FOOTNOTES

Postremus dicas, primus taceas.Pastores, pecua, salve servassis.Eorum sectam secuntur, multi mortales (Livius).Immortales mortales, si foret fas flere (of Naevius).

Postremus dicas, primus taceas.Pastores, pecua, salve servassis.Eorum sectam secuntur, multi mortales (Livius).Immortales mortales, si foret fas flere (of Naevius).

Postremus dicas, primus taceas.Pastores, pecua, salve servassis.Eorum sectam secuntur, multi mortales (Livius).Immortales mortales, si foret fas flere (of Naevius).

Postremus dicas, primus taceas.

Pastores, pecua, salve servassis.

Eorum sectam secuntur, multi mortales (Livius).

Immortales mortales, si foret fas flere (of Naevius).

This old, alliterative verse operated with antitheses, balance, contrast, anaphora, and word-play. Cicero needed no more to go to the Greeks for such simple devices than Cato, and I do not think that he did. If he employs them with more delicacy and restraint, it is partly because he learned with practice that his own youthful style had been prone to over-use the obvious tricks of speech.

Cicero also calls attention to the Greek rules for the proper organization of speeches, which must have (1) their introduction, (2) their exposition of the case, (3) their panoply of proof, (4) their refutation of the opponent, and (5) their conclusion. To Cicero this is of course schoolboy stuff.[37]It might save time for a freshman to have these obvious rules of composition called to his attention when he begins, but Cicero did not for a moment suppose that an adult who has had some practice needs instruction like this, or that men like Cato and Gracchus and the hundreds of other statesmen battling with the shrewdest minds of Rome needed to be told that the peroration belonged at the end and not at the beginning of a speech. Roman oratory during its hundred years of progress had never learned anything essential from these precepts. Their purpose was simply to train the Roman schoolboy to observe the processes involved in shaping speeches. The mistake of our modern critics has been to suppose that such rules as these created Roman prose. Nothing in Cicero’s writings or practices justifiesthat assumption. Roman prose grew to full maturity from native roots, in native soil, and with native nurture.

Ornate Latin speech reached its complete development in the orations of Cicero. To modern Anglo-Saxon taste the more elaborate paragraphs seem overwrought. Our busy courts and legislatures desire facts clearly and compactly presented. This has made us impatient of the style of persuasion in speech. When we have leisure for vacation reading we may resort to polyphonic or imagist prose in essays and occasionally in fiction. We still have a place for protreptic sound in well-written paragraphs, but not during business hours. That is the chief reason why some of the Ciceronian periods now seem misplaced. Another seems to lie in a difference of temperament in the respective peoples. If the Latins were in any respect like the modern Italians in their sensitivity to dramatic utterance, they may have enjoyed emotional persuasion more than some of the ultramontane peoples. The very fact that Cicero’s manner so frequently carried conviction in the courts, in the senate, and on the public platform removes him to that extent from modern ultramontane criticism. But Cicero himself was in his day considered a moderate and urged strongly that elaborate prose must never be used except for themes that could carry its burden. He also knew that the study of rhetoric was for young students only and not for mature statesmen. When in theDe Oratorehe represented Crassus and Antonius as giving such elementary instruction to the young students, Sulpicius and Cotta, he carefullydismissed the venerable Scaevola as being too dignified to participate in such a conversation. His sense of propriety here reveals the true Roman attitude toward Greek rhetoric.

To be sure Cicero was himself somewhat imposed upon by the claims of rhetoric which Greek teachers had elaborated, or he would not have written theDe Oratore—even with apologies. The erroneous belief was still current that some one some day might work out a real science of style. Hence he wished to make his contribution to that science by setting down his own precepts regarding prose rhythm, composition, and figures of speech. But that he had doubts concerning their validity appears in his insistence that the “grand manner” is a gift of nature (Or.99) and that Roman oratory owed more toingeniumthan todoctrina(Or.143). However, in criticizing his contemporaries—Calvus, Caelius, and Calidius—he always proceeds from the point of view of their effect on him rather than from any reference to rules of rhetoric.

