Chapter IV: The cruelty, follies and murder of Commodus [with added Pertinax]

[nwhyte]

Available here, here or here.

1) Good quotes

After an introductory couple of paras about Commodus' father and mother, Gibbon moves from historical scene-setting to moral scene-setting: Most of the crimes which disturb the internal peace of society, are produced by the restraints which the necessary but unequal laws of property have imposed on

Comments

[nwhyte]

It's always tempting to read parental neuroses into these things. I've just come across Peter Medawar's brilliant demolition of the idea that Darwin's chronic illness was caused by his hatred of his own father: These deep and terrible feelings found outward expression in Darwin's touching reverence towards his father and his father's memory, and in his describing his father as the kindest and wisest man he ever knew: clear evidence, if evidence were needed, of how deply his true inner sentiments had been repressed.
Gibbon writes thus of his reunion with his own father after he had been in Europe for almost five years: It was not without some awe and apprehension that I approached the presence of my father. My infancy, to speak the truth, had been neglected at home; the severity of his look and language at our last parting still dwelt on my memory; nor could I form any notion of his character, or my probable reception. They were both more agreeable than I could expect. The domestic discipline of our ancestors has been relaxed by the philosophy and softness of the age; and if my father remembered that he had trembled before a stern parent, it was only to adopt with his own son an opposite mode of behaviour. He received me as a man and a friend; all constraint was banished at our first interview, and we ever afterwards continued on the same terms of easy and equal politeness. He applauded the success of my education; every word and action was expressive of the most cordial affection; and our lives would have passed without a cloud, if his oeconomy had been equal to his fortune, or if his fortune had been equal to his desires.
I haven't read the full autobiography (at Project Gutenberg) but maybe I ought to; likewise the Morison biography.

[treize64]

I'm greatly tempted to track down the Gibbon autobiography after reading that passage.