MARCUS TULLIUS CICERO

(106-43 B. C.)

ICERO'S "De Oratore» ranks with the similar works of Aristotle and Quintilian as the highest authority on everything which concerns oratory as one of the fine arts. His "Brutus» deals also with oratory, but chiefly in connection with the works of classical authors whose speeches are now lost. The treatise "De Oratore" is written in the form of a dialogue, and Cicero imitates the style and methods of the Platonic dialogues, often with the happiest effect.

His claim to rank as the greatest orator since Demosthenes cannot be disputed. If we take into consideration his philosophical essays, as well as his orations, his claim to superiority over Demosthenes must be conceded, for they constitute him the greatest essayist as well as the greatest orator of Rome. His style as a prose writer still influences the best prose style of all Caucasian countries-not only French, Spanish, and Italian, the so-called "Latin races," but of German, English, and other "Teutonic » and "Gothic" peoples as well. Taine's "History of English Literature" is no doubt, the best modern example of it.

Cicero was born at Arpinum, 106 B. C. He began his career in Rome at a time when Republican institutions were already a failure because of the demoralization brought on the masses of the people by their conquests of other countries. Cicero's whole career as a statesman and orator was a protest against this demoralization and an attempt to save the republic from its already inevitable overthrow. His failure was followed by his assassination in 43 B. C.

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THE PARTS OF AN ORATION

HEN Hannibal in his exile from Carthage had taken refuge with Antiochus at Ephesus, he was invited by his hosts, in consequence of the widespread glory of his name, to attend a lecture given by that philosopher. Having accepted the invitation, he heard him fluently harangue for some hours on the duties of a commander and the whole art of war. When the audience, in their unbounded admiration of the speaker, appealed to Hannibal for his opinion, the Carthaginian is said to have answered with great candor, though not in the very best Greek, that he had in his time seen many mad old men, but never any one so raving mad as Phormio. And richly did he merit the rebuke; for what can be conceived more arrogant or more impertinently loquacious than that a mere Greek theorist who had never faced an enemy, never even seen a camp, nor filled any public office what

ever, should presume to dictate the principles of war to the man who had for so many years contested the palm of victory with the Roman people—the subjugators of the world? Of a similar folly, in my opinion, are all those guilty who lay down rules for the art of speaking: they would teach others that of which they themselves have no practical knowledge; their presumption, however, is perhaps more excusable, since they do not profess to teach you as Phormio did the Carthaginian, but only boys or youths bordering upon manhood.

You are mistaken, Catulus, said Antonius, for I myself have met with many Phormios. What Greek, indeed, ever gives us credit for knowing anything? To me, however, they are not particularly troublesome; I easily endure and tolerate them all, for either they give me some not unpleasing information, or leave me only the more satisfied with my own ignorance. I dismiss them, however, less contumeliously than Hannibal did this philosopher, and for that reason, perhaps, I am more subject to their importunity; but really their system, as far as I can judge, is extremely ridiculous. They divide the whole art of rhetoric into two parts- viz., the controversy about the cause and about the question. The cause they designate any definite dispute or discussion; the question, anything in unlimited investigation. Certain rules are laid down by them for the cause, but on the other division they maintain a marvelous silence. Lastly, they divide the subject into five several members or ramifications-to accumulate the material for any discourse, to arrange it, to clothe it in language, then to commit it to memory, and, finally, to deliver it, with a fitting accompaniment of action and expression- certainly no very recondite process; for who does not see, by his own unaided sagacity, that no one can make a speech without knowing what he has to say-in what words, and — in what order -and without having it well fixed in his memory. Nor do I find fault with this arrangement; I only think it too obvious to require elucidation -a remark which applies also to the four, five, six, or even seven parts (for they are differently divided by different professors) into which it is customary to distribute the whole oration. The object of the Exordium, we are told, should be to conciliate the judge-to make him open to persuasion, and disposed to listen; then follows the Narration, which, we are instructed, should be plausible, clear, and brief; then the Division and Proposition; next, the enforcement of our own cause with arguments and reasons, and the refutation of those of our opponent. Here some place the Conclusion and Peroration; but by others we are instructed to make a previous digression, for the purpose of embellishment or amplification, and then to conclude. Neither have I any quarrel with this distribution; it is neat and precise, but, as could scarcely fail to be the case with men devoid of all practical knowlege, not very scientific; for those rules which they would confine to the exordium ought to extend over the whole discourse. I can more easily conciliate the favor of the judge in the course of the address than before the merits of the case have been heard by him; I can make him amenable to persuasion, not by promising to demonstrate and prove, but by actual proof and demonstration; and most assuredly his attention can be more strongly attracted by keeping his interest alive during the progress of the whole speech than by the bare announcement of the question at issue. In demanding that the Narration should be plausible, clear, and brief, they are perfectly right; but it is a grave mistake to suppose that those qualities belong more to the Narration than to the entire discourse. Their whole error consists in regarding this as a kind of art similar to what Crassus said yesterday might be molded out of the civil lawfirst, by an exposition of the general heads of the subject, which is defective if any head be omitted; then, by the subdivisions of these general heads, which are faulty if more or less than the exact number; and, lastly, by a definition of the terms employed, in which there should be nothing wanting, nothing superfluous.