he ever accomplished it, has not
been transmitted to posterity. Candid, but decided in his judgment of
motives and actions, if we except his invectives against Pompey, he shows
little propensity to censure; but in awarding praise, he is not equally
parsimonious, and, on some occasions, risks the imputation of hyperbole.
The grace, however, and the apparent sincerity with which it is bestowed,
reconcile us to the compliment. This author concludes his history with a
prayer for the prosperity of the Roman empire.----

VALERIUS MAXIMUS was descended of a Patrician family; but we learn
nothing more concerning him, than that for some time he followed a
military life under Sextus Pompey. He afterwards betook himself to
writing, and has left an account, in nine books, of the memorable
apophthegms and actions of eminent persons; first of the Romans, and
afterwards of foreign nations. The subjects are of various kinds,
political, moral, and natural, ranged into distinct classes. His
transitions from one subject to another are often performed with
gracefulness; and where he offers any remarks, they generally show the
author to be a man of judgment and observation. Valerius Maximus is
chargeable with no affectation of style, but is sometimes deficient in
that purity of language which might be expected in the age of Tiberius,
to whom the work is addressed. What inducement the author had to this
dedication, we know not; but as it is evident from a passage in the ninth
book, that the compliment was paid after the death of Sejanus, and
consequently in the most shameful period of Tiberius's reign, we cannot
entertain any high opinion of the independent spirit of Valerius Maximus,
who could submit to flatter a tyrant, in the zenith of infamy and
detestation. But we cannot ascribe the cause to any delicate artifice,
of conveying to Tiberius, indirectly, an admonition to reform his
conduct. Such an expedient would have only provoked the severest
resentment from his jealousy.----

PHAEDRUS was a native of Thrace, and was brought to Rome as a slave. He
had the good fortune to come into the service of Augustus, where,
improving his talents by reading, he obtained (249) the favour of the
emperor, and was made one of his freedmen. In the reign of Tiberius, he
translated into Iambic verse the Fables of Aesop. They are divided into
five books, and are not less conspicuous for precision and simplicity of
thought, than for purity and e