Pas-
sages from it are quoted by several subsequent writers, and an anec-
dote preserved by Aulus Gellius in his Noctes Atticæ I.
sages from it are quoted by several subsequent writers, and an anec-
dote preserved by Aulus Gellius in his Noctes Atticæ I.
Warner - World's Best Literature - v05 - Bro to Cai
-Ange was petrified.
"Good-by, dear Jools, continued the parson. “I'm in the
Lord's haynds, and he's very merciful, which I hope and trust
you'll find it out. Good-by! ”— the schooner swung slowly off
before the breeze-good-by! ”
St. -Ange roused himself. "Posson Jone'! make me hany'ow
dis promise: you never, never, never will come back to New
Orleans. ”
“Ah, Jools, the Lord willin', I'll never leave home again!
"All right! ” cried the Creole; "I thing he's willin'. Adieu,
Posson Jone'. My faith'! you are
the so fighting an' moz
rilligious man as I never saw! Adieu! Adieu! »
Baptiste uttered a cry and presently ran by his master toward
the schooner, his hands full of clods.
St. -Ange looked just in time to see the sable form of Colossus
of Rhodes emerge from the vessel's hold, and the pastor of
Smyrna and Bethesda seize him in his embrace.
1
1
## p. 3035 (#609) ###########################################
GEORGE W. CABLE
3035
"O Colossus! you outlandish old nigger! Thank the Lord!
Thank the Lord ! »
The little Creole almost wept. He ran down the tow-path,
laughing and swearing, and making confused allusion to the en-
tire personnel and furniture of the lower regions.
By odd fortune, at the moment that St. -Ange further demon-
strated his delight by tripping his mulatto into a bog, the
schooner came brushing along the reedy bank with a graceful
curve, the sails flapped, and the crew fell to poling her slowly
along
Parson Jones was on the deck, kneeling once more in prayer.
His hat had fallen before him; behind him knelt his slave. In
thundering tones he was confessing himself “a plum fool,” from
whom "the conceit had been jolted out, and who had been
made to see that even his nigger had the longest head of the
two. "
Colossus clasped his hands and groaned.
The parson prayed for a contrite heart.
"Oh, yes! » cried Colossus.
The master acknowledged countless mercies.
« Dat's so! » cried the slave.
The master prayed that they might still be “piled on. ”
“Glory! ” cried the black man, clapping his hands; "pile on! ”
“An' now,” continued the parson, “bring this pore, back-
slidin' jackace of a parson and this pore ole fool nigger back to
thar home in peace! ”
"Pray fo’ de money! » called Colossus.
But the parson prayed for Jules.
Pray fo’ de money! ”repeated the negro.
« And oh, give thy servant back that there lost money! ”
Colossus rose stealthily, and tiptoed by his still shouting mas-
ter. St. -Ange, the captain, the crew, gazed in silent wonder at
the strategist. Pausing but an instant over the master's hat to
grin an acknowledgment of his beholders' speechless interest, he
softly placed in it the faithfully mourned and honestly prayed-for
Smyrna fund; then, saluted by the gesticulative, silent applause
of St. -Ange and the schooner-men, he resumed his first attitude
behind his roaring master.
“Amen! ” cried Colossus, meaning to bring him to a close.
“Onworthy though I be — cried Jones.
« Amen! » reiterated the negro.
## p. 3036 (#610) ###########################################
3036
GEORGE W. CABLE
"A-a-amen! ” said Parson Jones.
He rose to his feet, and, stooping to take up his hat, beheld
the well-known roll. As one stunned, he gazed for a moment
upon his slave, who still knelt with clasped hands and rolling
eyeballs; but when he became aware of the laughter and cheers
that greeted him from both deck and shore, he lifted eyes and
hands to heaven, and cried like the veriest babe. And when he
looked at the roll again, and hugged and kissed it, St. -Ange
tried to raise a second shout, but choked, and the crew fell to
their poles.
And now up runs Baptiste, covered with slime, and prepares
to cast his projectiles. The first one fell wide of the mark; the
schooner swung round into a long reach of water, where the
breeze was in her favor; another shout of laughter drowned
the maledictions of the muddy man; the sails filled; Colossus of
Rhodes, smiling and bowing as hero of the moment, ducked as
the main boom swept round, and the schooner, leaning slightly
to the pleasant influence, rustled a moment over the bulrushes,
and then sped far away down the rippling bayou.
M. Jules St. -Ange stood long, gazing at the receding vessel
as it now disappeared, now reappeared beyond the tops of the
high undergrowth; but when an arm of the forest hid it finally
from sight, he turned townward, followed by that fagged-out
spaniel his servant, saying as he turned, “Baptiste ? ”
Miché?
“You know w'at I goin' do wid dis money ? ”
"Non, m'sicur. ”
“Well, you can strike me dead if I don't goin' to pay hall my
debts! Allons ! »
He began a merry little song to the effect that his sweetheart
a wine-bottle, and master and man, leaving care behind,
returned to the picturesque Rue Royale. The ways of Providence
are indeed strange. In all Parson Jones's after-life, amid the
many painful reminiscences of his visit to the City of the Plain,
the sweet knowledge was withheld from him that by the light of
the Christian virtue that shone from him even in his great fall,
Jules St. -Ange arose, and went to his father an honest man.
was
## p. 3036 (#611) ###########################################
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## p. 3036 (#612) ###########################################
JULIUS CÆSAR.
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## p. 3036 (#614) ###########################################
## p. 3037 (#615) ###########################################
3037
CAIUS JULIUS CÆSAR
(100-44 B. C. )
BY J. H. WESTCOTT
seen.
RULY a wonderful man was Caius Julius Cæsar,” says Captain
Miles Standish. Truly wonderful he was on each of his
many sides: as soldier, statesman, orator, and author, all of
the first rank — and a respectable critic, man of science and poet
besides.
As a writer of Latin prose, and as an orator, he was second to
Cicero alone in the age that is called the Ciceronian; and no third is
to be named with these two. Yet among his contemporaries his lit-
erary power was an insignificant title to fame, compared with his
overwhelming military and political genius. Here he stood alone,
unrivaled, the most successful conqueror and civilizer of all history,
the founder of the most majestic political fabric the world has ever
There have been other generals, statesmen, authors, as great
as Cæsar; but the extraordinary combination of powers in this one
man goes very far toward making good the claim that he was the
most remarkable man in history.
He was born 100 B. C. , a member of the great Julian gens, which
claimed descent from Æneas and Venus, the glories of which are
celebrated in Vergil's immortal epic. Thus the future leader of the
turbulent democracy, and the future despot who was to humble the
nobles of Rome, was by birth an aristocrat of bluest blood. His life
might easily have come to an untimely end in the days of Sulla's
bloody ascendency, for he was connected by marriage with Marius
and Cinna. Sulla was persuaded to spare him, but clearly saw, even
then, that «in Cæsar there were many Mariuses. ”
All young Romans of rank were expected to go through a term
of at least nominal military service. Cæsar's apprenticeship was in
Asia Minor in 8o B. C. He distinguished himself at the storming of
Mytilene, and afterwards served in Cilicia. He began his political
and oratorical career by the prosecution of Cornelius Dolabella, one
of the nobility, on a charge of extortion. About 75 B. C. he was
continuing his studies at Rhodes, then a famous school of eloquence.
Obtaining the quæstorship in 67 B. C. , he was assigned to duty in the
province of Further Spain. Two years later he became ædile. At
the age of thirty-seven he was elected pontifex maximus over two
>>>
## p. 3038 (#616) ###########################################
3038
CAIUS JULIUS CÆSAR
powerful competitors. Entirely without religious belief, as far as we
can judge, he recognized the importance of this portion of the civil
order, and mastered the intricate lore of the established ceremonial.
