"But while Cicero stands justly charged with many grave infirmities of temper and defects of principle, while we remark with a sigh the vanity, the inconstancy, and the ingratitude he so often manifested, while we lament his ignoble subserviencies and his ferocious resentments, the high standard by which we claim to judge him is in itself the fullest acknowledgment of his transcendent merits. For undoubtedly had he not placed himself on a higher moral level than the statesmen and sages of his day, we should pass over many of his weaknesses in silence, and allow his pretensions to our esteem to pass almost unchallenged. But we demand a nearer approach to the perfection of human wisdom and virtue in one who sought to approve himself the greatest of their teachers. Nor need we scruple to admit that the judgment of the ancients on Cicero was for the most part unfavorable. The moralists of antiquity required in their heroes virtues with which we can more readily dispense: and they too had less sympathy with many qualities which a purer religion and a wider experience have taught us to love and admire. Nor were they capable, from their position, of estimating the slow and silent effects upon human happiness of the lessons which Cicero enforced. After all the severe judgments we are compelled to pass on his conduct, we must acknowledge that there remains a residue of what is amiable in his character and noble in his teaching beyond all ancient example. Cicero lived and died in faith. He has made converts to the belief in virtue, and had disciples in the wisdom of love. There have been dark periods in the history of man, when the feeble ray of religious instruction paled before the torch of his generous philanthropy. The praise which the great critic pronounced upon his excellence in oratory may be justly extended to the qualities of his heart, and even in our enlightened days it may be held no mean advance in virtue to venerate the master of Roman philosophy." LORD MAHON’S HISTORY OF THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION. Incomparably the best history of our struggle for independence that has been written by a foreigner is that of which we have the larger portion in the just-published fifth and sixth volumes of Lord MAHON’S _History of England from the Peace of Utrecht_, comprising the period from 1763 to 1780—from the commencement of the popular discontents until the virtual conclusion of the war.