Cicero in fact employed few of the figures of speech, the names of which he felt that convention required him to list, and his modulations are so intricate and varied that, despite a score of dissertations on the subject, no one has yet succeeded in analyzing them according to the standard scheme which he transmitted from the accepted authorities. For Cicero himself, living prose had a native movement and a wealth of sound that lay beyond analysis. His rules were for dull minds that required the aid of rules. His own ear required none. The teacher who compels his students to count thespecific clausulae of an oration of Cicero commits an unpardonable crime against the holy spirit of a great art. The student must, of course, learn to read that prose with an accurate pronunciation of the sounds and quantities, but after that the rhythm will take care of itself.

Cicero speaks[38]of his own orationPro Caecinaas an example of the “plain style,” employed in explicative demonstration, and thePro Rabirioas an illustration of the grave and lofty style employed in compelling persuasion, while he cites theDe Imperio Pompeias an instance of the “middle style.” He who has read these three speeches conscientiously feels the difference between them, yet he will not be able to convey that feeling by means of the traditional statistics of the stylistic doctorand. There are quite as many examples of the favorite rhythms (clausulae) in thePro Caecinaas in thePro Rabirio, a fact that shows that Cicero’s ear was remarkably sensitive to this effect and guided his vocal expression even when he was not consciously striving for it. Even in metaphors and in such devices as the rhetorical question, thePro Caecinadoes not differ materially from thePro Rabirio.[39]And this again shows that this orator was by nature luminous and aggressive as a successful speaker must be.

In the final analysis, if we may take the cue from these speeches, it is not the degree of consciously imposed rhetoric that differentiates their styles for Cicero, but the nature of the issues andaudiences involved and the resultant quality of the speaker’s inspiration.[40]In thePro Caecina, an ordinary civil suit called for close argumentation before a small jury of legal specialists. These facts determined the style, as Cicero says. In thePro Rabirio, which Cicero places at the opposite end of the scale, the critic will not find many more of the standard devices of rhetoric than in the other. But here it becomes apparent from the first sentence that Cicero is tense, that standing at full height he is battling with all his might for what seems to him a great principle. The issue was as serious as any he had ever championed. That accounts for the intensity of his utterance. But there are various ways of fighting, and the audience as well as the theme must determine the manner. Cicero had before him not only the voting public—which standing alone might have tempted him into mere vituperation—but he had also before him the aristocracy of the senate waiting to see whether theauctoritas senatuswould be betrayed by that day’s vote because of a possible failure on the orator’s part. Cicero did not fail. The speech in its gravity and dignity of word and period is worthy of the theme and adapted to the audience. And these are the factors which Cicero felt had made that speech. Scholars have catalogued externals in such oratory too assiduously, and Cicero did so himself, because it had not yet been discovered in his day that art is beyond the reach of science.

What we need to do in reading Cicero is first to comprehend the rich endowment of the man: thevast human sympathy that brought him into immediate contact with his audiences, be they ever so diverse, the celerity of his thought, the constructive power of his imagination, the close correspondence between his delicate sense of rhythm and sound and his copious vocabulary, and above all his very sensitive response to the issues of right and justice. Then we must bear in mind the breadth of his studies in philosophy, dramatic literature, history, law, and politics that enriched his mind with principles, illustrations, and points of view.[41]Finally, we must picture to ourselves in each case the nature of his audience, the issue at stake, and the intensity of its appeal to him. When we have done this we shall feel, if we have the gift of insight, and even if we cannot analyze it, the consummate art of Cicero’s Latin prose. To attempt to express the secret of it in statistics of tropes and meters is to miss it wholly.

