Institutio Oratoria

What use is it if we employ a lofty tone in cases of trivial import, a slight and refined style in cases of great moment, a cheerful tone when our matter calls for sadness, a gentle tone when it demands vehemence, threatening language when supplication, and submissive when energy is required, or fierceness and violence when our theme is one that asks for charm? Such incongruities are as unbecoming as it is for men to wear necklaces and pearls and flowing raiment which are the natural adornments of women, or for women to robe

This topic is discussed by Cicero in the third book of the de Oratore, [*](III. lv. 210.) and, although he touches on it but lightly, he really covers the whole subject when he says, One single style of oratory is not suited to every case, nor to every audience, nor every speaker, nor every occasion. And he says the same at scarcely greater length in the Orator. [*]( Ch. xxi. sqq. ) But in the first of these works Lucius Crassus, since he is speaking in the presence of men distinguished alike for their learning and their eloquence, thinks it sufficient merely to indicate this topic to his audience for their recognition;

while in the latter work Cicero asserts that, as these facts are familiar to Brutus, to whom that treatise is addressed, they will be given briefer treatment, despite the fact that the subject is a wide one and is discussed at greater length by the philosophers. 1, on the other hand, have undertaken the education of an orator, and, consequently, am speaking not merely to those that know, but also to learners; I shall, therefore, have some claim to forgiveness if I discuss the topic in greater detail.