ly in
his favor. Instead of being looked upon as a mere vulgar usurper, who
differed from other usurpers only in having a greater stage, and talents
proportioned to that stage, he is held up as the man of his times, and
as the only man who could fulfil the demands of the crisis that existed
after the death of Sulla. According to Mr. Merivale, who is a very
moderate Caesarian, Caesar was "the true captain and lawgiver and prophet
of the age" in which he lived. When such an assertion can be made by an
English gentleman of well-balanced mind, we may form some idea of the
intensity of that Caesarism which prevails in fiercer minds, and which is
intended to have an effect on contemporary rule. For the controversy
which exists relative to the merits of Romans "dead, and turned to
clay," is not merely critical and scholastic, but is enlivened by its
direct bearing upon living men and contending parties. Caesarism means
Napoleonism. The Bonaparte family is the Julian family of to-day.
Napoleon I. stood for the great Julius, and Napoleon III. is the modern
(and very Gallic) Caesar Augustus, the avenger of his ill-used uncle, and
the crusher of the Junii and the Crassi, and all the rest of the
aristocrats, who overthrew him, and caused his early death. It is not
necessary to point out the utter absurdity of this attempt to justify
modern despotism by referring to the action of men who lived and acted
in the greatest of ancient revolutions; and those men who admire Julius
Caesar, but who are not disposed to see in his conduct a justification of
the conduct of living men, object to the French Imperial view of his
career. Mommsen, whose admiration of Caesar is as ardent as his knowledge
of Roman history is great, speaks with well-deserved scorn of the
efforts that are made to defend contemporary usurpation by
misrepresentation of the history of antiquity. One of his remarks is
curious, read in connection with that history which daily appears in our
journals. Writing before our civil war began, he declared, that, if ever
the slaveholding aristocracy of the Southern States of America should
bring matters to such a pass as their counterparts in the Rome of Sulla,
Caesarism would be pronounced legitimate there also by the spirit of
history,--an observation that derived new interest from the report that
General Lee was to be made Dictator of the Confederacy, and Mr. Davis
allowed to go into that retirement which is so much admired and so