JULIUS CAESAR. 179 



ceeded, or been attempted, in the face of his military renown ; 

 and the resignation of Sylla, of which he is said to have 

 spoken disdainfully, could never have seemed to him other 

 than a warning ; since it had given fresh scope to those civil 

 disorders which he, above all men, knew the necessity of 

 bringing to an end. His personal ambition doubtless here 

 concurred with, and strengthened these convictions of his 

 reason. But power, even the most entire, cannot well subsist 

 without some external form or title ; and the turba Remi 

 resembled the populace of every age and country. We know 

 not how far the story of the kingly crown being offered to 

 him, and of his reluctant refusal of it, is worthy of reliance ; 

 but we suspect that the officiousness of friends, or the ma- 

 lignity of enemies, were more concerned in this matter than 

 the will of Caesar himself. There never was a man less 

 governed by mere phrases, or who would more readily 

 abandon an outward show for the reality that was before 

 him. The new prefix of Imperator sufficed for the designa- 

 tion of that power, which, in default of direct issue, he 

 would probably have conveyed downwards to the very suc- 

 cessor on whom future events actually conferred it. We 

 further believe, on all the evidence of his acts and character, 

 that his own rule would have been one of vigour, tempered 

 by moderation and humanity, of firmness to repress sedi- 

 tion, and of wisdom to organise new institutions where the 

 old ones had become impotent for good. 



Two anecdotes, unconnected with politics, belong to this 

 last period of Caesar's life, which have the greater interest 

 from the time of their occurrence. One is the narrative, 

 contained in a letter from Cicero to Atticus, of the visit paid 

 by the great master of Rome to its great orator, at his villa 

 near Puteoli. The details of the interview, and the dinner 

 given to the Dictator and his numerous attendants, illustrate 

 most agreeably the manners of the day; but far more 



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