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The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire

Edward Gibbon

The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire

Edward Gibbon

Edward Gibbon: 43 quotes15 likes

Famous Edward Gibbon Quotes

“The winds and waves are always on the side of the ablest navigators.”

Edward Gibbon

Vol. 1, Chap. 68. Compare: "On dit que Dieu est toujours pour les gros bataillons" (translated: "It is said that God is always on the side of the heaviest battalions"), Voltaire, Letter to M. le Riche. 1770; "J'ai toujours vu Dieu du coté des gros bataillons (translated: "I have always noticed that God is on the side of the heaviest battalions"), De la Ferté to Anne of Austria.
The Decline And Fall Of The Roman Empire: Volume 1 (1776)

“It was at Rome, on the fifteenth of October 1764, as I sat musing amidst the ruins of the Capitol, while the barefoot friars were singing vespers in the Temple of Jupiter, that the idea of writing the decline and fall of the city first started to my mind.”

Edward Gibbon

Memoirs (1796)

“Books are those faithful mirrors that reflect to our mind the minds of sages and heroes.”

Edward Gibbon

“The various modes of worship which prevailed in the Roman world were all considered by the people as equally true; by the philosopher as equally false; and by the magistrate as equally useful.”

Edward Gibbon The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire

Volume 1, Chapter 2 "Of the Union and Internal Prosperity of the Roman Empire, in the Age of the Antonines" http://www.ccel.org/ccel/gibbon/decline/files/volume1/chap2.htm. The portion regarding the views of the religions of the time taken by various constituencies has been misreported as Gibbon's own assessment of religion generally. See Paul F. Boller, John George, They Never Said It: A Book of Fake Quotes, Misquotes, and Misleading Attributions (1990), pp. 34–35. The bold text has been misattributed to Lucretius and Seneca the Younger. The Decline And Fall Of The Roman Empire (1776) Source: The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire Context: The various modes of worship, which prevailed in the Roman world, were all considered by the people, as equally true; by the philosopher, as equally false; and by the magistrate, as equally useful. And thus toleration produced not only mutual indulgence, but even religious concord. Context: The policy of the emperors and the senate, as far as it concerned religion, was happily seconded by the reflections of the enlightened, and by the habits of the superstitious, part of their subjects. The various modes of worship, which prevailed in the Roman world, were all considered by the people, as equally true; by the philosopher, as equally false; and by the magistrate, as equally useful. And thus toleration produced not only mutual indulgence, but even religious concord. The superstition of the people was not embittered by any mixture of theological rancour; nor was it confined by the chains of any speculative system. The devout polytheist, though fondly attached to his national rites, admitted with implicit faith the different religions of the earth. Fear, gratitude, and curiosity, a dream or an omen, a singular disorder, or a distant journey, perpetually disposed him to multiply the articles of his belief, and to enlarge the list of his protectors. The thin texture of the Pagan mythology was interwoven with various but not discordant materials.

“Unprovided with original learning, unformed in the habits of thinking, unskilled in the arts of composition, I resolved to write a book.”

Edward Gibbon

“I make it a point never to argue with people for whose opinion I have no respect.”

Edward Gibbon

Edward Gibbon Quotes about age

“The most worthless of mankind are not afraid to condemn in others the same disorders which they allow in themselves; and can readily discover some nice difference in age, character, or station, to justify the partial distinction.”

Edward Gibbon The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire

Source: The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire

“In a distant age and climate the tragic scene of the death of Hussyn will awaken the sympathy of the coldest reader.”

Edward Gibbon

Vol. 5, pages:391–392.
The Decline And Fall Of The Roman Empire: Volume 1 (1776)

“A long period of distress and anarchy, in which empire, and arts, and riches, had migrated from the banks of the Tiber, was incapable of restoring or adorning the city; and, as all that is human must retrograde if it do not advance, every successive age must have hastened the ruin of the works of antiquity.”

Edward Gibbon

Vol. 1, Chap. 71.
The Decline And Fall Of The Roman Empire: Volume 1 (1776)

“It was here [at the age of seventeen] that I suspended my religious inquiries.”

Edward Gibbon

Memoirs (1796)

Edward Gibbon Quotes

“We improve ourselves by victory over our self. There must be contests, and you must win.”

Edward Gibbon

“My early and invincible love of reading--I would not exchange for the treasures of India.”

Edward Gibbon

“Conversation enriches the understanding, but solitude is the school of genius.”

Edward Gibbon

“Revenge is profitable, gratitude is expensive.”

Edward Gibbon The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire

Vol. 1, Chap. 11.
The Decline And Fall Of The Roman Empire: Volume 1 (1776)
Source: The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire

“All that is human must retrograde if it does not advance.”