Before his death Cicero saw the fate of his favorite literary creed that prose should be a work of art. It is well to remember that as he had adopted this creed from his teachers so had his literary opponents adopted from their teachers at least the verbal expression of their own creed, i.e., that it was the business of the speaker to do the task before him simply and honestly without resorting to artifice. However, I do not believe that the literary contest that cost Cicero so much distress in his last days was essentially one of theory; it was rather one that grew out of the milieu in which he lived. Long before Caesar’s day, Cato had expressedhis natural aversion to the artifices of Crates and Carneadas when he said with his characteristic impatience: “Get hold of your theme and the words will take care of themselves.” Cicero in his youth had found the same antithesis expressed in Antonius and Crassus. And he lived to see men like Caesar, Brutus, and Calvus win the young men away from his own ideals to those of the matter-of-fact style. The antithesis lies deep in human nature and crops up in the revolt that each generation feels toward its predecessor. It is hardly sound to attribute the dominance of such elementary creeds to schoolroom precepts. The preceptor is usually a man who notes the requirements of his day and tries to prepare his pupils for its needs. He follows more often than he leads, as any one may observe who will examine any twenty standard books on composition produced by teachers during the last fifty years in America. They follow usage, they do not beget it.

Asianic rhetoric, with its advocacy of adornment, had come to Rome in Cicero’s youth. It is true that its rules engaged his attention. But a man as sensitive to artistic expression as Cicero, and as sure of the spirit of his audiences, had little to learn from Anatolian pedagogues who taughtGraeculihow to declaim to four walls. Those teachers would hardly have recognized thePro Rabirioas a product of their precepts. Similarly, Apollodorus came from Pergamum to teach the doctrines of a Lysianic or Attic style. Youths like Calidius, Calvus, and Pollio favored his method. But Apollodorus would have met with little success if so many Romans had not been practical and if the senate, with its traditionsof dignity, had not already lost its prestige before the emerging democracy led by Caesar. Apollodorus may have introduced the new style, but had the times not been ripe for him he would not have been heard; moreover, the part of his doctrine that Rome accepted, Rome had possessed already in the 150 speeches of old Cato. It was Caesar’s sword that antiquated senatorial oratory as it antiquated senatorial pretensions to govern Rome. Foreign schoolteachers did not do it. The Greek observer, Dionysius of Halicarnassus, who was an enthusiastic supporter of Atticism in the Augustan day, realized that it was not the Greek schoolteachers but the practical statesmen of Rome who in the last analysis required the new prose to take the form it did. “It is my belief,” he says, “that this great revolution [in stylistic matters] was originated by Rome, the mistress of the world, who compelled entire nations to look to her: Rome, I say, and her nobles, men of high character, excellent administrators, highly cultivated, and of high critical intelligence.” Here we have a keen insight into the fact that a powerful state generates a dominant culture which easily drowns the feeble whispers of the cloistered theorist.

The generation which followed Cicero, represented by Asinius Pollio and Messala, revolted completely against Cicero’s ornate prose and adopted the plain, matter-of-fact speech which was called Atticistic. Again it seems to me not only incorrect but contrary to the penetrating observations of Tacitus[42]to attribute this revolt to the victory ofa stylistic theory. Calvus, to be sure, represented the new style in a few speeches as early as 58 B.C. when he was but twenty-four years of age; Calidius began to speak earlier, but whether or not in the new manner is unknown. Brutus, controlled by a temperamental bluntness, supported the same tendency a few years later. But these men would not have been able to undermine the power of Ciceronian style had not events worked in their favor. It was the dominating political influence of Caesar that did the work. The first blow was Caesar’s quiet introduction of stenographers into the senate in 59. By publishing the minutes of the senatorial proceedings he compelled the speakers to consider the outside public, to drop the orotund periods addressed to their colleagues alone, and to confine themselves to pertinent details. Caesar himself had no time to waste on model orations. When opposed by the senate he carried his bills to the assembly to which he put his arguments in plain and pithy sentences. Cicero had scented the meaning of these effects enough to feel the need of stating his doctrine in full in theDe Oratorepublished in 55, and Calvus and Calidius were quietly profiting by the new trend. Presently, in 52, the triumvirs closed the second nursery of ornate prose, by passing a bill which severely limited the time of pleas in court. The purpose was, of course, to expedite the business of the overburdened courts, but the act reveals once more that the new politics were concerned with getting results, not with encouraging a time-consuming oratory. Two years later Caesar crossed the Rubicon, and thereafter, so long as Caesar lived,addresses in the senate all partook of the nature of business-like reports in committees that met before a curt presiding officer; and in the courts, whose judges were now appointed by Caesar, persuasive oratory gave way to a rapid estimation of facts.

