If we have [Pg ] executed all other parts to advantage, here we take possession of the minds of the judges, and having escaped all rocks, may expand all our sails for a favorable gale; and as amplification makes a great part of the peroration, we then may raise and embellish our style with the choicest expressions and brightest thoughts.
The first, calculated for ostentation, aims at nothing but the pleasure of the auditory. This is a circumstance requiring the circumspection of both parties, yet I think the favored advocate should behave with great caution, for a judge of a biased disposition will sometimes choose to pass sentence against his friends, or in favor of those to whom he bears enmity, that he may not appear to act with injustice.
Should there be a bench, a tribunal, an assembly of wise and learned judges whose hearts are inaccessible to hatred, envy, hope, fear, prejudice, and the impositions of false witnesses, there would be little occasion for the exertions of eloquence and all that might seem requisite would be only to amuse the ear with the harmony of cadence. Afterward he may say that they did not form this plan by themselves, that they were instigated to it by others who had more indulgent parents, that the result clearly showed they were not capable of so unnatural an action, that there was no necessity for binding themselves by oath if in reality they could have had such an inclination, nor of casting lots if each did not want to avoid the perpetration of such a crime.
Some one is accused of sacrilege for stealing the money of a private person out of a temple. This is evident by only computing the time of the day, besides the advantages of the night, of which a good part is more than sufficient for sleep. This, as most authors agree, is accomplished by making them friendly, attentive , and receptive, tho due regard should be paid [Pg 44] to these three particulars throughout the whole of a speech.
For to be eloquent is nothing else than to be able to set forth all the lively images you have conceived in your mind, and to convey them to the hearers in the same rich coloring, without which all the principles we have laid down are useless, and are like a sword concealed and kept sheathed in its scabbard. On these occasions persons seem to be differently affected; one will believe the fact, and exculpate the right; another will condemn the right, and perhaps not credit the fact. But as many words very often signify the same thing, and therefore are called synonymous , some of these must be more sublime, more bright, more agreeable, and sweeter and fuller in pronunciation than others.
For my part I think this should depend on the nature and exigencies of the cause, yet with this reservation, that the discourse might not dwindle from the powerful into what is nugatory and frivolous. When Hannibal perceived himself to be blocked up by Fabius, he ordered faggots of brush-wood to be fastened about the horns of some oxen, and fire being set to the faggots, had the cattle driven up the mountains in the night, in order to make the enemy believe he was about to decamp.
I admit it does not; but there may be a narration, and even somewhat long, concerning the probable causes of innocence in the accused, as his former integrity of life, the opponent's motives for endangering the life of a guiltless person, and other circumstances arguing the incredibility of the accusation. We are ashamed to differ in opinion from others, and by a sort of secret bashfulness are kept from believing ourselves more intelligent than they are; tho indeed we are aware, at the same time, that the taste of the greater number is vicious, and that sycophants , even persons hired to applaud, praise things which can not [Pg ] please us; as, on the other hand, it also happens that a bad taste can have no relish for the best things.
Sergius Galba escaped the severity of the laws by appearing in court with his own little children, and the son of Gallus Sulpitius, in his arms. The great secret for moving the passions is to be moved ourselves, for the imitation of grief, anger, indignation, will often be ridiculous if conforming to only our words and countenance, while our heart at the same time is estranged from them.
Another rule inculcated by the ancients is not to admit into the exordium any strange word, too bold a metaphor , an obsolete expression, or a poetical turn. Sometimes we may diversify the exposition with a variety of figures and turns; as, "You remember"; "Perhaps it would be unnecessary to insist any longer on this point"; "But why should I speak further when you are so well acquainted with the matter.
For, according as his temper is, harsh or mild, pleasant or grave, severe or easy, the cause should be made to incline toward the side which corresponds with his disposition, or to admit some mitigation or softening where it runs counter to it. Another rule inculcated by the ancients is not to admit into the exordium any strange word, too bold a metaphor, an obsolete expression, or a poetical turn. All agree that recapitulation may also be employed to advantage in other parts of the pleading, if the cause is complicated and requires many arguments to defend it, and, on the other hand, it will admit of no doubt that many causes are so short and simple as to have no occasion in any part of them for recapitulation.
What is redundant , disgusts; what is necessary is cut down with danger. It is of no significance to instruct them; they must be pleased. But if the orator has to deal with light, inconstant, prejudiced, and corrupt judges, and if many embarrassments must be removed in order to throw light upon truth, then artful stratagem must fight the battle, and set all its engines to work, for he who is beaten out [Pg 39] of the straight road can not get into it again except by another turnabout.