In this office, which he held for life, he busied himself with a Digest
of the Auspices and wrote an essay on Divination.
After filling the prætorship in 62 B. C. , he obtained, as proprætor,
the governorship of his old province of Further Spain, which he was
destined to visit twice in later years as conqueror in civil war. His
military success at this time against the native tribes was such as to
entitle him to the honor of a triumph. This he was obliged to forego
in order to stand at once for the consulship, which office he held for
the year 59 B. C. He had previously entered into a private agree-
ment with Pompey and Crassus, known as the First Triumvirate.
Cæsar had always presented himself as the friend of the people;
Pompey was the most famous man of the time, covered with military
laurels, and regarded, though not with perfect confidence, as the
champion of the Senatorial party. Crassus, a man of ordinary ability,
was valuable to the other two on account of his enormous wealth.
These three men agreed to unite their interests and their influence.
In accordance with this arrangement Cæsar obtained the consulship,
and then the command for five years, afterward extended to ten, of
the provinces of Gaul and Illyricum. It was while proconsul of Gaul
in the years 58-50 B. C. that he subjugated and organized «All Gaul,”
which was far greater in extent than the country which is now
France; increased his own political and material resources; and above
all formed an army, the most highly trained and efficient the world
had yet seen, entirely faithful to himself, by means of which he was
able in the years 49-46 B. C. to defeat all his political antagonists and
to gain absolute power over the State.
He held the consulship again in 48 and 46 B. C. , and was consul
without a colleague in 45 and 44 B. C. , as well as dictator with
authority to remodel the Constitution. While his far-reaching plans
of organization and improvement were incomplete, and when he was
about to start upon a
war against the Parthians on the eastern
frontier of the empire, he was murdered March 15th, 44 B. C. , by a
band of conspirators headed by Brutus and Cassius.
For purposes of a literary judgment of Cæsar we have of his own
works in complete or nearly complete form his military memoirs
only. His specifically literary works have all perished. A few sen-
tences from his speeches, a few of his letters, a few wise or witty
sayings, an anecdote or two scattered about in the pages of other
authors, and six lines of hexameter verse, containing a critical esti-
mate of the dramatist Terence, are all that remain as specimens of
what is probably forever lost to us.
## p. 3039 (#617) ###########################################
CAIUS JULIUS CÆSAR
3039
we
An enumeration of his works, so far as their titles are known, is
the best evidence of his versatility. A bit of criticism here and
there shows the estimation in which Cæsar the writer and orator was
held by his countrymen and contemporaries. Besides the military
memoirs and the works spoken of above in connection with his
pontificate, may mention, as of a semi-official character, his
astronomical treatise On the Stars (De Astris), published in connec-
tion with his reform of the calendar, when dictator, shortly before
the end of his life.
Cicero alludes to a collection of witty sayings (Apophthegms) made
by Cæsar, with evident satisfaction at the latter's ability to distin-
guish the real and the false Ciceronian bons mots.
Like most Roman gentlemen, Cæsar wrote in youth several poems,
of which Tacitus grimly says that they were not better than Cice-
ro's. This list includes a tragedy, Edipus,' Laudes Herculis) (the
Praises of Hercules), and a metrical account of a journey into Spain
(Iter).
A grammatical treatise in two books (De Analogia), dedicated to
Cicero, to the latter's immense gratification, was written on one of the
numerous swift journeys from Italy to headquarters in Gaul.
Pas-
sages from it are quoted by several subsequent writers, and an anec-
dote preserved by Aulus Gellius in his Noctes Atticæ I. 10. 4, wherein
a young man is warned by Cæsar to avoid unusual and far-fetched
language like a rock,” is supposed to be very characteristic of his
general attitude in matters of literary taste. The (Anticatones) were
a couple of political pamphlets ridiculing Cato, the idol of the repub-
licans. This was small business for Cæsar, but Cato had taken
rather mean advantage by his dramatic suicide at Utica, and
deprived Cæsar of the "pleasure of pardoning him. ”
Of Cæsar's orations we have none but the most insignificant frag-
ments — our judgment of them must be based on the testimony of
ancient critics. Quintilian speaks in the same paragraph (Quin-
tilian X. I, 114) of the wonderful elegance of his language and
of the “force” which made it “seem that he spoke with the same
spirit with which he fought. ” Cicero's phrase "magnifica et generosa”
(Cicero, Brutus, 261), and Fronto's "facultas dicendi imperatoria”
(Fronto, Ep. p. 123), indicate « some kind of severe magnificence. ”
Collections of his letters were extant in the second century, but
nothing now remains except a few brief notes to Cicero, copied by
the latter in his correspondence with Atticus. This loss is perhaps
the one most to be regretted. Letters reveal their author's person-
ality better than more formal species of composition, and Cæsar was
almost the last real letter-writer, the last who used in its perfection
the polished, cultivated, conversational language, the Sermo urbanus.
## p. 3040 (#618) ###########################################
3040
CAIUS JULIUS CÆSAR
But after all, we possess the most important of his writings,
the Commentaries on the Gallic and Civil Wars. The first may be
considered as a formal report to the Senate and the public on the
conduct of his Gallic campaigns; the latter, as primarily intended
for a defense of his constitutional position in the Civil War.
They are memoirs, half way between private notes and formal
history. Cicero says that while their author «desired to give others
the material out of which to create a history, he may perhaps have
done a kindness to conceited writers who wish to trick them out
with meretricious graces” (to "crimp with curling-irons "), but he
has deterred all men of sound taste from ever touching them. For
in history a pure and brilliant conciseness of style is the highest
attainable beauty. ” “They are worthy of all praise, for they are
simple, straightforward and elegant, with all rhetorical ornament
stripped from them as a garment is stripped. ” (Cicero, Brutus, 262. )
The seven books of the Gallic War are each the account of a
year's campaigning. They were written apparently in winter quar-
ters. When Cæsar entered on the administration of his province it
was threatened with invasion. The Romans had never lost their
dread of the northern barbarians, no orgotten the capture of Rome
three centuries before. Only a generation back, Marius had become
the national hero by destroying the invading hordes of Cimbri and
Teutones. Cæsar purposed to make the barbarians tremble at the
Roman name. This first book of the Commentaries tells how he
raised an army in haste, with which he outmarched, outmanæuvred
and defeated the Helvetian nation. This people, urged by pressure
behind and encouragement in front, had determined to leave its old
home in the Alpine valleys and to settle in the fairer regions of
southeastern France. Surprised and dismayed by Cæsar's terrific
reception of their supposed invincible host, they had to choose between
utter destruction and a tame return, with sadly diminished numbers,
to their old abodes. Nor was this all the work of the first year.
Ariovistus, a German king, also invited by a Gallic tribe, and rely-
ing on the terror of his nation's name, came to establish himself and
his people on the Gallic side of the Rhine. He too was astonished
at the tone with which Cæsar ordered him to depart, but soon found
himself forced to return far more quickly than he had come.
Having thus vindicated the Roman claim to the frontiers of Gaul
against other invaders, the proconsul devoted his second summer to
the subjugation of the Belgæ, the most warlike and the most remote
of the Gauls. The second book tells how this was accomplished.
There was one moment when the conqueror's career came near end-
ing prematurely. One of the Belgian tribes, the valiant Nervii, sur-
prised and nearly defeated the Roman army. But steady discipline
## p. 3041 (#619) ###########################################
CAIUS JULIUS CÆSAR
3041
and the dauntless courage of the commander, never so great as in
moments of mortal peril, saved the day, and the Nervii are immor-
talized as the people who nearly destroyed Cæsar.
