Institutio Oratoria

when the subject on which we have to speak is abnormal. For we are allowed to amplify, when the magnitude of the facts passes all words, and in such circumstances our language will be more effective if it goes beyond the truth than if it falls short of it. However, I have said enough on this topic, since I have already dealt with it in my work on the causes of the decline of oratory.

In my last book I spoke of tropes. I now come to figures, called σχήματα in Greek, a topic which is naturally and closely connected with the preceding.

For many authors have considered figures identical with tropes, because whether it be that the latter derive their name from having a certain form or from the fact that they effect alterations in language (a view which has also led to their being styled motions ), it must be admitted that both these features are found in figures as well. Their employment is also the same. For they add force and charm to our matter. There are some again who call tropes figures, Artorius Proculus among them.

Further the resemblance between the two is so close that it is not easy to distinguish between them. For although certain kinds differ, while retaining a general resemblance (since both involve a departure from the simple and straightforward method of expression coupled with a certain rhetorical excellence), on the other hand some are distinguished by the narrowest possible dividing line: for example, while irony belongs to figures of thought just as much as to tropes, [*](See IX. ii. 44.) periphrasis, hyperbaton and onomatopoea [*]( VIII. vi. 59 sqq., 62, 31 respectively. ) have been ranked by distinguished authors as figures of speech rather than tropes.