to prove was, that the senate, and not the populus, appointed the dictator in a great number of cases: the reason why he omitted the dictio of the consuls was clearly, we repeat, because it had nothing to do with his argument. Niebuhr did not omit these words because they were opposed to his opinion; he omitted them because they were extraneous to the subject in hand; and in doing so, he merely adopted the course which every sensible writer always adopts under similar circumstances. It is only a waste of space, and distracts the attention of the reader, for a writer to quote a passage at full length, when the context has nothing to do with the subject immediately under discussion. But our readers will say, Is this possible? Can the Reviewer have falsified Niebuhr in this fashion? Can it be true that Niebuhr is not discussing the question as to whether the senate or the consuls had the appointment of the dictator, but merely as to whether the senate frequently made the appointment without the populus? There can be no doubt on the point. The five passages quoted by the Reviewer are all contained in note 1254 in the first volume of the History. They are brought forward by Niebuhr to prove the following statement, which we have had occasion to quote already. "Still oftener, indeed throughout the whole first decad of Livy, do we read of a decree of the senate whereby a dictator was appointed, without any notice of the great council of the patricians." It is unnecessary to say more. We have taken up the great point, on which the Reviewer relied, in order to establish his charges against Niebuhr, and we think it must be evident to every reader. that the Reviewer must have been inexcusably misled by his French guide, who, if he has not been guilty of a "wilful falsification" of Niebuhr, must have misunderstood him most unaccountably. On either supposition M. Poirson deserves the severest reprehension : he has been either strangely dishonest or strangely negligent. We need not make any remark upon the Reviewer's apology for Niebuhr, whom he finally "acquits of dishonesty," but "convicts of a most licentious method;" for as the charge itself has fallen to the ground, it is quite unnecessary to enter into the merits of the defence, set up by the Reviewer,-a species of defence, which Niebuhr, if he had been alive, would have rejected, we are sure, with honest indignation. We might point out some instances, which prove that the Reviewer has not been so careful in making his statements as the importance of the subject demanded, and as the public had a right to expect; but we confine ourselves to one case. After citing the following observation of Niebuhr's (note 1253): "The viator, who carries the dictatorship to Cincinnatus, says to him: Vela corpus, ut proferam senatus populique Romani mandata. Pliny, xviii. 4. The Reviewer remarks: "But to make this favourable to his views, Niebuhr must translate it thus:- 'Cover your person that I may announce to you the orders of the senate and of the people:' with the implication that these orders' were for Cincinnatus to become dictator. But neither the translation nor the implication are correct. No act ever emanating from the senate and people was ever called mandatum. The invariable custom of all writers is to employ the words senatus-consultus (consultum is meant), plebiscitum, lex. Moreover, both Pliny and Livy explain the nature of the orders announced to Cincinnatus: they were not that he should assume the office of dictator, but that he should hasten with all speed to Rome to collect the forces, and march to the deliverance of the army of Minucius, as the delay of a few hours might be fatal." After these confident assertions what was our amazement, in referring to Pliny, to find the contrary directly stated! The whole passage is as follows: "Aranti quatuor sua jugera in Vaticano, quæ Prata Quinctia appellantur, Cincinnato viator attulit dictaturam, et quidem, ut traditur, nudo, plenoque pulveris etiamnum ore. Cui viator, Vela corpus, inquit, ut proferam senatus populique Romani mandata." Livy also says (iii. 26) "Qua (toga) simul, absterso pulvere ac sudore, velatus processit, dictatorem eum legati gratulantes consalutant: in urbem vocant: qui terror sit in exercitu, exponunt." Upon turning to M. Poirson's pamphlet (p. 19) we find this passage of Livy quoted in the following way: "Legati in urbem vocant: qui terror sit in exercitu exponunt:" thus omitting the very words which would refute his assertion. And Livy is mutilated in this fashion by a writer who has the effrontery to charge another with the same crime! We had formerly thought it possible that M. Poirson might have misunderstood Niebuhr, but after this clear case of dishonesty, we fear that he must have wilfully misrepresented him. We may indeed adopt M. Poirson's own words: "En vérité c'est trop compter sur la négligence des lecteurs à consulter les originaux, à vérifier les textes pour faire dire aux auteurs anciens l'opposé de ce qu'ils disent en effet." The Reviewer's remarks about the meaning of mandatum are scarcely worthy of notice. The word is frequently used in the general sense of a command from a superior to an inferior, and may therefore be applied to the commands of the senate or popu lus. Thus Cicero (Philipp. viii. 8) asks, “An ego ab eo mandata acciperem, qui senatus mandata contemneret?" us, In conclusion, we may be allowed to express a hope, that we have not said any thing personally disrespectful to the Reviewer. Such has not been our intention: and if any word has escaped which the Reviewer may consider as personally offensive, we shall be sorry. Our only object has been to vindicate the veracity of one of the most truth-loving men that ever lived, and this we could not do without pointing out the strange misapprehension, to use the mildest word, of his accuser. WILLIAM SMITH. XXX. ON THE MEANING OF "CIVILIZATION." THE last number of the Quarterly Review (No. 144) contains an interesting article on the Life and Works of Sismondi, in which the reviewer mentions Sismondi's History of the Fall of the Roman Empire, and the Decline of Civilization, published in 1837; and upon this work he makes the following remarks : "When we have read it, we obtain no clear idea whatever corresponding with the promises of the title-any more than we do by the more celebrated work of M. Guizot, which promises to develope the progress of civilization in Europe;' nor shall we, until a definite answer be given to the four following questions, which we can assure our readers we have propounded in vain to several of the excellent individuals who are most zealously and conscientiously engaged in the popular associations of the present age, intended for the moral and religious improvement of the whole human race: 1st, What are the specific characteristics and elements of civilization? 