slation can destroy. And it is
impossible not to admire the genius of the orator whose words did more
than armies toward recovering the lost liberty of Rome."

His words did more than armies, but neither could do anything lasting
for the Republic. What was one honest man among so many? We remember
Mommsen's verdict: "On the Roman oligarchy of this period no judgment
can be passed save one of inexorable and remorseless condemnation." The
farther we see into the facts of Roman history in our endeavors to read
the life of Cicero, the more apparent becomes its truth. But Cicero,
though he saw far toward it, never altogether acknowledged it. In this
consists the charm of his character, though at the same time the
weakness of his political aspirations; his weakness--because he was vain
enough to imagine that he could talk men back from their fish-ponds; its
charm--because he was able through it all to believe in honesty. The
more hopeless became the cause, the sweeter, the more impassioned, the
more divine, became his language. He tuned his notes to still higher
pitches of melody, and thought that thus he could bring back public
virtue. Often in these Philippics the matter is small enough. The men he
has to praise are so little; and Antony does not loom large enough in
history to have merited from Cicero so great a meed of vituperation! Nor
is the abuse all true, in attributing to him motives so low. But Cicero
was true through it all, anxious, all on fire with anxiety to induce
those who heard him to send men to fight the battles to which he knew
them, in their hearts, to be opposed.

The courage, the persistency, and the skill shown, in the attempt were
marvellous. They could not have succeeded, but they seem almost to have
done so. I have said that he was one honest man among many. Brutus was
honest in his patriotism, and Cassius, and all the conspirators. I do
not doubt that Caesar was killed from a true desire to restore the Roman
Republic. They desired to restore a thing that was in itself evil--the
evils of which had induced Caesar to see that he might make himself its
master. But Cicero had conceived a Republic in his own mind--not
Utopian, altogether human and rational--a Republic which he believed to
have been that of Scipio, of Marcellus, and Laelius: a Republic which
should do nothing for him but require his assistance, in which the
people should vote, and the oligarchs rule in accordance with the
established law