200 ESSAY upon the PRINCIPLES 



filent. Thus, " An nefcis longas regibus efTe manus * ?" Ci- 

 CERO, too, employs An in the fame way, when he perfonifies 

 his country, and makes it reafon with him as to the propriety 

 of perfecuting CATILINE ; " Quid tandem impedit te ? An in- 

 " vidiam times ?" 



AN fometimes does not operate as an interrogative particle at 

 all, but only expreifes doubt, or ignorance, upon the part of 

 the fpeaker. Thus SALLUST fays of SYLLA, " Multique du- 

 " bitavere fortior an felicior eflet f." So alfo, " Haud fcio an 

 " nemini magis quam tibi faciendum " 



UPON the beft authority, then, (it mould feem)^ deviates 

 from its original power, which is purely interrogative. It, in 

 the firft place, ftates a queftion to which no anfwer is expected ; 

 and, in the next, it prefents the mind of the fpeaker as unable 

 to fatisfy itfelf, but, at the fame time, as requiring no informa- 

 tion from others. 



TACITUS ufes An, in the fenfe laft mentioned, in a way that 

 is peculiar to himfelf. In uling it, he profefles his ignorance 

 as to the manner in which certain facts took place, but he fup- 

 preffes the term that announces the uncertainty. Thus, " AR- 

 " CHELAUS finem vitas fponte an fato implevit ||." He records 

 the fact, that this king did die ; and the particle An, befides 

 fuggefling two ways, in one of which he might have died, is, 

 without the aid of an incertum eft, a dublto, or baud fcio, made 

 to intimate alfo his ignorance, whether he perimed by a volun- 

 tary or by a natural death. There is clearly hefitation upon 

 the part of the hiflorian, otherwife he would have been abfurdly 

 reducing all the modes of death to two, and ufmg An as equiva- 

 lent to Vel. In the fame way, he talks of the feeming modera- 

 tion of GERMANICUS after the defeat of the Germans, " De fe 

 ;t nihil addidit, metu invidiae, an ratus confcientiam facti fatis 

 " effe." 



SOME 



* OVID, Ep. 17. 166. f Bell. Jug. cap. 95. 



t Cic. de Off. lib. 3. cap. 2. jj Ann. lib. 2. cap. 42. 



5 Ann. lib. 2. cap. 22. 