Cicero was well aware of all this.[43]During the first few years of Caesar’s dictatorship he complained frequently that there was no longer a place in the state for his gifts, and that his influence had wholly gone. However, hoping for a restoration of senatorial rule, he decided not to yield without some effort. He invited the most promising young politicians of Caesar’s circle to take practical exercises in political oratory with him; in 47 or 46 he wrote a letter of gentle remonstrance to Calvus, the most influential theorist of the “Atticistic school;” and for Brutus, who rejected the means of artistic expression for reasons of taste, he composed (in 46) a full history of Latin oratory in which he tried to show that Caesarian administration threatened to suffocate a great art, that the development of that art during more than a century had demonstrated the correctness of his own doctrine, and that the opposing theorists, men like Calvus and Calidius who had profited from events, could not by their methods create an effective style. Brutus, who of course comprehended the animus of the volume, responded with little enthusiasm and avoided the burden of arguing by asking for a more explicit statement of Cicero’s position. Cicero responded at once with the brilliant brochure called theOrator. But though Cicero sent out many presentationcopies the book met with general silence. No one was interested in tropes and prose rhythm at a time when Cato was taking his own life as an offering to the dying Republic. For the next two years the business of state rested on the brief staccato orders of a tyrant. At Caesar’s death the senate came to life again for a brief period and the fourteen Philippics reveal the enduring power of Cicero’s oratory, an art that had been well-nigh silent for ten years. Then Cicero, too, fell by the assassin’s sword.

Presently Augustus established the throne and once more offered freedom of discussion in the senate. But freedom had disappeared. Augustus’ trusted friends reported his views in the senate and before the people in business-like summaries. Cicero’s very name was anathema as that of a rebel to the new régime. Pollio and Messala, who represented the opposition to the unpopular style, who practiced the arts of brevity and directness suited to the needs of the new régime, were accounted the models of Augustan Latin prose. Ciceronian ideals returned in time to the schoolroom but only after the schoolroom had lost touch with politics.

