Each was an ideal in his
own class. But Augustus, having finally triumphed, has met with more than
justice from succeeding ages. Even Lord Bacon says, that, by comparison
with Julius Caesar, he was "_non tam impar quam dispar_," surely a
most extravagant encomium, applied to whomsoever. On the other hand,
Anthony, amongst the most signal misfortunes of his life, might number it,
that Cicero, the great dispenser of immortality, in whose hands (more
perhaps than in any one man's of any age) were the vials of good and evil
fame, should happen to have been his bitter and persevering enemy. It is,
however, some balance to this, that Shakspeare had a just conception of
the original grandeur which lay beneath that wild tempestuous nature
presented by Anthony to the eye of the undiscriminating world. It is to
the honor of Shakspeare, that he should have been able to discern the true
coloring of this most original character, under the smoke and tarnish of
antiquity. It is no less to the honor of the great triumvir, that a
strength of coloring should survive in his character, capable of baffling
the wrongs and ravages of time.
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