The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire: Volume IV

"The Romans were strong and noble, and in a more noble and stronger sense than have ever existed, or even been dreamed of on earth... Every relic of them, every inscription, ravishes the taste of him who has once had a taste for it." — Nietzsche Rome is all things to all people. Rome was, and is, the ultimate expression of what the peak of a nation’s Will to Power looks like. The expression of its art, its engineering feats, its philosophical and religious accomplishments, its military ethos and organization, are all felt in our collective psyche till this very day. In fact, it is safe to assume that it is the singular civilization which will be remembered, admired, and reconstituted, again and again until the end of time. It is Imperial Rome which the best instinct of princes seeks to learn from since it is here that Rome reveals herself at her crescendo as she overcomes the continuing trials and conflicts which characterizes her parabolic destiny. Edward Gibbon, recounts for all posterity a chronological history of Rome which dates from her height under Emperor Augustus and progresses until her ultimate ascension into the heavens in A.D. 1453. Gibbon initiates this chronicle at the zenith of the Roman Empire's power under the Antonine dynasty. He then meticulously documents the empire's protracted and painful descent into disorder and moral decay. This narrative is executed with unprecedented precision and force.