Much of the history of the period described by him, especially of the earlier Caesars, must have been obscure and locked up with the emperor's private papers and memoranda. As we should expect, there was a vast amount of floating gossip, which an his torian would have to sift and utilize as best he might. Tacitus, as a man of good social position, no doubt had access to the best information and must have talked matters over with the most eminent men of the day. There were several writers and chron iclers, whom he occasionally cites but not very often; there were memoirs of distinguished persons—those, for example, of the younger Agrippina, of Thrasea, and Helvidius. There were sev eral collections of letters, like those of the younger Pliny; a number, too, of funeral orations; and the "acta senatus" and the "acta populi" or "acta diurna," the first a record of proceedings in the senate, the latter a kind of gazette or journal. Thus there were the materials for history in considerable abundance, and Tacitus was certainly a man who knew how to turn them to good account. He has given us a striking, and on the whole doubtless a true, picture of the empire in the 1st century. The rhetorical tendency which characterizes the "silver age" of Roman literature gives perhaps exaggerated expression to his undoubtedly strong sense of the badness of individual emperors, but he assuredly wrote with a high aim, and we may accept his own account of it (Ann. iii., 65) : "I regard it as history's highest function to rescue merit from oblivion, and to hold up as a terror to base words and actions the reprobation of posterity." He is convinced of the degeneracy of the age, though it be relieved by the existence of truly noble virtues; and he connects this degeneracy more or less directly with the imperial regime. But it is difficult to dog matize as to Tacitus' political ideals. He is primarily concerned rather with ethics than with politics; though he may feel that the world is out of joint—with whatever sentimental sympathy he may regard the age of "liberty" and admire the heroic epoch of the republic—yet he appears to realize that the empire is a practical necessity, and to the provinces even a benefit. Like the Stoics, with whom otherwise he has little in common, he censures rather individual rulers than the imperial system. But "the key to the interpretation of Tacitus," it has been well said, (Dill, Roman Society from Nero to Marcus Aurelius, Bk.i.ch.i.) "is to regard him as a moralist rather than a politician." Perhaps the strongest work in the Annals and Histories is the delineation of character.
Tacitus gives us no certain clue to his religious belief. His expressions of opinion about the government of the universe are difficult to reconcile with each other. There seems to have been a strange tinge of superstition about him, and he could not divest himself of some belief (Ann. vi. 21,22.) in astrology and revela tions of the future through omens and portents, though he held these were often misunderstood and misinterpreted by charlatans and impostors. On the whole he appears to have inclined to the philosophical theory of "necessitarianism," that every man's future is fixed from his birth ; but we must not fasten on him any particular theory of the world or of the universe. Sometimes he speaks as a believer in a divine overruling Providence, and we may say confidently that with the Epicurean doctrine he had no sort of sympathy.
Tacitus' style is discussed in the article LATIN LANGUAGE. Whatever judgment may be passed on it, it is certainly that of a man of genius, and cannot fail to make a deep impression on the studious reader. Tacitean brevity has become proverbial, and with this are closely allied an occasional obscurity and a rhetori cal affectation which his warmest admirers must admit. He has been compared to Carlyle; and both certainly affect singularity of expression. But they are alike only in the brevity of sentences; and the brevity of Carlyle is not that of an artist in epigram. Tacitus was probably never a popular author ; to be understood and appreciated he must be read again and again, or the point of some of his acutest remarks will be quite missed.
Tacitus has been many times translated, in spite of the very great difficulty of the task; the number of the versions of the whole or part is stated as 393.
Murphy's translation (we should call it a paraphrase) was for long one of the best known ; it was published early in the 19th century. On this was based the so-called Oxford translation, published by Bohn in a revised edition. Messrs. Church and Brodribb's translation and Professor Ramsay's (r904) (the latter of Annals i.—iv.) are much better. Of the many commentaries see Ritter's (1864) ; Nipper dey's (1879) ; Heraus's (Histories, i885) ; Furneaux's (Annals, i. vi., 1884; xi.—xvi. 1891 ; Germania, 1894) ; Spooner's (Histories, 1891). The last two editors' introductions are particularly useful. By far the best edition of the Agricola in English is that of Furneaux as revised by Anderson (Clarendon Press, Oxford). Of works relating to Tacitean Latinity, Draeger's Syntax and Stil des Tacitus is the best.