He admired the _History of the Indies_.

It is one of the few books that he has honoured with mention and praise in the text of his own work.

But he points out that the "zeal of the philosophic historian for the rights of mankind" had led him into a blunder.

It was not only Gibbon's scholarly accuracy which saved him from such blunders.

Perhaps he had less zeal for the rights of mankind than men like Raynal, whose general views he shared.