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literary affociations. They will fee that emulation, the powerful spring of all human aims at excellence, has, in this inftance,. a more than ordinary effect, and will conclude it to be for the intereft of science and humanity, to encourage that most honest of every fpecies of ambition, the ambition of fuperiority in the various claffes of learning.

Dark refearches, indeed, where conjecture only flatters the purfuit, and abftracted fpeculations, where the imagination, like the dove in the deluge, has not where to place her foot, can do but little fervice in the promotion of real knowledge, and can only serve to prey upon those hours that are never to return.

Yet even amusements of this kind are not altogether to be condemned, while there are men to whofe happiness they contribute; and thofe inquifitions into antiquity must be barren indeed, that do not meet with fome marks of genius, or fome ray of moral truth.

Many of both are to be found in the hiftory of this Academy, and not a few in the volumes before us.

The hiftorical part, which is contained in the thirty-fourth volume, confifts of the following articles.

I. Remarks on fome Paflages in the Text of the Cyropædia of Xenophon.

II. On the Drefs and Lotions of the Heathen Divinities.
III. Obfervations on a Minerva of variegated Marble.
IV. On Lucian's Afs.

V. On the Golden Afs of Apuleius.

Lucian and Apuleius were cotemporaries, and lived in the times of the Antoninufes. The two tracts above-mentioned are Greek romances, which are in no other refpect worth notice, than as they throw light on the manners of the times. VI. On a Greek Romance, entitled the Babylonics... * *This piece is preferved by Photius. It is of the fame ftamp with the former. A ridiculous drama of witches, conjurers, vagabonds, and the like. In the fecond century of our era, the Greek tafte was wretched. It was the dotage of Greece, and hardly any of their authors are worth attending to, except Heliodorus, Longus, and poffibly one or two more.

VII. An Enquiry concerning thofe Authors from whom Parthenius has drawn his Narrations.

VIII. A Memoir on the ancient Hiftory of the Indians. ** A long, laborious dream.

IX. Obfervations on a Paffage in Plautus, that has fome Relation to the Hiftory of Sicily.

X. Memoirs of Marcus Valerius Meffala, the Friend of Auguftus, a Man of Letters, and a Patron of learned Men. Of this article we fhall take farther notice.

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XI. Obfervations on the Refpect which the Romans entertained for Religion, together. with an Enquiry how far they carried the Liberty of Toleration.

XII On the Afphaltic Lake, or the Dead Sea.

XIII. Remarks on the neceffity of Citations in Works of Erudition, and on the Manner in which the Ancients cited. XIV. Memoirs of Marius, Bifhop of Avenches, Author of the most ancient Chronicle of France.

XV. Remarks on the two laft French Translations of Virgil. XVI. Critical Obfervations on the Abbé de Foy's Notice des Diplomes.

XVII. Devices, Inferiptions, and Medals, made for the Academy.

Such are the contents of the hiftorical part, from which we fhall extract fome memoirs of Meffala. Our curiofity is naturally excited by any account of a perfon who was the friend of Horace, Ovid, and Tibullus, even though he had never been the friend of Auguftus.

The Valerian family were diftinguished in the earliest times of Rome. They acquired two furnames, Corvus, or Corvinus, and Mefiala. The former was given to the famous Valerius, who fought in fingle combat with the gigantic Gaul, in the year of Rome 405; the latter to another of the Valerii, on taking the city of Meffina in Sicily.

Marcus Valerius Meffala Corvinus, defcended from this family, was born in the year of Rome 695, fifty-nine years before the Chriftian era, the fame year in which Livy was born.

Eloquence was then in high eftimation, and Meffala, who turned his ftudies more particularly to it, ftood in the first rank of orators. Horace gives him the epithet of difertus, the eloquent; and places him in that rank:

—— C onfultus juris et a&tor Caufarum mediocris abeft virtute diferti Mefale

Sed tamen in pretio eft

A moderate council, far Meffala's skill

Beneath, may be a ufeful council ftill.

