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lic occasions, and show them to the world in their motives, their actions, their honesty or dishonesty.

We live in this world, and discharge the great obligations of life, mainly for two objects: to serve ourselves in what is essential to a moderate enjoyment of personal happinessand, to serve our fellow men. The devotion of our labors to the cause of ourselves supposes, if any sanctions be awarded to virtue, that no man has a right to serve himself by violating those plain maxims of good faith, which nature impresses on every man's mind. To permit this, would defeat the second object of our creation, by depriving our fellow men of the example of a well-spent, honest life. Although there be such a principle as self-defence recognized in law, we contend that there should be no self-defence at the expense of sincerity and justice;-in other words, that no man can, with moral right on his side, justify mean, dishonorable actions, on the ground that they were expedient to preserve him from some immediate danger.

We propose to apply these sentiments to Cicero, by a just review of some actions of his life. This we shall do, not from an invidious feeling towards his fame, but because it is our duty to expose the frauds upon the public, which cause a man's character for eloquence, or any other remarkable quality, to shield him from just animadversion for unprincipled conduct.

Nothing more conduced to the destruction of liberty in Greece and Rome, than the custom of permitting men, disgraced by private immoralities, to be exalted to high public stations; and, if we mistake not, upon this very error hangs the existence of the liberties of our own nation. What reflections will the youth of the country draw, from the lessons of virtue impressed at the parent's knee, when he is ushered into life, and instructed to recognize a distinction between political and private virtue? How can he preserve his respect for virtue, as a principle, when he is told to laud and venerate a distinguished public man, whose private life, he knows, has been disgraced by every immoral and mean action? He reads history, he is told to imitate the career of a certain military chief or great civilian; he finds magnificent mausoleums erected to his memory; and when his ambition is stirred up to follow him as a model, he is told that he was a debauchee, a drunkard, a violater of contracts, a cruel husband, a careless father, an unfaithful friend.

These things occur around us,-and have their effect upon all. Those, therefore, who review the lives and characters of men, are supposed to do so, because those lives and characters are identified with great public events, and distinguished by great moral and intellectual labors. What they do and say are history, and should be faithfully portrayed: for what is history but the repetition of what men have acted and expressed, and of what value is history, if these actions and expressions are not truly recorded?

Cicero, for the times in which he lived, was undoubtedly a great orator; and, if his admirers were to rest his claims to the applause of posterity upon that issue, we would be content silently to acquiesce in his celebrity. But Cicero's distinction has so dazzled the eyes of some, that so far from seeing faults in his character, they find merits where none existed, as school-boys, after looking at the sun at mid-day, see images of it wherever they cast their eyes.

Cicero is too far removed from present times, to be affected by our censure. But he is still looked upon as a patriot as well as orator; and it is not too late to call him before the tribunal of posterity, for a just judgment, if his character have not been properly presented. We do not complain. that Cicero was a politician; but we complain of him, as we would of all politicians who act as he did, that he was insincere and unfaithful. What we mean by insincerity and unfaithfulness, is not mere change of opinion. Politicians have a right, and are bound, to change their opinions, if done in good faith. Politics are not like great religious truths, fixed in nature, unchangable. Political truths become truths, only as properly applied to the times in which we live. What would be a true political maxim to-day, might be false fifty years hence. Cicero, therefore, was bound to change his opinions of particular measures, whenever he saw the times required it. But, in admitting this, we still say, that there is an immense distance between change of opinion, and a sordid, base, flattery of men in power, and malignant abuse of them when deprived of it. That Cicero was guilty of this latter conduct, is incontestibly proved by but too many concurring testimonies. His whole life, indeed, was a conflict between what was due to his country, and the claims of his own distinction and safety. His splendid intellect and unfortunate end, should create no sympathies for these errors. We may admire a man, and pity his fate; but intellect raises

an additional obligation in favor of a pure life, and an unfortunate end is no palliation of great moral improprieties.

The term politics, in the times of Cicero, had lost, if not the appellation, at least the merit of being the science of good government. It was, as now, an expression indicating a contest between men for the honors and emoluments of public stations. That it does not bear its true designation, is the fault of those who, with talents and opportunities, fail to turn those talents and opportunities to public good. Who doubts, that when Brutus "shook aloft his crimson steel," and called Tully "Father of his country," he only meant to sanction his assassination with the authority of Cicero's approbation? And who but must believe, that when Cicero approved the measure, it was in the face of the most servile flatteries rendered to Cæsar himself?