FOOTNOTES[1]Cf.De Oratore, I. 23; 52; 105; 146; 198; II. 50; 77; 100; 132; III. 29-33; 48; 54; 93; 226;Ad. Att.iv. 16.3;Brutus, 263.[2]De Oratoreiii. 29-33;Brutus202, 212, 276, 286,Orator99, 143.[3]Brutus315, 316.[4]Sir John Mandeville.[5]Nettleship,Essays Classical, II, 93; NordenDie antike Kunstprosa(which seriously overestimates the influence of Greek doctrine on Latin prose style). Cicero’sBrutusis the indispensable handbook.[6]Cf. e.g. C.I.L. I. 60, 366, 561.[7]The imperial copy is probably accurate except for a few words,Class. Phil.1919, 74.[8]Ed. Vahlen. Professor Rand’s translation may be found inFounders of the Middle Ages(Harvard University Press, 1928), 56.[9]De Orat.ii, 51, 59.[10]As for instance Norden,op. cit.I, 164 ff.[11]Leo,Gesch. Röm. Lit.37 ff.[12]In Thermum.Tuum nefarium facinus pejore facinore operire postulas; succidias humanas facis, tantas trucidationes facis, decem capita libera interficis, decem hominibus vitam eripis, indicta causa, injudicatis, incondemnatis. The passage is packed with excellent examples of anaphora, balance, metaphor, homoeoteleuton and alliteration. Had this been written in 88 B.C. instead of in 188 we should take it as an excellent illustration of the result of Greek rhetorical study. It is, however, just native Latin speech afire with the most vehement Catonian wrath.[13]Brutus, 67 ff.; modified in 284-6. Cicero had noticed that Cato’s orations were full of imagery;Brutus, 69.[14]Suet.Rhet.I;Athen.XII, 547.[15]Fiske,Univ. Wis. Studies, III, 62 ff.[16]Cicero,Brutus, 82, credits Galba with a lofty style in speeches which somehow failed to survive in the written copies, which reveals as in several instances that Latin style was apt to be primarily pragmatic rather than scholastic (ibid., 137, 138). To Aemilius Lepidus Porcina (fl. about 140) he accords credit for smooth sentence structure (ibid., 131).[17]Cic.Lael.96;Pro Murena, 58.[18]N. Häpke,C. Semproni Gracchi Fragmenta(Munich, 1915). This editor finds a few instances of prose rhythms in Gracchus. I do not think that Gracchus was conscious of them, since they occur in about the same ratio as in Sallust or Caesar, who could hardly be accused of encouraging the rhythmic style.[19]Meyer,Orat. Rom. Frag., 234.[20]Ibid.233.[21]Ibid.232.[22]Ibid.239.[23]Cicero in hisBrutusmentions fifteen speakers of the Catonian period, some twenty as being important between Cato and Tiberius Gracchus, about thirty who belonged distinctly to the period of the Gracchan reforms, and twenty more who gained distinction before the end of the second century; that is, some eighty-five whose contributions were worthy of mention before the fashion set in of studying rhetoric in Greece.[24]Cic.,Brutus, 161.[25]Cic.,De Orat.i. 146.[26]Cic.,De Orat.ii. 4. The few orthodox clausulae found in his fragments occur in about the ratio that one might expect in any normal Latin prose.[27]Cic.,De Orat.i. 198.[28]In the year 92 Crassus attempted with his colleague Domitius by censorial pronouncement to discourage the growth of Latin schools of rhetoric. It is difficult to take seriously the recent hypothesis that this was an aristocratic attack upon democratic schools. Cicero’s interpretation that the new Latin school was objectionable because it trained speakers without the cultural education in literature, philosophy, and history, which Greek rhetoricians usually required, seems adequate. Our own insistence that law schools require a college degree for entrance would then be analogous.[29]Cic.,De Orat.ii. 77 ff. Cicero, who dislikes to confess that good oratory can arise out of native endowments, accords Antonius some education, because he once conversed with the Athenian professors for a few days on his way to the province! TheBrutus, which attempts to give genuine history, represents Antonius as a self-made man.[30]De Orat.i. 105.[31]Ibid., ii. 88, 97 ff.Brutus202, 276, 286,Orat.99, 143, 214.[32]De Orat.iii. 131 and 124.[33]Orator, 191 ff. When inOrat.213 Cicero attempts to analyze the measures of Carbo his theory fails him. Again in 217, when he enumerates the feet that Greek theory allowed he fails to notice that his own feeling for Latin rhythms demanded a cretic before all of them. Indeed his selection of passages from his own orations in 210 is faulty (see Kroll’s commentary). In fact his usage is far truer to the genius of Latin than his theory. It is probable that Tyrannio, with whom he discussed Greek accents and rhythms during this period (ad Att.xii. 6, 2—about June 46) misled him. We need also to bear in mind Cicero’s statements that the ear unconsciously operates in selecting good rhythms (Brutus, 34) and that the tendency to seek balance—a very old quality of native Latin verse—also produces rhythm (doubtless because of the paenultimate law) (Orator, 167, 220). Needless to say, what compelled Cicero to shape clausulae somewhat unlike those of Isocrates was the stress-accent of Latin operating under the penultimate law.[34]Orator, 224.[35]This in turn tends to produce measured prose rhythm in Latin,Orat.167, 220.[36]Brutus69. He adds that uneducated peasants often use metaphors,Orat.81.[37]De Orat.i. 105non Graeci loquacitatem sine usu neque ex scholis cantilenam requirunt; ii. 77-84. Cicero made a summary of the rules in his youth (theDe Inventione) but none of his speeches follow these rules closely.[38]Orat.102.[39]Gotzes,De Ciceronis tribus generibus dicendi.[40]Orat.102 ff. and especially,Orat.24, where he says explicitly:eloquentiae moderatrix fuit auditorum prudentia.[41]Hubbell,The Influence of Isocrates on Cicero, etc. (Yale, 1913).[42]Tacitus,Dialogus19, 37, 38.[43]Cicero is well aware of the fact that the suppression of the old political freedom was endangering style:Brutus21, 324.

