História e Crítica: Gibbon e a “Grandeza imoderada de Roma”

In this article we aim to show that, nevertheless Gibbon uses the topics of the quarrel of luxury, he analyses the causes of the fall of Roman Empire from a different and innovative perspective. This point of view is incompatible with the mere moral evaluation luxury and frugality, as well of its consequences to the state, individuals and civilization. As we try to indicate here, this perspective depends on a well defined concept of what is history that is developed from a certain conception of critique that put Gibbon in a peculiar position in the Eighteenth Century.