Institutio Oratoria

There is also another kind of figure, which is not aposiopesis, since that involves leaving a sentence unfinished, but consists in bringing our words to a close before the natural point for their conclusion. The following is an example [*](pro Lig. iii. 9. ) :

I am pressing my point too far; the young man appears to be moved

Why should I say more? you heard the young man tell the story himself.

which is styled ἠθοποιί͂α or, as some prefer μίμησις may be counted among the devices which serve to excite the gentler emotions. For it consists mainly in banter, though it may be concerned either with words or deeds. If concerned with the latter, it closely resembles ὑποτύπωσις while the following passage from Terence [*](Eun. I. ii. 75. ) will illustrate it as applied to words:

I didn't see your drift. 'A little girl was stolen from this place; my mother brought her up as her own daughter. She was known as my sister. I want to get her away to restore her to her relations.'

We may, however, imitate our own words and deeds in a similar fashion by relating some

I said that they had Quintus Caecilius to conduct the prosecution.

Thus we may feign repentance for what we have said, as in the pro Caelio, [*](xv. 35.) where Cicero says,

But why did I introduce so respectable a character?

I didn't mean to say that.

What else is there?

Have I left anything out?

One more charge, too, of this sort still remains for me to deal with,

One thing suggests another.

Such methods will also provide us with elegant transitions, although transition is not itself to be ranked among figures: for example, Cicero, [*](Ve err. IV. xxvi. 57. ) after telling the story of Piso, who ordered a goldsmith to make a ring before him in court, adds, as though this story had suggested it to him,

This ring of Piso's reminds me of something which had entirely slipped my memory. How many gold rings do you think Verres has stripped from the fingers of honourable men?

But who was the sculptor who made those statues? Who

v7-9 p.413

was he? Thank you for prompting me, you are right; they said it was Polyclitus.

This device may serve for other purposes as well. For there are means of this kind whereby we may achieve an end quite other than that at which we appear to be aiming, as, for example, Cicero does in the passage just quoted. For while he taunts Verres with a morbid passion for acquiring statues and pictures, he succeeds in creating the impression that he personally has no interest in such subjects. So, too, when Demosthenes [*](De Coron. 263. He argued that defeat in such a cause could bring no shame. Athens would have been unworthy of the heroes of old had she not fought for freedom. ) swears by those who fell at Marathon and Salamis, his object is to lessen the odium in which he was involved by the disaster at Chaeronea.

We may further lend charm to our speech by deferring the discussion of some points after just mentioning them, thus depositing them in the safe keeping of the judge's memory and afterwards reclaiming our deposit; or we may employ some figure to enable us to repeat certain points (for repetition is not in itself a figure) or may make especial mention of certain things and vary the aspect of our pleading. For eloquence delights in variety, and just as the eye is more strongly attracted by the sight of a number of different things, so oratory supplies a continuous series of novelties to rivet the attention of the mind.

Emphasis may be numbered among figures also, when some hidden meaning is extracted from some phrase, as in the following passage from Virgil:

1. Might I not have lived,
2. From wedlock free, a life without a stain,
3. Happy as beasts are happy?

Aen. iv. 550.

1. O mother, happy in thy spouse!

Met. x. 422.