Quintilian: INSTITUTIONES

[1] I. Cum sit proximo libro de tropis dictum, sequitur pertinens ad figuras (quae schemata Graece vocantur) locus ipsa rei natura coniunctus superiori. Nam plerique has tropos esse existimaverunt, quia, sive ex hoc duxerint nomen, quod sint formati quodam modo, sive ex eo, quod vertant orationem, unde et motus dicuntur, fatendum erit esse utrumque eorum etiam in figuris. II. Vsus quoque est idem: nam et vim rebus adiciunt et gratiam praestant.

[1] 1. Since in the previous book there was speech about tropes, there follows, pertaining to figures (which are called schemata in Greek), a topic by the very nature of the matter conjoined to the preceding. For many have supposed these to be tropes, because, whether they have derived their name from this, that they are formed in a certain way, or from this, that they turn the oration—whence they are also called motions—it must be admitted that each of these belongs also to figures. 2. The use too is the same: for they both add force to things and bestow grace.

Nec desunt qui tropis figurarum nomen imponant, quorum est C. Artorius Proculus. III. Quin adeo similitudo manifesta est ut ea discernere non sit in promptu.

Nor are there lacking those who impose the name of figures upon tropes, among whom is C. Artorius Proculus. 3. Indeed, the similarity is so manifest that to discern them is not in promptu.

Nam quo modo quaedam in his species plane distant, manente tamen generaliter illa societate, quod utraque res a derecta et simplici ratione cum aliqua dicendi virtute deflectitur: ita quaedam perquam tenui limite dividuntur, ut cum ironia tam inter figuras sententiae quam inter tropos reperiatur, periphrasin autem et hyperbaton et onomatopoiian clari quoque auctores figuras verborum potius quam tropos dixerint.

For just as certain species among these differ plainly, the general association nevertheless remaining—because each thing is deflected from a direct and simple ratio with some virtue of speaking—so certain others are divided by a very thin boundary, as when irony is found both among figures of thought and among tropes; and periphrasis and hyperbaton and onomatopoeia even eminent authors have called rather figures of words than tropes.

IV. Quo magis signanda est utriusque rei differentia. Est igitur tropos sermo a naturali et principali significatione tralatus ad aliam ornandae orationis gratia, vel, ut plerique grammatici finiunt, dictio ab eo loco in quo propria est tralata in eum in quo propria non est: "figura", sicut nomine ipso patet, conformatio quaedam orationis remota a communi et primum se offerente ratione. V. Quare in tropis ponuntur verba alia pro aliis, ut in metaphorai, metonymiai, antonomasiai, metalempsei, synekdochei, katachresei, allegoriai, plerumque hyperbolei: namque et rebus fit et verbis.

4. All the more must the difference of the two be marked. A trope, therefore, is speech transferred from its natural and principal signification to another for the sake of adorning discourse; or, as most grammarians define it, a diction carried over from that place in which it is proper to that in which it is not proper: a "figure," as the very name itself makes clear, is a certain shaping of discourse removed from the common and first-offering manner. 5. Wherefore in tropes words are put one in place of others, as in metaphor, metonymy, antonomasia, metalepsis, synecdoche, catachresis, allegory, and for the most part hyperbole: for indeed it is done both with things and with words.

Onomatopoiia fictio est nominis: ergo hoc quoque pro aliis ponitur, quibus usuri fuimus si illud non fingeremus. VI. Periphrasis, etiam si frequenter et id ipsum in cuius locum adsumitur nomen complecti solet, utitur tamen pluribus pro uno. Epitheton, quoniam plerumque habet antonomasiae partem, coniunctione eius fit tropos.

Onomatopoeia is a fiction of a name: therefore this too is put in place of others, which we would have used if we did not invent that one. 6. Periphrasis, even if it frequently is wont also to include the very name in whose place it is assumed, nevertheless uses several for one. Epithet, since it for the most part has a share of antonomasia, by its conjunction with it becomes a trope.

In hyperbato commutatio est ordinis, ideoque multi tropis hoc genus eximunt: transfert tamen verbum aut partem eius a suo loco in alienum. VII. Horum nihil in figuras cadit: nam et propriis verbis et ordine conlocatis figura fieri potest.

In hyperbaton there is a change of order, and therefore many remove this kind from the tropes: yet it transfers a word or a part of it from its own place into another. 7. None of these falls into figures: for even with proper words and with the order arranged, a figure can be made.

Quo modo autem ironia alia sit tropi, alia schematos, suo loco reddam: nomen enim fateor esse commune. Haec scio quam multiplicem habeant quamque scrupulosam disputationem, sed ea non pertinet ad praesens meum propositum. Nihil enim refert quo modo appelletur utrumlibet eorum, si quid orationi prosit apparet: nec mutatur vocabulis vis rerum.

How, moreover, irony is in one respect of the trope, in another of the scheme, I will render in its proper place: for I admit the name is common. I know how manifold and how scrupulous a disputation these have, but that does not pertain to my present purpose. For it makes no difference by what either of them be called, if it appears that it profits the oration: nor is the force of things changed by the terms.

VIII. Et sicut homines, si aliud acceperunt quam quod habuerant nomen, idem sunt tamen, ita haec de quibus loquimur, sive tropi sive figurae dicentur, idem efficient. Non enim nominibus prosunt sed effectibus, ut statum coniecturalem an infitialem an facti an de substantia nominemus nihil interest, dum idem quaeri sciamus.

8. And just as men, if they have received a different name than the one they had, are nevertheless the same, so these things about which we speak, whether they be called tropes or figures, will effect the same. For they profit not by names but by effects: whether we name the status conjectural, or infitial, or of fact, or of substance, it makes no difference, provided we know that the same thing is being inquired.

IX. Optimum ergo in his sequi maxime recepta, et rem ipsam, quocumque appellabitur modo, intellegi. Illud tamen notandum, coire frequenter in easdem sententias et tropon et figuram: tam enim tralatis verbis quam propriis figuratur oratio.

9. Therefore the best course in these matters is to follow what is most widely received, and to have the thing itself, by whatever way it shall be named, understood. Nevertheless it should be noted that both the trope and the figure frequently converge into the same meanings; for the oration is figured as much by transferred words as by proper ones.

X. Est autem non mediocris inter auctores dissensio et quae vis nominis eius et quot genera et quae quam multaeque sint species. Quare primum intuendum est quid accipere debeamus figuram. Nam duobus modis dicitur: uno qualiscumque forma sententiae, sicut in corporibus, quibus, quoquo modo sunt composita, utique habitus est aliquis: XI. altero, quo proprie schema dicitur, in sensu vel sermone aliqua a vulgari et simplici specie cum ratione mutatio, sicut nos sedemus, incumbimus, respicimus.

10. Moreover there is a not inconsiderable disagreement among authors both what the force of its name is and how many genera and which, and how many and what the species are. Wherefore it must first be considered what we ought to take “figure” to be. For it is said in two ways: in one, any form whatsoever of the sentence/thought, as in bodies, for which, in whatever way they are composed, there is in any case some habitus: 11. in the other, in which it is properly called schema, a change, with rationale, in sense or in speech from the common and simple aspect, just as we sit, lean forward, look back.

Itaque cum in eosdem casus aut tempora aut numeros aut etiam pedes continuo quis aut certe nimium frequenter incurrit, praecipere solemus variandas figuras esse vitandae similitudinis gratia: XII. in quo ita loquimur tamquam omnis sermo habeat figuram. Itemque eadem figura dicitur "cursitare" qua "lectitare", id est eadem ratione declinari.

And so, when someone continually, or at any rate too frequently, falls into the same cases or tenses or numbers or even feet, we are accustomed to instruct that the figures must be varied for the sake of avoiding likeness: 12. in which we speak thus as though every discourse had a figure. Likewise the same figure is said to "run-about" as to "read-often," that is, to be declined by the same rationale.

Quare illo intellectu priore et communi nihil non figuratum est. Quo si contenti sumus, non inmerito Apollodorus, si tradenti Caecilio credimus, incomprensibilia partis huius praecepta existimavit. XIII.

Wherefore, in that prior and common understanding, nothing is not “figured.” If we are content with this, not without merit did Apollodorus, if we believe Caecilius who transmits it, consider the precepts of this part incomprehensible. 13.

Sed si habitus quidam et quasi gestus sic appellandi sunt, id demum hoc loco accipi schema oportebit quod sit a simplici atque in promptu posito dicendi modo poetice vel oratorie mutatum. Sic enim verum erit aliam esse orationem aschematiston, id est carentem figuris, quod vitium non inter minima est, aliam eschematismenen est figuratam. XIV.

But if a certain habitus and as it were gestus are to be so called, then in this place we must take “schema” to mean that which has been altered poetically or oratorically from a simple and readily available mode of speaking set forth in plain view. For thus it will be true that one speech is aschematiston, that is, lacking figures—a fault not among the least—another eschematismenen, that is, figured. 14.

Verum id ipsum anguste Zoilus terminavit, qui id solum putaverit schema quo aliud simulatur dici quam dicitur, quod sane vulgo quoque sic accipi scio: unde et figuratae controversiae quaedam, de quibus post paulo dicam, vocantur. Ergo figura sit arte aliqua novata forma dicendi.

Indeed Zoilus defined that very thing narrowly, who thought that only that is a schema in which something other is simulated to be said than what is said, which indeed I know is also commonly taken thus; whence also certain “figured controversies,” of which I shall speak shortly, are so called. Therefore let “figure” be a form of speaking innovated by some art.

XV. Genus eius unum quidam putaverunt, in hoc ipso diversas opiniones secuti. Nam hi, quia verborum mutatio sensus quoque verteret, omnis figuras in verbis esse dixerunt, illi, quia verba rebus accommodarentur, omnis in sensibus. XVI.

15. Some thought its genus to be one, following diverse opinions in this very point. For these, because a mutation of words would also turn the sense, said that all the figures are in words; those others, because words are accommodated to things, that all are in meanings. 16.

Quarum utraque manifesta cavillatio est. Nam et eadem dici solent aliter atque aliter manetque sensus elocutione mutata, et figura sententiae plures habere verborum figuras potest. Illa est enim posita in concipienda cogitatione, haec in enuntianda, sed frequentissime coeunt, ut in hoc: "iam, iam, Dolabella, neque me tui neque tuorum liberum -": nam oratio a iudice aversa in sententia, "iam iam" et "liberum" in verbis sunt schemata.

Each of which is a manifest cavillation. For the same things are wont to be said now in one way and now in another, and the sense remains although the elocution is altered; and a figure of thought can have several figures of words. The former is placed in the conceiving of the cogitation, the latter in the enunciating; yet most frequently they come together, as in this: "iam, iam, Dolabella, neque me tui neque tuorum liberum -": for the oration averted from the judge is in the thought, while "iam iam" and "liberum" are schemata in the words.

XVII. Inter plurimos enim, quod sciam, consensum est duas eius esse partes, dianoias, id est mentis vel sensus vel sententiarum (nam his omnibus modis dictum est), et lexeos, id est verborum vel dictionis vel elocutionis vel sermonis vel orationis: nam et variatur et nihil refert. XVIII.

17. Among the very many, so far as I know, there is a consensus that it has two parts: dianoia, that is, of mind or sense or sentences (for it has been said in all these ways), and lexis, that is, of words or diction or elocution or sermon or oration: for the usage varies and it makes no difference. 18.

Cornelius tamen Celsus adicit verbis et sententiis figuras colorum, nimia profecto novitatis cupiditate ductus. Nam quis ignorasse eruditum alioqui virum credat colores et sententias sensus esse? Quare sicut omnem orationem, ita figuras quoque versari necesse est in sensu et in verbis.

Cornelius Celsus, however, adds to words and sentences “figures of colors,” surely led by an excessive craving for novelty. For who would believe that a learned man, otherwise, was unaware that colors and sentences are aspects of sense? Therefore, just as all oration, so also figures must necessarily be situated in sense and in words.

XIX. Vt vero natura prius est concipere animo res quam enuntiare, ita de iis figuris ante est loquendum quae ad mentem pertinent: quarum quidem utilitas cum magna tum multiplex in nullo non orationis opere vel clarissime lucet. Nam etsi minime videtur pertinere ad probationem qua figura quidque dicatur, facit tamen credibilia quae dicimus, et in animos iudicum qua non observatur inrepit.

19. As indeed by nature it is prior to conceive things in the mind than to enunciate them, so it is first to speak about those figures which pertain to the mind: the utility of which, both great and manifold, shines out most clearly in every work of oration. For although it seems to pertain very little to proof by what figure each thing is said, yet it makes credible the things we say, and it steals into the minds of the judges unobserved.

XX. Namque ut in armorum certamine adversos ictus et rectas ac simplices manus cum videre tum etiam cavere ac propulsare facile est, aversae tectaeque minus sunt observabiles, et aliud ostendisse quam petas artis est: sic oratio, quae astu caret, pondere modo et inpulsu proeliatur, simulanti variantique conatus in latera atque in terga incurrere datur et arma avocare et velut nutu fallere. XXI. Iam vero adfectus nihil magis ducit.

20. For just as in a contest of arms it is easy both to see and also to beware and to repulse opposed blows and direct and simple strokes, those that are averted and covered are less observable, and to have shown one thing while you aim at another is a matter of art: so oratory, which lacks astuteness, fights only by weight and impulse; but to one who feigns and varies his attempts it is permitted to run in upon the flanks and the rear, and to draw the weapons away and, as it were, to deceive by a nod. 21. Now indeed nothing leads more than the passions.

Nam si frons, oculi, manus multum ad motum animorum valent, quanto plus orationis ipsius vultus ad id quod efficere tendimus compositus? Plurimum tamen ad commendationem facit, sive in conciliandis agentis moribus sive ad promerendum actioni favorem sive ad levandum varietate fastidium sive ad quaedam vel decentius indicanda vel tutius.

For if the brow, the eyes, the hands avail much for the stirring of minds, how much more does the very face of the speech, composed toward that which we aim to effect? Yet it contributes very greatly to commendation, whether in conciliating the speaker’s character, or in meriting favor for the action, or in relieving weariness by variety, or in indicating certain things either more becomingly or more safely.

XXII. Sed antequam quae cuique rei figura conveniat ostendo, dicendum est nequaquam eas esse tam multas quam sint a quibusdam constitutae: neque enim me movent nomina illa, quae fingere utique Graecis promptissimum est. XXIII.

XXII. But before I show which figure is suitable to each matter, it must be said that by no means are they so many as have been constituted by some: for those names do not move me, which to feign—or rather to invent—is, in any case, most prompt for the Greeks. XXIII.

Ante omnia igitur illi qui totidem figuras putant quot adfectus repudiandi, non quia adfectus non sit quaedam qualitas mentis, sed quia figura, quam non communiter sed proprie nominamus, non sit simplex rei cuiuscumque enuntiatio. Quapropter in dicendo irasci dolere misereri timere confidere contemnere non sunt figurae, non magis quam suadere minari rogare excusare. XXIV.

Before all things, therefore, those who think there are just as many figures as affections are to be repudiated, not because an affection is not a certain quality of the mind, but because a figure, which we name not in the common but in the proper sense, is not the simple enunciation of any given matter. Wherefore, in speaking, to be angry, to grieve, to feel pity, to fear, to be confident, to contemn are not figures, any more than to persuade, to threaten, to ask, to excuse. XXIV.

Sed fallit parum diligenter intuentes quod inveniunt in omnibus iis locis figuras et earum exempla ex orationibus excerpunt: neque enim pars una dicendi est quae non recipere eas possit. Sed aliud est admittere figuram, aliud figuram esse: neque enim verebor explicandae rei gratia frequentiorem eiusdem nominis repetitionem. XXV.

But it misleads those looking with too little diligence that they find figures in all those places and excerpt their examples from orations: for there is not a single part of speaking which cannot receive them. But it is one thing to admit a figure, another to be a figure: nor indeed shall I fear, for the sake of explaining the matter, a more frequent repetition of the same name. 25.

Quare dabunt mihi aliquam in irascente deprecante miserante figuram; scio: sed non ideo irasci, misereri, deprecari figura erit. Cicero quidem omnia orationis lumina in hunc locum congerit, mediam quandam, ut arbitror, secutus viam: ut neque omnis sermo schema iudicaretur neque ea sola quae haberent aliquam remotam ab usu communi fictionem, sed quae essent clarissima et ad movendum auditorem valerent plurimum: quem duobus ab eo libris tractatum locum ad litteram subieci, ne fraudarem legentes iudicio maximi auctoris.

Wherefore they will grant me some figure in one who is angry, who deprecates, who has compassion; I know: but not for that reason will “to be angry, to have compassion, to deprecate” be a figure. Cicero indeed heaps together all the lights of oration on this topic, following, as I judge, a certain middle way: so that neither all discourse should be adjudged a schema nor only those things which would have some feigning removed from common use, but those which are most brilliant and would avail most to move the auditor: which passage, treated by him in two books, I have subjoined to the letter, lest I defraud readers of the judgment of the greatest author.

XXVI. In tertio de Oratore ita scriptum est: "In perpetua autem oratione, cum et coniunctionis levitatem et numerorum quam dixi rationem tenuerimus, tum est quasi luminibus distinguenda et frequentanda omnis oratio sententiarum atque verborum. XXVII.

26. In the third book of On the Orator it is written thus: "But in continuous oration, when we have maintained both the lightness of conjunction and the rule of rhythms which I mentioned, then the whole oration must be, as it were, marked off and thickly set with lights, of sentences and of words. 27.

Nam et commoratio una in re permultum movet et inlustris explanatio rerumque quasi gerantur sub aspectum paene subiectio, quae in exponenda re plurimum valet, ad inlustrandum id quod exponitur, et ad amplificandum, ut iis qui audient illud quod augebimus, quantum efficere oratio poterit, tantum esse videatur: XXVIII. et huic contraria saepe percursio est et plus ad intellegendum quam dixeris significatio et distincte concisa brevitas et extenuatio, et huic adiuncta inlusio, a praeceptis Caesaris non abhorrens, et ab re digressio, in qua cum fuerit delectatio, tum reditus ad rem aptus et concinens esse debebit: propositioque quid sis dicturus et ab eo quod est dictum seiunctio et reditus ad propositum et iteratio et rationis apta conclusio: XXIX. tum augendi minuendive causa veritatis supralatio atque traiectio, et rogatio atque huic finitima quasi percontatio expositioque sententiae suae: tum illa, quae maxime quasi inrepit in hominum mentes, alia dicentis ac significantis dissimulatio, quae est periucunda cum [in] orationis non contentione sed sermone tractatur: XXX.

For both commoration on one matter moves very much, and a lustrous explanation and a subjection of things, as if they were being transacted under the gaze, which in setting forth a matter avails most, both for making bright that which is set forth and for amplifying it, so that to those who will hear that which we shall increase, as much as speech will be able to effect, so much it may seem to be: 28. and contrary to this is often a percurrence, and a signification toward understanding more than you shall have said, and distinctly concise brevity, and extenuation, and to this adjoined inlusion, not abhorrent from the precepts of Caesar, and a digression from the matter, in which, when there shall have been delectation, then the return to the matter ought to be apt and consonant: and a proposition of what you are going to say, and a disjunction from that which has been said, and a return to the proposition, and iteration, and a conclusion apt to the reasoning: 29. then, for the sake of augmenting or diminishing, a superlation and trajection of the truth, and questioning and, closely related to this, as it were, percontation, and an exposition of one’s own opinion: then that which most of all, as it were, steals into the minds of men, a dissimulation of saying one thing and signifying another, which is very delightful when it is handled not in the contention of oration but in conversation: 30.

deinde dubitatio, tum distributio, tum correctio vel ante vel post quam dixeris, vel cum aliquid a te ipso reicias. Praemunitio etiam est ad id quod adgrediare, et traiectio in alium: communicatio, quae est quasi cum iis ipsis apud quos dicas deliberatio: morum ac vitae imitatio vel in personis vel sine illis, magnum quoddam ornamentum orationis et aptum ad animos conciliandos vel maxime, saepe autem etiam ad commovendos: XXXI. personarum ficta inductio, vel gravissimum lumen augendi: descriptio, erroris inductio, ad hilaritatem inpulsio, anteoccupatio: tum duo illa quae maxime movent, similitudo et exemplum: digestio, interpellatio, contentio, reticentia, commendatio: XXXII.

then dubitation, then distribution, then correction either before or after you have spoken, or when you reject something from yourself. Premunition also is for that which you are about to undertake, and transference onto another: communication, which is as it were deliberation with those themselves before whom you speak: imitation of morals and of life, either in personae or without them, a certain great ornament of speech and most apt for conciliating minds, and very often also for moving them: 31. feigned induction of personae, even the most weighty light of amplifying: description, induction of error, impulse toward hilarity, preoccupation: then those two which most move, similitude and example: digestion (division), interpellation, contention, reticence, commendation: 32.

vox quaedam libera atque etiam effrenatior augendi causa, iracundia, obiurgatio, promissio, deprecatio, obsecratio, declinatio brevis a proposito, non ut superior illa digressio, purgatio, conciliatio, laesio, optatio atque exsecratio. XXXIII. His fere luminibus inlustrant orationem sententiae.

a certain free and even more unbridled voice for the sake of augmentation, irascibility, objurgation, promise, deprecation, obsecration, a brief declination from the proposition, not like that earlier digression, purgation, conciliation, injury, optation and execration. 33. With these lights, for the most part, sentences illustrate the oration.

Orationis autem ipsius tamquam armorum est vel ad usum comminatio et quasi petitio vel ad venustatem ipsa tractatio. Nam et geminatio verborum habet interdum vim, leporem alias, et paulum inmutatum verbum atque deflexum, et eiusdem verbi crebra tum a primo repetitio, tum in extremum conversio, et in eadem verba impetus et concursio, et adiunctio et progressio, et eiusdem verbi crebrius positi quaedam distinctio, et revocatio verbi, et illa quae similiter desinunt aut quae cadunt similiter aut quae paribus paria referuntur aut quae sunt inter se similia. XXXIV.

But the oration itself is, as of arms, either for use a commination and, as it were, a petition, or for comeliness the very tractation. For both the gemination of words sometimes has vim, at other times grace, and a word slightly mutated and deflected, and the frequent repetition of the same word, now from the beginning, now a turning to the end, and an impetus and concourse into the same words, and adjunction and progression, and a certain distinction of the same word more frequently set, and the revocation of a word, and those things which end similarly or which fall similarly or in which equals are referred to equals or which are similar among themselves. 34.

Est etiam gradatio quaedam et conversio et verborum concinna transgressio et contrarium et dissolutum et declinatio et reprehensio et exclamatio et inminutio et quod in multis casibus ponitur et quod de singulis rebus propositis ductum refertur ad singula, et ad propositum subiecta ratio et item in distributis supposita ratio, et permissio et rursus alia dubitatio et inprovisum quiddam, et dinumeratio et alia correctio et dissipatio, et continuatum et interruptum, et imago et sibi ipsi responsio et inmutatio et diiunctio et ordo et relatio et digressio et circumscriptio. XXXV. Haec enim sunt fere atque horum similia, vel plura etiam esse possunt, quae sententiis orationem verborumque conformationibus inluminent".

There is also a certain gradation and conversion and a concinnous transgression of words and the contrary and the dissolved style and declination and reprehension and exclamation and diminution and that which is set in many cases and that which, drawn from individual proposed matters, is referred back to the individuals, and a reason subjoined to the proposition and likewise a reason put under distributed parts, and permission and again another hesitation and something unforeseen, and enumeration and another correction and dissipation, and the continuous and the interrupted, and image and a response to oneself and mutation and disjunction and order and relation and digression and circumscription. 35. For these are for the most part, and things similar to these, or there can even be more, which illuminate a speech by sentences and by conformations of words".

XXXVI. Eadem sunt in Oratore plurima, non omnia tamen et paulo magis distincta, quia post orationis et sententiarum figuras tertium quendam subiecit locum ad alias, ut ipse ait, quasi virtutes dicendi pertinentem: XXXVII. "Et reliqua ex conlocatione verborum quae sumuntur quasi lumina magnum adferunt ornatum orationI.

36. Many of the same things are in the Orator, yet not all, and somewhat more distinct, because after the figures of oration and of sentences he has subjoined, as he himself says, a third place pertaining to other, as-it-were, virtues of speaking: 37. "And the remaining things which are taken from the collocation of words, as if lights, bring great adornment to the oration."

sunt enim similia illis quae in amplo ornatu scaenae aut fori appellantur insignia, non quia sola ornent, sed quod excellant. XXXVIII. Eadem ratio est horum, quae sunt orationis lumina et quodam modo insignia, cum aut duplicantur iteranturque verba aut breviter commutata ponuntur, aut ab eodem verbo ducitur saepius oratio aut in idem conicitur aut utrumque, aut adiungitur idem iteratum aut idem ad extremum refertur, aut continenter unum verbum non eadem sententia ponitur, aut cum similiter vel cadunt verba vel desinunt, aut multis modis contrariis relata contraria, aut cum gradatim sursum versum reditur, aut cum demptis coniunctionibus dissolute plura dicuntur, aut cum aliquid praetereuntes cur id faciamus ostendimus, aut cum corrigimus nosmet ipsos quasi reprehendentes, aut si est aliqua exclamatio vel admirationis vel questionis, aut cum eiusdem nominis casus saepius commutantur.

for they are similar to those which, in the ample adornment of the stage or of the forum, are called insignia—not because they alone adorn, but because they excel. 38. The same rationale holds for these things, which are the lights of oration and in a certain way insignia, when either words are doubled and repeated, or, briefly changed, are set down; or the oration is more often drawn from the same word, or is directed into the same thing, or both; or the same thing is adjoined repeated, or the same is referred back at the end; or, in continuity, one word is set down not with the same meaning; or when words either fall similarly or end similarly; or contraries are related by many contrary modes; or when, step by step, there is a turning back upward; or when, with conjunctions removed, more things are said loosely; or when, in passing by something, we show why we do that; or when we correct our very selves, as if reproaching; or if there is some exclamation, either of admiration or of questioning; or when the cases of the same noun are more often changed.

XXXIX. Sententiarum ornamenta maiora sunt: quibus quia frequentissime Demosthenes utatur, sunt qui putent idcirco eius eloquentiam maxime esse laudabilem. XL. Et vero nullus fere ab eo locus sine quadam conformatione sententiae dicitur, nec quicquam est aliud dicere nisi omnes aut certe plerasque aliqua specie inluminare sententias.

39. The ornaments of sentences are greater; and because Demosthenes makes use of these most frequently, there are those who think that on that account his eloquence is most laudable. 40. And indeed scarcely any passage is delivered by him without a certain conformation of the sentence, nor is speaking anything other than to illuminate all, or at least the greater part, of the sentences with some kind of appearance.

XLI. Quas cum tu optume, Brute, teneas, quid attinet nominibus uti aut exemplis? Tantum modo notetur locus.

41. Since you grasp these most excellently, Brutus, what is the point of using names or examples? Only let the locus be noted.

Sic igitur dicet ille quem expetimus ut verset saepe multis modis eadem et in una re haereat in eademque commoretur sententia: XLII. saepe etiam ut extenuet aliquid, saepe ut inrideat, ut declinet a proposito deflectatque sententiam, ut proponat quid dicturus sit, ut, cum transegerit iam aliquid, definiat, ut se ipse revocet, ut quod dixerit iteret, ut argumentum ratione concludat, ut interrogando urgeat, ut rursus quasi ad interrogata sibi ipse respondeat, ut contra ac dicat accipi et sentiri velit, XLIII. ut addubitet quid potius aut quo modo dicat, ut dividat in partis, ut aliquid relinquat et neglegat, ut ante praemuniat, ut in eo ipso in quo reprehendatur culpam in adversarium conferat, ut saepe cum iis qui audiunt, XLIV.

Thus therefore the man whom we seek will speak so as to turn the same things often in many ways and to stick in one matter and dwell upon the same sentiment: 42. often also to extenuate something, often to deride, to decline from the proposal and deflect the sentiment, to propose what he is going to say, to, when he has already transacted something, define, to recall himself, to repeat what he has said, to conclude the argument by reason, to press by questioning, to again, as if to things asked, answer himself, to wish that what he says be received and felt contrary to his words, 43. to hesitate what rather or in what way he should say, to divide into parts, to leave something and neglect it, to premunish beforehand, to, in that very point in which he is blamed, transfer the fault onto the adversary, to speak often with those who are listening, 44.

nonnumquam etiam cum adversario quasi deliberet, ut hominum mores sermonesque describat, ut muta quaedam loquentia inducat, ut ab eo quod agitur avertat animos, ut saepe in hilaritatem risumve convertat, ut ante occupet quod videat opponi, ut comparet similitudines, ut utatur exemplis, ut aliud alii tribuens dispertiat, ut interpellatorem coerceat, ut aliquid reticere se dicat, ut denuntiet quid caveant, ut liberius quid audeat, ut irascatur etiam, ut obiurget aliquando, ut deprecetur, ut supplicet, ut medeatur, ut a proposito declinet aliquantum, ut optet, ut exsecretur, ut fiat iis apud quos dicet familiaris. XLV. Atque alias etiam dicendi quasi virtutes sequetur: brevitatem si res petet, saepe etiam rem dicendo subiciet oculis, saepe supra feret quam fieri possit: significatio saepe erit maior quam oratio, saepe hilaritas, saepe vitae naturarumque imitatio.

sometimes also as if he were deliberating with his adversary, to describe the manners and discourses of men, to introduce certain mute things as if speaking, to avert minds from that which is being transacted, to turn things often into hilarity and laughter, to pre‑empt what he sees will be opposed, to compare similitudes, to use examples, to distribute by assigning one thing to one person, another to another, to restrain an interrupter, to say that he is keeping something back, to give warning what they should beware, to dare something more freely, to be angry as well, to upbraid at times, to deprecate, to supplicate, to remedy, to deviate somewhat from his purpose, to wish, to execrate, to become familiar to those before whom he will speak. 45. And he will also follow other as‑it‑were virtues of speaking: brevity, if the matter demands it; often too he will set the thing before the eyes by speaking; often he will carry it beyond what can be done; the signification will often be greater than the speech; often hilarity; often the imitation of life and of natures.

Hoc in genere (nam quasi silvam vides) omnis eluceat oportet eloquentiae magnitudo".

In this genus (for you see, as it were, a wood), the whole magnitude of eloquence ought to shine forth".

[2] I. Ergo cui latius complecti conformationes verborum ac sententiarum placuerit habet quod sequatur, nec adfirmare ausim quicquam esse melius; sed haec ad propositi mei rationem legat: nam mihi de iis sententiarum figuris dicere in animo est quae ab illo simplici modo indicandi recedunt, quod idem multis doctissimis viris video placuisse. II. Omnia tamen illa, etiam quae sunt alterius modi lumina, adeo sunt virtutes orationis ut sine iis nulla intellegi vere possit oratio. Nam quo modo iudex doceri potest si desit inlustris explanatio, propositio, promissio, finitio, seiunctio, expositio sententiae suae, rationis apta conclusio, praemunitio, similitudo, exemplum, digestio, distributio, interpellatio, interpellantis coercitio, contentio, purgatio, laesio?

[2] 1. Therefore, whoever shall have pleased to embrace more broadly the conformations of words and sentences has what he may follow, nor would I dare to affirm that anything is better; but let him read these according to the rationale of my plan: for I have in mind to speak about those figures of sentences which depart from that simple mode of indicating, which same I see to have pleased many most learned men. 2. Yet all those, even the lumina which are of another mode, are so much virtues of discourse that without them no speech can truly be understood. For in what way can a judge be instructed if there be lacking a bright explanation, proposition, promise, definition, disjunction, exposition of his opinion, an apt conclusion of the reasoning, premunition, similitude, example, digestion, distribution, interpellation, coercion of the interpellant, contention, purgation, injury?

III. Quid vero agit omnino eloquentia detractis amplificandi minuendique rationibus? Quarum prior desiderat illam plus quam dixeris significationem, id est emphasin, et supralationem veritatis et traiectionem, haec altera extenuationem et deprecationem.

3. What, indeed, does eloquence accomplish at all with the methods of amplifying and of diminishing removed? Of these, the former calls for that more-than-you-have-said signification, that is, emphasis, and an over-elevation of the truth and a transposition; the latter, extenuation and deprecation.

Qui adfectus erunt vel concitati detracta voce libera et effrenatiore, iracundia, obiurgatione, optatione, exsecratione? vel illi mitiores nisi adiuvantur commendatione, conciliatione, ad hilaritatem inpulsione? IV. Quae delectatio aut quod mediocriter saltem docti hominis indicium nisi alia repetitione, alia commoratione infigere, digredi a re et redire ad propositum suum scierit, removere a se, in alium traicere, quae relinquenda, quae contemnenda sint iudicare?

Which affects will be stirred either with the voice drawn down, or by a freer and more unbridled anger, objurgation, optation, execration? or those milder ones unless they are aided by commendation, conciliation, an impulsion toward hilarity? 4. What delectation or what indication of a man at least moderately learned, unless he shall have known how to infix by one means, by repetition; by another, by commoration; to digress from the matter and return to his proposition; to remove from himself, to transfer onto another; to judge what should be left aside, what should be contemned?

