The Sun.
London, England, 1864-02-15 00:00:00

CICERO'S LETTERS.

It is a rich mine of information, and furnishes the best
materials, not only for his own biography, but a great part
of the history of the time. Nowhere else do we find such a
vivid picture of contemporary events. We seem to be pre-
sent at the shifting scenes of the drama, as the plot unfolds
itself which involves the destinies of Rome. We hear
the groans of the expiring Republic, which has been
mortally wounded during the long civil wars of Marius
and Sylla, and was fast sinking under the flood of social
and political corruption which is sure to follow in
the train of civil was. At one time they watch with
eager impatience the arrival of a courier-at Tuseulum, with.
a letter from Atticud telling his friends the news of; the,
day, and in Cicero's reply we read all the fluctuations of
hope and fear which, agitated him during the, momentous
crisis of his country's fate At another we contemplate the
great orator and statesman in the seclusion ofhis villa, as
plai‘n country gentleman, busying himself with improve-
ments on his estate, building farm-houses, laying out and
planting shrubberies, and turning watercourses, or amusing
himself with pictures and statues,, and. the various objects
which interest a man of refined and cultivated taste. At
another we find him at Rome sick, weary, and disgusted with
the din of strife, mistrusting everybody where no one seems
worthy of trust, and harping ever on the vanity and ambition
and the worthlessness of popular applause. We see him
at one moment exalted to the summit of human glory when
saluted in the Senate by the proud title of Pater Petrie, and
at another sunk in the lowest depths, of despair when he is
a wandering fugitive exile from Rome, and tells his wife
that while he writes he is blinded by his tears. •
There is a charm itt these letters to which we have nothing
comparable in all that antiquity has spared us. To say no-
thing of their exquisite Latinity, and not unfrequently their
play of wit, they have,a freshness and reality which no nar-
rative of bygone events can ever hope to attain. We see in
them Cicero as he was. We behold him in his strength and
in his weakness—the bold advocate, and yet timid vacillating
statesman—the fond husband—the affectionate father—the
kind master—the warre.-hearted friend. I speak not now of
his political correspondence, written with an object in view,
and with a consciousness that it might one day be made
public, but his private letters to his relatives and friends, in
which he poured out the whole secret of his soul, and laid.
bare his innermost thoughts, yearning for sympathy and
clinging for support. To quote the words of De Quincy—.
"In them we come suddenly into deep lulls of angry pas..
sion—here upon a scheme for the extension of literature by
a domestic history, or by a comparison of Greek with Rot
man jurisprudence ; there again upon some ancient problera
from the quiet fields of philosophy." They show that he
was a man of genial soul, and of a meet kind and amiable
disposition—what Dr. Johnson would have called a the.
roughly " clubable" person. He is never more at home than
whenindulging in a little pleasant banter and irony, as when
he makes fun of Trebatius the lawyer, who had left the stmts.
sphere of the courts, to turn soldier and serve under Caesar
in Gaul. Bat he is always the scholar and the gentleman;
and no one had more of that refined polish which the Ro-
mans described by the expressive word urbanitus. Ido not
think that in the whole of his correspondence a single coarse
word or vulgar idea occurs. It is not so in his speeches.
There he often indulged in language which is, according to
modern notions, offensive to good taste and decency, ag
when he attacked Piso and Gabinius and Antony. But
that was the fault of the plain• speaking time in which he
lived, rather than of the man; just as the occasional coarse,
ness of Shakspere must be attributed to the age in which
he was born, and not to his own gentle nature.

How pleasant it is to hear him giving his friend Atticus 4
message from the little Tunis, or Tulliola as he often calls
her—making use of the endearing diminutive so significant
in the ancient Latin and modern Italian—to remind him of
his promise to make her a present, and afterwards tolling
him that:Tullia had brought an action against him for breach
of contract ; or to find him speaking of his only son " the
honey sweet Cicero," that " most aristocratic child," as ho
playfully etyhs him, who was with his sister in his youth-
ful days the pride and delight of his life. We see him
lounging on the shore at his villa near Antinm, and there
penning a letter to confess that he is in no humour to work,
and amuses himself w;th counting the waves as they roll

_ -
upon the beach. We would not willingly exchange that
letter to Atticus, in which he says of himself that ha knows
he has acted like a " genuine donkey" (me asinum ger•
manum fuisse), for the stiffest and most elaborate of hia
political epistles.--Torsyth'sldfe of Cicero.

A STATUE TO BERNARD PALJSSY is proposed tO
be erected at Salutes, his birthplace.
A STATUE OF SIGNOR ROSSINI, by Signor Maro-
chetti, which has been presented to his native town of
Pesaro by the Marquis of Salamanca and M. Delahante,
will be shortly inaugurated there.
BULWER'S " CAXTONIANA" form v01e.692 and 693
of the Tauchnitz Collection.
MISS NIGHTINGALE still remains in town, with-
out any perceptible change in her health.
A LIFE OF FLAXMAN, THE GREAT SCULPTOR.—
Mr. G. F. Terriswood is engaged in collecting materials for
a Life of Flaxman, the great sculptor.
THE SCOTCH LUNACY CASE.—The case of Mr.
Angus Macintosh, who brought an action against
the proprietors of the Saughton Hall Lunatic Asylum.
near Edinburgh, for illegally detaining him there when ho
was of sound mind, was brought to a close on Friday last,
We gavo the evidence of the alleged lunatic himself a few
days ago. On Friday, the jury, after a charge by the pre-
siding judge, returned a verdict, Ly a majority of nine to
three, which it will be recollected is allowed in Scotch
causes, in favour of the keeper of the asylum. The counsel
for Mr. Macintosh took exception to the
principles of law
laid down by the presiding judge.

WEST-END TRADESMEN ANDWEST-END SERVANTS.
—lt is the custom is many large \Vest-end houses
to have a table laid out in some back room, covered with
the delicacies of the season and with different wines, and
here about midday the butler and gentleman's gentleman
drop in and do justice to the excellent fare. In one large
and well-known establishment a cask of wine is always on
draught, and no upper servant ever delivers a message, or
order there, without taking his glass or two as a matter of
right. It is unnecessary to say that the cost ultimately
comes out of the pockets of the masters.—Laudon Review.:

before LoPrdAoMrPmEißda°leagta
Edinburghin called
TUE CASE.—This
JudgeSE.—
on Saturday. His lordship said as they were,ia the begin-
ning of a new class of Crown cases they would have to decide
To
fhis Exchequervas a
whether to follow the case of the Alexandra and take the
whole case at once to a jury, leaving it open to parties to
take objections to the information during the trial, or to
follow the ordinary Scotch form of disposing of ali ques-
tions of relevancy before trial. The Lord Advocate said
if the whole case went to trial the Crown would propose
about the 10th of March, or, it' not then, in the first week of
April. The case was adjourned till Tuesday to determine
the form.
- -

Constantinople journals to the 4th have arrived.
Letters s'ate that 100,000 men of the reserve have
been called under arms, end the greater number of
them will be sent on the Danube. For the first
time, two Christians, one a Greek and the other an
Armenian, have been named members of the Grand
Council of Justice. A change of Ministers is
spoken of.
MILAN, Feb. 12.—The King was last night pre.-
sent at the representation at the Scala, where
Majesty was received with loud acclamations. A
grand dinner is to be given this evening at the
Palace.