1. The Language.—2. The Writing.—3. The Literature.—4. The Monuments. —5. The Discovery of Champollion.—6. Literary Remains; Historical; Religious; Epistolary; Fictitious; Scientific; Epic; Satirical and Judicial.—7. The Alexandrian Period.—8. The Literary Condition of Modern Egypt.

1. THE LANGUAGE.—From the earliest times the language of Egypt was divided into three dialects: the Memphitic, spoken in Memphis and Lower Egypt; the Theban, or Sahidic, spoken in Upper Egypt; and the Bashmuric, a provincial variety belonging to the oases of the Lybian Desert.

The Coptic tongue, which arose from a union of ancient Egyptian with the vulgar vernacular, later became mingled with Greek and Arabic words, and was written in the Greek alphabet. It was used in Egypt until the tenth century A.D., when it gave way to the Arabic; but the Christians still preserve it in their worship and in their translation of the Bible. By rejecting its foreign elements Egyptologists have been enabled to study this language in its purity, and to establish its grammar and construction. It is the exclusive character of the Christian Egyptian literature, and marks the last development and final decay of the Egyptian language.

2. THE WRITING.—Four distinct graphic systems were in use in ancient Egypt: the hieroglyphic, the hieratic, the demotic, and Coptic. The first expresses words partly by representation of the object and partly by signs indicating sounds, and was used chiefly for inscriptions. The hieratic characters presented a flowing and abbreviated form of the hieroglyphic, and were used more particularly in the papyri. The great body of Egyptian literature has reached us through this character, the reading of which can only be determined by resolving it into its prototype, hieroglyphics.

The demotic writing indicates the rise of the vulgar tongue, which took place about the beginning of the seventh century B.C. It was used to transcribe hieroglyphic and hieratic inscriptions and papyri into the common idiom until the second century A.D., when the Coptic generally superseded it.

3. THE LITERATURE.—The literary history of ancient Egypt presents a remarkable exception to that of any other country. While the language underwent various modifications, and the written characters changed, the literature remained the same in all its principal features. This literature consists solely of inscriptions painted or engraved on monuments, or of written manuscripts on papyrus buried in the tombs or beneath the ruins of temples. It is so deficient in style, and so unsystematic in its construction, that it has taxed the labors of the ablest critics for the last fifty years to construct a whole from its disjointed materials, and these are so imperfect that many periods of Egyptian history are complete literary blanks. In the great period of the Rameses, novels or works of amusement predominated; under the Ptolemies, historical records, and in the Coptic or Christian stage, homolies and church rituals prevailed; but through every epoch the same general type appears. Notwithstanding these deficiencies, however, Egypt offers a most attractive field for the archaeologist, and new discoveries are constantly adding to our knowledge of this interesting country.

4. THE MONUMENTS.—The monuments of Egypt are religious, as the temples, sepulchral, as the necropoles, or triumphal, as the obelisks. The temples were the principal structures of the Egyptian cities, and their splendid ruins, covered with inscriptions, are among the most interesting remains of antiquity. Life after death, the leading idea of the religion of Egypt, was expressed in the construction of the tombs, so numerous in the vicinity of all the large cities. These necropoles, excavated in the rocks or hillsides, or built within the pyramids, consist of rows of chambers with halls supported by columns, which, with the walls, are often covered with paintings, historical or monumental, representing scenes from domestic or civil life. The great pyramids were probably built for the sepulchres of kings and their families, and the smaller ones for persons of inferior rank.

The most magnificent of the triumphal monuments are the obelisks, gigantic monoliths of red or white granite, some of which are more than two hundred feet high, covered with inscriptions, and bearing the image of the triumphant king, painted or engraved. The splendid obelisk in the Place de la Concorde, at Paris, celebrates the glories of Rameses II.

The obelisk now in New York is one of a pair erected at Heliopolis, before the Temple of the Sun, about 1600 B.C. In the reign of Augustus both were removed to Alexandria, and were known in modern times as Cleopatra's Needles. One was presented by the Khedive to the city of London in 1877, and the other to the city of New York the same year. The shaft on the latter bears two inscriptions, one celebrating Thothmes III., and the other Rameses II.

One of the most characteristic monuments of Egypt is the statue of the Sphinx, so often found in the temples and necropoles. It is a recumbent figure, having a human head and breast and the body of a lion. Whatever idea the Egyptians may have attached to this symbol, it represents most truly the character of that people and the struggle of mind to free itself from the instincts of brutal nature.

5. THE DISCOVERY OF CHAMPOLLION.—During the expedition into Egypt, in 1799, in throwing up some earthworks near Rosetta, a town on the western arm of the Nile, an officer of the French army discovered a block or tablet of black basalt, upon which were engraved inscriptions in Egyptian and Greek characters. This tablet, called the Rosetta Stone, was sent to France and submitted to the orientalists for interpretation. The inscription was found to be a decree of the Egyptian priests in honor of Ptolemy Epiphanes (196 B.C.), which was ordered to be engraved on stone in sacred (hieroglyphic), common (demotic), and in Greek characters. Through this interpretation, Champollion (1790-1832), after much study, discovered and established the alphabetic system of Egyptian writing, and applying his discovery more extensively, he was able to decipher the names of the kings of Egypt from the Roman emperors back, through the Ptolemies, to the Pharaohs of the elder dynasties. This discovery was the key to the interpretation of all the ancient monuments of Egypt; by it the history of the country was thrown open for a period of twenty-six centuries, the annals of the neighboring nations were rendered more intelligible, the religion, arts, sciences, life, and manners of the ancient Egyptians were revealed to the modern world, and the obelisks, the innumerable papyri, and the walls of the temples and tombs were transformed into inexhaustible mines of historical and scientific knowledge.

6. LITERARY REMAINS; HISTORICAL; RELIGIOUS; EPISTOLARY; FICTITIOUS; SCIENTIFIC; EPIC; SATIRICAL AND JUDICIAL.—The Egyptian priests from the earliest times must have preserved the annals of their country, though obscured by myths and symbols. These annals, however, were destroyed by Cambyses (500 B.C.), who, during his invasion of the country, burned the temples where they were preserved, although they were soon rewritten, according to the testimony of Herodotus, who visited Egypt 450 B.C. In the third century B.C., Manetho, a priest and librarian of Heliopolis, wrote the succession of kings, and though the original work was lost, important fragments of it have been preserved by other writers. There seem to have been four periods in this history of ancient Egypt, marked by great changes in the social and political constitution of the country. In the first epoch, under the rule of the gods, demigods, and heroes, according to Manetho, it was probably colonized and ruled by the priests, in the name of the gods. The second period extends from Menes, the supposed founder of the monarchy, to the invasion of the Shepherd Kings, about 2000 B.C. In the third period, under this title, the Phoenicians probably ruled Egypt for three centuries, and it was one of these kings or Pharaohs of whom Joseph was the prime minister. In the fourth period, from 1180 to 350 B.C., the invaders were expelled and native rule restored, until the country was again conquered, first by the Persians, about 500 B.C., and again by the Greeks under Alexander, 350 B.C. From that time to the present no native ruler has sat on the throne of that country. After the conquest by Alexander the Great, who left it to the sway of the Ptolemies, it was successively conquered by the Romans, the Saracens, the Mamelukes, and the Turks. Since 1841 it has been governed by a viceroy under nominal allegiance to the Sultan of Turkey. In 1865 the title of khedive was substituted for that of viceroy.

Early Egyptian chronology is in a great measure merely conjectural, and new information from the monuments only adds to the obscurity. The historical papyri are records of the kings or accounts of contemporary events. These, as well as the inscriptions on the monuments, generally in the form of panegyric, are inflated records of the successes of the heroes they celebrate, or explanations of the historical scenes painted or sculptured on the monuments.

The early religion of Egypt was founded on a personification of the laws of Nature, centred in a mysterious unity. Egyptian nature, however, supplied but few great objects of worship as symbols of divine power, the desert, a natural enemy, the fertilizing river, and the sun, the all-pervading presence, worshiped as the source of life, the lord of time, and author of eternity. Three great realms composed the Egyptian cosmos; the heavens, where the sun, moon, and stars paced their daily round, the abode of the invisible king, typified by the sun and worshiped as Ammon Ra, the earth and the under-world, the abode of the dead. Here, too, reigned the universal lord under the name of Osiris, whose material manifestation, the sun, as he passed beneath the earth, lightened up the under-world, where the dead were judged, the just recompensed, and the guilty punished.

Innumerable minor divinities, which originally personified attributes of the one Supreme Deity, were represented under the form of such animals as were endowed with like qualities. Every god was symbolized by some animal, which thus became an object of worship; but by confounding symbols with realities this worship soon degenerated into gross materialism and idolatry.

The most important religious work in this literature is the "Book of the Dead," a funeral ritual. The earliest known copy is in hieratic writing of the oldest type, and was found in the tomb of a queen, who lived probably about 3000 B.C. The latest copy is of the second century A.D., and is written in pure Coptic. This work, consisting of one hundred and sixty-six chapters, is a collection of prayers of a magical character, an account of the adventures of the soul after death, and directions for reaching the Hall of Osiris. It is a marvel of confusion and poverty of thought. A complete translation may be found in "Egypt's Place in Universal History," by Bunsen (second edition), and specimens in almost every museum of Europe. There are other theological remains, such as the Metamorphoses of the gods and the Lament of Isis, but their meaning is disguised in allegory. The hymns and addresses to the sun abound in pure and lofty sentiment.

The epistolary writings are the best known and understood branch of Egyptian literature. From the Ramesid era, the most literary of all, we have about eighty letters on various subjects, interesting as illustrations of manners and specimens of style. The most important of these is the "Anastasi Papyri" in the British Museum, written about the time of the Exodus.

Two valuable and tolerably complete relics represent the fictitious writing of Egyptian literature; they are "The Tale of Two Brothers," now in the British Museum, and "The Romance of Setna," recently discovered in the tomb of a Coptic monk. The former was evidently intended for the amusement of a royal prince. One of its most striking features is the low moral tone of the women introduced. "The Romance of Setna" turns upon the danger of acquiring possession of the sacred books. The opening and date of the story are missing.

Fresh information is being constantly acquired as to the knowledge of science possessed by the ancient Egyptians. Geometry originated with them, or from remote ages they were acquainted with the principles of this science, as well as with those of hydrostatics and mechanics, as is proved by the immense structures which remain the wonder of the modern world. They cultivated astronomy from the earliest times, and they have transmitted to us their observations on the movements of the sun, the stars, the earth, and other planets. The obelisks served them as sun dials, and the pyramids as astronomical observatories. They had great skill in medicine and much knowledge of anatomy. The most remarkable medical papyri are to be found in the Berlin Museum.

The epics and biographical sketches are narratives of personal adventure in war or travel, and are distinguished by some effort at grace of style. The epic of Pentaur, or the achievements of Rameses II., has been called the Egyptian Iliad. It is several centuries older than the Greek Iliad, and deserves admiration for its rapid narrative and epic unity.

The history of Mohan (by some thought to be Moses) has been called the Egyptian Odyssey, in contrast to the preceding. Mohan was a high official, and this narrative describes his travels in Syria and Palestine. This papyrus is in the British Museum, and both epics have been translated.

The satirical writings and beast fables of the Egyptians caricature the foibles of all classes, not sparing the sacred person of the king, and are often illustrated with satirical pictures. Besides these strictly literary remains, a large number of judicial documents, petitions, decrees, and treaties has been recovered.

7. THE ALEXANDRIAN PERIOD.—Egypt, in its flourishing period, having contributed to the civilization of Greece, became, in its turn, the pupil of that country. In the century following the age of Alexander the Great, under the rule of the Ptolemies, the philosophy and literature of Athens were transferred to Alexandria. Ptolemy Philadelphus, in the third century B.C., completed the celebrated Alexandrian Library, formed for the most part of Greek books, and presided over by Greek librarians. The school of Alexandria had its poets, its grammarians, and philosophers; but its poetry lacked the fire of genius, and its grammatical productions were more remarkable for sophistry and subtlety, than for soundness and depth of research. In the philosophy of Alexandria, the Eastern and Western systems combined, and this school had many distinguished disciples.

In the first century of the Christian era, Egypt passed from the Greek kings to the Roman emperors, and the Alexandrian school continued to be adorned by the first men of the age. This splendor, more Grecian than Egyptian, was extinguished in the seventh century by the Saracens, who conquered the country, and, it is believed, burned the great Alexandrian Library. After the wars of the immediate successors of Mohammed, the Arabian princes protected literature, Alexandria recovered its schools, and other institutions of learning were established; but in the conquest of the country by the Turks, in the thirteenth century, all literary light was extinguished.

8. LITERARY CONDITION OF MODERN EGYPT.—For more than nine hundred years Cairo has possessed a university of high rank, which greatly increased in importance on the accession of Mehemet Ali, in 1805, who established many other schools, primary, scientific, medical, and military, though they were suffered to languish under his two successors. In 1865, when Ismail- Pacha mounted the throne as Khedive (tributary king), he gave powerful aid to the university and to public instruction everywhere. The number of students at the University of Cairo advanced to eleven thousand. The wife of the Khedive, the Princess Cachma-Afet, founded in 1873, and maintained from her privy purse, a school for the thorough instruction of girls, which led to the establishment of a similar institution by the Ministry of Public Instruction. This princess is the first in the history of Islam who, from the interior of the harem, has exerted her influence to educate and enlighten her sex.

When the Khedive was driven into exile in 1879, the number of schools, nearly all the result of his energetic rule, was 4,817 and of pupils 170,000. Since the European intervention and domination the number of both has sensibly diminished, and a serious retrograde movement has taken place.

