nly Mirabeau, Pitt, Fox, Burke,
Brougham, Webster, and Clay can even be compared with them. In power of
moving the people, some of our modern reformers and agitators may be
mentioned favorably; but their harangues are comparatively tame
when read.

In philosophy the Greeks and Romans distinguished themselves more even
than in poetry, or history, or eloquence. Their speculations pertained
to the loftiest subjects that ever tasked the intellect of man. But this
great department has already been presented. There were respectable
writers in various other departments of literature, but no very great
names whose writings have descended to us. Contemporaries had an exalted
opinion of Varro, who was considered the most learned of the Romans, as
well as their most voluminous author. He was born ten years before
Cicero, and is highly commended by Augustine. He was entirely devoted to
literature, took no interest in passing events, and lived to a good old
age. Saint Augustine says of him that "he wrote so much that one wonders
how he had time to read; and he read so much, we are astonished how he
found time to write." He composed four hundred and ninety books. Of
these only one has descended to us entire,--"De Re Rustica," written at
the age of eighty; but it is the best treatise which has come down from
antiquity on ancient agriculture. We have parts of his other books, and
we know of still others that have entirely perished which for their
information would be invaluable, especially his "Divine Antiquities," in
sixteen books,--his great work, from which Saint Augustine drew
materials for his "City of God." Varro wrote treatises on language, on
the poets, on philosophy, on geography, and on various other subjects;
he also wrote satire and criticism. But although his writings were
learned, his style was so bad that the ages have failed to preserve him.
The truly immortal books are most valued for their artistic excellences.
No man, however great his genius, can afford to be dull. Style is to
written composition what delivery is to a public speaker. The multitude
do not go to hear the man of thoughts, but to hear the man of words,
being repelled or attracted by _manner_.

Seneca was another great writer among the Romans, but he belongs to the
domain of philosophy, although it is his ethical works which have given
him immortality,--as may be truly said of Socrates and Epictetus,
although they are usually classed among the philosoph