[1]Cf.De Oratore, I. 23; 52; 105; 146; 198; II. 50; 77; 100; 132; III. 29-33; 48; 54; 93; 226;Ad. Att.iv. 16.3;Brutus, 263.

[1]Cf.De Oratore, I. 23; 52; 105; 146; 198; II. 50; 77; 100; 132; III. 29-33; 48; 54; 93; 226;Ad. Att.iv. 16.3;Brutus, 263.

[2]De Oratoreiii. 29-33;Brutus202, 212, 276, 286,Orator99, 143.

[2]De Oratoreiii. 29-33;Brutus202, 212, 276, 286,Orator99, 143.

[3]Brutus315, 316.

[3]Brutus315, 316.

[4]Sir John Mandeville.

[4]Sir John Mandeville.

[5]Nettleship,Essays Classical, II, 93; NordenDie antike Kunstprosa(which seriously overestimates the influence of Greek doctrine on Latin prose style). Cicero’sBrutusis the indispensable handbook.

[5]Nettleship,Essays Classical, II, 93; NordenDie antike Kunstprosa(which seriously overestimates the influence of Greek doctrine on Latin prose style). Cicero’sBrutusis the indispensable handbook.

[6]Cf. e.g. C.I.L. I. 60, 366, 561.

[6]Cf. e.g. C.I.L. I. 60, 366, 561.

[7]The imperial copy is probably accurate except for a few words,Class. Phil.1919, 74.

[7]The imperial copy is probably accurate except for a few words,Class. Phil.1919, 74.

[8]Ed. Vahlen. Professor Rand’s translation may be found inFounders of the Middle Ages(Harvard University Press, 1928), 56.

[8]Ed. Vahlen. Professor Rand’s translation may be found inFounders of the Middle Ages(Harvard University Press, 1928), 56.

[9]De Orat.ii, 51, 59.

[9]De Orat.ii, 51, 59.

[10]As for instance Norden,op. cit.I, 164 ff.

[10]As for instance Norden,op. cit.I, 164 ff.

[11]Leo,Gesch. Röm. Lit.37 ff.

[11]Leo,Gesch. Röm. Lit.37 ff.

[12]In Thermum.Tuum nefarium facinus pejore facinore operire postulas; succidias humanas facis, tantas trucidationes facis, decem capita libera interficis, decem hominibus vitam eripis, indicta causa, injudicatis, incondemnatis. The passage is packed with excellent examples of anaphora, balance, metaphor, homoeoteleuton and alliteration. Had this been written in 88 B.C. instead of in 188 we should take it as an excellent illustration of the result of Greek rhetorical study. It is, however, just native Latin speech afire with the most vehement Catonian wrath.

[12]In Thermum.Tuum nefarium facinus pejore facinore operire postulas; succidias humanas facis, tantas trucidationes facis, decem capita libera interficis, decem hominibus vitam eripis, indicta causa, injudicatis, incondemnatis. The passage is packed with excellent examples of anaphora, balance, metaphor, homoeoteleuton and alliteration. Had this been written in 88 B.C. instead of in 188 we should take it as an excellent illustration of the result of Greek rhetorical study. It is, however, just native Latin speech afire with the most vehement Catonian wrath.

[13]Brutus, 67 ff.; modified in 284-6. Cicero had noticed that Cato’s orations were full of imagery;Brutus, 69.

[13]Brutus, 67 ff.; modified in 284-6. Cicero had noticed that Cato’s orations were full of imagery;Brutus, 69.

[14]Suet.Rhet.I;Athen.XII, 547.

[14]Suet.Rhet.I;Athen.XII, 547.

[15]Fiske,Univ. Wis. Studies, III, 62 ff.

[15]Fiske,Univ. Wis. Studies, III, 62 ff.

[16]Cicero,Brutus, 82, credits Galba with a lofty style in speeches which somehow failed to survive in the written copies, which reveals as in several instances that Latin style was apt to be primarily pragmatic rather than scholastic (ibid., 137, 138). To Aemilius Lepidus Porcina (fl. about 140) he accords credit for smooth sentence structure (ibid., 131).

