After the life of Hannibal, in the MS., occurred an epigram by the grammarian Aemilius Probus inscribing the work to Theodosius. By this scholars were long misled. It was Lambinus who first proved that the pure Latinity of the lives could not, except by magic, be the product of the Theodosian age; and as ancient testimony amply justified the assignment of the life of Atticus to Nepos, and he was known also to have been the author of just such a book as came out under Probus's name, the great scholar boldly drew the conclusion that the series of biographies we possess were the veritable work of Nepos. For a time controversy raged. A _via media_ was discovered which regarded them as an abridgment in Theodosius's time of the fuller original work. But even this, which was but a concession to prejudice, is now generally abandoned, and few would care to dispute the accuracy of Lambinus's penetrating criticism. [72]
The first artistic historian of Rome is C. SALLUSTIUS CRISPUS (86-34 B.C.). This great writer was born at Amiternum in the year in which Marius died, and, as we know from himself, he came to Rome burning with ambition to ennoble his name, and studied with that purpose the various arts of popularity. He rose steadily through the quaestorship to the tribuneship of the plebs (52 B.C.), and so became a member of the senate. From this position he was degraded (50 B.C.) on the plea of adultery, committed some years before with the wife of Annius Milo, a disgrace he seems to have deeply felt, although it was probably instigated by political and not moral disapprobation. For Sallust was a warm admirer and partisan of Caesar, who in time (47 B.C.) made him praetor, thus restoring his rank; and assigned him (46 B.C.) the province of Numidia, from which he carried an enormous fortune, for the most part, we fear, unrighteously obtained. On his return (45 B.C.), content with his success, he sank into private life; and to the leisure and study of his later years we owe the works that have made him famous. He employed his wealth in ministering to his comfort. His favourite retreats were a villa at Tibur which had once been Caesar's, and a magnificent palace which he built in the suburbs of Rome, surrounded by pleasure-grounds, afterwards well-known as the "Gardens of Sallust," and as the residence of successive emperors. The preacher of ancient virtue was an adept in modern luxury. Augustus chose the historian's dwelling as the scene of his most sumptuous entertainments; Vespasian preferred it to the palace of the Caesars; Nerva and Aurelian, stern as they were, made it their constant abode. [73] And yet Sallust was not a happy man. The inconsistency of conduct and the whirlwind of political passion in which most men then lived seems to have sapped the springs of life and worn out body and mind before their time. Caesar's activity had at his death begun to make him old; [74] Sallust lived only to the age of 52; Lucretius and Catullus were even younger when they died. And the views of life presented in their works are far from hopeful. Sallust, indeed, praises virtue; but it is an ideal of the past, colossal but extinct, on which his gloomy eloquence is exhausted. Among his contemporaries he finds no vestige of ancient goodness; honour has become a traffic, ambition has turned to avarice, and envy has taken the place of public spirit. From this scene of turpitude he selects two men who in diverse ways recall the strong features of antiquity. These are Caesar and Cato; the one the idol of the people, whom with real persuasion they adored as a god; [75] the other the idol of the senate, whom the Pompeian poet exalts even above the gods. [76] The contrast and balancing of the virtues of these two great men is one of the most effective passages in Sallust. [77]