The higher literature of Egypt at the present time is written in pure Arabic. The popular writing in magazines, periodicals, etc., is in Arabic mixed with Syriac and Egyptian dialects. Newspaper literature has greatly increased during the past eight years.

e earned a subsistence as a teacher of Greek, was the friend of Scipio, and, at his death, was buried in the family tomb of the Scipio, at the request of the great conqueror of Hannibal, whose fame he contributed to hand down to posterity. Cicero always uses the appellation, "our own Ennius," when he quotes his poetry. Horace calls him "Father Ennius," a term which implies reverence and regard, and that he was the founder of Latin poetry. He was, like his friends Cato the censor, and Scipio Africanus the elder, a man of action as well as philosophical thought, and not only a poet, but a brave soldier, with all the singleness of heart and simplicity of manners which marked the old times of Roman virtue. Ennius possessed great power over words, and wielded that power skillfully. He improved the language in its harmony and its grammatical forms, and increased its copiousness and power. What he did was improved upon, but was never undone; and upon the foundations he laid, the taste of succeeding ages erected an elegant and beautiful superstructure. His great epic poem, the "Annals," gained him the attachment and admiration of his countrymen. In this he first introduced the hexameter to the notice of the Romans, and detailed the rise and progress of their national glory, from the earliest legendary period down to his own times. The fragments of this work which remain are amply sufficient to show that he possessed picturesque power, both in sketching his narratives and in portraying his characters, which seem to live and breathe; his language, dignified, chaste, and severe, rises as high as the most majestic eloquence, but it does not soar to the sublimity of poetry. As a dramatic poet, Ennius does not deserve a high reputation. In comedy, as in tragedy, he never emancipated himself from the Greek originals.

3. ROMAN COMEDY.—The rude comedy of the early Romans made little progress beyond personal satire, burlesque extravagance and licentious jesting, but upon this was ingrafted the new Greek comedy, and hence arose that phase of the drama, of which the representatives were Plautus, Statius, and Terence. The Roman comedy was calculated to produce a moral result, although the morality it inculcated was extremely low. Its standard was worldly prudence, its lessons utilitarian, and its philosophy Epicurean. There is a want of variety in the plots, but this defect is owing to the social and political condition of ancient Greece, which was represented in the Greek comedies and copied by the Romans. There is also a sameness in the dramatis personae, the principal characters being always a morose or a gentle father, who is sometimes also the henpecked husband of a rich wife, an affectionate or domineering wife, a good-natured profligate, a roguish servant, a calculating slave-dealer and some others.

The actors wore appropriate masks, the features of which were not only grotesque, but much exaggerated and magnified. This was rendered necessary by the immense size of the theatre and stage, and the mouth of the mask answered the purpose of a speaking trumpet, to assist in conveying the voice to every part of the vast building. The characters were known by a conventional costume; old men wore robes of white, young men were attired in gay clothes, rich men in purple, soldiers in scarlet, poor men and slaves in dark and scanty dresses. The comedy had always a musical accompaniment of flutes of different kinds.

In order to understand the principles which regulated the Roman comic metres, it is necessary to observe the manner in which the language itself was affected by the common conversational pronunciation. Latin, as it was pronounced, was very different from Latin as it is written; this difference consisted in abbreviation, either by the omission of sounds altogether, or by the contraction of two sounds into one, and in this respect the conversational language of the Romans resembled that of modern nations; with them, as with us, the mark of good taste was ease and the absence of pedantry and affectation. In the comic writers we have a complete representation of Latin as it was commonly pronounced and spoken, and but little trammeled or confined by a rigid adhesion to Greek metrical laws.

4. COMIC POETS.—Plautus (227-184 B.C.) was a contemporary of Ennius; he was a native of Umbria, and of humble origin. Education did not overcome his vulgarity, although it produced a great effect upon his language and style. He must have lived and associated with the people whose manners he describes, hence his pictures are correct and truthful. The class from which his representations are taken consisted of clients, the sons of freedmen and the half-enfranchised natives of Italian towns. He had no aristocratic friends, like Ennius and Terence; the Roman public were his patrons, and notwithstanding their faults, his comedies retained their popularity even in the Augustan age, and were acted as late as the reign of Diocletian. Life, bustle, surprise, unexpected situations, sharp, sparkling raillery that knew no restraint nor bound, left his audience no time for dullness or weariness. Although Greek was the fountain from which he drew his stores, his wit, thought, and language were entirely Roman, and his style was Latin of the purest and most elegant kind—not, indeed, controlled by much deference to the laws of metrical harmony, but full of pith and sprightliness, bearing the stamp of colloquial vivacity, and suitable to the general briskness of his scenes. Yet in the tone of his dialogue we miss all symptoms of deference to the taste of the more polished classes of society. Almost all his comedies were adopted from the new comedy of the Greeks, and though he had studied both the old and the middle comedy, Menander and others of the same school furnished him the originals of his plots. The popularity of Plautus was not confined to Rome, either republican or imperial. Dramatic writers of modern times, as Shakspeare, Dryden, and MoliÈre, have recognized the effectiveness of his plots, and have adopted or imitated them. About twenty of his plays are extant, among which the Captivi, the Epidicus, the Cistellaria, the Aulularia, and the Rudens are considered the best.

Terence (193-158 B.C.) was a slave in the family of a Roman senator, and was probably a native of Carthage. His genius presented the rare combination of all the fine and delicate qualities which characterized Attic sentiment, without corrupting the native purity of the Latin language. The elegance and gracefulness of his style show that the conversation of the accomplished society, in which he was a welcome guest, was not lost upon his correct ear and quick intuition. So far as it can be so, comedy was, in the hands of Terence, an instrument of moral teaching. Six of his comedies only remain, of which the Andrian and the Adelphi are the most interesting. If Terence was inferior to Plautus in life, bustle, and intrigue, and in the delineation of national character, he is superior in elegance of language and refinement of taste. The justness of his reflections more than compensates for the absence of his predecessor's humor; he touches the heart as well as gratifies the intellect.

Of the few other writers of comedy among the Romans, Statius may be mentioned, who flourished between Plautus and Terence. He was an emancipated slave, born in Milan. Cicero and Varro have pronounced judgment upon his merits, the substance of which appears to be, that his excellences consisted in the conduct of the plot, in dignity, and in pathos, while his fault was too little care in preserving the purity of the Latin style. The fragments, however, of his works, which remain are not sufficient to test the opinion of the ancient critics.

5. ROMAN TRAGEDY.—While Roman comedy was brought to perfection under the influence of Greek literature, Roman tragedy, on the other hand, was transplanted from Athens, and, with few exceptions, was never anything more than translation or imitation. In the century during which, together with comedy, it flourished and decayed, it boasted of five distinguished writers, Livius, Naevius, Ennius (already spoken of), Pacuvius, and Attius. In after ages, Rome did not produce one tragic poet, unless Varius be considered an exception. The tragedies attributed to Seneca were never acted, and were only composed for reading and recitation.

Among the causes which prevented tragedy from flourishing at Rome was the little influence the national legends exerted over the people. These legends were more often private than public property, and ministered more to the glory of private families than to that of the nation at large. They were embalmed by their poets as curious records of antiquity, but they did not, like the venerable traditions of Greece, twine themselves around the heart of the nation. Another reason why Roman legends had not the power to move the affections of the Roman populace is to be found in the changes the masses had undergone. The Roman people were no longer the descendants of those who had maintained the national glory in the early period; the patrician families were almost extinct; war and poverty had extinguished the middle classes and miserably thinned the lower orders. Into the vacancy thus caused, poured thousands of slaves, captives in the bloody wars of Gaul, Spain, Greece, and Africa. These and their descendants replaced the ancient people, and while many of them by their talents and energy arrived at wealth and station, they could not possibly be Romans at heart, or consider the past glories of their adopted country as their own. It was to the rise of this new element of population, and the displacement or absorption of the old race, that the decline of patriotism was owing, and the disregard of everything except daily sustenance and daily amusement, which paved the way for the empire and marked the downfall of liberty. With the people of Athens, tragedy formed a part of the national religion. By it the people were taught to sympathize with their heroic ancestors; the poet was held to be inspired, and poetry the tongue in which the natural held communion with the supernatural. With the Romans, the theatre was merely a place for secular amusement, and poetry only an exercise of the fancy. Again, the religion of the Romans was not ideal, like that of the Greeks. The old national faith of Italy, not being rooted in the heart, soon became obsolete, and readily admitted the ingrafting of foreign superstitions, which had no hold on the belief or love of the people. Nor was the genius of the Roman people such as to sympathize with the legends of the past; they lived only in the present and the future; they did not look back on their national heroes as demigods; they were pressing forward to extend the frontiers of their empire, to bring under their yoke nations which their forefathers had not known. If they regarded their ancestors at all, it was not in the light of men of heroic stature as compared with themselves, but as those whom they could equal or even surpass.

The scenes of real life, the bloody combats of the gladiators, the captives, and malefactors stretched on crosses, expiring in excruciating agonies or mangled by wild beasts, were the tragedies which most deeply interested a Roman audience.

The Romans were a rough people, full of physical rather than of intellectual energy, courting peril and setting no value on human life or suffering. Their very virtues were stern and severe; they were strangers to both the passions which it was the object of tragedy to excite—pity and terror. In the public games of Greece, the refinements of poetry mingled with those exercises which were calculated to invigorate the physical powers, and develop manly beauty. Those of Rome were sanguinary and brutalizing, the amusements of a nation to whom war was a pleasure and a pastime.

It cannot be asserted, however, that tragedy was never to a certain extent an acceptable entertainment at Rome, but only that it never flourished there as it did at Athens, and that no Roman tragedies can be compared with those of Greece.

6. TRAGIC POETS.—Three separate eras produced tragic poets. In the first flourished Livius Andronicus, Naevius, and Ennius; in the second, Pacuvius and Attius; in the third, Asinius Pollio wrote tragedies, the plots of which seem to have been taken from Roman history. Ovid attempted a "Medea," and even the Emperor Augustus, with other men of genius, tried his hand, though unsuccessfully, at tragedy.

In the second of the eras mentioned, Roman tragedy reached its highest degree of perfection simultaneously with that of comedy. While Terence was successfully reproducing the wit and manners of the new Attic comedy, Pacuvius (220-130 B.C.) was enriching the Roman drama with free translations of the Greek tragedians. He was a native of Brundusium and a grandson of the poet Ennius. At Rome he distinguished himself as a painter as well as a dramatic poet. His tragedies were not mere translations, but adaptations of Greek tragedies to the Roman stage. The fragments which are extant are full of new and original thoughts, and the very roughness of his style and audacity of his expressions have somewhat of the solemn grandeur and picturesque boldness which distinguish the father of Attic tragedy.

Attius (fl. 138 B.C.), though born later than Pacuvius, was almost his contemporary, and a competitor for popular applause. He is said to have written more than fifty tragedies, of which fragments only remain. His taste is chastened, his sentiments noble, and his versification elegant. With him, Latin tragedy disappeared. The tragedies of the third period were written expressly for reading and recitation, and not for the stage: they were dramatic poems, not dramas. Amidst the scenes of horror and violence which followed, the voice of the tragic muse was hushed. Massacre and rapine raged through the streets of Rome, itself a theatre where the most terrible scenes were daily enacted.

7. SATIRE.—The invention of satire is universally attributed to the Romans, and this is true as far as the external form is concerned, but the spirit is found in many parts of the literature of Greece. Ennius was the inventor of the name, but Lucilius (148-102 B.C.) was the father of satire, in the proper sense. His satires mark an era in Roman literature, and prove that a love for this species of poetry had already made great progress. Hitherto, literature, science, and art had been considered the province of slaves and freedmen. The stern old Roman virtue despised such sedentary employment as intellectual cultivation, and thought it unworthy of the warrior and statesman. Some of the higher classes loved literature and patronized it, but did not make it their pursuit. Lucilius was a Roman knight, as well as a poet. His satires were comprised in thirty books, numerous fragments of which are still extant. He was a man of high moral principle, though stern and stoical; a relentless enemy of vice and profligacy, and a gallant and fearless defender of truth and honesty. After the death of Lucilius satire languished, until half a century later, when it assumed a new garb in the descriptive scenes of Horace, and put forth its original vigor in the burning thoughts of Persius and Juvenal.

8. HISTORY AND ORATORY.—Prose was far more in accordance with the genius of the Romans than poetry. As a nation, they had little or no imaginative power, no enthusiastic love of natural beauty, and no acute perception of the sympathy between man and the external world. The favorite civil pursuit of an enlightened Roman was statesmanship, and the subjects akin to it, history, jurisprudence, and oratory, the natural language of which was prose, not poetry. And their practical statesmanship gave an early encouragement to oratory, which is peculiarly the literature of active life. As matter was more valued than manner by this utilitarian people, it was long before it was thought necessary to embellish prose composition with the graces of rhetoric. The fact that Roman literature was imitative rather than inventive, gave a historical bias to the Roman intellect, and a tendency to study subjects from an historical point of view. But even in history, they never attained that comprehensive and philosophical spirit which distinguished the Greek historians.

The most ancient writer of Roman history was Fabius Pictor (fl. 219 B.C.). His principal work, written in Greek, was a history of the first and second Punic war, to which subsequent writers were much indebted. Contemporary with Fabius was Cincius Alimentus, also an annalist of the Punic war, in which he was personally engaged. He was a prisoner of Hannibal, who delighted in the society of literary men, and treated him with great kindness and consideration, and himself communicated to him the details of his passage across the Alps. Like Fabius, he wrote his work in Greek, and prefixed to it a brief abstract of Roman history. Though the works of these annalists are valuable as furnishing materials for more philosophical minds, they are such as could have existed only in the infancy of a national literature. They were a bare compilation of facts— the mere framework of history—diversified by no critical remarks or political reflections, and meagre and insipid in style.

The versatility of talent displayed by Cato the censor (224-144 B.C.) entitles him to a place among orators, jurists, economists, and historians. His life extends over a wide and important period of literary history, when everything was in a state of change,—morals, social habits, and literary taste. Cato was born in Tusculum, and passed his boyhood in the pursuits of rural life at a small Sabine farm belonging to his father. The skill with which he pleaded the causes of his clients before the rural magistracy made his abilities known, and he rose rapidly to eminence as a pleader. He filled many high offices of state. His energies were not weakened by advancing age, and he was always ready as the advocate of virtue, the champion of the oppressed, and the punisher of vice. With many defects, Cato was morally and intellectually one of the greatest men Rome ever produced. He had the ability and the determination to excel in everything which he undertook. His style is rude, unpolished, ungraceful, because to him polish was superficial, and, therefore, unreal. His statements, however, were clear, his illustrations striking; the words with which he enriched his native tongue were full of meaning; his wit was keen and lively, and his arguments went straight to the intellect, and carried conviction with them.

