To An Active Mind, Indolence Is More

The Historian Must Have Some Conception Of How Men Who Are Not Historians Behave.

The Distinctions Of Personal Merit And Influence, So Conspicuous In A Republic, So Feeble And Obscure Under A Monarchy, Were Abolished By The Despotism Of The Emperors; Who Substituted In Their Room A Severe Subordination Of Rank And Office, From The Titled Slaves Who Were Seated On The Steps Of The Throne, To The Meanest Instruments Of Arbitrary Power.

The Patient And Active Virtues Of A Soldier Are Insensibly Nursed In The Habits And Discipline Of A Pastoral Life.

[the Monks'] Credulity Debased And Vitiated The Faculties Of The Mind: They Corrupted The Evidence Of History; And Superstition Gradually Extinguished The Hostile Light Of Philosophy And Science.

[peace] Cannot Be Honorable Or Secure, If The Sovereign Betrays A Pusillanimous Aversion To War.