ABSTRACT
Edward Gibbon included the first, and larger, part of this period among the epochs to which he allotted the highest possible praise.
If a man were called to fix the period in the history of the world, during which the condition of the human race was most happy and prosperous, he would, without hesitation, name that which elapsed from the death of Domitian (ad 96) to the accession of Commodus (180). 1
