Institutio Oratoria

Quintilian

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

Who can narrate more briefly than the hero [*]( Antilochus, Il. xviii. 18. ) who brings the news of Patroclus' death, or more vividly than he [*]( Phoenix, Il. ix. 529. ) who describes the battle between the Curetes and the Aetolians? Then consider his

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similes, his amplifications, his illustrations, digressions, indications of fact, inferences, and all the other methods of proof and refutation which he employs. They are so numerous that the majority of writers on the principles of rhetoric have gone to his works for examples of all these things.

And as for perorations, what can ever be equal to the prayers which Priam addresses to Achilles [*](Il. xxiv. 486 sqq. ) when he comes to beg for the body of his son? Again, does he not transcend the limits of human genius in his choice of words, his reflexions, figures, and the arrangement of his whole work, with the result that it requires a powerful mind, I will not say to imitate, for that is impossible, but even to appreciate his excellences?

But he has in truth outdistanced all that have come after him in every department of eloquence, above all, he has outstripped all other writers of epic, the contrast in their case being especially striking owing to the similarity of the material with which they deal.

Hesiod rarely rises to any height, while a great part of his works is filled almost entirely with names [*]( Especially the Theogony. ) : none the less, his maxims of moral wisdom provide a useful model, the smooth flow of his words and structure merit our approval, and he is assigned the first place among writers of the intermediate style.