Book: The Orations of Marcus Tullius Cicero, Volume 4

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But in praising and blaming, it will be desirable to consider not
so much the personal character of, or the extraneous circumstances
affecting the person of whom one is speaking, as how he has availed
himself of his advantages. For to praise his good fortune is folly,
and to blame it is arrogance; but the praise of a man's natural
disposition is honourable, and the blame of it is a serious thing.

Now, since the principles of argumentation in every kind of cause have
been set forth, it appears that enough has been said about invention,
which is the first and most important part of rhetoric. Wherefore,
since one portion of my work has been brought down to its end from the
former book; and since this book has already run to a great length,
what remains shall be discussed in subsequent books.

[_The two remaining books are lost_.]




THE ORATOR OF M.T. CICERO. ADDRESSED TO MARCUS BRUTUS.


This work was composed by Cicero soon after the battle of Pharsalia,
and it was intended by him to contain the plan of what he himself
considered to be the most perfect style of eloquence. In his Epistles
to his Friends (vi. 18.) he tells Lepta that he firmly believed that
he had condensed all his knowledge of the art of oratory in what he
had set forth in this book.

I. I have, O Brutus, hesitated a long time and often as to whether
it was a more difficult and arduous business to refuse you, when
constantly requesting the same favour, or to do what you desired me to
do. For to refuse a man to whom I was attached above all men, and whom
I knew also to be most entirely devoted to me, especially when he was
only asking what was reasonable, and desiring what was honourable to
me, appeared to me to be very harsh conduct; and to undertake a matter
of such importance as was not only difficult for any man to have the
ability to execute in an adequate manner, but hard even to think of
in a way suited to its importance, appeared to me to be scarcely
consistent with the character of a man who stood in awe of the reproof
of wise and learned men. For what is there more important than, when
the dissimilarity between good orators is so great, to decide which is
the best sort and as it were the best form of eloquence?

However, since you repeat your entreaties, I will attempt the task,
not so much from any hope that I entertain of accomplishing it, as
from my willingness to attempt it. For I had rather that you should
find fault with my prudence in thus complying with your eager desire,
than with my friendship in refusing to attempt it.

You ask me then, and indeed you are constantly asking me, what kind
of eloquence I approve of in the highest degree, and which sort of
oratory I consider that to which nothing can be added, and which I
therefore think the highest and most perfect kind. And in answering
this question I am afraid lest, if I do what you wish, and give you an
idea of the orator whom you are asking for, I may check the zeal of
many, who, being discouraged by despair, will not make an attempt at
what they have no hope of succeeding in. But it is good for all men to
try everything, who have ever desired to attain any objects which are
of importance and greatly to be desired. But if there be any one who
feels that he is deficient either in natural power, or in any eminent
force of natural genius, or that he is but inadequately instructed in
the knowledge of important sciences, still let him hold on his course
as far as he can. For if a man aims at the highest place, it is very
honourable to arrive at the second or even the third rank. For in
the poets there is room not only for Homer (to confine myself to the
Greeks), or for Archilochus, or Sophocles, or Pindar, but there is
room also for those who are second to them, or even below the second.
Nor, indeed, did the nobleness of Plato in philosophical studies deter
Aristotle from writing; nor did Aristotle himself, by his admirable
knowledge and eloquence, extinguish the zeal in those pursuits of all
other men.

II. And it is not only the case that eminent men have not been
deterred by such circumstances from the highest class of studies, but
even those artists have not renounced their art who have been unable
to equal the beauty of the Talysus[58] which we have seen at Rhodes,
or of the Coan Venus. Nor have subsequent sculptors been so far
alarmed at the statue of the Olympian Jove, or of the Shield-bearer,
as to give up trying what they could accomplish, or how far they could
advance; and, indeed, there has been so vast a multitude of those men,
and each of them has obtained so much credit in his own particular
walk, that, while we admire the most perfect models, we have also
approbation to spare for those who come short of them.

But in the case of orators--I mean Greek orators--it is a marvellous
thing how far one is superior to all the rest. And yet when
Demosthenes flourished there were many illustrious orators, and so
there were before his time, and the supply has not failed since. So
that there is no reason why the hopes of those men, who have devoted
themselves to the study of eloquence, should be broken, or why
their industry should languish. For even the very highest pitch of
excellency ought not to be despaired of; and in perfect things those
things are very good which are next to the most perfect.

