situations, when not engaged in grave employments,) he was as playful as either

66

itaque quos ingenio, quos studio, quos doctrinâ præditos vident, quorumque vitam constantem et probatam, ut Catonis, LELII, Scipionis, aliorumque plurium, viderentur eos esse quales se ipsi velint." Top. 20.

"Sæpe ex socero meo audivi, quum is diceret, soce rum suum Lælium semper fere cum Scipione solitum rusticari, eosque incredibiliter repuerascere esse solitos, quum rus ex urbe, tanquam e vinculis, evolavissent, Non audeo dicere de talibus viris, sed tamen ita solet narrare Scævola, conchas eos et umbilicos ad Cajetam et ad Laurentum legere consuêsse, et ad omnem animi remissionem ludumque descendere." DE ORAT. ii, 6.

An old Scholiast on Horace goes still further, and informs us, that these two great men sometimes indulged. themselves in the same kind of boyish playfulness which has been recorded of the flagitious Cromwell and one of his fellow-regicides: "Scipio Africanus et LELIUS feruntur tam fuisse familiares et amici Lucilio, ut quodam tempore Lælio circum lectos triclinii fugienti Lucilius superveniens, eum obtortâ mappâ, quasi feriturus, sequeretur.

"Memoriâ teneo, Smyrnæ me ex P. Rutilio Rufo audisse, quum diceret adolescentulo se accidisse, ut exSenatus-consulto P. Scipio et D. Brutus, ut opinor, consules, de re atroci magnâque quærerent. Nam quum in silvâ Silâ facta cædes esset, notique homines interfecti ; insimulareturque familia, partim etiam liberi societatis ejus, quæ picarias de P. Cornelio, L. Mummio, censori

Lælius or his illustrious friend, and would as

bus, redemisset; decrevisse senatum, ut de eâ re cognos cerent et statuerent consules: causam pro publicanis accuratè, ut semper solitus esset, eleganterque dixisse Lælium. Quum consules, re auditâ, amphus de con. silii sententiâ pronuntiavissent, paucis interpositis diebus, iterum Lælium multo diligentius meliusque dixisse; iterumque eodem modo a consulibus rem esse prolatam. Tum Lælium, quum eum socii domum reduxissent, egissentque gratias, et ne defatigaretur oravissent, locutum esse ita; se quæ fecisset, honoris eorum causâ, studiosè, accuratèque fecisse; sed se arbitrari causam illam a Ser. Galbâ, quod is in dicendo fortior acriorque esset, gravius et vehementius posse defendi. Itaque auctoritate C. Lælii publicanos causam detulisse ad Galbam."After informing us that Galba pleaded this cause with great spirit and vigour, and obtained a decision in favour of his clients, Cicero adds-"Ex hac Rutilianâ narratione suspicari licet, quum duæ summæ sint in oratore laudes, una subtiliter disputandi, ad docendum; altera graviter agendi, ad animos audientium permovendos; multoque plus proficiat is qui inflammet judicem, quam ille qui doceat; elegantiam in Lælio, vim in Galba fuisse." BRUT. xxii.

From the foregoing passages, which I have collected with a view to illustrate the character of Lælius, (though some of them may seem not perfectly applicable to the present purpose,) a very competent notion of this celebrated person may be formed; and I trust that the comparison of these two characters will not appear, like many of Plutarch's, forced and constrained into parallelism.

readily have gathered pebbles on the sea shore; and though he was not an orator, if his studies and pursuits had originally led him to a popular profession, and he had been obliged to address a publick assembly, it is clear from his manners and his writings, that in the character of his eloquence he would have resembled the perspicuous and elegant Lælius, rather than the severe and vehement Galba. For the rest, the conformity is greater than at the first view may be supposed. As Lælius was the disciple and pro tector of Panatius, and the patron and companion of Lucilius, Sir Joshua Reynolds was the scholar and friend of Johnson, and the friend and benefactor of Goldsmith. What the illustrious Scipio was to Lælius, the allknowing and all-accomplished Burke was to Reynolds. For the pleadings and aureola oratiuncula of the amiable Roman, we have the luminous, I had almost said, the golden DISCOURSES of our author. As Lælius, admired and respected as he was, was repulsed

from the consulate, Sir Joshua Reynolds, in consequence of an unhappy misunderstanding, was forced for a short time to relinquish the Presidency of the Academy.-In publick estimation, in uniform success in life, in moderation in prosperity, in the applause and admiration of contemporaries, in simplicity of manners and playfulness of humour, in good sense and elegant attainments, in modesty and equability of temper, in undeviating integrity, in respect for received and long-established opinions, in serenity, cheerfulness, and urbanity, the resemblance must be allowed to be uncommonly striking and

exact.

If it should be asked,-amidst so many excellent and amiable qualities, were there no failings? I wish to answer the inquiry in the words of Mr. Burke, who on a paper (blotted with his tears) which has been transmitted to me while these sheets were passing through the press, has written"I do not know a fault or weakness of his

that he did not convert into something that bordered on a virtue, instead of pushing it to the confines of a vice."4

54 While I was employed in drawing up an account of our author's life. I requested Mr. Burke to communicate to me his thoughts on the subject; but he was then so ill, that he was able only to set down two or three hints, to be afterwards enlarged on; one of which is that given above. In this paper (which was not found till the former part of these sheets was worked off at the press,) he has noticed our author's disposition to generalize, and his early admiration of Mr. Mudge, which makes part of the subject of his subsequent letter, from which an extract has been given in a former page; but as the observation, as it appears in this fragment, has somewhat of a different shape and colouring, I subjoin it, that no particle of so great a writer may be lost:

"He was a great generalizer, and was fond of redu cing every thing to one system, more perhaps than the variety of principles which operate in the human mind and in every human work, will properly endure. But this disposition to abstractions, to generalizing and classification, is the great glory of the human mind, that indeed which most distinguishes man from other animals; and is the source of every thing that can be called science. I believe, his early acquaintance with Mr. Mudge of Exeter, a very learned and thinking man, and much inclined to philosophize in the spirit of the Platonists, disposed him to this habit. He certainly by that means liberalized in a high degree the theory of his own art; and if he had been