for the expedition of Evander, though affirmation is as easy as denial; all we maintain is that this legend, and others of the same class, give evidence of historical truth, though not of their own truth. The gain, it may be said, is not great; we have better proof of the affinity between primæval Greece and Latium than any legend. This is true; but we might have had the legend alone, without the corroboration of language and archeo logy, and it is important to know that it is something more than an idle invention, and might have been safely used if it had stood alone. The Etruscan nation differed essentially from the Roman. It had a language wholly unlike the Greek in roots and structure, joined with an art manifesting the closest resemblance to archaic Greek art,* and an alphabet not only corresponding generally with the old Greek alphabet, but specially with that of which we have remains in the Phrygian and Lycian inscriptions. And while these circumstances point to a connexion between Etruria and the coast of Asia Minor, we are told by the father of history that the Tyrrhenians emigrated from Lydia, a country in contact or close contiguity with Phrygia and Lysia. The supposition of an emigration from the coast of Asia to Etruria, and its incorporation with a people of a wholly different language from the Greek, explains the phenomenon, and is in entire accordance with all that we know of the progress of art, letters, and population in the ancient world. Nothing opposes it but the absence of any account of such an emigration in the Lydian history of Xanthus-an uncertain argument at all times, but especially in the case of an author, the genuineness of whose reputed works was doubted by ancient critics.† We cannot therefore accede to Sir G. Lewis's decision, when he pronounces that "all the elaborate researches of modern scholars, respecting the national races of Italy, are as unreal as the speculations concerning judicial astrology, or the discovery of the philosopher's stone and the elixir of life." There is no analogy between the two cases. One inquires after the explanation of a fact; the other goes in search of a nonentity. Our author proceeds in the same manner to inquire into the We speak of Etruscan art as seen in the remains of it which have inscriptions in the Etruscan character; they are chiefly engraved stones and funeral monuments. The fictile vases have, with hardly an exception, Greek inscriptions, and the resemblance of their style with that of the Corinthian vases (see Abeken Mittel-Italien, p. 290) confirms the account of Pliny (35, 43) that the ceramic art was introduced into Etruria from Corinth. Eucheir and Eugrammus no doubt are fictitious names, representing skill in manipulating the clay and painting the vase, but the historical and archeological fact is not rendered doubtful by this admixture of myth. † Athen. xii. 57. historical evidence for the arrival of the Trojans under Æneas in Italy, the succession of the Alban kings, the foundation of Rome, the legislation and religious system of Numa. Respecting these there is at present little difference of opinion among scholars; they are regarded as partly fabulous, partly uncertain. We pass on to the legislation of Servius Tullius, which appears to offer a firm resting-place for the foot, after the shifting sands of the preceding reigns. His constitution was not revealed to him by the inspiration of any nymph or god; it was a work of mere political human wisdom; it was not a thing lost and forgotten, about which fables might be promulgated at pleasure, but existed, and was in operation in historical times, and reasoned upon by Roman statesmen with the most entire belief in its reality. Yet its history and character are by no means clear; Sir G. Lewis points out some of the difficulties which are inherent in the common accounts of it. It appears to him incredible, that if every Roman citizen had previously enjoyed a right of individual voting,* the poorer classes should have consented to be rendered powerless by an arrangement which threw the control of the votes completely into the hands of the rich, by assigning to them either an absolute majority, or at least a decided preponderance. He thinks that Servius could never have obtained the character of a popular king, had he thus robbed the democracy of their prerogatives, and that royalty could not co-exist with such a development of the political activity of the wealthier classes. The system bears to him the appearance of having been the slow and deliberate result of a compromise between the different orders of the state. Yet we think the consideration of this part of the Roman history rather tends to establish its trustworthiness than its uncertainty, as far as the changes of the constitution are concerned. For we should make a strong distinction between this and personal anecdotes, so uncertain in their tradition, or military events, so apt to be distorted by patriotic feeling. Three first-rate authorities, Cicero, Dionysius, Livy,† though they differ in the arrangement and number of the Servian centuries, agree in the general principle that they were designed to throw all real power in the comitia into the hands of the rich, and at the same time to lay on them the chief burden of taxation and military service. We feel no reliance on the argument that the "Such a state of things," he says, "cannot have existed in any Greek or Italian republic at the time assigned to the reign of Servius, 557, 35 B.C., shortly after the legislation of Solon." This positive assertion of an impossibility comes oddly from an author who maintains that we have no historical documents or trustworthy traditions respecting this age. † Cic. Rep. ii. 22. Dion. Ant. iv. 16. Liv. i. 42. people could not have been so blind to their own interests as to allow themselves to be juggled out of their rights, and to accept exemption from taxation and military service, as a compensation for the loss of political power. There are times when nations are so sensitive in regard to their rights, that to lift a finger against them is to excite an insurrection; others—and not necessarily separated by a long interval—when they are so apathetic, that they will not lift a finger in their defence. At one time they are jealous of their exclusion from political power; at another impatient of the burdens of citizenship, but indifferent about political power. Arguments which assume sagacity, foresight, and stability of purpose on the part of popular bodies, must be always very uncertain. That the statements of ancient authors should vary in respect to the particulars of the Servian arrangement, affords no reasonable ground for supposing that they had no authority for their assertions. Surely such a difference as Livy's making the assessment of the fifth class 11,000 asses, while Dionysius makes it 12,500, Cicero and Gellius 15,000, is sufficiently