Institutio Oratoria

Is there then no difference between our declamations and genuine forensic oratory? I can only reply, that if we speak with a desire for improvement, there will be no difference. [ wish indeed that certain additions could be made to the existing practice; that we made use of names, that our fictitious debates dealt with more complicated cases and sometimes took longer to deliver, that we were less afraid of words drawn from everyday speech and that we were in the habit of seasoning our words with jests. For as regards all these points, we are mere novices when we come to actual pleading, however elaborate the training that the schools have given us on other points.

And even if display is the object of declamation, surely we ought to unbend a little for the entertainment of our audience.

For even in those speeches which, although undoubtedly to some extent concerned with the truth, are designed to charm the multitude (such for instance as panegyrics and the oratory of display in all its branches), it is permissible to be more ornate and not merely to disclose all the resources of our art, which in cases of law should as a rule be concealed, but actually to flaunt them before those who have been summoned to hear us.

Declamation therefore should resemble the truth, since it is modelled on forensic and deliberative oratory. On the other hand it also involves an element of display, and should in consequence assume a certain air of elegance.

In this connexion I may cite the practice of comic actors, whose delivery is not exactly that of common speech, since that would be inartistic, but is on the other hand not

So too we shall have to put up with certain inconveniences arising from the nature of our fictitious themes; such drawbacks occur more especially in connexion with those numerous details which are left uncertain and which we presume to suit our purpose, such as the ages of our characters, their wealth, their families, or the strength, laws and manners of the cities where our scenes are laid, and the like.

Sometimes we even draw arguments from the actual flaws of the assumptions involved by the theme. But each of these points shall be dealt with in its proper place. For although the whole purpose of this work is the formation of an orator, I have no intention of passing over anything that has a genuine connexion with the practice of the schools, for fear that students may complain of the omission.