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History is indeed little more than the register of the crimes, follies, and misfortunes of mankind.

Edward Gibbon

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Edward Gibbon
Age: 56 †
Born: 1737
Born: May 8
Died: 1794
Died: January 16
Classical Scholar
Historian
Politician
Writer
Gibbon
Indeed
Follies
Crime
Tourism
Mankind
Register
War
Crimes
History
Misfortunes
Littles
Historian
Little
Folly
Prison

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The courage of a soldier is found to be the cheapest and most common quality of human nature.
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Greek is a musical and prolific language, that gives a soul to the objects of sense, and a body to the abstractions of philosophy.
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The monastic studies have tended, for the most part, to darken, rather than to dispel, the cloud of superstition.
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A sentence of death and infamy was often founded on the slight and suspicious evidence of a child or a servant: the guilt [of the defendant] was presumed by the judges [due to the nature of the charge], and paederasty became the crime of those to whom no crime could be imputed.
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But a wild democracy . . . too often disdains the essential principles of justice.
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In old age the consolation of hope is reserved for the tenderness of parents, who commence a new life in their children, the faith of enthusiasts, who sing hallelujahs above the clouds and the vanity of authors, who presume the immortality of their name and writings.
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But in almost every province of the Roman world, an army of fanatics, without authority and without discipline, invaded the peaceful inhabitants and the ruin of the fairest structures of antiquity still displays the ravages of those barbarians who alone had time and inclination to execute such laborious destruction.
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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.
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Amiable weaknesses of human nature.
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Imam Hussain's sacrifice is for all groups and communities, an example of the path of rightousness.
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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.
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I darted a contemptuous look at the stately models of superstition.
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[All] the manly virtues were oppressed by the servile and pusillanimous reign of the monks.
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The frequent repetition of miracles serves to provoke, where it does not subdue, the reason of mankind.
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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
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A state of skepticism and suspense may amuse a few inquisitive minds. But the practice of superstition is so congenial to the multitude that, if they are forcibly awakened, they still regret the loss of their pleasing vision.
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[It] is the interest as well as duty of a sovereign to maintain the authority of the laws.
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My early and invincible love of reading I would not exchange for all the riches of India.
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History should be to the political economist a wellspring of experience and wisdom.
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The single combats of the heroes of history or fable amuse our fancy and engage our affections: the skillful evolutions of war may inform the mind, and improve a necessary, though pernicious, science. But in the uniform and odious pictures of a general assault, all is blood, and horror, and confusion . . .
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