Motus est in his orationis atque actus, quibus detractis iacet et velut agitante corpus spiritu caret. V. Quae cum adesse debent, tum disponenda atque varianda sunt, ut auditorem, quod in fidibus fieri videmus, omni sono mulceant. Verum ea plerumque recta sunt, nec se fingunt sed confitentur.

Movement and action of speech are in these; with them removed, it lies prostrate and, like a body that lacks the spirit which sets it in motion, is bereft. 5. And since these ought to be present, they must then be arranged and varied, so that they may soothe the hearer with every tone, as we see happen on the strings. But these things are for the most part straight, and they do not feign themselves but avow.

Admittunt autem, ut dixi, figuras, quod vel ex proxima doceri potest.

They admit, however, as I said, figures, as can be taught even from the immediately preceding.

VI. Quid enim tam commune quam interrogare vel percontari? Nam utroque utimur indifferenter, quamquam alterum noscendi, alterum arguendi gratia videtur adhiberi. At ea res, utrocumque dicitur modo, etiam multiplex habet schema: incipiamus enim ab iis quibus acrior ac vehementior fit probatio, quod primo loco posuimus.

6. For what is so common as to interrogate or to inquire? For we use both indifferently, although the one seems to be employed for the sake of knowing, the other for the sake of arguing. But that matter, in whatever mode it is expressed, also has multiple schemata: let us begin, then, with those by which the proof becomes sharper and more vehement, which we have placed in the first place.

VII. Simplex est sic rogare:

7. Simple is to ask thus:

"sed vos qui tandem? quibus aut venistis ab oris?": figuratum autem quotiens non sciscitandi gratia adsumitur, sed instandi: "quid enim tuus ille, tubero, destrictus in acie Pharsalica gladius agebat?" et "quo usque tandem abutere, Catilina, patientia nostra?" et "patere tua consilia non sentis?" et totus denique hic locus. III.

"but you—who, at length, are you? or from what shores have you come?": and it is figured whenever it is taken up not for the sake of inquiring, but of pressing: "for what, indeed, was that sword of yours, tubero, drawn in the Pharsalian battle line, doing?" and "how long, at last, will you abuse, Catiline, our patience?" and "do you not perceive that your plans lie open?" and finally this whole passage. 3.

Quanto enim magis ardet quam si diceretur "diu abuteris patientia nostra", et "patent tua consilia". Interrogamus etiam quod negari non possit: "dixitne tandem causam C. Fidiculanius Falcula?" aut ubi respondendi difficilis est ratio, ut vulgo uti solemus: "quo modo? qui fieri potest?" aut invidiae gratia, ut Medea apud Senecam: "quas peti terras iubes?" IX. aut miserationis, ut Sinon apud Vergilium "heu quae me tellus", inquit, "quae me aequora possunt accipere?" aut instandi et auferendae dissimulationis, ut Asinius: "Audisne? furiosum, inquam, non inofficiosum testamentum reprendimus". X. Totum hoc plenum est varietatis: nam et indignationi convenit: "et quisquam numen Iunonis adoret?" et admirationi: "quid non mortalia pectora cogis, auri sacra fames?" XI. Est interim acrius imperandi genus: "non arma expedient totaque ex urbe sequentur?" Et ipsi nosmet rogamus, quale est illud Terentianum: "quid igitur faciam?" XII.

For how much more does it blaze than if it were said “you will for a long time abuse our patience,” and “your plans lie open.” We also ask what cannot be denied: “Did Gaius Fidiculanius Falcula at last plead his case?” or where the method of responding is difficult, as we commonly are wont to use: “In what way? How can it be?” or for the sake of envy, as Medea in Seneca: “What lands do you bid to be sought?” 9. or for eliciting pity, as Sinon in Vergil: “Alas, what land,” he says, “what seas can receive me?” or for pressing and removing dissimulation, as Asinius: “Do you hear? we, I say, are criticizing a mad, not an undutiful will.” 10. This whole thing is full of variety: for it suits indignation as well: “and shall anyone adore the divinity of Juno?” and admiration: “to what do you not compel mortal hearts, accursed hunger for gold?” 11. There is meanwhile a sharper kind of commanding: “will they not get their arms ready and follow from the whole city?” And we ourselves ask ourselves, as is that Terentian line: “what then shall I do?” 12.

Est aliqua etiam in respondendo figura, cum aliud interroganti ad aliud, quia sic utilius sit, occurritur, tum augendi criminis gratia, ut testis in reum, rogatus an ab reo fustibus vapulasset, "innocens", inquit: tum declinandi, quod est frequentissimum: "quaero an occideris hominem", respondetur "latronem": "an fundum occupaveris", respondetur "meum", ut confessionem praecedat defensio: XIII. ut apud Vergilium in Bucolicis dicenti "non ego te vidi Damonis, pessime, caprum excipere insidiis?" occurritur: "an mihi cantando victus non redderet ille?" XIV. cui est confinis dissimulatio, non alibi quam in risu posita ideoque tractata suo loco: nam serio si fiat, pro confessione est.

There is also some figure in responding, when to one asking one thing one is met with another, because thus it is more useful, then for the sake of augmenting the charge, as when a witness against the defendant, asked whether he had been beaten with clubs by the defendant, says, "an innocent man": then for deflecting, which is most frequent: "I ask whether you have killed a man," the answer is "a robber": "whether you have seized an estate," the answer is "my own," so that defense may precede confession: 13. as in Vergil in the Bucolics, to the one saying "did I not see you, you worst one, taking Damon’s he-goat by ambush?" there is the counter: "would he not render to me, defeated in singing?" 14. to which dissimulation is adjacent, set nowhere else than in laughter and therefore treated in its own place: for if it be done seriously, it is in place of a confession.

Ceterum et interrogandi se ipsum et respondendi sibi solent esse non ingratae vices, ut Cicero pro Ligario: "Apud quem igitur hoc dico? Apud eum qui, cum hoc sciret, tamen me, antequam vidit, rei publicae reddidit". XV. Aliter pro Caelio ficta interrogatione: "dicet aliquis: haec igitur est tua disciplina? sic tu instituis adulescentis?" et totus locus.

Moreover, both the turns of interrogating oneself and of responding to oneself are wont to be not displeasing, as in Cicero’s Pro Ligarius: "Before whom, then, do I say this? Before him who, although he knew this, nevertheless, before he saw me, restored me to the republic." 15. Otherwise, in the Pro Caelius with a feigned interrogation: "someone will say: is this, then, your discipline? thus do you instruct young men?" and the whole passage.

Deinde: "ego, si qui, iudices, hoc robore animi atque hac indole virtutis ac continentiae fuit", et cetera. cui diversum est, cum alium rogaveris, non exspectare responsum, sed statim subicere: "Domus tibi deerat? At habebas.

Then: "I, if anyone, judges, was of this strength of spirit and this disposition of virtue and continence," and so forth. The opposite of this is, when you have asked another, not to wait for an answer, but immediately to subjoin: "Was a house lacking to you? Yet you had one.

Pecunia superabat? At egebas". Quod schema quidam "per suggestionem" vocant. XVI.

Did money abound? But you were in need". This schema some call "by suggestion." 16.

Fit et comparatione: "uter igitur facilius suae sententiae rationem redderet?" et alis modis tum brevius tum latius, tum de una re tum de pluribus.

It is done also by comparison: "Which of the two, therefore, would more easily render the reason of his own opinion?" and by other modes both more briefly and more at length, both about one matter and about several.

Mire vero in causis valet praesumptio, quae prolempsis dicitur, cum id quod obici potest occupamus. Id neque in aliis partibus rarum est et praecipue prohoemio convenit. XVII.

Remarkably indeed in cases, the presumption—called prolepsis—is effective, when we forestall that which can be objected. This is not rare in the other parts either, and it especially suits the proem. 17.

Sed quamquam generis unius diversas species habet. Est enim quaedam praemunitio, qualis Ciceronis contra Q. Caecilium quod ad accusandum descendat qui semper defenderit: quaedam confessio, ut pro Rabirio Postumo, quem sua quoque sententia reprehendendum fatetur quod pecuniam regi crediderit: quaedam praedictio, ut "dicam enim non augendi criminis gratia": quaedam emendatio, ut "rogo ignoscatis mihi, si longius sum evectus": frequentissima praeparatio, cum pluribus verbis vel quare facturi quid simus vel quare fecerimus dici solet. XVIII.

But although it has different species under one genus. For there is a certain premunitio, such as Cicero’s against Q. Caecilius, that he who has always defended should descend to accuse; a certain confessio, as in For Rabirius Postumus, whom he admits ought to be blamed even in his own judgment because he entrusted money to the king; a certain praedictio, as “for I will speak not for the sake of augmenting the charge”; a certain emendatio, as “I beg you to pardon me, if I have been carried too far”; most frequent is praeparatio, when with several words it is wont to be said either why we are going to do something or why we have done it. 18.

Verborum quoque vis ac proprietas confirmatur +vel praesumptione+: "quamquam illa non poena sed prohibitio sceleris fuit", aut reprehensione: "cives, inquam, si hoc eos nomine appellari fas est".

The force and propriety of words also is confirmed +or by presumption+: “although that was not a punishment but a prohibition of crime,” or by reprehension: “citizens, I say, if it is right that they be called by that name.”

XIX. Adfert aliquam fidem veritatis et dubitatio, cum simulamus quaerere nos unde incipiendum, ubi desinendum, quid potissimum dicendum, an omnino dicendum sit. cuius modi exemplis plena sunt omnia, sed unum interim sufficit: "Equidem, quod ad me attinet, quo me vertam nescio.

19. Hesitation also brings some credence of truth, when we simulate asking whence we should begin, where to end, what most especially should be said, or whether it should be said at all. Of which kind everything is full of examples, but one for the moment suffices: "Indeed, as far as it pertains to me, I do not know where to turn.

Negem fuisse infamiam illam iudicii corrupti?" et cetera. XX. Hoc etiam in praeteritum valet: nam et dubitasse nos fingimus.

"Am I to deny that that infamy of a corrupted judgment existed?" and so forth. 20. This also holds for the past: for we even pretend that we have doubted.

A quo schemate non procul abest illa quae dicitur communicatio, cum aut ipsos adversarios consulimus, ut Domitius Afer pro Cloatilla: "nescit trepida quid liceat feminae, quid coniugem deceat: forte vos in illa solitudine obvios casus miserae mulieri optulit: tu, frater, vos, paterni amici, quod consilium datis?" XXI. aut cum iudicibus quasi deliberamus, quod est frequentissimum: "quid suadetis?" et "vos interrogo" et "quid tandem fieri oportuit?" ut Cato: "cedo, si vos in eo loco essetis, quid aliud fecissetis?" et alibi: "communem rem agi putatote ac vos huic rei praepositos esse". XXII. Sed non numquam communicantes aliquid inexspectatum subiungimus, quod et per se schema est, ut in Verrem Cicero: "quid deinde?

Not far from this schema is that which is called communication, when either we consult the adversaries themselves, as Domitius Afer on behalf of Cloatilla: "The anxious woman does not know what is permitted to a woman, what befits a wife: perhaps chance, meeting you in that solitude, presented you to the wretched woman: you, brother, you, friends of her father, what counsel do you give?" 21. or when we, as it were, deliberate with the judges, which is most frequent: "What do you advise?" and "I interrogate you," and "What, pray, ought to have been done?" as Cato: "Come, if you were in that place, what else would you have done?" and elsewhere: "Consider that a common matter is being transacted and that you are appointed over this business." 22. But sometimes, while communicating, we subjoin something unexpected, which is a schema even by itself, as Cicero Against Verres: "What then?"

quid censetis? furtum fortasse aut praedam aliquam?" deinde, cum diu suspendisset iudicum animos, subiecit quod multo esset improbius. Hoc Celsus sustentationem vocat.

what do you judge? perhaps a theft or some kind of prey?" then, when he had for a long time kept the judges’ minds in suspense, he subjoined something that was much more wicked. This Celsus calls sustentation.

XXIII. Est autem duplex: nam et contra frequenter, cum exspectationem gravissimorum fecimus, ad aliquid quod sit leve aut nullo modo criminosum descendimus. Sed quia non tantum per communicationem fieri solet, paradoxon, alii nominarunt, id est inopinatum.

23. It is, moreover, twofold: for also, contrariwise, frequently, when we have produced an expectation of the gravest matters, we descend to something that is light or in no way criminal. But because it is wont to be done not only through communication, some have named it a paradox, that is, the unexpected.

XXIV. Illis non accedo qui schema esse existimant etiam si quid nobis ipsis dicamus inexspectatum accidisse, ut Pollio: "numquam fore credidi, iudices, ut reo Scauro ne quid in eius iudicio gratia valeret precarer". XXV. Paene idem fons est illius quam "permissionem" vocant qui communicationis, cum aliqua ipsis iudicibus relinquimus aestimanda, aliqua nonnumquam adversariis quoque, ut Calvus Vatinio: "perfrica frontem et dic te digniorem qui praetor fieres quam Catonem".

24. I do not go over to those who think it a schema even if we say that something unexpected has happened to us ourselves, as Pollio: “I never believed, judges, that I would entreat, in the trial of the defendant Scaurus, that favor should have no sway.” 25. Almost the same source has that which those who call it “permission” of “communication,” when we leave some things to the judges themselves to be assessed, some things sometimes even to our adversaries, as Calvus to Vatinius: “rub your forehead and say that you are more worthy to have become praetor than Cato.”

XXVI. Quae vero sunt augendis adfectibus accommodatae figurae constant maxime simulatione. Namque et irasci nos et gaudere et timere et admirari et dolere et indignari et optare quaeque sunt similia his fingimus.

XXVI. But the figures accommodated to augmenting affections consist especially in simulation. For we feign that we are angry and rejoice and fear and admire and grieve and are indignant and desire, and whatever things are similar to these.

Vnde sunt illa: "liberatus sum, respiravi", et "bene habet", et "quae amentia est haec?" et "o tempora, o mores!" et "miserum me! consumptis enim lacrimis infixus tamen pectori haeret dolor", et "magnae nunc hiscite terrae". XVII. Quod exclamationem quidam vocant ponuntque inter figuras orationis. Haec quotiens vera sunt, non sunt in ea forma de qua nunc loquimur: adsimulata et arte composita procul dubio schemata sunt existimanda.

Whence are those: "I am released, I have breathed again," and "it is well," and "what madness is this?" and "o times, o customs!" and "wretched me! for though my tears are spent, nevertheless the pain, fixed, clings to my heart," and "now gape, great lands." 17. What some call exclamation and put among the figures of speech. These, whenever they are true, are not in the form of which we are now speaking: those that are feigned and composed by art are, beyond doubt, to be considered schemata.

Quod idem dictum sit de oratione libera, quam Cornificius licentiam vocat, Graeci parrhesian. Quid enim minus figuratum quam vera libertas? XXVIII.

Let the same be said of free speech, which Cornificius calls license, the Greeks parrhesia. For what is less figurative than true liberty? 28.

Sed frequenter sub hac facie latet adulatio. Nam Cicero cum dicit pro Ligario: "suscepto bello, Caesar, gesto iam etiam ex parte magna, nulla vi coactus consilio ac voluntate mea ad ea arma profectus sum quae erant sumpta contra te", non solum ad utilitatem Ligari respicit, sed magis laudare victoris clementiam non potest. XXIX.

But frequently under this face adulation lies hidden. For when Cicero says on behalf of Ligarius: "with the war undertaken, Caesar, and now also carried on in great part, compelled by no force, by my counsel and will I proceeded to those arms which had been taken up against you," he not only looks to the utility of Ligarius, but he cannot more praise the victor’s clemency. 29.

In illa vero sententia: "quid autem aliud egimus, tubero, nisi ut quod hic potest nos possemus?" admirabiliter utriusque partis facit bonam causam, sed hoc eum demeretur cuius mala fuerat.

In that sentence indeed: "but what else did we do, Tubero, except that we might be able to do what this man can?" he marvelously makes a good case for both parties, but by this he wins over the man whom he had harmed.

Illa adhuc audaciora et maiorum, ut Cicero existimat, laterum, fictiones personarum, quae prosopopoiiai dicuntur: mire namque cum variant orationem tum excitant. XXX. His et adversariorum cogitationes velut secum loquentium protrahimus (qui tamen ita demum a fide non abhorrent si ea locutos finxerimus quae cogitasse eos non sit absurdum), et nostros cum aliis sermones et aliorum inter se credibiliter introducimus, et suadendo, obiurgando, querendo, laudando, miserando personas idoneas damus.

Those yet more audacious and, as Cicero judges, of broader lungs, the fictions of persons, which are called prosopopoeiae: for they wonderfully both vary the oration and also excite it. 30. By these we also draw forth the cogitations of adversaries as if speaking with themselves (which, however, do not then stray from credibility if we have feigned them to have spoken things which it is not absurd that they should have thought), and we credibly introduce our own conversations with others and those of others among themselves, and by persuading, objurgating, complaining, lauding, commiserating we assign fitting personae.

XXXI. Quin deducere deos in hoc genere dicendi et inferos excitare concessum est. Vrbes etiam populique vocem accipiunt.

31. Indeed, to lead down the gods in this kind of speaking and to rouse the infernals is permitted. Cities too and peoples receive a voice.

Ac sunt quidam qui has demum prosopopoiias dicant in quibus et corpora et verba fingimus: sermones hominum adsimulatos dicere dialogous malunt, quod Latinorum quidam dixerunt sermocinationem. XXXII. Ego iam recepto more utrumque eodem modo appellavi: nam certe sermo fingi non potest ut non personae sermo fingatur.

And there are some who say that only these are prosopopoeias, in which we fashion both bodies and words: they prefer to call the simulated speeches of men dialogues, which some of the Latins have called sermocination. 32. I, however, following the received custom, have called both by the same name: for surely speech cannot be feigned without the speech of a person being feigned.

Sed in iis quae natura non permittit hoc modo mollior fit figura: "etenim si mecum patria mea, quae mihi vita mea multo est carior, si cuncta Italia, si omnis res publica sic loquatur: Marce tulli, quid agis"? Illud audacius genus: "quae tecum, Catilina, sic agit et quodam modo tacita loquitur: nullum iam aliquot annis facinus extitit nisi per te". XXXIII. Commode etiam aut nobis aliquas ante oculos esse rerum personarum vocum imagines fingimus, aut eadem adversariis aut iudicibus non accidere miramur: qualia sunt "videtur mihi" et "nonne videtur tibi?" Sed magna quaedam vis eloquentiae desideratur. Falsa enim et incredibilia natura necesse est aut magis moveant, quia supra vera sunt, aut pro vanis accipiantur, quia vera non sunt.

But in those things which nature does not permit, in this way the figure becomes softer: "for indeed if with me my fatherland, which is much dearer to me than my life, if all Italy, if the whole res publica should speak thus: Marcus Tullius, what are you doing?" That is a more audacious kind: "which with you, Catiline, thus deals and in a certain way speaks silently: no crime now for some years has come forth except through you." 33. Aptly also we either feign that certain images of things, of persons, of voices are before our eyes, or we marvel that the same do not befall our adversaries or the judges: such as "it seems to me" and "does it not seem to you?" But a certain great force of eloquence is required. For things false and incredible by nature must either move more, because they are above the true, or be taken for vain, because they are not true.

XXXIV. Vt dicta autem quaedam, ita scripta quoque fingi solent, quod facit Asinius pro Liburnia: "mater mea, quae mihi cum carissima tum dulcissima fuit, quaeque mihi vixit bisque eodem die vitam dedit" et reliqua, deinde "exheres esto". Haec cum per se figura est, tum duplicatur quotiens, sicut in hac causa, ad imitationem alterius scripturae componitur. XXXV.

34. And as certain things said, so too writings are wont to be fashioned, which Asinius does on behalf of Liburnia: "my mother, who to me was both most dear and most sweet, and who lived for me and twice on the same day gave me life," and the rest; then, "let him be disinherited." This, while a figure in itself, is then doubled whenever, just as in this case, it is composed in imitation of another writing. 35.

Nam contra recitabatur testamentum: "P. Novanius Gallio, cui ego omnia meritissimo volo et debeo pro eius animi in me summa voluntate", et adiectis deinceps aliis "heres esto": incipit esse quodam modo parode, quod nomen ductum a canticis ad aliorum similitudinem modulatis abusive etiam in versificationis ac sermonum imitatione servatur. XXXVI. Sed formas quoque fingimus saepe, ut Famam Vergilius, ut Voluptatem ac Virtutem, quem ad modum a Xenophonte traditur, Prodicus, ut Mortem ac Vitam, quas contendentes in satura tradit, Ennius.

For, on the contrary, a testament was read aloud: "To P. Novanius Gallio, to whom I most deservedly wish and owe everything, on account of his supreme goodwill toward me," and, others being added in succession, "be heir": it begins to be in a certain manner a parode, a name drawn from songs modulated to the likeness of others, which, by an abusive extension, is also kept in the imitation of versification and of speeches. 36. But we also often feign personified forms: as Fame, by Vergil; as Pleasure and Virtue—Prodicus, as it is related by Xenophon; as Death and Life, which, contending, Ennius records in a satire.

Est et incerta persona ficta oratio: "hic aliquis" et "dicat aliquis". XXXVII. Est et iactus sine persona sermo: "hic Dolopum manus, hic saevus tendebat Achilles". Quod fit mixtura figurarum, cum prosopopoiiai accedit illa quae est orationis per detractionem: detractum est enim quis diceret. Vertitur interim prosopopoiia in speciem narrandi.

There is also a feigned speech with an uncertain persona: “here some someone,” and “let someone say.” 37. There is also an utterance cast without a persona: “here the band of the Dolopians, here cruel Achilles was pitching [his camp].” This comes about by a mixture of figures, when to prosopopoeia there is added that which belongs to speech by detraction (ellipsis): for it has been detracted who would be the speaker. Meanwhile prosopopoeia is turned into a species of narrating.

Vnde apud historicos reperiuntur obliquae adlocutiones, ut in Titi Livi primo statim: "urbes quoque ut cetera ex infimo nasci, deinde, quas sua virtus ac di iuvent, magnas opes sibi magnumque nomen facere".

Whence among historians oblique adlocutions are found, as straightaway in the First Book of Titus Livy: "that cities too, like other things, are born from the lowest; then, those which their own virtue and the gods aid, make for themselves great wealth and a great name".

XXXVIII. Aversus quoque a iudice sermo, qui dicitur apostrophe, mire movet, sive adversarios invadimus: "quid enim tuus ille, tubero, in acie Pharsalica?" sive ad invocationem aliquam convertimur: "vos enim iam ego, Albani tumuli atque luci", sive ad invidiosam inplorationem: "o leges Porciae legesque Semproniae! XXXIX.

38. A discourse turned away from the judge, which is called apostrophe, marvelously moves, whether we assail the adversaries: "for what, then, was that man of yours, Tubero, in the Pharsalian battle-line?" or we turn to some invocation: "for now you is it that I invoke, Alban mounds and groves", or to an invidious imploration: "O Porcian laws and Sempronian laws! 39.

Sed illa quoque vocatur aversio quae a proposita quaestione abducit audientem: "non ego cum Danais Troianam excindere gentem Aulide iuravi". Quod fit et multis et variis figuris, cum aut aliud exspectasse nos aut maius aliquid timuisse simulamus aut plus videri posse ignorantibus, quale est prohoemium pro Caelio.

But that too is called a turning-aside which leads the hearer away from the proposed question: "I did not at Aulis swear with the Danaans to extirpate the Trojan race." This is effected also by many and various figures, when we pretend either that we expected something else or that we feared something greater, or that more might seem to those who are ignorant, such as the proem in the speech For Caelius.

XL. Illa vero, ut ait Cicero, sub oculos subiectio tum fieri solet cum res non gesta indicatur sed ut sit gesta ostenditur, nec universa sed per partis: quem locum proximo libro subiecimus evidentiae. Et Celsus hoc nomen isti figurae dedit: ab aliis hypotyposis dicitur, proposita quaedam forma rerum ita expressa verbis ut cerni potius videantur quam audiri: "ipse inflammatus scelere et furore in forum venit, ardebant oculi, toto ex ore crudelitas eminebat". XLI. Nec solum quae facta sint aut fiant sed etiam quae futura sint aut futura fuerint imaginamur.

40. That truly, as Cicero says, bringing-under-the-eyes is then wont to be made when a matter is not reported as having been done, but is shown as if it were done, and not as a whole but through parts: which topic we placed under Evidence in the next book. And Celsus gave this name to that figure; by others it is called hypotyposis, a certain presented form of things so expressed by words that they seem rather to be seen than heard: "he himself, inflamed with crime and frenzy, comes into the forum; his eyes were blazing, from his whole face cruelty was standing out." 41. Nor do we only imagine things which have been done or are being done, but even those which are going to be, or would be going to be.

Mire tractat hoc Cicero pro Milone, quae facturus fuerit Clodius si praeturam invasisset. Sed haec quidem tralatio temporum, quae proprie metastasis dicitur, in diatyposi verecundior apud priores fuit (praeponebant enim talia: "credite vos intueri", ut Cicero: "haec, quae non vidistis oculis, animis cernere potestis"): XLII. novi vero et praecipue declamatores audacius nec mehercule sine motu quodam imaginantur, ut Seneca in controversia, cuius summa est quod pater filium et novercam inducente altero filio in adulterio deprensos occidit: "duc, sequor: accipe hanc senilem manum et quocumque vis inprime". XLIII.

Cicero handles this admirably in Pro Milo, what Clodius would have done if he had seized the praetorship. But this transference of times, which is properly called metastasis, was more modest in diatyposis among the earlier writers (for they used to prefix such things as: "believe that you are beholding," as Cicero: "these things, which you did not see with your eyes, you can discern with your minds"): 42. but the moderns, and especially the declaimers, imagine more boldly, and, by Hercules, not without a certain stirring of emotion, as Seneca in a controversia, the gist of which is that a father, with another son instigating, killed a son and a stepmother caught in adultery: "lead, I follow: take this senile hand and press it wherever you wish". 43.

Et post paulo: "Aspice, inquit, quod diu non credidisti. Ego vero non video, nox oboritur et crassa caligo". Habet haec figura manifestius aliquid: non enim narrari res sed agi videtur. XLIV.

And after a little: "Behold," he says, "what you did not believe for a long time. But I indeed do not see; night arises and thick caliginous gloom." This figure has something more manifest: for the matter seems not to be narrated but to be acted. 44.

Locorum quoque dilucida et significans descriptio eidem virtuti adsignatur a quibusdam, alii topographian dicunt.

A lucid and significant description of places is also assigned to the same virtue by some; others call it topography.

Eironeian inveni qui dissimulationem vocaret: quo nomine quia parum totius huius figurae vires videntur ostendi, nimirum sicut in plerisque erimus Graeca appellatione contenti. Igitur eironeia quae est schema ab illa quae est tropos genere ipso nihil admodum distat (in utroque enim contrarium ei quod dicitur intellegendum est), species vero prudentius intuenti diversas esse facile est deprendere: XLV. primum quod tropos apertior est et, quamquam aliud dicit ac sentit, non aliud tamen simulat: nam et omnia circa fere recta sunt, ut illud in Catilinam: "a quo repudiatus ad sodalem tuum, virum optimum, Metellum demigrasti"; in duobus demum verbis est ironia.

I have found someone who would call eironeia “dissimulation”: by which name, because the powers of this whole figure seem too little to be shown, surely, as in very many cases, we shall be content with the Greek appellation. Therefore eironeia which is a schema differs hardly at all in kind from that which is a tropos (for in each the contrary to what is said must be understood), but it is easy for one looking more prudently to apprehend that the species are diverse: 45. first, because the tropos is more open and, although it says one thing and feels another, yet it does not simulate something else: for also all the surroundings are almost straightforward, as that in the Catilinarian: “repudiated by whom you migrated to your crony, a most excellent man, Metellus”; in two words only is the irony.

XLVI. Ergo etiam brevior est tropos. At in figura totius voluntatis fictio est, apparens magis quam confessa, ut illic verba sint verbis diversa, hic +sensus sermonis et loci+ et tota interim causae conformatio, cum etiam vita universa ironiam habere videatur, qualis est visa Socratis (nam ideo dictus eiron, agens imperitum et admiratorem aliorum tamquam sapientium), ut, quem ad modum allegorian facit continua metaphora, sic hoc schema faciat tropos ille contextus.

46. Therefore the trope too is briefer. But in the figure there is a feigning of the whole intention, more apparent than confessed, so that there the words are different from the words, here the +sense of the discourse and of the place+ and meanwhile the entire shaping of the case, since even an entire life seems to have irony, such as Socrates’s was seen to have (for for that reason he was called an eiron, playing the unskilled man and an admirer of others as though wise), so that, just as a continuous metaphor makes an allegory, so this schema is made by that contexture of trope.

XLVII. Quaedam vero genera huius figurae nullam cum tropis habent societatem, ut illa statim prima quae ducitur a negando, quam nonnulli antiphrasin vocant: "non agam tecum iure summo, non dicam quod forsitan optinerem", et: "quid ego istius decreta, quid rapinas, quid hereditatium possessiones datas, quid ereptas proferam?" et: "mitto illam primam libidinis iniuriam", et: "ne illa quidem testimonia recito quae dicta sunt de sestertiis sescentis milibus", et: "possum dicere". XLVIII. Quibus generibus per totas interim quaestiones decurrimus, ut Cicero: "hoc ego si sic agerem tamquam mihi crimen esset diluendum, haec pluribus dicerem". Eiponeia est et cum similes imperantibus vel permittentibus sumus: "i, sequere Italiam ventis", et cum ea quae nolumus videri in adversariis esse concedimus eis.

47. Certain kinds of this figure have no association with tropes, as that first one straightway which is drawn from negating, which some call antiphrasis: "I will not proceed with you by the strict law, I will not say what perhaps I might obtain," and: "why should I bring forward that man’s decrees, why his rapines, why the possessions of inheritances granted, why those snatched away?" and: "I pass over that first outrage of lust," and: "not even do I recite those testimonies which were spoken about 600,000 sesterces," and: "I can say." 48. By which kinds we sometimes run through whole issues, as Cicero: "If I were conducting this as though a charge had to be washed away by me, I would say these things at greater length." Eironeia it is also when we are like those giving commands or permissions: "go, follow Italy with the winds," and when we concede to them those things which we do not wish to seem to be in our adversaries.

XLIX. Id acrius fit cum eadem in nobis sunt et in adversario non sunt: "meque timoris argue tu, Drance, quando tot caedis acervos Teucrorum tua dextra dedit". Quod idem contra valet cum aut ea quae a nobis absunt aut etiam quae in adversarios reccidunt quasi fatemur: "me duce Dardanius Spartam expugnavit adulter". L. Nec in personis tantum sed et in rebus versatur haec contraria dicendi quam quae intellegi velis ratio, ut totum pro Q. Ligario prohoemium et illae elevationes: "videlicet, o di boni!", LI. "scilicet is superis labor est", et ille pro Oppio locus: "o amorem mirum! o benivolentiam singularem!" Non procul autem absunt ab hac simulatione res inter se similes, confessio nihil nocitura, qualis est: "habes igitur, tubero, quod est accusatori maxime optandum, confitentem reum", et concessio, cum aliquid etiam inicum videmur causae fiducia pati: "metum virgarum navarchus nobilis nobilissimae civitatis pretio redemit: humanum est", et pro Cluentio de invidia: "dominetur in contionibus, iaceat in iudiciis": tertia consensio, ut pro eodem: "iudicium esse corruptum". LII.

49. This becomes sharper when the same things are in us and are not in the adversary: "and you, Drance, accuse me of timidity, when your right hand has given so many heaps of slaughter of the Teucrians." The same avails conversely when we, as if, admit either things which are absent from us or even those which recoil upon our adversaries: "with me as leader the Dardan adulterer captured Sparta." 50. And this contrary manner of speaking, as opposed to the sense you wish to be understood, is employed not only about persons but also about things, as in the whole proem for Q. Ligarius and those elevations: "evidently, O good gods!", 51. "of course this is toil for the celestials," and that passage for Oppius: "O wondrous love! O singular benevolence!" Not far, however, from this simulation are matters similar among themselves, a confession going to do no harm, such as: "you have then, Tubero, what is most to be wished by an accuser, a defendant confessing," and a concession, when we seem, in confidence of the case, to suffer even something inequitable: "the fear of rods a noble navarch of a most noble city bought off for a price: it is human," and for Cluentius concerning ill-will: "let it lord it in the assemblies, let it lie prostrate in the courts"; a third is agreement, as for the same man: "that the judgment was corrupted." 52.

Hac evidentior figura est cum alicui rei adsentimur quae est futura pro nobis, verum id accidere sine adversarii vitio non potest. Quaedam etiam velut laudamus, ut Cicero in Verrem circa crimen Apolloni Drepanitani: "gaudeo etiam si quid ab eo abstulisti, et abs te nihil rectius factum esse dico". LIII. Interim augemus crimina quae ex facili aut diluere possimus aut negare, quod est frequentius quam ut exemplum desideret.

This figure is more evident when we assent to some matter which is going to be on our side, but that cannot occur without the adversary’s fault. We even, as it were, praise certain things, as Cicero in Verrem concerning the crime of Apollonius of Drepanum: "I rejoice even if you took something from him, and I say that nothing more correct has been done by you." 53. Meanwhile we augment crimes which we can easily either wash away or deny, a thing too frequent to require an example.

