The Reign of Tiberius, Out of the First Six Annals of Tacitus - Cornelius Tacitus

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hand, a man of real taste and learning, says of the Commentaries, "All things be most perfectly done by him; in Caesar only, could never yet fault be found." I agree with Ascham: I think I prefer the Commentaries as they are, chaste and quiet; I really prefer them to Mr. Kinglake's "Crimean War," or to Mr. Forbes' Despatches, or even to the most effusive pages of Mr. Stanley's book on Africa.

      In "The Life of Agricola," I would mention the simplicity of the treatment and the excellence of the taste. Tacitus does not recite the whole of Roman history, nor assemble all the worthies out of Plutarch. Agricola is not compared to the pyramids, to the Flavian circus, nor to any works of art and literature: these flights of imagination were not known to the Ancients; but in a learned modern, I have seen Dante compared to Wagner's operas, to the Parthenon and St. Peter's, and to Justinian's code. The sanctities of private life are not violated; yet we know everything, that it is decent to know, about Agricola. Lord Coleridge has given a beautiful rendering of the closing passages of "The Agricola," in his account of Mr. Matthew Arnold: these elegant papers are not only models of good English; but are conspicuous, among recent obituary notices, for their fine taste and their becoming reticence. From the excesses of modern biographers, Tacitus was in little danger; thanks to his Roman sense, and to the qualities of the Roman Language. "Economy," says Mr. Symonds, "is exhibited in every element of this athletic tongue. Like a naked gladiator all bone and muscle, it relies upon bare sinewy strength." That author speaks of "the austere and masculine virtues of Latin, the sincerity and brevity of Roman speech;" and Tacitus is, beyond any doubt, the strongest, the austerest, the most pregnant of all the Romans. "Sanity," says Mr. Matthew Arnold, in conclusion, "that is the great virtue of the ancient literature; the want of that is the great defect of the modern, in spite of all its variety and power." "It is impossible to read the great ancients, without losing something of our caprice and eccentricity. I know not how it is, but their commerce with the ancients appears to me to produce, in those who constantly practise it, a steadying and composing effect upon the judgment, not of literary works only, but of men and events in general. They are like persons who have had a very weighty and impressive experience; they are more truly than others under the empire of facts, and more independent of the language current among those with whom they live."

      It has been told of Cardinal Newman, that he never liked to pass a single day, without rendering an English sentence into Latin. To converse with the Roman authors, to handle their precise and sparing language, is, I can well believe it, a most wholesome discipline; and the most efficient remedy against those faults of diffuseness, of obscurity, and of excess, which are only too common among the writers of our day. It may have been to this practice, that Cardinal Newman owed something of his clearness, and of his exquisite simplicity: and for his style, he should be idolised by every one who has a taste for literature. I have said many things in praise of the ancient authors: it pleases me, as I finish, to offer my humble tribute to an author who is quite our own; to one, who in all his writings has bequeathed us perfect models of chaste, of lucid, and of melodious prose.

      NEW COLLEGE, OXFORD: September 15, 1890.

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       Table of Contents

       Table of Contents

       Table of Contents

      Kings were the original Magistrates of Rome: Lucius Brutus founded Liberty and the Consulship: Dictators were chosen occasionally, and used only in pressing exigencies. Little more than two years prevailed the supreme power of the Decemvirate, and the consular jurisdiction of the military Tribunes not very many. The domination of Cinna was but short, that of Sylla not long. The authority of Pompey and Crassus was quickly swallowed up in Caesar; that of Lepidus and Anthony in Augustus. The Commonwealth, then long distressed and exhausted by the rage of her civil dissensions, fell easily into his hands, and over her he assumed a sovereign dominion; yet softened with a venerable name, that of Prince or Chief of the Senate. But the several revolutions in the ancient free state of Rome, and all her happy or disastrous events, are already recorded by writers of signal renown. Nor even in the reign of Augustus were there wanting authors of distinction and genius to have composed his story; till by the prevailing spirit of fear, flattery, and abasement they were checked. As to the succeeding Princes, Tiberius, Caligula, Claudius, and Nero; the dread of their tyranny, whilst they yet reigned, falsified their history; and after their fall, the fresh detestation of their cruelties inflamed their Historians. Hence my own design of recounting briefly certain incidents in the reign of Augustus, chiefly towards his latter end, and of entering afterwards more fully into that of Tiberius and the other three; unbiassed as I am in this undertaking by any resentment, or any affection; all the influences of these personal passions being far from me.

      When, after the fall of Brutus and Cassius, there remained none to fight for the Commonwealth, and her arms were no longer in her own hands; when Sextus Pompeius was utterly defeated in Sicily, Lepidus bereft of his command. Marc Anthony slain; and of all the chiefs of the late Dictator's party, only Octavius his nephew was left; he put off the invidious name of Triumvir, and styling himself Consul, pretended that the jurisdiction attached to the Tribuneship was his highest aim, as in it the protection of the populace was his only view: but when once he had laid his foundations wider, secured the soldiery by liberality and donations, gained the people by store of provisions, and charmed all by the blessings and sweetness of public peace, he began by politic gradations to exalt himself, to extend his domination, and with his own power to consolidate the authority of the Senate, jurisdiction of the Magistrate, and weight and force of the Laws; usurpations in which he was thwarted by no man: all the bravest Republicans and his most daring foes were slain in battle, or gleaned up by the late sanguinary proscriptions; and for the surviving Nobility, they were covered with wealth, and distinguished with public honours, according to the measure of their debasement, and promptness to bondage. Add, that all the creatures of this new Power, who in the loss of public freedom had gained private fortunes, preferred a servile condition, safe and possessed, to the revival of ancient liberty with personal peril. Neither were the Provinces averse to the present Revolution, and Sovereignty of one; since under that of the people and Senate they had lived in constant fear and mistrust, sorely rent and harassed as they were by the raging competition amongst our Grandees, as well as by the grievous rapine and exactions of our Magistrates; in vain too, under these their oppressions, had been their appeal to the protection of the laws, which were utterly enfeebled and borne down by might and violence, by faction and parties; nay, even by subornation and money.

      Moreover, Augustus, in order to fortify his domination with collateral bulwarks, raised his sister's son Claudius Marcellus, a perfect youth, to the dignity of Pontiff and that of Aedile; preferred Marcus Agrippa to two successive Consulships, a man in truth meanly born but an accomplished soldier, and the companion of his victories; and Marcellus, the husband of Julia, soon after dying, chose him for his son-in-law. Even the sons of his wife, Tiberius Nero, and Claudius Drusus, he dignified with high military titles and commands; though his house was yet supported by descendants of his own blood. For into the Julian family and name of the Caesars he had already adopted Lucius and Caius, the sons of Agrippa; and though they were but children, neither of them seventeen years old, vehement had been his ambition to see them declared Princes of the Roman Youth and even designed to the Consulship; while openly, he

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