15 Upon this Aper replied, You
still persist, Messala, in admiring only what is old and antique and in
sneering at and disparaging the culture of our own day. I have often heard this
sort of talk from you, when, forgetting the eloquence of yourself and your
brother, you argued that nobody in this age is an orator. And you did this, I
believe, with the more audacity because you were not afraid of a reputation for
ill-nature, seeing that the glory which others concede to you, you deny to
yourself. I feel no penitence, said Messala, for such talk, nor do I believe
that Secundus or Maternus or you yourself, Aper, think differently, though now
and then you argue for the opposite view. I could wish that one of you were
prevailed on to investigate and describe to us the reasons of this vast
difference. I often inquire into them by myself. That which consoles some
minds, to me increases the difficulty. For I perceive that even with the Greeks
it has happened that there is a greater distance between Aeschines and
Demosthenes on the one hand, and your friend Nicetes or any other orator who
shakes Ephesus or Mitylene with a chorus of rhetoricians and their noisy
applause, on the other, than that which separates Afer, Africanus, or
yourselves from Cicero or Asinius.
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