Cicero and Demosthenes have been frequently compared. Suidas says, that one Cicilus, a native of Sicily, whose works are now lost, was the first to institute the parallel, and they have been subsequently compared, in due form, by Plutarch and Quintilian, and, (as far as relates to sublimity,) by Longinus, among the ancients; and among the moderns, by Herder, in his _Philosophical History of Man_, and by Jenisch, in a German work devoted to the subject(345). Rapin, and all other French critics, with the exception of Fenelon, give the preference to Cicero. From what has already been said, it is sufficiently evident that Cicero had not to contend with any of those obstructions from nature which Demosthenes encountered; and his youth, in place of being spent like that of the Greek orator, in remedying and supplying defects, was unceasingly employed in pursuit of the improvements auxiliary to his art. But if Cicero derived superior advantages from nature, Demosthenes possessed other advantages, in the more advanced progress of his country in refinement and letters, at the era in which he appeared. Greek literature had reached its full perfection before the birth of Demosthenes, but Cicero was, in a great measure, himself the creator of the literature of Rome, and no prose writer of eminence had yet existed, after whom he could model his phraseology. In other external circumstances, they were placed in situations not very dissimilar. But Cicero had a wider, and perhaps more beautiful field, in which to expatiate and to exercise his powers. The wide extent of the Roman empire, the striking vices and virtues of its citizens, the memorable events of its history, supplied an endless variety of great and interesting topics; whereas many of the orations of Demosthenes are on subjects unworthy of his talents. Their genius and capacity were in many respects the same. Their eloquence was of that great and comprehensive kind, which dignifies every subject, and gives it all the force and beauty it is capable of receiving. “I judge Cicero and Demosthenes,” says Quintilian, “to be alike in most of the great qualities they possessed. They were alike in design, in the manner of dividing their subject, and preparing the minds of the audience; in short, in every thing belonging to invention.” But while there was much similarity in their talents, there was a wide difference in their tempers and characters. Demosthenes was of an austere, harsh, melancholy disposition, obstinate and resolute in all his undertakings: Cicero was of a lively, flexible, and wavering humour. This seems the chief cause of the difference in their eloquence; but the contrasts are too obvious, and have been too often exhibited to be here displayed. No person wishes to be told, for the twentieth time, that Demosthenes assumes a higher tone, and is more serious, vehement, and impressive, than Cicero; while Cicero is more insinuating, graceful, and affecting: That the Greek orator struck on the