These unprecedented successes all round the eastern and northern
frontiers thoroughly established Roman prestige and strengthened
Rome's supremacy over the central Gauls, who were already her
allies, at least in name. But much yet remained to do. The work
was but fairly begun. The third book tells of the conquest of the
western tribes. The most interesting episode is the creation of a
fleet and the naval victory over the Veněti on the far-away coast of
Brittany. In the fourth year Cæsar crossed the Rhine, after building
a wonderful wooden bridge in ten days, carried fire and sword
among the Germans on the further bank, and returned to his side of
the river, destroying the bridge behind him. Modern schoolboys
wish he had never built it. Later in the season he made an expe-
dition into Britain. This was followed in the fifth year by an
invasion of the island in greater force. To people of our race this
portion of the Commentaries is especially interesting. The southern
part of the country was overrun, the Thames was crossed some miles
above London, and several victories were gained, but no organized
conquest was attempted. That remained for the age of Claudius and
later emperors.
During the ensuing winter, on account of the scarcity of provis-
ions, the Roman troops had to be quartered in separate detachments
at long distances. One of these was treacherously destroyed by the
Gauls, and the others were saved only by the extraordinary quickness
with which Cæsar marched to their relief on hearing of their immi-
nent danger. The chief part in this rising had been taken by the
Eburones, led by their king Ambiorix. A large part of the sixth
book is occupied with the recital of Cæsar's vengeance upon these
people and their abettors, and with the vain pursuit of Ambiorix.
The remainder contains an elaborate contrast of the manners and
customs of the Gauls and Germans, which forms an important source
for the history of the primitive institutions of these nations. The
seventh book is the thrilling tale of the formidable rising of all the
Gauls against their conquerors, under the leadership of Vercingetorix,
an Arvernian chief. This man was a real hero, — brave, patriotic,
resourceful, perhaps the only worthy antagonist that Cæsar ever met.
This war strained to the utmost Cæsar's abilities and the disciplined
valor of his legions. The Gauls nearly succeeded in undoing all the
work of six years, in destroying the Roman army and in throwing off
the Roman yoke. In this campaign, more conspicuously than ever
before, Cæsar's success was due to the unexampled rapidity of his
movements. So perfect had become the training of his troops and
V-191
## p. 3042 (#620) ###########################################
3042
CAIUS JULIUS CÆSAR
their confidence in his ability to win under all circumstances, that
after a campaign of incredible exertions they triumphed over the
countless hosts of their gallant foes, and in the next two years the
last embers of Gaulish independence were finally stamped out. In
all his later wars, Cæsar never had anything to fear from Gaul. As
we read the story of Avaricum, of Gergovia, of Alesia, our sympathy
goes out to the brave barbarians who were fighting for liberty — but
we have to remember that though the cause of freedom failed, the
cause of civilization triumphed. The eighth book, containing the
account of the next two years, 51 and 50 B. C. , was written by one
of Cæsar's officers, Aulus Hirtius.
The first book of the Civil War begins with the year 49 B. C. ,
where the struggle between Cæsar and the Senatorial party opens
with his crossing of the Rubicon, attended by the advanced guard of
his legions. Pompey proved a broken reed to those who leaned upon
him, and Cæsar's conquest of the Italian peninsula was little else
than a triumphal progress through the country. The enemy retired
to the eastern shore of the Adriatic to muster the forces of the East
on the side of the aristocracy, leaving Cæsar in possession of the
capital and of the machinery of government. The latter part of the
book contains the account of the campaign against Pompey's lieu-
tenants in Spain, which was won almost without bloodshed, by mas-
terly strategy, and which ended with the complete possession of the
peninsula. The second book describes the capture of Marseilles after
a long siege, and the tragic defeat and death of Curio, a brave but
rash young officer sent by Cæsar to secure the African province. In
the third book (48 B. C. ) we have the story of the campaign against
Pompey; first the audacious blockade for months of Pompey's greatly
superior forces near Dyrrachium on the Illyrian coast: and when that
failed, of the long march into Thessaly, where Pompey was at last
forced into battle, against his judgment, by his own officers, on the
fatal plains of Pharsalia; of the annihilation of the Senatorial army;
of Pompey's flight to Egypt; of his treacherous murder there; of
Cæsar's pursuit. The books on the Alexandrian, the African, and the
Spanish wars, which continue the narrative down to Cæsar's final vic-
tory at Munda in southern Spain, are by other and inferior hands.
The question of their authorship has been the subject of much con-
troversy and conjecture.
Under this modest title of Commentaries,' in the guise of a
simple narrative of events, Cæsar puts forth at once an inimitable
nistory and a masterly apology. The author speaks of himself in
the third person, tells of the circumstances of each situation in a
quiet moderate way, which carries with it the conviction on the
reader's part of his entire truthfulness, accuracy, and candor. We
## p. 3043 (#621) ###########################################
CAIUS JULIUS CÆSAR
3043
are persuaded that the Cæsar about whom he tells could not have
acted otherwise than he did. In short, he exercises the same spell
over our minds that he cast over the hearts of men twenty centu-
ries ago.
There is nothing that so fascinates and enchains the imagination
of men
as power in another man. This man could captivate a
woman by his sweetness or tame an angry mob of soldiers with a
word; could mold the passions of a corrupt democracy or extermi-
nate a nation in a day; could organize an empire or polish an epi-
gram. His strength was terrible. But all this immense power was
marvelously balanced and under perfect control. Nothing was DO
small for his delicate tact. Nothing that he did was so difficult but
we feel he could have done more. Usually his means seemed inade-
quate to his ends. But it was Cæsar who used them.
The Commentaries show us this man at his work. They show
him as an organizer of armies and alliances, a wily diplomatist, an
intrepid soldier, an efficient administrator, a strategist of inspired
audacity, a tactician of endless resources, an engineer of infinite
inventiveness, an unerring judge of men. But he never boasts,
except in speeches to hearten discouraged troops. He does not vilify
or underrate his enemies.
His soldiers trusted him implicitly; there was no limit to their
zeal. They found in him a generous appreciation of their deeds.
Many a soldier and centurion has received immortality at his hands
as the guerdon of valor. He describes a victory of Labienus with as
much satisfaction as if it had been his own, and praises another
lieutenant for his prudent self-restraint when tempted by a prospect
of success. And he tells with hearty admiration of the devoted
Gauls who sacrificed their lives one after another in a post of danger
at Avaricum. Even in the Civil War no officers deserted him
except Labienus and two Gaulish chiefs.
It was difficult to deceive him. His analysis of other men's
motives is as merciless as it is passionless. He makes us disapprove
the course of his antagonists with the same moderate but convincing
statement with which he recommends his own. Few men can have
had as few illusions as he. One would scarcely care to possess such
an insight into the hearts of others. He seems to feel little warmth
of indignation, and never indulges in invective. But woe to those
who stood in the way of the accomplishment of his objects. Dread-
ful was the punishment of those who revolted after making peace.
Still, even his vengeance seems dictated by policy rather than by
passion. He is charged with awful cruelty because he slew a million
men and sold another million into slavery. But he did not enjoy
human suffering. These were simply necessary incidents in the
## p. 3044 (#622) ###########################################
3044
CAIUS JULIUS CÆSAR
execution of his plans. It is hard to see how European civilization
could have proceeded without the conquest of Gaul, and it is surely
better to make a conquest complete, rapid, overpowering, that the
work may have to be done but once.
It is hard not to judge men by the standards of our own age.