Interim hoc ipso fidem detrahimus illis, quod sint tam gravia, ut pro Roscio Cicero, cum inmanitatem parricidii, quamquam per se manifestam, tamen etiam vi orationis exaggerat.

Meanwhile by this very thing we detract credence from them, that they are so grave, as when, on behalf of Roscius, Cicero, although the inhumanity of parricide, however manifest in itself, nevertheless also exaggerates it by the force of oration.

LIV. Aposiopesis, quam idem Cicero reticentiam, Celsus obticentiam, nonnulli interruptionem appellant, et ipsa ostendit adfectus, vel irae, ut "quos ego - sed motos praestat componere fluctus", vel sollicitudinis et quasi religionis: "An huius ille legis, quam Clodius a se inventam gloriatur, mentionem facere ausus esset vivo Milone, non dicam consule? De nostrum omnium - non audeo totum dicere" (cui simile est in prohoemio pro Ctesiphonte Demosthenis); vel alio transeundi gratia: "Cominius autem - tametsi ignoscite mihi, iudices". LV. In quo est et illa, si tamen inter schemata numerari debet, cum aliis etiam pars causae videatur, digressio; abit enim causa in laudes Cn. Pompei, idque fieri etiam sine aposiopesei potuit.

54. Aposiopesis, which the same Cicero calls reticence, Celsus obticence, some interruption, itself displays affections—either of anger, as “whom I— but it is better to calm the stirred waves,” or of solicitude and, as it were, scruple: “Would he have dared to make mention of this law, which Clodius boasts was invented by himself, while Milo was alive—I will not say as consul? About what belongs to us all— I do not dare to say the whole” (similar to that in the proem to the speech for Ctesiphon by Demosthenes); or for the sake of passing over to another point: “But Cominius— although, forgive me, judges.” 55. In which there is also this, if indeed it ought to be numbered among the schemata, namely digression; for the case goes away into praises of Cn. Pompey, and this could have been done even without aposiopesis.

LVI. Nam brevior illa, ut ait Cicero, a re digressio plurimis fit modis. Sed haec exempli gratia sufficient: "tum C. Varenus, is qui a familia Anchariana occisus est - hoc quaeso, iudices, diligenter attendite", et pro Milone: "et aspexit me illis quidem oculis quibus tum solebat cum omnibus omnia minabatur". LVII.

56. For that briefer digression from the matter, as Cicero says, is made in very many ways. But these will suffice by way of example: "then C. Varenus, the one who was slain by the Ancharian family - this, I beg, judges, attend carefully," and in the speech For Milo: "and he looked at me with those very eyes with which at that time he was wont, when he was threatening everything to everyone." 57.

Est alia non quidem reticentia, quae sit inperfecti sermonis, sed tamen praecisa velut ante legitimum finem oratio, ut illud: "nimis urgeo, commoveri videtur adulescens", et: "quid plura? ipsum adulescentem dicere audistis".

There is another, not indeed reticence, which belongs to an imperfect discourse, but nevertheless a speech cut off as if before its legitimate end, as in this: "I press too much; the young man seems to be moved," and: "why say more? you have heard the young man himself speak."

LVIII. Imitatio morum alienorum, quae ethopoiia vel, ut alii malunt, mimesis dicitur,iam inter leniores adfectus numerari potest: est enim posita fere in eludendo. Sed versatur et in factis et in dictis: in factis, quod est hypotyposei, vicinum, in dictis quale est apud Terentium: "Aut ego nescibam quorsum tu ires.

58. The imitation of others’ manners, which is called ethopoeia or, as others prefer, mimesis,is now able to be numbered among the gentler affects: for it is set almost in jesting. But it is employed both in deeds and in words: in deeds, something neighboring to hypotyposis; in words, such as in Terence: "Or else I did not know where you were going.

Parvola hinc est abrepta, eduxit mater pro sua. Soror dicta est: cupio abducere, ut reddam suis". LIX. Sed nostrorum quoque dictorum factorumque similis imitatio est per relationem, nisi quod frequentius adseverat quam eludit: "dicebam habere eos actorem Q. Caecilium". sunt et illa iucunda et ad commendationem cum varietate tum etiam ipsa natura plurimum prosunt, quae simplicem quandam et non praeparatam ostendendo orationem minus nos suspectos iudici faciunt.

A little girl has from here been abducted; a mother has brought her up as her own. She is called a sister: I desire to lead her away, so that I may render her back to her own". 59. But there is also a similar imitation of our own sayings and doings through relation, except that it more frequently asseverates than jests: "I was saying that they had Q. Caecilius as prosecutor". And those things are pleasant, and for commendation they are of the greatest use both by variety and even by nature itself, which, by showing a certain simple and unprepared speech, make us less suspect to the judge.

LX. Hinc est quasi paenitentia dicti, ut pro Caelio: "sed quid ego ita gravem personam introduxi?" et quibus utimur vulgo: "inprudens incidi"; vel cum quaerere nos quid dicamus fingimus: "quid relicum est?" et: "num quid omisi?" et cum ibidem invenire, ut ait Cicero: "unum etiam mihi relicum eius modi crimen est", et "aliud ex alio succurrit mihi" - unde etiam venusti transitus fiunt (non quia transitus ipse sit schema), ut Cicero narrato Pisonis exemplo, qui anulum sibi cudi ab aurifice in tribunali suo iusserat, velut hoc in memoriam inductus adiecit: LXI. "Hoc modo me commonuit Pisonis anulus quod totum effluxerat. Quam multis istum putatis hominibus honestis de digitis anulos aureos abstulisse?"; et cum aliqua velut ignoramus: "Sed earum rerum artificem quem?

60. Hence there is a sort of penitence for what was said, as in For Caelius: "but why did I introduce so weighty a person?" and those which we commonly use: "unwittingly I fell into it"; or when we feign that we are seeking what we should say: "what remains?" and: "did I omit anything?" and when in that very place we pretend to find it, as Cicero says: "one charge also of this kind still remains to me," and "one thing after another comes to my mind" - whence also charming transitions are made (not because the transition itself is a schema), as Cicero, after relating the example of Piso, who had ordered a ring to be hammered out for himself by a goldsmith on his own tribunal, as though brought to mind by this he added: 61. "In this way Piso’s ring reminded me of what had entirely slipped away. How many men of honorable standing do you suppose he stripped of gold rings from their fingers?"; and when we as it were are ignorant of something: "But the craftsman of those things—who?"

- quemnam? Recte admones, Polyclitum esse dicebant". LXII. Quod quidem non in hoc tantum valet; quibusdam enim, dum aliud agere videmur, aliud efficimus, sicut hic Cicero consequitur ne, cum morbum in signis atque tabulis obiciat Verri, ipse quoque earum rerum studiosus esse credatur.

- whom then? You admonish rightly, they used to say it was Polyclitus". 62. Which indeed does not avail in this case only; for to some, while we seem to be doing one thing, we bring about another, just as here Cicero achieves that, when he casts the malady for statuary and paintings as a charge upon Verres, he himself too is not believed to be a devotee of those things.

Et Demosthenes iurando per interfectos in Marathone et Salamine id agit ut minore invidia cladis apud Chaeroneam acceptae laboret. LXIII. Faciunt illa quoque iucundam orationem, aliqua mentione habita differre et deponere apud memoriam iudicis et reposcere quae deposueris et iterare quaedam schemate aliquo (non enim est ipsa per se iteratio schema) et excipere aliqua et dare actioni varios velut vultus.

And Demosthenes, by swearing by those slain at Marathon and Salamis, contrives this: that he labors under less ill-will for the disaster received at Chaeronea. 63. Those things too make an oration pleasing: after some mention has been made, to defer and to deposit with the judge's memory, and to demand back what you have deposited; and to iterate certain things with some schema (for iteration by itself is not a schema), and to take up certain points, and to give the action various, as it were, faces.

Gaudet enim res varietate, et sicut oculi diversarum aspectu rerum magis detinentur, ita semper animis praestat in quod se velut novum intendant.

For the matter delights in variety, and just as the eyes are more held by the aspect of diverse things, so it is always preferable for minds to direct themselves toward something as if new.

LXIV. Est emphasis etiam inter figuras, cum ex aliquo dicto latens aliquid eruitur, ut apud Vergilium: "non licuit thalami expertem sine crimine vitam degere more ferae"; quamquam enim de matrimonio queritur Dido, tamen huc erumpit eius adfectus ut sine thalamis vitam non hominum putet sed ferarum. Aliud apud Ovidium genus, apud quem Zmyrna nutrici amorem patris sic confitetur: "o dixit, felicem coniuge matrem!"

64. There is emphasis also among the figures, when from some saying something latent is drawn out, as in Vergil: "it was not permitted to lead a life lacking the bridal chamber, without reproach, to live in the manner of a wild beast"; for although Dido complains about marriage, nevertheless her affect bursts out thus far, that without bridal-beds she deems life to be not of human beings but of beasts. Another kind in Ovid, in whom Zmyrna thus confesses to her nurse her love for her father: "O, she said, happy the mother with a husband!"

LXV. huic vel confinis vel eadem est qua nunc utimur plurimum. Iam enim ad id genus quod et frequentissimum est et exspectari maxime credo veniendum est, in quo per quandam suspicionem quod non dicimus accipi volumus, non utique contrarium, ut in eironeiai, sed aliud latens et auditori quasi inveniendum.

65. either akin to this or the same is that which we now use most of all. For now we must come to that genus which is both most frequent and, I believe, most to be expected, in which by a certain suspicion we want what we do not say to be received—not, to be sure, the contrary, as in eironeia, but something else lying hidden and, as it were, to be discovered by the auditor.

Quod, ut supra ostendi, iam fere solum schema a nostris vocatur, et unde controversiae figuratae dicuntur. LXVI. Eius triplex usus est: unus si dicere palam parum tutum est, alter si non decet, tertius qui venustatis modo gratia adhibetur et ipsa novitate ac varietate magis quam si relatio sit recta delectat.

This, as I have shown above, is now by our people called almost exclusively “schema,” and from it “figured controversies” are so named. 66. Its use is threefold: one, if to speak openly is somewhat unsafe; another, if it is not seemly; a third, which is employed for the sake of comeliness only, and by its very novelty and variety delights more than if the relation were straightforward.

LXVII. Ex his quod est primum frequens in scholis est. Nam et pactiones deponentium imperium tyrannorum et post bellum civile senatus consulta finguntur et capital est obicere ante acta, ut quod in foro non expedit illic nec liceat; sed schematum condicio non eadem est: quamlibet enim apertum, quod modo et aliter intellegi possit, in illos tyrannos bene dixeris, quia periculum tantum, non etiam offensa vitatur; LXVIII.

67. Of these, the first is common in the schools. For both the compacts of tyrants laying down their imperium and, after a civil war, senatorial decrees are feigned, and it is capital to allege things done before, so that what is not expedient in the forum may there not even be lawful; but the condition of schemata is not the same: for however open it may be, a statement which can just as well be understood otherwise you will have spoken well against those tyrants, because only the danger, not also the offense, is avoided; 68.

quod si ambiguitate sententiae possit eludi, nemo non illi furto favet. Vera negotia numquam adhuc habuerunt hanc silentii necessitatem, sed aliam huic similem verum multo ad agendum difficiliorem, cum personae potentes obstant sine quarum reprensione teneri causa non possit. Ideoque hoc parcius et circumspectius faciendum est, quia nihil interest quo modo offendas, et aperta figura perdit hoc ipsum quod figura est.

But if it can be eluded by ambiguity of meaning, no one fails to favor that theft. True business has never until now had this necessity of silence, but another similar to it, yet much more difficult for action, when powerful personae obstruct, without censuring whom the cause cannot be sustained. And therefore this must be done more sparingly and more circumspectly, because it makes no difference in what way you offend, and an open figure forfeits the very thing—that it is a figure.

LXIX. Ideoque a quibusdam tota res repudiatur, sive intellegatur sive non intellegatur. Sed licet modum adhibere, in primis ne sint manifestae.

69. And therefore the whole matter is repudiated by some, whether it be understood or not understood. But it is licit to apply a measure, in the first place that they not be manifest.

Non erunt autem si non ex verbis dubiis et quasi duplicibus petentur, quale est in suspecta nuru: "duxi uxorem quae patri placuit"; aut, quod est multo ineptius, compositionibus ambiguis, ut in illa controversia in qua infamis amore filiae virginis pater raptam eam interrogat a quo vitiata sit: LXX. "Quis te, inquit, rapuit? LXXI.

Nor will they be, however, if they are not sought from doubtful and as-it-were double words, such as in the case of a suspected daughter-in-law: "I took as wife one who pleased my father"; or, what is much more inept, from ambiguous constructions, as in that controversia in which a father, infamous for love of his virgin daughter, when she has been seized, asks her by whom she has been violated: 70. "Who," says he, "carried you off? 71.

tu, pater, nescis?" Res ipsae perducant iudicem ad suspicionem, et amoliamur cetera ut hoc solum supersit: in quo multum etiam adfectus iuvant et interrupta silentio dictio et cunctationes. Sic enim fiet ut iudex quaerat illud nescio quid ipse quod fortasse non crederet si audiret, et ei quod a se inventum existimat credat. LXXII.

"you, father, do you not know?" Let the facts themselves lead the judge to suspicion, and let us remove the rest so that this alone remains: in this, emotions too help much, and delivery interrupted by silence, and hesitations. For thus it will come about that the judge himself will seek that I-know-not-what which perhaps he would not believe if he heard it, and he will believe that which he deems discovered by himself. 72.

Sed ne si optimae quidem sint esse debent frequentes. Nam densitate ipsa figurae aperiuntur, nec offensae minus habent sed auctoritatis. Nec pudor videtur quod non palam obicias, sed diffidentia.

But not even if they are optimal should they be frequent. For by their very density the figures are exposed, and they are no less offensive, but have less authority. Nor does it seem modesty that you do not bring the charge openly, but diffidence.

In summa sic maxime iudex credit figuris si nos putat nolle dicere. LXXIII. Equidem et in personas incidi tales, et in rem quoque, quod est magis rarum, quae optineri nisi hac arte non posset.

In sum, thus most of all the judge trusts in figures if he thinks we are unwilling to speak. 73. Indeed, I have fallen upon persons of such a sort, and upon a matter also, which is more rare, which could not be obtained except by this art.

Ream tuebar quae subiecisse dicebatur mariti testamentum: et dicebantur chirographum marito exspiranti heredes dedisse, et verum erat. LXXIV. Nam, quia per leges institui uxor non poterat heres, id fuerat actum ut ad eam bona per hoc tacitum fideicommissum pervenirent.

I was defending an accused woman who was said to have foisted in her husband’s testament; and it was said that the heirs had given a chirograph to the husband as he was expiring, and it was true. 74. For, since by the laws a wife could not be instituted heir, this had been done so that the goods might come to her through this tacit fideicommissum.

Et caput quidem tueri facile erat si hoc diceremus palam, sed peribat hereditas. Ita ergo fuit nobis agendum ut iudices illud intellegerent factum, delatores non possent adprendere ut dictum, et contigit utrumque. Quod non inservissem veritus opinionem iactantiae nisi probare voluissem in foro quoque esse his figuris locum.

And indeed it was easy to protect the head if we were to say this openly, but the inheritance would perish. Thus we had to act in such a way that the judges would understand that that had been done, the delators could not seize upon it as said—and both came to pass. I would not have subserved this, fearing the opinion of vainglory, unless I had wished to prove that in the forum too there is a place for these figures.

LXXV. Quaedam etiam quae probare non possis figura potius spargenda sunt. Haeret enim nonnumquam telum illud occultum, et hoc ipso quod non apparet eximi non potest: at si idem dicas palam, et defenditur et probandum est.

75. Certain things also, which you cannot prove, are rather to be scattered by figure. For sometimes that hidden dart sticks fast, and by this very fact that it does not appear it cannot be removed; but if you say the same openly, it is both defended against and must be proved.

LXXVI. cum autem obstat nobis personae reverentia, quod secundum posuimus genus, tanto cautius dicendum est quanto validius bonos inhibet pudor quam metus. Hic vero tegere nos iudex quod sciamus et verba vi quadam veritatis erumpentia credat coercere.

76. But when the reverence for the person, which we set down as the second kind, stands in our way, we must speak all the more cautiously, inasmuch as modesty restrains good men more strongly than fear. Here indeed let the judge believe that we are covering what we know and that we are restraining words bursting forth by a certain force of truth.

Nam +quo+ minus aut ipsi in quos dicimus aut iudices aut adsistentes oderint hanc maledicendi lasciviam si velle nos credant? LXXVII. Aut quid interest quo modo dicatur cum et res et animus intellegitur?

For +why+ should either those themselves against whom we speak, or the judges, or the bystanders hate this lasciviousness of malediction any the less, if they believe that we wish it? 77. Or what difference does it make in what way it is said, when both the matter and the intent are understood?

Quid dicendo denique proficimus nisi ut palam sit facere nos quod ipsi sciamus non esse faciendum? Atqui praecipue prima quibus praecipere coeperam tempora hoc vitio laborarunt: dicebant enim libenter tales controversias. Quae difficultatis gratia placent, cum sint multo faciliores.

What do we finally profit by speaking, except that it be plain that we are doing what we ourselves know is not to be done? And yet especially the earliest times in which I had begun to give precepts labored under this vice: for they gladly declaimed such controversies. These please for the sake of difficulty, though they are much easier.

LXXVIII. Nam rectum genus adprobari nisi maximis viribus non potest: haec deverticula et anfractus suffugia sunt infirmitatis, ut qui cursu parum valent, flexu eludant - cum haec quae adfectatur ratio sententiarum non procul a ratione iocandi abhorreat. Adiuvat etiam quod auditor gaudet intellegere et favet ingenio suo et alio dicente se laudat.

78. For the straight kind cannot be approved except by the greatest powers: these byways and anfractuosities are refuges of infirmity, so that those who are little strong in running may evade by a flexure - since this affected method of “sentences” is not far removed from the manner of joking. It also helps that the auditor rejoices to understand and favors his own wit, and, while another is speaking, he praises himself.

LXXIX. Itaque non solum si persona obstaret rectae orationi, quo in genere saepius modo quam figuris opus est, decurrebant ad schemata, sed faciebant illis locum etiam ubi inutiles ac nefariae essent, ut si pater qui infamem in matre filium secreto occidisset reus malae tractationis iacularetur in uxorem obliquis sententiis. LXXX.

79. Thus not only, if the persona stood in the way of straight oration, in which kind there is more often need of manner rather than of figures, would they resort to schemata, but they would make room for them even where they were useless and nefarious, as if a father who had secretly killed a son notorious in regard to his mother, being a defendant for ill-treatment, would hurl at his wife with oblique sentences. 80.

Nam quid impurius quam retinuisse talem? Quid porro tam contrarium quam eum, qui accusetur quia summum nefas suspicatus de uxore videatur, confirmare id ipsa defensione quod diluendum est? At si iudicum sumerent animum, scirent quam eius modi actionem laturi non fuissent, multoque etiam minus cum in parentis abominanda crimina spargentur.

For what is more impure than to have retained such a one? What moreover is so contrary as that he who is accused because he seems to have suspected the highest abomination concerning his wife should by the very defense confirm that which ought to be washed away? But if they were to assume the mind of judges, they would know how they would not have brought such a kind of action, and much less still when abominable crimes will be scattered against a parent.

LXXXI. Et quatenus huc incidimus, paulo plus scholis demus: nam et in his educatur orator, et in eo quo modo declametur positum est etiam quo modo agatur. Dicendum ergo de iis quoque in quibus non asperas figuras sed palam contrarias causae plerique fecerunt: "Tyrannidis adfectatae damnatus torqueatur ut conscios indicet: accusator eius optet quod volet.

81. And since we have fallen upon this, let us grant a little more to the schools: for in these too the orator is educated, and upon the manner in which one declaims there is also set the manner in which one pleads. Therefore we must speak also about those in which many have employed not rough figures but ones openly contrary to the cause: "Let him who has been condemned for an attempted tyranny be tortured so that he may indicate his accomplices: let his accuser choose whatever he will.

Patrem quidam dammavit, optat ne is torqueatur: pater ei contra dicit". LXXXII. Nemo se tenuit agens pro patre quin figuras in filium faceret, tamquam illum conscium in tormentis nominaturus. Quo quid stultius?

"A certain man condemned his father, he wishes that he not be tortured: the father speaks against him." 82. No one, when pleading for the father, restrained himself from making figures against the son, as though about to name him as privy under torments. What is more foolish than that?

Nam cum hoc iudices intellexerint, aut non torquebitur, cum ideo torqueri velit, aut torto non credetur. "At credibile est hoc eum velle". Fortasse: dissimulet ergo, ut efficiat. LXXXIII.

For when the judges have understood this, either he will not be tortured, since for that reason he wishes to be tortured, or, if tortured, the tortured man will not be believed. "But it is credible that he wants this." Perhaps: let him dissimulate, then, in order to effect it. 83.

"Sed nobis, declamatoribus dico, quid proderit hoc intellexisse nisi dixerimus?" Ergo, si vere ageretur, similiter consilium illud latens prodidissemus? Quid si neque utique verum est, et habere alias hic damnatus contradicendi causas potest, vel quod legem conservandam putet, vel quod nolit accusatori debere beneficium, vel, quod ego maxime sequerer, ut se in tormentis innocentem esse pertendat? LXXXIV.

"But for us—I speak to declaimers—what will it profit to have understood this unless we say it?" Therefore, if it were truly being pleaded, would we likewise betray that latent counsel? What if it is not necessarily true, and this condemned man can have other grounds for contradiction, either that he thinks the law must be conserved, or that he does not wish to owe a benefit to the accuser, or—which I for my part would most follow—that he should maintain under torture that he is innocent? 84.

Quare ne illud quidem semper succurret sic dicentibus: "patrocinium hoc voluit qui controversiam finxit". Fortasse enim noluit, sed esto voluerit: continuone, si ille stulte cogitavit, nobis quoque stulte dicendum est? At ego in causis agendis frequenter non puto intuendum quid litigator velit. LXXXV.

Therefore not even that will always come to the aid of those speaking thus: "He who fabricated the controversy wanted this patronage." For perhaps he did not want it; but granted that he did want it: straightway, if he thought foolishly, must we also speak foolishly? But I, in conducting cases, frequently do not think one should look to what the litigant wants. 85.

Est et ille in hoc genere frequens error, ut putent aliud quosdam dicere, aliud velle, praecipue cum in themate est aliquem ut sibi mori liceat postulare, ut in illa controversia: "Qui aliquando fortiter fecerat et alio bello petierat ut militia vacaret e lege, quod quinquagenarius esset, adversante filio ire in aciem coactus deseruit. Filius, qui fortiter eodem proelio fecerat, incolumitatem eius optat: contra dicit pater". Non enim, inquiunt, mori vult, sed invidiam filio facere. LXXXVI.

There is also in this kind a frequent error, that they think some say one thing but want another, especially when in the theme someone is petitioning that it be permitted for him to die, as in that controversy: "A man who had once acted bravely and in another war had petitioned under the law to be free from military service, because he was a quinquagenarian, with his son opposing, when he was compelled to go into the battle line, deserted. The son, who acted bravely in the same battle, desires his safety; the father speaks against." For, they say, he does not wish to die, but to stir up ill will against his son. 86.

Equidem rideo, quod [ipsi] sic timent tamquam ipsi morituri et in consilium suos metus ferunt, obliti tot exemplorum circa voluntariam mortem, causarum quoque quas habet factus ex viro forti desertor. LXXXVII. Sed de una controversia loqui supervacuum est: ego in universum neque oratoris puto esse umquam praevaricari, neque litem intellego in qua pars utraque idem velit, neque tam stultum quemquam qui, si vivere vult, mortem potius male petat quam omnino non petat.

Indeed I laugh, because [they themselves] fear thus as though they themselves were about to die and carry their own fears into the counsel, forgetful of so many examples around voluntary death, and also of the causes which the deed has whereby a deserter is made out of a brave man. 87. But to speak about one controversy is superfluous: I, in general, think it is never the part of an orator to prevaricate, nor do I understand a lawsuit in which each party wants the same thing, nor anyone so foolish that, if he wishes to live, he would rather seek death badly than not seek it at all.

LXXXVIII. Non tamen nego esse controversias huius modi figuratas, ut est illa: "reus parricidii quod fratrem occidisset damnatu iri videbatur: pater pro testimonio dixit eum se iubente fecisse; absolutum abdicat". Nam neque in totum filio parcit, nec quod priore iudicio adfirmavit mutare palam potest, et, ut non durat ultra poenam abdicationis, ita abdicat tamen: et alioqui figura in patrem plus facit quam licet, in filium minus. LXXXIX.

88. I do not, however, deny that there are controversies of this sort cast in figure, as is this one: "the defendant on a charge of parricide, because he had killed his brother, seemed about to be condemned: the father, by way of testimony, said that he had done it at his bidding; when he is absolved he disowns him." For he neither spares his son altogether, nor can he openly change what he affirmed at the prior judgment, and, so that he does not go beyond the penalty of abdication (disownment), thus he nevertheless abdicates him; and otherwise the figure does more against the father than is permitted, and less against the son. 89.

Vt autem nemo contra id quod vult dicit, ita potest melius aliquid velle quam dicit: quo modo ille abdicatus, qui a patre ut filium expositum et ab eo educatum solutis alimentis recipiat postulat, revocari fortasse mavult, non tamen quod petit non vult. XC. Est latens et illa significatio qua, cum ius asperius petitur a iudice, fit [ei] tamen spes aliqua clementiae non palam, ne paciscamur, sed per quandam credibilem suspicionem, ut in multis controversiis, sed in hac quoque: "raptor nisi intra tricesimum diem et raptae patrem et suum exoraverit pereat: qui exorato raptae patre suum non exorat agit cum eo dementiae": XCI. nam si promittat hic pater, lis tollitur: si nullam spem faciat, ut non demens, crudelis certe videatur et a se iudicem avertat.

And just as no one says anything against what he wants, so he can want something better than what he says: in the way of that disinherited man who demands from his father that he receive him back as a son who was exposed and brought up by him, with the maintenance paid; he perhaps prefers to be reinstated, yet he does not dislike what he asks. 90. There is also that latent signification whereby, when a harsher right is sought from the judge, there is nevertheless afforded to [him] some hope of clemency—not openly, lest we make a bargain, but through a certain credible suspicion—as in many controversies, but in this one too: "A ravisher, unless within the thirtieth day he has appeased both the father of the ravished girl and his own, shall perish: he who, after the father of the ravished has been appeased, does not appease his own, brings an action of insanity against him." 91. For if this father should promise, the suit is removed; if he should hold out no hope, even if not insane, he will certainly seem cruel and will turn the judge away from himself.

Latro igitur optime: "Occides ergo? - Si potero". Remissius et pro suo ingenio pater Gallio: "dura, anime, dura: here fortior fuisti". XCII. Confinia sunt his celebrata apud Graecos schemata, per quae res asperas mollius significant.

Latro therefore very well: "Will you kill then? - If I can." More mildly, and in keeping with his own temperament, the father Gallio: "endure, my soul, endure: yesterday you were stronger." 92. Bordering on these are the schemata celebrated among the Greeks, through which they signify harsh matters more softly.

Nam Themistocles suasisse existimatur Atheniensibus ut urbem apud deos deponerent, quia durum erat dicere ut relinquerent; et qui Victorias aureas in usum belli conflari volebat ita declinavit victoriis utendum esse. Totum autem allegoriae simile est aliud dicere, aliud intellegi velle. Quaesitum etiam est quo modo responderi contra figuras oporteret.

For Themistocles is thought to have advised the Athenians to deposit the city with the gods, because it was harsh to say that they should relinquish it; and the man who wanted the golden Victories to be melted down for the use of war thus turned the phrase: that “victories ought to be used.” The whole, moreover, is akin to allegory: to say one thing, to will that another be understood. It has also been inquired in what way one ought to respond against figures.

XCIII. Et quidam semper ex diverso aperiendas putaverunt, sicut latentia vitia rescinduntur. Idque sane frequentissime faciendum est: aliter enim dilui obiecta non possunt, utique cum quaestio in eo consistit quod figurae petunt.

93. And certain men have always thought they should be opened up from the opposite side, just as latent vices are excised. And this indeed ought to be done very frequently: for otherwise the objections cannot be dissolved, especially when the question consists in that which the figures seek.

At cum maledicta sunt tantum, et non intellegere interim bonae conscientiae est. XCIV. Atque etiam si fuerint crebriores figurae quam ut dissimulari possint, postulandum est ut nescio quid illud quod adversarii obliquis sententiis significare voluerint, si fiducia sit, obiciant palam, aut certe non exigant ut, quod ipsi non audent dicere, id iudices non is modo intellegant sed etiam credant.

But when there are only maledictions, not to understand them meanwhile is a mark of good conscience. 94. And moreover, if the figures are more frequent than that they can be dissimulated, one must demand that that I-know-not-what which the adversaries have wished to signify by oblique statements—if they have confidence—let them object openly; or at least let them not demand that what they themselves do not dare to say the judges not only understand but also believe.

XCV. Vtilis aliquando etiam dissimulatio est, ut in eo (nota enim fabula est) qui, cum esset contra eum dictum "iura per patris tui cineres", paratum se esse respondit, et iudex condicione usus est, clamante multum advocato schemata de rerum natura tolli: ut protinus etiam praeceptum sit eius modi figuris utendum temere non esse.

95. Sometimes even dissimulation is useful, as in the case (for the tale is well-known) of the man who, when it had been said against him "swear by your father’s ashes," replied that he was ready, and the judge made use of the condition, while the advocate loudly cried that schemata are being removed from the nature of things: so that forthwith it has even been laid down as a precept that figures of this kind are not to be used rashly.

XCVI. Tertium est genus in quo sola melius dicendi petitur occasio ideoque id Cicero non putat esse positum in contentione. Tale est illud quo idem utitur in Clodium: "quibus iste, qui omnia sacrificia nosset, facile ab se deos placari posse arbitrabatur". XCVII.

96. The third kind is that in which only the occasion for speaking better is sought, and therefore Cicero does not think that it is set in contention. Such is that which he likewise employs against Clodius: "by which that fellow, who knew all the sacrifices, thought that the gods could easily be placated by himself." 97.

Eironeia quoque in hoc genere materiae frequentissima est. Sed eruditissimum longe si per aliam rem alia indicetur, ut cum adversus tyrannum, qui sub pacto abolitionis dominationem deposuerat, agit competitor: "mihi in te dicere non licet: tu in me dic, et potes; nuper te volui occidere". XCVIII. Frequens illud est nec magno opere captandum, quod petitur a iure iurando, ut pro exheredato: "ita mihi contingat herede filio mori". Nam et in totum iurare, nisi ubi necesse est, gravi viro parum convenit, et est a Seneca dictum eleganter non patronorum hoc esse sed testium.

Irony too in this kind of material is most frequent. But by far the most erudite is when one thing is indicated by another matter, as when a rival litigant pleads against a tyrant who, under a pact of abolition, had laid down his domination: "I am not permitted to speak against you: you speak against me, and you can; recently I wished to kill you." 98. That device is frequent and not to be much hunted after, which is sought from a juratory oath, as on behalf of the disinherited: "so may it befall me to die with my son as heir." For to swear outright, unless where it is necessary, hardly befits a grave man; and it has been said elegantly by Seneca that this belongs not to patrons but to witnesses.

Nec meretur fidem qui sententiolae gratia iurat, nisi si potest tam bene quam Demosthenes, ut supra dixi. XCIX. Levissimum autem longe genus ex verbo, etiam si est apud Ciceronem in Clodiam: "praesertim quam omnes amicam omnium potius quam cuiusquam inimicam putaverunt".

Nor does he merit credence who swears for the sake of a little sententia, unless he can do it as well as Demosthenes, as I said above. 99. But by far the very lightest kind is that from a word, even if it is found in Cicero against Clodia: "especially her whom all thought the friend of everyone rather than anyone’s enemy".

C. Comparationem equidem video figuram non esse, cum sit interim probationis, interim etiam causae genus; et si talis eius forma qualis est pro Murena: "vigilas tu de nocte ut tuis consultoribus respondeas, ille ut eo quo contendit mature cum exercitu perveniat: te gallorum, illum bucinarum cantus exsuscitat" et cetera, nescio an orationis potius quam sententiae sit. CI. Id enim solum mutatur, quod non universa universis sed singula singulis opponuntur. Et Celsus tamen et non neglegens auctor Visellius in hac eam parte posuerunt, Rutilius quidem Lupus in utroque genere, idque antitheton vocat.

100. I for my part see comparison not to be a figure, since it is at one time a kind of proof, at another even a kind of cause; and if its form is such as that in For Murena: "you keep vigil at night to answer your clients, he that he may arrive early with his army at the place he strives for: the song of the cocks rouses you, that of the war-horns him," and so on, I do not know whether it belongs rather to oratory than to thought. 101. For only this is changed: that not universals are opposed to universals, but single things to single things. And yet Celsus and the not-negligent authority Visellius have placed it in this part, while Rutilius indeed Lupus in both kinds, and he calls it antitheton.