And I, in depicting a consummate orator, will draw a picture of such
an one as perhaps never existed. For I am not asking who he was, but
what that is than which nothing can be more excellent. And perhaps the
perfection which I am looking for does not often shine forth, (indeed
I do not know whether it ever has been seen,) but still in some degree
it may at times be discoverable, among some nations more frequently,
and among others more sparingly. But I lay down this position, that
there is nothing of any kind so beautiful which has not something more
beautiful still from which it is copied,--as a portrait is from a
person's face,--though it can neither be perceived by the eyes or
ears, or by any other of the senses; it is in the mind only, and by
our thoughts, that we embrace it. Therefore, though we have never seen
anything of any kind more beautiful than the statues of Phidias and
than those pictures which I have named, still we can imagine something
more beautiful. Nor did that great artist, when he was making the
statue of Jupiter or of Minerva, keep in his mind any particular
person of whom he was making a likeness; but there dwelt in his mind
a certain perfect idea of beauty, which he looked upon, and fixed
his eyes upon, and guided his art and his hand with reference to the
likeness of that model.

III. As therefore there is in forms and figures something perfect and
superexcellent, the appearance of which is stamped in our minds so
that we imitate it, and refer to it everything which falls under our
eyes; so we keep in our mind an idea of perfect eloquence, and seek
for its resemblance with our ears.

Now Plato, that greatest of all authors and teachers, not only of
understanding, but also of speaking, calls those forms of things
ideas; and he affirms that they are not created, but that they
exist from everlasting, and are kept in their places by reason and
intelligence: that all other things have their rising and setting,
their ebb and flow, and cannot continue long in the same condition.
Whatever there is, therefore, which can become a subject of discussion
as to its principle and method, is to be reduced to the ultimate form
and species of its class.

And I see that this first beginning of mine is derived not from the
discussions of orators, but from the very heart of philosophy, and
that it is old-fashioned and somewhat obscure, and likely to incur
some blame, or at all events to provoke some surprise. For men will
either wonder what all this has to do with that which is the subject
of our inquiry, and they will be satisfied with understanding the
nature of the facts, so that it may not seem to be without reason that
we have traced their origin so far back; or else they will blame
us for hunting out for unaccustomed paths, and abandoning those in
ordinary use.

But I am aware that I often appear to say things which are novel, when
I am in reality saying what is very old, only not generally known.
And I confess that I have been made an orator, (if indeed I am one at
all,) or such as I am, not by the workshops of the rhetoricians, but
by the walks of the Academy. For that is the school of manifold and
various discourses, in which first of all there are imprinted the
footsteps of Plato. But the orator is to a great extent trained and
assisted by his discussions and those of other philosophers. For all
that copiousness, and forest, as it were, of eloquence, is derived
from those men, and yet is not sufficient for forensic business;
which, as these men themselves used to say, they left to more rustic
muses. Accordingly this forensic eloquence, being despised and
repudiated by philosophy, has lost many great and substantial helps;
but still, as it is embellished with flowery language and well-turned
periods, it has had some popularity among the people, and has had no
reason to fear the judgment or prejudice of a few. And so popular
eloquence has been lost to learned men, and elegant learning to
eloquent ones.

IV. Let this then be laid down among the first principles, (and it
will be better understood presently,)--that the eloquent man whom we
are looking for cannot be rendered such without philosophy. Not indeed
that there is everything necessary in philosophy, but that it is of
assistance to an orator as the wrestling-school is to an actor; for
small things are often compared with great ones. For no one can
express wide views, or speak fluently on many and various subjects,
without philosophy. Since also, in the Phaedrus of Plato, Socrates says
that this is what Pericles was superior to all other orators in, that
he had been a pupil of Anaxagoras the natural philosopher. And it was
owing to him, in his opinion, (though he had learnt also many other
splendid and admirable accomplishments,) that he was so copious and
imaginative, and so thoroughly aware--which is the main thing in
eloquence--by what kinds of speeches the different parts of men's
minds are moved.