Cato's great historical and antiquarian work, "The Origins," was a history of Italy and Rome from the earliest times to the latest events which occurred in his own lifetime. It was a work of great research and originality, but only brief fragments of it remain. In the "De Re Rustica," which has come down to us in form and substance as it was written, Cato maintains, in the introduction, the superiority of agriculture over other modes of gaining a livelihood. The work itself is a commonplace book of agriculture and domestic economy; its object is utility, not science: it serves the purpose of a farmer's and gardener's manual, a domestic medicine, herbal, and cookery book. Cato teaches his readers, for example, how to plant osier beds, to cultivate vegetables, to preserve the health of cattle, to pickle pork, and to make savory dishes.

Of the "Orations" of Cato, ninety titles are extant, together with numerous fragments. In style he despised art. He was too fearless and upright, too confident in the justness of his cause to be a rhetorician; he imitated no one, and no one was ever able to imitate him. Niebuhr pronounces him to be the only great man in his generation, and one of the greatest and most honorable characters in Roman history.

Varro (116-28 B.C.) was an agriculturist, a grammarian, a critic, a theologian, a historian, a philosopher, a satirist. Of his miscellaneous works considerable portions are extant, sufficient to display his erudition and acuteness, yet, in themselves, more curious than attractive.

Eloquence, though of a rude, unpolished kind, must have been, in the very earliest times, a characteristic of the Roman people. It is a plant indigenous to a free soil. As in modern times it has flourished especially in England and America, fostered by the unfettered freedom of debate, so it found a congenial home in free Greece and republican Rome. Oratory was, in Rome, the unwritten literature of active life, and recommended itself to a warlike and utilitarian people by its utility and its antagonistic spirit. Long before the art of the historian was sufficiently advanced to record a speech, the forum, the senate, the battlefield, and the threshold of the jurisconsult had been nurseries of Roman eloquence, or schools in which oratory attained a vigorous youth, and prepared for its subsequent maturity.

While the legal and political constitution of the Roman people gave direct encouragement to deliberative and judicial oratory, respect for the illustrious dead furnished opportunities for panegyric. The song of the bard in honor of the departed warrior gave place to the funeral oration. Among the orators of this time were the two Scipios, and Galba, whom Cicero praises as having been the first Roman who understood how to apply the theoretical principles of Greek rhetoric.

All periods of political disquiet are necessarily favorable to eloquence, and the era of the Gracchi was especially so. After a struggle of nearly four centuries the old distinction of plebeian and patrician no longer existed. Plebeians held high offices, and patricians, like the Gracchi, stood forward as champions of popular rights. These stirring times produced many celebrated orators. The Gracchi themselves were both eloquent and possessed of those qualities and endowments which would recommend their eloquence to their countrymen. Oratory began now to be studied more as an art, and the interval between the Gracchi and Cicero boasted of many distinguished names; the most illustrious among them are M. Antonius, Crassus, and Cicero's contemporary and most formidable rival, Hortensius.

M. Antonius (fl. 119 B.C.) entered public life as a pleader, and thus laid the foundation of his brilliant career; but he was through life greater as a judicial than as a deliberative orator. He was indefatigable in preparing his case, and made every point tell. He was a great master of the pathetic, and knew the way to the heart. Although he did not himself give his speeches to posterity, some of his most pointed expressions and favorite passages left an indelible impression on the memories of his hearers, and many of them were preserved by Cicero. In the prime of life he fell a victim to political fury, and his bleeding head was placed upon the rostrum, which was so frequently the scene of his eloquent triumphs.

L. Licinius Crassus was four years younger than Antonius, and acquired great reputation for his knowledge of jurisprudence, for his eminence as a pleader, and, above all, for his powerful and triumphant orations in support of the restoration of the judicial office to the senators. From among the crowd of orators, who were then flourishing in the last days of expiring Roman liberty, Cicero selected Crassus to be the representative of his sentiments in his imaginary conversation in "The Orator." Like Lord Chatham, Crassus almost died on the floor of the Senate house, and his last effort was in support of the aristocratic party.

Q. Hortensius was born 114 B.C. He was only eight years senior to the greatest of all Roman orators. He early commenced his career as a pleader, and he was the acknowledged leader of the Roman bar, until the star of Cicero arose. His political connection with the faction of Sylla, and his unscrupulous support of the profligate corruption which characterized that administration, both at home and abroad, enlisted his legal talents in defense of the infamous Verres; but the eloquence of Cicero, together with the justice of the cause which he espoused, prevailed; and from that time forward his superiority over Hortensius was established and complete. The style of Hortensius was Asiatic—more florid and ornate than polished and refined.

9. ROMAN JURISPRUDENCE.—The framework of their jurisprudence the Romans derived from Athens, but the complete structure was built up by their own hands. They were the authors of a system possessing such stability that they bequeathed it, as an inheritance, to modern Europe, and traces of Roman law are visible in the legal systems of the whole civilized world.

The complicated principles of jurisprudence of the Roman constitution became, in Rome, a necessary part of a liberal education. When a Roman youth had completed his studies, under his teacher of rhetoric, he not only frequented the forum, in order to learn the application of the rhetorical principles he had acquired, and frequently took some celebrated orator as a model, but also studied the principles of jurisprudence under eminent jurists, and attended the consultations in which they gave to their clients their expositions of law.

The earliest systematic works on Roman law were the "Manual" of Pomponius, and the "Institutes" of Gaius, who flourished in the time of Hadrian and the Antonines. Both of these works were, for a long time, lost, though fragments were preserved in the pandects of Justinian. In 1816, however, Niebuhr discovered a palimpsest MS., in which the epistles of St. Jerome were written over the erased "Institutes" of Gaius. From the numerous misunderstandings of the Roman historians respecting the laws and constitutional history of their country, the subject continued long in a state of confusion, until Vico, in his "Scienza nuova," dispelled the clouds of error, and reduced it to a system; and he was followed so successfully by Niebuhr, that modern students can have a more comprehensive and antiquarian knowledge of the subject than the writers of the Augustan age.

The earliest Roman laws were the "Leges Regiae," which were collected and codified by Sextus Papirius, and were hence called the Papirian code; but these were rude and unconnected—simply a collection of isolated enactments. The laws of the "Twelve Tables" stand next in point of antiquity. They exhibited the first attempt at regular system, and embodied not only legislative enactments, but legal principles. So popular were they that when Cicero was a child every Roman boy committed them to memory, as our children do their catechism, and the great orator laments that in the course of his lifetime this practice had become obsolete.

The oral traditional expositions of these laws formed the groundwork of the Roman civil law. To these were added, from time to time, the decrees of the people, the acts of the senate, and praetorian edicts, and from these various elements the whole body of Roman law was composed. So early was the subject diligently studied, that the age preceding the first two centuries of our era was rich in jurists whose powers are celebrated in history.

The most eminent jurists who adorned this period were the Scaevolae, a family in whom the profession seems to have been hereditary. After them flourished Aelius Gallus (123-67 B.C.), eminent as a law reformer, C. Juventius, Sextus Papirius, and L. Lucilius Balbus, three distinguished jurists, who were a few years senior to Cicero.

10. GRAMMARIANS.—Towards the conclusion of this literary period a great increase took place in the numbers of those learned men whom the Romans at first termed literati, but afterwards, following the custom of the Greeks, grammarians. To them literature was under great obligations. Although few of them were authors, and all of them possessed acquired learning rather than original genius, they exercised a powerful influence over the public mind as professors, lecturers, critics, and schoolmasters. By them the youths of the best families not only were imbued with a taste for Greek philosophy and poetry, but were also taught to appreciate the literature of their own country. Livius Andronicus and Ennius may be placed at the head of this class, followed by Crates Mallotes, C. Octavius Lampadio, Laelius, Archelaus, and others, most of whom were emancipated slaves, either from Greece or from other foreign countries.

PERIOD SECOND.

FROM THE AGE OF CICERO TO THE DEATH OF AUGUSTUS (74 B.C.-14 A.D.)

1. DEVELOPMENT OF THE ROMAN LITERATURE.—Latin literature, at first rude, and, for five centuries, unable to reach any high excellence, was, as we have seen, gradually developed by the example and tendency of the Greek mind, which moulded Roman civilization anew. The earliest Latin poets, historians, and grammarians were Greeks. The metre which was brought to such perfection by the Latin poets was formed from the Greek, and the Latin language more and more assimilated to the Hellenic tongue.

As civilization advanced, the rude literature of Rome was compared with the great monuments of Greek genius, their superiority was acknowledged, and the study of them encouraged. The Roman youth not only attended the schools of the Greeks, in Rome, but their education was considered incomplete, unless they repaired to those of Athens, Rhodes, and Mytilene. Thus, whatever of national character existed in the literature was gradually obliterated, and what it gained in harmony and finish it lost in originality. The Roman writers imitated more particularly the writers of the Alexandrian school, who, being more artificial, were more congenial than the great writers of the age of Pericles.

Roman genius, serious, majestic, and perhaps more original than at a later period, was manifest even at the time of the Punic wars, but it had not yet taken form; and while thought was vigorous and powerful, expression remained weak and uncertain. But, under the Greek influence, and aided by the vigor imparted by free institutions, the union of thought and form was at length consummated, and the literature reached its culminating point in the great Roman orator. The fruits which had grown and matured in the centuries preceding were gathered by Augustus; but the influences that contributed to the splendor of his age belong rather to the republic than the empire, and with the fall of the liberties of Rome, Roman literature declined.

2. MIMES, MIMOGRAPHERS, AND PANTOMIME.—Amidst all the splendor of the Latin literature of this period, dramatic poetry never recovered from the trance into which it had fallen, though the stage had not altogether lost its popularity. Aesopus and Roscius, the former the great tragic actor, and the latter the favorite comedian, in the time of Cicero, enjoyed his friendship and that of other great men, and both amassed large fortunes. But although the standard Roman plays were constantly represented, dramatic literature had become extinct. The entertainments, which had now taken the place of comedy and tragedy, were termed mimes. These were laughable imitations of manners and persons, combining the features of comedy and farce, for comedy represents the characters of a class, farce those of individuals. Their essence was that of the modern pantomime, and their coarseness, and even indecency, gratified the love of broad humor which characterized the Roman people. After a time, when they became established as popular favorites, the dialogue occupied a more prominent position, and was written in verse, like that of tragedy and comedy. During the dictatorship of Caesar, a Roman knight named Laberius (107-45 B.C.) became famous for his mimes. The profession of an actor of mimes was infamous, but Laberius was a writer, not an actor. On one occasion, Caesar offered him a large sum of money to enter the lists in a trial of his improvisatorial skill. Laberius did not submit to the degradation for the sake of the money, but he was afraid to refuse. The only method of retaliation in his power was sarcasm. His part was that of a slave; and when his master scourged him, he exclaimed: "Porro, Quirites, libertatem perdimus!" His words were received with a round of applause, and all eyes were fixed on Caesar. The dictator restored him to the rank of which his act had deprived him, but he could never recover the respect of his countrymen. As he passed the orchestra, on his way to the stalls of the knights, Cicero cried out: "If we were not so crowded, I would make room for you here." Laberius replied, alluding to Cicero's lukewarmness as a political partisan: "I am astonished that you should be crowded, as you generally sit on two stools."

Another writer and actor of mimes was Publius Syrus, originally a Syrian slave. Tradition has recorded a bon mot of his which is as witty as it is severe. Seeing an ill-tempered man named Mucius in low spirits, he exclaimed: "Either some ill fortune has happened to Mucius, or some good fortune to one of his friends!"

The Roman pantomime differed somewhat from the mime. It was a ballet of action, performed by a single dancer, who not only exhibited the human figure in its most graceful attitudes, but represented every passion and emotion with such truth that the spectators could, without difficulty, understand the story. The pantomime was licentious in its character, and the actors were forbidden by Tiberius to hold any intercourse with Romans of equestrian or senatorial dignity.

These were the exhibitions which threw such discredit on the stage, which called forth the well-deserved attacks of the early Christian fathers, and caused them to declare that whoever attended them was unworthy of the name of Christian. Had the drama not been so abused, had it retained its original purity, and carried out the object attributed to it by Aristotle, they would have seen it, not a nursery of vice, but a school of virtue; not only an innocent amusement, but a powerful engine to form the taste, to improve the morals, and to purify the feelings of a people.

3. EPIC POETRY.—The epic poets of this period selected their subjects either from the heroic age and the mythology of Greece, or from their own national history. The Augustan age abounds in representatives of these two poetical schools, though possessing little merit. But the Romans, essentially practical and positive in their character, felt little interest in the descriptions of manners and events remote from their associations, and poetry, restrained within the limits of their history, could not rise to that height of imagination demanded by the epic muse. Virgil united the two forms by selecting his subject from the national history, and adorning the ancient traditions of Rome with the splendor of Greek imagination.

Virgil (70-19 B.C.) was born at Andes, near Mantua; he was educated at Cremona and at Naples, where he studied Greek literature and philosophy. After this he came to Rome, where, through Maecenas, he became known to Octavius, and basked in the sunshine of court favor. His favorite residence was Naples. On his return from Athens, in company with Augustus, he was seized with an illness of which he died. He was buried about a mile from Naples, on the road to Pozzuoli; and a tomb is still pointed out to the traveler which is said to be that of the poet. Virgil was deservedly popular both as a poet and as a man. The emperor esteemed him and people respected him; he was constitutionally pensive and melancholy, temperate, and pure-minded in a profligate age, and his popularity never spoiled his simplicity and modesty. In his last moments he was anxious to burn the whole manuscript of the Aeneid, and directed his executors either to improve it or commit it to the flames.