The narration will have its due brevity if we begin by explaining the affair from the point where it is of concern to the judge; next, if we say nothing foreign to the cause; and last, if we avoid all superfluities, yet without curtailing anything that may give insight into the [Pg 76] cause or be to its advantage. If it were not so, we should exclude medicine from the catalog of arts, the discovery of which was owing to observations made on things conducive or harmful to public health, and in the opinion of some it is wholly grounded on experiments.
As Cicero says of himself, he is not unaware that [Pg 58] some will find it strange that he, who for so many years had defended such a number of people, and had given no offense to anyone, should undertake to accuse Verres. The points which may seem to require this enumeration, however, ought to be pronounced with some emphasis, and enlivened with opposite thoughts, and diversified by figures, otherwise nothing will be more disagreeable than a mere cursory repetition, which would seem to show distrust of the judge's memory.
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Catius, an Epicurean , has some levity in his way, but in the main is not an unpleasing author. Let us not be such slaves to the placing of words as to study transpositions longer than necessary, lest what we do in order to please, may displease by being affected. If this were an opinion peculiar to orators, it might be thought that they intended it as a mark of dignity attached to their studies, but most philosophers, stoics as well as peripatetics , concur in this opinion. Fear, too, sometimes must be removed, as Cicero, in his defense of Milo, endeavors to assure the judges that Pompey's army, drawn up about the Forum, is for their protection; and sometimes there will be an occasion to intimidate them, as the same orator does in one of his pleadings against Verres.
It is of particular consequence that we should be clear as to what ought to be amplified or diminished; whether we are to speak with heat or moderation; in a florid or austere style; in [Pg ] a copious or concise manner; in words of bitter invective, or in those showing placid and gentle disposition; with magnificence or plainness; gravity or politeness. Is it not the orator who strengthens the soldier's drooping courage, who animates him amidst the greatest dangers, and inspires him to choose a glorious death rather than a life of infamy?
Let the young orator, for whose instruction I make these remarks, accustom himself as much as possible to copy nature and truth. All bombast, and flimsiness, and studied sweetness, and redundancies, and far-fetched thoughts, and witticisms , fall under the same denomination.
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I have designedly omitted speaking hitherto of Seneca ,—who was proficient in all kinds of eloquence,—on account [Pg ] of the false opinion people entertained that I not only condemned his writings, but also personally hated him. Then his mind is to be roused and agitated by hope, fear, remonstrance, entreaty, and even by flattery, if it is thought that will be of any use. There are many very engaging things in an exordium which is framed from the opponent's pleading, and this is because it does not seem to favor of the closet, but is produced on the spot and comes from the very thing.
Herein, therefore, it will be better and more suitable for an advocate [Pg 57] to act than for the person himself; because when pleading for another he can praise without the imputation of arrogance, and sometimes can even reprove with advantage. The accuser does not merely say, "You have committed that murder," but shows reasons to evince its credibility; as, in tragedies, when Teucer imputes the death of Ajax to Ulysses, he says that "He was found in a lonely place, near the dead body of his enemy, with his sword all bloody.
But as many words very often signify the same thing, and therefore are called synonymous, some of these must be more sublime , more bright, more agreeable, and sweeter and fuller in pronunciation than others. They laughed foolishly and without reason, and made others laugh by some ridiculous gesticulation or grimace, especially when the heat of a debate exhibited anything akin to theatrical action.
Tho there is good reason for saying that perspicuity is best suited by proper words, and ornament by metaphorical, yet we should always know that an impropriety is never ornamental. Second, it ought to be short, and not encumbered with any superfluous word, because we do not enter upon the subject matter, but only point it out.
To these may be added several examples of Greeks and Romans, and a long list of orators whose eloquence was not only the ruin of private persons, but even destructive to whole cities and republics; and for this reason it was that eloquence was banished from Sparta and so restricted at Athens that the orator was not allowed to make appeal to the passions. If necessity requires it, I can not say that it is the business of the art of oratory to give directions in the matter, any more than to lodge an appeal, tho that, too, is often of service, or to cite the [Pg 50] judge in justice before he passes sentence, for to threaten, denounce, or indict may be done by any one else as well as the orator.
Eloquence requires a more manly temper, [Pg ] and if its whole body be sound and vigorous, it is quite regardless of the nicety of paring the nails and adjusting the hair. It will be unnecessary to enumerate all the favorable circumstances in causes, they being easily known from the state of facts; besides, no exact enumeration can take place on account of the great diversity of law-suits. Athenian statesman whose leadership contributed to Athens' political and cultural supremacy in Greece; he ordered the construction of the Parthenon died in BC.
For, not to mention the advantage and pleasure a good man reaps from defending his friends, governing the Senate by his counsels, seeing himself the oracle of the people, and master of armies, what can be more noble than by the faculty of speaking and thinking, which is common to all men, to erect for himself such a standard of praise and glory as to seem to the minds of men not so much to discourse and speak, but, like Pericles , to make his words thunder and lightning.
