There is then no need to translate the expression of Augustus "the play"--that is, the deceit--"is ended," but rather "the drama"--the work committed by destiny--"is finished."
The drama was ended, and what a drama! It is difficult to find in history a longer and more troubled career than that known by Augustus for nearly sixty years, from the far-away days when, young, handsome, full of ambition and daring, he had come to Rome, throwing himself head first into the frightful turmoil let loose by the murder of Caesar, to that tranquil death, the death of a great wise man, in the midst of the pax Romana, now spread from end to end of the Empire! After so many tragic catastrophies had struck his class and his family, Euthanasia--the death of the happy--descended for the first time since the passing of Lucullus, to close the eyes of a great Roman.
There is no better means of giving an idea of the mission of the Roman Empire in the world than to summarise the life and work of this famous personage. Augustus has been in our century somewhat the victim of Napoleon I. The extraordinary course of events at the beginning of the nineteenth century made so vivid an impression on succeeding generations, that for
