Preface To The Fourth Volume Of The Original Quarto Edition.

I now discharge my promise, and complete my design, of writing
the History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, both in
the West and the East. The whole period extends from the age of
Trajan and the Antonines, to the taking of Constantinople by
Mahomet the Second; and includes a review of the Crusades, and
the state of Rome during the middle ages. Since the publication
of the first volume, twelve years have elapsed; twelve years,
according to my wish, "of health, of leisure, and of
perseverance." I may now congratulate my deliverance from a long
and laborious service, and my satisfaction will be pure and
perfect, if the public favor should be extended to the conclusion
of my work.

It was my first intention to have collected, under one view,
the numerous authors, of every age and language, from whom I have
derived the materials of this history; and I am still convinced
that the apparent ostentation would be more than compensated by
real use. If I have renounced this idea, if I have declined an
undertaking which had obtained the approbation of a
master-artist, ^* my excuse may be found in the extreme
difficulty of assigning a proper measure to such a catalogue. A
naked list of names and editions would not be satisfactory either
to myself or my readers: the characters of the principal Authors
of the Roman and Byzantine History have been occasionally
connected with the events which they describe; a more copious and
critical inquiry might indeed deserve, but it would demand, an
elaborate volume, which might swell by degrees into a general