Quintilian Institutio Oratoria 3.1

[1] IN the second book the subject of inquiry was the nature and the end of rhetoric, and I proved to the best of my ability that it was an art, that it was useful, that it was a virtue and that its material was all and every subject that might come up for treatment. I shall now discuss its origin, its component parts, and the method to be adopted in handling and forming our conception of each. For most authors of text-books have stopped short of this, indeed Apollodorus confines himself solely to forensic oratory.

[2] I know that those who asked me to write this work were specially interested in that portion on which I am now entering, and which, owing to the necessity of examining a great diversity of opinions, at once forms by far the most difficult section of this work, and also, I fear, may be the least attractive to my readers, since it necessitates a dry exposition of rules.

[3] In other portions of this work I have attempted to introduce a certain amount of ornateness, not, I may say, to advertise my style (if I had wished to do that, I could have chosen a more fertile theme), but in order that I might thus do something to lure our young men to make themselves acquainted with those principles which I regarded as necessary to the study of rhetoric: for I hoped that by giving them something which was not unpleasant to read I might induce a greater readiness to learn those rules which I feared might, by the dryness and aridity which must necessarily characterise their exposition, revolt their minds and offend their ears which are nowadays grown somewhat over-sensitive.

[4] Lucretilus has the same object in mind when he states that he has set forth his philosophical system in verse; for you will remember the well known simile which he uses ¹ :— and the rest.

[5] But I fear that this book will have too little honey and too much wormwood, and that though the student may find it a healthy draught, it will be far from agreeable. I am also haunted by the further fear that it will be all the less attractive from the fact that most of the precepts which it contains are not original, but derived from others, and because it is likely to rouse the opposition of certain persons who do not share my views. For there are a large number of writers, who though they are all moving toward the same goal, have constructed different roads to it and each drawn their followers into their own.

[6] The latter, however, approve of the path on which they have been launched whatever its nature, and it is difficult to change the convictions implantted in boyhood, for the excellent reason that everybody prefers to have learned rather than to be in process of learning.

[7] But, as will appear in the course of this book, there is an infinite diversity of opinions among writers on [his subject, since some have added their own discoveries to those portions of the art which were still shapeless and unformed, and subsequently have altered even what was perfectly sound in order to establish a claim to originality.

[8] The first writer after those recorded by the poets who is said to have taken any steps in the direction of rhetoric is Empedocles. But the earliest writers of text-books are the Sicilians, Corax and Tisias, who were followed by another from the same island, namely Gorgias of Leontini, whom tradition asserts to have been the pupil of Empedocles.

[9] He, thanks to his length of days, for he lived to a hundred and nine, flourished as the contemporary of many rhetoricians, was consequently the rival of those whom I have just mentioned, and lived on to survive Socrates.

[10] In the same period flourished Thrasymachus of Chalcedon, Prodicus of Ceos, Protagoras of Abdera, for whose instructions, which he afterwards published in a text-book, Euathlus is said to have paid 10,000 ² denarii, Hippias of Elis and Alcidamas of Elaea whom Plato ³ calls Palamedes.

[11] There was Antiphon also, who was the first to write speeches and who also wrote a text-book and is said to have spoken most eloquently in his own defence; Polycrates, who, as have already said, wrote a speech against Socrates, and Theodorus of Byzantium, who was one of those called by Plato. ⁴

[12] Of these Protagoras and Gorgias are said to have been the first to treat commonplaces, Prodicus, Hippias, Protagoras and Thrasymachus the first to handle emotional themes. Cicero in the Brutus ⁵ states that nothing in the ornate rhetorical style was ever committed to writing before Pericles, and that certain of his speeches are still extant. For my part I have been unable to discover anything in the least worthy of his great reputation for eloquence, ⁶ and am consequently the less surprised that there should be some who hold that he never committed anything to writing, and that the writings circulating under his name are the works of others.

[13] These rhetoricias had many successors, but the most famous of (Gorgias' pupils was Isocrates, although our authorities are not agreed as to who was his teacher: I however accept the statement of Aristotle on the subject.

[14] From this point the roads begin to part. The pupils of Isocrates were eminent in every branch of study, and when he was already advanced in years (and he lived to the age of ninety-eight), Aristotle began to teach the art of rhetoric in his afternoon lectures, ⁷ in which he frequently quoted the wel-known line from the Philoctetes ⁸ in the form Both Aristotle and Isocrates left text-books on rhetoric, but that by Aristotle is the larger and contains more books. Theodectes, whose work I mentioned above,

[15] also lived about the same period: while Theophrastus, the pupil of Aristotle, produced some careful work on rhetoric. After him we may note that the philosophers, more especially the leaders of the Stoic and Peripatetic schools, surpassed even the rhetoricians in the zeal which they devoted to the subject.

[16] Hermagoras next carved out a path of his own, which numbers have followed: of his rivals Athenaeus seems to have approached him most nearly. Later still much work was done by Apollonius Molon, Areus, Caecilius and Dionysius of Halicarnassus.

[17] But the rhetoricians who attracted the most enthusiastic following were Apollodorus of Pergamus, who was the instructor of Augustus Caesar at Apollonia, and Theodorus of Gadara, who preferred to be called Theodorus of Rhodes: it is said that Tiberius Caesar during his retirement in that island was a constant attendant at his lectures.

[18] These rhetoricians taught different systems, and two schools have arisen known as the Apollodoreans and the Theodoreans, these names being modelled on the fashion of nomenclature in vogue with certain schools of philosophy. The doctrines of Apollodorus are best learned from his pupils, among whom Cains Valgius was the best interpreter of his master's views in Latin, Atticus in Greek. The only text-book by Apollodorus himself seems to be that addressed to Matius, as his letter to Domitius does not acknowledge the other works attributed to him. The writings of Theodorus were more numerous, and there are some still living who have seen his pupil Herinagoras.

[19] The first Roman to handle the subject was, to the best of my belief, Marcus Cato, the famous censor, while after him Marcus Antonius began a treatise on rhetoric: I say because only this one work of his survives, and that is incomplete. he was followed by others of less note, whose names I will not omit to mention, should occasion demand.

[20] But it was Cicero who shed the greatest light not only on the practice but on the theory of oratory; for he stands alone among Romans as combining the gift of actual eloquence with that of teaching the art. With him for ⁹ predecessor it would be more modest to be silent, but for the fact that he himself describes his Rhetorica ¹⁰ as a youthful indiscreition, while in his later works on oratory he deliberately omitted the discussion of certain minor points, on which instruction is generally desired.

[21] Cornificius wrote a good deal, Stertinius something, and the elder Gallio a little on the same subject. But Gallio's predecessors, Celsus and Laenas, and in our own day Verginius, Pliny and Tutilius, have treated rhetoric with greater accuracy. Even to-day we have some distinguished writers on oratory who, if they had dealt with the subject more comprehensively, would have saved me the trouble of writing this book. But I will spare the names of the living. The time will come when they will reap their meed of praise; for their merits will endure to after generations, while the calunmies of envy will perish utterly.

[22] Still, although so many writers have preceded me, I shall not shrink from expressing my own opinion on certain points. I am not a superstitious adherent of any school, and as this book will contain a collection of the opinions of many different authurs, it was desirable to leave it to my readers to selcet what they will. I shall be content if they praise me for my industry, wherever there is no scope for originality.