By the candid admission of some of Cicero's apologists, his errors of conduct towards Cæsar, are, in their opinion, extenuated by the fact, that he had not the light of Christianity to guide him: while others justify his approval of Cæsar's death, on the ground of an ancient law, which authorized any one to use the sword against an enemy of the public liberty. But Cicero, we think, would himself have been ashamed of such a defence. It required no light of Christianity for one to discover the sacred obligations he owed to the law and the life of his fellow man. Socrates was, before Christianity, a good Christian in these respects at least; and certainly Cicero was sufficiently schooled in philosophy and ethics to know, that no principle of either justified the murder of Cæsar. So far as the ancient law was concerned, Cicero was deeply enough versed in the rights of men to know, that murder should be denounced as opposed to every thing like public justice. In his books concerning the gods, he had speculated largely and finely upon the character of Deity;-in his "Offices," he had drawn noble distinctions upon our duties to ourselves and our fellow men ;-in his orations, he had contemplated, in every phase, those beautiful theories of the civil law, which secured the rights of men, and which form the pure sources of the rights of a much more improved age. But how does he carry out these theories in his own transactions with men ? At one time, we find him flattering Cæsar, to obtain offices and favors for himself and friends: at another, much to his dishonor, joining the conspirators, praising their murder, and

bewailing their tolerance:-at one period, we see him marrying his beloved Tullia to the infamous Dollabella; and, after their divorce, writing the most humble addresses to the unfaithful husband of his child:-at one moment, lauding the noble character of the advocate, and the next, prostituting his eloquence to the defence of the most depraved villains of Rome.

But, enough of generalities. We now proceed to sketch, from well-authenticated memorials, the particulars upon which we rest our assertion, that Cicero's fame, as an orator, has given him more character for morality and patriotism than he deserves. We know that, in taking this task upon ourselves, we may rouse the indignation of a host of the admirers of Cicero, who have long regarded him as the very personation of patriotism. With these we might reason, if we could agree with them upon the definition of patriotism. There are men who are maniacs in patriotism. They have become mad with liberty. They suppose liberty means unrestrained action, both physical and moral, both legal and political; that if laws or government do not suit the private views of an ignorant rabble, they have the right of burning houses and cutting people's throats. These are the patriots of the French Revolution,-the patriots of agrarian laws,— the patriots of perfect equality,-unconditional democracy. These are the men who would defend the murder of Cæsar, and therefore justify Cicero in praising it. With such persons we cannot reason. Argument, with them, would be an expedient-only convincing when it embraced their side of the controversy.

The period immediately preceding Cæsar's assassination, is a brilliant portion of Roman history. It was a time, indeed, disgraced by a shameful contest between rival competitors for power and fame,—a contest, in which public liberty and public law were forgotten in the fortunes and glory of particular individuals; but it was an epoch of men of great abilities and most distinguished civil and military services. To judge of these correctly, we must be made acquainted with the motives that actuated them. The praises or condemnation of contemporaries cannot be relied on. Those who write upon the characters of men of their own time, are deeply affected by the prejudices of their age. It is only when far removed from the events and men of a particular day, that the historian can take up their words and actions, VOL. VI.-No. 12.

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and, from among these, sift out that pure farina which is suited to an undepraved taste.

Cæsar, at the time to which we have referred, October, A. U. 708, had returned from the bloody and hard-contested field of Munda, where, after one of the severest of his battles, he had defeated the sons of Pompey, and destroyed the last force of his enemies. He had passed his fifty-fifth year, and was in possession of all the honors which great military achievements and splendid abilities could win, or an enslaved and servile senate could confer. His reputation as a warrior had reached its highest elevation. His intellectual powers were equal, if not superior, to any man's of his age; and if, in the mad career of ambition, he had sacrificed his million of lives, his conduct towards his opponents was gracious and noble. If he did minister to the public taste by agrarian laws and gladiatorial shows, it must be remembered that these were the besetting vices of the times, and while, from their moral enormity, not exonerating Cæsar, we are yet not disposed to place him below his contemporaries, who committed the same vices. The modern politician goes his annual tour, and ministers his potations of ardent spirits,-and even agrarian laws are not unknown to the present enlightened age. But, if we admit that Cæsar's vices preponderated, in the estimate of his good and evil qualities, still it does not follow that his assassination was to be justified. It would be a strange doctrine, to defend virtue by tolerating such evil. Assassination supposes so much of dark, secret, dishonest combination,-it combines so much of villainy with murder, that it may be said to be the very perfection of this horrible crime. We differ altogether with those who take life, according to law; but, certainly, no calls of patriotism, no demands of liberty, no claims of men in society, justify, either on principles of natural or conventional right, the conspiracy of men to take the life of any one supposed to be dangerous to public freedom. This was a truth as well known to Cicero as to present times: and yet, after the death of Cæsar, we discover that Cicero was among the first to hail the murder as the greatest and worthiest enterprise of all ages. If this act of Cicero had been the enthusiastic cheering of one drunk with liberty, in the moment of violent enthusiasm, it might have admitted of some slight apology; but it was the triumph of one over the dead lion, which was too formidable to be approached when living. It was worse;

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