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 now come to the subject of ornament, in which, more than in any other department, the orator undoubtedly allows himself the greatest indulgence. For a speaker wins but trifling praise if he does no more than speak with correctness and lucidity; in fact his speech seems rather to be free from blemish than to have any positive merit.

Even the untrained often possess the gift of invention, and no great learning need be assumed for the satisfactory arrangement of our matter, while if any more recondite art is required, it is generally concealed, since unconcealed it would cease to be an art, while all these qualities are employed solely to serve the interests of the actual case. On the other hand, by the employment of skilful ornament the orator

v7-9 p.213
commends himself at the same time, and whereas his other accomplishments appeal to the considered judgment of the learned, this gift appeals to the enthusiastic approval of the world at large, and the speaker who possesses it fights not merely with effective, but with flashing weapons.

If in his defence of Cornelius Cicero had confined himself merely to instructing the judge and speaking in clear and idiomatic Latin without a thought beyond the interests of his case, would he ever have compelled the Roman people to proclaim their admiration not merely by acclamation, but by thunders of applause? No, it was the sublimity and splendour, the brilliance and the weight of his eloquence that evoked such clamorous enthusiasm.

Nor, again, would his words have been greeted with such extraordinary approbation if his speech had been like the ordinary speeches of every day. In my opinion the audience did not know what they were doing, their applause sprang neither from their judgment nor their will; they were seized with a kind of frenzy and, unconscious of the place in which they stood, burst forth spontaneously into a perfect ecstasy of delight.

But rhetorical ornament contributes not a little to the furtherance of our case as well. For when our audience find it a pleasure to listen, their attention and their readiness to believe what they hear are both alike increased, while they are generally filled with delight, and sometimes even transported by admiration. The flash of the sword in itself strikes something of terror to the eye, and we should be less alarmed by the thunderbolt if we feared its violence alone, and not its flash as well.

Cicero was right when, in one of his letters to Brutus, he

v7-9 p.215
wrote,
Eloquence which evokes no admiration is, in my opinion, unworthy of the name.
Aristotle [*](Rhet. III. ii. 5. ) likewise thinks that the excitement of admiration should be one of our first aims. But such ornament must, as I have already said, [*](In the introduction to this book, 19.) be bold, manly and chaste, free from all effeminate smoothness and the false hues derived from artificial dyes, and must glow with health and vigour.

So true is this, that although, where ornament is concerned, vice and virtue are never far apart, those who employ a vicious style of embellishment disguise their vices with the name of virtue. Therefore let none of our decadents accuse me of being an enemy to those who speak with grace and finish. I do not deny the existence of such a virtue, I merely deny that they possess it.

Shall I regard a farm as a model of good cultivation because its owner shows me lilies and violets and anemones and fountains of living water in place of rich crops and vines bowed beneath their clusters? Shall I prefer the barren plane and myrtles trimly clipped, to the fruitful olive and the elm that weds the vine? No, let such luxuries delight the rich: but where would their wealth be if they had nought save these?

Again, is beauty an object of no consideration in the planting of fruit trees? Certainly not! For my trees must be planted in due order and at fixed intervals. What fairer sight is there than rows of trees planted in échelon [*](Quincunx. The formation may be thus represented ) which present straight lines to the eye from whatever angle they be viewed? But it has an additional advantage, since this form of plantation enables every tree to derive an equal share of moisture from the soil.

When the tops of my olive trees rise too high, I lop them away, with the result that their growth expands laterally

v7-9 p.217
in a manner that is at once more pleasing to the eye and enables them to bear more fruit owing to the increase in the number of branches. A horse whose flanks are compact is not only better to look upon, but swifter in speed. The athlete whose muscles have been formed by exercise is a joy to the eye, but he is also better fitted for the contests in which he must engage.