[16]Cicero,Brutus, 82, credits Galba with a lofty style in speeches which somehow failed to survive in the written copies, which reveals as in several instances that Latin style was apt to be primarily pragmatic rather than scholastic (ibid., 137, 138). To Aemilius Lepidus Porcina (fl. about 140) he accords credit for smooth sentence structure (ibid., 131).

[17]Cic.Lael.96;Pro Murena, 58.

[17]Cic.Lael.96;Pro Murena, 58.

[18]N. Häpke,C. Semproni Gracchi Fragmenta(Munich, 1915). This editor finds a few instances of prose rhythms in Gracchus. I do not think that Gracchus was conscious of them, since they occur in about the same ratio as in Sallust or Caesar, who could hardly be accused of encouraging the rhythmic style.

[18]N. Häpke,C. Semproni Gracchi Fragmenta(Munich, 1915). This editor finds a few instances of prose rhythms in Gracchus. I do not think that Gracchus was conscious of them, since they occur in about the same ratio as in Sallust or Caesar, who could hardly be accused of encouraging the rhythmic style.

[19]Meyer,Orat. Rom. Frag., 234.

[19]Meyer,Orat. Rom. Frag., 234.

[20]Ibid.233.

[20]Ibid.233.

[21]Ibid.232.

[21]Ibid.232.

[22]Ibid.239.

[22]Ibid.239.

[23]Cicero in hisBrutusmentions fifteen speakers of the Catonian period, some twenty as being important between Cato and Tiberius Gracchus, about thirty who belonged distinctly to the period of the Gracchan reforms, and twenty more who gained distinction before the end of the second century; that is, some eighty-five whose contributions were worthy of mention before the fashion set in of studying rhetoric in Greece.

[23]Cicero in hisBrutusmentions fifteen speakers of the Catonian period, some twenty as being important between Cato and Tiberius Gracchus, about thirty who belonged distinctly to the period of the Gracchan reforms, and twenty more who gained distinction before the end of the second century; that is, some eighty-five whose contributions were worthy of mention before the fashion set in of studying rhetoric in Greece.

[24]Cic.,Brutus, 161.

[24]Cic.,Brutus, 161.

[25]Cic.,De Orat.i. 146.

[25]Cic.,De Orat.i. 146.

[26]Cic.,De Orat.ii. 4. The few orthodox clausulae found in his fragments occur in about the ratio that one might expect in any normal Latin prose.

[26]Cic.,De Orat.ii. 4. The few orthodox clausulae found in his fragments occur in about the ratio that one might expect in any normal Latin prose.

[27]Cic.,De Orat.i. 198.

[27]Cic.,De Orat.i. 198.

[28]In the year 92 Crassus attempted with his colleague Domitius by censorial pronouncement to discourage the growth of Latin schools of rhetoric. It is difficult to take seriously the recent hypothesis that this was an aristocratic attack upon democratic schools. Cicero’s interpretation that the new Latin school was objectionable because it trained speakers without the cultural education in literature, philosophy, and history, which Greek rhetoricians usually required, seems adequate. Our own insistence that law schools require a college degree for entrance would then be analogous.

[28]In the year 92 Crassus attempted with his colleague Domitius by censorial pronouncement to discourage the growth of Latin schools of rhetoric. It is difficult to take seriously the recent hypothesis that this was an aristocratic attack upon democratic schools. Cicero’s interpretation that the new Latin school was objectionable because it trained speakers without the cultural education in literature, philosophy, and history, which Greek rhetoricians usually required, seems adequate. Our own insistence that law schools require a college degree for entrance would then be analogous.

[29]Cic.,De Orat.ii. 77 ff. Cicero, who dislikes to confess that good oratory can arise out of native endowments, accords Antonius some education, because he once conversed with the Athenian professors for a few days on his way to the province! TheBrutus, which attempts to give genuine history, represents Antonius as a self-made man.

[29]Cic.,De Orat.ii. 77 ff. Cicero, who dislikes to confess that good oratory can arise out of native endowments, accords Antonius some education, because he once conversed with the Athenian professors for a few days on his way to the province! TheBrutus, which attempts to give genuine history, represents Antonius as a self-made man.

[30]De Orat.i. 105.