The idea and plan of the Aeneid are derived from Homer. As the wrath of Achilles is the mainspring of the Iliad, so the unity of the Aeneid results from the anger of Juno. The arrival of Aeneas in Italy after the destruction of Troy, the obstacles that opposed him through the intervention of Juno, and the adventures and the victories of the hero form the subject of the poem. Leaving Sicily for Latium, Aeneas is driven on the coast of Africa by a tempest raised against him by Juno; at Carthage he is welcomed by the queen, Dido, to whom he relates his past adventures and sufferings. By his narrative he wins her love, but at the command of Jupiter abandons her. Unable to retain him, Dido, in the despair of her passion, destroys herself. After passing through many dangers, under the guidance of the Sibyl of Cumae, he descends into the kingdom of the dead to consult the shade of his father. There appear to him the souls of the future heroes of Rome. On his return, he becomes a friend of the king of Latium, who promises to him the hand of his daughter, which is eagerly sought by King Turnus. A fearful war ensues between the rival lovers, which ends in the victory of Aeneas.

Though the poem of Virgil is in many passages an imitation from the Iliad and the Odyssey, the Roman element predominates in it, and the Aeneid is the true national poem of Rome. There was no subject more adapted to flatter the vanity of the Romans, than the splendor and antiquity of their origin. Augustus is evidently typified under the character of Aeneas; Cleopatra is boldly sketched as Dido; and Turnus as the popular Antony. The love and death of Dido, the passionate victim of an unrequited love, give occasion to the poet to sing the victories of his countrymen over their Carthaginian rivals; the Pythagorean metempsychosis, which he adopts in the description of Elysium, affords an opportunity to exalt the heroes of Rome; and the wars of Aeneas allow him to describe the localities and the manners of ancient Latium with such truthfulness as to give to his verses the authority of historical quotations. In style, the Aeneid is a model of purity and elegance, and for the variety and the harmony of its incidents, for the power of its descriptions, and for the interest of its plot and episodes, second only to the Iliad. It has been observed that Virgil's descriptions are more like landscape painting than those of any of his predecessors, whether Greek or Roman, and it is a remarkable fact, that landscape painting was first introduced in his time.

4. DIDACTIC POETRY.—The poems, which first established the reputation of Virgil as a poet, belong to didactic poetry. They are his Bucolics and Georgics. The Bucolics are pastoral idyls; the characters are Italian in all their sentiments and feelings, acting, however, the unreal and assumed part of Greek shepherds. The Italians never possessed the elements of pastoral life, and could not furnish the poet with originals and models from which to draw his portraits. When represented as Virgil represents them in his Bucolics, they are in masquerade, and the drama in which they form the characters is of an allegorical kind. Even the scenery is Sicilian, and does not truthfully describe the tame neighborhood of Mantua. In fact, these poems are imitations of Theocritus; but, divesting ourselves of the idea of the outward form which the poet has chosen to adopt, we are touched by the simple narrative of disappointed loves and childlike woes; we appreciate the delicately-veiled compliments paid by the poet to his patron; we enjoy the inventive genius and poetical power which they display, and we are elevated by the exalted sentiments which they sometimes breathe.

The Georgics are poems on the labors and enjoyments of rural life, a subject for which Rome offered a favorable field. Though in this style Hesiod was the model of Virgil, his system is perfectly Italian, so much so, that many of his rules may be traced in modern Italian husbandry, just as the descriptions of implements in the Greek poet are frequently found to agree with those in use in modern Greece. The great merit of the Georgics consists in their varied digressions, interesting episodes, and in the sublime bursts of descriptive vigor which are interspersed throughout them. They have frequently been taken as models for imitation by the didactic poets of all nations, and more particularly of England. The "Seasons," for instance, is a thoroughly Virgilian poem.

Lucretius (95-51 B.C.) belongs to the class of didactic poets. He might claim a place among philosophers as well as poets, for his poem marks an epoch both in poetry and philosophy. But his philosophy is a mere reflection from that of Greece, while his poetry is bright with the rays of original genius. His poem on "The Nature of Things" is in imitation of that of Empedocles. Its subject is philosophical and its purpose didactic; but its unity of design gives to it almost the rank of an epic. Its structure prevents it from being a complete and systematic survey of the whole Epicurean philosophy, but as far as the form of the poem permitted, it presents an accurate view of the philosophy which then enjoyed the highest popularity.

The object of the poem of Lucretius is to emancipate mankind from the debasing effects of superstition by an exposition of philosophy, and though a follower of Epicurus, he is not entirely destitute of the religious sentiment, for he deifies nature and has a veneration for her laws. His infidelity must be viewed rather in the light of a philosophical protest against the results of heathen superstition, than a total rejection of the principles of religious faith.

Lucretius valued the capabilities of the Latin language. He wielded at will its power of embodying the noblest thoughts, and showed how its copious and flexible properties could overcome the hard technicalities of science. The great beauty of his poetry is its variety; his fancy is always lively, his imagination has always free scope. He is sublime, as a philosopher who penetrates the secrets of the natural world, and discloses to the eyes of man the hidden causes of its wonderful phenomena. His object was a lofty one; for although the absurdities of the national creed drove him into skepticism, his aim was to set the intellect free from the trammels of superstition. But besides grandeur and sublimity, we find the totally different qualities of softness and tenderness. Rome had long known nothing but war, and was now rent by civil dissension. Lucretius yearned for peace; and his prayer, that the fabled goddess of all that is beautiful in nature would heal the wounds which discord had made, is distinguished by tenderness and pathos even more than by sublimity. He is superior to Ovid in force, though inferior in facility; not so smooth or harmonious as Virgil, his poetry always falls upon the ear with a swelling and sonorous melody. Virgil appreciated his excellence, and imitated not only single expressions, but almost entire verses and passages; and Ovid exclaims, that the sublime strains of Lucretius shall never perish until the world shall be given up to destruction.

5. LYRIC POETRY.—The Romans had not the ideality and the enthusiasm which are the elements of lyric poetry, and in all the range of their literature there are only two poets who, greatly inferior to the lyric poets of Greece, have a positive claim to a place in this department, Catullus and Horace. Catullus (86-46 B.C.) was born near Verona. At an early age he went to Rome, where he plunged into all the excesses of the capital, and where his sole occupation was the cultivation of his literary tastes and talents. A career of extravagance and debauchery terminated in the ruin of his fortune, and he died at the age of forty. The works of Catullus consist of numerous short pieces of a lyrical character, elegies and other poems. He was one of the most popular of the Roman poets, because he possessed those qualities which the literary society at Rome most valued, polish and learning, and because, although an imitator, there was a truly Roman nationality in all that he wrote. His satire was the bitter resentment of a vindictive spirit; his love and his hate were both purely selfish, but his excellences were of the most alluring and captivating kind. He has never been surpassed in gracefulness, melody, and tenderness.

Horace (65-8 B.C.), like Virgil and other poets of his time, enjoyed the friendship and intimacy of Maecenas, who procured for him the public grant of his Sabine farm, situated about fifteen miles from Tivoli. At Rome he occupied a house on the beautiful heights of the Esquiline. The rapid alternation of town and country life, which the fickle poet indulged in, gives a peculiar charm to his poetry. His "Satires" were followed by the publication of the "Odes" and the "Epistles." The satires of Horace occupied the position of the fashionable novel of our day. In them is sketched boldly, but good-humoredly, a picture of Roman social life, with its vices and follies. They have nothing of the bitterness of Lucilius, the love of purity and honor that adorns Persius, or the burning indignation of Juvenal at the loathsome corruption of morals. Vice, in his day, had not reached that appalling height which it attained in the time of the emperors who succeeded Augustus. Deficient in moral purity, nothing would strike him as deserving censure, except such excess as would actually defeat the object which he proposed to himself, namely, the utmost enjoyment of life. In the "Epistles," he lays aside the character of a moral teacher or censor, and writes with the freedom with which he would converse with an intimate friend. But it is in his inimitable "Odes" that the genius of Horace as a poet is especially displayed; they have never been equaled in beauty of sentiment, gracefulness of language, and melody of versification; they comprehend every variety of subject suitable to the lyric muse; they rise without effort to the most elevated topics; and they descend to the simplest joys and sorrows of every-day life.

The life of Horace is especially instructive, as a mirror in which is reflected a faithful image of the manners of his day. He is the representative of Roman refined society, as Virgil is of the national mind. His morals were lax, but not worse than those of his contemporaries. He looked at virtue and vice from a worldly, not from a moral point of view, and with him the one was prudence and the other folly.

In connection with Horace, we may mention Maecenas, who, by his good taste and munificence, exercised a great influence upon literature, and literary men of Rome were much indebted to him for the use he made of his friendship with Augustus, to whom, probably, his love of literature and of pleasure and his imperturbable temper recommended him as an agreeable companion. He had wealth enough to gratify his utmost wishes, and his mind was so full of the delights of refined society, of palaces, gardens, wit, poetry, and art, that there was no room in it for ambition. All the most brilliant men of Rome were found at his table,—Virgil, Horace, Propertius, and Varius were among his friends and constant associates. He was a fair specimen of the man of pleasure and society,—liberal, kind- hearted, clever, refined, but luxurious, self-indulgent, indolent, and volatile, with good impulses, but without principle.

6. ELEGY.—Tibullus (b. 54 B.C.) was the father of the Roman elegy. He was a contemporary of Virgil and Horace. The style of his poems and their tone of thought are like his character, deficient in vigor and manliness, but sweet, smooth, polished, tender, and never disfigured by bad taste. He passed his short life in peaceful retirement, and died soon after Virgil. The poems ascribed to Tibullus consist of four books, of which only two are genuine.

Propertius (b. 150 B.C.), although a contemporary and friend of the Augustan poets, may be considered as belonging to a somewhat different school of poetry. While Horace, Virgil, and Tibullus imitated the noblest poets of the Greek age, Propertius, like the minor Roman poets, aspired to nothing more than the imitation of the graceful, but feeble strains of the Alexandrian poets. If he excels Tibullus in vigor of fancy, expression, and coloring, he is inferior to him in grace, spontaneity, and delicacy; he cannot, also, be compared with Catullus, who greatly surpasses him in his easy and effective style.

Ovid (43 B.C.-6 A.D.), the most fertile of the Latin poets, not only in elegy, but also in other kinds of poetry, was enabled by his rank, fortune, and talents to cultivate the society of men of congenial tastes. A skeptic and an epicurean, he lived a life of continual indulgence and intrigue. He was a universal admirer of the female sex, and a favorite among women. He was popular as a poet, successful in society, and possessed all the enjoyments that wealth could bestow; but later in life he incurred the anger of Augustus, and was banished to the very frontier of the Roman empire, where he lingered for a few years and died in great misery. The "Epistles to and from Women of the Heroic Age" are a series of love-letters; with the exception of the "Metamorphoses," they have been greater favorites than any other of his works. Love, in the days of Ovid, had in it nothing pure or chivalrous. The age in which he lived was morally polluted, and he was neither better nor worse than his contemporaries; hence grossness is the characteristic of his "Art of Love." His "Metamorphoses" contain a series of mythological narratives from the earliest times to the translation of the soul of Julius Caesar from earth to heaven, and his metamorphosis into a star. In this poem especially may be traced that study and learning by which the Roman poets made all the treasures of Greek literature their own. "The Fasti," a poem on the Roman calendar, is a beautiful specimen of simple narrative in verse, and displays, more than any of his works, his power of telling a story without the slightest effort, in poetry as well as prose. The five books of the "Tristia," and the "Epistles from Pontus," were the outpourings of his sorrowful heart during the gloomy evening of his days.

7. ORATORY AND PHILOSOPHY.—As oratory gave to Latin prose-writing its elegance and dignity, Cicero (106-43 B.C.) is not only the representative of the flourishing period of the language, but also the instrumental cause of its arriving at perfection. He gave a fixed character to the Latin tongue; showed his countrymen what vigor it possessed, and of what elegance and polish it was susceptible. The influence of Cicero on the language and literature of his day was not only extensive, but permanent, and it survived almost until the language was corrupted by barbarism. After traveling in Greece and Asia, and holding a high office in Sicily, he returned to Rome, resumed his forensic practice, and was made consul. The conspiracy of Catiline was the great event of his consulship. The prudence and tact with which he crushed this gained him the applause and gratitude of his fellow-citizens, who hailed him as the father of his country; but he was obliged, by the intrigues of his enemies, to fly from Rome; his exile was decreed, and his town and country houses given up to plunder. He was, however, recalled, and appointed to a seat in the college of Augurs. In the struggle between Pompey and Caesar, he followed the fortunes of the former; but Caesar, after his triumph, granted him a full and free pardon. After the assassination of Caesar, Cicero delivered that torrent of indignant and eloquent invective, his twelve Philippic orations, and became again the popular idol; but when the second triumvirate was formed, and each member gave up his friends to the vengeance of his colleagues, Octavius did not hesitate to sacrifice Cicero. Betrayed by a treacherous freedman, he would not permit his attendants to make any resistance, but courageously submitted to the sword of the assassins, who cut off his head and hands, and carried them to Antony, whose wife, Julia, gloated with inhuman delight upon the pallid features, and in petty spite pierced with a needle the once eloquent tongue. Cicero had numerous faults; he was vain, vacillating, inconstant, timid, and the victim of morbid sensibility; but he was candid, truthful, just, generous, pure-minded, and warm-hearted. Gentle, sympathizing, and affectionate, he lived as a patriot and died as a philosopher.

