EDWARD GIBBON

[From The Memoirs of the Life of Edward Gibbon with Various Observations and Excursions by Himself, 1795. Edited by G. B. Hill, Methuen & Co., London, 1900.

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GIBBON, EDWARD (1737-1794), historian; educated at Westminster; owed his taste for books to his aunt, Catherine Porten; spent fourteen ‘unprofitable' months at Magdalen College, Oxford, 1752-3; became Romanist after reading Middleton's 'Free Inquiry' and works by Bossuet and Parsons, 1753; at Lausanne (1753-8), where his tutor, Pavillard, drew him back to protestantism, and where he made friends with Deyverdun and read widely; became attached to Susanne Curchod (afterwards Madame Necker), but in deference to his father broke off the engagement, 1757; published 'Essai sur l'Etude de la Littérature,' 1761 (English version, 1764); served in Hampshire militia, 1759-70, and studied military literature; at Lausanne met Holroyd (afterwards Lord Sheffield); during a tour in Italy, 1764-5, formed plan of his 'History' amid the ruins of the Capitol; with Deyverdun published ‘Mémoires Littéraires de la Grande-Bretagne,' 1767-8, contributing a review of Lyttelton's 'Henry II': issued 'Critical Observations on the Sixth Book of the Æneid,' attacking Warburton, 1770; settled in London, 1772; joined Dr. Johnson's Club, 1774; became professor in ancient history at the Royal Academy in succession to Goldsmith; M.P., Liskeard, 1774-80, Lymington, 1781-3; drew up a state paper against France, and was commissioner of trade and plantations, 1779-82; issued in 1776 the first volume of his 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire,' which passed into three editions, and obtained the favourable verdict of Hume, Robertson, Warton, and Walpole; defended the chapters on growth of Christianity in his ‘Vindication,' 1779; issued the second and third volumes, 1781, after a visit to Paris, where he met Buffon and disputed with De Mably; retired with Deyverdun to Lausanne, 1783, where he finished the work, 1787 (published, 1788); returned to England, 1793; died suddenly in London; a Latin epitaph written for his monument at Fletching, Sussex, by Dr. Samuel Parr [q. v.]. His 'Miscellaneous Works' (edited by his friend Lord Sheffield, 1796) contained an autobiographical memoir, and 'Antiquities of the House of Brunswick' (1814). — Index and Epitome of D. N. B.

"If, as Johnson said, there had been only three books 'written by man that were wished longer by their readers,' the eighteenth century was not to draw to its close without seeing a fourth added. With Don Quixote, The Pilgrim's Progress and Robinson Crusoe, the Autobiography of Edward Gibbon was henceforth to rank as 'a work whose conclusion is perceived with an eye of sorrow, such as the traveller casts upon departing day.' It is indeed so short that it can be read by the light of a single pair of candles; it is so interesting in its subject, and so alluring in its turns of thought and its style, that in a second and third reading it gives scarcely less pleasure than in the first. Among the books in which men have told the story of their own lives it stands in the front rank. It is a striking fact that one of the first of autobiographies and the first of biographies were written in the same years.

Boswell was still working at his Life of Johnson when Gibbon began those memoirs from which his autobiography, in the form in which it was given to the world, was so skilfully pieced together. But a short time had gone by since Johnson had said that 'he did not think that the life of any literary man in England had been well written.' That reproach against our writers he himself did much to lessen by his Lives of Cowley and of Milton, of Dryden and of Pope. It was finally removed by two members of that famous club which he had helped to found. However weak was the end of the eighteenth century in works of imagination, in one great branch of literature it faded nobly away. Both in the Life of Johnson and in the Autobiography of Edward Gibbon it 'left something so written to after-times as they should not willingly let it die.'” GEORGE BIRKBECK HILL, The Memoirs of the Life

of Edward Gibbon, Preface, p. v.

AT OXFORD

A traveller who visits Oxford or Cambridge is surprised and edified by the apparent order and tranquillity that prevail in the seats of the English Muses. In the most celebrated universities of Holland, Germany, and Italy, the students, who swarm from different countries, are loosely dispersed in private lodgings at the houses of the burghers: they dress according to their fancy and fortune; and in the intemperate quarrels of youth and wine, their swords, though less frequently than of old, are sometimes stained with each other's blood. The use of arms is banished from our English universities; the uniform habit of the academics, the square cap and black gown, is adapted to the civil and even clerical professions; and from the doctor in divinity to the undergraduate, the degrees of learning and age are externally distinguished. Instead of being scattered in a town, the students of Oxford and Cambridge are united in colleges; their maintenance is provided at their own expense, or that of the founders; and the stated hours of the hall and chapel represent the discipline of a regular and, as it were, a religious community. The eyes of the traveller are attracted by the size or beauty of the public edifices; and the principal colleges appear to be so many palaces which a liberal nation has erected and endowed for the habitation of science. My own introduction to the University of Oxford forms a new era 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. A decent allowance, more money than a school-boy had ever seen, was at my own disposal; and I might command among the tradesmen of Oxford an indefinite and dangerous latitude of credit. A key was delivered into my hands which gave me the free use of a numerous and learned library, my apartment consisted of three elegant and well-furnished rooms in the new building, a stately pile, of Magdalen College, and the adjacent walks, had they been frequented by Plato's disciples, might have been compared to the Attic shade on the banks of the Ilissus. Such was the fair prospect of my entrance (April 3, 1752) into the University of Oxford.

