Memoirs of My Life and Writings by Edward Gibbon

Author:Edward Gibbon [Gibbon, Edward]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Historians -- Great Britain -- Biography, Gibbon, Edward, 1737-1794
Published: 2004-07-01T04:00:00+00:00

{Passage in Greek}

Ilias, A 481.

—Fair wind, and blowing fresh,

Apollo sent them; quick they rear'd the mast,

Then spread th'unsullied canvas to the gale,

And the wind fill'd it. Roar'd the sable flood

Around the bark, that ever as she went

Dash'd wide the brine, and scudded swift away.

COWPER'S Homer.

In the study of a poet who has since become the most intimate of my friends, I successively applied many passages and fragments of Greek writers; and among these I shall notice a life of Homer, in the Oposcula Mythologica of Gale, several books of the geography of Strabo, and the entire treatise of Longinus, which, from the title and the style, is equally worthy of the epithet of sublime. My grammatical skill was improved, my vocabulary was enlarged; and in the militia I acquired a just and indelible knowledge of the first of languages. On every march, in every journey, Horace was always in my pocket, and often in my hand: but I should not mention his two critical epistles, the amusement of a morning, had they not been accompanied by the elaborate commentary of Dr. Hurd, now Bishop of Worcester. On the interesting subjects of composition and imitation of epic and dramatic poetry, I presumed to think for myself; and thirty close-written pages in folio could scarcely comprise my full and free discussion of the sense of the master and the pedantry of the servant.

After his oracle Dr. Johnson, my friend Sir Joshua Reynolds denies all original genius, any natural propensity of the mind to one art or science rather than another. Without engaging in a metaphysical or rather verbal dispute, I know, by experience, that from my early youth I aspired to the character of an historian. While I served in the militia, before and after the publication of my essay, this idea ripened in my mind; nor can I paint in more lively colours the feelings of the moment, than by transcribing some passages, under their respective dates, from a journal which I kept at that time. Beriton, April 14, 1761. (In a short excursion from Dover.)—

"Having thought of several subjects for an historical composition, I chose the expedition of Charles VIII. of France into Italy. I read two memoirs of Mr. de Foncemagne in the Academy of Inscriptions (tom. xvii. p. 539-607.), and abstracted them. I likewise finished this day a dissertation, in which I examine the right of Charles VIII. to the crown of Naples, and the rival claims of the House of Anjou and Arragon: it consists of ten folio pages, besides large notes."

Beriton, August 4, 1761. (In a week's excursion from Winchester camp.)—"After having long revolved subjects for my intended historical essay, I renounced my first thought of the expedition of Charles VIII. as too remote from us, and rather an introduction to great events, than great and important in itself. I successively chose and rejected the crusade of Richard the First, the barons' wars against John and Henry the Third, the History of Edward the Black Prince, the lives and comparisons of Henry V.

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