Ablatum mediis opus est incudibus istud; 1 เ This work unfinish'd from the anvil came.' I was not an hour about it; I have never looked at it since." Well, then, say I, lay these aside; and give me a perfect one, such a one as you would be measured by; and then, what do you think is the best thing in your work; is it this part or that? the grace or the matter, the invention, the judgment, or the learning? For I find that men are commonly as wide of the mark in judging of their own works, as those of others; not only by reason of the kindness they have for them, but for want of capacity to know and distinguish them. The work, by its own fairness and fortune, may second the workman, and sometimes outstrip him, beyond his invention and knowledge. For my part, I do not judge of the value of other men's works more obscurely than of my own; and prize my Essays now high, now low, with great doubt and inconstancy. There are several books that are useful upon the account of their subjects, from which the author derives no praise; and good books, as well as good works, that shame the workman. I may write the manner of our feasts, and the fashion of our clothes, and may write them ill; I may publish the edicts of my time, and the letters of princes that pass from hand to hand; I may make an abridgment of a good book (and every abridgment of a good book is a foolish abridgment), which book shall come to be lost, and so on. Posterity will derive a singular utility from such compositions; but what honour shall I have, unless by great good fortune? A great part of the most famous books are in this condition. When I read Philip de Comines, several years ago, doubtless a very good author, I there took notice of this for no vulgar saying: "That a man must have a care of doing his master such great service that at last he will not know how to give him his just reward;" I ought to commend the 1 Ovid, Trist. i. 6, 29. 2 inventor, not him,1 for I met with it in Tacitus, not long since: Beneficia eo usque læta sunt, dum videntur exsolvi posse; ubi multum antevenere, pro gratiâ odium redditur; "Benefits are so far acceptable, as they are in a capacity of being returned; but once exceeding that, hatred is returned instead of thanks;" and Seneca boldly says: Nam qui putat esse turpe non reddere, non vult esse cui reddat; "For he who thinks it a shame not to requite, would not have that man live to whom he owes return;" and Cicero, more faintly : Qui se non putat satisfacere, amicus esse nullo modo potest.* "Who thinks himself behindhand in obligation, can by no means be a friend." The subject, according to what it is, may make a man be looked upon as learned, and of good memory; but to judge in him the parts more his own and more worthy, the vigour and beauty of his soul, we must first know what is his own, and what is not; and in that which is not his own, how far we are obliged to him for the choice, disposition, ornament, and language he has there presented us with. What if he has borrowed the matter, and spoiled the form, as it oft falls out! We, who are little read in books, are in this strait, that when we meet with some fine fancy in a new poet, or some strong argument in a preacher, we dare not nevertheless commend it, till we have first informed ourselves of some learned man if it be their own, or borrowed from some other; until that, I always stand upon my guard. I lately came from reading the history of Tacitus right through (which but seldom happens to me, it being twenty years since I have stuck to any one book an hour together); and I did it at the instance of a gentleman for whom France has great esteem, as well for his own particular worth, as upon the account of a constant form of capacity and, virtue, which runs through a great many brothers of them. I do not know any author 1 Comines does not take the merit of this apothegm to himself, but says he had it from his master (Louis XI.), who mentioned the name of its author. Memoirs, iii. 12. 2 Annal. iv. 18. 4 Q. Cicero, de Pet. Consul, c. 9. that in a public narration mixes so much consideration of manners and particular inclinations; and it seems to me quite contrary to his opinion,1 that being especially The character of to follow the lives of the emperors of his time, Tacitus. so various and extreme in all sorts of forms, and so many notable actions, as their cruelty particularly produced in their subjects, he had a stronger and more attractive matter to treat of, than if he had had to describe battles and universal commotions; so that I oft find him sterile, running over those brave deaths, as if he feared to trouble us with their multitude and length. This form of histories is by much the most useful; public commotions depend most upon the conduct of fortune, private ones upon our own. 