The place which Cicero occupies in the history of Roman literature is that of an orator and philosopher. The effectiveness of his oratory was mainly owing to his knowledge of the human heart, and of the national peculiarities of his countrymen. Its charm was owing to his extensive acquaintance with the stores of literature and philosophy, which his sprightly wit moulded at will; to the varied learning, which his unpedantic mind made so pleasant and popular; and to his fund of illustration, at once interesting and convincing. He carried his hearers with him; senate, judges, and people understood his arguments, and felt his passionate appeals. Compared with the dignified energy and majestic vigor of Demosthenes, the Asiatic exuberance of some of his orations may be fatiguing to the more sober and chaste taste of modern scholars; but in order to form a just appreciation, we must transport ourselves mentally to the excitements of the thronged forum, to the senate, composed of statesmen and warriors in the prime of life, maddened with the party- spirit of revolutionary times. Viewed in this light, his most florid passages will appear free from affectation—the natural flow of a speaker carried away with the torrent of his enthusiasm. Among his numerous orations, in which, according to the criticisms of Quintilian, he combined the force of Demosthenes, the copiousness of Plato, and the elegance of Isocrates, we mention the six celebrated Verrian harangues, which are considered masterpieces of Tullian eloquence. In the speech for the poet Archias, he had evidently expended all his resources of art, taste, and skill; and his oration in defense of Milo, for force, pathos, and the externals of eloquence, deserves to be reckoned among his most wonderful efforts. The oratory of Cicero was essentially judicial; even his political orations are rather judicial than deliberative. He was not born for a politician; he did not possess that analytical character of mind which penetrates into the remote causes of human action, nor the synthetical power which enables a man to follow them out to their farthest consequences. Of the three qualities necessary for a statesman, he possessed only two,—honesty and patriotism; he had not political wisdom. Hence, in the finest specimens of his political orations, his Catilinarians and Philippics, we look in vain for the calm, practical weighing of the subject which is necessary in addressing a deliberative assembly. Nevertheless, so irresistible was the influence which he exercised upon the minds of his hearers, that all his political speeches were triumphs. His panegyric on Pompey carried his appointment as commander-in-chief of the armies of the East; he crushed in Catiline one of the most formidable traitors that had ever menaced the safety of the republic, and Antony's fall followed the complete exposure of his debauchery in private life, and the factiousness of his public career.

In his rhetorical works, Cicero left a legacy of practical instruction to posterity. The treatise "On Invention" is merely interesting as the juvenile production of a future great man. "The Orator," "Brutus, or the illustrious Orators," and "The Orator to Marius Brutus," are the results of his matured experience. They form together one series, in which the principles are laid down, and their development carried out and illustrated; and in the "Orator" he places before the eyes of Brutus the model of ideal perfection. In his treatment of that subject, he shows a mind imbued with the spirit of Plato; he invests it with dramatic interest, and transports the reader into the scene which he so graphically describes.

Roman philosophy was neither the result of original investigation, nor the gradual development of the Greek system. It arose rather from a study of ancient philosophical literature, than from an emanation of philosophical principles. It consisted in a kind of eclecticism with an ethical tendency, bringing together doctrines and opinions scattered over a wide field in reference to the political and social relations of man. Greek philosophy was probably first introduced into Rome 166 B.C. But although the Romans could appreciate the majestic dignity and poetical beauty of the style of Plato, they were not equal to the task of penetrating his hidden meaning; neither did the peripatetic doctrines meet with much favor. The philosophical system which first arrested the attention of the Romans, and gained an influence over their minds, was the Epicurean. That of the Stoics also, the severe principles of which were in harmony with the stern old Roman virtues, had distinguished disciples. The part which Cicero's character qualified him to perform in the philosophical instruction of his countrymen was scarcely that of a guide; he could give them a lively interest in the subject, but he could not mould and form their belief, and train them in the work of original investigation. Not being devoutly attached to any system of philosophical belief, he would be cautious of offending the philosophical prejudices of others. He was essentially an eclectic in accumulating stores of Greek erudition, while his mind had a tendency, in the midst of a variety of inconsistent doctrines, to leave the conclusion undetermined. He brought everything to a practical standard; he admired the exalted purity of stoical morality, but he feared that it was impractical. He believed in the existence of one supreme creator, in his spiritual nature, and the immortality of the soul; but his belief was rather the result of instinctive conviction, than of proof derived from philosophy.

The study of Cicero's philosophical works is invaluable, in order to understand the minds of those who came after him. Not only all Roman philosophy after his time, but a great part of that of the Middle Ages, was Greek philosophy filtered through Latin, and mainly founded on that of Cicero. Among his works on speculative philosophy are "The Academics, or a history and defense of the belief of the new Academy;" "Dialogues on the Supreme Good, the end of all moral action;" "The Tusculan Disputations," containing five treatises on the fear of death, the endurance of pain, power of wisdom over sorrow, the morbid passions, and the relation of virtue to happiness. His moral philosophy comprehends the "Duties," a stoical treatise on moral obligations, and the unequaled little essays on "Friendship and Old Age." His political works are "The Republic" and "The Law;" but these remains are fragmentary.

The extent of Cicero's correspondence is almost incredible. Even those epistles which remain number more than eight hundred. In them we find the eloquence of the heart, not of the rhetorical school. They are models of pure Latinity, elegant without stiffness, the natural outpourings of a mind which could not give birth to an ungraceful idea. In his letters to Atticus he lays bare the secret of his heart; he trusts his life in his hands; he is not only his friend but his confidant, his second self. In the letters of Cicero we have the description of the period of Roman history, and the portrait of the inner life of Roman society in his day.

8. HISTORY.—In their historical literature the Romans exhibited a faithful transcript of their mind and character. History at once gratified their patriotism, and its investigations were in accordance with their love of the real and the practical. In this department, they were enabled to emulate the Greeks and to be their rivals, and sometimes their superiors. The elegant simplicity of Caesar is as attractive as that of Herodotus; none of the Greek historians surpasses Livy in talent for the picturesque and in the charm with which he invests his spirited and living stories; while for condensation of thought, terseness of expression, and political and philosophical acumen, Tacitus is not inferior to Thucydides. The catalogue of Roman historians contains many writers whose works are lost; such as L. Lucretius, the friend and correspondent of Cicero, L. Lucullus, the illustrious conqueror of Mithridates, and Cornelius Nepos, of whom only one work was preserved, the "Lives of Eminent Generals." The authenticity of this work is, however, disputed. But at the head of this department, as the great representatives of Roman history, stand Julius Caesar, Sallust, Livy, and Tacitus, all of whom, except the last, belong to the Augustan age.

Julius Caesar (100-44 B.C.) was descended from one of the oldest among the patrician families of Rome. He attached himself to the popular party, and his good taste, great tact, and pleasing manners contributed, together with his talents, to insure his popularity. He became a soldier in the nineteenth year of his age, and hence his works display all the best qualities which are fostered by a military education—frankness, simplicity, and brevity. His earliest literary triumph was as an orator, and, according to Quintilian, he was a worthy rival of Cicero. When he obtained the office of Pontifex Maximus, he diligently examined the history and nature of the Roman belief in augury, and published his investigations. When his career as a military commander began, whatever leisure his duties permitted him to enjoy he devoted to the composition of his memoirs, or commentaries of the Gallic and civil wars. He wrote, also, some minor works on different subjects, and he left behind him various letters, some of which are extant.

But by far the most important of the works of Caesar is his "Commentaries," which have come down to us in a tolerably perfect state. They are sketches taken on the spot, in the midst of action, while the mind was full, and they have all the graphic power of a master-mind and the vigorous touches of a master-hand. The Commentaries are the materials for history, notes jotted down for future historians. The very faults which may justly be found with the style of Caesar are such as reflect the man himself. The majesty of his character consists chiefly in the imperturbable calmness and equanimity of his temper; he had no sudden bursts of energy and alternations of passion and inactivity. The elevation of his character was a high one, but it was a level table-land. This calmness and equability pervades his writings, and for this reason they have been thought to want life and energy. The beauty of his language is, as Cicero says, statuesque rather than picturesque. Simple and severe, it conveys the idea of perfect and well-proportioned beauty, while it banishes all thoughts of human passion. In relating his own deeds, he does not strive to add to his own reputation by detracting from the merits of those who served under him. He is honest, generous, and candid, not only towards them, but also towards his brave enemies. He recounts his successes without pretension or arrogance, though he has evidently no objection to be the hero of his own tale. His Commentaries are not confessions, although he is the subject of them; not a record of a weakness appears, nor even a defect, except that which the Romans would readily forgive, cruelty. His savage waste of human life he recounts with perfect self-complacency. Vanity, the crowning error in his career as a statesman, though hidden by the reserve with which he speaks of himself, sometimes discovers itself in the historian.

The Commentaries of Caesar have been compared with the work of the great soldier-historian of Greece, Xenophon. Both are eminently simple and unaffected, but there the parallel ends. The severe contempt of ornament, which characterizes the stern Roman, is totally unlike the mellifluous sweetness of the Attic writer.

Sallust (85-35 B.C.) was born of a plebeian family, but, having filled the offices of tribune and quaestor, attained senatorial rank. He was expelled from the Senate for his profligacy, but restored again to his rank through the influence of Caesar, whose party he espoused. He accompanied his patron in the African war, and was made governor of Numidia. While in that capacity, he accumulated by rapacity and extortion enormous wealth, which he lavished in expensive but tasteful luxury. The gardens on the Quirinal which bore his name were celebrated for their beauty; and there, surrounded by the choicest works of art, he devoted his retirement to composing the historical records which survived him. As a politician, he was a mere partisan of Caesar, and therefore a strenuous opponent of the higher classes and of the supporters of Pompey. The object of his hatred was not the old patrician blood of Rome, but the new aristocracy, which had of late years been rapidly rising up and displacing it. That new nobility was utterly corrupt, and its corruption was encouraged by the venality of the masses, whose poverty and destitution tempted them to be the tools of unscrupulous ambition. Sallust strove to place that party in the unfavorable light which it deserved; but, notwithstanding the truthfulness of the picture which he draws, selfishness and not patriotism was the mainspring of his politics; he was not an honest champion of popular rights, but a vain and conceited man, who lived in an immoral and corrupt age, and had not the strength of principle to resist the force of example and temptation. If, however, we make some allowance for the political bias of Sallust, his histories have not only the charms of the historical romance, but are also valuable political studies. His characters are vigorously and naturally drawn, and the more his histories are read, the more obvious it is that he always writes with an object, and uses his facts as the means of enforcing a great political lesson.

His first work is on the "Jugurthine War;" the next related to the period from the consulship of Lepidus to the praetorship of Cicero, and is unfortunately lost. This was followed by a history of the conspiracy of Catiline, "The War of Catiline," in which he paints in vivid colors the depravity of that order of society which, bankrupt in fortune and honor, still plumes itself on its rank and exclusiveness. To Sallust must be conceded the praise of having first conceived the notion of a history, in the true sense of the term. He was the first Roman historian, and the guide of future historians. He had always an object to which he wished all his facts to converge, and he brought them forward as illustrations and developments of principles. He analyzed and exposed the motives of parties, and laid bare the inner life of those great actors on the public stage, in the interesting historical scenes which he describes. His style, although ostentatiously elaborate and artificial, is, upon the whole, pleasing, and almost always transparently clear. Following Thucydides, whom he evidently took as his model, he strives to imitate his brevity; but while this quality with the Greek historian is natural and involuntary, with the Roman it is intentional and studied. The brevity of Thucydides is the result of condensation, that of Salust is elliptical expression.

Livy (59-18 B.C.) was born in Padua, and came to Rome during the reign of Augustus, where he resided in the enjoyment of the imperial favor and patronage. He was a warm and open admirer of the ancient institutions of the country, and esteemed Pompey as one of its greatest heroes; but Augustus did not allow political opinions to interfere with the regard which he entertained for the historian. His great work is a history of Rome, which he modestly terms "Annals," in one hundred and forty-two books, of which thirty-five are extant. Besides his history, Livy is said to have written treatises and dialogues, which were partly philosophical and partly historical.

The great object of Livy's history was to celebrate the glories of his native country, to which he was devotedly attached. He was a patriot: his sympathy was with Pompey, called forth by the disinterestedness of that great man, and perhaps by his sad end. He delights to put forth his powers in those passages which relate to the affections. He is a biographer quite as much as a historian; he anatomizes the moral nature of his heroes, and shows the motive springs of their noble exploits. His characters stand before us like epic heroes, and he tells his story like a bard singing his lay at a joyous festive meeting, checkered by alternate successes and reverses, though all tending to a happy result at last. But while these features constitute his charm as a narrator, they render him less valuable as a historian. Although he would not be willfully inaccurate, if the legend he was about to tell was interesting, he would not stop to inquire whether or not it was true. Taking upon trust the traditions which had been handed down from generation to generation, the more flattering and popular they were, the more suitable would he deem them for his purposes. He loved his country, and he would scarcely believe anything derogatory to the national glory. Whenever Rome was false to treaties, unmerciful in victory, or unsuccessful in arms, he either ignores the facts or is anxious to find excuses. He does not appear to have made researches into the many original documents which were extant at his time, but he trusted to the annalists, and took advantage of the investigations of preceding historians. His descriptions of military affairs are often vague and indistinct, and he often shows himself ignorant of the localities which he describes. Such are the principal defects of Livy, who otherwise charms his readers with his romantic narratives, and his lively, fresh, and fascinating style.

9. OTHER PROSE WRITERS.—Though the grammarians of this period were numerous, they added little or nothing to its literary reputation. The most conspicuous among them were Atteius, a friend of Sallust; Epirota, the correspondent of Cicero; Julius Hyginus, a friend of Ovid; and Nigidius Figulus, an orator as well as grammarian. M. Vitruvius Pollio, the celebrated architect, deserves to be mentioned for his treatise on architecture. He was probably native of Verona, and served under Julius Caesar in Africa, as a military engineer. Notwithstanding the defects of his style, the language of Vitruvius is vigorous, and his descriptions bold; his work is valuable as exhibiting the principles of Greek architectural taste and beauty, of which he was a devoted admirer.

PERIOD THIRD.

FROM THE DEATH OF AUGUSTUS TO THE CLOSE OF THE REIGN OF THEODORIC (14-526 A.D.).

