Institutio Oratoria

Quintilian

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

Again, when Plato in the Symposium [*](218B–219D.) makes Alcibiades confess how he had wished Socrates to treat him, he does not, I think, record these facts with a view to blaming Aleibiades, but rather to show the unconquerable self-control of Socrates, which would not yield even to the charms which the greatest beauty of his day so frankly placed at his disposal.

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We are even given the means of realising the extraordinary stature of the heroes of old by the description of their weapons, such as the shield of Ajax [*](Il. vii. 219. ) and the spear-shaft of Achilles [*](Il. xvi. 140. ) hewn in the forests of Pelion. Virgil [*]( Aen. iii. 659. ) also has made admirable use of this device in his description of the Cyclops. For what an image it gives us of the bulk of that body

Whose hand was propped by a branchless trunk of pine.

So, too, what a giant must Demoleos [*](Aen. v. 264. ) have been,

Whose

corselet manifold
Scarce two men on their shoulders could uphold

And yet the hero buckled it upon him and

Drave the scattering Trojans at full speed.

And again, Cicero [*](Phil. ii. 27. ) could hardly even have conceived of such luxury in Antony himself as he describes when he says,

You might see beds in the chambers of his slaves strewn with the purple coverlets that had once been Pompey's own.

Slaves are using purple coverlets in their chambers, aye, and coverlets that had once been Pompey's! No more, surely, can be said than this, and yet it leaves us to infer how infinitely greater was the luxury of their master.

This form of amplification is near akin to emphasis: but emphasis derives its effect from the actual words, while in this case the effect is produced by inference from the facts, and is consequently far more impressive, inasmuch as facts are more impressive than words.

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Accumulation of words and sentences identical in meaning may also be regarded under the head of amplification. For although the climax is not in this case reached by a series of steps, it is none the less attained by the piling up of words. Take the following example: [*](Pro Lig. iii. 9. )

What was that sword of yours doing, Tubero, the sword you drew on the field of Pharsalus? Against whose body did you aim its point? What meant those arms you bore? Whither were your thoughts, your eyes, your hand, your fiery courage directed on that day? What passion, what desires were yours?

This passage recalls the figure styled συναθροισμός [*](accumulation.) by the Greeks, but in that figure it is a number of different things that are accumulated, whereas in this passage all the accumulated details have but one reference. The heightening of effect may also be produced by making the words rise to a climax. [*](Verr. xv. xlv. 118. )

There stood the porter of the prison, the praetor's executioner, the death and terror of the citizens and allies of Rome, the lictor Sextius.

Attenuation is effected by the same method, since there are as many degrees of descent as ascent. I shall therefore content myself with quoting but one example, namely, the words used by Cicero [*](Leg. Agr. II. V. 13. ) to describe the speech of Rullus:

A few, however, who stood nearest to him suspected that he had intended to say something about the agrarian law.

This passage may be regarded as providing an example of attenuation or of augmentation, according as we consider its literal meaning or fix our attention on the obscurity attributed to Rullus.

I know that some may perhaps regard hyperbole as a species of amplification, since hyperbole can be

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employed to create an effect in either direction. But as the name is also applied to one of the tropes, I must postpone its consideration for the present. I would proceed to the immediate discussion of this subject but for the fact that others have given separate treatment to this form of artifice, [which employs words not in their literal, but in a metaphorical sense [*](See ch. vi.) ]. I shall therefore at this point indulge a desire now almost universal, and discuss a form of ornament which many regard as the chief, nay, almost the sole adornment of oratory.

V. When the ancients used the word sententia, they meant a feeling, or opinion. The word is frequently used in this sense by orators, and traces of this meaning are still found even in the speech of every day. For when we are going to take an oath we use the phrase ex animi nostri sententia (in accordance with what we hold is the solemn truth), and when we offer congratulations, we say that we do so ex sententia (with all our heart). The ancients, indeed, often expressed the same meaning by saying that they uttered their sensa; for they regarded senses as referring merely to the senses of the body.

But modern usage applies sensus to concepts of the mind, while sentcntia is applied to striking reflexions such as are more especially introduced at the close of our periods, a practice rare in earlier days, but carried even to excess in our own. Accordingly, I think that I ought to say something of the various forms which such reflexions may tale and the manner in which they should be used.

Although all the different forms are included under the same name, the oldest type of sententia, and that in which the term is most correctly applied,

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is the aphorism, called γνώμη by the Greeks. Both the Greek and the Latin names are derived from the fact that such utterances resemble the decrees or resolutions of public bodies. The term, however, is of wide application (indeed, such reflexions may be deserving of praise even when they have no reference to any special context), and is used in various ways. Sometimes it refers merely to things, as in the sentence:

There is nothing that wins the affections of the people more than goodness of heart. [*]( Cic. pro Lig. xii. 37. )

Occasionally, again, they may have a personal reference, as in the following utterance of Domitius Afer:

The prince who would know all, must needs ignore much.

