26. Near two thousand of his letters - a mode of composition
in which Libanius was thought to excel - are still extant,
and already published. The critics may praise their subtle
and elegant brevity yet Dr. Bentley (Dissertation upon
Phalaris, p. 487) might justly though quaintly observe that
"you feel, by the emptiness and deadness of them, that you
converse with some dreaming pedant, with his elbow on his
desk."