Institutio Oratoria

For instance, must not the words,

This poor wretched, poverty-stricken man,

be uttered in a low, subdued tone, whereas,

A hold and violent fellow and a robber,

is a phrase requiring a strong and energetic utterance? For such conformity gives a force and appropriateness to our matter, and without it the expression of the voice will be out of harmony with our thought.

Again, what of the fact that a change of delivery may make precisely the same words either demonstrate or affirm, express reproach, denial, wonder or indignation, interrogation, mockery or depreciation? For the word

thou

is given a different expression in each of the following passages:

1. Thou this poor kingdom dost on me bestow.

Aen. i. 78.

and

1. Thou vanquish him in song?

Ecl. iii. 25.

and

1. Art thou, then, that Aeneas?

Aen i. 617.

and

1. And of fear,
2. Do thou accuse me, Drances!

Aen. xi. 383.

To cut a long matter short, if my reader will take this or any other word he chooses and run it through the whole gamut of emotional expression, he will realise the truth of what I say.