Institutio Oratoria

Such jests should not however descend to buffoonery. Consequently I cannot give my approval to the orator, although he was one of the most distinguished speakers of his day, who, when his opponent brought in some children to enhance the effect of his peroration, threw some dice among them, with the result that they began to scramble for them. For their childish ignorance of the perils with which

For the same reason I cannot commend the advocate who, when his opponent the accuser produced a bloodstained sword in court, fled suddenly from the benches as though in an agony of terror, and then, when his turn came to plead, peeped out of the crowd with his head half covered by his robe and asked whether the man with the sword had gone away. For though he caused a laugh, he made himself ridiculous.

Still, theatrical effects of the kind we are discussing can be dispelled by the power of eloquence. Cicero provides most admirable examples of the way in which this may be done both in the pro Rabirio [*](cp. Pro Rab. ix 24. ) where he attacks the production in court of the portrait of Saturninus in the most dignified language, and in the pro Vareno where he launches a number of witticisms against a youth whose wound had been unbound at intervals in the course of the trial.

There are also milder kinds of peroration in which, if our opponent is of such a character that he deserves to be treated with respect, we strive to ingratiate ourselves with him or give him some friendly warning or urge him to regard us as his friends. This method was admirably employed by Passienus when he pleaded in a suit brought by his wife Domitia against her brother Ahenobarbus for the recovery of a sum of money: he began by making a number of remarks about the relationship of the two parties and then, referring to their wealth, which was in both cases enormous, added,

There is nothing either of you need less than the subject of this dispute.