The Auto-biography of Edward Gibbon, Esq: Illustrated from His Letters, with Occasional Notes and Narratives

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Turner & Hayden, 1846 - 381 páginas
 

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Página 171 - that the influence of the Crown had increased, was increasing, and ought to be diminished', and Mr Burke's Bill of Reform was framed with skill, 162 introduced with eloquence, and supported by numbers.
Página 7 - Thou hast most traitorously corrupted the youth of the realm in erecting a grammar school; and whereas, before, our forefathers had no other books but the score and the tally, thou hast caused printing to be used, and, contrary to the king, his crown and dignity, thou hast built a paper-mill.
Página 5 - Who builds a church to God, and not to Fame, Will never mark the marble with his name : Go, search it there, where to be born and die, Of rich and poor makes all the history ; Enough, that Virtue fill'd the space between ; Prov'd by the ends of being, to have been.
Página 66 - After a painful struggle I yielded to my fate : I sighed as a lover, I obeyed as a son 9 ; (8) my wound was insensibly healed by time, absence, and the habits of a new life.
Página 139 - Our solid and increasing establishments in America, where we need less dread the inundation of Barbarians, promise a superior stability and duration to the English language.
Página 186 - I wrote the last lines of the last page, in a summer house in my garden. After laying down my pen, I took several turns in a berceau, or covered walk of acacias, which commands a prospect of the country, the lake, and the mountains.
Página 133 - It was at Rome, on the 15th of October, 1764, as I sat musing amidst the ruins of the Capitol, while the bare-footed friars were singing vespers in the temple of Jupiter,* that the idea of writing the decline and fall of the city first started to my mind.
Página 158 - I am at a loss how to describe the success of the work, without betraying the vanity of the writer. The first impression was exhausted in a few days; a second and third edition were scarcely adequate to the demand ; and the bookseller's property was twice invaded by the pirates of Dublin. My book was on every table, and almost on every toilette ; the historian was crowned by the taste or fashion of the day j nor was the general voice disturbed by the barking of any profane critic.
Página 26 - My own introduction to the university of Oxford forms a new sera in my life ; and at the distance of forty years I still remember my first emotions of surprise and satisfaction. In my fifteenth year I felt myself suddenly raised from a boy to a man ; the persons whom I respected as my superiors in age and academical rank, entertained me with every mark of attention and civility ; and my vanity was flattered by the velvet cap and silk gown, which distinguish a gentleman commoner from a plebeian student.
Página 54 - As soon as I understood the principles, I relinquished for ever the pursuit of the mathematics ; nor can I lament that I desisted, before my mind was hardened by the habit of rigid demonstration, so destructive of the finer feelings of moral evidence, which must, however, determine the actions and opinions of our lives.

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