Tibullus reprefents him as having the principal influence at the bar, and deciding the fate of the accufed by the force of his eloquence:

Nam quis te majora gerit caftrifve forove?
Nam fiu diverfi fremat inconflantia vulgi,
Non alius fedare queat, feu judicis ira
Sit placanda, tuis poterit mitejcere verbis,
To none fall thy diflinguifh'd honours yield,
Borne from the bar, or purchas'd in the field.
The wrathful judge, the undifcerning crowd.
For ever changeful, and for ever loud,
When others fought to foothe their rage in vain,
Would thy perfuafive Eloquence restrain.

• Tiberius

<Tiberius chofe him for his master and his model. In oratione Latina, fays Suetonius, fecutus eft Corvinum Meffalam quem fenem obfervaverat.

Pliny gives him a high eulogium. Quintilian celebrates him for his purity and perfpicuity. The author of the book De caufis corrupta eloquentia, compares him with Cicero, and, in fome refpects, gives him the preference to the prince of orators. Cicerone mitior Corvinus, et dulcior, et in verbis magis elaboratus. He has been fometimes cenfured for beginning all his exordiums with complaint of his health.

Meffala, as was usual with the Romans, was both a lawyer and a foldier. We know but little of his first campaigns. We only know that he mentions, with a good deal of complacency, his having the honour to ferve under Caffius the friend of Brutus. He was fond of fpeaking of his general. Meljala Corvinus imperatorem fuum Caffium prædicabat. It is evident from hence, that he was of the republican party, till fuch time as it was deftroyed by the Triumvirates, and on this account he was included in that execrable profcription which deprived the world of Cicero, and of the moft refpectable people in Rome. He had the good fortune, however, to escape the fury of those who fought his life; and in the end he obtained the protection of Auguftus, who was fenfible of his merit, gave him a principal place in his friendship, and raised him to the higheft honours.

Meffala adhered to the party of Brutus and Caffius till those great men were no more; but afterwards, when it was obvious that the republic had no other resources, he joined Octavius, and his attachment to him ended only with his life. This we have from Velleius Paterculus, who is curious on the subject. Protinus Meffala, fulgentiffimus juvenis, proximus in illis caftris Bruti Caffique auctoritati, cum effent qui eum ducem pofcerent, fervari beneficio Cafaris maluit, quam dubiam fpem armorum amplius tentare: nec aut Cæfari quidquam ex victoriis fuis fuit latius quam fervaffe Corvinum: aut majus exemplum hominis grati ac pii, quam Corvinus in Cafarem fuit.

Octavius immediately procured him the dignity of augur, which his father had enjoyed fifty-five years. An irreconcileable enmity took place between Octavius and Antony, and the fenate declared for Octavius. Antony, who was to have been conful with Octavius for the year 723, was deprived of that dignity, and Meflala was chofen in his place. This year was the famous battle of Actium. Meffala accompanied Octavius, and destroyed the remains of Antony's party. It is true that the manner in which he did it does no honour to his good faith. Dion tells us, that Antony and Cleopatra, abandoned by almost all their party, were beaten at Actium; that the gladiators continued faithful to them, and would not hear of any terms of accommodation;

accommodation; but that, after the death of Antony, they càpitulated. Didius promised them terms of favour, but Messala, without refpect to that, caufed them all to be maffacred.

After the expiration of his confulfhip, he took the command in Syria. Tibullus, the poet, was to have accompanied him, but he fell fick by the way, and it was on this occafion that the third elegy of his first book was written :

Ibitis Egeas fine me, Meffala, per undase.

✪ utinam memores ipfe, coborfque mei.
Yes, go, without me, feek wild Adria's fea,
But think, and bid each foldier think of me.

