Page:Thucydides, translated into English Vol 1.djvu/10

THE GREATNESS OF THUCYDIDES • What are they all (the Roman Historians) to the great Athenian ? ' I do assure j'ou that there is no prose composition in the world, not 'even the De Corona, which I place so high as the seventh book of •Thucydidcs. It is the tie plus ultra of human art. I was delighted ' to find in Gray's letters the other day this query to Wharton : " The ' retreat from Syracuse— Is it or is it not the finest thing you ever read ' in your life ?" ' — Life of Lord Macaulay, vol. i. p. 449. ' Most people read all the Greek that they ever read before they are ' five and twenty , . , Accordingly, almost all their ideas of Greek ' literature are ideas formed while they were still very young. A young ' man, whatever his genius may be, is no judge of such a writer as ' Thucydidcs. I had no high opinion of him ten years ago. I have now ' been reading him with a mind accustomed to historical researches, and ' to political affairs ; and I am astonished at my own former blindness, ' and at his greatness.* — Vol. i. p. 440. Appendi-x, p. 475. — 'This day I finished Thucydidcs, after reading ' him with inexpressible interest and admiration. He is the greatest ' historian that ever lived. Feb. 27, 1835.' ' I am still of the same mind. May 30, 1836.' ' Wliilc I was reading the Annals I was reading Thucydidcs . . . ' What made the Annals appear cold and poor to me was the intense 'interest which Thucydidcs inspired. Indeed, what colouring is there 'which would not look tame when placed side by side with the mag- ' nifiLcnt light, and the terrible shade, of Thucydidcs ? Tacitus was 'a great man, but he was not up to the Sicilian expedition.'— Vol. i. p. 45B- I