and perpetual decay.

Son, Eight, Years

Edward Gibbon (2000). “The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Volume II: A.D. 395 to A.D. 1185 (A Modern Library E-Book)”, p.304, Modern Library

In the productions of the mind, as in those of the soil, the gifts of nature are excelled by industry and skill . . .

Skills, Mind, Soil

Edward Gibbon (2016). “The Collected Works of Edward Gibbon: Historical Works, Autobiographical Writings and Private Letters, Including The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire”, p.3339, e-artnow

But the desire of obtaining the advantages, and of escaping the burthens, of political society, is a perpetual and inexhaustible source of discord; nor can it reasonably be presumed that the restoration of British freedom was exempt from tumult and faction. The pre-eminence of birth and fortune must have been frequently violated by bold and popular citizens; and the haughty nobles, who complained that they were become the subjects of their own servants, would sometimes regret the reign of an arbitrary monarch.

Regret, Escaping, History

Edward Gibbon (1840). “The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire”, p.100

In less than seven years the vestiges of the Gothic invasion were almost obliterated, and the city appeared to resume its former splendour and tranquillity. The venerable matron replaced her crown of laurel, which had been ruffled by the storms of war, and was still amused in the last moment of her decay with the prophecies of revenge, of victory, and of eternal dominion.

Revenge, War, Years

Edward Gibbon (2008). “The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire”, p.338, Cosimo, Inc.

In populous cities, which are the seat of commerce and manufactures, the middle ranks of inhabitants, who derive their subsistence from the dexterity or labour of their hands, are commonly the most prolific, the most useful, and, in that sense, the most respectable part of the community.

Hands, Cities, History

Edward Gibbon (1846). “The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire”, p.113

The ancients were destitute of many of the conveniences of life which have been invented or improved by the progress of industry; and the plenty of glass and linen has diffused more real comforts among the modern nations of Europe than the senators of Rome could derive from all the refinements of pompous or sensual luxury.

Real, Luxury, Glasses

Edward Gibbon (1846). “The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire”, p.106

These idle disputants overlooked the invariable laws of nature, which have connected peace with innocence, plenty with industry, and safety with valour.

Law, Safety, History

Edward Gibbon (1998). “Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire”, p.600, Wordsworth Editions

The valuable library of Alexandria was pillaged or destroyed; and near twenty years afterwards, the appearance of the empty shelves excited the regret and indignation of every spectator whose mind was not totally darkened by religious prejudice. The compositions of ancient genius, so many of which have irretrievably perished, might surely have been excepted from the wreck of idolatry, for the amusement and instruction of succeeding ages.

Religious, Regret, Years

Edward Gibbon (2000). “The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Volume II: A.D. 395 to A.D. 1185 (A Modern Library E-Book)”, p.96, Modern Library

A small number of temples was protected by the fears, the venality, the taste, or the prudence of the civil and ecclesiastical governors. The temple of the Celestial Venus at Carthage, whose sacred precincts formed a circumference of two miles, was judiciously converted into a Christian church; and a similar consecration has preserved inviolate the majestic dome of the Pantheon at Rome.

Christian, Numbers, Rome

Edward Gibbon (1998). “Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire”, p.562, Wordsworth Editions

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