Institutio Oratoria
Quintilian
Quintilian. Institutio Oratoria, Volume 1-4. Butler, Harold Edgeworth, translator. Cambridge, Mass; London: Harvard University Press, William Heinemann Ltd., 1920-1922.
In fact, they think it a disgrace, nay, almost a crime, to pause to breathe except at the end of a passage that is designed to call forth applause. The result is a number of tiny epigrams, affected, irrelevant and disjointed. For there are not enough striking reflexions in the world to provide a close to every period.
The following forms of reflexion are even more modern. There is the type which depends on surprise for its effect, as, for example, when Vibius Crispus, in denouncing the man who wore a breastplate when strolling in the forum and alleged that he did so because he feared for his life, cried,
WhoAnother instance is the striking remark made by Africanus to Nero with reference to the death of Agrippina:v7-9 p.291gave you leave to be such a coward?
Caesar, your provinces of Gaul entreat you to bear your good fortune with courage.
Others are of an allusive type: for example, Domitius Afer, in his defence of Cloatilla, whom Claudius had pardoned when she was accused of having buried her husband, who had been one of the rebels, addressed her sons in his peroration with the words:
Nonetheless, it is your duty, boys, to give your mother burial.[*]( The point is uncertain. Possibly, as Gesner suggests, the sons were accusing their mother. ) Some, again,
depend on the fact that they are transferred from one context to another Crispus, in his defence of Spatale, whose lover had made her his heir and then proceeded to die at the age of eighteen, remarked:
What a marvellous fellow to gratify his passion thus
Another type of reflexion may be produced by the doubling of a phrase, as in the letter written by Seneca for Nero to be sent to the senate on the occasion of his mother's death, with a view to creating the impression that he had been in serious danger:—
As yet I cannot believe or rejoice that I am safe.Better, however, is the type which relies for its effect on contrast of opposites, as
I know from whom to fly, but whom to follow I know not;[*]( Cic. ad Att. VIII. vii. 2. ) or,
What of the fact that the poor wretch, though he could not speak, could not keep silence?[*]( Probably from the lost in Pisonem, since St. Jerome in a letter to Oceanus says postea vero Pisoniano vitio, cum loqui non post, tacere non poterat. But here again the point is obscure. ) But to produce the most striking effect this type should be given point by the introduction of a comparison, such as is made by Trachalus in his speech against Spatale, where he says:
Is it your pleasure, then, ye laws, the faithful guardians of chastity, that wives should receive a title [*]( By the lex Julia et Papia Poppaea childless wives were only entitled to a tenth of their husband's estate. ) and harlots a quarter?
On the other hand, there are some which will always be bad, such as those which turn on play upon words, as in the following case:
Conscript fathers, for I must address you thus that you may remember the duty owed to fathers.Worse still, as being more unreal and far-fetched, is the remark made by the gladiator mentioned above in his prosecution of his sister:
I have fought to the last finger.[*]( The exact meaning is uncertain. The allusion may be to the turning up of the thumb as a sign of defeat. See sect. 12. )
There is another similar type, which is perhaps the worst of all, where the play upon words is combined with a false comparison. When I was a young man I heard a distinguished pleader, after handing a mother some splinters of bone taken from the head of her son (which he did merely to provide an occasion for his epigram), cry:
Unhappiest of women, your son is not yet dead and yet you have gathered up his bones!