The End Comes When We No Longer

The Emperor Of The East Was No Longer Guided By The Wisdom And Authority Of His Elder Brother, Whose Death Happened Towards The End Of The Preceding Year: And, As The Distressful Situation Of The Goths Required An Instant And Peremptory Decision, He Was Deprived Of The Favourite Resource Of Feeble And Timid Minds; Who Consider The Use Of Dilatory And Ambiguous Measures As The Most Admirable Efforts Of Consummate Prudence.

If We Are More Affected By The Ruin Of A Palace Than By The Conflagration Of A Cottage, Our Humanity Must Have Formed A Very Erroneous Estimate Of The Miseries Of Human Life.

The Ruin Of Paganism, In The Age Of Theodosius, Is Perhaps The Only Example Of The Total Extirpation Of Any Ancient And Popular Superstition; And May Therefore Deserve To Be Considered, As A Singular Event In The History Of The Human Mind.

The Most Distinguished Merit Of Those Two Officers Was Their Respective Prowess, Of The One In The Combats Of Bacchus, Of The Other In Those Of Venus.

At That Time The Archiepiscopal Throne Of Alexandria Was Filled By Theophilus, The Perpetual Enemy Of Peace And Virtue; A Bold, Bad Man, Whose Hands Were Alternately Polluted With Gold And With Blood.