edward-gibbon Quotes About humans

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

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

Ifs Humans Doe Wisdom Growth Human Nature Progression Roman Empire Human Progress Retrograde

“The authority of Plato and Aristotle, of Zeno and Epicurus, still reigned in the schools; and their systems, transmitted with blind deference from one generation of disciples to another, precluded every generous attempt to exercise the powers, or enlarge the limits, of the human mind.”

Mind Humans Stills School Growth Generations Exercise Limits Authority Blind Generous Human Mind Disciple Plato Deference Plato And Aristotle

Book:The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, 1

Source: The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, 1

“The Germans, in the age of Tacitus, were unacquainted with the use of letters; and the use of letters is the principal circumstance that distinguishes a civilised people from a herd of savages incapable of knowledge or reflection. Without that artificial help, the human memory soon dissipates or corrupts the ideas intrusted to her charge; and the nobler faculties of the mind, no longer supplied with models or with materials, gradually forget their powers; the judgment becomes feeble and lethargic, the imagination languid or irregular.”

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

“Although the progress of civilisation has undoubtedly contributed to assuage the fiercer passions of human nature, it seems to have been less favourable to the virtue of chastity, whose most dangerous enemy is the softness of the mind. The refinements of life corrupt while they polish the intercourse of the sexes. The gross appetite of love becomes most dangerous when it is elevated, or rather, indeed, disguised by sentimental passion.”

Source: Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire

“The German huts, open on every side to the eye of indiscretion or jealousy, were a better safeguard of conjugal fidelity than the walls, the bolts, and the eunuchs of a persian harem. To this reason, another may be added of a more honourable nature. The Germans treated their women with esteem and confidence, consulted them on every occasion of importance, and fondly believed that in their breasts resided a sanctity and wisdom more than human.”

Source: The Modern Library Essential World History 4-Book Bundle: The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (Abridged); Montcalm and Wolfe; History of the Conquest of Mexico; The Naval War of 1812

“To the love of pleasure we may therefore ascribe most of the agreeable, to the love of action we may attribute most of the useful and respectable, qualifications. The character in which both the one and the other should be united and harmonised would seem to constitute the most perfect idea of human nature.”

Should Humans May Ideas Character Seems Action Perfect Pleasure United History Human Nature Attributes Respectable Roman Empire Qualifications

Book:The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire

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

“But the human character, however it may be exalted or depressed by a temporary enthusiasm, will return by degrees to its proper and natural level, and will resume those passions that seem the most adapted to its present condition.”

Humans May Character Seems Passion Natural Levels History Conditions Return Degrees Enthusiasm Temporary Exalted Adapted Roman Empire Resumes

Book:Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire

Source: Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire

“We stand in need of such reflections to comfort us for the loss of some illustrious characters, which in our eyes might have seemed the most worthy of the heavenly present. The names of Seneca, of the elder and the younger Pliny, of Tacitus, of Plutarch, of Galen, of the slave Epictetus, and of the emperor Marcus Antoninus, adorn the age in which they flourished, and exalt the dignity of human natures.”

Source: EDWARD GIBBON Premium Collection: Historiographical Works, Memoirs & Letters: Including

“Where the subject lies so far beyond our reach, the difference between the highest and the lowest of human understandings may indeed be calculated as infinitely small; yet the degree of weakness may perhaps be measured by the degree of obstinacy and dogmatic confidence.”

Humans May Lying Understanding Differences History Subjects Degrees Highest Weakness Lowest Roman Empire Dogmatic Obstinacy

Book:The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire

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

“Philosophy alone can boast (and perhaps it is no more than the boast of philosophy), that her gentle hand is able to eradicate from the human mind the latent and deadly principle of fanaticism.”

