Top 200 Edward Gibbon Quotes (2025 Update)
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51. “I sighed as a lover, I obeyed as a son.”

— Edward Gibbon

52. “There is more pleasure to building castles in the air than on the ground.”

— Edward Gibbon

53. “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.”

— Edward Gibbon

54. “The division of the Roman world between the sons of Theodosius marks the final establishment of the empire of the East, which, from the reign of Arcadius to the taking of Constantinople by the Turks, subsisted one thousand and fifty-eight years in a state of premature and perpetual decay.”

— Edward Gibbon

55. “In a distant age and climate, the tragic scene of the death of Hosein will awaken the sympathy of the coldest reader.”

— Edward Gibbon

56. “A false modesty is the meanest species of pride.”

— Edward Gibbon

57. “Hope, the best comfort of our imperfect condition, was not denied to the Roman slave; and if he had any opportunity of rendering himself either useful or agreeable, he might very naturally expect that the diligence and fidelity of a few years would be rewarded with the inestimable gift of freedom.”

— Edward Gibbon

58. “An absolute monarch, who is rich without patrimony, may be charitable without merit; and Constantine too easily believed that he should purchase the favour of Heaven if he maintained the idle at the expense of the industrious, and distributed among the saints the wealth of the republic.”

— Edward Gibbon

59. “Corruption, the most infallible symptom of constitutional liberty.”

— Edward Gibbon

60. “My English text is chaste, and all licentious passages are left in the decent obscurity of a learned language.”

— Edward Gibbon

61. “A taste for books, which is still the pleasure and glory of my life.”

— Edward Gibbon

62. “Hope, the best comfort of our imperfect condition.”

— Edward Gibbon

63. “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.”

— Edward Gibbon

64. “The union of the Roman empire was dissolved; its genius was humbled in the dust; and armies of unknown barbarians, issuing from the frozen regions of the North, had established their victorious reign over the fairest provinces of Europe and Africa.”

— Edward Gibbon

65. “Fanaticism obliterates the feelings of humanity.”

— Edward Gibbon

66. “As for this young Ali, one cannot but like him. A noble-minded creature, as he shows himself, now and always afterwards; full of affection, of fiery daring. Something chivalrous in him; brave as a lion; yet with a grace, a truth and affection worthy of Christian knighthood.”

— Edward Gibbon

67. “While the Romans languished under the ignominious tyranny of eunuchs and bishops, the praises of Julian were repeated with transport in every part of the empire, except in the palace of Constantius.”

— Edward Gibbon

68. “In the end, they wanted security more than they wanted freedom.”

— Edward Gibbon

69. “The courage of a soldier is found to be the cheapest and most common quality of human nature.”

— Edward Gibbon

70. “War, in its fairest form, implies a perpetual violation of humanity and justice.”

— Edward Gibbon

71. “To the University of Oxford I acknowledge no obligation; and she will as cheerfully renounce me for a son, as I am willing to disclaim her for a mother. I spent fourteen months at Magdalen College: they proved the fourteen months the most idle and unprofitable of my whole life.”

— Edward Gibbon

72. “Many a sober Christian would rather admit that a wafer is God than that God is a cruel and capricious tyrant.”

— Edward Gibbon

73. “The terror of the Roman arms added weight and dignity to the moderation of the emperors. They preserved the peace by a constant preparation for war.”

— Edward Gibbon

74. “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.”

— Edward Gibbon

75. “The Roman government appeared every day less formidable to its enemies, more odious and oppressive to its subjects.”

— Edward Gibbon

76. “Another d-mn’d thick, square book! Always, scribble, scribble, scribble! Eh! Mr. Gibbon?”

— Edward Gibbon

77. “The style of an author should be the image of his mind, but the choice and command of language is the fruit of exercise.”

— Edward Gibbon

78. “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.”

— Edward Gibbon

79. “Amiable weaknesses of human nature.”

— Edward Gibbon

80. “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.”

— Edward Gibbon

81. “If all the barbarian conquerors had been annihilated in the same hour, their total destruction would not have restored the empire of the West: and if Rome still survived, she survived the loss of freedom, of virtue, and of honour.”

— Edward Gibbon

82. “Five times was Athanasius expelled from his throne; twenty years he passed as an exile or a fugitive; and almost every province of the Roman empire was successively witness to his merit, and his sufferings in the cause of the Homoousion, which he considered as the sole pleasure and business, as the duty, and as the glory, of his life. Amidst the storms of persecution, the archbishop of Alexandria was patient of labour, jealous of fame, careless of safety; and.”

— Edward Gibbon

83. “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.”

— Edward Gibbon

84. “The end comes when we no longer talk with ourselves. It is the end of genuine thinking and the beginning of the final loneliness.”

— Edward Gibbon

85. “Augustus was sensible that mankind is governed by names; nor was he deceived in his expectation, that the senate and people would submit to slavery, provided they were respectfully assured that they still enjoyed their ancient freedom.”

— Edward Gibbon

86. “The mixture of Sarmatic and German blood had contributed to improve the features of the Alani, to whiten their swarthy complexions, and to tinge their hair with a yellowish cast, which is seldom found in the Tartar race.”

— Edward Gibbon

87. “A martial nobility and stubborn commons, possessed of arms, tenacious of property, and collected into constitutional assemblies form the only balance capable of preserving a free constitution against the enterprise of an aspiring prince.”

— Edward Gibbon

88. “The Gauls were endowed with all the advantages of art and nature; but as they wanted courage to defend them, they were justly condemned to obey, and even to flatter, the victorious Barbarians, by whose clemency they held their precarious fortunes and their lives.”

— Edward Gibbon

89. “A nation of slaves is always prepared to applaud the clemency of their master who, in the abuse of absolute power, does not proceed to the last extremes of injustice and oppression.”

— Edward Gibbon

90. “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.”

— Edward Gibbon

91. “History, which undertakes to record the transactions of the past, for the instruction of future ages, would ill deserve that honourable office if she condescended to plead the cause of tyrants, or to justify the maxims of persecution.”

— Edward Gibbon

92. “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.”

— Edward Gibbon

93. “The first and indispensable requisite of happiness is a clear conscience.”

— Edward Gibbon

94. “Such events may be disbelieved or disregarded; but the charity of a bishop, Acacius of Amida, whose name might have dignified the saintly calendar, shall not be lost in oblivion.”

— Edward Gibbon

95. “There is nothing perhaps more adverse to nature and reason than to hold in obedience remote countries and foreign nations, in opposition to their inclination and interest.”

— Edward Gibbon

96. “It is the common calamity of old age to lose whatever might have rendered it desirable...”

— Edward Gibbon

97. “Style is the image of character.”

— Edward Gibbon

98. “The principles of a free constitution are irrecoverably lost, when the legislative power is nominated by the executive.”

— Edward Gibbon

99. “The mathematics are distinguished by a particular privilege, that is, in the course of ages, they may always advance and can never recede.”

— Edward Gibbon

100. “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.”

— Edward Gibbon