It is only in this sense that there can be true representatives of a people, who, if the expression is allowable, are its true historical men. It is in them that the spirit and character, the general leaning tendency, the peculiar style of feeling, sentiment, and thought of a nation, in any definite period or periods, finds its most decided and loudest expression. Rarely, however, is this attained in a system of elective deputies or representatives, which is liable to many passing and accidental influences, and, indeed, in and by itself has no connection with it. Scipio and Cato would be representatives of the Roman character and spirit, even if they had never been invested with public authority and had lived their whole lives in exile. And in the same manner purely intellectual natures may often stand for such historical characters and representatives. Horace and Tacitus most assuredly occupy the same relation to their respective ages as the two former did to theirs, and this, in truth, quite independently of any subordinate rank or political dignity and influence which either the one or the other possessed in peace or war. Cicero, indeed, would have been all this in an equal degree, and, perhaps, still more so, if, keeping entirely aloof from the civil contentions of his day, for which he was little suited, he had devoted himself to the acquisition of a purely intellectual and literary influence. However, it is not every famous author or every brilliant political speaker that can in this sense be justly regarded as historical characters. Besides that energy of talent which creates an epoch, and which is, indeed, the primary and essential condition, certain other properties of character are required, certain sentiments and principles vividly carried out and realized in life and action. But this is a combination which is rarely found. A peculiar sphere of practical influence does not form an immediate, nor, indeed, a necessary qualification of such a character. Still it is evident that a writer who truly merits such an appellation must be something more than a mere man of letters or an artist. The effects he produces on the minds of men must be both truly national and historical. Such alone are truly and properly the historical representatives of a people--the men of their nation.