To bring the matter home to our oratorical studies, of what significance is the custom which I see kept up by many, of declaiming so many years in schools, and of expending so much labor on imaginary subjects, when in a moderate time the rules of eloquence may be learned, and pursuant to their directions, a real image framed of the contests at the bar?
To these are subjoined proofs, but the proofs, too, are not without narration, the plaintiff alleging , "You were in the place where your enemy was found killed. The style and manner suitable on these occasions ought, therefore, to be sweet and insinuating, never hot and imperious, never hazarded in too elevated a strain.
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The sense ought to increase and rise, which Cicero observes admirably [Pg ] where he says: We shall procure the favor of the judge not so much by praising him, [Pg 47] which ought to be done with moderation, and is common to both sides, but rather by making his praise fitting, and connecting it with the interest of our cause. And, indeed, what art do we find coeval with the world, and what is there of which the value is not enhanced by improvement?
Second, if it distinguishes exactly things, persons, times, places, causes; all of which should be accompanied with a suitable delivery, that the judge may retain the more easily what is said. From what has been said, it appears that different causes require to be governed by different rules; and five kinds of causes are generally specified, which are said to be, either honest, base, doubtful, extraordinary, or obscure. But should the father, who has already made a partition of his estate in their favor, plead their cause, he may proceed thus: Sometimes honorable mention may be made of him, as when we pretend to be in dread of his interest and eloquence in order to make them suspected by the judges, and sometimes by casting odium on him, altho this must be done very seldom.
We find almost the same thing in the Gorgias of Plato , but this is the opinion of that rhetorician, and not of Plato. This opinion originated with Isocrates, if the work ascribed to him be really his; not that he intended to dishonor his profession, tho he gives us a generous idea of rhetoric by calling it the workmanship of persuasion.
It appears from Plato's Gorgias that he was far from regarding rhetoric as [Pg 19] an art of ill tendency, but that, rather it is, or ought to be, if we were to conceive an adequate idea of it inseparable from virtue. If art, as Cleanthes thinks, is a power which prepares a way and establishes an order, can it be doubted that we must keep to a certain way and a certain order for speaking well? That which may be spoken in a plain, direct manner we express by paraphrase; and we [Pg ] use repetitions where to say a thing once is enough; and what is well signified by one word, we load with many, and most things we choose to signify rather by circumlocution than by proper and pertinent terms.
In sacred canticles, some airs are for elating the heart into raptures, others to restore the mind to its former tranquillity. Should there be an interval for study amidst these avocations , can it be said to be proper? Composition, therefore, in my opinion, is to thoughts and words what the dexterous management of a bow or string may be for directing the aim of missive weapons; and I may say that the most learned are convinced that it is greatly conducive not only to pleasure, but also to making a good impression on others.
To begin with our first division, the same style will not suit [Pg ] equally demonstrative , deliberative, and judicial causes. We find almost the same thing in the Gorgias of Plato, but this is the opinion of that rhetorician , and not of Plato. It is the cause itself, therefore, that must teach us to find and improve these circumstances; and, in like manner, with a circumstance that may make against us the cause will inform us how it may either be made entirely void, or at least invalidated.
This is what animals lack, more than thought and understanding, of which it can not be said they are entirely destitute. An example of this we have in Cicero's description of a riotous banquet; he being the only one who can furnish us with examples of all kinds of ornaments: If, then, so great a power lies in musical strains and modulations , what must it be with eloquence, the music of which is a speaking harmony? For, according as his temper is, harsh or mild, pleasant or grave, severe or easy, the cause should be made to incline toward the side which corresponds with his disposition , or to admit some mitigation or softening where it runs counter to it.
This is what animals lack , more than thought and understanding, of which it can not be said they are entirely destitute. But when it is done for some particular reason, then it becomes a figure of speech. It is to this that Gorgias, in the book above cited , is at last reduced [Pg 18] by Socrates. If this were an opinion peculiar to orators, it might be thought that they intended it as a mark of dignity attached to their studies, but most philosophers, stoics as well as peripatetics, concur in this opinion.
Doubts of this kind may well be entertained by such as make "the force persuasion the end of eloquence," but we who constitute it "The science of speaking well," resolved to acknowledge none but the good man an orator, must naturally judge that its advantage is very considerable. Yet a magnificent, and suitable, dress adds authority to man; but an effeminate dress, the garb of luxury and softness, lays open the corruption of the heart without adding to the ornament of the body.