[30]De Orat.i. 105.

[31]Ibid., ii. 88, 97 ff.Brutus202, 276, 286,Orat.99, 143, 214.

[31]Ibid., ii. 88, 97 ff.Brutus202, 276, 286,Orat.99, 143, 214.

[32]De Orat.iii. 131 and 124.

[32]De Orat.iii. 131 and 124.

[33]Orator, 191 ff. When inOrat.213 Cicero attempts to analyze the measures of Carbo his theory fails him. Again in 217, when he enumerates the feet that Greek theory allowed he fails to notice that his own feeling for Latin rhythms demanded a cretic before all of them. Indeed his selection of passages from his own orations in 210 is faulty (see Kroll’s commentary). In fact his usage is far truer to the genius of Latin than his theory. It is probable that Tyrannio, with whom he discussed Greek accents and rhythms during this period (ad Att.xii. 6, 2—about June 46) misled him. We need also to bear in mind Cicero’s statements that the ear unconsciously operates in selecting good rhythms (Brutus, 34) and that the tendency to seek balance—a very old quality of native Latin verse—also produces rhythm (doubtless because of the paenultimate law) (Orator, 167, 220). Needless to say, what compelled Cicero to shape clausulae somewhat unlike those of Isocrates was the stress-accent of Latin operating under the penultimate law.

[33]Orator, 191 ff. When inOrat.213 Cicero attempts to analyze the measures of Carbo his theory fails him. Again in 217, when he enumerates the feet that Greek theory allowed he fails to notice that his own feeling for Latin rhythms demanded a cretic before all of them. Indeed his selection of passages from his own orations in 210 is faulty (see Kroll’s commentary). In fact his usage is far truer to the genius of Latin than his theory. It is probable that Tyrannio, with whom he discussed Greek accents and rhythms during this period (ad Att.xii. 6, 2—about June 46) misled him. We need also to bear in mind Cicero’s statements that the ear unconsciously operates in selecting good rhythms (Brutus, 34) and that the tendency to seek balance—a very old quality of native Latin verse—also produces rhythm (doubtless because of the paenultimate law) (Orator, 167, 220). Needless to say, what compelled Cicero to shape clausulae somewhat unlike those of Isocrates was the stress-accent of Latin operating under the penultimate law.

[34]Orator, 224.

[34]Orator, 224.

[35]This in turn tends to produce measured prose rhythm in Latin,Orat.167, 220.

[35]This in turn tends to produce measured prose rhythm in Latin,Orat.167, 220.

[36]Brutus69. He adds that uneducated peasants often use metaphors,Orat.81.

[36]Brutus69. He adds that uneducated peasants often use metaphors,Orat.81.

[37]De Orat.i. 105non Graeci loquacitatem sine usu neque ex scholis cantilenam requirunt; ii. 77-84. Cicero made a summary of the rules in his youth (theDe Inventione) but none of his speeches follow these rules closely.

[37]De Orat.i. 105non Graeci loquacitatem sine usu neque ex scholis cantilenam requirunt; ii. 77-84. Cicero made a summary of the rules in his youth (theDe Inventione) but none of his speeches follow these rules closely.

[38]Orat.102.

[38]Orat.102.

[39]Gotzes,De Ciceronis tribus generibus dicendi.

[39]Gotzes,De Ciceronis tribus generibus dicendi.

[40]Orat.102 ff. and especially,Orat.24, where he says explicitly:eloquentiae moderatrix fuit auditorum prudentia.

[40]Orat.102 ff. and especially,Orat.24, where he says explicitly:eloquentiae moderatrix fuit auditorum prudentia.

[41]Hubbell,The Influence of Isocrates on Cicero, etc. (Yale, 1913).

[41]Hubbell,The Influence of Isocrates on Cicero, etc. (Yale, 1913).

[42]Tacitus,Dialogus19, 37, 38.

[42]Tacitus,Dialogus19, 37, 38.

[43]Cicero is well aware of the fact that the suppression of the old political freedom was endangering style:Brutus21, 324.

[43]Cicero is well aware of the fact that the suppression of the old political freedom was endangering style:Brutus21, 324.


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