his contemporaries refuse to appreciate him, posterity will not fail to do so. This confidence was fully justified. Not only his friends but the public amply recognised his genius; and if men like Cicero, Horace, and Caesar, do not grant him the highest creative power, they at least speak with admiration of his cultivated taste. The criticism of Cicero is as discriminating as it is friendly: [26] "Tu quoque, qui solus lecto sermone, Terenti, Conversum espressumque Latina voce Menandrum In medio populi sedatis vocibus effers; Quidquid come loquens atque omnia dulcia dicens." Caesar, in a better known epigram, [27] is somewhat less complimentary, but calls him _puri sermonis amator_ ("a well of English undefiled"). Varro praises his commencement of the _Andria_ above its original in Menander; and if this indicates national partisanship, it is at least a testimony to the poet's posthumous fame. The modern character of Terence, as contrasted with Plautus, is less apparent in his language than in his sentiments. His Latin is substantially the same as that of Plautus, though he makes immeasurably fewer experiments with language. He never resorts to strange words, uncouth compounds, puns, or Graecisms for producing effect; [28] his diction is smooth and chaste, and even indelicate subjects are alluded to without any violation of the proprieties; indeed it is at first surprising that with so few appeals to the humourous instinct and so little witty dialogue, Terence's comic style should have received from the first such high commendation. The reason is to be found in the circumstances of the time. The higher spirits at Rome were beginning to comprehend the drift of Greek culture, its subtle mastery over the passions, its humanitarian character, its subversive influence. The protest against traditional exclusiveness begun by the great Scipio, and powerfully enforced by Ennius, was continued in a less heroic but not less effective manner by the younger Scipio and his friends Lucilius and Terence. All the plays of Terence are written with a purpose; and the purpose is the same which animated the political leaders of free thought. To base conduct upon reason rather than tradition, and paternal authority upon kindness rather than fear; [29] to give up the vain attempt to coerce youth into the narrow path of age; to grapple with life as a whole by making the best of each difficulty when it arises; to live in comfort by means of mutual concession and not to plague ourselves with unnecessary troubles: such are some of the principles indicated in those plays of Menander which Terence so skilfully adapted, and whose lessons he set before a younger and more vigorous people. The elucidation of these principles in the action of the play, and the corresponding interchange of thought naturally awakened in the dialogue and expressed with studied moderation, [30] form the charm of the Terentian drama. In the bolder elements of dramatic excellence it must