[365]. This, of course, is the old invidious distinction between tragedy and comedy revived in other material. Cf. the curious passage in Tacitus (Ann., xiii. 31) in which he, for his part, glances disdainfully at those who think “beams and foundation-stones” (Nero’s amphitheatre) worth mentioning. such things should be kept for journals (diurnis urbis actis): it is for the dignity of the Roman people that only illustrious matters should find place in Annals. The two thoughts are characteristic of the two men.
[366]. Vi, amaritudine, instantia.
[367]. Diserti, used here, as disertior is lower, with the slightly invidious sense which often attaches to the word, just as it does to the English equivalent here used for it.
[368]. Est enim res difficilis, ardua, fastidiosa, et quæ eos, a quibus contemnitur, invicem contemnat.
[369]. So I translate nominibus.
[370]. The Declamations were last edited, I think, by Ritter in the Teubner Library. That invaluable collection puts (as indeed is usual) the Dialogus with the other minor works of Tacitus, ed. Halm. It may also be found, with the same company, in the new Oxford Bibliotheca Classicorum, ed. Furneaux. I use a pretty and convenient joint edition of the nineteen complete Declamations and the Dialogue, which appeared at Oxford, without editor’s name, in 1692.
[372]. I say this in some fear and trembling, with such an authority as the late Mr Nettleship against me. But I have been accustomed for a good many years to compare styles in more languages than one or two, and I think these most unlike. Even the argument that a man may suit his style to his work is not conclusive, for here it is the general unlikeness of tone and flavour, which cannot be wholly disguised, that decides me.
[373]. Causidici.
[374]. Or Vipstanus, as they read now.