The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Volume 1

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Phillips, Sampson, 1852 - Byzantine Empire

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Page 40 - The various modes of worship, which prevailed in the Roman world, were all considered by the people, as equally true; by the philosopher, as equally false; and by the magistrate, as equally useful.
Page 514 - He doth execute the judgment of the fatherless and widow, and loveth the stranger, in giving him food and raiment. Love ye therefore the stranger : for ye were strangers in the land of Egypt.
Page 43 - In their writings and conversation, the philosophers of antiquity asserted the independent dignity of reason, but they resigned their actions to the commands of law and of custom. Viewing, with a smile of pity and indulgence, the various errors of the vulgar, they diligently practised the ceremonies of their fathers, devoutly frequented the temples of the gods, and sometimes condescending to act a part on the theatre of superstition, they concealed the sentiments of an atheist under the sacerdotal...
Page 100 - His reign is marked by the rare advantage of furnishing very few materials for history; which is, indeed, little more than the register of the crimes, follies, and misfortunes of mankind.
Page 211 - Twenty-two acknowledged concubines, and a library of sixty-two thousand volumes, attested the variety of his inclinations; and from the productions which he left behind him, it appears that the former as well as the latter were designed for use rather than for ostentation.
Page 544 - How shall I admire, how laugh, how rejoice, how exult, when I behold so many proud monarchs, and fancied gods, groaning in the lowest abyss of darkness ; so many magistrates, who persecuted the name of the Lord, liquefying in fiercer fires than they ever kindled against the Christians ; so many sage philosophers blushing in red hot flames, with their deluded scholars...
Page 17 - That public virtue, which among the ancients was denominated patriotism, is derived from a strong sense of our own interest in the preservation and prosperity of the free government of which we are members.
Page 41 - The deities of a thousand groves and a thousand streams possessed, in peace, their local and respective influence; nor could the Roman who deprecated the wrath of the Tiber, deride the Egyptian who presented his offering to the beneficent genius of the Nile.
Page xii - The secrets of the hoary deep: a dark Illimitable ocean, without bound, Without dimension, where length, breadth, and highth, • And time, and place, are lost...
Page 366 - The most illustrious of the senate, the people, and the army closed the solemn procession. Unfeigned joy, wonder, and gratitude swelled the acclamations of the multitude ; but the satisfaction of the senate was clouded by the appearance of Tetricus ; nor could they suppress a rising murmur that the haughty emperor should thus expose to public ignominy the person of a Roman and a...

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