And we may draw the same conclusion from the case of Demosthenes; from
whose letters it may be gathered what a constant pupil of Plato's
he was. Nor, indeed, without having studied in the schools of
philosophers, can we discern the genus and species of everything; nor
explain them by proper definitions; nor distribute them into their
proper divisions; nor decide what is true and what is false; nor
discern consequences, perceive inconsistencies, and distinguish what
is doubtful. Why should I speak of the nature of things, the knowledge
of which supplies such abundance of topics to oratory? or of life, and
duty, and virtue, and manners? for what of all these things can be
either spoken of or understood without a long study of those matters?

V. To these numerous and important things there are to be added
innumerable ornaments, which at that time were only to be derived from
those men who were accounted teachers of oratory. The consequence is,
that no one applies himself to that genuine and perfect eloquence,
because the study requisite for understanding those matters is
different from that which enables me to speak of them; and because it
is necessary to go to one class of teachers to understand the things,
and to another to learn the proper language for them. Therefore Marcus
Antonius, who in the time of our fathers was considered to be the most
eminent of all men alive for eloquence, a manly nature very acute and
eloquent, in that one treatise which he has left behind him, says that
he has seen many fluent speakers, but not one eloquent orator, in
truth, he had in his mind a model of eloquence which in his mind he
saw, though he could not behold it with his eyes. But he, being a man
of the most acute genius, (as indeed he was,) and feeling the want of
many things both in himself and other men, saw absolutely no one who
had fairly a right to be called eloquent. But if he did not think
either himself or Lucius Crassus eloquent, then he certainly must
have had in his mind some perfect model of eloquence; and as that
had nothing wanting, he felt himself unable to include those who had
anything or many things wanting in that class.

Let us then, O Brutus, if we can, investigate the nature of this man
whom Antonius never beheld, or who perhaps has never even existed; and
if we cannot imitate and copy him exactly, (which indeed Antonius said
was scarcely possible for a god to do,) still we may perhaps be able
to explain what he ought to be like.

VI. There are altogether three different kinds of speaking, in each of
which there have been some eminent men; but very few (though that is
what we are now looking for) who have been equally eminent in all. For
some have been grandiloquent men, (if I may use such an expression,)
with an abundant dignity of sentiments and majesty of language,
--vehement, various, copious, authoritative; well adapted and prepared
to make an impression on and effect a change in men's feelings: an
effect which some have endeavoured to produce by a rough, morose,
uncivilized sort of speaking, not elaborated or wrought up with any
care; and others employ a smooth, carefully prepared, and well rounded
off style.

On the other hand, there are men neat, acute, explaining everything,
and making matters clearer, not nobler, polished up with a certain
subtle and compressed style of oratory; and in the same class there
are others, shrewd, but unpolished, and designedly resembling rough
and unskilful speakers; and some who, with the same barrenness and
simplicity, are still more elegant, that is to say, are facetious,
flowery, and even slightly embellished.

But there is another class, half-way between these two, and as it were
compounded of both of them, endowed neither with the acuteness of the
last-mentioned orators, nor with the thunder of the former; as a sort
of mixture of both, excelling in neither style; partaking of both, or
rather indeed (if we would adhere to the exact truth) destitute of all
the qualifications of either. Those men go on, as they say, in one
uniform tenor of speaking, bringing nothing except their facility and
equalness of language; or else they add something, like reliefs on a
pedestal, and so they embellish their whole oration, with trifling
ornaments of words and ideas.

VII. Now, whoever have by themselves arrived at any power in each of
these styles of oratory, have gained a great name among orators; but
we must inquire whether they have sufficiently effected what we want.
For we see that there have been some men who have been ornate and
dignified speakers, being at the same time shrewd and subtle arguers.
And I wish that we were able to find a model of such an orator among
the Latins. It would be a fine thing not to be forced to have recourse
to foreign instances, but to be content with those of our own country.
But though in that discourse of mine which I have published in the
Brutus, I have attributed much credit to the Latins,--partly
to encourage others, and partly out of affection for my own
countrymen,--I still recollect that I by far prefer Demosthenes to all
other men, inasmuch as he adapted his energy to that eloquence which
I myself feel to be such, and not to that which I have ever had any
experience of in any actual instance. He was an orator than whom
there has never existed one more dignified, nor more wise, nor more
temperate. And therefore it is well that we should warn those men
whose ignorant conversation is getting to have some notoriety and
weight, who wish either to be called Attic speakers, or who really
wish to speak in the Attic style, to fix their admiration on this man
above all others, than whom I do not think Athens itself more Attic.
For by so doing they may learn what Attic means, and may measure
eloquence by his power and not by their own weakness; for at present
every one praises just that which he thinks that he himself is able
to imitate. But still I think it not foreign to my present subject to
remind those who are endowed with but a weak judgment, what is the
peculiar merit of the Attic writers.

