The result has
certainly been that he is one of the best-known of English prose
writers on the Continent, and one whom foreigners most readily
comprehend. This peculiarity, of which he himself was fully aware, we
may agree with him in ascribing to his residence at Lausanne. At the
"flexible age of sixteen he soon learned to endure, and gradually to
adopt," foreign manners. French became the language in which he
spontaneously thought; "his views were enlarged, and his prejudices
were corrected." In one particular he cannot be complimented on the
effect of his continental education, when he congratulates himself
"that his taste for the French theatre had abated his idolatry for the
gigantic genius of Shakespeare, which is inculcated from our infancy
as the first duty of Englishmen." Still it is well to be rid of
idolatry and bigotry even with regard to Shakespeare. We must remember
that the insular prejudices from which Gibbon rejoiced to be free were
very different in their intensity and narrowness from anything of the
kind which exists now. The mixed hatred and contempt for foreigners
which prevailed in his day, were enough to excite disgust in any
liberal mind.
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