1. DECLINE OF ROMAN LITERATURE.—With the death of Augustus began the decline of Roman literature, and a few names only rescue the first years of this period from the charge of a corrupt and vitiated taste. After a while, indeed, political circumstances again became more favorable; the dangers, which paralyzed genius and talent, and prevented their free exercise under Tiberius and his tyrannical successors, diminished, and a more liberal system of administration ensued under Vespasian and Titus. Juvenal and Tacitus then stood forth, as the representatives of the old Roman independence. Vigor of thought communicated itself to the language; a taste for the sublime and beautiful, to a certain extent, revived, although it did not attain to the perfection which shed a lustre over the Augustan age. Between the ages of Horace and Juvenal, Cicero and Tacitus, there was a gap of half a century, in which Roman genius was slumbering. The gradual growth of a spirit of adulation deterred all who were qualified for the task of the historian from attempting it. Fear, during the lifetime of Tiberius and Caligula, Claudius and Nero, and hatred, still fresh after their deaths, rendered all accounts of their reigns false. And the same causes which silenced the voice of history extinguished the genius of poetry and oratory. As liberty declined, natural eloquence decayed; the orator sought only to please the corrupt taste of his audiences with strange and exaggerated statements; the poet aimed to win public admiration through a style over-laden with ornament, and florid and diffuse descriptions. Literature, in order to flourish, requires the genial sunshine of human sympathy; it needs either the patronage of the great, or the favor of the people. Immediately after the death of Augustus, patronage was withdrawn, and there was no public sympathy to supply its place. In the reign of Nero, literature partially revived; for, though the bloodiest of tyrants, he had a taste for art and poetry, and an ambition to excel in refinement.

2. FABLE.—In fable, as in other fields of literature, Rome was an imitator of Greece, but nevertheless Phaedrus struck out a new line for himself, and, through his fables, became not only a moral instructor, but a political satirist. Phaedrus (fl. 16 A.D.), the originator and only author of Roman fable, though born in the reign of Augustus, wrote when the Augustan age had passed away. His works are, as it were, isolated; he had no contemporaries. Nevertheless, his solitary voice was lifted up when those of the poet, the historian, and the philosopher were silenced. The moral and political lessons conveyed in his fables were suggested by the evils of the times in which he lived. Some of them illustrate the danger of riches and the comparative safety of obscurity and poverty, in an age when the rich were marked for destruction, in order that the confiscation of their property might glut the avarice of the emperor and of his servants; others were suggested by historical events, being nevertheless satirical strictures on individuals. The style of Phaedrus is pure and classical, and combines the simple neatness and graceful elegance of the golden age with the vigor and terseness of the silver one. He has the facility of Ovid and the brevity of Tacitus. In the construction of his fables, he displays observation and ingenuity; but he is deficient in imagination. He makes his animals the vehicles of his wisdom, but he does not throw himself into them, or identify himself with them; while they look and act like animals, they talk like human beings. In this consists the great superiority of Aesop to his Roman imitator; his brutes are a superior race, but they are still brutes, and it would seem that the fabulist had lived among them as one of themselves, had adopted their mode of life, and conversed with them in their own language. In Phaedrus we have human sentiments translated into the language of beasts, while in Aesop we have beasts giving utterance to such sentiments as would be naturally theirs if they were placed in the position of men.

3. SATIRE AND EPIGRAM.—Roman satire, subsequently to Horace, is represented by Persius and Juvenal. Persius (34-62 A.D.) early attached himself to the Stoic philosophy. He was pure in mind, and free from the corrupt taint of an immoral age. Although Lucilius was, to a certain extent, his model, he does not attack vice with the biting severity of the old satirist, nor do we find in his writings the enthusiastic indignation which burns in the verses of Juvenal. His purity of mind and kindliness of heart disinclined him to portray vice in its hideous and loathsome forms, and to indulge in that bitterness of invective which the prevalent enormities of his times deserved. His uprightness and love of virtue are shown by the uncompromising severity with which he rebukes sins of not so deep a dye; and the heart which was capable of being moulded by his example, and influenced by his purity, would have shrunk from the fearful crimes which deform the pages of Juvenal. The greatest defect in Persius, as a satirist, is that the Stoic philosophy in which he was educated rendered him indifferent to the affairs of the world. His contemplative habits led him to criticise, as his favorite subjects, false taste in poetry and empty pretensions to philosophy. Horace mingled in the society of the profligate and considering them as fools, laughed their folly to scorn. Juvenal looked down upon the corruption of the age from the eminence of his virtue, and punished it like an avenging deity. Persius, pure in heart and passionless by education, while he lashes wickedness in the abstract, almost ignores its existence, and shrinks from probing to the bottom the vileness of the human heart. His works comprise six satires, all of which breathe the natural amiability and placid cheerfulness of his temper.

Juvenal flourished in the reign of Domitian, towards the close of the first century A.D., a dark period, which saw the utter moral degradation of the people, and the bloodiest tyranny and oppression on the part of their rulers. The picture of Roman manners, as painted by his glowing pencil, is truly appalling. The fabric of society was in ruins, the popular religion was rejected with scorn, and the creed of natural religion had not occupied its place. The emperors took part in public scenes of folly and profligacy, and exposed themselves as charioteers, as dancers, and as actors. Nothing was respected but wealth, nothing provoked contempt but poverty. Players and dancers had all honors and offices at their disposal; the city swarmed with informers, who made the rich their prey; every man feared his most intimate friend, and the only bond of friendship was to be an accomplice in crime. The teacher would corrupt his pupil, and the guardian defraud his ward. Crimes which cannot be named were common, and the streets of Rome were the constant scene of robbery, assault, and assassination. The morals of women were as depraved as those of men, and there was no public amusement so immoral or so cruel as not to be countenanced by their presence. In this period of moral dearth, the fountains of genius and literature were dried up. There was criticism, declamation, panegyric, and verse writing, but no oratory, history, or poetry. Juvenal, though himself not free from the declamatory affectation of the day, attacked the false literary taste of his contemporaries as unsparingly as he did their depraved morality. His sixteen satires exhibit an enlightened, truthful, and comprehensive view of Roman manners, and of the inevitable result of such depravity. The two finest of them are those which Dr. Johnson has thought worthy of imitation.

The historical value of these satires must not be forgotten. Tacitus lived in the same perilous times as Juvenal, and when they had come to an end and it was not unsafe to speak, he wrote their public history, which the poet illustrates by displaying the social and inner life of the Romans. Their works are parallel, and each forms a commentary upon the other. The style of Juvenal is vigorous and lucid; his morals were pure in the midst of a debased age, and his language shines forth in classic elegance, in the midst of specimens of declining and degenerate taste.

Juvenal closes the list of Roman satirists, properly speaking. The satirical spirit animates the piquant epigrams of his friend Martial, but their purpose is not moral or didactic. They sting the individual, and render him an object of scorn and disgust, but they do not hold up vice itself to ridicule and detestation.

Martial (43-104 A.D.) was born in Spain. He early emigrated to Rome, where he became a favorite of Titus and Domitian, and in the reign of the latter he was appointed to the office of court-poet. During thirty-five years, he lived at Rome the life of a flatterer and a dependent, and then he returned to his native town, where his death was hastened by his distaste for provincial life. Measured by the corrupt standard of morals which disgraced the age in which he lived, Martial was probably not worse than most of his contemporaries; for the fearful profligacy, which his powerful pen describes in such hideous terms, had spread through Rome its loathsome infection. Had he lived in better times, his talents might have been devoted to a purer object; as it was, no language is strong enough to denounce the impurities of his page, and his moral taste must have been thoroughly depraved not to have turned with disgust from the contemplation of such subjects. But not all his poems are of this character. Amidst some obscurity of style and want of finish, many are redolent of Greek sweetness and elegance. Here and there are pleasing descriptions of the beauties of nature, and many are kind-hearted and full of varied wit, poetical imagination, and graceful expression. To the original characteristics of the Greek epigram, Martial, more than any other poet, added that which constitutes an epigram in the modern sense of the term: pointedness either in jest or earnest, and the bitterness of personal satire.

4. DRAMATIC LITERATURE.—Dramatic literature never flourished in Rome, and still less under the empire. During this period there were not wanting some imitators of Greece in this noble branch of poetry, but their productions were rather literary than dramatic; they were poems composed in a dramatic form, intended to be read, not acted. They contain noble philosophical sentiments, lively descriptions, and passages full of tenderness and pathos, but they are deficient in dramatic effect, and positively offend against those laws of good taste which regulated the Athenian stage. In the Augustan age, a few writers attained some excellence in tragedy, at least in the opinion of ancient critics.

Under the tyrant Nero, dramatic literature reappeared, specimens of which are extant in the ten tragedies attributed to Seneca. But the genius of the author never grasps, in their wholeness, the characters which he attempts to copy; they are distorted images of the Greek originals, and the shadowy grandeur of the godlike heroes of Aeschylus stands forth in corporeal vastness, and appears childish and unnatural, like the giants of a story-book. The Greeks believed in the gods and heroes whose agency and exploits constituted the machinery of tragedy, but the Romans did not, and we cannot sympathize with them, because we see that they are insincere.

An awful belief in destiny, and the hopeless yet patient struggle of a great and good man against this all-ruling power, are the mainspring of Greek tragedy. This belief the Romans did not transfer into their imitations, but they supplied its place with the stern fatalism of the Stoics. The principle of destiny entertained by the Greek poets is a mythological, even a religious one. It is the irresistible will of God. God is at the commencement of the chain of causes and effects, by which the event is brought about which God has ordained; his inspired prophets have power to foretell, and mortals cannot resist or avoid. It is rather predestination than destiny. The fatalism of the Stoics, on the other hand, is the doctrine of practical necessity. It ignores the almighty power of the Supreme Being, and although it does not deny his existence, it strips him of his attributes as the moral governor of the universe. These doctrines, expressed equally in the writings of Seneca the philosopher, and in the tragedies attributed to him, lead to the probability, amounting almost to certainty, that he was their author. But whatever be the case in regard to their authorship, it is certain that, notwithstanding their false rhetorical taste and the absence of all ideal and creative genius, they have found many admirers and imitators in modern times. The French school of tragic poets took them for their model; Corneille evidently considered them the ideal of tragedy, and Racine servilely imitated them.

5. EPIC POETRY.—At the head of the epic poets who flourished during the Silver Age, stands Lucan (39-66 A.D.). He was born at Cordova, in Spain, and probably came to Rome when very young, where his literary reputation was soon established. But Nero, who could not bear the idea of a rival, forbade him to recite his poems, then the common mode of publication. Neither would he allow him to plead as an advocate. Smarting under this provocation, he joined in a conspiracy against the emperor's life. The plot failed, but Lucan was pardoned on condition of pointing out his confederates, and in the vain hope of saving himself from the monster's vengeance, he actually impeached his mother. This noble woman was incapable of treason. Tacitus says, "the scourge, the flames, the rage of the executioners who tortured her the more savagely, lest they should be scorned by a woman, were powerless to extort a false confession." Lucan never received the reward which he purchased by treachery. When the warrant for his death was issued, he caused his veins to be cut asunder, and expired in the twenty-seventh year of his age.

The only one of his works which survives is the "Pharsalia," an epic poem on the subject of the civil war between Caesar and Pompey. It bears evident marks of having been left unfinished; it has great faults and at the same time great beauties. The sentiments contained in this poem breathe a love of freedom and an attachment to the old Roman republicanism. Its subject is a noble one, full of historic interest, and it is treated with spirit, brilliancy, and animation. The characters of Caesar and Pompey are masterpieces; but while some passages are scarcely inferior to any written by the best Latin poets, others have neither the dignity of prose, nor the melody of poetry. Description forms the principal feature in the poetry of Lucan; in fact, it constitutes one of the characteristic features of Roman literature in its decline, because poetry had become more than ever an art, and the epoch one of erudition.

Silius Italicus (fl. 54 A.D.) was the favorite and intimate of two emperors, Nero and Vitellius. He left a poem, the "Punica," which contains the history in heroic verse of the second Punic war. The Aeneid of Virgil was his model, and the narrative of Livy furnished his materials. It is considered the dullest and most tedious poem in the Latin language though its versification is harmonious, and will often, in point of smoothness, bear comparison with that of Virgil.

Valerius Flaccus flourished in the reign of Vespasian. He is author of the "Argonautica," an imitation and in some parts a translation of the Greek poem of Apollonius Rhodius on the same subject. He evidently did not live to complete his original design. In the Argonautica there are no glaring faults or blemishes, but there is also no genius, no inspiration. He has some talents as a descriptive poet; his versification is harmonious and his style graceful.

P. Statius (61-95 A.D.) was the author of the Silviae, Thebaid, and Achilleid. The "Silviae" are the rude materials of thought springing up spontaneously in all their wild luxuriance, from the rich, natural soil of the imagination of the poet. The subject of the "Thebaid" is the ancient Greek legend respecting the war of the Seven against Thebes, and the "Achilleid" was intended to embrace all the exploits of Achilles, but only two books were completed. The poems of Statius contain many poetical incidents, which might stand by themselves as perfect fugitive pieces. In these we see his natural and unaffected elegance, his harmonious ear, and the truthfulness of his perceptions. But, as an epic poet, he has neither grasp of mind nor vigor of conception; his imaginary heroes do not inspire and warm his imagination; and his genius was unable to rise to the highest departments of art.

6. HISTORY.—For the reasons already stated, Rome for a long period could boast of no historian; the perilous nature of the times, and the personal obligations under which learned men frequently were to the emperors, rendered contemporary history a means of adulation and servility. To this class of historians belongs Paterculus (fl. 30 A.D.), who wrote a history of Rome which is partial, prejudiced, and adulatory. He was a man of lively talents, and his taste was formed after the model of Sallust, of whom he was an imitator. His style is often overstrained and unnatural.

Under the genial and fostering influence of the Emperor Trajan, the fine arts, especially architecture, flourished, and literature revived. The same taste and execution which are visible in the bas-reliefs on the column of Trajan adorn the literature of his age as illustrated by its two great lights, Tacitus and the younger Pliny. There is not the rich, graceful manner which invests with such a charm the writers of the Golden Age, but the absence of these qualities is amply compensated by dignity, gravity, and honesty. Truthfulness beams throughout the writings of these two great contemporaries, and incorruptible virtue is as visible in the pages of Tacitus as benevolence and tenderness are in the letters of Pliny. They mutually influenced each other's characters and principles; their tastes and pursuits were similar; they loved each other dearly, corresponded regularly, corrected each other's works, and accepted patiently and gratefully each other's criticism.

