But they, while their companions slépt, 10. Standing on what | too long we bore | A path to higher destinies; 11. Nor deem the irrevocable Past | To something nobler | we attàin. HENRY W. LONGFELLOW. DICTIONARY LESSON. Define, and use in sentences of your own, with the meaning they have in this lesson, the following words: ignoble, eminent domain, bastions, irrevocable, irreverence, scale, destinies, discontents, uprear. 51. JULIUS CÆSAR. Before this lesson is read, the teacher should relate to the class the leading events in Roman history, connected with Cæsar. 1. In person, Cæsar was tall and slight. His features were more refined than was usual in Roman faces. The forehead was wide and high, the nose large and thin, the lips full, the eyes dark-gray like an eagle's, the neck extremely thick and sinewy. His complexion was pale. His beard and mustache were kept carefully shaved. His hair was short and naturally scanty, falling off toward the end of his life and leaving him partially bald. His voice, especially when he spoke in public, was high and shrill. 2. His health was uniformly strong until his last year, when he became subject to epileptic fits. He was a great bather, and scrupulously clean in all his habits, abstemious in his food, and careless in what it consisted, rarely or never touching wine, and noting sobriety as the highest of qualities when describing any new people. 3. He was an athlete in early life, admirable in all manly exercises, and especially in riding. In Gaul, as has been said already, he rode a remarkable horse, which he had bred himself, and which would let no one but Cæsar mount him. 4. From his boyhood it was observed of him that he was the truest of friends, that he avoided quarrels, and was most easily appeased when offended. In manner he was quiet and gentlemanlike, with the natural courtesy of high breeding. On an occasion, when he was dining somewhere, the other guests found the oil too rancid for them. Cæsar took it without remark, to spare his entertainer's feeling. When on a journey through a forest with his friend Oppius, he came one night to a hut where there was a single bed. Oppius being unwell, Cæsar gave it up to him and slept on the ground. 5. Of Cæsar, too, it may be said that he came into the world at a special time and for a special object. The old religions were dead, from the pillars of Hercules to the Euphrates and the Nile, and the principles on which human society had been constructed were dead also. There remained of spiritual conviction only the common and human sense of justice and morality; and out of this sense some ordered system of government had to be constructed, under which quiet men could live and labor and eat the fruit of their industry. 6. Under a rule of this material kind there can be no enthusiasm, no chivalry, no saintly aspirations, no patriotism of the heroic type. It was not to last forever. A new life was about to dawn for mankind. Poetry, and faith, and devotion were to spring again out of the seeds which were sleeping in the heart of humanity. 7. But the life which is to endure grows slowly; and as the soil must be prepared before the wheat can be sown, so before the kingdom of heaven could throw up its shoots there was needed a kingdom of this world where the nations were neither torn in pieces by violence, nor were rushing after false ideals and spurious ambitions. 8. Such a kingdom was the empire of the Cæsarsa kingdom where peaceful men could work, think, and speak as they pleased, and travel freely among provinces ruled for the most part by governors who protected life and property, and forbade fanatics to tear each other in pieces for their religious opinions. 9. "It is not lawful for us to put any man to death," was the complaint of the Jewish priests to the Roman governor. Had Europe and Asia been covered with independent nations, each with a local religion represented in its ruling powers, Christianity must have been stifled in its cradle. If St. Paul had escaped the Sanhedrim at Jerusalem, he would have been torn to pieces by the silversmiths at Ephesus. The appeal to Cæsar's judg ment-seat was the shield of his mission, and alone made possible his success. 10. And this spirit, which confined government to its simplest duties, while it left opinion unfettered, was especially present in Julius Cæsar himself. From cant of all kinds he was totally free. He was a friend of the people, but he indulged in no enthusiasm for liberty. He never dilated on the beauties of virtue, or complimented, as Cicero did, a Providence in which he did not believe. He was too sincere to stoop to unreality. 11. He held to the facts of this life and to his own convictions; and, as he found no reason for supposing that there was a life beyond the grave, he did not pretend to expect it. He respected the religion of the Roman State as an institution established by the laws. He encouraged, or left unmolested, the creeds and practices of the uncounted sects or tribes who were gathered under the eagles. But his own writings contain nothing to indicate that he himself had any religious belief at all. 12. He saw no evidence that the gods practically interfered in human affairs. He never pretended that Jupiter was on his side. He thanked his soldiers after a victory, but he did not order Te Deums to be sung for it; and, in the absence of these conventionalisms, he perhaps showed more real reverence than he could have displayed by the freest use of the formulas of pietism. DEFINITIONS. ep'i lep sy, a disease of the brain, in which the person attacked falls in convulsions. scru'pu lous ly, with a nice regard to minute particulars. fa nat'ics, persons wildly zealous in religious matters. FROUDE. as pi ra'tions, eager desires after. spu'ri ous, illegitimate; not genuine. San'he drim, the highest council of the Jews. di lat'ed, spoke at length; enlarged. ath'lete, a contender for victory Ju'pi ter, the chief god of the in feats of strength. Romans. COMPOSITION. Write what you can remember about Cæsar. 52. TRANSPOSITION OF POETRY INTO PROSE. Poetry is converted into prose, by making such changes in words as are necessary to break up the rhyme or measure; by supplying elliptical expressions, and by arranging the words in their grammatical order as follows: I. The subject with its adjective elements,—word, phrase, or clause. II. The predicate, consisting of a verb only; a verb and object, or a neuter verb with its complement,word, phrase, or clause. III. The adverbial element, consisting of a single adverb, a phrase, or a clause. ILLUSTRATION OF TRANSPOSITION. POETIC ORDER. Were a star quenched on high, Still traveling downward from the sky, Shine on our mortal sight. So when a great man dies, For years beyond our ken, The light he leaves behind him lies Upon the paths of men. PROSE ORDER. LONGFELLOW. If a star were quenched in the heavens, its light, traveling downward from the sky, would shine upon us for ages. So when a great man dies, the light which he leaves behind him shines, for years beyond our ken, upon the paths of mortals. EXERCISES. In a similar manner, change the following stanzas, and be prepared to read the prose form in the class. 1. Beneath those rugged elms, that yew-tree's shade, Where heaves the turf in many a moldering heap, Each in his narrow cell forever laid, The rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep. 2. On the grass land, on the fallow, |