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Tacitus (Historian is known to us)

the historian, is known to us chiefly from autobiographical touches in his own writings and from allusions in Pliny's letters. His full name is matter of doubt - CORNELIUS TACITUS being his nomen and cognomen; but whether TACITUS his prænomen was PUBLIUS or GAIUS can only be conjectured. Born perhaps in Rome (less probably in Terni), under the Emperor Claudius between A. D. 52 and 54, it is inferred that his family was respectable from his education. his pro- TACITUS fession, and his marriage. He studied rhetoric in Rome under M. Aper, Julius rose to eminence as a pleader at the Ro- man bar; and in 77 or 78 married the rose to eminence as a pleader at the Roman bar; and in 77 or 78 married the ship under Vespasian, who made him governor of Britain. He filled a quætorship under Vespasian, who made him prætor and member of a priestly college. In 89 A. D. he left Rome, probably for Germany, where, doubtless as governor, he must have acquired his knowledge of the features, natural and social, of the country; and he did not return till 93, when he found his father-in-law had recently died. He was an eye-witness of Domitian's reign of terror. We have his own testimony as to the blessed change wrought by the accession of Nerva and Trajan.

Under the former emperor he became consul suffectus, succeeding the great and good Virginius Rufus, on whom he delivered in the Senate a splendid oraison funèbre. In A. D. 99, conjointly with the younger Pliny, he prosecuted the political malefactor, Marius Priscus, which won him the thanks of the Senate. After this we lose sight of him, but may assume it as certain that he saw the close of Trajan's reign, if not the opening of Haas certain that he saw the close of Tra- jan's reign, if not the opening of Hain life is attested by the eulogistic mention of him repeatedly made in Pliny's letters, and in the 3d century the Emperor Tacitus, proud to claim kinship with him, built in his honor a tomb which was still standing in the later decades of the 16th century, when it was destroyed by Pope Pius V. The same emperor also issued an edict by which the works of his namesake were to be copied peror also issued an edict by which the as_many public libraries.

In spite of this multiplication of copies we possess but a moiety of what he wrote. His earliest work, the "Dialogues de Oratoribus," treats, in conversational form, of the decline of eloquence following on the change for the worse in the education of the Roman youth under the empire. It has reached us entire. Next comes the "Agricola," the literary character of which it is difficult to define.

Quite a library has accumulated on the question whether it is a "laudatio fune- Next comes the "Agricola," the literary character of which it is difficult to define. panegyric framed for political ends. But it will always be read for its elevation of style, its dramatic force, its invective and its pathos. For English readers its interest is unique. The third work, the panegyric framed for political ends. But it will always be read for its elevation populis Germaniæ," is a monograph of the greatest value on the ethnography of Germany. Fourth in order are the TACK of the 12 books originally composing it only the first 4 and a fragment of the from the accession of Galba in A. D. 69 to the assassination of Domitian in 97. of the 12 books originally composing it only the first 4 and a fragment of the 5th are extant. position, to say Tacitus is at his strongest in this narrative. His material was drawn from contemporary experience; and though the imperial archives were closed to him, he had at command the personal information open to a man of his posi nothing of correspondence (as of Pliny).

He yearned partisan, but is able to justify the most and the Fabii. He is, on this account, a partisan, but is able to justify the most Rome, which latter he conof Imperial Rome, which latter he con- trasts disadvantageously with the freeof Imperial Rome dom and simplicity of even barbarian trasts disadvantageously with the freedom and simplicity of even barbarian Germany. To his peculiar satirical gift which often makes him a "Juvenal in prose" he gives free rein from time to higher qualities of the Jews, and his atti- tude to the growth of Christianity is that higher qualities of the Jews, and his attitude to the growth of Christianity is that of a prejudiced, if cultured Roman. ed for the return of an aristo- The qualities conspicuous in the "Historiæ" are maintained in his last work, 14 to 68). Of their 16 books only 8 have Julian line from Tiberius to Nero (A. D. 14 to 68). Of their 16 books only 8 have come down to us entire, 4 are fragmentary, and the others lost. In these, as in all his writings, his avowed aim was a noble one, to perpetuate virtue, and to stigmatize baseness in word or deed. Among the more obvious defects which lower his value as a historian are his weakness in geography and his carelessness as to strategic details.