accounted for by their quoting from memory, which is so treacherous in regard to numbers. The suggestion that the Servian constitution was the slow and deliberate result of a compromise between the orders of the state is, we think, inconsistent with the position which the reign of Servius holds between those of the two Tarquins, Priscus and Superbus. The policy of the former was aristocratico-monarchical; latter was a tyrant; where then can we find time for the slow and deliberate growth of a popular institution? The facility with which it was infringed, and the shortness of the time during which it remained in force, are a presumption against its having that depth of root which a gradual formation would have given to it. the Another circumstance which we think entitles us to claim a truly historical character for the reign of Servius, is the existence of at least one contemporaneous document. When Ulpian tells us, in the reign of Alexander Severus, that the bills of mortality of Servius's time were extant, and employs them as the groundwork for calculating the average of life among the Romans, we may reasonably doubt their being the autograph returns of the censors. But Dionysius† says, that there remained to his age a stele in the temple of Diana, in archaic Greek characters, on which were inscribed the decree of the delegates of Rome and Latium, respecting the panegyris Centum in patres legit: factio haud dubia regis, cujus beneficio in curiam venerant. Livy, i. 35. † Dion. Ant. iv. 26. to be annually held in the temple of Diana, and the names of the towns who were parties to this league. We think Sir G. Lewis a little captious in his observations on this remarkable monument. He says (i. 502, note 86) "this inscription was doubtless of great antiquity, and contained a list of the towns of the Latin league, and the rules of the federal festival; but there is nothing to show that the name of Servius occurred in it.” Now Dionysius distinctly says, στήλην κατασκευάσας χαλκήν ἔγραψεν ἐν ταύτῃ τὰ δόξαντα τοῖς συνέδροις κ.τ.λ. This could only be known by his name occurring in it, and it is too much to require that Dionysius should have anticipated the scepticism of a future age, by telling us this in so many words. We must believe him till his critic can produce something to show that Servius was not mentioned in the tablet; and if he was mentioned, he must certainly be something more to us than what Niebuhr makes him, "serving the same purpose as x, the symbol of an unknown magnitude in mathematics." The second volume of Sir G. Lewis's Inquiry opens with the History of Rome from the expulsion of the Kings to the burning of the city by the Gauls, and he thus describes the aspect of the period: "We now enter upon a period of one hundred and twenty years, which resembles the previous period of two hundred and forty-four years in being prior to all regular contemporary history, but differs from it in approaching more closely to the time when oral traditions were committed to the sure custody of writing. The reminiscences from which this portion of the history was written down were fresher, and more distinct, and had passed through a shorter series of reporters; and hence they probably adhered more closely to the truth, and contained a larger portion of real fact, than the legends out of which the previous history was formed. As the story advances, we cease to float about in entire uncertainty, and we observe some points of fixed and immovable land rising on the horizon. The mists of night begin to disperse, and we discover some faint traces of real objects. Jamque rubescebat stellis Aurora fugatis, But although, when we descend to the siege of Veii and the burning of the city, we come to events of which the substance is clearly historical, we can perceive but little difference in character between the narrative of the early years of the Republic, and that of the last years of the kings. In external evidence they stand on the same ground; and the internal features of the accounts are similar.” Whatever cause the historical inquirer may have to regret the uncertainty of the Roman history during the first five cen turies, he has none to complain of the Roman historians themselves, who have not concealed the imperfection of their materials. It is from Livy we learn that the use of writing was rare in the ages which preceded the burning of the city by the Gauls, 390 B.C., and that of the written documents which existed in the commentaries of the pontiffs, and other public and private monuments, the greater part perished by that event. He acknowledges that the remoteness of those times made their occurrences obscure, and when he emerges from them rejoices that he has reached a period of more certain historical light. It is from Livy and Cicero we learn that the vanity of the patrician families at Rome had led them to place false inscriptions on the busts of their ancestors, and that of the plebeian parvenus to foist their names into illustrious genealogies. It is from the complaints of the same authors we learn that the funeral orations pronounced over distinguished citizens were full of exaggerations and falsehoods-triumphs never gained, and consulships never held; and they acknowledge that as these perversions and forgeries belonged to times from which no contemporary history had been preserved, it was impossible for the historian, while he pointed out the falsehood, to substitute the truth for it.* It is important to note these characters of honesty in the great Roman writers, as they warrant us in concluding that, however they may have been embarrassed by the scarcity of authentic materials, and the abundance of forgeries, they have not wilfully corrupted history. And if Livy and Dionysius are free from this imputation, Fabius and Macer, on whom they were compelled to rely, as the authors of the earliest continuous histories, stand equally clear of suspicion. After all, the exaggerations and falsehoods of which Livy and Cicero complain do not affect the main course of events, either in the political or constitutional history of Rome. False triumphs may have been claimed, and false names interpolated into the records of real triumphs, but the march of Roman conquest in Italy is unmistakeably traced. The overthrow of royalty, the establishment of the tribunate, the decemviral legislation, the gradual admission of the plebeians to power and office, are all related with personal details, which, when rigidly examined and compared, are found to be inconsistent or improbable, or even chronologically impossible; but the succession and causal nexus between the events themselves, in which the real lesson of the history lies, is not rendered doubtful by these discrepancies. Roman history, at least after the time of Romulus and Numa, never could become mythic. There was no period at which the art * Cic. Brut. c. 16; Liv. viii. 40. |