The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, 8. köide

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William Y. Birch & Abraham Small, Printed by Robert Carr, 1805
 

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Page lx - 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.
Page 16 - To the University of Oxford / 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.
Page 17 - In the university of Oxford, the greater part of the public professors have, for these many years, given up altogether even the pretence of teaching.
Page 41 - A rich banker of Paris, a citizen of Geneva, had the good fortune and good sense to discover and possess this inestimable treasure ; and in the capital of taste and luxury she resisted the temptations of wealth, as she had sustained the hardships of indigence. The genius of her husband has exalted him to the most conspicuous station in Europe. In every change of prosperity and disgrace he has reclined on the bosom of a faithful friend ; and Mademoiselle Curchod is now the wife of M. Necker, the minister,...
Page 74 - It was at Rome, on the 15th of October 1764, as I sat musing amidst the ruins of the Capitol, while the barefooted 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.
Page 86 - From the adverse side of the house an ardent and powerful opposition was supported, by the lively declamation of Barre, the legal acuteness of Dunning, the profuse and philosophic fancy of Burke, and the argumentative vehemence of Fox, who in the conduct of a party approved himself equal to the conduct of an empire.
Page 49 - The perfect composition, the nervous language, the well-tuned periods of Dr. Robertson, inflamed me to the ambitious hope that I might one day tread in his footsteps : the calm philosophy, the careless inimitable beauties of his friend and rival, often forced me to close the volume with a mixed sensation of delight and despair.
Page 132 - ... adversaries, who, with the design of boarding, presumed to approach them; and the winds and waves are always on the side of the ablest navigators.
Page 87 - ... is productive of those warm sensibilities, which at a second meeting can no longer be rekindled. If I listened to the music of praise, I was more seriously satisfied with the approbation of my judges. The candour of Dr. Robertson embraced his disciple. A letter from Mr. Hume overpaid the labour of ten years ; but I have never presumed to accept a place in the triumvirate of British historians.
Page 34 - After finishing this great author, a library of eloquence and reason, I formed a more extensive plan of reviewing the Latin classics,* under the four divisions of, 1. Historians, 2. Poets, 3. Orators, and 4. Philosophers, in a chronological series, from the days of Plautus and Sallust, to the decline of the language and empire of Rome...

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