VIII. The prudence of the hearers has always been the regulator of
the eloquence of the orators. For all men who wish to be approved of,
regard the inclination of those men who are their hearers, and form
and adapt themselves entirely which of the Greek rhetoricians
ever drew any of his rules from Thucydides? Oh, but he is praised
universally. I admit that, but it is on the ground that he is a wise,
conscientious, dignified relater of facts, not that he was pleading
causes before tribunals, but that he was relating wars in a history.
Therefore, he was never accounted an orator; nor, indeed, should we
have ever heard of his name if he had not written a history, though he
was a man of eminently high character and of noble birth. But no one
ever imitates the dignity of his language or of his sentiments, but
when they have used some disjointed and unconnected expressions, which
they might have done without any teacher at all, then they think that
they are akin to Thucydides. I have met men too who were anxious to
resemble Xenophon, whose style is, indeed, sweeter than honey, but as
unlike as possible to the noisy style of the forum.

X Let us then return to the subject of laying a foundation for
the orator whom we desire to see, and of furnishing him with that
eloquence which Antonius had never found in any one. We are, O Brutus,
undertaking a great and arduous task, but I think nothing difficult to
a man who is in love. But I am and always have been in love with your
genius, and your pursuits, and your habits. Moreover, I am every day
more and more inflamed not only with regret,--though I am worn away
with that while I am wishing to enjoy again our meetings and our daily
association, and your learned discourse,--but also with the admirable
reputation of your incredible virtues, which, though different in
their kind, are united by your prudence. For what is so different or
remote from severity as courtesy? And yet who has ever been considered
either more conscientious or more agreeable than you? And what is
so difficult as, while deciding disputes between many people, to be
beloved by all of them? Yet you attain this end, of dismissing in a
contented and pacified frame of mind the very parties against whom you
decide. Therefore, while doing nothing from motives of interest
you still contrive that all that you do should be acceptable. And
therefore, of all the countries on earth, Gaul[59] is now the only one
which is not affected by the general conflagration, while you yourself
enjoy your own virtues in peace, knowing that your conduct is
appreciated in this bright Italy, and surrounded as you are by the
flower and strength of the citizens.

And what an exploit is that, never, amid all your important
occupations, to interrupt your study of philosophy! You are always
either writing something yourself or inviting me to write something.
Therefore, I began this work as soon as I had finished my Cato, which
I should never have meddled with, being alarmed at the aspect of the
times, so hostile to virtue, if I had not thought it wicked not to
comply with your wishes, when you were exhorting me and awaking in me
the recollection of that man who was so dear to me, and I call you to
witness that I have only ventured to undertake this subject after many
entreaties on your part, and many refusals on mine. For I wish that
you should appear implicated in this fault, so that if I myself should
appear unable to support the weight of such a subject, you may bear
the blame of having imposed such a burden on me, and I only that
of having undertaken it. And then the credit of having had such a
commission given me by you, will make amends for the blame which the
deficiency of my judgment will bring upon me.

XI. But in everything it is very difficult to explain the form (that
which is called in Greek [Greek: charaktaer]) of perfection, because
different things appear perfection to different people. I am delighted
with Ennius, says one person, because he never departs from the
ordinary use of words. I love Pacuvius, says another, all his verses
are so ornamented and elaborate while Ennius is often so careless.
Another is all for Attius. For there are many different opinions, as
among the Greeks, nor is it easy to explain which form is the most
excellent. In pictures one man is delighted with what is rough harsh
looking, obscure, and dark, others care only for what is neat cheerful
and brilliant. Why should you, then give any precise command or
formula, when each is best in its own kind, and when there are many
kinds? However, these difficulties have not repelled me from this
attempt, and I have thought that in everything there is some point of
absolute perfection even though it is not easily seen, and, that it
can be decided on by a man who understands the matter.

