GIBBON, EDWARD

(1737-94), Eng. historian; 6. Putney, Surrey, of good and rather wealthy family; suffered from weak health until 1752; went to school at Kingston-upon-Thames 1746; returned home, 1747, on mother’s death, and continued to develop a love of wide reading; went to Westminster School, 1749. In 1751;G. first started his interest in Rom, history by: casually icking up a continuation ‘of Hchard’s Ron, history; matriculated as gentleman commoner at Magdalen Coll., Oxford, April, 1752. At Oxford he was temporarily converted to the Church of Rome, but the system not suiting him, and conversion offending his 'f., he left Oxford and was placed under the tutelage of M. Pavilliard, a Calvin ist minister of Lausanne. Here he read systematically and wisely under shrewd guidance. In 1754 he returned to,2-Jn 1761 he published E at sur Ul’ etude Ge la literature. He e a captain in the Hampshire Militia, June, 1759, and from 1760 to 1762 was in ‘Military Servitude.’ During the years 1763-65 he toured the Continent; at Rome he first conceived his immortal work, the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, 1764. In 1767 he joined with a young Swi friend in writing a literary journal Bretagne. In 1770 he wrote Critical Observations, an attack on a theory of War burton’s. The first vol. of the Decline and Fall appeared Feb., 1776. The famous chapters (15 and 16) produced a great clamor and a library of _ controversy. contr Gibbon wrote his Vindication, Feb. 1779. Meanwhile he had been elected M.P. for Liskeard, 1774. For some service to the Government he received, 1779-80, a seat at the Board of Trade and Plantations with a sinecure salary of 800 pounds a year. He lost his seat for Liskeard, 1780, but was elected subsequently for Lymington. In April, 1781, the second and third quartos of his history were i ued. G.’s salary disappeared after abolition of Board of Trade by Burke’s Bill in 1782. He retired te Lausanne, Sept., 1783, and the History progre ed. Volume iv. was completed in June, 1784. Volume v. took le thar two years. Volume vi, begun May, 1786. was finished in thirteen months. G. returned to London, 1787, and in 1788 last three volumes of the history were published. In July he went to Switzer. Jjand. His Memoirs came out in 1789 He returned to England in June, 1793 and died at London after a painful illne