Institutio Oratoria

Quintilian

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

When we are going to deliver a declamation on a theme that turns largely on its emotional features, we must give it a dramatic character suited to the persons concerned. For emotions are not transferable at will, nor can we give the same forcible

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expression to another man's emotions that we should give to our own.

The circumstances which call for insinuation arise also in cases where the pleading of our opponent has made a powerful impression on the minds of the judges, or where the audience whom we have to address are tired. The first difficulty we shall evade by promising to produce our own proofs and by eluding the arguments of our opponents, the second by holding out hopes that we shall be brief and by the methods already mentioned for capturing the attention of the judges.

Again an opportune display of wit will often restore their flagging spirits and we may alleviate their boredom by the introduction of entertaining matter derived from any source that may be available. It will also be found advantageous to anticipate the objections that may be raised by our opponent, as Cicero [*](Div. in Caec. i. 1. ) does when he says

I know that some persons are surprised that one, who for such a number of years has defended so many and attacked none, should have come forward as the accuser of Verres,

he then goes on to show that the accusation which he has undertaken is really a defence of the allies, an artifice known as πρόληψις or anticipation.

Although this is at times a useful device, some of our declaimers employ it on practically every occasion, on the assumption that one should always start with the order thus reversed. The adherents of Apollodorus reject the view stated above to the effect that there are only three respects in which the mind of the judge requires to be prepared, and enumerate many others, relating to the character of the judge, to opinions regarding matters which though outside the case have still

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some bearing on it, to the opinion current as to the case itself, and so on ad infinitum: to these they add others relating to the elements of which every dispute is composed, such as persons, deeds, words, motives, time and place, occasions and the like. Such views are, I admit, perfectly correct,

but are covered by one or other of the three classes which I have mentioned. For if I can secure good-will, attention and readiness to learn on the part of my judge, I cannot see what else I ought to require; even fear, which perhaps may be thought more than anything else to lie outside the considerations I have mentioned, secures the attention of the judge and deters him from favouring our opponent.