But since there are many kinds of speeches, and those different, and
as they do not all fall under one form, the form of panegyric, and of
declamation, and of narration, and of such discourses as Isocrates has
left us in his panegyric, and many other writers also who are called
sophists; and the form also of other kinds which have no connexion
with forensic discussion, and of the whole of that class which is
called in Greek [Greek: epideiktikon], and which is made up as it were
for the purpose of being looked at--for the sake of amusement, I
shall omit at the present time. Not that they deserve to be entirely
neglected; for they are as it were the nursery of the orator whom we
wish to draw; and concerning whom we are endeavouring to say something
worth hearing.

XII. From this form is derived fluency of words; from it also the
combination and rhythm of sentences derives a freer licence. For
great indulgence is shown to neatly turned sentences; and rhythmical,
steady, compact periods are always admissible. And pains are taken
purposely, not disguisedly, but openly and avowedly, to make one word
answer to another, as if they had been measured together and were
equal to each other. So that words opposed to one another may be
frequently contrasted, and contrary words compared together, and that
sentences may be terminated in the same manner, and may give the same
sound at their conclusion; which, when we are dealing with actual
causes, we do much more seldom, and certainly with more disguise. But,
in his Panathenaic oration, Isocrates avows that he diligently kept
that object in view; for he composed it not for a contest in a court
of justice, but to delight the ears of his hearers.

They say that Thrasymachus of Chalcedon, and Gorgias of Leontini,
were the first men who taught this science; after him Theodorus of
Byzantium, and many others whom Socrates in the Phaedrus calls [Greek:
logodaidaloi]; who have said many things very tolerably clever, but
which seem as if they had arisen at the moment, trifling, and like
animals which change their colour, and too minutely painted. And this
is what makes Herodotus and Thucydides the more admirable; for though
they lived at the same time with those men whom I have named, still
they kept aloof as far as possible from such amusements, or I should
rather say from such follies. For one of them flows on like a tranquil
river, without any attempts at facetiousness; the other is borne on
in a more impetuous course, and relates warlike deeds in a warlike
spirit; and they are the first men by whom, as Theophrastus says,
history was stirred up to dare to speak in a more fluent and adorned
style than their predecessors had ventured on.

XIII. Isocrates lived in the age next to theirs; who is at all times
praised by us above all other orators of his class, even though you,
O Brutus, sometimes object in a jesting though not in an unlearned
spirit. But you will very likely agree with me when you know why I
praise him. For as Thrasymachus appeared to him to be too concise with
his closely measured rhythm, and Gorgias also, though they are the
first who are said to have laid down any rules at all for the harmony
of sentences; and as Thucydides was somewhat too abrupt and not
sufficiently round, if I may use such an expression; he was the first
who adopted a system of dilating his ideas with words, and filling
them up with better sounding sentences; and as by his own practice he
formed those men who were afterwards accounted the most eminent men in
speaking and writing, his house got to be reckoned a perfect school
of eloquence. Therefore, as I, when I was praised by our friend Cato,
could easily bear to be blamed by the rest; so Isocrates appears to
have a right to despise the judgment of other men, while he has the
testimony of Plato to pride himself on. For, as you know, Socrates is
introduced in almost the last page of the Phaedrus speaking in these
words:--"At present, O Phaedrus, Isocrates is quite a young man; but
still I delight in telling the expectations which I have of him."
"What are they?" says he. "He appears to me to be a man of too lofty
a genius to be compared to Lysias and his orations: besides, he has a
greater natural disposition for virtue; so that it will not be at all
strange if, when he has advanced in age, he will either surpass all
his contemporaries who turn their attention to eloquence, and in this
kind of oratory, to the study of which he is at present devoted, as if
they were only boys; or, if he is not content with such a victory, he
will then feel some sort of divine inspiration prompting him to desire
greater things. For there is a deep philosophy implanted by nature
in this man's mind." This was the augury which Socrates forms of him
while a young man. But Plato writes it of him when he has become an
old man, and when he is his contemporary, and a sort of attacker of
all the rhetoricians. And Isocrates is the only one whom he admires.
And let those men who are not fond of Isocrates allow me to remain in
error in the company of Socrates and Plato.

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