Mind Humans Philosophy Hands Able Principles History Gentle Human Mind Boast Fanaticism Roman Empire Latent

Book:The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire

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

“It was the fashion of the times to attribute every remarkable event to the particular will of the Deity; the alterations of nature were connected, by an invisible chain, with the moral and metaphysical opinions of the human mind; and the most sagacious divines could distinguish, according to the colour of their respective prejudices, that the establishment of heresy tended to produce an earthquake, or that a deluge was the inevitable consequence of the progress of sin and error.”

Source: THE HISTORY OF THE DECLINE AND FALL OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE (All 6 Volumes): From the Height of the Roman Empire, the Age of Trajan and the Antonines - to the Fall of Byzantium; Including a Review of the Crusades, and the State of Rome during the Middle Ages

“The simple circumstantial narrative (did such a narrative exist) of the ruin of a single town, of the misfortunes of a single family, might exhibit an interesting and instructive picture of human manners; but the tedious repetition of vague and declamatory complaints would fatigue the attention of the most patient reader.”

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

“There exists in human nature a strong propensity to depreciate the advantages, and to magnify the evils, of the present times.”

Humans Evil Strong History Human Nature Advantage Roman Empire Propensity Present Time Depreciate

Book:The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Volume II: A.D. 395 to A.D. 1185 (A Modern Library E-Book)

Source: The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Volume II: A.D. 395 to A.D. 1185 (A Modern Library E-Book)

“The science of the church is neglected for the study of geometry, and they lose sight of Heaven while they are employed in measuring the earth. Euclid is perpetually in their hands. Aristotle and Theophrastus are the objects of their admiration; and they express an uncommon reverence for the works of Galen. Their errors are derived from the abuse of the arts and sciences of the infidels, and they corrupt the simplicity of the gospel by the refinements of human reason.”

Source: Delphi Complete Works of Edward Gibbon (Illustrated)

“If we are more affected by the ruin of a palace than by the conflagration of a cottage, our humanity must have formed a very erroneous estimate of the miseries of human life.”

Ifs Humans Humanity Sorrow Misery Ruins Human Life Affected Palaces Cottages

Book:The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire

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

“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.”

Mind Humans May Age Events Example Deserve Ancient Ruins Human Mind Superstitions Paganism

Book:The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire

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

“Yet the experience of four thousand years should enlarge our hopes, and diminish our apprehensions: we cannot determine to what height the human species may aspire in their advances towards perfection; but it may safely be presumed, that no people, unless the face of nature is changed, will relapse into their original barbarism.”

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

“A philosopher may deplore the eternal discords of the human race, but he will confess, that the desire of spoil is a more rational provocation than the vanity of conquest.”

Humans May Desire Race Eternal Philosopher Rational Vanity Human Race Conquest Spoil Discord Provocation

Book:The Modern Library Essential World History 4-Book Bundle: The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (Abridged); Montcalm and Wolfe; History of the Conquest of Mexico; The Naval War of 1812

Source: The Modern Library Essential World History 4-Book Bundle: The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (Abridged); Montcalm and Wolfe; History of the Conquest of Mexico; The Naval War of 1812

“Of human life, the most glorious or humble prospects are alike and soon bounded by the sepulchre.”

Humans Humble Human Life Glorious Prospects

Book:The Modern Library Essential World History 4-Book Bundle: The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (Abridged); Montcalm and Wolfe; History of the Conquest of Mexico; The Naval War of 1812

Source: The Modern Library Essential World History 4-Book Bundle: The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (Abridged); Montcalm and Wolfe; History of the Conquest of Mexico; The Naval War of 1812

“Passion, interest, or caprice, suggested daily motives for the dissolution of marriage; a word, a sign, a message, a letter, the mandate of a freedman, declared the separation; the most tender of human connections was degraded to a transient society of profit or pleasure.”

Humans Passion Interest Pleasure Messages Letters Connections Profit Separation Motive Transient Mandates Dissolution Human Connection Caprice

Book:EDWARD GIBBON Premium Collection: Historiographical Works, Memoirs & Letters: Including

Source: EDWARD GIBBON Premium Collection: Historiographical Works, Memoirs & Letters: Including

“The active, insatiate principle of self-love can alone supply the arts of life and the wages of industry; and as soon as civil government and exclusive property have been introduced, they become necessary to the existence of the human race.”

