A
gratitude of the same mixed quality must naturally have been felt by the
Second Caesar for his title of _Augustus_, which, whilst it illustrated his
public character by the highest expression of majesty, set apart and
sequestrated to public functions, had also the agreeable effect of
withdrawing from the general remembrance his obscure descent. For the
Octavian house [_gens_] had in neither of its branches risen to any great
splendor of civic distinction, and in his own, to little or none. The same
titular decoration, therefore, so offensive to the celebrated Whig, was,
in the eyes of Augustus, at once a trophy of public merit, a monument of
public gratitude, and an effectual obliteration of his own natal
obscurity.
But, if merely odious to men of Sir William's principles, to others the
character of Augustus, in relation to the circumstances which surrounded
him, was not without its appropriate interest. He was summoned in early
youth, and without warning, to face a crisis of tremendous hazard, being
at the same time himself a man of no very great constitutional courage;
perhaps he was even a coward.
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