MEMOIRS OF MY LIFE AND WRITINGS
By Edward Gibbon
In the fifty-second year of my age, after the completion of anarduous and successful work, I now propose to employ some moments ofmy leisure in reviewing the simple transactions of a private andliterary life. Truth, naked unblushing truth, the first virtue ofmore serious history, must be the sole recommendation of thispersonal narrative. The style shall be simple and familiar; butstyle is the image of character; and the habits of correct writingmay produce, without labour or design, the appearance of art andstudy. My own amusement is my motive, and will be my reward: and ifthese sheets are communicated to some discreet and indulgentfriends, they will be secreted from the public eye till the authorshall be removed beyond the reach of criticism or ridicule.
A lively desire of knowing and of recording our ancestors sogenerally prevails, that it must depend on the influence of somecommon principle in the minds of men. We seem to have lived in thepersons of our forefathers; it is the labour and reward of vanity toextend the term of this ideal longevity. Our imagination is alwaysactive to enlarge the narrow circle in which Nature has confined us.Fifty or an hundred years may be allotted to an individual, but westep forward beyond death with such hopes as religion and philosophywill suggest; and we fill up the silent vacancy that precedes ourbirth, by associating ourselves to the authors of our existence.Our calmer judgment will rather tend to moderate, than to suppress,the pride of an ancient and worthy race. The satirist may laugh,the philosopher may preach; but Reason herself will respect theprejudices and habits, which have been consecrated by the experienceof mankind.
Wherever the distinction of birth is allowed to form a superiororder in the state, education and example should always, and willoften, produce among them a dignity of sentiment and propriety ofconduct, which is guarded from dishonour by their own and the publicesteem. If we read of some illustrious line so ancient that it hasno beginning, so worthy that it ought to have no end, we sympathizein its various fortunes; nor can we blame the generous enthusiasm,or even the harmless vanity, of those who are allied to the honoursof its name. For my own part, could I draw my pedigree from ageneral, a statesman, or a celebrated author, I should study theirlives with the diligence of filial love. In the investigation ofpast events, our curiosity is stimulated by the immediate orindirect reference to ourselves; but in the estimate of honour weshould learn to value the gifts of Nature above those of Fortune; toesteem in our ancestors the qualities that best promote theinterests of society; and to pronounce the descendant of a king lesstruly noble than the offspring of a man of genius, whose writingswill instruct or delight the latest posterity. The family ofConfucius is, in my opinion, the most illustrious in the world.After a painful ascent of eight or ten centuries, our barons andprinces of Europe are lost in the darkness of the middle ages; but,in the vast equality of the empire of China, the posterity ofConfucius have maintained, above two thousand two hundred years,their peaceful honours and perpetual succession. The chief of thefamily is still revered, by the sovereign and the people, as thelively image of the wisest of mankind. The nobility of the Spencershas been illustrated and enriched by the trophies of Marlborough;but I exhort them to consider the "Fairy Queen" as the most preciousjewel of their coronet. I have exposed my private feelings, as Ishall always do, without scruple or reserve. That t