Edward Gibbon

"I was never less alone than when by myself."

"Beauty is an outward gift which is seldom despised, except by those to whom it has been refused."

"Our work is the presentation of our capabilities."

"The courage of a soldier is found to be the cheapest and most common quality of human nature."

"Their poverty secured their freedom, since our desires and our possessions are the strongest fetters of despotism."

"I understand by this passion the union of desire, friendship, and tenderness, which is inflamed by a single female, which prefers her to the rest of her sex, and which seeks her possession as the supreme or the sole happiness of our being."