The ancients rarely felt an international humanity, and in his own
time “Cæsar's clemency” was proverbial. As he was always careful
not to waste in useless fighting the lives of his soldiers, so he was
always true to his own precept, «Spare the citizens. ” The way in
which he repeatedly forgave his enemies when they were in his
power was an example to many a Christian conqueror. The best of
his antagonists showed themselves bloodthirsty in word or act; and
most of them, not excepting Cicero, were basely ungrateful for his
forbearance. His treatment of Cicero was certainly most handsome
our knowledge of it is derived mainly from Cicero's letters. Per-
haps this magnanimity was dashed with a tinge of kindly contempt
for his fellow-citizens; but whatever its motives, it was certainly wise
and benign at the beginning of the new era he was inaugurating.
He was no vulgar destroyer, and did not desire to ruin in order to
rule.
He is charged with ambition, the sin by which the angels fell. It
is not for us to fathom the depths of his mighty mind.
Let us
admit the charge. But it was not an ignoble ambition. Let us say
that he was so ambitious that he laid the foundations of the Roman
Empire and of modern France; that his services to civilization and
his plans for humanity were so broad that patriots were driven to
murder him.
Some of Casar's eulogists have claimed for him a moral greatness
corresponding to his transcendent mental power. This is mistaken
zeal. He may stand as the supreme representative of the race in the
way of practical executive intellect. It is poor praise to put him
into another order of men, with Plato or with Paul. Their greatness
was of another kind. We cannot speak of degrees. He is the expo-
nent of creative force in political history — not of speculative or
ethical power.
Moreover, with all his originality of conception and power of exe-
cution, Cæsar lacked that kind of imagination which makes the true
poet, the real creative artist in literature. Thus we observe the
entire absence of the pictorial element in his writings. There is no
trace of his ever being affected by the spectacular incidents of war-
fare nor by the grandeur of the natural scenes through which he
passed. The reason may be that his intellect was absorbed in the
contemplation of men and motives, of means and ends. We cannot
conceive of his ever having been carried out of himself by the
## p. 3045 (#623) ###########################################
CAIUS JULIUS CÆSAR
3045
rapture of inspiration. Such clearness of mental perception is natu-
rally accompanied by a certain coolness of temperament. A man of
superlative greatness must live more or less alone among his fellows.
With his immense grasp of the relations of things in the world,
Cæsar cannot have failed to regard men to some extent as the
counters in a great game - himself the player. So he used men,
finding them instruments efficient and zealous, often — of his far-
reaching plans. He was just in rewarding their services — more than
just: he was generous and kind. But he did not have real associ-
ates, real friends; therefore it is not surprising that he met with so
little gratitude. Even his diction shows this independence, this isola-
tion. It would be difficult to find an author of any nation in a
cultivated age so free from the influence of the language of his
predecessors. Cæsar was unique among the great Roman writers in
having been born at the capital. Appropriately he is the incarnation
of the specifically Roman spirit in literature, as Cicero was the em-
bodiment of the Italian, the Hellenic, the cosmopolitan spirit.
Toward the close of Cæsar's career there are some signs of weari-
ness observable — a certain loss of serenity, suspicion of vanity, a
dimming of his penetrating vision into the men about him. The
only wonder is that mind and body had not succumbed long before
to the prodigious strain put upon them. Perhaps it is well that he
died when he did, hardly past his prime. So he went to his setting,
like the other weary Titan,” leaving behind him a brightness which
lasted all through the night of the Dark Ages. Cæsar died, but the
imperial idea of which he was the first embodiment has proved the
central force of European political history even down to our time.
Such is the man who speaks to us from his pages still. He was a
man who did things rather than a man who said things. Yet who
could speak so well? His mastery of language was perfect, but in
the same way as his mastery of other instruments. Style with him
was a means rather than an end. He had the training which others
of his kind enjoyed. Every Roman noble had to learn oratory. But
Cæsar wrote and spoke with a faultless taste and a distinction that
no training could impart. So we find in his style a beauty which
does not depend upon ornament, but upon perfect proportion; a dic-
tion plain and severe almost to baldness; absolute temperateness of
expression. The descriptions are spirited, but never made so by
strained rhetoric; the speeches are brief, manly, business-like; the
arguments calm and convincing; always and everywhere the lan-
guage of a strong man well inside the limits of his power.
The chief ancient authorities for the life of Cæsar, besides his
own works, are Suetonius in Latin, Plutarch and Appian in Greek.
Among modern works of which he is made the subject may be
## p. 3046 (#624) ###########################################
3046
CAIUS JULIUS CÆSAR
mentioned Jules César,' by Napoleon III. (Paris, 1865); continued by
Colonel Stoffel, with an Atlas; Cæsar, a Sketch,' by J. A. Froude
(London, 1886); (Cæsar,' by A. Trollope (London, 1870); Cæsar,' by
T. A. Dodge, U. S. A. (Boston, 1893).
Jothest
esterst
THE DEFEAT OF ARIOVISTUS AND THE GERMANS
From The Gallic Wars)
Web
manner
HEN he had proceeded three days' journey, word was
brought to him that Ariovistus was hastening with all
his forces to seize on Vesontio,* which is the largest
town of the Sequani, and had advanced three days' journey from
his territories. Cæsar thought that he ought to take the greatest
precautions lest this should happen, for there was in that town
a most ample supply of everything which was serviceable for
war; and so fortified was it by the nature of the ground as to
afford a great facility for protracting the war, inasmuch as the
river Doubs almost surrounds the whole town, as though it were
traced round with a pair of compasses.
A mountain of great
height shuts in the remaining space, which is not more than six
hundred feet, where the river leaves a gap in such a
that the roots of that mountain extend to the river's bank on
either side. A wall thrown around it makes a citadel of this
mountain, and connects it with the town. Hither Cæsar hastens
by forced marches by night and day, and after having seized
the town, stations a garrison there.
Whilst he is tarrying a few days at Vesontio, on account of
corn and provisions; from the inquiries of our men and the
reports of the Gauls and traders (who asserted that the Ger-
mans were men of huge stature, of incredible valor and practice
in arms, – that ofttimes they, on encountering them, could not
bear even their countenance and the fierceness of their eyes),
so great
panic on a sudden seized the whole army, as to dis-
compose the minds and spirits of all in no slight degree. This
* Modern Besançon.
## p. 3047 (#625) ###########################################
CAIUS JULIUS CÆSAR
3047
first arose from the tribunes of the soldiers, the prefects and the
rest, who, having followed Cæsar from the city (Rome) from
motives of friendship, had no great experience in military affairs.
And alleging, some of them one reason, some another, which
they said made it necessary for them to depart, they requested
that by his consent they might be allowed to withdraw; some,
infuenced by shame, stayed behind in order that they might
avoid the suspicion of cowardice. These could neither compose
their countenance, nor even sometimes check their tears: but
hidden in their tents, either bewailed their fate or deplored with
their comrades the general danger. Wills were sealed universally
throughout the whole camp. By the expressions and cowardice
of these men, even those who possessed great experience in the
camp, both soldiers and centurions, and those [the decurions]
who were in command of the cavalry, were gradually discon-
certed. Such of them as wished to be considered less alarmed
said that they did not dread the enemy, but feared the narrow-
ness of the roads and the vastness of the forests which lay
between them and Ariovistus, or else that the supplies could not
be brought up readily enough. Some even declared to Cæsar
that when he gave orders for the camp to be moved and the
troops to advance, the soldiers would not be obedient to the
command nor advance, in consequence of their fear.
When Cæsar observed these things, having called a council,
and summoned to it the centurions of all the companies, he
severely reprimanded them, “particularly for supposing that it
belonged to them to inquire or conjecture either in what
direction they were marching or with what object. That Ario-
vistus during his [Cæsar's] consulship had most anxiously
sought after the friendship of the Roman people; why should
any one judge that he would so rashly depart from his duty ?
