Institutio Oratoria

But the most ostentatious kind of boasting takes the form of actual self-derision. Let us therefore leave it to others to praise us. For it beseems us, as Demosthenes says, to blush even when we are praised by others. I do not mean to deny that there are occasions when an orator may speak of his own achievements, as Demosthenes himself does in his defence of Ctesiphon. [*](De Cor. 128. ) But on that occasion he qualified his statements in such a way as to show that he was compelled by necessity to do so, and to throw the odium attaching to such a proceeding on the man who had forced him to it.

Again, Cicero often speaks of his suppression of the Catilinarian conspiracy, but either attributes his success to the

One could only wish that he had shown greater restraint in his poems, which those who love him not are never weary of criticising. I refer to passages such as: [*](From the poem on his consulship.)

1. Let arms before the peaceful toga yield,
2. Laurels to eloquence resign the field,

1. O happy Rome, born in my consulship!

Jupiter, by whom he is summoned to the assembly of the gods,

Minerva that taught him her accomplishments

But while it is unseemly to make a boast of one's eloquence, it is, however, at times permissible to express confidence in it. Who, for instance, can blame the following? [*](Phil. i. 2. )

What, then, am I to think? That I am held in contempt? I see nothing either in my past life, or my position, or such poor talents as I may possess, that Antony can afford to despise.