08-07-2001, 08:14 AM
Yes it is inaccurate and even some mechanisms he invokes to explain the decline and fall are very out dated but his stlye is magnificent. I am not the only person to think his english prose is the very best. So even if he is inaccurate try reading it as a work of art. Change your expectations (your way of reading it) and I am convinced you will learn to enjoy it.<br>
Just for fun try reading this example. An experiment: stand up and read it OUT LOUD. Try it.<br>
<br>
"It was the fashion of the times to attribute every remarkable event to the particular will of the Deity; the alterations of nature were connected, by an invisible chain, with the moral and metaphysical opinions of the human mind; and the most sagacious divines could distinguish, according to the colour of their respective prejudices, that the establishment of heresy tended to produce an earthquake, or that a deluge was the inevitable consequence of the progress of sin and error. Without presuming to discuss the truth or propriety of these lofty speculations, the historian may content himself with an observation, which seems to be justified by experience, that man has much more to fear from the passions of his fellow-creatures than from the convulsions of the elements. The mischievous effects of an earthquake or deluge, a hurricane, or the eruption of a volcano, bear a very inconsiderable proportion to the ordinary calamities of war, as they are now moderated by the prudence or humanity of the princes of Europe, who amuse their own leisure, and exercise the courage of their subjects, in the practice of the military art." <p></p><i>Edited by: <A HREF=http://pub45.ezboard.com/ugoffredo.showPublicProfile?language=EN>goffredo</A> at: 8/7/01 3:29:25 pm<br></i>
Just for fun try reading this example. An experiment: stand up and read it OUT LOUD. Try it.<br>
<br>
"It was the fashion of the times to attribute every remarkable event to the particular will of the Deity; the alterations of nature were connected, by an invisible chain, with the moral and metaphysical opinions of the human mind; and the most sagacious divines could distinguish, according to the colour of their respective prejudices, that the establishment of heresy tended to produce an earthquake, or that a deluge was the inevitable consequence of the progress of sin and error. Without presuming to discuss the truth or propriety of these lofty speculations, the historian may content himself with an observation, which seems to be justified by experience, that man has much more to fear from the passions of his fellow-creatures than from the convulsions of the elements. The mischievous effects of an earthquake or deluge, a hurricane, or the eruption of a volcano, bear a very inconsiderable proportion to the ordinary calamities of war, as they are now moderated by the prudence or humanity of the princes of Europe, who amuse their own leisure, and exercise the courage of their subjects, in the practice of the military art." <p></p><i>Edited by: <A HREF=http://pub45.ezboard.com/ugoffredo.showPublicProfile?language=EN>goffredo</A> at: 8/7/01 3:29:25 pm<br></i>
Jeffery Wyss
"Si vos es non secui of solutio tunc vos es secui of preciptate."
"Si vos es non secui of solutio tunc vos es secui of preciptate."
