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It is impossible to reduce, or, at least, to hold a distant country against the wishes and efforts of its inhabitants.

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
Efforts
Hold
Least
Impossible
Effort
Inhabitants
Wish
Distant
Country
Reduce
Wishes

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Truth, naked, unblushing truth, the first virtue of all serious history, must be the sole recommendation of this personal narrative.
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Women [in ancient Rome] were condemned to the perpetual tutelage of parents, husbands, or guardians a sex created to please and obey was never supposed to have attained the age of reason and experience. Such, at least, was the stern and haughty spirit of the ancient law . . .
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The desire of perfection became the ruling passion of their soul and it is well known, that while reason embraces a cold mediocrity, our passions hurry us, with rapid violence, over the space which lies between the most opposite extremes.
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The primitive Christians perpetually trod on mystic ground, and their minds were exercised by the habits of believing the most extraordinary events
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Ignorant of the arts of luxury, the primitive Romans had improved the science of government and war.
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All that is human must retrograde if it does not advance.
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In the field of controversy I always pity the moderate party, who stand on the open middle ground exposed to the fire of both sides.
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History should be to the political economist a wellspring of experience and wisdom.
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In the productions of the mind, as in those of the soil, the gifts of nature are excelled by industry and skill . . .
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Extreme distress, which unites the virtue of a free people, imbitters the factions of a declining monarchy.
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But the wisdom and authority of the legislator are seldom victorious in a contest with the vigilant dexterity of private interest.
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History is indeed little more than the register of the crimes, follies, and misfortunes of mankind.
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[Courage] arises in a great measure from the consciousness of strength . . .
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The progress of despotism tends to disappoint its own purpose.
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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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The ruin of Paganism, in the age of Theodosius, is perhaps the only example of the total extirpation of any ancient and popular superstition and may therefore deserve to be considered, as a singular event in the history of the human mind.
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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.
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A nation ignorant of the equal benefits of liberty and law, must be awed by the flashes of arbitrary power: the cruelty of a despot will assume the character of justice his profusion, of liberality his obstinacy, of firmness.
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Fanaticism obliterates the feelings of humanity.
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The vain, inconstant, rebellious disposition of the people [of Armorica], was incompatible either with freedom or servitude.
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