CII. Praeter illa vero quae Cicero inter lumina posuit sententiarum multa alia et idem Rutilius Gorgian secutus, non illum Leontinum, sed alium sui temporis, cuius quattuor libros in unum suum transtulit, et Celsus, videlicet Rutilio accedens, posuerunt schemata: CIII. consummationem, quam Graecus diallagen vocat, cum plura argumenta ad unum effectum deducuntur: consequens (ille epakolouthesin) de quo nos in argumentis diximus: collectionem, qui apud illum est syllogismos: minas, id est kataplexin: exhortationem, paraineticon.

102. Besides those things indeed which Cicero placed among the lights of sententiae, many others too both Rutilius himself, following Gorgias—not the Leontine, but another of his own time, whose four books he transferred into one of his own—and Celsus, plainly siding with Rutilius, set down as schemata: 103. consummation, which the Greek calls diallage, when several arguments are led down to one effect; the consequent (he [calls it] epakolouthesin), about which we have spoken among the arguments; collection, which with him is syllogismos; threats, that is kataplexis; exhortation, paraineticon.

Quorum nihil non rectum est nisi cum aliquam ex iis de quibus locuti sumus figuram accipit. CIV. Praeter haec Celsus excludere, adseverare, detrectare, excitare iudicem, proverbiis uti et versibus et ioco, et invidia et invocatione intendere crimen, quod est deinosis, adulari, ignoscere, fastidire, admonere, satisfacere, precari, corripere figuras putat.

Of which nothing is not proper, unless when it takes on some figure from those about which we have spoken. 104. Besides these, Celsus thinks the following are figures: to exclude, to asseverate, to detrect/decline, to rouse the judge, to use proverbs and verses and jest, and to intensify the charge by ill-will and by invocation, which is deinosis, to adulate, to forgive, to disdain, to admonish, to satisfy, to entreat, to rebuke.

CV. Partitionem quoque et propositionem et divisionem et rerum duarum cognationem, quod est ut idem valeant quae videntur esse diversa, ut non is demum sit veneficus qui vitam abstulit data potione, sed etiam qui mentem, quod est in parte finitionis. CVI. Rutilius sive Gorgias anankaion, anamnesin, anthypophoran, antirrhesin, parauxesin, proekthesin (quod est dicere quid fieri oportuerit, deinde quid factum sit), enantioteta (unde sint enthymemata kat'enantiosin), metalempsin etiam, quo statu Hermagoras utitur.

105. Partition as well, and proposition and division, and the cognation of two things, which is that things which seem to be diverse amount to the same—so that not only is he a poisoner who has taken away life by an administered potion, but also he who has deprived the mind—which belongs in part to definition. 106. Rutilius or Gorgias [sets down] anankaion, anamnesin, anthypophoran, antirrhesin, parauxesin, proekthesin (which is to say what ought to have been done, then what was done), enantioteta (whence come enthymemata kat'enantiosin), and metalempsin too, a status which Hermagoras employs.

CVII. Visellius quamquam paucissimas faciat figuras, epicheirema tamen, quod commentum vocat, et rationem appellans epicheirema inter eas habet. Quod quidem recipit quodam modo et Celsus: nam consequens an epichirema sit dubitat.

107. Visellius, although he makes the very fewest figures, nevertheless includes among them the epicheireme, which he calls a commentum, and, styling reason (ratio) an epicheireme, he counts it among them. This indeed Celsus also in a certain way admits: for he doubts whether the consequent (consequens) is an epicheireme.

Visellius adicit et sententiam. invenio qui adgregent his diaskevas, apagoreuseis, paradiegeseis. Sed ut haec non sunt schemata, sic alia vel sint forsitan ac nos fugerint vel etiam nova fieri adhuc possint, eiusdem tamen naturae cuius sunt ea de quibus dictum est.

Visellius adds also the sententia. I find some who aggregate to these the diaskevas, apagoreuseis, paradiegeseis. But as these are not schemata, so perhaps there are others which have escaped us, or even new ones can still be made, yet of the same nature as those of which we have spoken.

[3] I. Verborum vero figurae et mutatae sunt semper et utcumque valuit consuetudo mutantur. Itaque, si anticum sermonem nostro comparemus, paene iam quidquid loquimur figura est, ut "hac re invidere", non, ut omnes veteres et Cicero praecipue, "hanc rem", et "incumbere illi", non "in illum", et "plenum vino", non "vini", et "huic", non "hunc adulari" iam dicitur et mille alia, utinamque non peiora vincant. II. Verum schemata lexeos duorum sunt generum: alterum loquendi rationem novat, alterum maxime conlocatione exquisitum est.

[3] 1. The figures of words indeed have always been altered, and they are altered however usage has prevailed. Therefore, if we compare ancient speech with our own, almost now whatever we speak is a figure, as “hac re invidere,” not, as all the ancients and Cicero especially, “hanc rem,” and “incumbere illi,” not “in illum,” and “plenum vino,” not “vini,” and “huic,” not “hunc adulari” is now said, and a thousand others—would that worse things do not prevail. 2. But the schemata of lexis are of two kinds: the one innovates the mode of speaking; the other is most of all exquisite by collocation.

Quorum tametsi utrumque convenit orationi, tamen possis illud grammaticum, hoc rhetoricum magis dicere.

Of which, although both suit speech, nevertheless you could call that one more grammatical, this one more rhetorical.

Prius fit isdem generibus quibus vitia: esset enim omne eiusmodi schema vitium si non peteretur sed accideret. III. Verum auctoritate vetustate consuetudine plerumque defenditur, saepe etiam ratione quadam.

First, the former arises in the same kinds as the faults: for every schema of this sort would be a fault if it were not sought but happened. 3. But it is for the most part defended by authority, antiquity, and consuetude, and often also by a certain reason.

Ideoque, cum sit a simplici rectoque loquendi genere deflexa, virtus est si habet probabile aliquid quod sequatur. Vna tamen in re maxime utilis, ut et cotidiani ac semper eodem modo formati sermonis fastidium levet et nos a vulgari dicendi genere defendat. IV. Quod si quis parce et cum res poscet utetur, velut adsperso quodam condimento iucundior erit: at qui nimium adfectaverit, ipsam illam gratiam varietatis amittet.

And therefore, since it is deflected from the simple and straight kind of speaking, it is a virtue if it has something probable to follow—some plausible precedent. Yet it is most useful in one respect: that it both lightens the tedium of quotidian discourse, always formed in the same way, and defends us from the vulgar manner of speaking. 4. But if someone uses it sparingly and when the matter shall require, he will be more pleasant, as if with a certain condiment sprinkled on; but he who has over-affected it will lose that very grace of variety.

Quamquam sunt quaedam figurae ita receptae ut paene iam hoc ipsum nomen effugerint: quae etiam si fuerint crebriores, consuetas aures minus ferient. V. Nam secretae et extra vulgarem usum positae ideoque magis notabiles ut novitate aurem excitant, ita copia satiant, et se non obvias fuisse dicenti, sed conquisitas et ex omnibus latebris extractas congestasque declarant.

Although certain figures are so accepted that they have almost now escaped this very name: which, even if they should be more frequent, will strike accustomed ears less. 5. For those that are secret and placed outside vulgar use, and on that account more notable, just as they, by their novelty, arouse the ear, so by abundance they satiate it, and declare themselves to the speaker not to have been obvious, but to have been sought out and extracted from all hiding-places and heaped up.

VI. Fiunt ergo et circa genus figurae in nominibus, nam et "oculis capti talpae" et "timidi dammae" dicuntur a Vergilio, sed subest ratio, quia sexus uterque altero significatur, tamque mares esse talpas dammasque quam feminas certum est: et in verbis, ut "fabricatus est gladium" et "inimicum poenitus es". VII. Quod minus mirum est quia in natura verborum est et quae facimus patiendi modo saepe dicere, ut "arbitror", "suspicor", et contra faciendi quae patimur, ut "vapulo": ideoque frequens permutatio est et pleraque utroque modo efferuntur: luxuriatur luxuriat, fluctuatur fluctuat, adsentior adsentio. VIII.

6. Therefore figures also arise concerning gender in nouns, for both “oculis capti talpae” and “timidi dammae” are said by Vergil, but there is an underlying reason, because each sex is signified by the other, and it is certain that moles and deer are as much males as females: and in verbs, as “fabricatus est gladium” and “inimicum poenitus es”. 7. Which is less a marvel, because it is in the nature of verbs often to speak in a suffering (passive) mode of the things we do, as “arbitror,” “suspicor,” and conversely in a doing (active) mode of the things we suffer, as “vapulo”: and therefore there is frequent interchange, and many are expressed in both ways: luxuriatur luxuriat, fluctuatur fluctuat, adsentior adsentio. 8.

Est figura et in numero, vel cum singulari pluralis subiungitur: "gladio pugnacissima gens Romani" (gens enim ex multis), vel ex diverso: "qui non risere parentes, nec deus hunc mensa dea nec dignata cubili est": ex illis enim "qui non risere" hic quem non dignata * in satura: IX. "et nostrum istud vivere triste aspexi," cum infinito verbo sit usus pro appellatione: nostram enim vitam vult intellegi. Vtimur et verbo pro participio: "magnum dat ferre talentum," tamquam "ferendum", et participio pro verbo: "volo datum". X. Interim etiam dubitari potest cui vitio simile sit schema, ut in hoc: "virtus est vitium fugere": aut enim partis orationis mutat ex illo "virtus est fuga vitiorum", aut casus ex illo "virtutis est vitium fugere", multo tamen hoc utroque excitatius. Iunguntur interim schemata: "Sthenelus sciens pugnae": est enim "scitus pugnandi". XI. Transferuntur et tempora: "Timarchides negat esse ei periculum a securi" (praesens enim pro praeterito positum est) et status: "hoc Ithacus velit": et, ne morer, per omnia genera per quae fit soloecismus.

There is also a figure in number, either when a plural is subjoined to a singular: "gladio pugnacissima gens Romani" (for a gens is from many), or conversely: "qui non risere parentes, nec deus hunc mensa dea nec dignata cubili est": from those words "qui non risere" here it is understood whom she did not deem worthy * in the satire: 9. "et nostrum istud vivere triste aspexi," when he has used an infinitive verb in place of an appellation: for he wishes our life to be understood. We also use a verb in place of a participle: "magnum dat ferre talentum," as though "ferendum", and a participle in place of a verb: "volo datum". 10. Meanwhile it can also be doubted to what fault the schema is similar, as in this: "virtus est vitium fugere": for either it changes the part of speech from that "virtus est fuga vitiorum", or the case from that "virtutis est vitium fugere", yet this is much more stirring than either. Schemata are sometimes joined: "Sthenelus sciens pugnae": for it is "scitus pugnandi". 11. Tenses too are transferred: "Timarchides negat esse ei periculum a securi" (for the present is put in place of the past) and mood: "hoc Ithacus velit": and, not to delay, through all the kinds by which a solecism is made.

XII. Haec quoque est quam heteroiosin vocant, cui non dissimilis exallage dicitur, ut apud Sallustium "neque ea res falsum me habuit" et "duci probare". Ex quibus fere praeter novitatem brevitas etiam peti solet. Vnde eo usque processum est ut "non paeniturum" pro non acturo paenitentiam et "visuros" ad videndum missos idem auctor dixerit.

12. This too is what they call heteroiosis, to which exallage is said to be not dissimilar, as in Sallust: "nor did that matter have me false" and "to approve to a leader." From which, for the most part, besides novelty, brevity also is sought. Whence it has gone so far that the same author has said "not about to repent" for not about to perform repentance, and "those about to see" for those sent to see.

XIII. Quae ille quidem fecerit schemata: an idem vocari possint videndum, quia recepta sunt. Nam in receptis etiam vulgo auctore contenti sumus, ut iam evaluit "rebus agentibus", quod Pollio in Labieno damnat, et "contumeliam fecit", quod a Cicerone reprehendi notum est: "adfici" enim "contumelia" dicebant.

13. These he indeed would have made schemata: whether they can be called the same must be considered, because they have been received. For in received usages we are content even with the crowd as author, as now “rebus agentibus” has prevailed, which Pollio condemns in Labienus, and “contumeliam fecit,” which is known to have been reproved by Cicero: for they used to say “adfici contumelia.”

XIV. Alia commendatio vetustatis, cuius amator unice Vergilius fuit: "vel cum se pavidum contra mea iurgia iactat"; "progeniem sed enim Troiano a sanguine duci audierat". Quorum similia apud veteres tragicos comicosque sunt plurima. Illud et in consuetudine remansit "enimvero". XV. His amplius apud eundem: "nam quis te, iuvenum confidentissime", quo sermonis initium fit; et "tam magis illa tremens et tristibus effera flammis, quam magis effuso crudescunt sanguine pugnae". Quod est versum ex illo: "quam magis aerumna urget, tam magis ad malefaciendum viget". XVI.

14. Another commendation of antiquity, of which Vergil was a uniquely devoted lover: "or when he, timid, vaunts himself against my taunts"; "but indeed she had heard that a progeny was being drawn from Trojan blood." Of which very many similar examples are among the old tragedians and comedians. That, too, has remained in usage, "enimvero". 15. Beyond these in the same author: "for who, most confident of youths," with which the beginning of a speech is made; and "so much the more she, trembling and wild with gloomy flames, the more the battles grow cruel with blood poured out." Which is turned from that saying: "the more distress presses, the more it thrives for doing ill." 16.

Pleni talibus antiqui sunt. Initio Eunuchi Terentius "quid igitur faciam?" inquit. +Alius+: "ain tandem leno?" Catullus in epithalamio: "dum innupta manet, dum cara suis est", cum prius "dum" significet "quoad", sequens "usque eo". XVII.

The ancients are full of such things. At the beginning of the Eunuchus Terence says, "what then shall I do?" +Another+: "Really now, pimp?" Catullus in the epithalamium: "while she remains unwed, while she is dear to her own," with the former "dum" signifying "until", the latter "to that point". 17.

Ex Graeco vero tralata vel Sallusti plurima, quale est: [vulgus] "amat fieri", vel Horati, nam id maxime probat: "nec ciceris nec longae invidit avenae", vel Vergili: "Tyrrhenum navigat aequor", et iam vulgatum actis quoque: "saucius pectus". XVIII. Ex eadem parte figurarum (priore dico) et adiectio est illa quae videri potest supervacua, sed non sine gratia est: "nam neque Parnasi vobis iuga, nam neque Pindi" (potest enim deesse alterum "nam"): et apud Horatium illud: "Fabriciumque, hunc et intonsis curium capillis"; et detractiones quae in complexu sermonis aut vitium habent aut figuram: "accede ad ignem, iam calesces plus satis": "plus" enim "quam satis" est. XIX.

Truly, very many things carried over from Greek even in Sallust, such as: [the common crowd] “loves to be done,” or in Horace—for he especially approves this: “he begrudged neither chickpea nor long oats,” or in Vergil: “he sails the Tyrrhenian sea,” and now a thing made commonplace even in the public acts: “a wounded breast.” 18. From that same department of figures (I mean the former) there is also that addition which can seem superfluous, but is not without grace: “for neither the ridges of Parnassus for you, for neither of Pindus” (for one “for” can be lacking); and in Horace this: “and Fabricius, this one and Curius with unshorn hair”; and the subtractions which in the complex of discourse either have a fault or a figure: “come near the fire, now you will grow warm more than enough”: for “more” indeed is “than enough.” 19.

Nam de altera quae * detractione pluribus dicendum est. Vtimur vulgo et comparativis pro absolutis, ut cum se quis infirmiorem esse dicet. duo inter se comparativa committimus: "si te, Catilina, comprehendi, si interfici iussero, credo erit verendum mihi ne potius hoc omnes boni serius a me quam quisquam crudelius factum esse dicat". XX. sunt et illa non similia soloecismo quidem, sed tamen numerum mutantia, quae et tropis adsignari solent, ut de uno pluraliter dicamus: "sed nos inmensum spatiis confecimus aequor", et de pluribus singulariter: "haud secus ac patriis acer Romanus in armis". XXI.

Now about the other, namely *detraction*, more must be said. We commonly use even comparatives for absolutes, as when someone will say that he is the weaker. We also bring two comparatives into collision with each other: "if I shall have ordered you, Catiline, to be apprehended, if to be put to death, I believe it will have to be feared by me lest rather all good men say that this was done by me too late than anyone say that it was done more cruelly." 20. There are also those things, not indeed similar to a solecism, yet altering number, which are also wont to be assigned to tropes: so that we speak in the plural of one: "but we have completed the immense plain by spaces," and of several in the singular: "not otherwise than the keen Roman in his ancestral arms." 21.

Specie diversa sed genere eadem et haec sunt: "neve tibi ad solem vergant vineta cadentem"; "ne mihi tum mollis sub divo carpere somnos, neu dorso nemoris libeat iacuisse per herbas": non enim nescio cui alii prius, nec postea sibi uni, sed omnibus praecipit. Et de nobis loquimur tamquam de aliis: "dicit Servius, negat tullius". XXII. Et nostra persona utimur pro aliena, et alios pro aliis fingimus.

Different in appearance but the same in kind are also these: "and let not your vineyards incline toward the setting sun"; "nor then let it be my pleasure to pluck soft sleeps under the open sky, nor to have lain on the ridge of the grove through the grasses": for he enjoins not first on some other unknown person, nor afterward on himself alone, but on all. And we speak about ourselves as though about others: "Servius says, tullius denies". 22. And we use our own persona in place of an alien one, and we feign others for others.

Vtriusque rei exemplum pro Caecina. Pisonem, adversae partis advocatum, adloquens Cicero dicit: "restituisse te dixti: nego me ex edicto praetoris restitutum esse": verum enim est illud: "restituisse" Aebutius dixit, "nego me" Caecina [ex edicto praetoris restitutum esse]: et ipsum "dixti", excussa syllaba, figura in verbo. XXIII.

Example of both matters from For Caecina. Addressing Piso, the advocate of the adverse party, Cicero says: "restituisse te dixti: nego me ex edicto praetoris restitutum esse": but the true version is this: "restituisse" Aebutius said, "nego me" Caecina [ex edicto praetoris restitutum esse]: and the "dixti" itself, with a syllable struck off, is a figure in the verb. 23.

Illa quoque ex eodem genere possunt videri: unum quod interpositionem vel interclusionem dicimus, Graeci parenthesin sive paremptosin vocant, cum continuationi sermonis medius aliqui sensus intervenit: "ego cum te (mecum enim saepissime loquitur) patriae reddidissem": cui adiciunt hyperbaton qui id inter tropos esse noluerunt: XXIV. alterum quod est ei figurae sententiarum quae apostrophe dicitur simile, sed non sensum mutat verum formam eloquendi: "Decios Marios magnosque Camillos, Scipiadas duros bello et te, maxime Caesar". Acutius adhuc in Polydoro: XXV. "Fas omne abrumpit, Polydorum obtruncat et auro vi potitur.

Those too can seem to be of the same kind: one, which we call interposition or interclusion, the Greeks call parenthesis or paremptosis, when in the continuation of the discourse some intermediate sense intervenes: "ego cum te (mecum enim saepissime loquitur) patriae reddidissem": to which those who did not wish this to be among the tropes add hyperbaton: 24. another, which is similar to that figure of sentences which is called apostrophe, but it does not change the sense, rather the form of speaking: "Decios Marios magnosque Camillos, Scipiadas duros bello et te, maxime Caesar". More sharply still in Polydorus: 25. "Fas omne abrumpit, Polydorum obtruncat et auro vi potitur.

Quid non mortalia pectora cogis auri sacra fames?" Hoc, qui tam parva momenta nominibus discreverunt, metabasin vocant, quam et aliter fieri putant: "quid loquar? aut ubi sum?" XXVI. Coniunxit autem parenthesin et apostrophen Vergilius illo loco: "haud procul inde citae Mettum in diversa quadrigae distulerant (at tu dictis, Albane, maneres!) raptabatque viri mendacis viscera tullus". XVII.

“To what do you not drive mortal hearts, accursed hunger for gold?” Those who have distinguished such slight nuances by names call this metabasis, which they also suppose can be effected otherwise: “what shall I say? or where am I?” 26. Moreover, Vergil combined parenthesis and apostrophe in that passage: “not far from there the swift chariots had borne Mettus apart in different directions (but do you, Alban, abide by your words!) and tullus was dragging the entrails of the lying man.” 17.

Haec schemata, aut his similia quae erunt per mutationem adiectionem detractionem ordinem, et convertunt in se auditorem nec languere patiuntur subinde aliqua notabili figura excitatum, et habent quandam ex illa vitii similitudine gratiam, ut in cibis interim acor ipse iucundus est. Quod continget si neque supra modum multae fuerint nec eiusdem generis aut iunctae aut frequentes, quia satietatem ut varietas earum, ita raritas effugit. XXVIII.

These schemata, or those similar to them which arise through alteration, addition, subtraction, ordering, both draw the hearer to themselves and do not allow him to grow languid, from time to time roused by some notable figure, and they have a certain charm from that resemblance to a fault, just as in foods at times the sourness itself is pleasant. This will happen if they are neither beyond measure many nor of the same kind either joined together or frequent, because, as their variety evades satiety, so too does their rarity. 28.

Illud est acrius genus quod non tantum in ratione positum est loquendi, sed ipsis sensibus tum gratiam tum etiam vires accommodat. Ex quibus primum sit quod fit adiectione. Plura sunt genera.

That is the keener kind which is grounded not only in the rationale of speaking, but accommodates to the senses themselves both grace and even force. Of these, the first is that which is effected by adjection. There are several kinds.

Nam et verba geminantur, vel amplificandi gratia, ut "occidi, occidi non Spurium Maelium" (alterum est enim quod indicat, alterum quod adfirmat), vel miserandi, ut "a Corydon, Corydon". XXIX. Quae eadem figura nonnumquam per ironian ad elevandum convertitur. Similis geminationis post aliquam interiectionem repetitio est, sed paulo etiam vehementior: "bona Cn. Pompei - miserum me! consumptis enim lacrimis infixus tamen pectori haeret dolor - bona, inquam, Cn. Pompei acerbissimae voci subiecta praeconis"; "vivis, et vivis non ad deponendam sed ad confirmandam audaciam". XXX.

For words too are doubled, either for the sake of amplification, as “I have killed, I have killed, not Spurius Maelius” (for the one points out, the other affirms), or for lamenting, as “ah, Corydon, Corydon.” 29. The same figure is sometimes turned, through irony, to make a thing lighter. A repetition after some interjection is a like kind of doubling, but even a little more vehement: “the goods of Gnaeus Pompey — wretched me! for though my tears are spent, yet the grief fixed in my breast clings — the goods, I say, of Gnaeus Pompey, subjected to the most bitter voice of the auctioneer”; “you live, and you live not to lay down but to confirm audacity.” 30.

Et ab isdem verbis plura acriter et instanter incipiunt: "nihilne te nocturnum praesidium Palatii, nihil urbis vigiliae, nihil timor populi, nihil consensus bonorum omnium, nihil hic munitissimus habendi senatus locus, nihil horum ora vultusque moverunt?" et in isdem desinunt: "Quis eos postulavit? Appius. Quis produxit?

And from the same words several begin sharply and insistently: "Did the nocturnal guard of the Palatine, did the city’s watches, did the people’s fear, did the consensus of all the good, did this most fortified place for holding the senate, did the faces and countenances of these men, move you not at all?" and they end with the same words: "Who demanded them? Appius. Who produced them?

Appius". XXXI. Quamquam hoc exemplum ad aliud quoque schema pertinet, cuius et initia inter se et rursus inter se fines idem sunt ("quis" et "quis", "Appius" et "Appius") - quale est: "Qui sunt qui foedera saepe ruperunt? Carthaginienses.

Appius". 31. Although this example pertains also to another schema, whose beginnings among themselves and again whose endings among themselves are the same ("who" and "who", "Appius" and "Appius") - such as is: "Who are they who have often broken treaties? The Carthaginians."

Qui sunt qui crudelissime bellum gesserunt? Carthaginienses. Qui sunt qui Italiam deformarunt?

Who are they who most cruelly waged war? The Carthaginians. Who are they who disfigured Italy?

Carthaginienses. Qui sunt qui sibi ignosci postulant? Carthaginienses". XXXII.

The Carthaginians. Who are they who petition that they themselves be pardoned? The Carthaginians". 32.

Etiam in contrapositis vel comparativis solet respondere primorum verborum alterna repetitio, quod modo huius [modi] esse loci potius dixi: "vigilas tu de nocte ut tuis consultoribus respondeas, ille ut eo quo intendit mature cum exercitu perveniat: te gallorum, illum bucinarum cantus exsuscitat: tu actionem instituis, ille aciem instruit: tu caves ne consultores tui, ire ne urbes aut castra capiantur". XXXIII. Sed hac gratia non fuit contentus orator; vertit in contrarium eandem figuram: "ille tenet et scit ut hostium copiae, tu ut aquae pluviae arceantur: ille exercitatus in propagandis finibus, tu in regendis". XXXIV. Possunt media quoque respondere vel primis, ut "te nemus Angitiae, vitrea te fucinus unda," vel ultimis, ut: "haec navis onusta praeda Siciliensi, cum et ipsa esset ex praeda". Nec quisquam dubitabit idem fieri posse iteratis utrimque mediis.

Even in contraposites or comparatives the alternate repetition of the first words is wont to respond, which a moment ago I said rather to belong to a locus of this [kind]: "you keep vigil by night that you may respond to your consultors; he, that he may arrive early with his army at the place he aims at: the songs of cocks rouse you, the blasts of buccinae him: you institute an action, he arrays a battle-line: you take precautions for your consultors, he that cities or camps not be captured." 33. But with this grace the orator was not content; he turned the same figure into the contrary: "he holds and knows how the forces of the enemy are to be warded off, you how rain-waters are to be warded off: he trained in propagating borders, you in governing them." 34. The middle members also can respond either to the first, as "you, the grove of Angitia; you, the glassy wave of Fucinus," or to the last, as: "this ship laden with Sicilian booty, although it too was from booty." Nor will anyone doubt that the same can be done with the middles iterated on both sides.

Respondent primis et ultima: "multi et graves dolores inventi parentibus et propinquis, multi". XXXV. Est et illud repetendi genus quod semel proposita iterat et dividit: "Iphitus et Pelias mecum, quorum Iphitus aevo iam gravior, Pelias et vulnere tardus Vlixei". XXXVI. Epanodos dicitur Graece, nostri regressionem vocant.

The last also respond to the first: "many and grave dolors found for parents and relatives, many". 35. There is also that kind of repeating which, once things have been set forth, repeats and divides them: "Iphitus and Pelias with me, of whom Iphitus now graver with age, and Pelias too slowed by the wound of Ulysses". 36. It is called epanodos in Greek; our people call it regression.

Nec solum in eodem sensu sed etiam in diverso eadem verba contra sumuntur: "principum dignitas erat paene par, non par fortasse eorum qui sequebantur". Interim variatur casibus haec et generibus retractatio: "magnus est dicendi labor, magna res". Est et apud Rutilium longa periodois, sed haec initia sententiarum sunt: "Pater hic tuus? Patrem nunc appellas? XXXVII.

Not only in the same sense but even in a different one the same words are taken in the contrary: "the dignity of the leaders was almost equal, perhaps not that of those who were following". Meanwhile this retractation is varied by cases and by genders: "great is the labor of speaking, a great thing". There is also with Rutilius a long period, but these are the beginnings of the sentences: "Is this your father? Do you now call him father? 37.

Patris tui filius es?" Fit casibus modo hoc schema (quod polyptoton vocant), constat et aliis etiam modis, ut pro Cluentio: "Quod autem tempus veneni dandi illo die, illa frequentia? Per quem porro datum? Vnde sumptum?

"Are you your father's son?" This schema is formed by cases alone (which they call polyptoton), yet it also consists in other ways, as in pro Cluentio: "But what time for giving the poison on that day, with that throng? By whom, moreover, was it given? Whence was it procured?"

Quae porro interceptio poculi? cur non de integro autem datum?" XXXVIII. Hanc rerum coniunctam diversitatem Caecilius metabolen vocat, qualis est pro Cluentio locus in Oppianicum: "illum tabulas publicas Larini censorias corrupisse decuriones universi iudicaverunt, cum illo nemo rationem, nemo rem ullam contrahebat, nemo illum ex tam multis cognatis et adfinibus tutorem umquam liberis suis scripsit", et deinceps adhuc multa.

"What, moreover, was the interception of the cup? why, however, was it not given afresh?" 38. Caecilius calls this connected diversity of things a metabole, such as is the passage in the Pro Cluentio against Oppianicus: "the decurions all judged that that man had corrupted the public censorial tablets at Larinum, while with him no one entered into an account, no one contracted any matter, no one out of so many cognates and affines ever wrote him as guardian for his children", and thereafter many more things besides.

XXXIX. Vt haec in unum congeruntur, ita contra illa dispersa sunt, quae a Cicerone "dissupata" dici puto: "hic segetes, illic veniunt felicius uvae, arborei fetus alibi", et deinceps. XL. Illa vero apud Ciceronem mira figurarum mixtura deprehenditur, in qua et primo verbo longum post intervallum redditum est ultimum, et media primis et mediis ultima congruunt: "vestrum iam hic factum deprehenditur, patres conscripti, non meum, ac pulcherrimum quidem factum, verum, ut dixi, non meum, sed vestrum". XLI.

39. Just as these are heaped together into one, so on the contrary those are scattered, which I think Cicero calls “dissipated”: “here the grain-fields, there the grapes come more felicitously, arboreal fruits elsewhere,” and so on. 40. Truly with Cicero a wondrous mixture of figures is detected, in which both the first word, after a long interval, has its last returned, and the middles agree with the firsts and the lasts with the middles: “your deed is now here detected, Conscript Fathers, not mine, and indeed a most beautiful deed, but, as I said, not mine, but yours.” 41.

Hanc frequentiorem repetitionem ploken vocant, quae fit et permixtis figuris, ut supra dixi, utque se habet epistula ad Brutum: "ego cum in gratiam redierim cum Appio Claudio, et redierim per Cn. Pompeium, [et] ego ergo cum redierim", et in isdem sententiis crebrioribus mutata declinationibus iteratione verborum, ut apud Persium: XLII. "usque adeone scire tuum nihil est nisi te scire hoc sciat alter?" et apud Ciceronem: "+neque enim poterat indicio et his damnatis qui indicabantur". XLIII. Sed sensus quoque toti quem ad modum coeperunt desinunt: "Venit ex Asia.

They call this more frequent repetition ploke, which also comes about with mixed figures, as I said above, as the letter to Brutus has it: "I, when I shall have been restored into favor with Appius Claudius, and shall have been restored through Cn. Pompeius, [and] I therefore, when I shall have been restored", and in the same clauses, by a more frequent iteration of words with the inflections changed, as in Persius: 42. "Is your knowing to such an extent nothing at all unless another knows that you know this?" and in Cicero: "+for indeed it could not be by the testimony, with those being condemned who were being informed against". 43. But whole senses too end in the way in which they began: "He came from Asia.

Hoc ipsum quam novum! Tribunus plebis venit ex Asia". In eadem tamen perihodo et verbum ultimum primo refertur, tertium iam sermone, adiectum est enim: "verumtamen venit". Interim sententia quidem repetitur, sed non eodem verborum ordine: "Quid Cleomenes facere potuit? Non enim possum quemquam insimulare falso.

How new this very thing! "A tribune of the plebs has come from Asia". In the same period, however, the last word is referred back to the first, a third already in the discourse; for there has been added: "nevertheless, he came". Meanwhile the thought indeed is repeated, but not in the same order of words: "What could Cleomenes do? For I cannot accuse anyone falsely.

Quid, inquam, facere Cleomenes potuit?" XLIV. Prioris etiam sententiae verbum ultimum ac sequentis primum frequenter est idem, quo quidem schemate utuntur poetae saepius: "Pierides, vos haec facietis maxima Gallo, Gallo, cuius amor tantum mihi crescit in horas", sed ne oratores quidem raro: "hic tamen vivit: vivit? immo vero etiam in senatum venit". XLV.

What, I say, could Cleomenes do?" 44. Also the last word of the prior sentence and the first of the following are frequently the same, a figure which poets use more often: "Pierides, you will make these things very great for Gallus, for Gallus, whose love grows for me hour by hour", but not even orators use it rarely: "this man, however, lives: lives? nay indeed he even comes into the senate." 45.

Aliquando, sicut in geminatione verborum diximus, initia quoque et clausulae sententiarum aliis sed non alio tendentibus verbis inter se consonant. Initia hoc modo: "dediderim periculis omnibus, optulerim insidiis, obiecerim invidiae". Rursus clausulae ibidem statim: "vos enim statuistis, vos sententiam dixistis, vos iudicastis". Hoc alii synonymian, alii diiunctionem vocant, utrumque, etiam si est diversum, recte: nam est nominum idem significantium separatio. Congregantur quoque verba idem significantia: "quae cum ita sint, Catilina, perge quo coepisti, egredere aliquando ex urbe: patent portae, proficiscere". XLVI.

