Still, I may write something about the manner of
Tacitus, which will not violate Cardinal Newman's laws, nor be an outrage
to taste and common-sense. "It is the great excellence of a writer," says
Dr. Johnson, "to put into his book as much as it will hold:" and if this
judgment be sound, then is Tacitus the greatest of all writers in prose.
Gordon says of him, "He explains events with a redundancy of images, and a
frugality of words: his images are many, but close and thick; his words
are few, but pointed and glowing; and even his silence is instructive and
affecting. Whatever he says, you see; and all, that you see, affects you.
Let his words be ever so few, his thought and matter are always abundant.
His imagination is boundless, yet never outruns his judgment; his wisdom
is solid and vast, yet always enlivened by his imagination. He starts the
idea, and lets the imagination pursue it; the sample he gives you is so
fine, that you are presently curious to see the whole piece, and then you
have your share in the merit of the discovery; a compliment, which some
able writers have forgot to pay to their readers.
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