Quotes About Edward Gibbon

Greek is doubtless the most perfect [language] that has been contrived by the art of man.

A modern Greek, who could write the life of a saint without adding fables and miracles, is entitled to some commendation.

If a man were called to fix the period in the history of the world, during which the condition of the human race was most happy and prosperous, he would, without hesitation, name that which elapsed from the death of Domitian to the accession of Commodus.

A cloud of critics, of compilers, of commentators, darkened the face of learning, and the decline of genius was soon followed by the corruption of taste.

whose one hundred and twenty-nine homilies are still extant, if what no one reads may be said to be extant.]

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

If a man were called to fix the period in the history of the world, during which the condition of the human race was most happy and prosperous, he would, without hesitation, name that which elapsed from the death of Domitian [in 96] to the accession of Commodus [in 180].

The great work of Gibbon is indispensable to the student of history. The literature of Europe offers no substitute for "The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire.

I never make the mistake of arguing with people for whose opinions I have no respect.

Men run with great avidity to give their evidence in favour of what flatters their passions and national prejudices,' David Hume told Edward Gibbon.

As Edward Gibbon observed about the modes of worship prevalent in the Roman world, they were "considered by the people as equally true, by the philosopher as equally false and by the magistrate as equally useful.