But these ought to be regulated according to the sentiments we would have the judges imbibe from us. The impetuous torrent sweeps him away, and he is borne down in the current. Is not credit, the authority of the speaker, the dignity of a respectable person, attended with the same effect? It was well known that he was assassinated; his body also lay in state, until his funeral should take place; yet that garment, still dripping with blood, formed so graphic a picture of the horrible murder that it seemed to them to have been perpetrated that very instant. Whatever is cited and argued before the third point must seem quite unnecessary, for the judge is in haste to have you come to that which is of most consequence, and the patient, will tacitly call upon you to acquit yourself of your promise, or, if he has much business to dispatch, or his dignity puts him above your tri [Pg 89] fling, or he is of a peevish humor, he will oblige you to speak to the purpose, and perhaps do so in disrespectful terms.
It is the master's business to require this duty, and to commend it according as it is well executed. As the confidence observable in some orators may easily pass for arrogance, there are certain ways of behavior which, tho common, will please, and therefore ought not to be neglected, to prevent their being used by the opposing side: Theodectes does not much differ from them, if the work ascribed to him be his, or Aristotle's.
And again, "To stand up before a vast assembly composed of men of the most various callings, views, passions, and prejudices , and mold them at will; [Pg vi] to play upon their hearts and minds as a master upon the keys of a piano; to convince their understandings by the logic, and to thrill their feelings by the art of the orator; to see every eye watching his face, and every ear intent on the words that drop from his lips; to see indifference changed to breathless interest, and avers If time can mitigate the pangs of real grief, of course the counterfeit grief assumed in speaking must sooner vanish; so that if we dally , the auditor finding himself overcharged with mournful thoughts, tries to resume [Pg ] his tranquility, and thus ridding himself of the emotion that overpowered him, soon returns to the exercise of cool reason.
Oratory, in the true sense, is not a lost art, but a potent means of imparting information, instruction, and persuasion. The next objection is not one so much in reality as it is a mere cavil; that "Art never assents to false opinions, because it can not be constituted as such without [Pg 34] precepts, which are always true; but rhetoric assents to what is false, therefore it is not an art. The stentorian and dramatic tones, with hand inserted in the breast of the coat, with exaggerated facial expression, and studied posture, would make a speaker to-day an object of ridicule.
I am persuaded that those of the contrary opinion were so more for the sake of exercising their wit on the singularity of the subject than from any real conviction. Tho geometricians and grammarians , and the professors of other arts, spent all their lives, however long, in treating and discussing their respective arts, does it thence follow that we must have as many lives as there are things to be learned?
These acts are commonly of mighty efficacy , as fully revealing the reality of the occurrence. To go through all of them is not my purpose, nor do I think it possible, as most writers on arts have shown a perverse dislike for defining things as others do or in the same terms as those who wrote before them. The floor of their apartment was all in a muck of dirt, streaming with wine, and strewed all about with chaplets of faded flowers, and fish-bones. Yet the accuser is sometimes not without tears, in deploring the distress of those in whose behalf he sues for satisfaction, and the defendant sometimes complains with great vehemence of the persecution raised against him by the calumnies and conspiracy of his enemies.
He on whom the lot falls, enters his father's bed-chamber at night, with a poniard , but has not courage to put the design into execution.
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Secondly, because we are naturally affected by harmony, otherwise the sounds of musical instruments , tho they express no words, would not excite in us so great a variety of pleasing emotions. In things that can not be denied, we must endeavor to show that they are greatly short of what they are reported to be, or that they have been done with a different intention, or that they do not in any wise belong to the present question, or that repentance will make sufficient amends for them, or that they have already received a proportionate punishment. Nor ought judgment to be passed on the whole from examining a part, but after the book has been fully perused, it should have a second reading ; especially should this be done with an oration, the perfections of which are often designedly kept concealed.
An athlete whose arms from exercise show a full spring and play of the muscles, is a beautiful sight, and he, likewise, is best fitted as a combatant. The example of the Romans, among whom eloquence always has been held in the greatest veneration, shall have a higher place in my regard than that of the Spartans and Athenians. If some authors weaken the subjects of which they treat, by straining them into certain soft and lascivious measures, we must not on that account judge that this is the fault of composition. Before it was reduced to an art, tents and bandages were applied to wounds, rest and abstinence cured fever; not that the [Pg 33] reason of all this was then known, but the nature of the ailment indicated such curative methods and forced men to this regimen.
Its object is to narrate, and not to prove, and its whole business neither intends action nor contention, but to transmit facts to posterity , and enhance the reputation of its author. And, indeed, I believe that those present were not completely aware of what they were doing, and that what they did was neither spontaneous, nor from an act of judgment, but that filled with a sort of enthusiasm, and not considering the place they were in, they burst forth with unrestrained excitement.
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The vocabulary of eloquent public speaking
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