2nd, What are the benefits secured to the people, and particularly the masses,' by civilization? 3rd, What are the causes opposing civilization? and 4th, Is there ever any practical opposition between civilization, and Christianity and the Holy Scripture? Nowhere do we find any satisfactory reply: possibly it may not be thought unworthy of the attention of those who employ the term 'civilization,' if they were to attempt to define their own meaning, as well as the end they propose to attain." (Q. R. Vol. LXXII. p. 353). It is to be presumed that the writer of the above remarks was acquainted with the explanation of the ideas comprised under the term civilization which is given by M. Guizot in the first chapter of his lectures on Civilisation en Europe; of which explanation a full and distinct analysis has been given in an English review1. The Quarterly Reviewer has apparently considered this explanation unsatisfactory, on the ground of its too great generality; inasmuch as M. Guizot uses the word 'to denote all kinds of improvement';' so that a history of civilization would, according to his usage of the word, be equivalent to a history of the progress of civil society, in whatever that progress might consist. Without attempting to enter into the wide field of discussion, historical and philosophical, which is opened by the explanation of M. Guizot, and the queries of the Reviewer, I propose to offer some remarks upon the meaning of the term in question, which will be suitable to a philological journal, but which may, at the same time, tend to remove some of the obscurity which the Quarterly Reviewer seems to have found in its signification. The Latin civilis corresponds pretty closely to the Greek ToмTIKós; as the one signifies that which belongs to the móλus, so the other signifies that which belongs to the civitas, or state. Thus civilis scientia is equivalent to ToλITIKỲ éσтýμn (Quintil. 11. 15); jus civile meant the peculiar law of the Roman state, as opposed to jus gentium, the common law of the nations which it had subdued. So bellum civile is a war between citizens of the same state, as distinguished from a war against an external enemy. Vir civilis is a statesman, a politician; thus Quintilian: "quum vir ille vere civilis et publicarum privatarumque rerum administrationi accommodatus, qui regere consiliis urbes, fundare legibus, emendare judiciis possit, non alius sit profecto quam orator." Proem. §. 10. 1 London Review, Vol. 11. p. 313, civilization be the height of moral persqq. 2 London Review, ib. p. 334. A nearly similar view of the import of the term had been taken by the author of the article on the first volume of Drumann's Roman History, in a previous number of the Quarterly Review. "It is difficult (says the Reviewer) to define that term, which is at present so constantly used in historical discussion, civilization; but if fection and greatness, we can by no means assign a pre-eminent place in the comparative estimate of the different races of mankind to the old republican of Rome. He was a noble, a splendid savage, but still he was a savage." &c. Q. R. Vol. LVI. p. 350. Some remarks will be made presently as to the extent to which moral qualities are involved in the idea of civilization. A meaning of civilis, easily derived from its etymological significations, but not identical with them, is thus described in the dictionary of Facciolati: "eleganter civilis dicitur, qui moderatus est, et eadem cum aliis civibus ratione vivendi et agendi utens, atque adeo humanus, comis, facilis, cortese, affabile, civile, degnevole; et dicitur sæpe de viris principibus, qui civiliter et comiter cum inferioribus se gerunt, tamquam si æquo jure cum iis sint." Thus Suetonius says of Vespasian that he was 'civilis et clemens,' Vesp. c. 11, and Tacitus states that the youthful Germanicus had 'civile ingenium, mira comitas,' and manners different from the insolence and gloom of Tiberius, Ann. 1. 33. In the latter sense, it is equivalent to dŋμorikos, or popularis. The substantive civilitas follows the meanings of civilis. Quintilian uses it to denote the science or art of government, † wodɩtɩký, I. 15. § 33. 17. § 14; and in Suetonius it signifies the mildness and moderation of a beneficent ruler thus this writer says of Augustus, "Clementiæ civilitatisque ejus multa et magna documenta sunt," c. 51. Civile, in Italian, nearly retained its Latin significations. Dante uses it to denote the excellence of statesmanship; Atene e Lacedemona, che fenno Le antiche leggi, e furon sì civili, Verso di te. Purg. vi. 139-42. Its more common sense made it nearly equivalent to urbanus or άoréîos: “Dicesi a uomo di costumi nobili, e dotato di civiltà. Cortese, gentile, urbano, culto, onesto, galante;" is the explanation in Alberti's dictionary. Civiltà is there explained to be "costume e maniera di viver civile, urbanità, gentilezza, costumatezza, creanza." Civilizzare is not an old Italian verb: the only example of it cited by Alberti, is from the letters of Count Magalotti, who died in 1712. It may be remarked that civile in Italian is equivalent to the French bourgeois: "talvolta vale (says Alberti) di condizione tra 'l nobile e 'l plebeo." In Italian la classe civile is the bourgeoisie, the middle class; in Spanish, it signified a low or mean condition. The following meanings are (amongst others) attributed by Johnson to the word civil: "1. Relating to the community, political, relating to the city or government. 3. Not in anarchy, not wild, not without rule or government. 9. Civilized, not barbarous. 10. Complaisant, civilized, gentle, well-bred, elegant of manners, not rude, not brutal, not coarse," (compare civilly). |