A Heart To Resolve, A

The Subject, However Various And Important, Has Already Been So Frequently, So Ably, And So Successfully Discussed, That It Is Now Grown Familiar To The Reader, And Difficult To The Writer.

Every Man Who Rises Above The Common Level Has Received Two Educations: The First From His Teachers; The Second, More Personal And Important, From Himself.

The Valuable Library Of Alexandria Was Pillaged Or Destroyed; And Near Twenty Years Afterwards, The Appearance Of The Empty Shelves Excited The Regret And Indignation Of Every Spectator Whose Mind Was Not Totally Darkened By Religious Prejudice. The Compositions Of Ancient Genius, So Many Of Which Have Irretrievably Perished, Might Surely Have Been Excepted From The Wreck Of Idolatry, For The Amusement And Instruction Of Succeeding Ages.

Vicissitudes Of Fortune, Which Spares Neither Man Nor The Proudest Of His Works, Which Buries Empires And Cities In A Common Grave.

It Was Rome, On The Fifteenth Of October, 1764, As I Sat Musing Amidst The Ruins Of The Capitol, While The Barefooted Friars Were Singing Vespers In The Temple Of Jupiter, That The Idea Of Writing The Decline And Fall Of The City First Started To My Mind.