Sometimes, just as we said in the gemination of words, the beginnings and the closes of sentences harmonize with each other in words different, yet not tending to a different aim. Beginnings in this way: "I would have surrendered myself to all dangers, I would have offered myself to insidious snares, I would have thrown myself to envy." Again, the closes there straightway: "for you have determined, you have spoken your sentence, you have judged." Some call this synonymy, others disjunction; both, even if different, rightly: for it is the separation of names signifying the same thing. Words signifying the same thing are also congregated: "since these things are so, Catiline, proceed where you have begun, go out at last from the city: the gates stand open, set forth." 46.

Et in eundem alio libro: "abiit excessit erupit evasit". Hoc Caecilio pleonasmos videtur, id est abundans super necessitatem oratio, sicut illa: "vidi oculos ante ipse meos": in illo enim "vidi" inest "ipse". Verum id, ut alio quoque loco dixi, cum supervacua oneratur adiectione, vitium est, cum auget aut manifestat sententiam, sicut hic, virtus: "vidi", "ipse", "ante oculos" totidem sunt adfectus. XLVII. cur tamen haec proprie nomine tali notarit non video: nam et geminatio et repetitio et qualiscumque adiectio pleonasmos videri potest.

And in the same author in another book: "he went away, he departed, he burst out, he escaped." To Caecilius this seems a pleonasm, that is, speech abounding beyond necessity, just like that: "I myself saw before my very own eyes": for in that "I saw" the "myself" is contained. But that, as I have said elsewhere too, is a fault when it is burdened with a superfluous addition; when it amplifies or makes the thought manifest, as here, it is a virtue: "I saw," "myself," "before the eyes" are just so many emphases. 47. why, however, he has marked these specifically with such a name I do not see: for both gemination and repetition and whatever kind of addition can seem pleonasms.

Nec verba modo sed sensus quoque idem facientes acervantur: "perturbatio istum mentis et quaedam scelerum offusa caligo et ardentes furiarum faces excitaverunt".

Not words only, but also senses producing the same thing are heaped up: "a perturbation of his mind, and a certain diffused gloom of crimes, and the burning torches of the Furies, have aroused that man".

XLVIII. Congeruntur et diversa: "Mulier, tyranni saeva crudelitas, patris amor, ira praeceps, temeritatis dementia". Et apud Ovidium: "sed grave Nereidum numen, sed corniger Ammon, sed quae visceribus veniebat belua ponti exsaturanda meis". XLIX. inveni qui et hoc ploken vocaret: cui non adsentior, cum sit unius figurae.

48. Different things, too, are piled together: "Woman, the savage cruelty of a tyrant, a father’s love, headlong wrath, the madness of temerity." And in Ovid: "but the weighty numen of the Nereids, but horn-bearing Ammon, but the beast of the sea that was coming from its entrails to be glutted with my own." 49. I have found one who would even call this ploke: to whom I do not assent, since it is of one figure.

Mixta quoque et idem et diversum significantia, quod et ipsum diallagen vocant: "quaero ab inimicis, sintne haec investigata comperta id est patefacta sublata delata extincta per me?" Et "investigata comperta id est patefacta" aliud ostendunt, "sublata delata extincta": sunt inter se similia, sed non etiam prioribus. L. Et hoc autem exemplum et superius aliam quoque efficiunt figuram, quae quia coniunctionibus caret dissolutio vocatur, apta cum quid instantius dicimus: nam et singula inculcantur et quasi plura fiunt. Ideoque utimur hac figura non in singulis modo verbis, sed sententiis etiam, ut Cicero dicit contra contionem Metelli: "qui indicabantur, eos vocari, custodiri, ad senatum adduci iussi: senatum si interposui", et totus hic locus talis est.

Mixed too, signifying both the same and the different, which they also call diallage: "I ask of my enemies whether these things have been investigated, discovered, that is, laid open, removed, denounced, extinguished by me?" And "investigated, discovered, that is, laid open" show one thing; "removed, denounced, extinguished" are similar among themselves, but not also to the former. 50. And this example and the one above also produce another figure, which, because it lacks conjunctions, is called dissolution, apt when we say something more urgently: for both the individual items are hammered in and they as it were become more numerous. And so we use this figure not only in single words, but even in sentences, as Cicero says against Metellus’s assembly: "those who were being informed against—to be summoned, to be kept under guard, to be brought to the senate—I ordered: the senate, if I interposed," and this whole passage is of such a kind.

Hoc genus et brachylogian vocant, quae potest esse copulata dissoluto. Contrarium [ut] est schema quod coniunctionibus abundat: illud asyndeton, hoc polysyndeton dicitur. LI. Sed hoc est vel isdem saepius repetitis, ut "tectumque laremque armaque Amyclaeumque canem Cressamque pharetram", vel diversis: LII.

They also call this kind brachylogia, which can be coupled with the dissolutio. The contrary [as it were] is the schema which abounds in conjunctions: the former is called asyndeton, the latter polysyndeton. 51. But this is either with the same ones repeated rather often, as "roof and hearth and arms and the Amyclaean dog and the Cretan quiver", or with different ones: 52.

"arma virumque - multum ille et terris - multa quoque". LIII. Adverbia quoque et pronomina variantur: "hic illum vidi iuvenem - bis senos cui nostra dies - hic mihi responsum primus dedit ire petenti". Sed utrumque horum acervatio est aut iuncta aut dissoluta. LIV.

"arms and the man - much he both on lands - many things too". 53. Adverbs too and pronouns are varied: "here I saw that youth - for whom our day is 12 - here he first gave me a response as I was seeking to go". But each of these is an accumulation, either conjoined or dissolved. 54.

Omnibus scriptores sua nomina dederunt, sed varia et ut cuique fingenti placuit: fons quidem unus, qui acriora facit et instantiora quae dicimus et vim quandam prae se ferentia velut saepius erumpentis adfectus.

Writers have given it their own names, but various, and as it pleased each one fashioning; the fount, however, is one, which makes what we say sharper and more instant, and bearing a certain force before itself, as it were the affect of something bursting forth more often.

Gradatio, quae dicitur climax, apertiorem habet artem et magis adfectatam, ideoque esse rarior debet. LV. Est autem ipsa quoque adiectionis: repetit enim quae dicta sunt, et priusquam ad aliud descendat in prioribus resistit. cuius exemplum ex Graeco notissimo transferatur: "non enim dixi quidem haec, sed non scripsi, nec scripsi quidem, sed non obii legationem, nec obii quidem legationem, sed non persuasi Thebanis". LVI.

Gradation, which is called climax, has a more overt art and is more affected, and therefore ought to be rarer. 55. Moreover, it itself also is of addition: for it repeats the things that have been said, and before it descends to another point it halts on the former. Let an example of it be translated from a very well-known Greek: "for I did not indeed say these things, but I did not write; nor indeed did I write, but I did not go on the legation; nor indeed did I go on the legation, but I did not persuade the Thebans". 56.

Sunt tamen tradita et Latina: "Africano virtutem industria, virtus gloriam, gloria aemulos comparavit". Et Calvi: "non ergo magis pecuniarum repetundarum quam maiestatis, neque maiestatis magis quam Plautiae legis, neque Plautiae legis magis quam ambitus, neque ambitus magis quam omnium legum". LVII. +Est+ invenitur apud poetas quoque, ut apud Homerum de sceptro, quod a Iove ad Agamemnonem usque deducit, et apud nostrum etiam tragicum: "Iove propagatus est, ut perhibent, Tantalus, ex Tantalo ortus Pelops, ex Pelope autem satus Atreus, qui nostrum porro propagat genus". LVIII. At quae per detractionem fiunt figurae, brevitatis novitatisque maxime gratiam petunt: quarum una est ea quam libro proximo in figuras ex synekdochei distuli, cum subtractum verbum aliquod satis ex ceteris intellegitur, ut Caelius in Antonium: "stupere gaudio Graecus": simul enim auditur "coepit"; Cicero ad Brutum: "Sermo nullus scilicet nisi de te; quid enim potius?

There have nevertheless been transmitted Latin ones as well: "For Africanus, industry procured virtue, virtue glory, glory rivals." And of Calvus: "not therefore more of extortions of monies than of treason, nor more of treason than of the Plautian law, nor more of the Plautian law than of bribery, nor more of bribery than of all the laws." 57. +It is+ found among the poets too, as with Homer about the scepter, which he traces down from Jove all the way to Agamemnon, and also with our own tragedian: "From Jove, as they report, Tantalus was propagated, from Tantalus arose Pelops, from Pelops moreover was begotten Atreus, who further propagates our stock." 58. But the figures that are made through detraction seek most of all the favor of brevity and novelty: one of which is that which in the previous book I deferred among the figures from synecdoche, when some subtracted word is sufficiently understood from the rest, as in Caelius against Antonius: "The Greek [began] to be stupefied with joy": for at the same time "began" is heard; Cicero to Brutus: "Of course no conversation except about you; for what rather?"

tum Flavius, cras, inquit, tabellarii, et ego ibidem has inter cenam exaravi". LIX. cui similia sunt illa meo quidem iudicio, in quibus verba decenter pudoris gratia subtrahuntur: "novimus et qui te, transversa tuentibus hircis, et quo, sed faciles Nymphae risere, sacello". LX. Hanc quidam aposiopesin putant, frustra: nam illa quid taceat incertum est aut certe longiore sermone explicandum, hic unum verbum et manifestum quidem desideratum: quod si aposiopesis est, nihil non in quo deest aliquid idem appellabitur. LXI.

then Flavius, “tomorrow,” says he, “the letter‑carriers; and I likewise in the same place have dashed these off during dinner.” 59. To which similar are those, in my judgment at least, in which words are decently subtracted for the sake of modesty: “we know both who took you, with the goats looking askance, and to what little shrine; but the easy Nymphs laughed.” 60. Some think this aposiopesis, in vain: for in that figure what is kept silent is uncertain, or certainly must be explained by a longer discourse, whereas here a single word—and a manifest one at that—is desiderated; and if this is aposiopesis, then everything in which something is lacking will be called by the same name. 61.

Ego ne illud quidem aposiopesin semper voco, in quo res quaecumque relinquitur intellegenda, ut ea quae in epistulis Cicero: "data Lupercalibus, quo die Antonius Caesari". Non enim opticuit: lusit, quia nihil aliud intellegi poterat quam hoc: "diadema imposuit". LXII. Altera est per detractionem figura, de qua modo dictum est, cui coniunctiones eximuntur. Tertia, quae dicitur epezeugmenon, in qua unum ad verbum plures sententiae referuntur, quarum unaquaeque desiderasset illud si sola poneretur.

I do not even always call that aposiopesis, in which whatever matter is left is to be understood, as that in the letters, Cicero: "given on the Lupercalia, on which day Antony to Caesar." For he did not keep quiet: he jested, because nothing else could be understood than this: "he set a diadem upon him." 62. Another figure is by detraction, of which mention was just now made, from which conjunctions are removed. The third, which is called epezeugmenon, in which several sentences are referred to one word, each of which would have desired that if it were set alone.

Id accidit aut praeposito verbo ad quod reliqua respiciant: "vicit pudorem libido, timorem audacia, rationem amentia", aut inlato quo plura cluduntur: "neque enim is es, Catilina, ut te aut pudor umquam a turpitudine aut metus a periculo aut ratio a furore revocaverit". LXIII. Medium quoque potest esse quod et prioribus et sequentibus sufficiat: iungit autem et diversos sexus, ut cum marem feminamque "filios" dicimus, et singularia pluralibus miscet. LXIV.

This happens either with a word set before, to which the rest look back: "libido conquered modesty, audacity fear, amentia reason," or by introducing one under which several are enclosed: "for you are not such a man, Catiline, that either pudor would ever have recalled you from turpitude, or fear from peril, or reason from fury." 63. The middle, too, can be such as to suffice both for what goes before and for what follows: moreover, it joins even different sexes, as when we call a male and a female "children," and it mixes singulars with plurals. 64.

Sed haec adeo sunt vulgaria ut sibi artem figurarum adserere non possint. Illud plane figura est, quo diversa sermonis forma coniungitur: "sociis tunc arma capessant edico, et dira bellum cum gente gerendum". Quamvis enim pars [bello] posterior participio insistat, utrique convenit illud "edico". Non utique detractionis gratia factam coniunctionem synoikeiosin vocant, quae duas res diversas colligat: "tam deest avaro quod habet quam quod non habet". LXV. huic diversam volunt esse distinctionem, cui dant nomen paradiastolen, qua similia discernuntur: "cum te pro astuto sapientem appelles, pro confidente fortem, pro inliberali diligentem". Quod totum pendet ex finitione, ideoque an figura sit dubito.

But these are so commonplace that they cannot claim for themselves the art of figures. That indeed is a figure, wherein a diverse form of speech is conjoined: "let the allies then take up arms I proclaim, and a dire war must be waged with the tribe." For although the latter part [in war] rests on a participle, that "I proclaim" suits both. They call synoeciosis a joining made not, to be sure, for the sake of detraction, which binds together two different things: "what he has is as much lacking to the avaricious man as what he does not have." 65. to this they wish a different thing to be opposed, distinction, to which they give the name paradiastole, whereby things similar are distinguished: "when you style yourself wise instead of astute, brave instead of overconfident, diligent instead of illiberal." The whole of this depends on definition, and therefore I doubt whether it is a figure.

cui contraria est ea qua fit ex vicino transitus ad diversa ut similia: "brevis esse laboro, obscurus fio" et quae secuntur.

To which the contrary is that by which a transition is made from what is near to different things as if similar: "I labor to be brief, I become obscure," and what follows.

LVI. Tertium est genus figurarum quod aut similitudine aliqua vocum aut paribus aut contrariis convertit in se aures et animos excitat. Hinc est paronomasia quae dicitur adnominatio.

56. The third kind of figures is that which, either by some similarity of voices or by equals or by contraries, turns ears toward itself and excites minds. Hence is paronomasia, which is called adnomination.

Ea non uno modo fieri solet: ex vicinia quadam praedicti nominis ducta, casibus declinatis, ut Domitius Afer pro Cloatilla: "mulier omnium rerum imperita, in omnibus rebus infelix," et cum verbo idem verbum plus significans subiungitur: LXVII. "quando homo hostis, homo". Quibus exemplis sum in aliud usus, +sed in uno phasis+ est geminatio. Paronomasiai contrarium est quod eodem verbo quasi falsum arguitur: "quae lex privatis hominibus esse lex non videbatur". LXVIII.

This is not wont to be done in only one way: drawn from a certain vicinity of the aforesaid name, with the cases declined, as Domitius Afer in regard to Cloatilla: "a woman unskilled in all things, in all things unlucky," and when to a word the same word, signifying more, is subjoined: 67. "when a man is an enemy, a man." With which examples I have used for another purpose, +but in one phasis+ there is gemination. To paronomasia the contrary is that by the same word, as it were, a falsehood is arraigned: "which law did not seem to be a law for private men." 68.

cui confinis est quae antanaklasis dicitur, eiusdem verbi contraria significatio. cum Proculeius quereretur de filio quod is mortem suam exspectaret, et ille dixisset "se vero non exspectare", "immo", inquit, "rogo exspectes". Non ex eodem sed ex vicino diversum accipitur cum supplicio adficiendum dicas quem supplicatione dignum iudicaris. LXIX.

Adjacent to this is what is called antanaclasis, the contrary signification of the same word. When Proculeius was complaining about his son because he was expecting his death, and the latter had said “that he indeed was not expecting,” “Nay rather,” he said, “I beg that you expect.” A different sense is taken, not from the same but from a neighboring word, when you say that he must be afflicted with punishment whom you judge worthy of a supplication. 69.

Aliter quoque voces aut eaedem [aut] diversa in significatione ponuntur aut productione tantum vel correptione mutatae: quod etiam in iocis frigidum equidem tradi inter praecepta miror, eorumque exempla vitandi potius quam imitandi gratia pono: "amari iucundum est, si curetur ne quid insit amari", "avium dulcedo ad avium ducit", et apud Ovidium ludentem: LXX. "cur ego non dicam, furia, te furiam?" LXXI. Cornificius hanc traductionem vocat, videlicet alterius intellectus ad alterum.

Otherwise too, words, either the same [or] different, are employed in a different signification, or altered only by lengthening or by shortening: which, even in jests, I for my part marvel is handed down among precepts, and I set their examples for the sake of avoiding rather than imitating: "to be loved is pleasant, if care be taken that nothing of the bitter be in it", "the sweetness of birds leads to the birds", and with Ovid jesting: 70. "why should I not say, Fury, that you are a fury?" 71. Cornificius calls this traduction, namely the carrying-over of one sense to another.

Sed elegantius quod est positum in distinguenda rei proprietate: "hanc rei publicae pestem paulisper reprimi, non in perpetuum comprimi posse"; et quae praepositionibus in contrarium mutantur: "non emissus ex urbe, sed inmissus in urbem esse videatur". Melius atque acrius quod cum figura iucundum est, tum etiam sensu valet: "emit morte inmortalitatem". LXXII. Illa leviora: "non Pisonum sed pistorum" et "ex oratore arator". Pessimum vero: "ne patres conscripti videantur circumscripti". Raro evenit, sed vehementer +venit sic+ contigit, ut aliqui sensus vehemens et acer venustatem aliquam +non eadem eo verbo non dissona accipit.+ LXXIII. Et cur me prohibeat pudor uti domestico exemplo?

But more elegant is what is set down in distinguishing the propriety of the matter: "that this pest of the republic can be repressed for a little while, not compressed for ever"; and those which are changed into their contrary by prepositions: "let him seem not to have been emitted from the city, but immitted into the city." Better and sharper is that which is pleasant in figure and also strong in sense: "he bought immortality with death." 72. Those are lighter: "not of the Pisones but of the bakers" and "from orator to ploughman." But the worst: "lest the Conscript Fathers seem circumscribed." Rarely it happens, but it very strongly +thus comes+ about, that some meaning, vehement and keen, takes on a certain grace +not by the same word, not out of harmony with it+. 73. And why should modesty forbid me to use a domestic example?

Pater meus contra eum qui se legationi inmoriturum dixerat, deinde vix paucis diebus insumptis re infecta redierat: "non exigo uti inmoriaris legationi: inmorare". Nam et valet sensus ipse et in verbis tantum distantibus iucunde consonat vox, praesertim non captata sed velut oblata, cum altero suo sit usus, alterum ab adversario acceperit. LXXIV. Magnae veteribus curae fuit gratiam dicendi et paribus et contrariis adquirere.

My father, in reply to a man who had said that he would die for the legation, and then, with scarcely a few days expended, had returned with the affair undone: "I do not demand that you die for the legation: linger over it." For both the sense itself is valid, and the sound pleasantly consonates, the words differing only by so much—especially as it was not hunted up but, as it were, offered: since he used the one as his own, and received the other from his adversary. 74. It was a great concern to the ancients to acquire the grace of speaking both by likes and by contraries.

Gorgias in hoc inmodicus: copiosus, aetate utique prima, Isocrates fuit. Delectatus est his etiam M. tullius, verum et modum adhibuit non ingratae nisi copia redundet voluptati, et rem alioqui levem sententiarum pondere implevit. Nam per se frigida et inanis adfectatio, cum in acris incidit sensus innatam gratiam videtur habere, non arcessitam.

Gorgias was immoderate in this; copious—especially in his earliest age—was Isocrates. M. tullius also was delighted with these, but he both applied a measure to a pleasure not ungrateful unless abundance overflows, and he filled what otherwise is light with the weight of sentences. For an affectation cold and inane in itself, when it falls upon keen thoughts, seems to have an innate grace, not a fetched one.

LXXV. Similium fere quadruplex ratio est. Nam est primum quotiens verbum verbo aut non dissimile valde quaeritur, ut "puppesque tuae pubesque tuorum", et: "sic in hac calamitosa fama quasi in aliqua perniciosissima flamma", et: "non enim tam spes laudanda quam res est", aut certe par et extremis syllabis consonans: "non verbis sed armis". LXXVI.

75. The method of similars is roughly quadruple. For first, it is whenever a word is paired with a word not greatly dissimilar, as "puppesque tuae pubesque tuorum", and: "sic in hac calamitosa fama quasi in aliqua perniciosissima flamma", and: "non enim tam spes laudanda quam res est", or at least equal and consonant in the terminal syllables: "non verbis sed armis". 76.

Et hoc quoque quotiens in sententias acris incidit pulchrum est: "quantum possis, in eo semper experire ut prosis". Hoc est parison, ut plerisque placuit; Theon Stoicus parison existimat quod sit e membris non dissimilibus. LXXVII. Secundum ut clausula similiter cadat, syllabis isdem in ultimam partem conlatis; homoioteleuton vocant, id est similem duarum sententiarum vel plurium finem: "non modo ad salutem eius extinguendam, sed etiam gloriam per tales viros infringendam". Ex quibus fere fiunt, non tamen ut semper utique ultimis consonent, quae trikola dicuntur: "vicit pudorem libido, timorem audacia, rationem amentia". In quaternas quoque ac plures haec ratio ire sententias potest.

And this too, whenever it falls upon keen sentences, is beautiful: "as much as you are able, in that always make trial, so that you may benefit." This is parison, as it has pleased most; Theon the Stoic considers parison to be that which is made of not dissimilar members. 77. Secondly, that the clausula fall similarly, with the same syllables brought together into the ultimate part; they call it homoioteleuton, that is, a similar end of two or more sentences: "not only for extinguishing his safety, but also for breaking his glory through such men." From which there are generally produced those which are called tricola, not, however, that they always of necessity agree in the last syllables: "lust conquered modesty, boldness fear, madness reason." This method can carry sentences into fours and even more.

Fit etiam singulis verbis: "Hecuba hoc dolet pudet piget", et "abiit excessit erupit evasit". LXXVIII. Tertium est quod [non] in eosdem casus cadit: homoioptoton dicitur. Sed neque quod finem habet similem, utique in eundem venit finem homoioptoton, quia homoioptoton est tantum casu simile [est] etiam si dissimilia sint quae declinentur, nec tantum in fine deprehenditur, sed respondentibus vel primis inter se vel mediis vel extremis vel etiam permutatis his, ut media primis et summa mediis accommodentur; et quocumque modo accommodari potest: LXXIX.

It is done also with single words: “Hecuba at this grieves, is ashamed, is vexed,” and “he departed, he withdrew, he broke out, he escaped.” 78. The third is that which [does not] fall into the same cases: it is called homoioptoton. But neither does that which has a similar ending necessarily come to the same ending as homoioptoton, because homoioptoton is likeness by case [is] even if the things that are declined are dissimilar; nor is it only detected at the end, but when the answering parts are either the first among themselves or the middle or the last, or even with these transposed, such that the middle are fitted to the first and the highest to the middle; and in whatever way it can be fitted: 79.

nec enim semper paribus syllabis constat, ut est apud Afrum: "amisso nuper infelicis +auleis+ non praesidio inter pericula, tamen solacio inter adversa". Eius fere videntur optima in quibus initia sententiarum et fines consentiunt (ut hic "praesidio, solacio" +pedem+) ut et similia sint verso bis et a paribus cadant et eodem modo desinant: LXXX. etiam ut sint, quod est quartum, membris aequalibus, quod isokolon dicitur. "Si, quantum in agro locisque desertis audacia potest, tantum in foro atque iudiciis impudentia valeret" isokolon est et homoioptoton habet; "non minus nunc in causa cederet Aulus Caecina Sexti Aebuti impudentiae quam tum in vi facienda cessit audaciae" isokolon, homoioptoton, homoioteleuton.

for nor does it always consist of equal syllables, as is in the African: "with the unlucky one's +auleis+ recently lost, not a protection among dangers, yet a solace amid adversities." His are considered almost the best in which the beginnings of the sentences and the ends agree (as here "praesidio, solacio" +foot+), so that they both be similar twice in the line and fall from equals and end in the same way: 80. also that they be, which is the fourth, with equal members, which is called isokolon. "If, as much as boldness can in the field and in desert places, so much in the forum and in the courts impudence were strong," is isokolon and has homoioptoton; "Aulus Caecina would now yield in the case no less to Sextus Aebutius’s impudence than then in the doing of violence boldness yielded," is isokolon, homoioptoton, homoioteleuton.

Accedit et ex illa figura gratia qua nomina dixi mutatis casibus repeti: "non minus cederet quam cessit". Adhuc homoioteleuton et paronomasia est "neminem alteri posse dare in matrimonium nisi penes quem sit patrimonium".

There is added also a grace from that figure by which I said that nouns are repeated with the cases changed: "he would yield no less than he yielded." Further, there is homoioteleuton and paronomasia: "that no one can give anyone to another in matrimony unless the patrimony is in the power of the one in question."

LXXXI. Contrapositum autem vel, ut quidam vocant, contentio (antitheton dicitur) non uno fit modo. Nam et [sic] singula singulis opponuntur, ut in eo quod modo dixi: "Vicit pudorem libido, timorem audacia", et bina binis: "non nostri ingeni, vestri auxili est", et sententiae sententiis: "dominetur in contionibus, iaceat in iudiciis". LXXXII.

81. The contrapositum, or, as some call it, contention (it is called antithesis), is not effected in one way. For even [sic] singles are set against singles, as in what I just said: "Lust conquered shame, boldness conquered fear," and pairs against pairs: "it is not of our talent, but of your help," and sentences against sentences: "let him dominate in public assemblies, let him lie low in the courts." 82.

cui commodissime subiungitur et ea species quam distinctionem diximus: "odit populus Romanus privatam luxuriam, publicam magnificentiam diligit", et quae sunt simili casu dissimili sententia in ultimo locata: "ut quod in tempore mali fuit nihil obsit, quod in causa boni fuit prosit". LXXXIII. Nec semper contrapositum subiungitur, ut in hoc: "est igitur haec, iudices, non scripta sed nata lex", verum, sicut Cicero dicit, de singulis rebus propositis refertur ad singula, ut in eo quod sequitur: "quam non didicimus accepimus legimus, verum ex natura ipsa arripuimus hausimus expressimus". LXXXIV. Nec semper quod adversum est contra ponitur, quale est apud Rutilium: "nobis primis di immortales fruges dederunt, nos quod soli accepimus in omnes terras distribuimus". LXXXV.

to which there is most conveniently subjoined also that species which we called a distinction: "the Roman people hates private luxury, loves public magnificence", and those which, with similar case but dissimilar sententia, are placed at the end: "so that what, in a time of evil, was, may in no way harm, what, in a cause of good, was, may profit". 83. Nor is the contrapositum always subjoined, as in this: "therefore this, judges, is a law not written but born", but, just as Cicero says, from single things set forth it is referred to single things, as in that which follows: "which we did not learn, receive, read, but from nature herself we seized, drew, expressed". 84. Nor is what is adverse always set against, such as in Rutilius: "to us first the immortal gods gave the crops; what we alone received, we distributed into all lands". 85.

Fit etiam adsumpta illa figura qua verba declinata repetuntur, quod antimetabole dicitur: "non ut edam vivo, sed ut vivam edo". Et quod apud Ciceronem conversum ita est ut, cum mutationem casus habeat, etiam similiter desinat: "ut et sine invidia culpa plectatur et sine culpa invidia ponatur". LXXXVI. Et eodem eluditur verbo, ut quod dicit de [se] Roscio: "etenim cum artifex eius modi est ut solus videatur dignus esse * videatur qui non accedat". Est et in nominibus ex diverso conlocatis sua gratia: "si consul Antonius, Brutus hostis, si conservator rei publicae Brutus, hostis Antonius".

That figure also is made use of, the one assumed in which inflected words are repeated, which is called antimetabole: "I do not live in order to eat, but I eat in order to live." And that which in Cicero is turned so that, although it has a change of case, it also ends similarly: "that both fault be chastised without envy and envy be put down without fault." 86. And there is play with the same word, as in what he says about Roscius [himself]: "for since the performer is of such a sort that he alone seems worthy to be seen * 'seems' he who does not come near." There is also its own grace in names set from opposite sides: "if Antony is consul, Brutus is enemy; if Brutus is the preserver of the commonwealth, Antony is enemy."

LXXXVII. Olim plura de figuris quam necesse erat, et adhuc erunt qui putant esse figuram "incredibile est quod dico sed verum" (anthypophoran vocant) et "aliquis hoc semel tulit, nemo bis, ego ter" (diexodon) et "longius evectus sum, sed redeo ad propositum" (aphodon). LXXXVIII. Quaedam verborum figurae paulum a figuris sententiarum declinantur, ut dubitatio.

87. Formerly, more was said about figures than was necessary, and there will still be those who think it is a figure: "it is incredible what I say, but true" (they call it anthypophora) and "someone bore this once, no one twice, I three times" (diexodon) and "I have been carried farther, but I return to the proposition" (aphodon). 88. Certain figures of words decline a little from figures of thoughts, such as dubitation.

Nam cum est in re, priori parti adsignanda est, cum in verbo, sequenti: "sive me malitiam sive stultitiam dicere oportet". LXXXIX. Item correctionis eadem ratio est: nam quod illic dubitat, hic emendat. Etiam in personae fictione accidere quidam idem putaverunt, ut in verbis esset haec figura: "crudelitatis mater est avaritia", et apud Sallustium in Ciceronem "o Romule Arpinas": quale est apud Menandrum "Oedipus Thriasius". Haec omnia copiosius sunt exsecuti qui non ut partem operis transcurrerunt, sed proprie libros huic operi dedicaverunt, sicut Caecilius, Dionysius, Rutilius, Cornificius, Visellius aliique non pauci (sed non minor erit eorum qui vivunt gloria). XC. Vt fateor autem verborum quoque figuras posse pluris reperiri a quibusdam, ita his, quae ab auctoribus claris traduntur, meliores non adsentior.

For when it is in the matter, it must be assigned to the prior part; when in the word, to the following: “whether I ought to call it malice or stupidity.” 89. Likewise the same principle holds for correction: for what there he hesitates over, here he amends. Some have also thought the same to occur in the feigning of a persona, so that this figure was in the words: “avarice is the mother of cruelty”; and in Sallust against Cicero, “O Romulus of Arpinum”; such as in Menander, “Oedipus the Thriasian.” All these things have been set forth more copiously by those who did not run through them as a part of a work, but specially dedicated books to this work, such as Caecilius, Dionysius, Rutilius, Cornificius, Visellius, and not a few others (but the glory of those who live will be no less). 90. While I admit, moreover, that figures of words too can be discovered in greater number by some, yet I do not assent that there are better than those handed down by illustrious authors.

Nam in primis M. tullius multas in tertio de Oratore libro posuit quas in Oratore postea scripto transeundo videtur ipse damnasse: quarum pars est quae sententiarum potius quam verborum sit, ut inminutio, inprovisum, imago, sibi ipsi responsio, digressio, permissio, contrarium (hoc enim puto quod dicitur enantiotes), sumpta ex adverso probatio: XCI. quaedam omnino non sunt figurae, sicut ordo, dinumeratio, circumscriptio, sive hoc nomine significatur comprensa breviter sententia sive finitio: nam et hoc Cornificius atque Rutilius schema lexeos putant. Verborum autem concinna transgressio hyperbaton est, quod Caecilius quoque putat schema, a nobis est inter tropos posita.

For first of all M. Tullius set down many in the third book of On the Orator, which in the Orator written afterward, by passing them over, he seems himself to have condemned: a part of which are those that belong rather to figures of thoughts than of words, such as diminution, the unforeseen, image, answer to oneself, digression, permission, the contrary (for this I think is what is called enantiotes), proof taken from the opposite: 91. certain things are not figures at all, such as order, enumeration, circumscription—whether by this name there is signified a thought briefly enclosed, or a definition: for Cornificius and Rutilius also think this a schema of lexis. But a neat transposition of words is hyperbaton, which Caecilius also thinks a schema; by us it has been placed among the tropes.

XCII. Sed mutatio, [et] si ea est quam Rutilius alloiosin vocat, dissimilitudinem ostendit hominum rerum factorum: quae si latius fiat, figura non est, si angustius, in antitheton cadet; si vero haec appellatio significat hypallagen, satis de ea dictum est. XCIII.

92. But mutation, [and] if it is that which Rutilius calls alloiosis, displays a dissimilarity of persons, things, deeds: which, if it be made more broadly, is not a figure; if more narrowly, it will fall into antitheton; but if indeed this appellation signifies hypallage, enough has been said about it. 93.

Quod vero schema est ad propositum subiecta ratio, quod Rutilius aitiologian vocat? [utrum] Nam de illo dubitari possit, an schema sit in distributis subiecta ratio, quod apud eundem primo loco positum est: prosapodosin dicit, quae, ut maxime, servetur sane in pluribus propositis, quia aut singulis statim ratio subiciatur, ut est apud Gaium Antonium: XCIV. "sed neque accusatorem eum metuo, quod sum innocens, neque competitorem vereor, quod sum Antonius, neque consulem spero, quod est Cicero": aut positis duobus vel tribus eodem ordine singulis continua reddatur, quale apud Brutum de dictatura Cn. Pompei: XCV.

But what of the figure in which a reason is subjoined to the proposition, which Rutilius calls aitiologia? [whether] For about this there may be doubt whether a subjoined reason in distributive statements is a figure, which is set by the same author in the first place: he calls it prosapodosis; which, to the highest degree, is indeed observed in several propositions, because either to each item at once a reason is subjoined, as it is with Gaius Antonius: 94. "but I neither fear that prosecutor, because I am innocent, nor do I dread the competitor, because I am an Antonius, nor do I hope for the consulship, because it is Cicero": or, when two or three have been posited, a continuous reason is rendered to the individual items in the same order, as in Brutus about the dictatorship of Cn. Pompey: 95.

