384 



COSMOS. 



that account lose any of their individuality. Plato extols in 

 general terms, " the dark shade of the thickly-leaved plane- 

 tree ; the luxuriance of plants and herbs in all the fragrance 

 of their bloom ; and the sweet summer breezes which fan the 

 chirping swarms of grasshoppers." In Cicero's smaller 

 sketches of nature we find, as has lately been remarked by an 

 intelligent enquirer,* all things described as they still exist in 

 the actual landscape, we see the Liris shaded by lofty poplars, 

 and as we descend from the steep mountain behind the old 

 towers of Arpinum, we see the grove of oaks on the margin 

 of the Fibrenus, and the island now called Isola di Carnello, 

 which is formed by the division of the stream, and whither 

 Cicero retired in order, as he said, to " give himself up to 

 meditation, reading, and writing." Arpinum, situated on the 

 Volscian hills, was the birth-place of the great statesman, 

 and its noble scenery no doubt exercised an influence on his 

 character in boyhood. Unconsciously to himself, the external 

 aspect of the surrounding scenery impresses itself upon the soul 

 of man, with an intensity corresponding to the greater or less 

 degree of his natural susceptibility, and becomes closely inter- 

 woven with the deep original tendencies and the free natural 

 disposition of his mental powers. 



In the midst of the eventful storms of the year 708 

 (from the foundation of Rome), Cicero found consolation in 

 his villas, alternately at Tusculum, Arpinum, Curnsea, and 

 Antium. " Nothing can be more delightful," he writes to 

 Atticus, f " than this solitude nothing more charming than 

 this country place, the neighbouring shore, and the view of the 

 sea. In the lonely Island of Astura, at the mouth of the river 

 of the same name, on the shore of the Tyrrhenian sea, no 

 human being disturbs me; and when early in the morning I 

 retire to the leafy recesses of some thick and wild wood, I do 



* See s. 431-434 of the admirable work by Rudolph Abeken, Rector 

 of the Gymnasium at Osnabriick, which appeared in 1835, under the 

 title of Cicero in seinen Brief en. The important addition relative to 

 the birthplace of Cicero is by H. Abeken, the learned nephew of the 

 author, who was formerly chaplain to the Prussiar Embassy at Rome, and 

 is now taking part in the important Egyptian expedition of Professor 

 Lcpsius. See also on the birthplace of Cicero, Valery, Voy. hist, en 

 Itahe. t. iii. p. 421. 



f Cic., Ep. adAUicum, xii. 9 and 15. 



