This day may possibly be my last: but the laws of probability, so true in general, so fallacious in particular, still allow about fifteen years. A quote of English historian Edward Gibbon (1737 - 1794). The quote was written in 1787 and was published after his death in "Miscellaneous works of Edward Gibbon, with memoirs of his life and writings composed by himself" edited by Lord John Seffield, 1796