Institutio Oratoria

Quintilian

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

Too much insistence cannot be laid upon the point that no one can be said to speak appropriately who has not considered not merely what it is expedient, but also what it is becoming to say. I am well aware that these two considerations generally go hand in hand. For whatever is becoming is, as a rule, useful, and there is nothing that does more to conciliate the good-will of the judge than the observance or to alienate it than the disregard of these considerations.

Sometimes, however, the two are at variance. Now, whenever this occurs, expediency must yield to the demands of what is becoming. Who is there who does not realise that nothing would have contributed more to secure the acquittal of Socrates than if he had employed the ordinary forensic methods of defence and had conciliated the minds of his judges by adopting a submissive tone and had devoted his attention to refuting the actual charge against him?

But such a course would have been unworthy of his character,

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and, therefore, he pleaded as one who would account the penalty to which he might be sentenced as the highest of honours. The wisest of men preferred to sacrifice the remnant of his days rather than to cancel all his past life. And since he was but ill understood by the men of his own day, he reserved his case for the approval of posterity and at the cost of a few last declining years achieved through all the ages life everlasting.

And so although Lysias, who was accounted the first orator of that time, offered him a written defence, he refused to make use of it, since, though he recognised its excellence, he regarded it as unbecoming to himself. This instance alone shows that the end which the orator must keep in view is not persuasion, but speaking well, since there are occasions when to persuade would be a blot upon his honour. The line adopted by Socrates was useless to secure his acquittal, but was of real service to him as a man; and that is by far the greater consideration.

In drawing this distinction between what is expedient and what is becoming, I have followed rather the usage of common speech than the strict law of truth; unless, indeed, the elder Africanus [*]( Falsely accused of having taken a bribe from King Antiochus. See Livy, XXXVIII. li. 16. ) is to be regarded as having failed to consult his true interests, when he retired into exile sooner than wrangle over his own innocence with a contemptible tribune of the people, or unless it be alleged that Publius Rutilius [*]( See de Or. I. liii. 227 sqq. ) was ignorant of his true advantage both on the occasion when he adopted a defence which may almost be compared with that of Socrates, and when he preferred to remain in exile rather than return at Sulla's bidding.

No, these great men regarded all those trifles that the most abject natures regard as

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advantageous, as being contemptible if weighed in the balance with virtue, and for this reason they have their reward in the deathless praise of all generations. Let not us, then, be so poor spirited as to regard the acts, which we extol, as being inexpedient.