After commanding in Afia, Meffala was fent into Aquitaine to reduce the people who had revolted there. Aquitaine comprehended all the countries that lay between the Pyrenees, the Rhone, the Loire, and the ocean. Meffala had already given proofs of his valour in the victory he had obtained over the Salaffians. We have no certain detail of what happened in the expedition to Aquitaine. All we know is, that he subdued the people, and triumphed.

Tibullus has celebrated this triumph in feveral parts of his works. We fee in the panegyric of Meffala, which begins the fourth volume of the poems of Tibullus, in what military departments that general excelled, and in what countries he gained his victories.

Six years after the battle of Actium, and two years after the triumph of Meffala, the emperor Auguftus thought proper to establish a new magiftracy at Rome, under the title of the præfect of Rome, who had power to punish arbitrarily and without delay, not only flaves, but alfo diforderly citizens, whom the flow and embarraffed progrefs of justice was not fufficient to keep in awe. In this appointment he placed Meffala, who at the end of fix days quitted it, incivilem poteflatem effe conteftans, alledging that it was an uncitizen-like employment. In Eufebius we read incivilem, and in all the MSS. yet Scaliger would have us read invecilem, that is imbecillem fefe poteftati conteftans, becaufe Meffala was too old to go through the duties of fuch a troublesome office: on which Mr. Burigny remarks, that Meffala was not yet forty years of age, when this office was conferred upon him, and that it is not to be prefumed, that a man of his great talents, who had commanded armies, had not abilities fufficient for an officer of juftice. It is more natural to believe that Meffala, brought up in the principles of liberty, was foon difgufted with an employment fo defpotic, fo inconfiftent with the laws, which would at the fame time alarm the people and the prætors whofe power it weakened.

It is to be concluded then that he refigned this office, becaufe he thought the exercise of it injurious to the liberty of the

citizen,

citizen, incivilem. But it was neceffary that he fhould find an excufe to Auguftus, and he reprefented to him that he did not understand the duties of the office. This is what Tacitus intimates, where he fays Mellala gave up the appointment, quafi nefcius exercendi.

This circumftance of his life muft have done him honour with those who had yet any affection for the republican form of government. His reputation for integrity was very great, and Caufaubon does not doubt but Perfius had his eye on him in that paffage, where after cenfuring one of the defcendants of Meffala, he gives us the portrait of a man of real virtue:

Quin damus id fuperis de magna quod dare lance
Non poffit magni Meffala lippa propago:
Compofitum jus, fajque Anieni, Janetofque receffus
Mentis, et incoctum generofo pectus honefto.

We give the gods what in the ponderous bow!
Of great Meffala's race they cannot find,
The unftained heart, the uncorrupted foul,

And all the facred manfion of the mind.

• Meffala is reprefented by Tacitus as a man of irreproachable character; he gave proofs of his attachment to Auguftus, by moving in the fenate that he should be ftyled the father of his country.

When he had bidden adieu to public honours, he retired with a very large fortune, and fpent the remainder of his life in the ftudy of letters, and in the fociety of the moft illuftrious of the learned.

It was after his retreat that Tiberius, who was then young, cultivated his friendship, and adopted him for his preceptor in the rhetorical studies. His attachment to his mater, Auguftus, did not make him defcend to any courtly meannefs; for in his writings he fcruples not to do justice to the emperor's greatest enemies.

• Cremutius Cordus, who, under the empire of Tiberius, fell a victim to that generofity with which he had nobly dared to praise Brutus and Caffius, pleaded in his defence the examples of Afinius Pollio, and Meffala. Both the one and the other, faid he, notwithstanding the liberties they took in this refpect, were loaded with riches and honours. Uterque opibus et honoribus perviguere.

• Tibullus and Horace were the most intimate friends of Meffala. He often vifited them to take a frugal and philosophic dinner. Tibullus flattered himself that he would fee him at his country feat, where his Delia would be diligent in doing honour to her noble gueft:

Huc

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