A venerable prelate, whose taste and erudition must reflect honour on the society in which they were formed, has drawn a very interesting picture of his academical life. "I was educated," says Bishop Lowth, "in the University of Oxford. I enjoyed all the advantages, both public and private, which that famous seat of learning so largely affords. I spent many years in that illustrious society, in a well-regulated course of useful discipline and studies, and in the agreeable and improving commerce of gentlemen and of scholars; in a society where emulation without envy, ambition without jealousy, contention without animosity, incited industry and awakened genius; where a liberal pursuit of knowledge and a genuine freedom of thought was raised, encouraged, and pushed forward by example, by commendation, and by authority. I breathed the same atmosphere that the Hookers, the Chillingworths, and the Lockes had breathed before; whose benevolence and humanity were as extensive as their vast genius and comprehensive knowledge; who always treated their adversaries with civility and respect; who made candour, moderation, and liberal judgment as much the rule and law as the subject of their discourse. And do you reproach me with my education in this place, and with my relation to this most respectable body, which I shall always esteem my greatest advantage and my highest honour?" I transcribe with pleasure this eloquent passage, without examining what benefits or what rewards were derived by

Hooker, or Chillingworth, or Locke, from their academical institution; without inquiring whether in this angry controversy the spirit of Lowth himself is purified from the intolerant zeal which Warburton had ascribed to the genius of the place. It may indeed be observed that the atmosphere of Oxford did not agree with Mr. Locke's constitution; and that the philosopher justly despised the academical bigots who expelled his person and condemned his principles. The expression of gratitude is a virtue and a pleasure: a liberal mind will delight to cherish and celebrate the memory of its parents; and the teachers of science are the parents of the mind. I applaud the filial piety, which it is impossible for me to imitate; since I must not confess an imaginary debt to assume the merit of a just or generous retribution. 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; the reader will pronounce between the school and the scholar; but I cannot affect to believe that Nature had disqualified me for all literary pursuits. The specious and ready excuse of my tender age, imperfect preparation, and hasty departure may doubtless be alleged; nor do I wish to defraud such excuses of their proper weight. Yet in my sixteenth year I was not devoid of capacity or application; even my childish reading had displayed an early though blind propensity for books; and the shallow flood might have been taught to flow in a deep channel and a clear stream. In the discipline of a well-constituted academy, under the guidance of skilful and vigilant professors, I should gradually have risen from translations to originals, from the Latin to the Greek classics, from dead languages to living science: my hours would have been occupied by useful and agreeable studies, the wanderings of fancy would have been restrained, and I should have escaped the temptations of idleness which finally precipitated my departure from Oxford.

Perhaps in a separate annotation I may coolly examine the fabulous and real antiquities of our sister universities, a question which has kindled such fierce and foolish disputes among their fanatic sons. In the meanwhile it will be acknowledged that these venerable bodies are sufficiently old to partake of all the

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prejudices and infirmities of age. The schools of Oxford and Cambridge were founded in a dark age of false and barbarous science; and they are still tainted with the vices of their origin. Their primitive discipline was adapted to the education of priests and monks; and the government still remains in the hands of the clergy, an order of men whose manners are remote from the present world, and whose eyes are dazzled by the light of philosophy. The legal incorporation of these societies by the charters of popes and kings had given them a monopoly of the public instruction; and the spirit of monopolists is narrow, lazy, and oppressive; their work is more costly and less productive than that of independent artists; and the new improvements so eagerly grasped by the competition of freedom are admitted with slow. and sullen reluctance in those proud corporations, above the fear of a rival, and below the confession of an error. We may scarcely hope that any formation will be a voluntary act; and so deeply are they rooted in law and prejudice, that even the omnipotence of parliament would shrink from an inquiry into the state and abuses of the two universities.

The use of academical degrees, as old as the thirteenth century, is visibly borrowed from the mechanic corporations; in which an apprentice, after serving his time, obtains a testimonial of his skill, and a licence to practise his trade and mystery. It is not my design to depreciate those honours, which could never gratify or disappoint my ambition; and I should applaud the institution, if the decrees of bachelor or licentiate were bestowed as the reward of manly and successful study: if the name and rank of doctor or master were strictly reserved for the professors of science, who have approved their title to the public esteem.

In all the universities of Europe, excepting our own, the languages and sciences are distributed among a numerous list of effective professors: the students, according to their taste, their calling, and their diligence, apply themselves to the proper masters; and in the annual repetition of public and private lectures these masters are assiduously employed. Our curiosity may inquire what number of professors has been instituted at Oxford? (for I shall now confine myself to my own university). By whom are they appointed, and what may be the probable chances of merit or