He for his part was persuaded that when his demands were
known and the fairness of the terms considered, he would reject
neither his nor the Roman people's favor. But even if, driven
on by rage and madness, he should make war upon them, what
after all were they afraid of ? - or why should they despair
either of their own valor or of his zeal?
"Good-by, dear Jools, continued the parson. “I'm in the
Lord's haynds, and he's very merciful, which I hope and trust
you'll find it out. Good-by! ”— the schooner swung slowly off
before the breeze-good-by! ”
St. -Ange roused himself. "Posson Jone'! make me hany'ow
dis promise: you never, never, never will come back to New
Orleans. ”
“Ah, Jools, the Lord willin', I'll never leave home again!
"All right! ” cried the Creole; "I thing he's willin'. Adieu,
Posson Jone'. My faith'! you are
the so fighting an' moz
rilligious man as I never saw! Adieu! Adieu! »
Baptiste uttered a cry and presently ran by his master toward
the schooner, his hands full of clods.
St. -Ange looked just in time to see the sable form of Colossus
of Rhodes emerge from the vessel's hold, and the pastor of
Smyrna and Bethesda seize him in his embrace.
1
1
## p. 3035 (#609) ###########################################
GEORGE W. CABLE
3035
"O Colossus! you outlandish old nigger! Thank the Lord!
Thank the Lord ! »
The little Creole almost wept. He ran down the tow-path,
laughing and swearing, and making confused allusion to the en-
tire personnel and furniture of the lower regions.
By odd fortune, at the moment that St. -Ange further demon-
strated his delight by tripping his mulatto into a bog, the
schooner came brushing along the reedy bank with a graceful
curve, the sails flapped, and the crew fell to poling her slowly
along
Parson Jones was on the deck, kneeling once more in prayer.
His hat had fallen before him; behind him knelt his slave. In
thundering tones he was confessing himself “a plum fool,” from
whom "the conceit had been jolted out, and who had been
made to see that even his nigger had the longest head of the
two. "
Colossus clasped his hands and groaned.
The parson prayed for a contrite heart.
"Oh, yes! » cried Colossus.
The master acknowledged countless mercies.
« Dat's so! » cried the slave.
The master prayed that they might still be “piled on. ”
“Glory! ” cried the black man, clapping his hands; "pile on! ”
“An' now,” continued the parson, “bring this pore, back-
slidin' jackace of a parson and this pore ole fool nigger back to
thar home in peace! ”
"Pray fo’ de money! » called Colossus.
But the parson prayed for Jules.
Pray fo’ de money! ”repeated the negro.
« And oh, give thy servant back that there lost money! ”
Colossus rose stealthily, and tiptoed by his still shouting mas-
ter. St. -Ange, the captain, the crew, gazed in silent wonder at
the strategist. Pausing but an instant over the master's hat to
grin an acknowledgment of his beholders' speechless interest, he
softly placed in it the faithfully mourned and honestly prayed-for
Smyrna fund; then, saluted by the gesticulative, silent applause
of St. -Ange and the schooner-men, he resumed his first attitude
behind his roaring master.
“Amen! ” cried Colossus, meaning to bring him to a close.
“Onworthy though I be — cried Jones.
« Amen! » reiterated the negro.
## p. 3036 (#610) ###########################################
3036
GEORGE W. CABLE
"A-a-amen! ” said Parson Jones.
He rose to his feet, and, stooping to take up his hat, beheld
the well-known roll. As one stunned, he gazed for a moment
upon his slave, who still knelt with clasped hands and rolling
eyeballs; but when he became aware of the laughter and cheers
that greeted him from both deck and shore, he lifted eyes and
hands to heaven, and cried like the veriest babe. And when he
looked at the roll again, and hugged and kissed it, St. -Ange
tried to raise a second shout, but choked, and the crew fell to
their poles.
And now up runs Baptiste, covered with slime, and prepares
to cast his projectiles. The first one fell wide of the mark; the
schooner swung round into a long reach of water, where the
breeze was in her favor; another shout of laughter drowned
the maledictions of the muddy man; the sails filled; Colossus of
Rhodes, smiling and bowing as hero of the moment, ducked as
the main boom swept round, and the schooner, leaning slightly
to the pleasant influence, rustled a moment over the bulrushes,
and then sped far away down the rippling bayou.
M. Jules St. -Ange stood long, gazing at the receding vessel
as it now disappeared, now reappeared beyond the tops of the
high undergrowth; but when an arm of the forest hid it finally
from sight, he turned townward, followed by that fagged-out
spaniel his servant, saying as he turned, “Baptiste ? ”
Miché?
“You know w'at I goin' do wid dis money ? ”
"Non, m'sicur. ”
“Well, you can strike me dead if I don't goin' to pay hall my
debts! Allons ! »
He began a merry little song to the effect that his sweetheart
a wine-bottle, and master and man, leaving care behind,
returned to the picturesque Rue Royale. The ways of Providence
are indeed strange. In all Parson Jones's after-life, amid the
many painful reminiscences of his visit to the City of the Plain,
the sweet knowledge was withheld from him that by the light of
the Christian virtue that shone from him even in his great fall,
Jules St. -Ange arose, and went to his father an honest man.
was
## p. 3036 (#611) ###########################################
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JULIUS CÆSAR.
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## p. 3037 (#615) ###########################################
3037
CAIUS JULIUS CÆSAR
(100-44 B. C. )
BY J. H. WESTCOTT
seen.
RULY a wonderful man was Caius Julius Cæsar,” says Captain
Miles Standish. Truly wonderful he was on each of his
many sides: as soldier, statesman, orator, and author, all of
the first rank — and a respectable critic, man of science and poet
besides.
As a writer of Latin prose, and as an orator, he was second to
Cicero alone in the age that is called the Ciceronian; and no third is
to be named with these two. Yet among his contemporaries his lit-
erary power was an insignificant title to fame, compared with his
overwhelming military and political genius. Here he stood alone,
unrivaled, the most successful conqueror and civilizer of all history,
the founder of the most majestic political fabric the world has ever
There have been other generals, statesmen, authors, as great
as Cæsar; but the extraordinary combination of powers in this one
man goes very far toward making good the claim that he was the
most remarkable man in history.
He was born 100 B. C. , a member of the great Julian gens, which
claimed descent from Æneas and Venus, the glories of which are
celebrated in Vergil's immortal epic. Thus the future leader of the
turbulent democracy, and the future despot who was to humble the
nobles of Rome, was by birth an aristocrat of bluest blood. His life
might easily have come to an untimely end in the days of Sulla's
bloody ascendency, for he was connected by marriage with Marius
and Cinna. Sulla was persuaded to spare him, but clearly saw, even
then, that «in Cæsar there were many Mariuses. ”
All young Romans of rank were expected to go through a term
of at least nominal military service. Cæsar's apprenticeship was in
Asia Minor in 8o B. C. He distinguished himself at the storming of
Mytilene, and afterwards served in Cilicia. He began his political
and oratorical career by the prosecution of Cornelius Dolabella, one
of the nobility, on a charge of extortion. About 75 B. C. he was
continuing his studies at Rhodes, then a famous school of eloquence.
Obtaining the quæstorship in 67 B. C. , he was assigned to duty in the
province of Further Spain. Two years later he became ædile. At
the age of thirty-seven he was elected pontifex maximus over two
>>>
## p. 3038 (#616) ###########################################
3038
CAIUS JULIUS CÆSAR
powerful competitors. Entirely without religious belief, as far as we
can judge, he recognized the importance of this portion of the civil
order, and mastered the intricate lore of the established ceremonial.