"praestat enim nemini imperare quam alicui servire: sine illo enim vivere honeste licet, cum hoc vivendi nulla condicio est". XCVI. Sed et uni rei multiplex ratio subiungitur, ut apud Vergilium: "sive inde occultas vires et pabula terrae pinguia concipiunt, sive illis omne per ignem excoquitur vitium" et totus locus, "seu pluris calor ille vias ... seu durat magis". XCVII. Relationem quid accipi velit non liquet mihi: nam si antanaclasin aut epanodon aut antimetabolen dicit, de omnibus his locuti sumus.

"for it is better to command no one than to serve someone: without the former, to live honorably is permitted, whereas with the latter there is no condition of living." 96. But also to a single matter a manifold rationale is subjoined, as in Vergil: "whether from there they conceive hidden forces and the rich pastures of the earth, or for them every defect is smelted out through fire" and the whole passage, "whether that heat opens more ways ... or it hardens more." 97. What he wishes to be taken by “relation” is not clear to me: for if he means antanaclasis or epanodos or antimetabole, we have spoken about all these.

Sed quidquid est, nec hoc nec superiora in Oratore repetit. Sola est in eo libro posita inter figuras verborum exclamatio quam sententiae potius puto (adfectus enim est); [et] ceteris omnibus consentio. XCVIII.

But whatever it is, he does not repeat this nor the earlier matters in the Orator. The only thing set in that book among the figures of words is exclamation, which I think rather belongs to sentence (for it is an affect); [and] I agree with all the rest. 98.

Adicit his Caecilius periphasin, de qua dixi, Cornificius interrogationem ratiocinationem subiectionem transitionem occultationem, praeterea sententiam membrum articulos interpretationem conclusionem. Quorum priora alterius generis sunt schemata sequentia schemata omnino non sunt. XCIX.

To these Caecilius adds periphrasis, about which I have spoken; Cornificius adds interrogation, ratiocination, subjection, transition, occultation; moreover, sententia, member, articles, interpretation, conclusion. Of which the former are figures of another kind; the following are not figures at all. 99.

Item Rutilius, praeter ea quae apud alios quoque sunt, paromologian, anagcaion, ethopoiian, dicaiologian, prolempsin, characterismon, brachylogian, parasiopesin, parresian, de quibus idem dico. Nam eos quidem auctores qui nullum prope finem fecerunt exquirendis nominibus praeteribo, qui etiam quae sunt argumentorum figuris adscripserunt.

Likewise Rutilius, besides those which are also found among others, [adds] paromologian, anagcaion, ethopoiian, dicaiologian, prolempsin, characterismon, brachylogian, parasiopesin, parresian, about which I say the same. For I will pass over those authors who have set almost no limit to the searching out of names, who have even ascribed to figures things that are arguments.

C. Ego illud de iis etiam quae vere sunt adiciam breviter, sicut ornent orationem oportune positae, ita ineptissimas esse cum inmodice petantur. Sunt qui, neglecto rerum pondere et viribus sententiarum, si vel inania verba in hos modos depravarunt summos se iudicent artifices, ideoque non desinant eas nectere, quas sine substantia sectari tam est ridiculum quam quaerere habitum gestumque sine corpore. CI. Sed ne eae quidem quae recte fiunt densandae sunt nimis: nam et vultus mutatio oculorumque coniectus multum in actu valet, sed si quis ducere os exquisitis modis et frontis ac luminum inconstantia trepidare non desinat, rideatur.

100. I will add this briefly even about those things which are truly genuine: just as, when aptly placed, they adorn the oration, so they are most inept when they are sought immoderately. There are those who, with the weight of the matters and the forces of the sentences neglected, if they have even perverted empty words into these modes, judge themselves supreme artificers, and therefore do not cease to weave them together—pursuing them without substance is as ridiculous as seeking habit and gesture without a body. 101. But not even those which are done rightly ought to be crowded too much: for both a change of countenance and the cast of the eyes avail much in delivery; but if someone does not cease to draw the mouth in over-refined ways and to fuss with an inconstancy of brow and eyes, he will be laughed at.

Et oratio habet rectam quandam velut faciem, quae ut stupere inmobili rigore non debebit, ita saepius in ea quam natura dedit specie continenda est. CII. Sciendum vero in primis quid quisque in orando postulet locus, quid persona, quid tempus: maior enim pars harum figurarum posita est in delectatione.

And an oration has a certain, as it were, right visage, which, just as it ought not to be stupefied with motionless rigor, so more often it must be kept within that appearance which nature has given. 102. It must truly be known first of all what each in orating requires: what the place, what the persona, what the time; for the greater part of these figures is placed in delectation.

Vbi vero atrocitate invidia miseratione pugnandum est, quis ferat contrapositis et pariter cadentibus et consimilibus irascentem flentem rogantem? - cum nimia in his rebus cura verborum deroget adfectibus fidem, et ubicumque ars ostentatur, veritas abesse videatur.

Where, in truth, one must fight by atrocity, envy, and commiseration, who can endure, with contrapositions and equal cadences and similitudes, a speaker raging, weeping, pleading? - since excessive care for words in these matters derogates credibility from the emotions, and wherever art is ostentatiously displayed, truth seems to be absent.

[4] I. De compositione non equidem post M. tullium scribere auderem, cui nescio an ulla pars operis huius sit magis elaborata, nisi et eiusdem aetatis homines scriptis ad ipsum etiam litteris reprehendere id conlocandi genus ausi fuissent, et post eum plures multa ad eandem rem pertinentia memoriae tradidissent. Itaque accedam in plerisque Ciceroni, atque in his ero, quae indubitata sunt, brevior, in quibusdam paulum fortasse dissentiam. II. Nam etiam cum iudicium meum ostendero, suum tamen legentibus relinquam.

[4] 1. On composition I for my part would not dare to write after M. Tullius (Cicero), for I do not know whether any part of this work was more elaborated by him, unless men of the same age had also dared, by writings and even by letters to him himself, to censure that manner of arrangement, and unless after him several had consigned to memory many things pertinent to the same matter. Therefore I shall in most points accede to Cicero, and in those things which are indubitable I shall be briefer; in certain points perhaps I shall dissent a little. 2. For even when I shall have shown my judgment, nevertheless I will leave their own to the readers.

III. Neque ignoro quosdam esse qui curam omnem compositionis excludant, atque illum horridum sermonem, ut forte fluxerit, modo magis naturalem, modo etiam magis virilem esse contendant. Qui si id demum naturale esse dicunt quod natura primum ortum est et quale ante cultum fuit, tota hic ars orandi subuertitur.

3. Nor am I unaware that there are certain people who exclude all care for composition, and contend that that horrid style of speech, as it has happened to flow, is at one time more natural, at another even more virile. And if they say that only that is natural which first arose from nature and such as it was before cultivation, here the whole art of oratory is subverted.

IV. Neque enim locuti sunt ad hanc regulam et diligentiam primi homines, nec prohoemiis praeparare, docere expositione, argumentis probare, adfectibus commovere scierunt. Ergo his omnibus, non sola compositione caruerunt: quorum si fieri nihil melius licebat, ne domibus quidem casas aut vestibus pellium tegmina aut urbibus montes ac silvas mutari oportuit. V. Quae porro ars statim fuit?

4. For the earliest men did not speak according to this rule and diligence, nor did they know how to prepare by proems, to teach by exposition, to prove by arguments, to move by affections. Therefore they lacked all these things, not composition alone: and if it was permitted that nothing better be brought about than those, then not even should huts have been replaced by houses, nor coverings of skins by garments, nor mountains and forests by cities. 5. What art, moreover, was there immediately?

Quid non cultu mitescit? cur vites coercemus manu? cur eas fodimus?

What does not grow mild through cultivation? why do we curb the vines with the hand? why do we dig them?

Rubos arvis excidimus: terra et hos generat. Mansuefacimus animalia: indomita nascuntur. Verum id est maxime naturale quod fieri natura optime patitur.

We excise brambles from the fields: the earth generates these too. We domesticate animals: they are born indomitable. Truly, that is most natural which nature best permits to come to be.

VI. Fortius vero qui incompositum potest esse quam vinctum et bene conlocatum? Neque, si pravi pedes vim detrahunt rebus, ut sotadeorum et galliamborum et quorundam in oratione simili paene licentia lascivientium, id vitium compositionis est iudicandum. VII.

6. But what uncomposed thing can be stronger than what is bound and well placed? Nor, if crooked feet detract force from things—as in Sotadeans and Galliambics and in the nearly similar license of certain persons lasciviously frolicking in prose—is that to be judged a vice of composition. 7.

Ceterum quanto vehementior fluminum cursus est prono alveo ac nullas moras obiciente quam inter obstantia saxa fractis aquis ac reluctantibus, tanto quae conexa est et totis viribus fluit fragosa atque interrupta melior oratio. cur ergo vires ipsa specie solvi putent, quando res nec ulla sine arte satis valeat et comitetur semper artem decor? VIII.

Moreover, just as the course of rivers is the more vehement with a sloping channel that offers no delays than among opposing rocks, the waters shattered and resisting, by so much is the oration that is conjoined and flows with all its forces better than the harsh and interrupted. Why, then, should they think that forces are loosened by the very appearance, since not any matter is strong enough without art, and decor ever accompanies art? 8.

An non eam quae missa optime est hastam speciosissime contortam ferri videmus, et arcu derigentium tela quo certior manus, hoc est habitus ipse formosior? Iam in certamine armorum atque in omni palaestra quid satis recte cavetur ac petitur cui non artifex motus et certi quidam pedes adsint? IX. Quare mihi compositione velut ammentis quibusdam nervisve intendi et concitari sententiae videntur.

Do we not see that the spear which is cast most excellently is borne most splendidly whirled, and that, in the bow of those directing their missiles, the surer the hand, the more shapely is the very posture? Now in the contest of arms and in every palaestra, what is there that is duly guarded against and aimed at, to which an artful movement and certain specific steps are not attendant? 9. Therefore, to me, sentences seem by composition to be, as it were, strung and stirred by certain thongs or sinews.

Ideoque eruditissimo cuique persuasum est valere eam plurimum, non ad delectationem modo sed ad motum quoque animorum: X. primum quia nihil intrare potest in adfectus quod in aure velut quodam vestibulo statim offendit, deinde quod natura ducimur ad modos. Neque enim aliter eveniret ut illi quoque organorum soni, quamquam verba non exprimunt, in alios tamen atque alios motus ducerent auditorem. XI. In certaminibus sacris non eadem ratione concitant animos ac remittunt, non eosdem modos adhibent cum bellicum est canendum et cum posito genu supplicandum est, nec idem signorum concentus est procedente ad proelium exercitu, idem receptui carmen.

Therefore it has been persuaded to every most erudite person that it is of very great efficacy, not only for delectation but also for the movement of spirits: X. first, because nothing can enter into the affections which, as it were in a certain vestibule, at once strikes against the ear; then because by nature we are led to modes. For it would not otherwise come about that those sounds of instruments also, although they do not express words, nevertheless would lead the hearer into now one movements and now others. XI. In sacred contests they do not by the same method rouse the spirits and relax them; they do not employ the same modes when the war-song must be sung and when, the knee set down, supplication must be made; nor is the same concord of signals used as the army advances to battle, the same song for the retreat.

XII. Pythagoreis certe moris fuit et cum evigilassent animos ad lyram excitare, quo essent ad agendum erectiores, et cum somnum peterent ad eandem prius lenire mentes, ut, si quid turbidiorum cogitationum, componerent. XIII.

12. It was certainly a custom of the Pythagoreans both, when they had awakened, to excite their spirits by the lyre, so that they might be more erect for action, and, when they sought sleep, to soothe their minds beforehand by the same, so that, if there were any more turbid thoughts, they might compose them. 13.

Quod si numeris ac modis inest quaedam tacita vis, in oratione ea vehementissima, quantumque interest sensus idem quibus verbis efferatur, tantum verba eadem qua compositione vel in textu iungantur vel in fine cludantur: nam quaedam et sententiis parva et elocutione modica virtus haec sola commendat. XIV. Denique quod cuique visum erit vehementer dulciter speciose dictum, solvat et turbet: abierit omnis vis iucunditas decor.

But if there is in numbers and modes a certain silent force, in oratory that force is most vehement; and as much as it matters in what words the same sense is uttered, so much it matters in what composition the same words are either joined in the texture or closed at the end: for certain things, small in thoughts and moderate in elocution, this virtue alone commends. 14. Finally, whatever has seemed to anyone to be said vehemently, sweetly, splendidly—let him loosen it and disturb it: all force, pleasantness, and grace will have departed.

Solvit quaedam sua in Oratore Cicero: "Neque me divitiae movent, quibus omnis Africanos, Laelios multi venalicii mercatoresque superarunt. Inmuta paululum, ut sit "multi superarunt mercatores venaliciique", et insequentis deinceps perihodos, quas si ad illum modum turbes, velut fracta aut transversa tela proieceris. XV. Idem corrigit quae a Graccho composita durius putat.

He resolves certain points of his own in On the Orator: “Nor do riches move me, in which many slave-dealers and merchants have surpassed all the Africani and Laelii.” Change it a little, so that it be “multi superarunt mercatores venaliciique,” and the following periods in sequence; which, if you throw into confusion in that fashion, you will have cast your missiles as if broken or askew. 15. The same man corrects what he thinks was composed too harshly by Gracchus.

Illum decet: nos hac sumus probatione contenti, quod in scribendo quae se nobis solutiora optulerunt componimus. Quid enim attinet eorum exempla quaerere quae sibi quisque experiri potest? Illud notasse satis habeo, quo pulchriora et sensu et elocutione dissolveris, hoc orationem magis deformem fore, quia neglegentia conlocationis ipsa verborum luce deprenditur.

That befits him: we are content with this probation, that in writing we compose those things which have proffered themselves to us looser. For what is the point of seeking examples of things which each person can test for himself? I deem it enough to have noted this: the more you have dissolved the more beautiful things both in sense and in elocution, by so much the oration will be more deformed, because negligence of collocation is detected by the very light of the words themselves.

XVI. Itaque ut confiteor paene ultimam oratoribus artem compositionis, quae quidem perfecta sit, contigisse, ita illis quoque priscis habitam inter curas, in quantum adhuc profecerant, puto. Neque enim mihi quamlibet magnus auctor Cicero persuaserit, Lysian Herodotum Thucydiden parum studiosos eius fuisse.

16. And so, as I confess that the art of composition, at least in its perfected form, has well-nigh at last fallen to the orators, so I think that even those ancients kept it among their concerns, in so far as they had advanced up to that point. For Cicero, however great an authority, would not persuade me that Lysias, Herodotus, and Thucydides were but little studious of it.

XVII. Genus fortasse sint secuti non idem quod Demosthenes aut Plato, quamquam et hi ipsi inter se dissimiles fuerunt. Nam neque illud in Lysia dicendi textum tenue atque rasum laetioribus numeris corrumpendum erat: perdidisset enim gratiam, quae in eo maxima est, simplicis atque inadfectati coloris, perdidisset fidem quoque.

17. Perhaps they followed a genus not the same as that of Demosthenes or Plato, although these themselves too were dissimilar among themselves. For that tenuous and polished textum of speaking in Lysias was not to be corrupted by more luxuriant numbers (rhythms): for he would have lost the grace, which is greatest in him, of a simple and unaffected color, and he would have lost credibility as well.

Nam scribebat aliis, non ipse dicebat, ut oporteret esse illa rudibus et incompositis similia: XVIII. quod ipsum compositio est. Et historiae, quae currere debet ac ferri, minus convenissent insistentes clausulae et debita actionibus respiratio et cludendi inchoandique sententias ratio.

For he wrote for others, he did not himself speak, so that those pieces ought to be similar to rude and uncomposed ones: 18. which thing itself is composition. And for history, which ought to run and be borne along, lingering cadences and the respiration owed to delivery and the method of closing and beginning sentences would have been less fitting.

In contionibus quidem etiam similiter cadentia quaedam et contraposita deprehendas. In Herodoto vero cum omnia, ut ego quidem sentio, leniter fluunt, tum ipsa dialectos habet eam iucunditatem ut latentes in se numeros complexa videatur. XIX.

In public assemblies indeed you may also detect certain similarly falling cadences and contrapositions. But in Herodotus, while everything, as I at least feel, flows gently, then the dialect itself has such pleasantness that it seems to have embraced latent numbers within itself. 19.

Sed de propositorum diversitate post paulum: nunc quae prius iis qui recte componere volent discenda sunt.

But about the diversity of the proposed matters a little later: now, the things which must first be learned by those who wish to compose rightly.

Est igitur ante omnia oratio alia vincta atque contexta, soluta alia, qualis in sermone et epistulis, nisi cum aliquid supra naturam suam tractant, ut de philosophia, de re publica similibusque. XX. Quod non eo dico quia non illud quoque solutum habeat suos quosdam et forsitan difficiliores etiam pedes: neque enim aut hiare semper vocalibus aut destitui temporibus volunt sermo atque epistula, sed non fluunt nec cohaerent nec verba verbis trahunt, ut potius laxiora in his vincla quam nulla sint. XXI.

Therefore, before all things, there is one kind of discourse bound and woven together, another unbound, such as in conversation and in epistles, unless when they handle something above their own nature, as about philosophy, the commonwealth, and the like. 20. Which I do not say because that unbound style does not also have its own certain feet, and perhaps even more difficult ones: for conversation and epistle do not wish either always to gape with vowels or to be bereft of measures, but they do not flow nor cohere nor draw words with words, so that the bonds in these are rather looser than nonexistent. 21.

Nonnumquam in causis quoque minoribus decet eadem simplicitas, quae non nullis sed aliis utitur numeris, dissimulatque eos et tantum communit occultius.

Sometimes even in lesser causes the same simplicity is fitting, which employs numbers—not none, but other ones—, and dissimulates them and only fortifies more occultly.

XXII. At illa conexa series tris habet formas: incisa, quae commata dicuntur, membra, quae kola, periodon quae est vel ambitus vel circumductum vel continuatio vel conclusio. In omni porro compositione tria sunt genera necessaria: ordo, iunctura, numerus.

22. But that connected series has three forms: incisions, which are called commata; members, which are cola; the period, which is either an ambit or a circumduction or a continuation or a conclusion. Moreover, in every composition three kinds are necessary: order, juncture, number.

XXIII. Primum igitur de ordine. Eius observatio in verbis est singulis et contextis (singula sunt quae asyndeta diximus). In his cavendum ne decrescat oratio, et fortiori subiungatur aliquid infirmius, ut sacrilego fur aut latroni petulans: augeri enim debent sententiae et insurgere, et optime Cicero "tu", inquit, "istis faucibus, istis lateribus, ista gladiatoria totius corporis firmitate": aliud enim maius alii supervenit.

23. First, therefore, concerning order. Its observance is in words both single and connected (the single are those which we have called asyndeta). In these one must beware lest the discourse diminish, and that to something stronger something weaker be subjoined, as a thief to a sacrilegious man, or a petulant fellow to a robber: for sentences ought to be augmented and to rise up; and most excellently Cicero: "you," he says, "with those jaws, those flanks, that gladiatorial firmness of your whole body": for something greater supervenes upon something else.

At si coepisset a toto corpore, non bene ad latera faucesque descenderet. Est et alius naturalis ordo, ut "viros ac feminas", "diem ac noctem", "ortum et occasum" dicas potius, quamquam et retrorsum. XXIV.

But if he had begun from the whole body, it would not descend well to the sides and the throat. There is also another natural order, that you should say "men and women," "day and night," "rising and setting" rather, although also in reverse. 24.

Quaedam ordine permutato fiunt supervacua, ut "fratres gemini": nam si "gemini" praecesserint, "fratres" addere non est necesse. Illa nimia quorundam fuit observatio, ut vocabula verbis, verba rursus adverbiis, nomina adpositis et pronominibus essent priora: nam fit contra quoque frequenter non indecore. XXV.

Certain things, with the order transposed, become superfluous, as “twin brothers”: for if “twins” has preceded, to add “brothers” is not necessary. That was an excessive observance on the part of certain people, that nouns should be prior to verbs, verbs in turn to adverbs, names to appositions and to pronouns: for it also happens the other way around frequently, not unseemly. 25.

Nec non et illud nimiae superstitionis, uti quaeque sint tempore, ea facere etiam ordine priora, non quin frequenter sit hoc melius, sed quia interim plus valent ante gesta ideoque levioribus superponenda sunt. XXVI. Verbo sensum cludere multo, si compositio patiatur, optimum est: in verbis enim sermonis vis est.

Nor indeed is this also not of excessive superstition: to make things also earlier in order as they are in time—not that this is not frequently better, but because things done before meanwhile have more weight and therefore ought to be set over lighter ones. 26. To close the sense with a verb, if the composition permit, is by far the best: for in verbs is the force of discourse.

Si id asperum erit, cedet haec ratio numeris, ut fit apud summos Graecos Latinosque oratores frequentissime. Sine dubio erit omne quod non cludet hyperbaton, sed ipsum hoc inter tropos vel figuras, quae sunt virtutes, receptum est. XXVII.

If that will be rough, this method will yield to the numbers, as happens most frequently among the greatest Greek and Latin orators. Without doubt, whatever does not close the sense with the verb will be a hyperbaton; but this very thing has been received among the tropes or figures, which are virtues. 27.

Non enim ad pedes verba dimensa sunt, ideoque ex loco transferuntur in locum, ut iungantur quo congruunt maxime, sicut in structura saxorum rudium etiam ipsa enormitas invenit cui adplicari et in quo possit insistere. Felicissimus tamen sermo est cui et rectus ordo et apta iunctura et cum his numerus oportune cadens contigit. XXVIII.

For words are not measured to feet, and therefore they are transferred from place to place, so that they may be joined where they most congrue, just as in the structure of rough stones even the very enormity finds that to which it may be applied and on which it can stand. Most felicitous, however, is the discourse to which both a straight order and an apt juncture, and along with these a rhythm opportunely falling, have fallen. 28.

Quaedam vero transgressiones et longae sunt nimis, ut superioribus diximus libris, et interim etiam compositione vitiosae, quae in hoc ipsum petuntur, ut exultent atque lasciviant, quales illae Maecenatis: "sole et aurora rubent plurima"; "inter sacra movit aqua fraxinos"; "ne exsequias quidem unus inter miserrimos viderem meas" (quod inter haec pessimum est, quia in re tristi ludit compositio). XXIX. Saepe tamen est vehemens aliquis sensus in verbo, quod si in media parte sententiae latet, transire intentionem et obscurari circumiacentibus solet, in clausula positum adsignatur auditori et infigitur, quale illud est Ciceronis: "ut tibi necesse esset in conspectu populi Romani vomere postridie". XXX. Transfer hoc ultimum: minus valebit.

Certain transgressions, indeed, are too long, as we said in the previous books, and at times even vicious in composition, which are sought for this very purpose, that they may exult and frolic, such as those of Maecenas: "the sun and the dawn redden very many [things]"; "amid the rites the water moved the ash-trees"; "that not even my obsequies should I, alone among the most wretched, see—my own" (which among these is the worst, because in a sad matter the composition plays). 29. Often, however, some vehement force is in a word which, if it lies hidden in the middle part of the sentence, is wont to pass beyond the intention and be obscured by the circumjacent things; set in the clausula it is assigned to the hearer and fixed in, such as that of Cicero: "that it should be necessary for you to vomit on the next day in the sight of the Roman people." 30. Move this last word: it will have less force.

Nam totius ductus hic est quasi mucro, ut per se foeda vomendi necessitas iam nihil ultra exspectantibus hanc quoque adiceret deformitatem, ut cibus teneri non posset postridie. XXXI. Solebat Afer Domitius traicere in clausulas verba tantum asperandae compositionis gratia, et maxime in prohoemiis, ut pro Cloatilla: "gratias agam continuo", et pro Laelia: "eis utrisque apud te iudicem periclitatur Laelia". Adeo refugit teneram delicatamque modulandi voluptatem ut currentibus per se numeris quod eos inhiberet [et] obiceret.

For this is, as it were, the point of the whole duct, such that the foul necessity of vomiting, even by itself, would, for those now expecting nothing further, add this disfigurement also: that food could not be held on the next day. 31. Domitius Afer used to carry over words into the clausulae for the sake only of asperating the composition, and especially in prooemia, as in the case for Cloatilla: “I will give thanks immediately,” and in the case for Laelia: “before you as judge Laelia is on trial by both of them.” So far did he shrink from the tender and delicate pleasure of modulating that, with numbers running of themselves, he would interpose something to inhibit [and] to oppose them.

XXXII. Amphiboliam quoque fieri vitiosa locatione verborum nemo est qui nesciat. Haec arbitror, ut in brevi, de ordine fuisse dicenda: qui si vitiosus est, licet et vincta ac sit apte cadens oratio, tamen merito incomposita dicatur.

32. No one is unaware that amphiboly too is produced by a faulty placement of words. These points, I think, to be brief, had to be said about order: which, if it is faulty, although the speech be bound and fall with apt cadence, nevertheless is deservedly called ill-composed.

Iunctura sequitur. Est in verbis, incisis, membris, perihodis: omnia namque ista et virtutes et vitia in complexu habent. XXXIII.

Juncture follows. It is in words, incises, members, periods: for all these have both virtues and vices in their complex. 33.

Atque ut ordinem sequar, primum sunt quae imperitis quoque ad reprehensionem notabilia videntur, id est, quae commissis inter se verbis duobus ex ultima [fine] prioris ac prima sequentis syllaba deforme aliquod nomen efficiunt. tum vocalium concursus: quod cum accidit, hiat et intersistit et quasi laborat oratio. Pessime longae, quae easdem inter se litteras committunt, sonabunt; praecipuus tamen erit hiatus earum quae cavo aut patulo maxime ore efferuntur.

And that I may follow the order, first there are things which even to the unskilled seem notable for censure, that is, those which, when two words are brought together, from the last [end] syllable of the former and the first of the following make some misshapen word. Then the concourse of vowels: when this happens, the oration yawns, halts, and as it were labors. Long ones will sound worst, those which bring the same letters into contact with each other; yet the hiatus will be most marked in those which are uttered with the mouth most hollow or gaping.

XXXIV. E planior littera est, i angustior, ideoque obscurius in his vitium. Minus peccabit qui longis breves subiciet, et adhuc qui praeponet longae brevem.

34. The letter e is plainer, i narrower, and therefore the vice is more obscure in these. He will sin less who subjoins short vowels to long ones, and even less he who preposes a short to a long.

Minima est in duabus brevibus offensio. Atque cum aliae subiunguntur aliis, proinde asperiores aut leviores erunt prout oris habitu simili aut diverso pronuntiabuntur. XXXV.

The offense is minimal in two short vowels. And when some are subjoined to others, they will be correspondingly rougher or lighter, according as they are pronounced with a similar or a different habit of the mouth. 35.

Non tamen id ut crimen ingens expavescendum est, ac nescio neglegentia in hoc an sollicitudo sit peior. Inhibeat enim necesse est hic Metus impetum dicendi et a potioribus avertat. Quare ut neglegentiae est pars hoc pati, ita humilitatis ubique perhorrescere, nimiosque non inmerito in hac cura putant omnis Isocraten secutos praecipueque Theopompum.

Not, however, is that to be dreaded as an immense crime, and I do not know whether negligence in this matter or solicitude is worse. For this Fear must of necessity inhibit the impetus of speaking and avert one from the weightier matters. Wherefore, just as it is a part of negligence to allow this, so it belongs to humility to shudder at it everywhere; and with good reason they deem all who have followed Isocrates, and especially Theopompus, excessive in this care.

XXXVI. At Demosthenes et Cicero modice respexerunt ad hanc partem. Nam et coeuntes litterae, quae synaliphai dicuntur, etiam leviorem faciunt orationem quam si omnia verba suo fine cludantur, et nonnumquam hiulca etiam decent faciuntque ampliora quaedam, ut "pulchra oratione +acta oratio iactatae+", cum longae per se et velut opimae syllabae aliquid etiam medii temporis inter vocales quasi intersistatur adsumunt.

36. But Demosthenes and Cicero paid moderate regard to this part. For coalescing letters, which are called synaliphai, also make the oration lighter than if all words are closed with their own end; and sometimes even gaping (hiatuses) are becoming and make certain things ampler, as “with fair oration +an oration conducted, brandished+,” since long syllables in themselves and, as it were, opulent, take on even something of a middle interval of time when, as if, an intermission is interposed between the vowels.

XXXVII. Qua de re utar Ciceronis potissimum verbis. "Habet" inquit "ille tamquam hiatus et concursus vocalium molle quiddam et quod indicet non ingratam neglegentiam de re hominis magis quam de verbis laborantis".

37. On which matter I will use Cicero’s words above all. "It has," he says, "as it were a hiatus and a concourse of vowels, a certain softness, and something that indicates a not unpleasing negligence, of a man laboring more about the matter than about the words."

Ceterum consonantes quoque, earumque praecipue quae sunt asperiores, in commissura verborum rixantur, ut s ultima cum x proxima, quarum tristior etiam si binae collidantur stridor est, ut "ars studiorum". XXXVIII. Quae fuit causa et Servio sulpicio, ut dixi, subtrahendae s litterae quotiens ultima esset aliaque consonante susciperetur, quod reprehendit Luranius, Messala defendit. Nam neque Lucilium putat uti eadem ultima, cum dicit "Aeserninus fuit" et "dignus locoque", et Cicero in Oratore plures antiquorum tradit sic locutos.

Moreover the consonants too, and especially those which are harsher, wrangle at the commissure of words, as a final s with a next x, whose hissing is grimmer even when the pair are collided, as “ars studiorum.” 38. This was the cause also for Servius Sulpicius, as I said, of subtracting the letter s whenever it was final and was taken up by another consonant—a practice which Luranius reproached, but Messalla defended. For he does not think that Lucilius uses the same final s, when he says “Aeserninus fuit” and “dignus locoque,” and Cicero in the Orator hands down that several of the ancients spoke thus.

XXXIX. Inde "belligerare", "pos meridiem" et illa Censoris Catonis "dicae" "faciae"que, m littera in e mollita. Quae in veteribus libris reperta mutare imperiti solent, et dum librariorum insectari volunt inscientiam, suam confitentur.

39. Thence “belligerare,” “pos meridiem,” and those of Cato the Censor, “dicae” and “faciae,” the letter m softened into e. These, when found in ancient books, the inexpert are wont to change; and while they wish to assail the ignorance of copyists, they confess their own.

XL. Atqui eadem illa littera, quotiens ultima est et vocalem verbi sequentis ita contingit ut in eam transire possit, etiam si scribitur, tamen parum exprimitur, ut "multum ille" et "quantum erat", adeo ut paene cuiusdam novae litterae sonum reddat. Neque enim eximitur sed obscuratur, et tantum in hoc aliqua inter duas vocales velut nota est, ne ipsae coeant. XLI.

40. And yet that same letter, whenever it is final and so touches the vowel of the following word that it can pass into it, even if it is written, nevertheless is scarcely expressed, as in "multum ille" and "quantum erat," to such a degree that it almost renders the sound of a certain new letter. For it is not removed but is obscured, and only for this it is as it were some mark between two vowels, lest they themselves coalesce. 41.

Videndum etiam ne syllaba verbi prioris ultima et prima sequentis +ide nec+: quod ne quis praecipi miretur, Ciceroni in epistulis excidit: "res mihi invisae visae sunt, Brute", et in carmine: "o fortunatam natam me consule Romam". XLII. Etiam monosyllaba, si plura sunt, male continuabuntur, quia necesse est compositio multis clausulis concisa subsultet. Ideoque etiam brevium verborum ac nominum vitanda continuatio et ex diverso quoque longorum: adfert enim quandam dicendi tarditatem.

We must also see to it lest the last syllable of the preceding word and the first of the following +ide nec+: so that no one may wonder that this is being prescribed, it even slipped in Cicero’s letters: “things hateful to me seemed seen, Brutus,” and in a poem: “O fortunate Rome, born with me as consul.” 42. Even monosyllables, if there are many, will be poorly strung together, because it is necessary that a composition cut by many clauses should skip. And therefore the continuation of short words and of names is to be avoided, and conversely that of long ones as well: for it brings a certain slowness of speaking.

Illa quoque vitia sunt eiusdem loci, si cadentia similiter et desinentia et eodem modo declinata multa iunguntur. XLIII. Ne verba quidem verbis aut nomina nominibus similiaque his continuari decet, cum virtutes etiam ipsae taedium pariant nisi gratia varietatis adiutae.

Those too are vices of the same locus, if many words with similar cadences and endings and declined in the same mode are joined. 43. Not even words to words nor names to names, nor things similar to these, ought to be continued, since even virtues themselves beget tedium unless aided by the grace of variety.

XLIV. Membrorum incisorumque iunctura non ea modo est observanda quae verborum, quamquam et in his extrema ac prima coeunt, sed plurimum refert compositionis quae quibus anteponas. Nam et "vomens frustis esculentis gremium suum et totum tribunal implevit" * et contra (nam frequentius utar isdem diversarum quoque rerum exemplis, quo sint magis familiaria) "saxa atque solitudines voci respondent, bestiae saepe inmanes cantu flectuntur atque consistunt" magis insurgebat si verteretur: nam plus est saxa quam bestias commoveri; vicit tamen compositionis decor.

