critic. As regards his
attitude towards the credibility of early Roman history he is quite as
conscious as we are of its mythical and unsound nature. He will not, for
instance, decide whether the Horatii were Albans or Romans; who was the
first dictator; how many tribunes there were, and the like. His method,
as a rule, is merely to mention all the accounts and sometimes to decide
in favour of the most probable, but usually not to decide at all. No
canons of historical criticism will ever discover whether the Roman women
interviewed the mother of Coriolanus of their own accord or at the
suggestion of the senate; whether Remus was killed for jumping over his
brother's wall or because they quarrelled about birds; whether the
ambassadors found Cincinnatus ploughing or only mending a hedge. Livy
suspends his judgment over these important facts and history when
questioned on their truth is dumb. If he does select between two
historians he chooses the one who is nearer to the facts he describes.
But he is no critic, only a conscientious writer. It is mere vain waste
to dwell on his critical powers, for they do not exist.

* * * * *

In the case of Tacitus imagination has taken the place of history. The
past lives again in his pages, but through no laborious criticism; rather
through a dramatic and psychological faculty which he specially
possessed.

In the philosophy of history he has no belief. He can never make up his
mind what to believe as regards God's government of the world. There is
no method in him and none elsewhere in Roman literature.

Nations may not have missions but they certainly have functions. And the
function of ancient Italy was not merely to give us what is statical in
our institutions and rational in our law, but to blend into one elemental
creed the spiritual aspirations of Aryan and of Semite. Italy was not a
pioneer in intellectual progress, nor a motive power in the evolution of
thought. The owl of the goddess of Wisdom traversed over the whole land
and found nowhere a resting-place. The dove, which is the bird of
Christ, flew straight to the city of Rome and the new reign began. It
was the fashion of early Italian painters to represent in mediaeval
costume the soldiers who watched over the tomb of Christ, and this, which
was the result of the frank anachronism of all true art, may serve to us
as an allegory. For it was in vain that the middle ages strove to guard
the buried spiri