In this office, which he held for life, he busied himself with a Digest
of the Auspices and wrote an essay on Divination.
After filling the prætorship in 62 B. C. , he obtained, as proprætor,
the governorship of his old province of Further Spain, which he was
destined to visit twice in later years as conqueror in civil war. His
military success at this time against the native tribes was such as to
entitle him to the honor of a triumph. This he was obliged to forego
in order to stand at once for the consulship, which office he held for
the year 59 B. C. He had previously entered into a private agree-
ment with Pompey and Crassus, known as the First Triumvirate.
Cæsar had always presented himself as the friend of the people;
Pompey was the most famous man of the time, covered with military
laurels, and regarded, though not with perfect confidence, as the
champion of the Senatorial party. Crassus, a man of ordinary ability,
was valuable to the other two on account of his enormous wealth.
These three men agreed to unite their interests and their influence.
In accordance with this arrangement Cæsar obtained the consulship,
and then the command for five years, afterward extended to ten, of
the provinces of Gaul and Illyricum. It was while proconsul of Gaul
in the years 58-50 B. C. that he subjugated and organized «All Gaul,”
which was far greater in extent than the country which is now
France; increased his own political and material resources; and above
all formed an army, the most highly trained and efficient the world
had yet seen, entirely faithful to himself, by means of which he was
able in the years 49-46 B. C. to defeat all his political antagonists and
to gain absolute power over the State.
He held the consulship again in 48 and 46 B. C. , and was consul
without a colleague in 45 and 44 B. C. , as well as dictator with
authority to remodel the Constitution. While his far-reaching plans
of organization and improvement were incomplete, and when he was
about to start upon a
war against the Parthians on the eastern
frontier of the empire, he was murdered March 15th, 44 B. C. , by a
band of conspirators headed by Brutus and Cassius.
For purposes of a literary judgment of Cæsar we have of his own
works in complete or nearly complete form his military memoirs
only. His specifically literary works have all perished. A few sen-
tences from his speeches, a few of his letters, a few wise or witty
sayings, an anecdote or two scattered about in the pages of other
authors, and six lines of hexameter verse, containing a critical esti-
mate of the dramatist Terence, are all that remain as specimens of
what is probably forever lost to us.
## p. 3039 (#617) ###########################################
CAIUS JULIUS CÆSAR
3039
we
An enumeration of his works, so far as their titles are known, is
the best evidence of his versatility. A bit of criticism here and
there shows the estimation in which Cæsar the writer and orator was
held by his countrymen and contemporaries. Besides the military
memoirs and the works spoken of above in connection with his
pontificate, may mention, as of a semi-official character, his
astronomical treatise On the Stars (De Astris), published in connec-
tion with his reform of the calendar, when dictator, shortly before
the end of his life.
Cicero alludes to a collection of witty sayings (Apophthegms) made
by Cæsar, with evident satisfaction at the latter's ability to distin-
guish the real and the false Ciceronian bons mots.
Like most Roman gentlemen, Cæsar wrote in youth several poems,
of which Tacitus grimly says that they were not better than Cice-
ro's. This list includes a tragedy, Edipus,' Laudes Herculis) (the
Praises of Hercules), and a metrical account of a journey into Spain
(Iter).
A grammatical treatise in two books (De Analogia), dedicated to
Cicero, to the latter's immense gratification, was written on one of the
numerous swift journeys from Italy to headquarters in Gaul.
Pas-
sages from it are quoted by several subsequent writers, and an anec-
dote preserved by Aulus Gellius in his Noctes Atticæ I. 10. 4, wherein
a young man is warned by Cæsar to avoid unusual and far-fetched
language like a rock,” is supposed to be very characteristic of his
general attitude in matters of literary taste. The (Anticatones) were
a couple of political pamphlets ridiculing Cato, the idol of the repub-
licans. This was small business for Cæsar, but Cato had taken
rather mean advantage by his dramatic suicide at Utica, and
deprived Cæsar of the "pleasure of pardoning him. ”
Of Cæsar's orations we have none but the most insignificant frag-
ments — our judgment of them must be based on the testimony of
ancient critics. Quintilian speaks in the same paragraph (Quin-
tilian X. I, 114) of the wonderful elegance of his language and
of the “force” which made it “seem that he spoke with the same
spirit with which he fought. ” Cicero's phrase "magnifica et generosa”
(Cicero, Brutus, 261), and Fronto's "facultas dicendi imperatoria”
(Fronto, Ep. p. 123), indicate « some kind of severe magnificence. ”
Collections of his letters were extant in the second century, but
nothing now remains except a few brief notes to Cicero, copied by
the latter in his correspondence with Atticus. This loss is perhaps
the one most to be regretted. Letters reveal their author's person-
ality better than more formal species of composition, and Cæsar was
almost the last real letter-writer, the last who used in its perfection
the polished, cultivated, conversational language, the Sermo urbanus.
## p. 3040 (#618) ###########################################
3040
CAIUS JULIUS CÆSAR
But after all, we possess the most important of his writings,
the Commentaries on the Gallic and Civil Wars. The first may be
considered as a formal report to the Senate and the public on the
conduct of his Gallic campaigns; the latter, as primarily intended
for a defense of his constitutional position in the Civil War.
They are memoirs, half way between private notes and formal
history. Cicero says that while their author «desired to give others
the material out of which to create a history, he may perhaps have
done a kindness to conceited writers who wish to trick them out
with meretricious graces” (to "crimp with curling-irons "), but he
has deterred all men of sound taste from ever touching them. For
in history a pure and brilliant conciseness of style is the highest
attainable beauty. ” “They are worthy of all praise, for they are
simple, straightforward and elegant, with all rhetorical ornament
stripped from them as a garment is stripped. ” (Cicero, Brutus, 262. )
The seven books of the Gallic War are each the account of a
year's campaigning. They were written apparently in winter quar-
ters. When Cæsar entered on the administration of his province it
was threatened with invasion. The Romans had never lost their
dread of the northern barbarians, no orgotten the capture of Rome
three centuries before. Only a generation back, Marius had become
the national hero by destroying the invading hordes of Cimbri and
Teutones. Cæsar purposed to make the barbarians tremble at the
Roman name. This first book of the Commentaries tells how he
raised an army in haste, with which he outmarched, outmanæuvred
and defeated the Helvetian nation. This people, urged by pressure
behind and encouragement in front, had determined to leave its old
home in the Alpine valleys and to settle in the fairer regions of
southeastern France. Surprised and dismayed by Cæsar's terrific
reception of their supposed invincible host, they had to choose between
utter destruction and a tame return, with sadly diminished numbers,
to their old abodes. Nor was this all the work of the first year.
Ariovistus, a German king, also invited by a Gallic tribe, and rely-
ing on the terror of his nation's name, came to establish himself and
his people on the Gallic side of the Rhine. He too was astonished
at the tone with which Cæsar ordered him to depart, but soon found
himself forced to return far more quickly than he had come.
Having thus vindicated the Roman claim to the frontiers of Gaul
against other invaders, the proconsul devoted his second summer to
the subjugation of the Belgæ, the most warlike and the most remote
of the Gauls. The second book tells how this was accomplished.
There was one moment when the conqueror's career came near end-
ing prematurely. One of the Belgian tribes, the valiant Nervii, sur-
prised and nearly defeated the Roman army. But steady discipline
## p. 3041 (#619) ###########################################
CAIUS JULIUS CÆSAR
3041
and the dauntless courage of the commander, never so great as in
moments of mortal peril, saved the day, and the Nervii are immor-
talized as the people who nearly destroyed Cæsar.
