Edward Gibbon: Humanity

Edward Gibbon was English historian and Member of Parliament. Explore interesting quotes on humanity.
Edward Gibbon: 86   quotes 4   likes

“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

War , Justice

“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)

Men , God , Truth , Books

“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)

Housing

“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)

Nature

“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)

Age , Art , Success