The Caesars | Page 8

all of them entirely unknown, except
to a few elaborate scholars. We purpose to collect from these obscure,
but most interesting memorialists, a few sketches and biographical
portraits of these great princes, whose public life is sometimes known,
but very rarely any part of their private and personal history. We must

of course commence with the mighty founder of the Cæsars. In his case
we cannot expect so much of absolute novelty as in that of those who
succeed. But if, in this first instance, we are forced to touch a little
upon old things, we shall confine ourselves as much as possible to
those which are susceptible of new aspects. For the whole gallery of
those who follow, we can undertake that the memorials which we shall
bring forward, may be looked upon as belonging pretty much to what
has hitherto been a sealed book.
CHAPTER I.
The character of the first Cæsar has perhaps never been worse
appreciated than by him who in one sense described it best--that is,
with most force and eloquence wherever he really did comprehend it.
This was Lucan, who has nowhere exhibited more brilliant rhetoric, nor
wandered more from the truth, than in the contrasted portraits of Cæsar
and Pompey. The famous line, "Nil actum reputans si quid superesset
agendum," is a fine feature of the real character, finely expressed. But
if it had been Lucan's purpose (as possibly, with a view to Pompey's
benefit, in some respects it was) utterly and extravagantly to falsify the
character of the great Dictator, by no single trait could he more
effectually have fulfilled that purpose, nor in fewer words, than by this
expressive passage, "Gaudensque viam fecisse ruina." Such a trait
would be almost extravagant applied even to Marius, who (though in
many respects a perfect model of Roman grandeur, massy, columnar,
imperturbable, and more perhaps than any one man recorded in history
capable of justifying the bold illustration of that character in Horace,
"_Si fractus illabatur orbis, impavidum ferient ruinæ_") had, however,
a ferocity in his character, and a touch of the devil in him, very rarely
united with the same tranquil intrepidity. But for Cæsar, the
all-accomplished statesman, the splendid orator, the man of elegant
habits and polished taste, the patron of the fine arts in a degree
transcending all example of his own or the previous age, and as a man
of general literature so much beyond his contemporaries, except Cicero,
that he looked down even upon the brilliant Sylla as an illiterate
person,--to class such a man with the race of furious destroyers exulting
in the desolations they spread, is to err not by an individual trait, but by

the whole genus. The Attilas and the Tamerlanes, who rejoice in
avowing themselves the scourges of God, and the special instruments
of his wrath, have no one feature of affinity to the polished and humane
Cæsar, and would as little have comprehended his character, as he
could have respected theirs. Even Cato, the unworthy hero of Lucan,
might have suggested to him a little more truth in this instance, by a
celebrated remark which he made on the characteristic distinction of
Cæsar, in comparison with other revolutionary disturbers; for, whereas
others had attempted the overthrow of the state in a continued
paroxysm of fury, and in a state of mind resembling the lunacy of
intoxication, that Cæsar, on the contrary, among that whole class of
civil disturbers, was the only one who had come to the task in a temper
of sobriety and moderation, (unum accessisse sobrium ad rempublicam
delendam.)
In reality, Lucan did not think as he wrote. He had a purpose to serve;
and in an age when to act like a freeman was no longer possible, he
determined at least to write in that character. It is probable, also, that he
wrote with a vindictive or a malicious feeling towards Nero; and, as the
single means he had for gratifying that, resolved upon sacrificing the
grandeur of Cæsar's character wherever it should be found possible.
Meantime, in spite of himself, Lucan for ever betrays his lurking
consciousness of the truth. Nor are there any testimonies to Cæsar's
vast superiority more memorably pointed, than those which are
indirectly and involuntarily extorted from this Catonic poet, by the
course of his narration. Never, for example, was there within the same
compass of words, a more emphatic expression of Cæsar's essential and
inseparable grandeur of thought, which could not be disguised or be
laid aside for an instant, than is found in the three casual
words--Indocilis privata loqui. The very mould, it seems, by Lucan's
confession, of his trivial conversation was regal; nor could he, even to
serve a purpose, abjure it for so much as a casual purpose. The acts of
Cæsar speak