Page:Essay on the Principles of Translation - Tytler (1791, 1st ed).djvu/44

To be clearly understood, I must give my own version of the whole passage. "The history of the ancient republic of Rome, both in its prosperous and in its adverse days, has been recorded by eminent authors: Even the reign of Augustus has been happily delineated, down to those times, when the prevailing spirit of adulation put to silence every ingenuous writer. The annals of Tiberius, of Caligula, of Claudius, and of Nero, written while they were alive, were falsified from terror; as were those histories composed after their death, from hatred to their recent memories. For this reason, I have resolved to attempt a short delineation of the latter part of the reign of Augustus; and afterwards that of Tiberius, and of the succeeding prin-"ces;