I have now, my dear Marcellus Victorius, completed the third book of the work which I have dedicated to you, and have nearly finished a quarter of my task, and am confronted with a motive for renewed diligence and increased anxiety as to the judgment it may be found to deserve. For up to this point we were merely discussing rhetoric between ourselves and, in the event of our system being regarded as inadequate by the world at large, were prepared to content ourselves with putting it into practice at home and to confine ourselves to the education of your son and mine.
But now Domitianus Augustus has entrusted me with the education of his sister's grandsons, and I should be undeserving of the honour conferred upon me by such divine appreciation, if I were not to regard this distinction as the standard by which the greatness of my undertaking must be judged.
For it is clearly my duty to spare no pains in moulding the character of
my august pupils, that they may earn the deserved approval of the most
righteous of censors. The same applies to their intellectual
But no one is surprised at the frequency with which the greatest poets invoke the Muses not merely at the commencement of their works, but even further on when they have reached some important passage and repeat their vows and utter fresh prayers for assistance.
Assuredly therefore I may ask indulgence for doing what I omitted to do when I first entered on this task and calling to my aid all the gods and Himself before them all (for his power is unsurpassed and there is no deity that looks with such favour upon learning), beseeching him to inspire me with genius in proportion to the hopes that he has raised in me, to lend me propitious and ready aid and make me even such as he has believed me to be.
And this, though the greatest, is not the only motive for this act of
religious devotion, but my work is of such a nature that, as it
proceeds, I am confronted with greater and more arduous obstacles than
have yet faced me. For my next task is to explain the order to be
followed in forensic causes, which present the utmost complication and
variety. I must set forth the function of the exordium, the method of the statement of
facts, the cogency of proofs, whether we
are confirming our own assertions or refuting those of our opponents,
and the force of the peroration, whether we have
to refresh the memory of the judge by a brief recapitulation of the
facts, or to do what is far more effective, stir his emotions.
Some have preferred to give each of these points separate treatment,
fearing that if they undertook them as a whole the burden would be
greater than they