These unprecedented successes all round the eastern and northern
frontiers thoroughly established Roman prestige and strengthened
Rome's supremacy over the central Gauls, who were already her
allies, at least in name. But much yet remained to do. The work
was but fairly begun. The third book tells of the conquest of the
western tribes. The most interesting episode is the creation of a
fleet and the naval victory over the Veněti on the far-away coast of
Brittany. In the fourth year Cæsar crossed the Rhine, after building
a wonderful wooden bridge in ten days, carried fire and sword
among the Germans on the further bank, and returned to his side of
the river, destroying the bridge behind him. Modern schoolboys
wish he had never built it. Later in the season he made an expe-
dition into Britain. This was followed in the fifth year by an
invasion of the island in greater force. To people of our race this
portion of the Commentaries is especially interesting. The southern
part of the country was overrun, the Thames was crossed some miles
above London, and several victories were gained, but no organized
conquest was attempted. That remained for the age of Claudius and
later emperors.
During the ensuing winter, on account of the scarcity of provis-
ions, the Roman troops had to be quartered in separate detachments
at long distances. One of these was treacherously destroyed by the
Gauls, and the others were saved only by the extraordinary quickness
with which Cæsar marched to their relief on hearing of their immi-
nent danger. The chief part in this rising had been taken by the
Eburones, led by their king Ambiorix. A large part of the sixth
book is occupied with the recital of Cæsar's vengeance upon these
people and their abettors, and with the vain pursuit of Ambiorix.
The remainder contains an elaborate contrast of the manners and
customs of the Gauls and Germans, which forms an important source
for the history of the primitive institutions of these nations. The
seventh book is the thrilling tale of the formidable rising of all the
Gauls against their conquerors, under the leadership of Vercingetorix,
an Arvernian chief. This man was a real hero, — brave, patriotic,
resourceful, perhaps the only worthy antagonist that Cæsar ever met.
This war strained to the utmost Cæsar's abilities and the disciplined
valor of his legions. The Gauls nearly succeeded in undoing all the
work of six years, in destroying the Roman army and in throwing off
the Roman yoke. In this campaign, more conspicuously than ever
before, Cæsar's success was due to the unexampled rapidity of his
movements. So perfect had become the training of his troops and
V-191
## p. 3042 (#620) ###########################################
3042
CAIUS JULIUS CÆSAR
their confidence in his ability to win under all circumstances, that
after a campaign of incredible exertions they triumphed over the
countless hosts of their gallant foes, and in the next two years the
last embers of Gaulish independence were finally stamped out. In
all his later wars, Cæsar never had anything to fear from Gaul. As
we read the story of Avaricum, of Gergovia, of Alesia, our sympathy
goes out to the brave barbarians who were fighting for liberty — but
we have to remember that though the cause of freedom failed, the
cause of civilization triumphed. The eighth book, containing the
account of the next two years, 51 and 50 B. C. , was written by one
of Cæsar's officers, Aulus Hirtius.
The first book of the Civil War begins with the year 49 B. C. ,
where the struggle between Cæsar and the Senatorial party opens
with his crossing of the Rubicon, attended by the advanced guard of
his legions. Pompey proved a broken reed to those who leaned upon
him, and Cæsar's conquest of the Italian peninsula was little else
than a triumphal progress through the country. The enemy retired
to the eastern shore of the Adriatic to muster the forces of the East
on the side of the aristocracy, leaving Cæsar in possession of the
capital and of the machinery of government. The latter part of the
book contains the account of the campaign against Pompey's lieu-
tenants in Spain, which was won almost without bloodshed, by mas-
terly strategy, and which ended with the complete possession of the
peninsula. The second book describes the capture of Marseilles after
a long siege, and the tragic defeat and death of Curio, a brave but
rash young officer sent by Cæsar to secure the African province. In
the third book (48 B. C. ) we have the story of the campaign against
Pompey; first the audacious blockade for months of Pompey's greatly
superior forces near Dyrrachium on the Illyrian coast: and when that
failed, of the long march into Thessaly, where Pompey was at last
forced into battle, against his judgment, by his own officers, on the
fatal plains of Pharsalia; of the annihilation of the Senatorial army;
of Pompey's flight to Egypt; of his treacherous murder there; of
Cæsar's pursuit. The books on the Alexandrian, the African, and the
Spanish wars, which continue the narrative down to Cæsar's final vic-
tory at Munda in southern Spain, are by other and inferior hands.
The question of their authorship has been the subject of much con-
troversy and conjecture.
Under this modest title of Commentaries,' in the guise of a
simple narrative of events, Cæsar puts forth at once an inimitable
nistory and a masterly apology. The author speaks of himself in
the third person, tells of the circumstances of each situation in a
quiet moderate way, which carries with it the conviction on the
reader's part of his entire truthfulness, accuracy, and candor. We
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CAIUS JULIUS CÆSAR
3043
are persuaded that the Cæsar about whom he tells could not have
acted otherwise than he did. In short, he exercises the same spell
over our minds that he cast over the hearts of men twenty centu-
ries ago.
There is nothing that so fascinates and enchains the imagination
of men
as power in another man. This man could captivate a
woman by his sweetness or tame an angry mob of soldiers with a
word; could mold the passions of a corrupt democracy or extermi-
nate a nation in a day; could organize an empire or polish an epi-
gram. His strength was terrible. But all this immense power was
marvelously balanced and under perfect control. Nothing was DO
small for his delicate tact. Nothing that he did was so difficult but
we feel he could have done more. Usually his means seemed inade-
quate to his ends. But it was Cæsar who used them.
The Commentaries show us this man at his work. They show
him as an organizer of armies and alliances, a wily diplomatist, an
intrepid soldier, an efficient administrator, a strategist of inspired
audacity, a tactician of endless resources, an engineer of infinite
inventiveness, an unerring judge of men. But he never boasts,
except in speeches to hearten discouraged troops. He does not vilify
or underrate his enemies.
His soldiers trusted him implicitly; there was no limit to their
zeal. They found in him a generous appreciation of their deeds.
Many a soldier and centurion has received immortality at his hands
as the guerdon of valor. He describes a victory of Labienus with as
much satisfaction as if it had been his own, and praises another
lieutenant for his prudent self-restraint when tempted by a prospect
of success. And he tells with hearty admiration of the devoted
Gauls who sacrificed their lives one after another in a post of danger
at Avaricum. Even in the Civil War no officers deserted him
except Labienus and two Gaulish chiefs.
It was difficult to deceive him. His analysis of other men's
motives is as merciless as it is passionless. He makes us disapprove
the course of his antagonists with the same moderate but convincing
statement with which he recommends his own. Few men can have
had as few illusions as he. One would scarcely care to possess such
an insight into the hearts of others. He seems to feel little warmth
of indignation, and never indulges in invective. But woe to those
who stood in the way of the accomplishment of his objects. Dread-
ful was the punishment of those who revolted after making peace.
Still, even his vengeance seems dictated by policy rather than by
passion. He is charged with awful cruelty because he slew a million
men and sold another million into slavery. But he did not enjoy
human suffering. These were simply necessary incidents in the
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3044
CAIUS JULIUS CÆSAR
execution of his plans. It is hard to see how European civilization
could have proceeded without the conquest of Gaul, and it is surely
better to make a conquest complete, rapid, overpowering, that the
work may have to be done but once.
It is hard not to judge men by the standards of our own age.
The ancients rarely felt an international humanity, and in his own
time “Cæsar's clemency” was proverbial. As he was always careful
not to waste in useless fighting the lives of his soldiers, so he was
always true to his own precept, «Spare the citizens. ” The way in
which he repeatedly forgave his enemies when they were in his
power was an example to many a Christian conqueror. The best of
his antagonists showed themselves bloodthirsty in word or act; and
most of them, not excepting Cicero, were basely ungrateful for his
forbearance. His treatment of Cicero was certainly most handsome
our knowledge of it is derived mainly from Cicero's letters. Per-
haps this magnanimity was dashed with a tinge of kindly contempt
for his fellow-citizens; but whatever its motives, it was certainly wise
and benign at the beginning of the new era he was inaugurating.
