Institutio Oratoria

For in the first place nothing can penetrate to the emotions that stumbles at the portals of the ear, and secondly man is naturally attracted by harmonious sounds. Otherwise it would not be the case that musical instruments, in spite of the fact that their sounds are inarticulate, still succeed in exciting a variety of different emotions in the hearer.

In the sacred games different methods are employed to excite and calm the soul, different melodies are required for the war-song and the entreaty sung by the suppliant on bended knee, while the war-note of the trumpet that leads the army forth to battle has no resemblance to the call that sounds the retreat.

It was the undoubted custom of the Pythagoreans, when they woke from slumber, to rouse their souls with the music of the lyre, that they might be more alert for action, and before they retired to rest, to soothe their minds by melodies from the same instrument, in order that all

But if there is such secret power in rhythm and melody alone, this power is found at its strongest in eloquence, and, however important the selection of words for the expression of our thoughts, the structural art which welds them together in the body of a period or rounds them off at the close, has at least an equal claim to importance. For there are some things which, despite triviality of thought and mediocrity of language, may achieve distinction in virtue of this excellence alone.