102 On the ANCIENT FORM 



nefTes of the " very deed ;" we are prefent in the fenate, in the 

 forum, or on the field of battle. Nor is this effect wonderful ; 

 for hiflorians, by adopting the dramatic method, have an op- 

 portunity of diverfifying their labours, not only with the orna- 

 ments, but with the impetuofity of rhetorical diction. Some 

 of the ipeech.es in LIVY are as animated and defcriptive as the 

 pleadings of CICERO. The advantages of the rhetorical form, 

 in point of vivacity and amufement, are particularly manifefl, 

 when an hiftorian, in relating an important event, has occafion 

 to explain the ftate of parties, with the particular views and in- 

 tentions of fuch leading men, efpecially in civil difTenfions, as 

 may have oppofite interefts. Such detail in modern hiftory be- 

 comes often very tedious and unengaging, though it may have 

 coft the writer much laborious refearch, and may be in itfelf 

 important ; yet the reader very frequently tires, and counts the 

 pages. How much more interefting is it, when this informa- 

 tion is conveyed to us indirectly, in an eloquent fpeech, and 

 with all the graces of rhetorical expreffion ! It was neceflary for 

 THUCYDIDES to inform his reader, that the ftate of Athens was 

 accufed by their neighbours of depredation, and tofet before him 

 the various interefts, views or condition of thofe Grecian re- 

 publics that entered early into the Peloponnefian war ; and this 

 he does in the moft agreeable manner, in the fpeeches he attri- 

 butes to ambafTadors, or other perfons in high office, among 

 the Spartans, Corinthians, and Athenians. How diftinctly, and 

 with how much fpirit does LIVY fet before us the different 

 rights, powers and pretenfions of the patricians and plebeians 

 at Rome, in the orations of APPIUS and CANULEIUS ! Add to 

 all this, that the dramatic method gives us an interefting difplay 

 of character. Who is not more ftruck with the character of a 

 Lacasdemonian, in the following fpeech attributed to STHENE- 

 LAIDAS *, than if it were defcribed in a more direct, and even 

 in a more circumftantial narrative ! The Corinthian ambafladors 



at 



* THDCYD. lib. I. 



