which Cæsar pardoned Marcellus as higher than all his warlike exploits, would but have raised a smile on the lips of the Dictator; and the slighting way in which the cause of the republic and Pompey are mentioned, is totally different from the manner in which Cicero expressed himself on these delicate topics, even in presence of Cæsar, in his authentic orations for Deiotarus and Ligarius. It is evident, at first view, that many of Wolf’s observations are hypercritical; and that in his argument concerning the encomiums on Cæsar, and the overrated importance of his clemency to Marcellus, he does not make sufficient allowance for Cicero’s habit of exaggeration, and the momentary enthusiasm produced by one of those transactions, —— “Quæ, dum geruntur, Percellunt animos.” —— Accordingly, in the year following that of Wolf’s edition, Olaus Wormius published, at Copenhagen, a vindication of the authenticity of this speech. To the argument adduced from Plutarch, he answers, that some months had elapsed between the orations for Marcellus and Ligarius, which might readily be called a long period, by one accustomed to hear Cicero harangue almost daily in the Senate or Forum. Besides, the phrase of Plutarch, λεγοντος may mean pleading for some one, which was not the nature of the speech for Marcellus. As to the motive which led to write and publish the oration, Cicero, above all men, was delighted with his own productions, and nothing can be more probable than that he should have wished to preserve the remembrance of that memorable day, which he calls in his letters, _diem illam pulcherrimam_. It was natural to send the oration to Marcellus, in order to hasten his return to Rome, and it must have been an acceptable thing to Cæsar, thus to record his fearlessness and benignity. With regard to the manner in which Pompey and the republican party are talked of, it is evident, from his letters, that Cicero was disgusted with the political measures of that faction, that he wholly disapproved of their plan of the campaign, and foreseeing a renewal of Sylla’s proscriptions in the triumph of the aristocratic power, he did not exaggerate in so highly extolling the humanity of Cæsar. The arguments of Wormius were expanded and illustrated by Weiske, _In Commentario perpetuo et pleno in Orat. Ciceronis pro Marcello_, published at Leipsic, in 1805(344), while, on the other hand, Spalding, in his _De Oratione pro Marcello Disputatio_, published in 1808, supported the opinions of Wolfius.