44. The joining of members and of cut clauses is to be observed not only as that of words—although in these too the endings and beginnings cohere—but it matters very much for the composition which things you set before which. For both “vomiting up pieces of edibles he filled his lap and the whole tribunal” * and, conversely (for I shall more frequently use the same examples even for different matters, that they may be more familiar), “rocks and solitudes respond to the voice; beasts, often savage, are bent by song and come to a halt” would rise up more if it were inverted: for it is more to move rocks than beasts; nevertheless the grace of the composition prevailed.

Sed transeamus ad numeros.

But let us pass on to numbers.

XLV. Omnis structura ac dimensio et copulatio vocum constat aut numeris (numeros rythmous accipi volo) aut metrois, id est dimensione quadam. Quod, etiam si constat utrumque pedibus, habet tamen non simplicem differentiam.

45. Every structure and dimension and coupling of words consists either in numbers (by numbers I wish rhythms to be understood) or in metres, that is, in a certain dimension. Which, even if both consist of feet, nevertheless has a difference not simple.

XLVI. Nam primum numeri spatio temporum constant, metra etiam ordine, ideoque alterum esse quantitatis videtur, alterum qualitatis. Rhythmos est aut par, ut dactylicus, una enim syllaba par est brevibus (est quidem vis eadem et aliis pedibus, sed nomen illud tenet: XLVII.

46. For, first, rhythms consist in the span of times, meters also in order, and therefore the one seems to be of quantity, the other of quality. Rhythmos is either equal, as the dactylic, for one syllable is equal to the short ones (indeed the same force is in other feet as well, but that name holds: 47.

longam esse duorum temporum, brevem unius etiam pueri sciunt) aut sescuplex, ut paeanicus: is est ex longa et tribus brevibus (aut ex tribus brevibus) et longa (vel alio quoque modo, ut tempora tria ad duo relata sescuplum faciant) aut duplex, ut iambos (nam est ex brevi et longa) quique est ei contrarius. XLVIII. sunt hi et metrici pedes, sed hoc interest, quod rhythmo indifferens dactylicusne ille priores habeat breves an sequentes: tempus enim solum metitur, ut a sublatione ad positionem idem spatii sit.

that a long is of two time-units, a short of one, even boys know) or sesquialter, as the Paeanic: it is from a long and three shorts (or from three shorts) and a long (or in another way also, so that three time-units to two make a sesquialter) or double, as the iambus (for it is from a short and a long) and the one that is contrary to it. 48. these too are metrical feet, but this is the difference, that for rhythm it is indifferent whether that dactylic has the short syllables first or following: for it measures time only, so that from the lifting to the setting there is the same span.

Proinde alia [ad] dimensio versuum: pro dactylico poni non poterit anapaestos aut spondius, nec paean eadem ratione brevibus incipiet ac desinet. XLIX. Neque solum alium pro alio pedem metrorum ratio non recipit, sed ne dactylum quidem aut forte spondium alterum pro altero.

Accordingly, there is another [to] measurement of verses: in place of a dactylic an anapaest or a spondee cannot be set, nor will the paeon on the same principle begin and end with short syllables. 49. Nor does the theory of meters admit not only one foot in place of another, but not even a dactyl, or perhaps a spondee, the one for the other.

Itaque si quinque continuos dactylos, ut sunt in illo "panditur interea domus omnipotentis Olympi" confundas, solveris versum. L. sunt et illa discrimina, quod rhythmis libera spatia, metris finita sunt, et his certae clausulae, illi quo modo coeperant currunt usque ad metabolen, id est transitum ad aliud rhythmi genus, et quod metrum in verbis modo, rhythmos etiam in corporis motu est. LI. Inania quoque tempora rhythmi facilius accipient, quamquam haec et in metris accidunt.

And so if you confound five continuous dactyls, as they are in that "Meanwhile the house of omnipotent Olympus is thrown open" you dissolve the verse. 50. there are also those discriminations, that for rhythms the spaces are free, for meters they are bounded, and for these there are fixed clausulae, those run, in whatever way they began, up to the metabole, that is, the transit to another kind of rhythm; and that meter is only in words, rhythm also is in the movement of the body. 51. Rhythms too will more easily admit empty times, although these also occur in meters.

Maior tamen illic licentia est; ubi tempora [etiam animo] metiuntur et pedum et digitorum ictu, intervalla signant quibusdam notis, atque aestimant quot breves illud spatium habeat: inde tetrasemoe, pentasemoe, deinceps longiore sunt percussiones (nam semion tempus est unum).

Yet greater license is there; where they measure the times [even in mind] and by the stroke of feet and fingers, they mark the intervals with certain notes, and they estimate how many breves that span has: hence there are tetrasemoe, pentasemoe, and thereafter longer percussions (for a semion is one unit of time).

LII. In compositione orationis certior et magis omnibus aperta servari debet dimensio. Est igitur in pedibus, et metricis quidem pedibus, qui adeo reperiuntur in oratione ut in ea frequenter non sentientibus nobis omnium generum excidant versus, et contra nihil quod est prorsa scriptum non redigi possit in quaedam versiculorum genera vel in membra, si in tam molestos incidimus grammaticos quam fuerunt qui lyricorum quorundam carmina in varias mensuras coegerunt.

52. In the composition of oration a more certain and more open-to-all dimension ought to be observed. There is, then, a dimension in feet, and indeed in metrical feet, which are so found in oration that in it, often without our perceiving, verses of every kind drop out; and conversely, nothing that is written in prose cannot be reduced into certain kinds of little verses or into members (cola), if we fall in with grammarians as troublesome as were those who compelled the songs of certain lyric poets into various measures.

LIII. At Cicero frequentissime dicit totum hoc constare numeris, ideoque reprehenditur a quibusdam tamquam orationem ad rhythmos alliget. LIV.

53. But Cicero very frequently says that this whole matter consists of numbers, and for that reason he is reproved by certain people as though he were binding oration to rhythms. 54.

Nam sunt numeri rhythmoe, ut et ipse constituit et secuti eum Vergilius, cum dicit "numeros memini, si verba tenerem", et Horatius "numerisque fertur lege solutis". LV. Invadunt ergo hanc inter ceteras vocem: "neque enim Demosthenis fulmina tantopere vibratura" dicit "nisi numeris contorta ferrentur": in quo si hoc sentit: "rhythmis contorta", dissentio. Nam rhythmi, ut dixi, neque finem habent certum nec ullam in contextu varietatem, sed qua coeperunt sublatione latione ac positione ad finem usque decurrunt: oratio non descendet ad crepitum digitorum. LVI.

For numbers are rhythms, as he himself has established and, following him, Vergil, when he says "I remember the numbers, if only I held the words," and Horace "and he is borne with numbers the law loosened." 55. Therefore they attack among other things this saying: "for Demosthenes’ thunderbolts would not be so greatly brandished," he says, "unless, twisted by numbers, they were carried": in which, if he means this: "twisted by rhythms," I disagree. For rhythms, as I said, have neither a fixed end nor any variety in the texture, but with the same sublation, lation, and position with which they began they run on to the end: speech will not descend to the snapping of fingers. 56.

Idque Cicero optime videt ac testatur frequenter se quod numerosum sit quaerere ut magis non arrhythmum, quod esset inscitum atque agreste, quam enrhythmum, quod poeticum est, esse compositionem velit: sicut etiam quos palaestritas esse nolumus, tamen esse nolumus eos qui dicuntur apalaestroe. LVII. Veram ea quae efficitur e pedibus apta conclusio nomen aliquod desiderat.

And Cicero sees this very well and often bears witness that he seeks what is numerous (well‑measured), so that he would wish the composition to be rather not arrhythmic—which would be unskilled and rustic—than enrhythmic, which is poetic: just as, although we do not wish them to be palaestritas, nevertheless we do not wish them to be those who are called apalaestroe. 57. But in truth that fitting close which is produced from feet is in want of some name.

Quid sit igitur potius quam "numerus", sed oratorius numerus, ut enthymema rhetoricus syllogismus? Ego certe, ne in calumniam cadam, qua ne M. quidem tullius caruit, posco hoc mihi, ut, cum pro composito dixero numerum et ubicumque iam dixi, oratorium dicere intellegar.

What then should it rather be called than “number,” but oratorical number, as an enthymeme is a rhetorical syllogism? I, for my part, lest I fall into calumny—of which not even Marcus Tullius was free—demand this for myself: that, when I have said “number” in place of “composition,” and wherever I have already said it, I be understood to mean the oratorical number.

LVIII. Conlocatio autem verba iam probata et electa et velut adsignata sibi debet conectere: nam vel dure inter se commissa potiora sunt inutilibus. Tamen et eligere quaedam, dum ex iis quae idem significent atque idem valeant, permiserim, et adicere dum.

58. Collocation, however, ought to connect the words already approved and elected and, as it were, assigned to their places: for even when somewhat harshly conjoined with one another they are preferable to the inutile. Nevertheless, I would also permit electing certain ones, provided that it be from those which signify the same and have the same force, and adding, provided that.

non otiosa, et detrahere dum non necessaria, et figuris mutare [et] casus atque numeros, quorum varietas frequenter gratia compositionis adscita etiam suo nomine solet esse iucunda. LIX. Etiam ubi aliud ratio, aliud consuetudo poscet, utrum volet sumat compositio, "vitavisse" vel "vitasse", "deprehendere" vel "deprendere". Coitus etiam syllabarum non negabo et quidquid sententiis aut elocutioni non nocebit.

not idle, and to subtract provided [they are] not necessary, and by figures to change [and] cases and numbers, the variety of which, frequently, with the grace of composition superadded, is wont to be pleasing even in its own right. 59. Even when reason will demand one thing and custom another, let composition take whichever it will, "vitavisse" or "vitasse", "deprehendere" or "deprendere". I will not deny also the coalescence of syllables, and whatever will not harm the thoughts or the elocution.

LX. Praecipuum tamen in hoc opus est, scire quod quoque loco verborum maxime quadret. Atque is optime componet qui hoc non solum componendi gratia facit.

60. The principal thing in this work, however, is to know what best fits each place with respect to the words. And he will compose best who does this not only for the sake of composing.

Ratio vero pedum in oratione est multo quam in versu difficilior: primum quod versus paucis continetur, oratio longiores habet saepe circumitus, deinde quod versus semper similis sibi est et una ratione decurrit, orationis compositio, nisi varia est, et offendit similitudine et in adfectatione deprenditur. LXI. Et in omni quidem corpore totoque, ut ita dixerim, tractu numerus insertus est: neque enim loqui possum nisi e syllabis brevibus ac longis, ex quibus pedes fiunt.

Indeed the measure of feet in oration is much more difficult than in verse: first, because verse is contained within few limits, oration often has longer circuits, then because verse is always similar to itself and runs down by one method, the composition of oration, unless it is varied, both offends by similarity and is caught in affectation. 61. And in every body and, so to speak, in the whole tract, number is inserted: for I cannot speak except out of short and long syllables, from which feet are made.

Magis tamen et desideratur in clausulis et apparet, primum quia sensus omnis habet suum finem, poscitque naturale intervallum quo a sequentis initio dividatur, deinde quod aures continuam vocem secutae, ductaeque velut prono decurrentis orationis flumine, tum magis iudicant cum ille impetus stetit et intuendi tempus dedit. LXII. Non igitur durum sit neque abruptum quo animi velut respirant ac reficiuntur.

Yet it is both more desired in cadences and more apparent, first because every sense has its own end and demands a natural interval by which it may be divided from the beginning of what follows, then because the ears, having followed a continuous voice and being led as if by the downhill current of a running river of speech, judge the more when that impetus has halted and has given time for contemplating. 62. Therefore let it not be harsh nor abrupt, that point at which minds, as it were, breathe and are refreshed.

Haec est sedes orationis, hoc auditor exspectat, hic laus omnis +declamat+. Proximam clausulis diligentiam postulant initia: nam et in haec intentus auditor est. LXIII. Sed eorum facilior ratio est; non enim cohaerent aliis nec praecedentibus serviunt: exordium sumunt, +cum ea+ quamlibet sit enim composita ipsa, gratiam perdet si ad eam rupta via venerimus.

This is the seat of the oration, this the hearer expects, here all praise +is declaimed+. The beginnings demand diligence next to the clausulae: for upon these too the hearer is intent. 63. But the handling of them is easier; for they are not connected with others nor do they serve what precedes: they take their start, +with this+—for however well composed it itself may be, it will lose its grace if we have come to it by a broken road.

Namque eo fit ut cum Demosthenis severa videatur compositio tois theois euchomai pasi cai pasais, et illa quae ab uno, quod sciam, Bruto minus probatur, ceteris placet kan mepo ballei mede toxevei, Ciceronem carpant in his "familiaris coeperat esse balneatori" et "non nimis dura archipiratae". LXIV. Nam "balneatori" et "archipiratae" idem finis est qui pasi kai pasais et qui mede toxevei sed priora sunt severiora. LXV.

For thus it comes about that, while Demosthenes’ composition seems severe—tois theois euchomai pasi cai pasais—and that phrase which, so far as I know, is less approved by one man, Brutus, yet pleases the rest—kan mepo ballei mede toxevei—they carp at Cicero in these: “he had begun to be familiar to the balneator” and “not too hard for the archipirate.” 64. For “balneatori” and “archipiratae” have the same ending as pasi kai pasais and as mede toxevei, but the former are more severe. 65.

Est in eo quoque nonnihil, quod hic singulis verbis bini pedes continentur, quod etiam in carminibus est praemolle, nec solum ubi quinae, ut in his, syllabae nectuntur, "fortissima Tyndaridarum", sed etiam quaternae, cum versus cluditur "Appennino" et "armamentis" et "Orione". LXVI. Quare hic quoque vitandum est ne plurium syllabarum [his] verbis utamur in fine.

There is in this also somewhat, namely that here in single words two feet are contained, which even in poems is rather soft, and not only when five, as in these, syllables are bound together, "fortissima Tyndaridarum," but even four, when the verse is closed with "Appennino" and "armamentis" and "Orione". 66. Wherefore here too it must be avoided lest we use at the end words of more syllables [these].

Mediis quoque non ea modo cura sit, ut inter se cohaereant, sed ne pigra, ne longa sint, ne, quod nunc maxime vitium est, brevium contextu resultent ac sonum reddant paene puerilium crepitaculorum. LXVII. Nam ut initia clausulaeque plurimum momenti habent, quotiens incipit sensus aut desinit, sic in mediis quoque sunt quidam conatus iique leviter insistunt, ut currentium pes, etiam si non moratur, tamen vestigium facit.

In the middle parts, too, let there be not only this care, that they cohere with one another, but also that they not be sluggish, not long, and that they not, which now is the chief fault, by the context of short members, rebound and give back a sound almost of children’s rattles. 67. For as beginnings and clausulae have very much importance whenever the sense begins or ends, so in the middles, too, there are certain efforts, and these lightly plant themselves, as the foot of runners, even if it does not linger, nevertheless makes a footprint.

Itaque non modo membra atque incisa bene incipere atque cludi decet, sed etiam in iis quae non dubie contexta sunt nec respiratione utuntur sunt illi vel occulti gradus. LXVIII. Quis enim dubitet unum sensum in hoc et unum spiritum esse: "animadverti, iudices, omnem accusatoris orationem in duas divisam esse partis"; tamen et duo prima verba et tria proxima et deinceps duo rursus ac tria suos quasi numeros habent: spiritum sustinemus +sic aput rimas aestimantur.+ LXIX.

Therefore it is fitting not only that the members and incisions begin and close well, but even in those which are without doubt continuous and do not make use of respiration there are, as it were, hidden steps. 68. For who would doubt that there is one sense here and one breath: "I have noticed, judges, that the whole speech of the accuser has been divided into two parts"; nevertheless both the first two words and the next three, and thereafter two again and three, have their, as it were, own measures: we hold our breath—+thus they are assessed as at the cracks.+ 69.

Hae particulae prout sunt graves acres, lentae celeres, remissae exsultantes, proinde id quod ex illis conficitur aut severum aut luxuriosum aut quadratum aut solutum erit. LXX. Quaedam etiam clausulae sunt claudae atque pendentes si relinquantur, sed sequentibus suscipi ac sustineri solent, eoque facto vitium quod erat in fine continuatio emendat.

These little parts, according as they are grave or acute, slow or swift, relaxed or exultant, accordingly that which is put together from them will be either severe or luxurious or quadrate or loose. 70. Some cadences too are lame and hanging if they are left, but they are wont to be taken up and sustained by what follows, and by this being done the continuation corrects the fault which was at the end.

"Non vult populus Romanus obsoletis criminibus accusari Verrem" durum si desinas: sed cum est continuatum his quae secuntur, quamquam natura ipsa divisa sunt: "nova postulat, inaudita desiderat", salvus est cursus. LXXI. "Vt adeas, tantum dabis" male cluderet, nam et trimetri versus pars ultima est: excipit "ut tibi cibum vestitumque intro ferre liceat, tantum": praeceps adhuc firmatur ac sustinetur ultimo "nemo recusabat".

"The Roman people does not wish Verres to be accused with obsolete crimes" is harsh if you end; but when it is continued with the things that follow, although by their very nature they are divided: "it demands new things, it desires unheard-of things," the course is safe. 71. "That you may approach, you will give so much" would close badly, for it is also the last part of a trimeter verse: it is taken up by "that it may be permitted you to carry food and clothing inside, so much": the headlong cadence is still strengthened and is sustained by the last, "no one was refusing."

LXXII. Versum in oratione fieri multo foedissimum est totum, sed etiam in parte deforme, utique si pars posterior in clausula deprehendatur aut rursus prior in ingressu. Nam quod est contra saepe etiam decet, quia et cludit interim optime prima pars versus, dum intra paucas syllabas, praecipue senari atque octonari ("in Africa fuisse" initium senari est, primum pro Q. Ligario caput cludit; LXXIII.

72. For a verse to be formed in oration is by far most unsightly as a whole, but even in part it is deformed, especially if the latter part is caught in the clausula or, conversely, the former at the ingress. But what is the contrary often even befits, because the first part of a verse sometimes closes most excellently, provided it is within a few syllables, especially of the senarius and the octonarius ("in Africa fuisse" is the beginning of a senarius, it closes the first chapter in the speech for Q. Ligarius; 73.

"esse videatur", iam nimis frequens, octonarium inchoat: talia sunt Demosthenis pasi kai pasais, pasin hymin et totum paene principium) et ultima versuum initio conveniunt orationis: LXXIV. "etsi vereor, iudices", et "animadverti, iudices". Sed initia initiis non convenient, ut T. Livius hexametri exordio coepit: "facturusne operae pretium sim" (nam ita editum est, [quod] melius quam quo modo emendatur), nec clausulae clausulis, ut Cicero: LXXV. "quo me vertam nescio", qui trimetri finis est.

"seem to be," already too frequent, begins an octonarius: such are Demosthenes’ pasi kai pasais, pasin hymin and almost the whole beginning) and the endings of verses agree with the beginning of oration: 74. "although I fear, judges," and "I have taken note, judges." But openings do not agree with openings, as T. Livy began with the exordium of a hexameter: "whether I am going to do something worth the effort" (for thus it has been published, [which] is better than the way it is emended), nor do clausulae with clausulae, as in Cicero: 75. "whither I should turn I do not know," which is the end of a trimeter.

Trimetrum et senarium promiscue dicere licet: sex enim pedes, tres percussiones habet. Peius cludit finis hexametri, ut Brutus in epistulis: "neque illi malunt habere tutores aut defensores, quamquam sciunt placuisse Catoni". LXXVI. Illi minus sunt notabiles, quia hoc genus sermoni proximum est.

It is permitted to speak the trimeter and the senarius promiscuously: for it has six feet, three beats. The ending of a hexameter closes worse, as Brutus in his epistles: "nor do those men prefer to have tutors or defenders, although they know that it has pleased Cato." 76. They are less noticeable, because this kind is proximate to speech.

Itaque et versus hic fere excidunt, quos Brutus ipso componendi durius studio saepissime facit, non raro Asinius, sed etiam Cicero nonnumquam, ut in principio statim orationis in L. Pisonem: "pro di inmortales, qui hic inluxit dies?" LXXVII. Non minore autem cura vitandum est quidquid est enrythmon, quale apud Sallustium: "falso queritur de natura sua". Quamvis enim vincta sit, tamen soluta videri debet oratio. Atqui Plato, diligentissimus compositionis, in Timaeo prima statim parte vitare ista non potuit.

And so even here verses almost slip out, which Brutus, through an overly harsh zeal for composing itself, very often produces, Asinius not rarely, but even Cicero sometimes, as straightway at the very beginning of the speech Against L. Piso: “O immortal gods, what day has dawned here?” 77. Yet with no less care must whatever is enrythmon be avoided, such as in Sallust: “he complains falsely about his nature.” For although speech is bound, nevertheless it ought to seem unbound. And yet Plato, most diligent in composition, in the Timaeus, right in the first part, could not avoid these things.

LXXVIII. Nam et initium hexametri statim invenias, et anacreontion protinus colon efficies, et si velis trimetron, et quod duobus pedibus et parte penthemimeres a Graecis dicitur, et haec omnia in tribus versibus: et Thucydidi hyper hemisy Kares ephanesan ex mollissimo rhythmorum genere excidit.

78. For you will at once find the beginning of a hexameter, and you will straightway make an Anacreontic colon, and, if you wish, a trimeter, and that which by the Greeks is called a penthemimeres, with two feet and a part—and all these in three verses; and in Thucydides the phrase "hyper hemisy Kares ephanesan" has fallen out from the very softest genus of rhythms.

LXXIX. Sed quia omnem oratoriam compositionem pedibus constare dixi, aliqua de his quoque: quorum nomina quia varie traduntur, constituendum est quo quemque appellemus. Equidem Ciceronem sequar (nam is eminentissimos Graecorum est secutus), excepto quod pes mihi tris syllabas non videtur excedere, quamquam ille paeane dochmioque, quorum prior in quattuor, secundus in quinque excurrit, utatur; LXXX.

79. But since I said that all oratorical composition consists of feet, something about these as well: since their names are handed down variously, it must be determined by what term we shall call each. For my part I shall follow Cicero (for he followed the most eminent of the Greeks), except that a foot does not seem to me to exceed three syllables, although he uses the paeon and the dochmius, the former of which runs to four, the second to five; 80.

nec tamen ipse dissimulat quibusdam numeros videri, non pedes, neque inmerito: quidquid est enim supra tris syllabas, id est ex pluribus pedibus. Ergo cum constent quattuor pedes binis, octo ternis, spondion longis duabus, pyrrhichium, quem alii pariambum vocant, brevibus, iambum brevi longaque, huic contrarium e longa et brevi choreum, non ut alii trochaeum nominemus: LXXXI. ex iis vero qui ternas syllabas habent dactylum longa duabusque brevibus, huic temporibus parem sed retro actum appellari constat anapaeston.

nor yet does he himself conceal that to some they seem “numbers,” not feet, and not without cause: for whatever is above three syllables is composed of more than one foot. Therefore, since there are four feet consisting of two syllables, and eight consisting of three, the spondee of two longs, the pyrrhichius, which others call the pariambus, of shorts, the iamb of a short and a long, its opposite, of a long and a short, the choreus—let us not, as others, name it the trochaeus: 81. of those, indeed, which have three syllables, the dactyl is of a long and two shorts; to this equal in “times” but reversed, it is agreed, is called the anapaest.

Media inter longas brevis faciet amphimacron (sed frequentius eius nomen est creticus); longa inter brevis amphibrachys. LXXXII. * huic adversus longis brevem praecedentibus palimbacchius erit.

A short between longs will make an amphimacron (but more frequently its name is creticus); a long between shorts, an amphibrachys. 82. * Opposed to this, with the longs preceding a short, will be the palimbacchius.

Tres breves trochaeum, quem tribrachyn dici volunt qui choreo trochaei nomen imponunt, tres longae molosson efficient. LXXXIII. Horum pedum nullus non in orationem venit, sed quo quique sunt temporibus pleniores longisque syllabis magis stabiles, his graviorem faciunt orationem, breves celerem ac mobilem.

Three short syllables will make a trochee—what those call a tribrach who impose the name “trochee” upon the choreus; three long syllables will make a molossus. 83. Of these feet, none fails to come into oration; but the more each are fuller in measures and more stable with long syllables, by these they make the oration graver, while short syllables make it swift and mobile.

Vtrumque locis utile: nam et illud, ubi opus est velocitate, tardum et segne et hoc, ubi pondus exigitur, praeceps ac resultans merito damnetur. LXXXIV. Sit in hoc quoque aliquid fortasse momenti, quod et longis longiores et brevibus sunt breviores syllabae: ut, quamvis neque plus duobus temporibus neque uno minus habere videantur ideoque in metris omnes breves omnesque longae inter se ipsae sint pares, lateat tamen nescio quid quod supersit aut desit.

Each is useful in its proper places: for both that one, when there is need of velocity, being tardy and sluggish, and this one, where weight is required, being headlong and rebounding, is rightly condemned. 84. Perhaps there is in this too some matter of moment: namely, that among the long syllables there are longer ones and among the short there are shorter; so that, although they seem to have neither more than two times nor less than one, and therefore in meters all the shorts and all the longs are equal among themselves, nevertheless there lies hidden I-know-not-what which is in excess or is lacking.

Nam versuum propria condicio est, ideoque in his quaedam etiam communes; LXXXV. veritas vero qui patitur aeque brevem esse vel longam vocalem cum est sola quam cum eam consonantes una pluresve praecedunt? Certe in dimensione pedum syllaba quae est brevis, insequente alia vel brevi, quae tamen duas primas consonantes habeat, fit longa, ut "agrestem tenui musam": LXXXVI.

For verses have their own proper condition, and therefore in these some things are also common; 85. but does truth indeed allow a vowel to be equally short or long when it is alone as when one or more consonants precede it? Certainly, in the dimension of feet, a syllable which is short, when another follows, even if short, yet which has two initial consonants, becomes long, as “a rustic Muse with a slender pipe”: 86.

nam "a" brevis, "gres" brevis, faciet tamen longam a priorem. Dat igitur illi aliquid ex suo tempore; quo modo, nisi habet plus quam quae brevissima, qualis ipsa esset detractis consonantibus? Nunc unum tempus accommodat priori et unum accipit a sequente: ita duae natura breves positione sunt temporum quattuor.

for “a” is short, “gres” is short, yet it will make the prior “a” long. Therefore it gives to it something from its own time; how so, unless it has more than that which is most brief, such as it itself would be with the consonants subtracted? Now it accommodates one time-unit to the prior and receives one from the subsequent: thus two syllables by nature short are, by position, of four time-units.

LXXXVII. Miror autem in hac opinione doctissimos homines fuisse, ut alios pedes ita eligerent aliosque damnarent quasi ullus esset quem non sit necesse in oratione deprendi. Licet igitur paeana sequatur Ephorus, inventum a Thrasymacho, probatum ab Aristotele, dactylumque ut temperatos brevibus ac longis, fugiat * trochaeum, alterius tarditate nimia, alterius celeritate damnata, herous, qui est idem dactylus, Aristoteli amplior, iambus humilior videatur, trochaeum ut nimis currentem damnet eique cordacis nomen imponat, eademque dicant Theodectes ac Theophrastus, similia post eos Halicarnasseus Dionysius: LXXXVIII.

87. I marvel, however, that most learned men have been in this opinion, that they should so choose some feet and condemn others, as though there were any which it is not necessary to be detected in oratory. Granted, therefore, that Ephorus follows the paean, invented by Thrasymachus, approved by Aristotle, and the dactyl as tempered with shorts and longs, that he shuns * the trochee, the excessive slowness of the one and the speed of the other condemned; that the heroic, which is the same as the dactyl, seems to Aristotle more ample, the iamb more humble; that he condemns the trochee as running too fast and imposes on it the name of cordax; and that Theodectes and Theophrastus say the same things, and after them Dionysius of Halicarnassus similar things: 88.

inrumpent etiam ad invitos, nec semper illis heroo aut paeane suo, quem quia versum raro facit maxime laudant, uti licebit. LXXXIX. Vt sint tamen aliis alii crebriores non verba facient, quae neque augeri nec minui nec sicuti modulatione produci aut corripi possunt, sed transmutatio et conlocatio; XC. plerique enim ex commissuris eorum vel divisione fiunt pedes.

they will break in even upon the unwilling, nor will it always be permitted them to use their heroic or their own paeon, which, because it rarely makes a verse, they most highly praise. 89. Yet that some be more frequent for some than for others will be made not by the words, which can neither be augmented nor diminished nor, as by modulation, prolonged or clipped, but by transmutation and collocation; 90. for for the most part feet are made from their commissures or their division.

Quo fit ut isdem verbis alii atque alii versus fiant, ut memini quendam non ignobilem poetam talis exarasse: "astra tenet caelum, mare classes, area messem". Hic retrorsum fit sotadeus, itemque sotadeus [adiu] retro trimetros: "caput exseruit mobile pinus repetita". XCI. Miscendi ergo sunt, curandumque ut sint plures qui placent et circumfusi bonis deteriores lateant. Nec vero in litteris syllabisque natura mutatur, sed refert quae cum quaque optime coeat.

Hence it comes about that with the same words different verses are made, as I remember a certain not-ignoble poet to have penned such as these: "the heaven holds the stars, the sea the fleets, the threshing-floor the harvest." Here, when read backwards, it becomes a Sotadean, and likewise a Sotadean [adiu] backwards, trimeters: "it thrust forth its mobile head, the pine, repeated." 91. Therefore they must be mingled, and care must be taken that there be more of those that please, and that the worse, surrounded by good ones, lie hidden. Nor indeed is nature changed in letters and syllables, but what matters is which best comes together with which.

Plurimum igitur auctoritatis, ut dixi, et ponderis habent longae, celeritatis breves: quae si miscentur quibusdam longis, currunt, si continuantur, exsultant. XCII. Acres quae ex brevibus ad longas insurgunt, leviores quae a longis in breves descendunt.

Therefore the longs, as I said, have very much authority and weight; the shorts, celerity: which, if they are mixed with certain longs, run; if they are continued, they exult. 92. Keener are those which rise from shorts to longs, lighter those which descend from longs to shorts.

Optime incipitur a longis, recte aliquando a brevibus, ut "novum crimen": levius a duabus, ut "animadverti, iudices", sed hoc pro Cluentio recte quia initium eius partitionis simile est, quae celeritate gaudet. XCIII. Clausula quoque e longis firmissima est, sed venit et in breves, quamvis habeatur indifferens ultima.

One begins best from longs, rightly at times from shorts, as “a new charge”: more lightly from two shorts, as “I have observed, judges,” but this in the speech for Cluentius is right because the beginning of that partition is of the kind that rejoices in celerity. 93. The clausula too is most firm when from longs, but it also comes in with shorts, although the final is held indifferent.

Neque enim ego ignoro in fine pro longa accipi brevem, quia videtur aliquid vacantis temporis ex eo quod insequitur accedere: aures tamen consulens meas intellego multum referre verene longa sit quae cludit an pro longa. Neque enim tam plenum est "dicere incipientem timere" quam illud "ausus est confiteri": atqui si nihil refert brevis an longa sit ultima, idem pes erit, verum nescio quo modo sedebit hoc, illud subsistet. XCIV.

Nor indeed am I unaware that at the end a short is taken as long, because it seems that some vacant time is added from what follows; yet, consulting my ears, I understand it makes much difference whether what closes is truly long or only as-if-long. For “to say ‘the beginner is afraid’” is not so full as that “he dared to confess”; and yet, if it makes no difference whether the last is short or long, the foot will be the same; but somehow this will sit, that will stand firm. 94.

Quo moti quidam longae ultimae tria tempora dederunt, ut illud tempus quod brevis e loco accipit huic quoque accederet. Nec solum refert quis cludat pes, sed cludentem quis antecedat. XCV.

Moved by this, some assigned three times to the final long, so that that time which a short receives from its place might also be added to this one. Nor does it only matter which foot closes, but which precedes the one closing. 95.

Retrorsum autem neque plus tribus, iique si non ternas syllabas habebunt, repetendi erunt (absit tam poetica observatio) neque minus duobus (alioqui pes erit, non numerus). Potest tamen vel unus esse, dichoreus si unus est, qui constat e duobus choreis, itemque paean, qui est ex choreo et pyrrhichio (quem aptum initiis putant), vel contra, qui est ex tribus brevibus et longa, cui clausulam adsignant: XCVI. de quibus fere duobus scriptores huius artis locuntur, alii omnes +ut quocumque sint quoque+ temporum quod ad rationem pertineat paeanas appellant. XCVII.

Backward, however, neither more than three, and these, if they will not have threefold syllables, will have to be repeated (far be so poetic an observation) nor fewer than two (otherwise it will be a foot, not number). Yet even a single one can be, a dichoreus if it is single, which consists of two chorei, and likewise the paean, which is from a choreus and a pyrrhichius (which they think apt for beginnings), or conversely, that which is from three short and a long, to which they assign the clausula: 96. about which two the writers of this art for the most part speak; all others +ut quocumque sint quoque+ of the times, so far as pertains to theory, they call paeans. 97.

