It is evident from what has been said above that Livy is far from being a perfect historian; yet his history is true in the main, and is based upon broad knowledge and insight into the underlying principles of human character and human actions. He is less interested in accuracy of detail than in broader and more general truth and dramatic presentation. [Sidenote: Livy’s speeches.] So in the speeches with which he enlivens his work, he does not pretend to repeat what the speakers actually said, nor even in every instance to put in their mouths words that express their individual characters, but rather to say in good rhetorical form what the circumstances seem to him to demand. In this he follows Thucydides, and his speeches, like those of Thucydides, serve not merely to give variety to the narrative, but also to bring vividly before us and to explain the circumstances and motives that led up to the actions narrated. These speeches are the most brilliant parts of his work. In them he shows the fruit of his training in the rhetorical schools and of careful study of Demosthenes and Cicero; but his rhetoric does not end in mere declamation. The speeches are not written merely to exhibit his rhetorical training, but to explain and enlighten. Throughout his work Livy appears as the enemy of extremes. His admiration for Pompey does not lead him to become hostile to the ruling family; he is opposed alike to royalty and to unbridled democracy. At the same time he treats his subject with sympathy and warmth of feeling, and makes the ethical side of history prominent, seeking to present in a strong light such actions as may serve as models for conduct, not merely to give a record of events. [Sidenote: Livy’s style.] Livy is unrivalled as a narrator and a painter in words. His style is clear and straightforward, although his periods are often long and sometimes made complicated by the insertion in the sentence of numerous subordinate ideas, often expressed in the form of participles. As is natural for one who wrote when Roman poetry was at its height, he introduces poetical words which are foreign to the prose of Cicero and Cæsar, and some of his phrases show poetic coloring. But his Latin is pure, and it is difficult to see what Asinius Pollio meant by accusing him of “Patavinitas” or Paduanism. In later prose writers the striving for poetic effect becomes a disagreeable mannerism, but such traces of poetry as are found in Livy are not the result of conscious effort, but of the literary atmosphere of the time. His style is not everywhere of uniform excellence; for it is inevitable that in such a long historical work the different qualities of the subject and the advancing age of the writer affect the mode of presentation, but there is no part of the work in which the style is dull or without charm. It is perhaps at its best in the books dealing with the Punic wars.