In fact true beauty and usefulness always go hand in hand. It does not, however, require any special ability to discern the truth of this. It is more important to note that such seemly ornament must be varied to suit the nature of the material to which it is applied. To begin with the primary classification of oratory, the same form of ornament will not suit demonstrative, deliberative and forensic speeches. For the oratory of display aims solely at delighting the audience, and therefore develops all the resources of eloquence and deploys all its ornament, since it seeks not to steal its way into the mind nor to wrest the victory from its opponent, but aims solely at honour and glory.

Consequently the orator, like the hawker who displays his wares, will set forth before his audience for their inspection, nay, almost for their handling, all his most attractive reflexions, all the brilliance that language and the charm that figures can supply, together with all the magnificence of metaphor and the elaborate art of composition that is at his disposal. For his success concerns himself, and not his cause.

But when it is a question of facts, and he is confronted by the hard realities of battle, his last thought will be for his personal glory. Nay, it is even unseemly to trouble overmuch about words when the greatest interests are at stake. I would

v7-9 p.219
not assert that such themes afford no scope for ornament, but such ornament as is employed must be of a more severe, restrained and less obvious character; above all, it must be adapted to the matter in hand.

For whereas in deliberative oratory the senate demand a certain loftiness and the people a certain impetuosity of eloquence, the public cases of the courts and those involving capital punishment demand a more exact style. On the other hand, in private deliberations and lawsuits about trifling sums of money (and there are not a few of these) it is more appropriate to employ simple and apparently unstudied language. For we should be ashamed to demand the repayment of a loan in rolling periods, or to display poignant emotion in a case concerned with water-droppings, or to work ourselves into a perspiration over the return of a slave to the vendor. But I am wandering from the point.

Since rhetorical ornament, like clearness, may reside either in individual words or groups of words, we must consider the requirements of both cases. For although tile canon, that clearness mainly requires propriety of language and ornament the skilful use of metaphor, is perfectly sound, it is desirable that we should realise that without propriety ornament is impossible.

But as several words may often have the same meaning (they are called synonyms), some will be more distinguished, sublime, brilliant, attractive or euphonious than others. For as those syllables are the most pleasing to the ear which are composed of the more euphonious letters, thus words composed of such syllables will sound better than others, and the more vowel sounds they contain the more attractive they will be to hear.

v7-9 p.221
The same principle governs the linking of word with word; some arrangements will sound better than others.

But words require to be used in different ways. For example, horrible things are best described by words that are actually harsh to the ear. But as a general rule it may be laid down that the best words, considered individually, are those which are fullest or most agreeable in sound. Again, elegant words are always to be preferred to those which are coarse, and there is no room for low words in the speech of a cultivated man.

The choice of striking or sublime words will be determined by the matter in hand; for a word that in one context is magnificent may be turgid in another, and words which are all too mean to describe great things may be suitable enough when applied to subjects of less importance. And just as a mean word embedded in a brilliant passage attracts special attention, like a spot on a bright surface, so if our style be of a plain character, sublime and brilliant words will seem incongruous and tasteless excrescences on a flat surface.

In some cases instinct, and not reason, must supply the touchstone, as, for example, in the line: [*](Aen. viii. 641. )

  1. A sow was slain to ratify their pacts.
Here the poet, by inventing the word porca, succeeded in producing an elegant impression, whereas if lie had used the masculine porcuis, the very reverse would have been the case. In some cases, however, the incongruity is obvious enough. It was only the other day that we laughed with good reason at the poet who wrote:
  1. The youngling mice had gnawed
  2. Within its chest the purple-bordered gown.
  3. [*]( Camillus originally means a young boy. )
v7-9 p.223

On the other hand, we admire Virgil [*](Georg. i. 181. ) when he says:

  1. Oft hath the tiny mouse,
    etc.
For here the epithet is appropriate and prevents our expecting too much, while the use of the singular instead of the plural, and the unusual monosyllabic conclusion of the line, both add to the pleasing effect. Horace [*](A. P. 139. ) accordingly imitated Virgil in both these points, when he wrote,
  1. The fruit shall be a paltry mouse.