'Tis rather a judgment than a deduction of history; there are in it more precepts than stories; it is not a book to read, 'tis a book to study and learn; 'tis so full of sentences that, right or wrong, they are everywhere in muster; 'tis a nursery of ethics and political discourses, for the use and ornament of those who have any place in the government of the world. He always pleads by strong and solid reasons, after a pointed and subtle manner, according to the affected style of that age, which was so in love with swelling periods, that, where quickness and subtlety were wanting in things, they supplied them with words. It is not much unlike the style of Seneca. I look upon Tacitus as more sinewy, and Seneca more sharp. His pen seems most proper for a troubled and sick estate, as ours at present is; you would often say that he depicts and points at us. His They who doubt of his fidelity sufficiently accuse themselves of being his enemy upon some other account. opinions are sound, and lean for the most part towards the right side in Roman affairs. And yet I am angry at him for judging more severely of Pompey, than is borne out by the opinion of those worthy men that lived in the same time, and treated with him; and for putting him on a level with Marius and Sylla, excepting that he was more close.1 Other writ ers have not acquitted his intention in the government of affairs, from ambition and revenge; and even his friends were afraid that his victory would have transported him beyond the bounds of reason, but not to so immeasurable a degree; there is nothing in his life that has threatened us with so express cruelty and tyranny. Neither ought we to weigh suspicion against evidence; and therefore I do not believe him here. That his narratives are ingenuous and straightforward, may be argued from this very thing, that they are not always applied to the conclusions of his judgments, which he follows according to the inclination he has taken, very often beyond the matter he shows us, which he will not deign to look upon with so much as one glance. He needs no excuse for having approved the religion of his time, according as the laws enjoined, and to have been ignorant of the true; this was his misfortune, not his fault. I have principally considered his judgment, and am not very well satisfied throughout; as at these words in the letter, that Tiberius, being old and sick, sent to the senate: 2 "What shall I write to you, sirs, or how shall I write to you, or what shall I not write to you, at this time? May the gods and the goddesses lay a worse punishment upon me than I am every day tormented with, if I know." I do not see why he should so positively apply these to a sharp remorse, tormenting the conscience of Tiberius; at least, when I was in the same condition, I perceived no such thing. And this also seemed to me a little mean in him, that having to say he had borne honourable office in Rome, he excuses himself that he does not speak it out of ostentation; this seems somewhat mean for such a soul as his; for not to speak roundly of a man's self, implies some want of courage; a firm and lofty judgment, and that judges soundly and surely, makes use of his own example upon all occasions, as 1 Hist. ii. 38 • Annal. xi. 11. 2 Tacitus, Annal. vi. 6. Suetonius, Life of Tiberius, c. 67. well as those of others; and gives evidence as freely of himself as of a third person. We are to pass by these common rules of society in favour of truth and liberty. I dare not only speak of myself, but to speak only of myself; when I write of anything else, I miss my way, and wander from my subject. I am not so indiscreetly enamoured of myself, that I cannot distinguish and consider myself apart, as I do a neighbour or a tree; 'tis equally a fault not to discern how far a man's worth extends, and to say more than a man discovers in himself. We owe more love to God than to ourselves, and know him less; and yet speak of him as much as we will. If the writings of Tacitus relate anything true of his qualities, he was a great man, upright and bold, not of a superstitious but of a philosophical and generous virtue. Some may think him a little too bold in his relations; as where he tells us of a soldier, carrying a burden of wood, whose hands were so frozen, and so stuck to the load, that they there remained closed and dead, being severed from his arms.1 I always in such things submit to the authority of such great witnesses. What he says also, that Vespasian, by the favour of the god Serapis, cured in Alexandria a blind woman, by anointing her eyes with his spittle and some other miracle, I forget what, he does by the example and duty of all good historians. He records all events of importance; and amongst public matters, also, the common rumours and opinions. 'Tis their part to recite common beliefs, not to regulate them; that part concerns divines and philosophers, who are the guides of conscience. And therefore it was that this companion of his, and as great a man as himself, very wisely said: Equidem plura transcribo quam credo; nam nec affirmare sustineo de quibus dubito, nec subducere quæ accepi; "Truly, I set down more things than I believe, for I can neither endure to affirm things whereof I doubt, nor suppress what I have 3 Quint. Curt. ix. 1 1 Annal. xiii. 35. 2 Hist. iv. 81. |