He was no vulgar destroyer, and did not desire to ruin in order to
rule.
He is charged with ambition, the sin by which the angels fell. It
is not for us to fathom the depths of his mighty mind.
Let us
admit the charge. But it was not an ignoble ambition. Let us say
that he was so ambitious that he laid the foundations of the Roman
Empire and of modern France; that his services to civilization and
his plans for humanity were so broad that patriots were driven to
murder him.
Some of Casar's eulogists have claimed for him a moral greatness
corresponding to his transcendent mental power. This is mistaken
zeal. He may stand as the supreme representative of the race in the
way of practical executive intellect. It is poor praise to put him
into another order of men, with Plato or with Paul. Their greatness
was of another kind. We cannot speak of degrees. He is the expo-
nent of creative force in political history — not of speculative or
ethical power.
Moreover, with all his originality of conception and power of exe-
cution, Cæsar lacked that kind of imagination which makes the true
poet, the real creative artist in literature. Thus we observe the
entire absence of the pictorial element in his writings. There is no
trace of his ever being affected by the spectacular incidents of war-
fare nor by the grandeur of the natural scenes through which he
passed. The reason may be that his intellect was absorbed in the
contemplation of men and motives, of means and ends. We cannot
conceive of his ever having been carried out of himself by the
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CAIUS JULIUS CÆSAR
3045
rapture of inspiration. Such clearness of mental perception is natu-
rally accompanied by a certain coolness of temperament. A man of
superlative greatness must live more or less alone among his fellows.
With his immense grasp of the relations of things in the world,
Cæsar cannot have failed to regard men to some extent as the
counters in a great game - himself the player. So he used men,
finding them instruments efficient and zealous, often — of his far-
reaching plans. He was just in rewarding their services — more than
just: he was generous and kind. But he did not have real associ-
ates, real friends; therefore it is not surprising that he met with so
little gratitude. Even his diction shows this independence, this isola-
tion. It would be difficult to find an author of any nation in a
cultivated age so free from the influence of the language of his
predecessors. Cæsar was unique among the great Roman writers in
having been born at the capital. Appropriately he is the incarnation
of the specifically Roman spirit in literature, as Cicero was the em-
bodiment of the Italian, the Hellenic, the cosmopolitan spirit.
Toward the close of Cæsar's career there are some signs of weari-
ness observable — a certain loss of serenity, suspicion of vanity, a
dimming of his penetrating vision into the men about him. The
only wonder is that mind and body had not succumbed long before
to the prodigious strain put upon them. Perhaps it is well that he
died when he did, hardly past his prime. So he went to his setting,
like the other weary Titan,” leaving behind him a brightness which
lasted all through the night of the Dark Ages. Cæsar died, but the
imperial idea of which he was the first embodiment has proved the
central force of European political history even down to our time.
Such is the man who speaks to us from his pages still. He was a
man who did things rather than a man who said things. Yet who
could speak so well? His mastery of language was perfect, but in
the same way as his mastery of other instruments. Style with him
was a means rather than an end. He had the training which others
of his kind enjoyed. Every Roman noble had to learn oratory. But
Cæsar wrote and spoke with a faultless taste and a distinction that
no training could impart. So we find in his style a beauty which
does not depend upon ornament, but upon perfect proportion; a dic-
tion plain and severe almost to baldness; absolute temperateness of
expression. The descriptions are spirited, but never made so by
strained rhetoric; the speeches are brief, manly, business-like; the
arguments calm and convincing; always and everywhere the lan-
guage of a strong man well inside the limits of his power.
The chief ancient authorities for the life of Cæsar, besides his
own works, are Suetonius in Latin, Plutarch and Appian in Greek.
Among modern works of which he is made the subject may be
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3046
CAIUS JULIUS CÆSAR
mentioned Jules César,' by Napoleon III. (Paris, 1865); continued by
Colonel Stoffel, with an Atlas; Cæsar, a Sketch,' by J. A. Froude
(London, 1886); (Cæsar,' by A. Trollope (London, 1870); Cæsar,' by
T. A. Dodge, U. S. A. (Boston, 1893).
Jothest
esterst
THE DEFEAT OF ARIOVISTUS AND THE GERMANS
From The Gallic Wars)
Web
manner
HEN he had proceeded three days' journey, word was
brought to him that Ariovistus was hastening with all
his forces to seize on Vesontio,* which is the largest
town of the Sequani, and had advanced three days' journey from
his territories. Cæsar thought that he ought to take the greatest
precautions lest this should happen, for there was in that town
a most ample supply of everything which was serviceable for
war; and so fortified was it by the nature of the ground as to
afford a great facility for protracting the war, inasmuch as the
river Doubs almost surrounds the whole town, as though it were
traced round with a pair of compasses.
A mountain of great
height shuts in the remaining space, which is not more than six
hundred feet, where the river leaves a gap in such a
that the roots of that mountain extend to the river's bank on
either side. A wall thrown around it makes a citadel of this
mountain, and connects it with the town. Hither Cæsar hastens
by forced marches by night and day, and after having seized
the town, stations a garrison there.
Whilst he is tarrying a few days at Vesontio, on account of
corn and provisions; from the inquiries of our men and the
reports of the Gauls and traders (who asserted that the Ger-
mans were men of huge stature, of incredible valor and practice
in arms, – that ofttimes they, on encountering them, could not
bear even their countenance and the fierceness of their eyes),
so great
panic on a sudden seized the whole army, as to dis-
compose the minds and spirits of all in no slight degree. This
* Modern Besançon.
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CAIUS JULIUS CÆSAR
3047
first arose from the tribunes of the soldiers, the prefects and the
rest, who, having followed Cæsar from the city (Rome) from
motives of friendship, had no great experience in military affairs.
And alleging, some of them one reason, some another, which
they said made it necessary for them to depart, they requested
that by his consent they might be allowed to withdraw; some,
infuenced by shame, stayed behind in order that they might
avoid the suspicion of cowardice. These could neither compose
their countenance, nor even sometimes check their tears: but
hidden in their tents, either bewailed their fate or deplored with
their comrades the general danger. Wills were sealed universally
throughout the whole camp. By the expressions and cowardice
of these men, even those who possessed great experience in the
camp, both soldiers and centurions, and those [the decurions]
who were in command of the cavalry, were gradually discon-
certed. Such of them as wished to be considered less alarmed
said that they did not dread the enemy, but feared the narrow-
ness of the roads and the vastness of the forests which lay
between them and Ariovistus, or else that the supplies could not
be brought up readily enough. Some even declared to Cæsar
that when he gave orders for the camp to be moved and the
troops to advance, the soldiers would not be obedient to the
command nor advance, in consequence of their fear.
When Cæsar observed these things, having called a council,
and summoned to it the centurions of all the companies, he
severely reprimanded them, “particularly for supposing that it
belonged to them to inquire or conjecture either in what
direction they were marching or with what object. That Ario-
vistus during his [Cæsar's] consulship had most anxiously
sought after the friendship of the Roman people; why should
any one judge that he would so rashly depart from his duty ?
He for his part was persuaded that when his demands were
known and the fairness of the terms considered, he would reject
neither his nor the Roman people's favor. But even if, driven
on by rage and madness, he should make war upon them, what
after all were they afraid of ? - or why should they despair
either of their own valor or of his zeal?
