Quotations from Chapter 10 of Edward Gibbon's History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire ("The Emperors Decius, Gallus, Aemilianus, Valerian, and Gallienus — The general Irruption of the Barbarians — The thirty Tyrants (248 - 268 A.D.)"):
The love of liberty was the ruling passion of these Germans; the enjoyment of it, their best treasure; the word that expressed that enjoyment the most pleasing to their ear. They deserved, they assumed, they maintained the honourable epithet of Franks or Freemen; which concealed, though it did not extinguish, the peculiar names of the several states of the confederacy.
(see also Gibbon _-_Table_of_Contents, Gibbon_-_Thoughts_Upon_Reading, ... and http://www.his.com/~z/gibbon.html for a single-page presentation of Gibbon quotes)
(correlates: Gibbon - Table of Contents, MoreElegantTechnologies, GibbonChapter19, ...)