"The change of a popular into an absolute government has generally been of very ill consequence; for, betwixt the hatred of the people and injustice of the prince, it, of necessity, comes to pass, that they live in distrust, and mutual apprehensions. But, if the commons knew a just person, whom they entirely confided in, it would be for the advantage of all parties, that such a one should be their sovereign; wherefore, if you shall continue to administer justice impartially, as hitherto you have done, your power will prove safe to yourself, and beneficial to mankind." This excellent sentence, which seems taken out of Plato, (with whose writings the grammarians were not much acquainted, and therefore cannot reasonably be suspected of forgery in this matter,) contains the true state of affairs at that time: for the commonwealth maxims were now no longer practicable; the Romans had only the haughtiness of the old commonwealth left, without one of its virtues. And this sentence we find, almost in the same words, in the First Book of the "Æneïs," which at this time he was writing; and one might wonder that none of his commentators have taken notice of it. He compares a tempest to a popular insurrection, as Cicero had compared a sedition to a storm, a little before: _Ac veluti, magno in populo, cum sæpe coorta est Seditio, sævitque animis ignobile vulgus, Jamque faces, et saxa volant; furor arma ministrat: Tum pietate gravem ac meritis si forte virum quem Conspexere, silent, arrectisque auribus adstant: Ille regit dictis animos, et pectora mulcet._ Piety and merit were the two great virtues which Virgil every where attributes to Augustus, and in which that prince, at least politicly, if not so truly, fixed his character, as appears by the _Marmor Ancyr._ and several of his medals. Franshemius, the learned supplementor of Livy, has inserted this relation into his history; nor is there any good reason, why Ruæus should account it fabulous. The title of a poet in those days did not abate, but heighten, the character of the gravest senator. Virgil was one of the best and wisest men of his time, and in so popular esteem, that one hundred thousand Romans rose when he came into the theatre, and paid him the same respect they used to Cæsar himself, as Tacitus assures us. And, if Augustus invited Horace to assist him in writing his letters, (and every body knows that the "_Rescripta Imperatorum_" were the laws of the empire,) Virgil might well deserve a place in the cabinet-council.