Two points may be remarked about
these legends: first, that on no single occasion does Caesar appear to
have been involved in any trouble or quarrel on account of his love
affairs; and secondly, that, with the exception of Brutus and of
Cleopatra's Caesarion, whose claims to be Caesar's son were denied and
disproved, there is no record of any illegitimate children as the result
of these amours--a strange thing if Caesar was as liberal of his favors as
popular scandal pretended. It would be idle to affect a belief that Caesar
was particularly virtuous. He was a man of the world, living in an age as
corrupt as has been ever known. It would be equally idle to assume that
all the ink blots thrown upon him were certainly deserved, because we find
them in books which we call classical. Proof deserving to be called proof
there is none; and the only real evidence is the town talk of a society
which feared and hated Caesar, and was glad of every pretext to injure him
when alive, or to discredit him after his death. Similar stories have been
spread, are spread, and will be spread of every man who raises himself a
few inches above the level of his fellows. We know how it is with our
contemporaries. A single seed of fact will produce in a season or two a
harvest of calumnies, and sensible men pass such things by, and pay no
attention to them.
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