THE historian of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire' was born at Putney, in Surrey, in May, 1737. He was the eldest son of Edward Gibbon, a gentleman of some fortune, and a strong attachment to Tory principles. His mother's name was Porten. But in his Memoirs, written at the close of his life, he betrays no strong sense of gratitude or affection towards either of his parents; while he acknowledges, with abundant warmth, the most important obligations to his aunt, Catherine Porten. To her lessons he ascribes his "invincible love for reading;" to her care he attributes the very preservation of his precarious life; and he designates her, in the calmness of dis

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tant reflection, as the true mother both of his body and his mind.

From a private school he was removed to Westminster; from Westminster to Magdalen College, Oxford, where he was admitted as a gentleman-commoner, April 3, 1752. About this time his constitution, hitherto extremely feeble, acquired a sudden vigour, which never deserted him during the rest of his life. At Oxford he made absolutely no proficiency in any branch of knowledge, or any useful accomplishment. "To the University of Oxford (he says) I acknowledge no obligation; and she will as cheerfully renounce me for a son, as I am willing to disclaim her for a mother." Accordingly he exhausts the severity of his sarcasm, both upon the system which was there established, and upon the men who administered it, without honestly inquiring whether he had labouret to extract even from an imperfect system, the modicum of advantage which it was capable of yielding... But his recollections of Oxford were embittered by his subsequent contests with some of the clergy, and the hostile treatment which he sustained at their hands and the principles which he embraced in after life would have rendered him equally intolerant of any institution, standing on a religious foundation.

During his residence at Oxford, and at the usually unreflecting age of sixteen, he was converted to the Roman Catholic faith. He was first stirred to thought by the "bold criticism" of Middleton. He then "swallowed" the miracles of the Basils, the Chrysostoms, and other fathers of the Church; and Bossuet achieved the conquest by the Exposition of the Catholic Doctrine,' and the History of the Variations.' And then he made his formal recantation before a Jesuit, named Baker, one of the Chaplains of the Sardinian Ambassador. In his retrospect upon

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this the most singular incident in the history of his mind, Gibbon might indeed profess to be proud of his change of opinion, as a sacrifice of interest to principle; but he probably conveys his habitual reflections more faithfully when he says, with his usual strength, "To my present feelings it seems incredible that I should ever believe that I believed in transubstantiation.”

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He was immediately removed from Oxford, and placed under the care of a tutor at Lausanne. To a Swiss pastor, named Pavillard, was entrusted the delicate office of disentangling the mind of Gibbon from the intricacies of popery, and leading it back again into the pale of the Protestant Church. He succeeded by seasonable arguments, and judicious admonitions, aided perhaps by the influence of a mild and benevolent character, he prevailed over the hasty caprice of a powerful mtellect; and on Christmas-day, in 1754, Gibbon publicly renounced his adopted creed, and reocived the sacrament in the church of Lausanne. There is, no reason to suspect the sincerity of this recantation, or to, believe that he had yet fallen either into scepticisin, or indifference.

He remained, in the whole, five years at Lausanne, and by his "serious character, and soft and quiet manners," he won the respect and affection of his tutor. During this time he laid the foundation of those studious habits, which formed the pride and happiness of his later life. Besides a passionate devotion to French literature, and great diligence in forming a correct style in that language, he read, according to a regular system, the whole of the Latin Classics; he acquired the rudiments of Greek, and gained some insight into the principles of mathematics. But this last pursuit he never afterwards renewed; though he would lead us to believe that a readiness in calculation was the talent of his child