I shall not subject you, my dear Sextus, to one of my disquisitions; but it seems to me more nearly true, as the years pass, that those old “virtues,” of which the Roman professes himself to be so proud, and upon which, he insists, the greatness of the Empire is founded—it seems to me more and more that those “virtues” of rank, prestige, honor, duty, and piety have simply denuded man of his humanity. Through the labors of the great Octavius Caesar, Rome is now the most beautiful city in the world. May not its citizens now have the leisure to indulge their souls, and thus lead themselves, like
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