Edward Gibbon

“Corruption, the most infallible symptom of constitutional liberty.”

Edward Gibbon

“War, in its fairest form, implies a perpetual violation of humanity and justice.”

Edward Gibbon The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire

Source: The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire

“… as long as mankind shall continue to bestow more liberal applause on their destroyers than their benefactors, the thirst of military glory will ever be the vice of the most exalted characters.”

Edward Gibbon

Source: The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire Volume I

“To an active mind, indolence is more painful than labor.”

Edward Gibbon

“The end comes when we no longer talk with ourselves. It is the end of genuine thinking and the beginning of the final loneliness”

Edward Gibbon

“The reign of Antoninus is marked by the rare advantage of furnishing very few materials for history, which is indeed little more than the register of the crimes, follies, and misfortunes of mankind.”

Edward Gibbon

Vol. 1, Chap. 3. Compare: "L'histoire n'est que le tableau des crimes et des malheurs" (translated: "History is but the record of crimes and misfortunes"), Voltaire, L'Ingénu, chap. x.
The Decline And Fall Of The Roman Empire: Volume 1 (1776)

“Wit and valor are qualities that are more easily ascertained than virtue, or the love of wisdom.”

Edward Gibbon

Vol. 1, Chap. 1.
The Decline And Fall Of The Roman Empire: Volume 1 (1776)

“In the spirit of enthusiasm or vanity, the prophet [Muhammad] rests the truth of his mission on the merit of his book; audaciously challenges both men and angels to imitate the beauties of a single page; and presumes to assert that God alone could dictate this incomparable performance. This argument is most powerfully addressed to a devout Arabian, whose mind is attuned to faith and rapture; whose ear is delighted by the music of sounds; and whose ignorance is incapable of comparing the productions of human genius… If the composition of the Koran exceed the faculties of a man to what superior intelligence should we ascribe the Iliad of Homer, or the Philippics of Demosthenes?”

Edward Gibbon

EGPaIV" Edward Gibbon, [1788], Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire http://www.sacred-texts.com/cla/gibbon/05/daf05010.htm, Vol. 5, Chapter L: Description Of Arabia And Its Inhabitants. Part IV. The Decline And Fall Of The Roman Empire: Volume 1 (1776)

“The successors of Charles the Fifth may disdain their brethren of England; but the romance of Tom Jones, that exquisite picture of human manners, will outlive the palace of the Escurial and the imperial eagle of the house of Austria.”

Edward Gibbon

Memoirs (1796)

“Vicissitudes of fortune, which spares neither man nor the proudest of his works, which buries empires and cities in a common grave.”

Edward Gibbon

Vol. 1, Chap. 71.
The Decline And Fall Of The Roman Empire: Volume 1 (1776)

“In the end, more than freedom, they wanted security. They wanted a comfortable life, and they lost it all – security, comfort, and freedom. When the Athenians finally wanted not to give to society but for society to give to them, when the freedom they wished for most was freedom from responsibility, then Athens ceased to be free and was never free again.”

Edward Gibbon

This quotation appeared in an article by Margaret Thatcher, "The Moral Foundations of Society" ( Imprimis, March 1995 https://imprimis.hillsdale.edu/the-moral-foundations-of-society/), which was an edited version of a lecture Thatcher had given at Hillsdale College in November 1994. Here is the actual passage from Thatcher's article: <blockquote>[M]ore than they wanted freedom, the Athenians wanted security. Yet they lost everything—security, comfort, and freedom. This was because they wanted not to give to society, but for society to give to them. The freedom they were seeking was freedom from responsibility. It is no wonder, then, that they ceased to be free. In the modern world, we should recall the Athenians' dire fate whenever we confront demands for increased state paternalism.</blockquote> The italicized passage above originated with Thatcher. In characterizing the Athenians in the article she cited Sir Edward Gibbon, but she seems to have been paraphrasing statements in "Athens' Failure," a chapter of classicist Edith Hamilton's book The Echo of Greece (1957), pp. 47–48 http://www.ergo-sum.net/books/Hamilton_EchoOfGreece_pp.47-48.jpg). Misattributed

“I sighed as a lover, I obeyed as a son.”

Edward Gibbon

Memoirs (1796)

“Our sympathy is cold to the relation of distant misery.”

Edward Gibbon

Vol. 1, Chap. 49.
The Decline And Fall Of The Roman Empire: Volume 1 (1776)

“Amiable weaknesses of human nature.”

Edward Gibbon

Vol. 1, Chap. 14. Compare: "Amiable weakness", Henry Fielding, Tom Jones, Book x, Chapter viii.
The Decline And Fall Of The Roman Empire: Volume 1 (1776)

“Decent easy men, who supinely enjoyed the gifts of the founder.”

