EVIDENCE AND EXAMPLES. 53 



words. Cicero like all active and highly endowed 

 men was clear, rapid, and effective, but he had nothing 

 of the restraint and patience and wisdom which are 

 not rarely found in the active mind. An immensity of 

 self showed itself in both, but it took more the form 

 of self-confidence in Caesar, while in the orator it took 

 the form of almost insane self-importance nay, or even 

 of childish vanity. He besought a popular historian 

 of his time not to adhere too closely to fact, but to 

 invest Cicero with as much glory as possible. Caesar's 

 mind was naturally questioning and sceptical ; he sang 

 no Te Deums, but praised his legions ; Cicero, credu- 

 lous and superstitious as well as censorious, was always 

 praising God and scolding men. The description of 

 Cicero's bodily conformation is of the deepest interest 

 and significance : his dorsal skeleton was strongly 

 curved, and his head carried much in advance of his 

 shoulders; as one writer expresses it, "his neck 

 seemed too weak for the weight of his head/' Caesar's 

 busts and reliefs suggest a skeleton of more inter- 

 mediate construction. 



There is perhaps no period of history in which 

 character is more clearly revealed to us than in that 

 conflict of two parties and two ideals which cul- 

 minated in the sixteenth century. We know more of 

 Henry VIII., of Elizabeth Tudor and Mary Stuart, 

 than we do of any other king or any other queen, and 

 few if any great figures are better known to us than 

 Erasmus and More. Henry happened to be king 

 when the great Reformation storm burst over these 

 islands; he happened also to marry six wives in 

 succession. Had he married one wife only at that 

 eventful period he would have been less known to us ; 

 had he, at a quiet epoch, married as many wives as 