Tacitus (60-135 A.D.) was of equestrian rank, and served in several important offices of the empire. His works now extant are a life of his father-in-law, Agricola, a tract on the manners and nations of the Germans, a small portion of a voluminous work entitled "Histories," about two thirds of another historical work, entitled "Annals," and a dialogue on the decline of eloquence. The life of Agricola, though a panegyric rather than a biography, is a beautiful specimen of the vigor and force of expression with which this greatest painter of antiquity could throw off any portrait which he attempted. Even if the likeness be somewhat flattered, the qualities which the writer possessed, his insight into character, his pathetic power, and his affectionate heart, render this short piece one of the most attractive biographies extant. The treatise on the "Geography, Manners, and Nations of Germany," though containing geographical descriptions often vague and inaccurate, and accounts evidently founded on mere tales of travelers, bears the impress of truth in the salient points and characteristic features of the national manners and institutions of Teutonic nations. The "Histories," his earliest historical work, of which only four books and a portion of the fifth are extant, extended from the year 69 to 96 A.D., and it was his intention to include the reigns of Nero and Trajan. In this work he proposed to investigate the political state of the commonwealth, the feeling of its armies, the sentiments of its provinces, the elements of its strength and weakness, and the causes and reasons for each historical phenomenon. The principal fault which diminishes the value of his history as a record of events is his too great readiness to accept evidence unhesitatingly, and to record popular rumors without taking sufficient pains to examine into their truth. His incorrect account of the history, constitution, and manners of the Jewish people is one among the few instances of this fault, scattered over a vast field of faithful history. The "Annals" consist of sixteen books; they begin with the death of Augustus, and conclude with that of Nero (14-68 A.D.). The object of Tacitus was to describe the influence which the establishment of tyranny on the ruins of liberty exercised for good or for evil in bringing out the character of the individual. In the extinction of freedom there still existed in Rome bright examples of heroism and courage, and instances not less prominent of corruption and degradation. In the annals of Tacitus these individuals stand out in bold relief, either singly or in groups upon the stage, while the emperor forms the principal figure, and the moral sense of the reader is awakened to admire instances of patient suffering and determined bravery, or to witness abject slavery and remorseless despotism.

Full of sagacious observation and descriptive power, Tacitus engages the most serious attention of the reader by the gravity of his condensed and comprehensive style, as he does by the wisdom and dignity of his reflections. Living amidst the influences of a corrupt age, he was uncontaminated. By his virtue and integrity, and his chastened political liberality, he commands our admiration as a man, while his love of truth is reflected in his character as a historian. In his style, the form is always subordinate to the matter; his sentences are suggestive of far more than they express, and his brevity is enlivened by copiousness, variety, and poetry; his language is highly figurative; his descriptions of scenery and incidents are eminently picturesque, his characters dramatic, and the expression of his own sentiments almost lyrical.

Suetonius was born about 69 A.D. His principal extant works are the "Lives of the Twelve Caesars," "Notices of Illustrious Grammarians and Rhetoricians," and the Lives of the Poets Terence, Horace, Persius, Lucan, and Juvenal. The use which he makes of historical documents proves that he was a man of diligent research, and, as a biographer, industrious and careful. He indulges neither in ornament of style nor in romantic exaggeration. The pictures which he draws of some of the Caesars are indeed terrible, but they are fully supported by the contemporary authority of Juvenal and Tacitus. As a historian, Suetonius had not that comprehensive and philosophical mind which would qualify him for taking an enlarged view of his subject; he has no definite plan or method, and wanders at will from one subject to another just as the idea seizes him.

Curtius is considered by some writers as belonging to the Silver Age, and by others to a later period. His biography of Alexander the Great is deeply interesting. It is a romance rather than a history. He never loses an opportunity, by the coloring which he gives to historical facts, of elevating the Macedonian conqueror to a super-human standard. His florid and ornamented style is suitable to the imaginary orations which are introduced in the narrative, and which constitute the most striking portions of the work.

Valerius Maximus flourished during the reign of Tiberius. His work is a collection of anecdotes entitled "Memorable Sayings and Deeds," the object of which was to illustrate by examples the beauty of virtue and the deformity of vice. The style is prolix and declamatory, and characterized by awkward affectation and involved obscurity.

7. RHETORIC AND ELOQUENCE.—Under the empire, schools of rhetoric were multiplied, as harmless as tyranny could desire. In these the Roman youth learned the means by which the absence of natural endowments could be compensated. The students composed their speeches according to the rules of rhetoric; they were then corrected, committed to memory, and recited, partly with a view to practice, partly in order to amuse an admiring audience. Nor were these declamations confined to mere students. Public recitations had, since the days of Juvenal, been one of the crying nuisances of the times. Seneca, the father of the philosopher of the same name, a famous rhetorician himself, left two works containing a series of exercises in oratory, which show the hollow and artificial system of those schools. He was born in Cordova in Spain (61 A.D.), and as a professional rhetorician amassed a considerable fortune.

Quintilian (40-118 A.D.) was the most distinguished teacher of rhetoric of this age. He attempted to restore a purer and more classical taste, but, although to a certain extent he was successful, the effect which he produced was only temporary. For the instruction of his elder son he wrote his great work, "Institutes of Oratory," a complete system of instruction in the art of oratory; and in it he shows himself far superior to Cicero as a teacher, though he was inferior to him as an orator.

His work is divided into twelve books, in which he traces the progress of the orator from the very cradle until he arrives at perfection. In this monument of his taste and genius he fully and completely exhausted the subject, and left a text-book of the science and art of nations, as well as a masterly sketch of the eloquence of antiquity.

The disposition of Quintilian was as affectionate and tender as his genius was brilliant and his taste pure; few passages throughout the whole range of Latin literature can be compared to that in which he mourns the loss of his wife and children. It is the touching eloquence of one who could not write otherwise than gracefully.

Among the pupils of Quintilian, Pliny the younger took the highest place in the literature of his age. He was born in Como, 61 A.D., and adopted and educated by his maternal uncle, the elder Pliny. He attained great celebrity as a pleader, and stood high in favor with the emperor. His works consist of a panegyric on Trajan, and a collection of letters in ten books. The panegyric is a piece of courtly flattery in accordance with the cringing and fawning manners of the times. The letters are very valuable, not only for the insight which they give into his own character, but also into the manners and modes of thought of his illustrious contemporaries, as well as the politics of the day. For liveliness, descriptive power, elegance, and simplicity of style, they are scarcely inferior to those of Cicero, whom he evidently took for his model. These letters show how accurate and judicious was the mind of Pliny, how prudent his administration in the high offices which he filled under the reign of Trajan, and how refined his taste for the beautiful. The tenth book, which consists of the letters to Trajan, together with the emperor's rescripts, will be read with the greatest interest. The following passages from his dispatch respecting the Christians, written while he was procurator of the province of Bithynia, and the emperor's answer, are worthy of being transcribed, both because reference is so often made to them, and because they throw light upon the marvelous and rapid propagation of the gospel, the manners of the early Christians, the treatment to which their constancy exposed them, and the severe jealousy with which they were regarded:—

"It is my constant practice, sire, to refer to you all subjects on which I entertain doubt. For who is better able to direct my hesitation, or to instruct my ignorance? I have never been present at the trials of Christians, and, therefore, I do not know in what way, or to what extent it is usual to question or to punish them. I have also felt no small difficulty in deciding whether age should make any difference, or whether those of the tenderest and those of mature years should be treated alike; whether pardon should be accorded to repentance, or whether, where a man has once been a Christian, recantation should profit him; whether, if the name of Christian does not imply criminality, still the crimes peculiarly belonging to the name should be punished. Meanwhile, in the case of those against whom informations have been laid before me, I have pursued the following line of conduct: I have put to them, personally, the question whether they were Christians. If they confessed, I interrogated them a second and third time, and threatened them with punishment. If they still persevered, I ordered their commitment; for I had no doubt whatever, that whatever they confessed, at any rate, dogged and inflexible obstinacy deserved to be punished. There were others who displayed similar madness; but, as they were Roman citizens, I ordered them to be sent back to the city. Soon, persecution itself, as is generally the case, caused the crime to spread, and it appeared in new forms. An anonymous information was laid against a large number of persons, but they deny that they are, or ever have been, Christians. As they invoked the gods, repeating the form after me, and offered prayer with incense and wine, to your image, which I had ordered to be brought together with those of the deities, and besides, cursed Christ, while those who are true Christians, it is said, cannot be compelled to do any one of these things, I thought it right to set them at liberty. Others, when accused by an informer, confessed that they were Christians, and soon after denied the fact. They said they had been, but had ceased to be, some three, some more, not a few even twenty years previously. All these worshiped your image and those of the gods, and cursed Christ. But they affirmed that the sum-total of their fault, or their error, was that they were accustomed to assemble on a fixed day, before dawn, and sing an antiphonal hymn to Christ as God; that they bound themselves by an oath, not to the commission of any wickedness, but to abstain from theft, robbery, and adultery; never to break a promise, or to deny a deposit, when it was demanded back. When these ceremonies were concluded, it was their custom to depart, and again assemble together to take food harmlessly and in common. That after my proclamation, in which, in obedience to your command, I had forbidden associations, they had desisted from this practice. For these reasons, I the more thought it necessary to investigate the real truth, by putting to the torture two maidens who were called deaconesses; but I discovered nothing, but a perverse and excessive superstition. I have, therefore, deferred taking cognizance of the matter until I had consulted you; for it seemed to me a case requiring advice, especially on account of the number of those in peril. For many of every age, sex, and rank are, and will continue to be called in question. The infection, in fact, has spread not only through the cities, but also through the villages and open country; but it seems that its progress can be arrested. At any rate, it is clear that the temples, which were almost deserted, begin to be frequented; and solemn sacrifices, which had been long intermitted, are again performed, and victims are being sold everywhere, for which, up to this time, a purchaser could rarely be found. It is, therefore, easy to conceive that crowds might be reclaimed, if an opportunity for repentance were given."

Trajan to Pliny: "In sifting the cases of those who have been indicted on the charge of Christianity, you have adopted, my dear Secundus, the right course of proceeding; for no certain rule can be laid down which will meet all cases. They must not be sought after, but if they are informed against, and convicted, they must be punished; with this proviso, however, that if any deny that he is a Christian, and proves the point by offering prayers to our deities, notwithstanding the suspicions under which he has labored, he shall be pardoned on his repentance. On no account should any anonymous charges be attended to, for it would be the worst possible precedent, and is inconsistent with the habits of our time."

8. PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE.—Philosophy, and particularly moral philosophy, became a necessary study at this time, when the popular religion had lost its influence. In the general ruin of public and private morals, virtuous men found in this science a guide in the dangers by which they were continually threatened, and a consolation in all their sorrows. The Stoic among the other schools met with most favor from this class of men, for it offered better security against the evils of life, and taught men how to take shelter from baseness and profligacy under the influence of virtue and courage. The doctrines of the Stoics suited the rigid sternness of the Roman character. They embodied that spirit of self-devotion and self- denial with which the Roman patriot, in the old times of simple republican virtue, threw himself into his public duties, and they enabled him to meet death with a courageous spirit in this degenerate age, in which many of the best and noblest willingly died by their own hands, at the imperial mandate, in order to save their name from infamy, and their inheritance from confiscation.

Seneca, (12-69 A.D.), a native of Cordova in Spain, was the greatest philosopher of this age. He early displayed great talent as a pleader, but in the reign of Claudius he was banished to Corsica, where he solaced his exile with the study of the Stoic philosophy; and though its severe precepts exercised no moral influence on his conduct, he not only professed himself a Stoic, but imagined that he was one. A few years after, he was recalled by Agrippina, to become tutor to her son Nero. He was too unscrupulous a man of the world to attempt the correction of the vicious propensities of his pupil, or to instill into him high principles. After the accession of Nero, he endeavored to arrest his depraved career, but it was too late. Seneca had, by usury and legacy-hunting, amassed one of those large fortunes of which so many instances are met with in Roman history; feeling the dangers of wealth, he offered his property to Nero, who refused it, but resolved to rid himself of his former tutor, and easily found a pretext for his destruction. In adversity the character of Seneca shone with brighter lustre. Though he had lived ill, he could die well. He met the messengers of death without trembling. His noble wife, Paulina, determined to die with him. The veins of both were opened at the same time, but the little blood which remained in his emaciated frame refused to flow. He suffered excruciating agony. A warm bath was tried, but in vain; and a draught of poison was equally ineffectual. At last he was suffocated by the vapor of a stove.

Seneca lived in a perilous atmosphere. He had not firmness to act up to the high moral standard which he proposed to himself. He was avaricious, but avarice was the great sin of his times. The education of one who was a brute rather than a man was a task to which no one would have been equal; he therefore retained the influence which he had not the uprightness to command, by miserable and sinful expedients. He had great abilities, and some of the noble qualities of the old Romans; and had he lived in the days of the republic, he would have been a great man.

Seneca was the author of twelve ethical treatises, the best of which are entitled, "On Providence," "On Consolation," and "On the Perseverance of Wise Men." He cared little for abstract speculation, and delighted to inculcate precepts rather than to investigate principles. He was always a favorite with Christian writers, and some of his sentiments are truly Christian. There is even a tradition that he was acquainted with St. Paul. He may unconsciously have imbibed some of the principles of Christianity. The gospel had already made great and rapid strides over the civilized world, and thoughtful minds may have been enlightened by some of the rays of divine truth dispersed by the moral atmosphere, just as we are benefited by the light of the sun, even when its disk is obscured by clouds. His epistles, of which there are one hundred and twenty-four, are moral essays, and are the most delightful of his works. They are evidently written for the public eye; they are rich in varied thought, and their reflections flow naturally, and without effort. They contain a free and unconstrained picture of his mind, and we see in them how he despised verbal subtleties, the external badges of a sect or creed, and insisted that the great end of science is to learn how to live and how to die. The style of Seneca is too elaborate to please. It is affected, often florid, and bombastic; there is too much sparkle and glitter, too little repose and simplicity.

