Institutio Oratoria

Quintilian

Quintilian. Institutio Oratoria, Volume 1-4. Butler, Harold Edgeworth, translator. Cambridge, Mass; London: Harvard University Press, William Heinemann Ltd., 1920-1922.

I shall speak more fully a little later on. Returning to definition for the moment, we find it in the question raised by Demosthenes,

whether Philip should give or restore Halonnesus,

[*]( Halonnesus had belonged to Athens, but had been seized by pirates. Philip ejected the pirates. The Athenians asked him to restore it; he replied that it belonged to him and that there could be no question of restoration, but if they asked for it as a gift he promised to give it them. ) and to that discussed by Cicero in the Philippics [*]( VIII. i. 2, where the question is discussed as to whether the war with Antony is bellum or tumultus, the latter being the technical name for any grave national emergency such as civil war or a Gallic invasion within the bounds of Italy. ) as to the nature of a tumultus. Again does not the question raised in connection with the statue of Servius Sulpicius [*](Phil. ix. 1. ) as to

whether statues should be erected only in honour of those ambassadors who perish by the sword

bear a strong resemblance to the questions that are raised in the law courts?

The deliberative department of oratory (also called the

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advisory department), while it deliberates about the future, also enquires about the past, while its functions are twofold and consist in advising and dissuading. Deliberative oratory does not always require an exordium, such as is necessary in forensic speeches, since he who asks an orator for his opinion is naturally well disposed to him. But the commencement, whatever be its nature, must have some resemblance to an exordium. For we must not begin abruptly or just at the point where the fancy takes us, since in every subject there is something which naturally comes first.

In addressing the senate or the people the same methods apply as in the law courts, and we must aim as a rule at acquiring the goodwill of our audience. This need cause no surprise, since even in panegyric we seek to win the favour of our hearers when our aim is praise pure and simple, and not the acquisition of any advantage. Aristotle, [*](Rhet. iii. 14 )

it is true, holds, not without reason, that in deliberative speeches we may often begin with a reference either to ourselves or to our opponent, borrowing this practice from forensic oratory, and sometimes producing the impression that the subject is of greater or less importance than it actually is. On the other hand he thinks that in demonstrative oratory the exordium may be treated with the utmost freedom,

since it is sometimes drawn from irrelevant material, as for example in Isocrates' Praise of Helen, [*]( The speech opens with a disquisition on the absurd and trivial nature of much that is contained in the speeches of sophists and rhetoricians. ) or from something akin to the subject, as for instance in the Panegyricus of the same author, when he complains that more honour is given to physical than to moral excellence, or as Gorgias in his speech delivered at the Olympic games praises the founders of the great national games. Sallust seems

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to have imitated these authors in his Jugurthine War and in the introduction to his Catiline, which has no connection with his narrative.