The subjects chosen for themes should, therefore, be as true to life as possible, and the actual declamation should, as far as may be, be modelled on the pleadings for which it was devised as a training.

For we shall hunt in vain among sponsions sponsio (= a wager) was a form of lawsuit in which the litigant promised to pay a certain sum of money if he lost his case. The interdict was an order issued by the praetor commanding or prohibiting certain action. It occurred chiefly in disputes about property. and interdicts for magicians and plagues and oracles and stepmothers more cruel than any in tragedy, and other subjects still more unreal than these. The themes of the controversiae often turned on the supernatural and on crimes and incidents such as rarely or never occur in actual life. What then? are we never to permit young men to handle unreal or, to be more accurate, poetic themes that they may run riot and exult in their strength and display their full stature?

It were best to prohibit them absolutely. But at any rate the themes, however swelling and magnificent, should not be such as to seem foolish and laughable to the eye of an intelligent observer. Consequently, if we must make some concession, let us allow the declaimer to gorge himself occasionally, as long as he realises that his case will be like that of cattle that have blown themselves out with a surfeit of green food: they are cured of their disorder by blood-letting and then put back to food such as will maintain their strength; similarly the declaimer must be rid of his superfluous fat, and his corrupt humours must be discharged, if he wants to be strong and healthy.