Edward Gibbon

Memoirs (1796)

“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.”

Edward Gibbon The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire

Vol. 1, Chap. 5 http://books.google.com/books?id=aLcWAAAAQAAJ&q=&quot;It+has+been&quot;+&quot;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&quot;&pg=PA106#v=onepage The Decline And Fall Of The Roman Empire: Volume 1 (1776)

“The captain of the Hampshire grenadiers…has not been useless to the historian of the Roman Empire.”

Edward Gibbon

Memoirs (1796)

“On the approach of spring I withdraw without reluctance from the noisy and extensive scene of crowds without company, and dissipation without pleasure.”

Edward Gibbon

Vol. i. p. 116.
Memoirs (1796)

“Antoninus diffused order and tranquility over the greatest part of the earth. His reign is marked by the rare advantage of furnishing very few materials for history; which is, indeed, little more than the register of the crimes, follies, and misfortunes of mankind.”

Edward Gibbon

Vol. 1, Ch. 3 "Of the Constitution of the Roman Empire, in the Age of the Antonines" http://www.ccel.org/ccel/gibbon/decline/files/volume1/chap3.htm This has often been paraphrased: History is indeed little more than the register of crimes, follies, and misfortunes of mankind. The Decline And Fall Of The Roman Empire: Volume 1 (1776)

“Crowds without company, and dissipation without pleasure.”

Edward Gibbon

Referring to London.
Memoirs (1796)

“I was never less alone than when by myself.”

Edward Gibbon

Vol. i. p. 117. Compare: "Never less alone than when alone", Samuel Rogers, Human Life; "In solitude, where we are least alone", Lord Byron, Childe Harold's Pilgrimage, Canto III, Stanza 90.
Memoirs (1796)

“In every deed of mischief he had a heart to resolve, a head to contrive, and a hand to execute.”

Edward Gibbon

Vol. 1, Chap. 48. Compare: "He had a head to contrive, a tongue to persuade, and a hand to execute any mischief", Edward Hyde, 1st Earl of Clarendon (on Hampden), History of the Rebellion, Vol. iii, Book vii, Section 84.
The Decline And Fall Of The Roman Empire: Volume 1 (1776)

“I saw and loved.”

Edward Gibbon

Vol. i. p. 106. Compare: "None ever loved but at first sight they loved", George Chapman, The Blind Beggar of Alexandria.
Memoirs (1796)

“Our habits of thinking so fondly connect the order of the universe with the fate of man, that this gloomy period of history has been decorated with inundations, earthquakes, uncommon meteors, preternatural darkness, and a crowd of prodigies fictitious or exaggerated.”

Edward Gibbon

Vol. 1, Chap. 10.
The Decline And Fall Of The Roman Empire: Volume 1 (1776)

“It is difficult to paint the light, the various, the inconstant character of Gallienus, which he displayed without constraint, as soon as he became sole possessor of the empire. There were, however, a few short moments in the life of Gallienus, when, exasperated by some recent injury, he suddenly appeared the intrepid soldier and the cruel tyrant; till, satiated with blood, or fatigued by resistance, he insensibly sunk into the natural mildness and indolence of his character.In every art that he attempted, his lively genius enabled him to succeed; and as his genius was destitute of judgment, he attempted every art, except the important ones of war and government. He was a master of several curious, but useless sciences, a ready orator, an elegant poet, a skilful gardener, an excellent cook, and most contemptible prince... There were, however, a few short moments in the life of Gallienus, when, exasperated by some recent injury, he suddenly appeared the intrepid soldier and the cruel tyrant; till, satiated with blood, or fatigued by resistance, he insensibly sunk into the natural mildness and indolence of his character.”

Edward Gibbon

Vol. 1, Chap. 10.
The Decline And Fall Of The Roman Empire: Volume 1 (1776)

“When Gallienus received the intelligence that his capital was delivered from the barbarians, he was much less delighted than alarmed with the courage of the senate, since it might one day prompt them to rescue the public from domestic tyranny as well as from foreign invasion. His timid ingratitude was published to his subjects, in an edict which prohibited the senators from exercising any military employment, and even from approaching the camps of the legions. But his fears were groundless. The rich and luxurious nobles, sinking into their natural character, accepted, as a favor, this disgraceful exemption from military service; and as long as they were indulged in the enjoyment of their baths, their theatres, and their villas, they cheerfully resigned the more dangerous cares of empire to the rough hands of peasants and soldiers.”

Edward Gibbon

Vol. 1, Chap. 10.
The Decline And Fall Of The Roman Empire: Volume 1 (1776)