BATTLES, (recital of.)

Isocrates, one of the most celebrated of the Athenian orators, observes that the prudence, philosophy, and justice of Hercules, were qualities infinitely more valuable than the strength of his arms: and yet that the orators and poets praised him only for the actions he performed by the latter; and suffered the perfections of his mind to fall into oblivion, such as his prudence, his justice, and his knowledge, virtues infinitely more estimable than

personal strength. They did so not only because they themselves were more affected with what is shining, than with what is solid, but because they were persuaded that their auditors and readers would much more applaud stories of battles, than a description of virtues which are exercised in times of peace. Horace has very well observed this, in supposing that the shades lent a favourable ear to the poesies of Sappho and Alcæus, but were more delighted with the latter, because they treated only of war, revolutions of state, and banishments. In fact, tyrants overcome, monsters subdued, and times of confusion and slaughter, are subjects more proper to show the wit and eloquence of a writer, than is the conduct of a uniform life, led according to the rules of virtue. An historian, who has no great events to describe, falls asleep over his work, and makes his readers yawn; but a civil-war, two or three conspiracies, as many battles, the same leaders sometimes humbled, sometimes exalted, sharpen his pen, warm his imagination, and always keep his readers in breath. I really believe that if he were commanded to write a history of a quiet reign, of little variety, he would complain of his fate much in the same manner with Caligula, who complained, that in his reign there did not happen any great misfortunes. “ He used openly to lament,” says Suetonius, “ the condition of the times in which he lived, because they were not distinguished by any public calamities; saying that the reign of Augustus would still be remembered, on account of the defeat of Varus; and that of Tiberius, by the fall of the theatre at Fidenæ; but that he was in hazard of falling into oblivion, because of the prosperity of the times.” Desolations, and public calamities, are an advantage to an historian, and give lustre to his writings. He pities, if he be a good man, the illustrious vestal who was buried alive; he abhors the tyrant who, to make his reign more remarkable, oppressed her; but yet it is a favourable topic, and very advantageous to his pen, and an ornament to his book. His work is a vessel that never sails better than in a storm; a tempest is his best gale: a calm is as disagreeable to it as to a real ship; and when an historian can begin, like Tacitus, with “ Opus aggredior opimum casibus, atrox præliis, discors seditionibus, ipsa etiam pace sævum. Quatuor principes ferro interempti. Tria bella civilia, plura externa, ac plerumque permixta.—I begin a work fruitful in great events, horrid with wars, divided by seditions, and terrible even in peace. Four princes slain; three civil wars, more foreign, and for the most part both joined together;” he prepossesses his readers in his favour, and knows very well he has found an advantageous subject.

But after all, it is a mark of a depraved taste to prefer an account of warlike actions before that of an equitable conduct; and to admire a man more for the strength of his arms, and for his boldness, that give him the victory over a wild boar, or a bull, than for his virtue, that makes him master of his passions, and moves him to establish good laws amongst his neighbours. This virtue, though it shines less than the other, has much more of true grandeur in it; there is more reality in the qualities of Hercules, which writers have passed over in silence, than in those which they have so pompously magnified; but then they followed the taste of the public.

It may be observed that young people are. much more delighted with romantic than real histories; and that after age has ripened and rectified our judgment, we would rather read a Thuanus and a Mezerai, than a Calprene or a Scuderi. But few people lose the taste of their childhood with

respect to the description of a peaceable reign, and to the history of one full of troubles and great events.—Art.Hercules.