Roman Empire Quotes - Page 5

• Rhino-mounted Bantu shock troops could have overthrown the Roman Empire. It never happened.

  Jared Diamond

  Rhinos, Troops, Empires

  Jared Diamond (2017). “Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies”, p.352, W. W. Norton & Company

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• Instead of pressing, with the foremost of the crowd, into the palace of Constantinople, Libanius calmly expected his arrival at Antioch; withdrew from court on the first symptoms of coldness and indifference; required a formal invitation for each visit; and taught his sovereign an important lesson, that he might command the obedience of a subject, but that he must deserve the attachment of a friend.

  Edward Gibbon

  Attachment, History, Important

  Edward Gibbon, William George Smith (1857). “The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire”, p.175

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• When Julian ascended the throne, he declared his impatience to embrace and reward the Syrian sophist, who had preserved, in a degenerate age, the Grecian purity of taste, of manners and of religion. The emperor's prepossession was increased and justified by the discreet pride of his favourite.

  Edward Gibbon

  Pride, History, Age

  Edward Gibbon (1840). “The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire”, p.137

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• Today you can buy the Dialogues of Plato for less than you would spend on a fifth of whiskey, or Gibbon's Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire for the price of a cheap shirt. You can buy a fair beginning of an education in any bookstore with a good stock of paperback books for less than you would spend on a week's supply of gasoline.

  Louis L'Amour

  Plato, Book, Fall

  Louis L'Amour (2008). “Education of a Wandering Man”, p.11, Bantam

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• The Holy Roman Empire was neither holy nor Roman nor an empire, the United Nations is a disunited collection of regimes, many of which do not represent the nations they govern.

  George Will

  Empires, Holy, Regimes

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• The real cause of the great upheavals which precede changes of civilisations, such as the fall of the Roman Empire and the rise of the Arabian Empire, is a profound modification in the ideas of the peoples .... The memorable events of history are the visible effects of the invisible changes of human thought .... The present epoch is one of these critical moments in which the thought of mankind is undergoing a process of transformation.

  Gustave Le Bon

  Real, Fall, Memorable

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• Every historian has a vested interest. "The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire" was not about the Roman but the British empire. What price the truth?

  Peter Greenaway

  Fall, Empires, Decline

  "'You have naked bodies and genitalia, don't you? Why are you so adolescent?': Director Peter Greenaway on 'Puritan' Americans and the intense sex scenes in 'Eisenstein in Guanajuato'". Interview with Gary M. Kramer, www.salon.com. February 4, 2016.

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• His [Andy warhol] films were way ahead of the times...and I'm not suggesting this has all necessarily been a good thing for America, mind you. I kind of think we're all in a really big mess, kind of like the end days of the Roman Empire.

  Bob Colacello

  Thinking, America, Mind

  Source: www.huffingtonpost.com

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• A warlike nation like the Germans, without either cities, letters, arts, or money, found some compensation for this savage state in the enjoyment of liberty. Their poverty secured their freedom, since our desires and our possessions are the strongest fetters of despotism.

  Edward Gibbon

  Art, Cities, History

  Edward Gibbon (1854). “The history of the decline and fall of the Roman empire, with notes by Milman and Guizot. Ed. by W. Smith”, p.359

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• Charlemagne either died or was born or did something with the Holy Roman Empire in 800.

  Robert Benchley

  Art, Empires, Entertainment

  Robert Benchley (1946). “One Minute, Please”

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• The imprudent Maximus disregarded these salutary considerations: he gratified his resentment and ambition; he saw the bleeding corpse of Valentinian at his feet; and he heard himself saluted Emperor by the unanimous voice of the senate and people. But the day of his inauguration was the last day of his happiness.

  Edward Gibbon

  Ambition, Voice, Feet

  Edward Gibbon (2015). “History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire V3: the History Focus”, p.235, 谷月社

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• 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

  Son, Eight, Years

  Edward Gibbon (2000). “The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Volume II: A.D. 395 to A.D. 1185 (A Modern Library E-Book)”, p.304, Modern Library

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• The pastoral labours of the archbishop of Constantinople provoked and gradually united against him two sorts of enemies; the aspiring clergy, who envied his success, and the obstinate sinners, who were offended by his reproofs. When Chrysostom thundered from the pulpit of St. Sophia against the degeneracy of the Christians, his shafts were spent among the crowd, without wounding or even marking the character of any individual.

  Edward Gibbon

  Christian, Character, Past

  Edward Gibbon (1854). “The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire”, p.502

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• I’ve been listening to how the Roman Empire fell and all I can say is, it didn’t fall nearly fast enough!”-Iggy

  James Patterson

  Fall, Listening, Empires

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• 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

  Names, History, Events

  Edward Gibbon (1821). “The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire”, p.209

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• These idle disputants overlooked the invariable laws of nature, which have connected peace with innocence, plenty with industry, and safety with valour.

  Edward Gibbon

  Law, Safety, History

  Edward Gibbon (1998). “Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire”, p.600, Wordsworth Editions

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• Yet the people, and even the clergy, incapable of forming any rational judgment of the business of peace and war, presumed to arraign the policy of Stilicho, who so often vanquished, so often surrounded, and so often dismissed the implacable enemy of the republic. The first moment of the public safety is devoted to gratitude and joy; but the second is diligently occupied by envy and calumny.

  Edward Gibbon

  Gratitude, War, People

  Edward Gibbon (2009). “The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (Edited and Abridged): Abridged Edition”, p.552, Modern Library

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• 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

  Army, Dust, Europe

  Edward Gibbon (1837). “The history of the decline and fall of the Roman empire”, p.526

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• The laws of war, that restrain the exercise of national rapine and murder, are founded on two principles of substantial interest: the knowledge of the permanent benefits which may be obtained by a moderate use of conquest, and a just apprehension lest the desolation which we inflict on the enemy's country may be retaliated on our own. But these considerations of hope and fear are almost unknown in the pastoral state of nations.

  Edward Gibbon

  Country, War, Exercise

  Edward Gibbon (1840). “The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire”, p.161

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• The proliferation of bureaucrats and its invariable accompaniment, much heavier tax levies on the productive part of the population, are the recognizable signs, not of a great, but of a decaying society. Historians know that both phenomena were especially marked in the declining eras of the Roman Empire in the West and of its successor state, the Eastern or Byzantine Empire.

  William Henry Chamberlin

  Liberty, Population, Byzantine

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• 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.

  Edward Gibbon

  Men, Names, Race

  1776-88 The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, ch.3.

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• A citizen of the Roman Empire, for example, would have placed less value on individual liberty in the modern Western sense than on collective responsibility.

  Stephen Baxter

  Responsibility, Liberty, Example

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• It is scarcely possible that the eyes of contemporaries should discover in the public felicity the latent causes of decay and corruption. This long peace, and the uniform government of the Romans, introduced a slow and secret poison into the vitals of the empire. The minds of men were gradually reduced to the same level, the fire of genius was extinguished, and even the military spirit evaporated.

  Edward Gibbon

  Military, Eye, Men

  The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire ch. 2 (1776 - 1788)

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• 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

  Opportunity, Years, History

  Edward Gibbon (2009). “The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (Edited and Abridged): Abridged Edition”, p.29, Modern Library

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• 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

  Loss, Rome, History

  Edward Gibbon (1854). “The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire”, p.42

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