Some have called this form of reflexion a part of the enthymeme, others the major premise or conclusion of the epichireme, as it sometimes, though not invariably, is. More correct is the statement that at times it is simple, as in the example just quoted, while at other times a reason for the statement may be added, [*]( The premises of the enthymeme are simple, while those of the epichireme are supported by a reason. See v. xiv. ) such as the following: [*](Sall. Jug. 10. )

For in every struggle, the stronger seems not to suffer wrong, even when this is actually the case, but to inflict it, simply in virtue of his superior power.

Sometimes, again, it may be double, as in the statement that

Complaisance wins us friends, truth enmity.
Ter. Andr. I. i. 41.

There are some even who classify them under ten [*](##) heads, though the principle on which they make this division is such that it would justify a still larger number: they class them as based on interrogation, comparison, denial, similarity, admiration, and the like, for they can be treated under every

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kind of figure. A striking type is that which is produced by opposition:

Death is not bitter, but the approach to death.
Author unknown.

Others are cast in a form of a direct statement,

such as

The miser lacks
That which he has no less than what he has not.
Publil. Syr. Sent. 486.

But they acquire greater force by a change in the figure employed, as in the following:

Is it so bitter, then, to die?
Aen. xii. 646.

For this is more vigorous than the simple statement,

Death is not bitter.

A similar effect may be produced by transference of' the statement from the general to the particular. For example, although the direct statement would be,

To hurt is easy, but to do good is hard.

Ovid [*](In his lost tragedy, the Medea.) gives this reflexion increased force when lie makes Medea say,

I had the power to save, and ask you then
If I have power to ruin?

Cicero [*](' Pro Lig. xii. 38. ) again gives the general statement a personal turn when he says:

Caesar, the splendour of your present fortune confers on you nothing greater than the power and nothing better than the will to save as many of your fellow-citizens as possible.

For here he attributes to Caesar what was really attributable to the circumstances of his power. In this class of reflexion we must be careful, as always, not to employ them too frequently, nor at random, nor place them in the mouth of every kind of person,

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while we must make certain that they are not untrue, as is so often the case with those speakers who style them reflexions of universal application and recklessly employ whatever seems to support their case as though its truth were beyond question.

Such reflexions are best suited to those speakers whose authority is such that their character itself will lend weight to their words. For who would tolerate a boy, or a youth, or even a man of low birth who presumed to speak with all the authority of a judge and to thrust his precepts down our throats?

The term enthymeme may be applied to any concept of the mind, but in its strict sense means a reflexion drawn from contraries. Consequently, it has a supremacy among reflexions which we may compare to that of Homer among poets and Rome among cities.

I have already said enough on this topic in dealing with arguments. [*]( See v. x. 2, and again, for greater detail, v. xiv. 1 (note at end), where an example of this type of sententia is given from the pro Milone (ch. 29) You are sitting to avenge the death of one whom you would be unwilling to restore to life even if you thought it was in your power to restore it! ) But the use of the enthymeme is not confined to proof, it may sometimes be employed for the purpose of ornament, as in the following instance: [*](Pro Lig. iv. 10. )

Caesar, shall the language of those whom it is your glory to have spared goad you to imitate their own cruelty?

Cicero's motive in saying this is not that it introduces any fresh reason for clemency, but because he has already demonstrated by other arguments how unjust such conduct would be,

while he adds it at the period's close as an epiphonema, not by way of proof, but as a crowning insult to his opponents. For an epiphonema is an exclamation attached to the close of a statement or a proof by way of climax. Here are two examples:

Such toil it was to found the Roman race!
Aen. i. 33.

and

The virtuous youth preferred to risk his life
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by slaying him to suffering such dishonour.

[*]( Cic. pro Mil. iv. 9, cp. V. xi. 13. )

There is also what our modern rhetoricians call the noema, a term which may be taken to mean every kind of conception, but is employed by them in the special sense of things which they wish to be understood, though they are not actually said, as in the declamation where the sister defends herself against the brother whom she had often bought out from the gladiatorial school, when he brought an action against her demanding the infliction of a similar mutilation because she had cut off his thumb while he slept:

You deserved,

she cries,

to have all your fingers,

meaning thereby,

You deserved to be a gladiator all your days.

There is also what is called a clausula. If this merely means a conclusion, it is a perfectly correct and sometimes a necessary device, as in the following case:

You must, therefore, first confess your own offence before you accuse Ligarius of anything.

[*](Pro Lig. i. 2. It is a conclusion in the logical sense. But clausula more commonly means close, conclusion, cadence of a period. Cp. what follows. ) But to-day something more is meant, for our rhetoricians want every passage, every sentence to strike the ear by an impressive close.

In fact, they think it a disgrace, nay, almost a crime, to pause to breathe except at the end of a passage that is designed to call forth applause. The result is a number of tiny epigrams, affected, irrelevant and disjointed. For there are not enough striking reflexions in the world to provide a close to every period.