Est et dochmius, qui fit ex bacchio et iambo vel iambo et cretico, stabilis in clausulis et severus. Spondius quoque, quo plurimum est Demosthenes usus, non eodem modo semper [prae] se habet: optime praecedet eum creticus, ut in hoc: "de qua ego nihil dicam nisi depellendi criminis causa". Non nihil est, quod supra dixi multum referre, unone verbo sint duo pedes comprehensi an uterque liber. Sic enim fit forte "criminis causa", more "archipiratae", mollius si tribrachys praecedat, "facilitates", "temeritates". XCVIII.

There is also the dochmius, which is formed from a bacchius and an iamb, or an iamb and a cretic, stable in clausulae and austere. The spondee too, which Demosthenes used very much, does not always present itself in the same way: a cretic will most excellently precede it, as in this: "about which I will say nothing except for the sake of dispelling the charge." It is not nothing—what I said above matters much—whether two feet are comprised in one word or each is free. For thus there arises, for instance, "criminis causa," in the manner of "archipiratae," more softly if a tribrach precedes, "facilitates," "temeritates". 98.

Est enim quoddam ipsa divisione verborum latens tempus, ut in pentametri medio spondio, qui nisi alterius verbi fine, alterius initio constat, versum non efficit. Potest, etiam si minus bene, praeponi anapaestos: "muliere non solum nobili verum etiam nota". XCIX. cum anapaestos et creticus, iambus quoque, qui est utroque syllaba minor: praecedet enim tres longas brevis.

For there is a certain time-value hidden by the very division of words, as in the pentameter’s middle spondee, which, unless it consists of the end of one word and the beginning of another, does not make the verse. It can, even if less well, be preceded by anapaests: "muliere non solum nobili verum etiam nota". 99. along with the anapaest and the cretic, the iamb as well, which is by a syllable smaller than either: for a short will precede three longs.

Sed et spondius iambo recte praeponitur: "isdem in armis fui". cum spondius, et bacchius: sic enim fiet ultimus dochmius: "in armis fui". C. Ex iis quae supra probavi apparet molosson quoque clausulae convenire, dum habeat ex quocumque pede ante se brevem: "illud scimus, ubicumque sunt esse pro nobis". CI. Minus gravis erit spondius, praecedentibus +et pyrrhichio,+ ut "iudicii Iuniani", et adhuc peius priore paeane, ut "Brute dubitavi", nisi potius hos esse volumus dactylum et bacchium. duo spondii non fere se iungi patiuntur, quae in versu quoque notabilis clausula est, ni cum id fieri potest ex tribus quasi membris: "cur de perfugis nostris copias comparat is contra nos?" - una syllaba, duabus, una. CII.

But also the spondee is rightly put before the iamb: "isdem in armis fui". with the spondee, and the bacchius: thus the final dochmius will be produced: "in armis fui". 100. From the things which I have approved above it appears that the molossus also suits a clausula, provided it has before it a short from whatever foot: "illud scimus, ubicumque sunt esse pro nobis". 101. The spondee will be less heavy, with +and a pyrrhic,+ going before, as "iudicii Iuniani", and still worse with the first paeon, as "Brute dubitavi", unless we prefer these rather to be a dactyl and a bacchius. two spondees scarcely allow themselves to be joined, which in verse too is a notable clausula, unless it can be done from, as it were, three members: "cur de perfugis nostris copias comparat is contra nos?" - one syllable, with two, one. 102.

Ne dactylus quidem spondio bene praeponitur, quia finem versus damnamus in fine orationis. Bacchius et cludit et sibi iungitur: "venenum timeres", vel choreum et spondium ante se amat: "ut venenum timeres". Contrarius quoque qui est cludet, nisi si ultimam syllabam longam esse volumus, optimeque habebit ante se molosson: "civis Romanus sum", aut bacchium: "quod hic potest nos possemus". CIII. Sed verius erit cludere choreum praecedente spondio, nam hic potius est numerus: "nos possemus" et "Romanus sum". Cludet et dichoreus, id est idem pes sibi ipse iungetur, quo Asiani sunt usi plurimum; cuius exemplum Cicero ponit: "patris dictum sapiens temeritas fili comprobavit". CIV.

Not even the dactyl is well set before the spondee, because we condemn a verse-ending at the end of an oration. The bacchius both closes and is joined to itself: "you would fear poison," or it likes to have a choreus and a spondee before itself: "so that you would fear poison." The contrary foot too will close, unless we wish the last syllable to be long, and it will very well have a molossus before it: "I am a Roman citizen," or a bacchius: "what this man can, we could." 103. But it will be truer to close with a choreus, a spondee preceding, for this rather is the rhythm: "we could" and "I am Roman." A dichoreus too will close, that is, the same foot will be joined to itself, which the Asiatics used very much; of which Cicero sets an example: "the rashness of the son has confirmed the father’s wise saying." 104.

Accipiet ante se choreus et pyrrhichium: "omnis prope cives virtute gloria dignitate superabat". Cludet et dactylus, nisi eum observatio ultimae creticum facit: "muliercula nixus in litore". Habebit ante se bene creticum et iambum, spondium male, peius choreum. Cludit amphibrachys: CV. "Q. Ligarium in Africa fuisse", si non eum malumus esse bacchium. Non optimus est trochaeus, si ulla est ultima brevis, quod certe sit necesse est: alioqui quo modo cludet, qui placet plerisque, dichoreus?

It will take before itself a choreus and a pyrrhichius: "he surpassed nearly all the citizens in virtue, glory, dignity". It will also be closed by a dactyl, unless the observance of the last makes it a cretic: "a little woman braced on the shore". It will have well before itself a cretic and an iamb, a spondee badly, worse a choreus. An amphibrach closes: 105. "that Q. Ligarius was in Africa," unless we prefer it to be a bacchius. A trochaeus is not the best, if the last syllable is short at all, which certainly it must be: otherwise, how will the dichoreus, which pleases most people, close?

Illa observatione ex trochaeo fit anapaestos. CVI. Idem trochaeus praecedente longa fit paean, quale est "si potero" et "dixit hoc Cicero", "obstat invidia". Sed hunc initiis dederunt.

By that observation, from a trochee anapaests are made. 106. The same trochee, with a long syllable preceding, becomes a paean, such as "si potero" and "dixit hoc Cicero", "obstat invidia". But they have assigned this to beginnings.

Cludet et pyrrhichius choreo praecedente, nam sic paean est. Sed omnes hi qui in breves excidunt minus erunt stabiles nec alibi fere satis apti quam ubi cursus orationis exigitur et clausulis non intersistitur. CVII.

The pyrrhic also closes with a choreus preceding, for thus it is a paean. But all these that fall into short syllables will be less stable and hardly anywhere sufficiently apt except where the course of the speech is demanded and one does not linger at the clausulae. 107.

Creticus et initiis optimus: "quod precatus a dis inmortalibus sum", et clausulis: "in conspectu populi Romani vomere postridie". Apparet vero quam bene eum praecedant vel anapaestos vel ille qui videtur fini aptior paean. Sed et se ipse sequitur: "servare quam plurimos". Sic melius quam choreo praecedente: "quis non turpe duceret?" (si ultima brevis pro longa sit: sed fingamus sic: "non turpe duceres".) CVIII. Sed hic est illud inane quod dixi: paulum enim morae damus inter ultimum atque proximum verbum, et "turpe" illud intervallo quodam producimus: alioqui sit exsultantissimum et trimetri finis: "quis non turpe duceret?" sicut illud "ore excipere liceret" si iungas lascivi carminis est, sed interpunctis quibusdam et tribus quasi initiis fit plenum auctoritatis.

The Cretic too is best at beginnings: "what I have prayed from the immortal gods," and at clausulae: "to plow on the next day in the sight of the Roman people." It is clear indeed how well either anapaests or that paean which seems more fitting for an ending may precede it. But it also follows itself: "to save as many as possible." Thus better than with a choreus preceding: "who would not deem it shameful?" (if the last short be in place of a long: but let us imagine thus: "you would not deem it shameful.") 108. But here is that emptiness which I mentioned: for we allow a little delay between the last and the next word, and we prolong that "shameful" by a certain interval; otherwise it would be most bounding and the end of a trimeter: "who would not deem it shameful?" just like that "it would be permitted to catch with the mouth"—if you join it, it belongs to a lascivious song—but with certain punctuations and, as it were, three openings, it becomes full of authority.

CIX. Nec ego, cum praecedentis pedes posui, legem dedi ne alii essent, sed quid fere accideret, quid in praesentia videretur optimum ostendi. Qui non optime est sibi iunctus anapaestos, ut qui sit pentametri finis vel rhythmos qui nomen ab eo traxit: "nam ubi libido dominatur, innocentiae leve praesidium est" (nam synaliphe facit ut duae ultimae syllabae pro una sonent), melior fiet praecedente spondio vel bacchio, ut si idem mutes "leve innocentiae praesidium est". CX. Non me capit, ut a magnis viris dissentiam, paean qui est ex tribus brevibus et longa (nam est et ipse una plus brevi anapaestos): "facilitas" et "agilitas". Qui quid ita placuerit his non video, nisi quod illum fere probaverunt quibus loquendi magis quam orandi studium fuit.

109. Nor, when I set down the preceding feet, did I give a law that there should not be others, but I showed what generally happens, what for the present seemed best. The anapaest is not most happily joined to itself, as when it is the end of a pentameter or of the rhythm that drew its name from it: "nam ubi libido dominatur, innocentiae leve praesidium est" (for synaloepha makes the last two syllables sound as one); it will be better with a spondee or a bacchius going before, as if you change the same to "leve innocentiae praesidium est". 110. It does not appeal to me—even if I thereby dissent from great men—the paeon which is of three short syllables and a long (for the anapaest itself is also one more than a short): "facilitas" and "agilitas". I do not see why this has pleased them, unless that it was for the most part approved by those whose zeal was for speaking rather than for orating.

CXI. Nam et ante se brevibus gaudet pyrrhichio vel choreo: "mea facilitas", "nostra facilitas", ac praecedente spondio tamen plane finis est trimetri, cum sit per se quoque. Ei contrarius principiis merito laudatur: nam et primam stabilem et tres celeres habet.

111. For it also delights in having shorts before it, a pyrrhic or a choreus: "my facility", "our facility"; and with a spondee preceding, nevertheless it is plainly the ending of a trimeter, since it is so in itself as well. Its contrary for beginnings is deservedly praised: for it has both a stable first and three swift ones.

Tamen hoc quoque meliores alios puto.

Yet in this too I think others are better.

CXII. Totus vero hic locus non ideo tractatur a nobis ut oratio, quae ferri debet ac fluere, dimetiendis pedibus ac perpendendis syllabis consenescat; nam id cum miseri, tum in minimis occupati est: neque enim qui se totum in hac cura consumpserit potioribus vacabit, si quidem relicto rerum pondere ac nitore contempto "tesserulas" " ut ait Lucilius, struet et vermiculate inter se lexis committet. CXIII.

112. But indeed this whole topic is not therefore handled by us, that the oration, which ought to be borne and to flow, should grow old in measuring feet and weighing syllables; for that belongs both to the miserable and to those occupied in the least things: for he who has consumed himself wholly in this care will not have leisure for weightier matters, since, with the weight of things left aside and their splendor scorned, "little tesserae" " as Lucilius says, he will pile up, and, vermiculately, he will join words among themselves. 113.

Nonne ergo refrigeretur sic calor et impetus pereat, ut equorum cursum delicati minutis passibus frangunt? CXIV. Quasi vero fecerint sint in compositione deprensi, sicut poema nemo dubitaverit spiritu quodam initio fusum et aurium mensura et similiter decurrentium spatiorum observatione esse generatum, mox in eo repertos pedes.

Would not, then, the heat be cooled and the impetus perish, just as the delicate break the course of horses with minute steps? 114. As though, in truth, they had made them, whereas they are caught in the composition—just as no one would doubt that a poem, poured forth at the beginning by a certain spirit and generated by the measure of the ears and by the observation of spaces running similarly, has the feet afterward found in it.

Satis igitur in hoc nos componet multa scribendi exercitatio, ut ex tempore etiam similia fundamus. CXV. Neque vero tam sunt intuendi pedes quam universa comprensio, ut versum facientes totum illum decursum, non sex vel quinque partes ex quibus constat versus, aspiciunt: ante enim carmen ortum est quam observatio carminis, ideoque illud "Fauni vatesque canebant". CXVI.

Thus, much practice in writing will sufficiently compose us in this, so that we may also pour forth similar things ex tempore. 115. Nor indeed are the feet so much to be looked at as the universal comprehension, as those making a verse look to that whole course, not the six or five parts of which the verse consists: for the song arose before the observation of song, and hence that saying, "Fauns and bards were singing." 116.

Ergo quem in poemate locum habet versificatio, eum in oratione compositio.

Therefore, the place which versification has in a poem, composition has in oratory.

Optime autem de illa iudicant aures, quae plena sentiunt et parum expleta desiderant, et fragosis offenduntur, levibus mulcentur, [et] contortis excitantur, et stabilia probant, clauda deprendunt, redundantia ac nimia fastidiunt. Ideoque docti rationem componendi intellegunt, etiam indocti voluptatem. Quaedam vero tradi arte non possunt.

But the ears judge best about it: they perceive what is full and desire what is scantily filled, are offended by rough things, are soothed by light/smooth ones, [and] are aroused by contorted ones; they approve the stable, detect the halting, and are disgusted by the redundant and excessive. Therefore the learned understand the rationale of composition, the unlearned too the pleasure. Certain things, however, cannot be handed down by art.

CXVII. Mutandus est casus si durius is quo coeperamus feratur: num in quem transeamus ex quo praecipi potest? Figura laboranti compositioni variata saepe succurrit, quae cum orationis, tum etiam sententiae: num praescriptum eius rei unum est?

117. The case must be changed if the one with which we had begun is borne too harshly: can it be prescribed from which we should pass into which? A varied figure often comes to the aid of a struggling composition, one that belongs both to the oration and also to the thought: is there a single prescription for that matter?

Occasionibus utendum et cum re praesenti deliberandum est. CXVIII. Iam vero spatia ipsa, quae in hac quidem parte plurimum valent, quod possunt nisi aurium habere iudicium?

Opportunities must be made use of, and one must deliberate with the present matter. 118. Now indeed the intervals themselves, which in this part are most effective, what can they have except the judgment of the ears?

cur alia paucioribus verbis satis plena vel nimium, alia pluribus brevia et abscisa sint? cur in circumductionibus, etiam cum sensus finitus est, aliquid tamen loci vacare videatur? "Neminem vestrum ignorare arbitror, iudices, hunc per hosce dies sermonem vulgi atque hanc opinionem populi Romani fuisse". CXIX.

why are some, with fewer words, quite full or even too much, while others, with more words, are brief and cut off? why in circumductions, even when the sense is finished, does some space nevertheless seem to be left vacant? "I think that none of you, judges, is unaware that during these last days this talk of the common folk and this opinion of the Roman people has prevailed." 119.

cur "hosce" potius quam "hos"? Neque enim erat asperum. Rationem fortasse non reddam, sentiam esse melius. cur non satis sit "sermonem vulgi fuisse"? Compositio enim patiebatur: ignorabo, sed ut audio hoc, animus accipit plenum sine hac geminatione non esse: CXX.

why "hosce" rather than "hos"? For it was not harsh. Perhaps I will not render a reason; I feel it to be better. why is "sermonem vulgi fuisse" not sufficient? For the composition permitted it: I shall not know, but as I hear this, the mind apprehends it to be not full without this gemination: 120.

ad sensus igitur referenda sunt. Nequis satis forte, quid severum, quid iucundum sit intellegent; facient quidem natura duce melius quam arte, sed naturae ipsi ars inerit.

Therefore they must be referred to the senses. Lest perhaps they not sufficiently understand what is severe and what is jocund; they will indeed do, with nature as guide, better than by art, but art itself will inhere in nature.

CXXI. Illud prorsus oratoris, scire ubi quoque genere compositionis sit utendum. Ea duplex observatio est: altera quae ad pedes refertur, altera quae ad comprensiones quae efficiuntur e pedibus.

121. That is precisely the orator’s business: to know where, in each case, a given kind of composition is to be used. This observation is twofold: one part pertains to feet, the other to comprehensions that are made from feet.

CXXII. Ac de his prius. Diximus igitur esse incisa membra circumitus.

122. And about these first. We have said, therefore, that there are incisions, members, periods.

Incisum, quantum mea fert opinio, erit sensus non expleto numero conclusus, plerisque pars membri. Tale est enim quo Cicero utitur: "Domus tibi deerat? At habebas.

An incisum, so far as my opinion carries, will be a sense concluded without the measure completed, for the most part a part of a member. Such is, for example, that which Cicero uses: "Was a house lacking to you? Yet you had one."

Pecunia superabat? At egebas". Fiunt autem etiam singulis verbis incisa: "diximus, testes dare volumus": incisum est "diximus". CXXIII. Membrum autem est sensus numeris conclusus, sed a toto corpore abruptus et per se nihil efficiens.

Was money superabundant? But you were in need". But also incisa are made by single words: "we said, we wish to give witnesses": the incisum is "we said". 123. A member, however, is a sense concluded by numbers, but torn from the whole body and accomplishing nothing by itself.

"O callidos homines" perfectum est, sed remotum a ceteris vim non habet, ut per se manus et pes et caput: "o rem excogitatam". Quando ergo incipit corpus esse? cum venit extrema conclusio: "quem quasi nostrum fefellit id vos ita esse facturos?" Quam Cicero brevissimam putat. Itaque fere incisa et [in] membra mutila sunt et conclusionem utique desiderant.

"O shrewd men" is perfect, but removed from the rest it has no force, as hand and foot and head by themselves; "O thing excogitated." When, then, does it begin to be a body? when the ultimate conclusion comes: "whom of us, as it were, did it escape that you would do so?" Which Cicero thinks most brief. And so generally incises and [in] members are mutilated and by all means long for the conclusion.

CXXIV. Perihodo plurima nomina dat Cicero: ambitum, circumitum, comprensionem, continuationem, circumscriptionem. Genera eius duo sunt: alterum simplex, cum sensus unus longiore ambitu circumducitur, alterum quod constat membris et incisis, quod plures sensus habet: "aderat ianitor carceris, [et] carnifex praetoris" reliqua.

124. To the period Cicero gives very many names: ambit, circumition, comprehension, continuation, circumscription. Its kinds are two: the one simple, when a single sense is led around with a longer ambit; the other which consists of members and incisa, which has several senses: "the doorkeeper of the prison was present, [and] the executioner of the praetor," and the rest.

CXXV. Habet perihodos membra minime duo; medius numerus videtur quattuor, sed recipit frequenter et plura. Modus eius a Cicerone aut quattuor senariis versibus aut ipsius spiritus modo terminatur.

125. The period has at least two members; the mean number seems to be four, but it frequently admits even more. Its mode, according to Cicero, is concluded either by four senarii verses or by the measure of his own breath.

Praestare debet ut sensum concludat: sit aperta, ut intellegi possit, non inmodica, ut memoria contineri. Membrum longius iusto tardum, brevius instabile est. CXXVI.

It ought to ensure that it concludes the sense: let it be open, so that it can be understood; not immoderate, so that it can be contained by memory. A member longer than is just is slow; shorter is unstable. 126.

Vbicumque acriter erit et instanter et pugnaciter dicendum membratim caesimque dicemus: nam hoc in oratione plurimum valet; adeoque rebus accommodanda compositio ut asperis asperos etiam numeros adhiberi oporteat et cum dicente aeque audientem inhorrescere. CXXVII. Membratim plerumque narrabimus, aut ipsas perihodos maioribus intervallis et velut laxioribus nodis resolvemus, exceptis quae non docendi gratia sed ornandi narrantur, ut in Verrem Proserpinae raptus: hic enim lenis et fluens contextus decet.

Wherever it will be necessary to speak sharply and insistently and pugnaciously, we will speak memberwise and by cuts: for this avails very greatly in oratory; and the composition must be accommodated to the matters to such a degree that for rough things one ought to employ rough numbers as well, and that the listener shudder equally with the speaker. 127. We will for the most part narrate memberwise, or we will loosen the periods themselves with larger intervals and, as it were, looser knots, except for those which are narrated not for the sake of teaching but of ornament, as in In Verrem the Rape of Proserpina: for here a smooth and flowing texture is fitting.

CXXVIII. Perihodos apta prohoemiis maiorum causarum, ubi sollicitudine commendatione miseratione res eget, item communibus locis et in omni amplificatione, sed poscitur tum austera si accuses, tum fusa si laudes. Multum et in epilogis pollet.

128. The period is apt for the proems of greater causes, where the matter needs solicitude, commendation, or commiseration, likewise in commonplaces and in every amplification; but it is required now austere if you accuse, now diffuse if you praise. It also prevails much in epilogues.

CXXIX. Totum autem hoc adhibendum est, quod sit amplius compositionis genus, cum iudex non solum rem tenet, sed etiam captus est oratione et se credit actori et voluptate iam ducitur. Historia non tam finitos numeros quam orbem quendam contextumque desiderat.

129. All this, moreover, is to be applied—that there be a more ample genus of composition—when the judge not only holds the matter, but is also captured by the oration and entrusts himself to the advocate and is now led by delight. History desires not so much finite numbers as a certain orbit and contexture.

Namque omnia eius membra conexa sunt, +et quoniam lubrica est ac fluit+, ut homines, qui manibus invicem adprehensis gradum firmant, continent et continentur. CXXX. Demonstrativum genus omne fusiores habet liberioresque numeros, iudiciale et contionale ut materia varium est, sic etiam ipsa conlocatione verborum.

For indeed all its members are connected, +and since it is slippery and flows+, as men who, with hands mutually grasped, steady their step, contain and are contained. 130. The demonstrative kind as a whole has more diffuse and freer numbers; the judicial and contional, as it is varied by the subject-matter, so also by the very collocation of words.

Vbi iam nobis pars ex duabus quas modo fecimus secunda tractanda est. Nam quis dubitat alia lenius alia concitatius, alia sublimius alia pugnacius, alia ornatius alia gracilius esse dicenda: CXXXI. gravibus, sublimibus, ornatis longas magis syllabas convenire, ita ut lenia spatium, sublimia et ornata claritatem quoque vocalium poscant?

Where now the second part out of the two which we have just made must be handled by us. For who doubts that some things must be said more gently, others more excitedly; others more sublimely, others more pugnaciously; others more ornately, others more slenderly: 131. that to weighty, lofty, ornate (styles) longer syllables are more fitting, so that smooth things call for space, and lofty and ornate things demand also a clarity of the vowels?

his contraria magis gaudere brevibus, argumenta partitiones iocos et quidquid est sermoni magis simile? CXXXII. Itaque componemus prohoemium varie atque ut sensus eius postulabit.

their contraries take more pleasure in short syllables—arguments, partitions, jokes, and whatever is more similar to speech? 132. And so we shall compose the proem variously and as its sense shall demand.

Neque enim accesserim Celso, qui unam quandam huic parti formam dedit et optimam compositionem esse prohoemii ut est apud Asinium dixit: "si, Caesar, ex omnibus mortalibus qui sunt ac fuerunt posset huic causae disceptator legi, non quisquam te potius optandus nobis fuit": CXXXIII. non quia negem hoc +aut+ bene esse compositum, sed quia legem hanc esse componendi in omnibus principiis recusem. Nam iudicis animus varie praeparatur: tum miserabiles esse volumus, tum modesti, tum acres, tum graves, tum blandi, tum flectere, tum ad diligentiam hortari.

Nor indeed would I agree with Celsus, who gave a single certain form to this part and said that the best composition of a proem is as it is in Asinius: "if, Caesar, from all mortals who are and who have been a decider for this cause could be chosen, not anyone rather than you ought to have been desired by us": 133. not because I deny that this +or+ is well composed, but because I refuse that this be a law of composing in all introductions. For the judge’s mind is prepared in various ways: now we wish to be pitiable, now modest, now keen, now weighty, now coaxing, now to bend, now to exhort to diligence.

Haec ut sunt diversa natura, ita dissimilem componendi quoque rationem desiderant. An similibus Cicero usus est numeris in exordio pro Milone, pro Cluentio, pro Ligario? CXXXIV.

These, as they are diverse by nature, so also require a dissimilar method of composing. Or did Cicero use similar numbers in the exordium for Milo, for Cluentius, for Ligarius? 134.

Narratio fere tardiores atque, ut sic dixerim, modestiores desiderat pedes ex omnibus maxime mixtos. Nam et verbis, ut saepius pressa est, ita interim insurgit, sed docere et infigere animis res semper cupit? quod minime festinantium opus est: ac mihi videatur tota narratio constare longioribus membris, brevioribus perihodis.

Narration generally desires slower and, so to speak, more modest feet, most of all mixed from all kinds. For both in its words, as it is more often pressed down, so at times it rises up; but does it not always desire to teach and to fix things into minds?—which is least the work of those who are hurrying. And it seems to me that the whole narration consists of longer members, shorter periods.

CXXXV. Argumenta acria et citata pedibus quoque ad hanc naturam commodatis utentur, non +dum ita ut+ trochaeis (quae celeria quidem sed sine viribus sunt), verum iis qui sunt brevibus longisque non tamen plures longas quam brevis habent. CXXXVI.

135. Sharp and hastened arguments will also make use of feet accommodated to this nature, not — yet so as — with trochaics (which are swift indeed but without strength), but with those which are of shorts and longs, yet do not have more longs than shorts. 136.

Iam illa sublimia spatiosas clarasque voces habent; amant amplitudinem dactyli quoque ac paeanis, etiam si maiore ex parte syllabis brevibus, temporibus tamen satis plenI. Aspera contra iambis maxime concitantur, non solum quod sunt e duabus modo syllabis eoque frequentiorem quasi pulsum habent, quae res lenitati contraria est, sed etiam quod omnibus pedibus insurgunt et a brevibus in longas nituntur et crescunt, ideoque meliores choreis, qui ab longis in breves cadunt. CXXXVII.

Now those lofty things have spacious and bright voices; they love amplitude, the dactyls too and the paeans, even if for the greater part in short syllables, yet with times sufficiently full. Harsh things, on the contrary, are most stirred by iambs, not only because they are of only two syllables and thus have, as it were, a more frequent beat, a thing contrary to smoothness, but also because with all their feet they rise and strive from shorts into longs and grow; and therefore they are better than the chorees (trochees), which fall from longs into shorts. 137.

Summissa, qualia in epilogis sunt, lentas et ipsa, sed minus exclamantis exigunt.

Subdued things, such as are in epilogues, are slow themselves, but they require less exclamation.

Vult esse Celsus aliquam et +superiorem+ compositionem, quam equidem si scirem non docerem: sed sit necesse est tarda et supina; verum nisi ex verbis atque sententiis per se si id quaeritur, satis odiosa esse non poterit.

Celsus wants there to be some even +superior+ composition, which indeed, for my part, if I knew it, I would not teach: but if it exists, it must of necessity be tardy and supine; yet, unless from the words and the sentences themselves—if that is what is being sought—it will not be able to be sufficiently odious.

CXXXVIII. Denique, ut semel finiam, sic fere componendum quo modo pronuntiandum erit. An non in prohoemiis plerumque summissi, nisi cum in accusatione concitandus est iudex aut aliqua indignatione complendus, in narratione pleni atque expressi, in argumentis citati atque ipso etiam motu celeres sumus, [ut] in locis ac descriptionibus fusi ac fluentes, in epilogis plerumque deiecti et infracti?

138. Finally, to finish once for all, the composition ought generally to be arranged in the way it will be delivered. Are we not in proems for the most part subdued, unless in an accusation the judge must be stirred or filled with some indignation, in the narration full and expressed, in the arguments quick and even swift in our very motion, [as] in commonplaces and descriptions diffuse and flowing, in epilogues for the most part cast down and broken?

CXXXIX. Atqui corporis quoque motus sua quaedam habet tempora, et ad signandos pedes non minus saltationi quam modulationibus adhibetur musica ratio numerorum. Quid?

139. And yet the movement of the body too has certain measures, and the musical method of numbers is employed for marking the feet no less in dancing than in modulations. What?

non vox et gestus accommodatur naturae ipsarum de quibus dicimus rerum? Quo minus id mirere in pedibus orationis, cum debeant sublimia ingredi, lenia duci, acria currere, delicata fluere. CXL.

Is not the voice and gesture accommodated to the nature of the very things of which we speak? So much the less should you marvel at this in the feet of oration, since the sublime ought to step, the gentle to be led, the sharp to run, the delicate to flow. 140.

Itaque +tragoediae ubi recesset adfectatus etiam tumor rerum et+ spondiis atque iambis maxime continetur: "en impero Argis, sceptra mihi liquit Pelops". At ille comicus aeque senarius, quem trochaicum vocant, pluribus choreis, qui trochaei ab aliis dicuntur, pyrrhichiisque decurrit, sed quantum accipit celeritatis, tantum gravitatis tatis amittit: CXLI. "quid igitur faciam? non eam ne nunc quidem?" Aspera vero et maledica, ut dixi, etiam in carmine iambis grassantur: "quis hoc potest videre, quis potest pati, nisi inpudicus et vorax et aleo?" CXLII.

And so +where in tragedies, when the affected swelling of the subjects has also receded+ it is for the most part contained by spondees and iambs: "lo, I command in Argos, Pelops left the scepters to me." But that comic senarius too, which they call trochaic, runs with more chorei (which by others are called trochaei) and with pyrrhichii, but as much speed as it takes on, so much gravity it loses: 141. "What then shall I do? Shall I not go even now?" But harsh and slanderous things, as I said, also in song rampage with iambs: "who can see this, who can endure it, unless a shameless man and a voracious one and a dice-player?" 142.

In universum autem, si sit necesse, duram potius atque asperam compositionem malim esse quam effeminatam et enervem, qualis apud multos, et cotidie magis, lascivissimis syntonorum modis saltat. Ac ne tam bona quidem ulla erit ut debeat esse continua et in eosdem semper pedes ire. CXLIII.

In general, however, if it be necessary, I would prefer the composition to be hard and rough rather than effeminate and enervated, such as, among many, and more each day, capers to the most lascivious modes of the “syntoni.” And not even any so good will be such that it ought to be continuous and to go always into the same feet. 143.

Nam et versificandi genus est unam legem omnibus sermonibus dare, et id cum manifestae adfectationis est, cuius rei maxime cavenda suspicio est, tum etiam taedium ex similitudine ac satietatem creat, quoque est dulcius, magis perdit +atque+ et fidem et adfectus motusque omnis qui est in hac cura deprensus, nec potest ei credere aut propter eum dolere et irasci iudex cui putat hoc vacare. CXLIV. Ideoque interim quaedam quasi solvenda de industria sunt, et quidem illa maximi laboris, ne laborata videantur.

For there is also a kind of versifying, namely to give one law to all discourses; and this, not only is of manifest affectation—suspicion of which is most to be guarded against—but it also creates tedium from likeness and satiety; and the sweeter it is, the more it ruins both credit and feelings and every motion that is caught in this concern; nor can a judge either believe him, or grieve and be angry on his account, for whom he thinks this is what he has leisure for. 144. And so, at times certain things must be, as it were, relaxed on purpose, and indeed those of the greatest labor, lest they seem labored.

Sed neque longioribus quam oportet hyperbatis compositioni serviamus, ne quae eius rei gratia fecerimus propter eam fecisse videamur, et certe nullum aptum atque idoneum verbum permutemus gratia levitatis. CXLV. Neque enim ullum erit tam difficile quod non commode inseri possit, nisi quod in evitandis eius modi verbis non decorem compositionis quaerimus, sed facilitatem.

But neither let us serve composition with hyperbatons longer than is fitting, lest the things we have done for the sake of that seem to have been done on account of it, and surely let us not exchange any apt and suitable word for the sake of levity. 145. For there will be nothing so difficult that it cannot be inserted commodiously, except that in avoiding words of that kind we seek not the decorum of composition, but facility.

Non tamen mirabor Latinos magis indulsisse compositioni quam Atticos, quo minus in verbis habeant venustatis et gratiae, nec vitium duxerim si Cicero a Demosthene paulum in hac parte descivit. CXLVI. Sed quae sit differentia nostri Graecique sermonis explicabit summus liber.

Nor yet shall I marvel that the Latins have indulged more in composition than the Attics, in that they have less of charm and grace in words; nor would I reckon it a fault if Cicero in this respect somewhat departed from Demosthenes. 146. But what the difference is between our speech and the Greek will be explained by the last book.

Compositio (nam finem imponere egresso destinatum modum volumini festino) debet esse honesta iucunda varia. CXLVII. Eius tres partes: ordo coniunctio numerus.

Composition (for I hasten to impose upon the volume, now running beyond its bounds, its destined measure) ought to be seemly, pleasant, varied. 147. Its three parts: order, conjunction, number.

Ratio in adiectione detractione mutatione: usus pro natura rerum quas dicimus: cura ita magna ut sentiendi atque eloquendi prior sit: dissimulatio curae praecipua, ut numeri sponte fluxisse [arcessisse], non arcessiti et coacti esse videantur.

Method in addition, detraction, mutation: usage according to the nature of the things which we say: care so great that it be prior to conceiving and to expressing: the concealment of care is paramount, so that the numbers may seem to have flowed of their own accord [arcessisse], not to be fetched and forced.