Humans Has Beens Art Self Government Race Existence Principles Industry Self Love Property Active Human Race Wages Exclusive

Book:Delphi Complete Works of Edward Gibbon (Illustrated)

Source: Delphi Complete Works of Edward Gibbon (Illustrated)

“Majorian presents the welcome discovery of a great and heroic character, such as sometimes arise, in a degenerate age, to vindicate the honor of the human species.”

Humans Sometimes Character Age Honor Discovery Species Arise Welcome Heroic Degenerates Human Species

Book:Delphi Complete Works of Edward Gibbon (Illustrated)

Source: Delphi Complete Works of Edward Gibbon (Illustrated)

“In this primitive and abject state [of hunters and gatherers], which ill deserves the name of society, the human brute, without arts or laws, almost without sense or language, is poorly distinguished from the rest of the animal creation.”

Humans Art States Law Names Language Animal Creation Deserve Ill Primitive Hunters Distinguished Brutes

Author:Edward Gibbon

“[The] vain and transitory scenes of human greatness are unworthy of a serious thought.”

Humans Greatness Serious Scene Vain Unworthy Transitory

Book:Delphi Complete Works of Edward Gibbon (Illustrated)

Source: Delphi Complete Works of Edward Gibbon (Illustrated)

“The law of nature instructs most animals to cherish and educate their infant progeny. The law of reason inculcates to the human species the returns of filial piety.”

Humans Reason Law Animal Return Species Cherish Educate Infant Laws Of Nature Piety Human Species Progeny Filial Filial Piety

Book:Guizot's Gibbon: History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire

Source: Guizot's Gibbon: History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire

“We may therefore acquiesce in the pleasing conclusion, that every age of the world has increased, and still increases, the real wealth, the happiness, the knowledge, and perhaps the virtue, of the human race.”

World Humans May Stills Real Age Wealth Race Virtue Increase Conclusion Human Race Real Wealth

Book:Delphi Complete Works of Edward Gibbon (Illustrated)

Source: Delphi Complete Works of Edward Gibbon (Illustrated)

“The nations, and the sects, of the Roman world, admitted with equal credulity, and similar abhorrence, the reality of that infernal art [witchcraft], which was able to control the eternal order of the planets, and the voluntary operations of the human mind. . . . They believed, with the wildest inconsistency, that this preternatural dominion of the air, of earth, and of hell, was exercised, from the vilest motives of malice or gain, by some wrinkled hags and itinerant sorcerers, who passed their obscure lives in penury and contempt.”

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

“The history of empires is the record of human misery; the history of the sciences is that of the greatness and happiness of mankind.”

Humans Misery Empires

Author:Edward Gibbon

“'I believe in one God and Mohammed the Apostle of God,' is the simple and invariable profession of Islam. The intellectual image of the Deity has never been degraded by any visible idol; the honours of the prophet have never transgressed the measure of human virtue, and his living precepts have restrained the gratitude of his disciples within the bounds of reason and religion.”

Source: The Modern Library Essential World History 4-Book Bundle: The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (Abridged); Montcalm and Wolfe; History of the Conquest of Mexico; The Naval War of 1812

“History, in fact, is no more than a list of the crimes of humanity, human follies and accidents”

Humans Facts Humanity Crime Historical Accidents Lists Folly Human Folly

Author:Edward Gibbon

“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.”

Ifs Men World Humans Names Race History Conditions Periods Historical Human Race World History Prosperous Hesitation Roman Empire

Author:Edward Gibbon

“The value of money has been settled by general consent to express our wants and our property, as letters were invented to express our ideas; and both these institutions, by giving a more active energy to the powers and passions of human nature, have contributed to multiply the objects they were designed to represent.”