Pliny the elder (A.D. 23-79) was born probably at Como, the family residence. He was educated at Rome, where he practiced at the bar, and filled different civil offices. He perished a martyr to the cause of science, in the eruption of Vesuvius, which took place in the reign of Titus, the first of which there is any record in history. The circumstances of his death are described by his nephew, Pliny the younger, in two letters to Tacitus. He was at Misenum, in command of the fleet, when, observing the first indications of the eruption, and wishing to investigate it more closely, he fitted out a light galley, and sailed towards the villa of a friend at Stabiae. He found his friend in great alarm, but Pliny remained tranquil and retired to rest. Meanwhile, broad flames burst forth from the volcano, the blaze was reflected from the sky, and the brightness was enhanced by the darkness of the night. Repeated shocks of an earthquake made the houses rock to and fro, while in the air the fall of half burnt pumice-stones menaced danger. He was awakened, and he and his friend, with their attendants, tied cushions over their heads to protect them from the falling stones, and walked out to see if they might venture on the water. It was now day, but the darkness was denser than the darkest night, the sea was a waste of stormy waters, and when at last the flames and the sulphureous smell could no longer be endured, Pliny fell dead, suffocated by the dense vapor.

The natural history of Pliny is an unequaled monument of studious diligence and persevering industry. It consists of thirty-seven books, and contains 20,000 facts (as he believed them to be) connected with nature and art, the result not of original research, but, as he honestly confessed, culled from the labors of other men.

Owing to the extent of his reading, his love of the marvelous, and his want of judgment in comparing and selecting, he does not present us with a correct view of the science of his own age. He reproduces errors evidently obsolete and inconsistent with facts and theories which had afterwards replaced them. With him, mythological traditions appeared to have almost the same authority as modern discoveries; the earth teems with monsters, not exceptions to the regular order of nature, but specimens of her ingenuity. His peculiar pantheistic belief prepared him to consider nothing incredible, and his temper inclined him to admit all that was credible as true.

He tells us of men whose feet were turned backwards, of others whose feet were so large as to shade them when they lay in the sun; others without mouths, who fed on the fragrance of fruits and flowers. Among the lower animals, he enumerates horned horses furnished with wings; the mantichora, with the face of a man, three rows of teeth, a lion's body, and a scorpion's tail; the basilisk, whose very glance is fatal; and an insect which cannot live except in the midst of the flames. But notwithstanding his credulity and his want of judgment, this elaborate work contains many valuable truths and much entertaining information. The prevailing character of his philosophical belief, though tinctured with the stoicism of the day, is querulous and melancholy. Believing that nature is an all- powerful principle, and the universe instinct with deity, he saw more of evil than of good in the divine dispensation, and the result was a gloomy and discontented pantheism.

Celsus probably lived in the reign of Tiberius. He was the author of many works, on various subjects, of which one, in eight books, on medicine, is now extant. The independence of his views, the practical, as well as the scientific nature of his instructions, and above all, his knowledge of surgery, and his clear exposition of surgical operations, have given his work great authority; the highest testimony is borne to its merits by the fact of its being used as a text-book, even in the present advanced state of medical science. The taste of the age in which he lived turned his attention also to polite literature, and to that may be ascribed the Augustan purity of his style.

Pomponius Mela lived in the reign of Claudius. He is considered as the representative of the Roman geographers. Though his book, "The Place of the World," is but an epitome of former treatises, it is interesting for the simplicity of its style and the purity of its language.

Columella flourished in the reigns of Claudius and Nero. He is author of an agricultural work, "De Re Rustica," in which he gives, in smooth and fluent, though somewhat too diffuse a style, the fullest and completest information on practical agriculture among the Romans in the first century of the Christian era.

Frontinus (fl. 78 A.D.) left two valuable works, one on military tactics, the other a descriptive architectural treatise on those wonderful monuments of Roman art, the aqueducts. Besides these, there are extant fragments of other works on surveying, and on the laws and customs relating to landed property, which assign Frontinus an important place in the estimation of the students of Roman history.

9. ROMAN LITERATURE FROM HADRIAN TO THEODORIC (138-526 A.D.).—From the death of Augustus, Roman literature had gradually declined, and though it shone forth for a time with classic radiance in the writings of Persius, Juvenal, Quintilian, Tacitus, and the Plinies, with the death of freedom, the extinction of patriotism, and the decay of the national spirit, nothing could avert its fall. Poetry had become declamation; history had degenerated either into fulsome panegyric or the fleshless skeletons of epitomes; and at length the Romans seemed to disdain the use of their native tongue, and wrote again in Greek, as they had in the infancy of the national literature. The Emperor Hadrian resided long at Athens, and became imbued with a taste and admiration for Greek; and thus the literature of Rome became Hellenized. From this epoch the term classical can no longer be applied to it, for it no longer retained its purity. To Greek influence succeeded the still more corrupting one of foreign nations. With the death of Nerva, the uninterrupted succession of emperors of Roman or Italian birth ceased. Trajan himself was a Spaniard, and after him not only foreigners of every European race, but even Orientals and Africans were invested with the imperial purple, and the huge empire over which they ruled was one unwieldy mass of heterogeneous materials. The literary influence of the capital was not felt in the interior portions of the Roman dominions. Schools were established in the very heart of nations just emerging from barbarism; and though the blessings of civilization and intellectual culture were thus distributed far and wide, still literary taste, as it flowed through the minds of foreigners, became corrupted, and the language of the imperial city, exposed to the infecting contact of barbarous idioms, lost its purity.

The Latin authors of this age were numerous, but few had taste to appreciate and imitate the literature of the Augustan age. They may be classified according to their departments of poetry, history, grammar and oratory, philosophy and science.

The brightest star of the poetry of this period was Claudian (365-404 A.D.), in whom the graceful imagination of classical antiquity seems to have revived. He enjoyed the patronage of Stilicho, the guardian and minister of Honorius, and in the praise and honor of him and of his pupil, he wrote "The Rape of Proserpine," the "War of the Giants," and several other poems.

His descriptions indicate a rich and powerful imagination, but, neglecting substance for form, his style is often declamatory and affected. Among the earliest authors of Christian hymns were Hilarius and Prudentius, Those of the former were expressly designed to be sung, and are said to have been set to music by the author himself. Prudentius (fl. 348 A.D.) wrote many hymns and poems in defense of the Christian faith, more distinguished for their pious and devotional character than for their lyric sublimity or parity of language. To this age belong also the hymns of Damasus and of Ambrose.

Among the historians are Flavius Eutropius, who lived in the fourth century, and by the direction of the Emperor Valens composed an "Epitome of Roman History," which was a favorite book in the Middle Ages. Ammianus Marcellinus, his contemporary, wrote a Roman history in continuation of Tacitus and Suetonius. Though his style is affected and often rough and inaccurate, his work is interesting for its digressions and observations. Severus Sulpicius wrote the history of the Hebrews, and of the four centuries of the church. His "Sacred History," for its language and style, is one of the best works of that age.

In the department of oratory may be mentioned Cornelius Fronto, who flourished under Domitian and Nerva, and was endowed with a rich imagination and a mind stored with vast erudition in Greek and Latin literature, Symmachus, distinguished for his opposition to Christianity, and Cassiodorus, minister and secretary of the Emperor Theodoric.

In the decline of Roman, as of Greek literature, grammarians took the place of poets and of historians; they commented on and interpreted the ancient classics, and transmitted to us valuable information concerning the Augustan writers. Among the most important works of this kind are the "Attic Nights" of Gellius, who was born in Rome, and lived under Hadrian and the Antonines. In this work are preserved many valuable passages of the classics which would otherwise have been lost. Macrobius, who flourished in the middle of the fifth century, was the author of different works in which the doctrines of the Neo-Platonic school are expounded. His style, however, is very defective.

A striking characteristic of the writings, both in Greek and Latin, of the last ages of the empire, is the prevalence of principles and opinions imported from the East. The Neo-Platonic school, imbued with Oriental mysticism, had diffused the belief in spirits and magic, and the philosophy of this age was a mixture of ancient wisdom with new superstitions belonging to the ages of transition between the decadence of the ancient faith and the development of a new religion. The best representative of the philosophy of this age is Apuleius, born in Africa in the reign of Hadrian. After having received his education in Carthage and Athens, he came to Rome, where he acquired great reputation as a literary man, and as the possessor of extraordinary supernatural powers. To this extensive philosophical knowledge and immense erudition he united great polish of manner and remarkable beauty of person. He wrote much on philosophy; but his most important work is a romance known as "Metamorphoses, or the Golden Ass," containing his philosophical and mystic doctrines. In this book, the object of which is to encourage the belief in mysticism, the writer describes the transformation of a young man into an ass, who is allowed to take his primitive human form only through a knowledge of the mysteries of Isis. The story is well told, and the romance is full of interest and sprightliness; but its style is incorrect, florid, and bombastic.

Boethius (470-524), the last of the Roman philosophers, was the descendant of an illustrious family. He made Greek philosophy the principal object of his meditations. He was raised to the highest honors and offices in the empire by Theodoric, but finally, through the artifices of enemies who envied his reputation, he lost the favor of his patron, was imprisoned, and at length beheaded. Of his numerous works, founded on the peripatetic philosophy, that which has gained him the greatest celebrity is entitled "On the Consolations of Philosophy," composed while he was in prison. It is in the form of a dialogue, in which philosophy appears to console him with the idea of Divine Providence. The poetical part of the book is written with elegance and grace, and his prose, though not pure, is fluent and full of tranquil dignity. The work of Boethius, which is known in all modern languages, was translated into Anglo-Saxon by King Alfred, 900 A.D.

The fathers of the church followed more particularly the philosophy of Plato, which was united and adapted to Christianity. St. Augustine is the most illustrious among the Christian Platonists.

The most eloquent orators and writers of this period were found among the advocates of Christianity; and among the most celebrated of these Latin fathers of the Christian church we may mention the following names. Tertullian (160-285), in his apology for the Christians, gives much information on the manners and conduct of the early Christians; his style is concise and figurative, but harsh, unpolished, and obscure. St. Cyprian (200-258), beheaded at Carthage for preaching the gospel contrary to the orders of the government, wrote an explanation of the Lord's Prayer, which affords a valuable illustration of the ecclesiastical history of the time. Arnobius (fl. 300) refuted the objections of the heathen against Christianity with spirit and learning, in his "Disputes with the Gentiles," a work rich in materials for the understanding of Greek and Roman mythology. Lactantius (d. 335), on account of his fine and eloquent language, is frequently called the Christian Cicero; his "Divine Institutes" are particularly celebrated. St. Ambrose (340-397) obtained great honor by his conduct as Bishop of Milan, and his writings bear the stamp of his high Christian character. St. Augustine (360-430) was one of the most renowned of all the Latin fathers. Though others may have been more learned or masters of a purer style, none more powerfully touched and warmed the heart towards religion. His "City of God" is one of the great monuments of human genius. St. Jerome (330-420) wrote many epistles full of energy and affection, as well as of religious zeal. He made a Latin version of the Old Testament, which was the foundation of the Vulgate, and which gave a new impulse to the study of the Holy Scriptures. Leo the Great (fl. 440) is the first pope whose writings have been preserved. They consist of sermons and letters. His style is finished and rhetorical.

10. ROMAN JURISPRUDENCE.—In the period which followed, from the death of Augustus to the time of the Antonines, Roman civilians and legal writers continued to be numerous, and as a professional body they seem to have enjoyed high consideration until the close of the reign of Alexander Severus, 385* A.D. After that time they were held in much less estimation, as the science fell into the hands of freedmen and plebeians, who practiced it as a sordid and pernicious trade. With the reign of Constantine, the credit of the profession revived, and the youth of the empire were stimulated to pursue the study of the law by the hope of being ultimately rewarded by honorable and lucrative offices, the magistrates being almost wholly taken from the class of lawyers. Two jurists of this reign, Gregorianus and Hermogenianus, are particularly distinguished as authors of codes which are known by their names, and which were recognized as standard authorities in courts of justice. The "Code of Theodosius" was a collection of laws reduced by that emperor, and promulgated in both empires 438 A.D. It retained its authority in the western empire until its final overthrow, 476 A.D., and even after this, though modified by the institutions of the conquerors. In the eastern empire, it was only superseded by the code of Justinian. This emperor undertook the task of reducing to order and system the great confusion and perplexity in which the whole subject of Roman jurisprudence was involved. For this purpose he employed the most eminent lawyers, with the celebrated Tribonian at their head, to whom he intrusted the work of forming and publishing a complete collection of the preceding laws and edicts, and who devoted several years of unwearied labor and research to this object. They first collected and reduced the imperial constitutions from the time of Hadrian downwards, which was promulgated as the "Justinian Code." Their next labor was to reduce the writings of the jurisconsults of the preceding ages, especially those who had lived under the empire, and whose works are said to have amounted to two thousand volumes. This work was published 533 A.D., under the title of "Pandects," or "Digest," the former title referring to their completeness as comprehending the whole of Roman jurisprudence, and the latter to their methodical arrangement. At the same time, a work prepared by Tribonian was published by the order of the emperor, on the elements or first principles of Roman law, entitled "Institutes," and another collection consisting of constitutions and edicts, under the title of "Novels," chiefly written in Greek, but known to the moderns by a Latin translation. These four works, the Code, the Pandects, the Institutes, and the Novels, constituted what is now called the Body of Roman Law.

The system of jurisprudence established by Justinian remained in force in the eastern empire until the taking of Constantinople, 1453 A.D. After the fall of the western empire, these laws had little sway until the twelfth century, when Irnerius, a German lawyer who had studied at Constantinople, opened a school at Bologna, and thus revived and propagated in the West a knowledge of Roman civil law. Students flocked to this school from all parts, and by them Roman jurisprudence, as embodied in the system of Justinian, was transmitted to most of the countries of Europe.

During the fourth and fifth centuries, the process of the debasement of the Roman tongue went on with great rapidity. The influence of the provincials began what the irruptions of the northern tribes consummated. In many scattered parts of the empire it is probable that separate Latin dialects arose, and the strain upon the whole structure of the tongue was prodigious, when the Goths poured into Italy, established themselves in the capital, and began to speak and write in a language previously foreign to them. With the close of the reign of Theodoric the curtain falls upon ancient literature.