36 Great eloquence, like fire,
grows with its material; it becomes fiercer with movement, and brighter as it
burns. On this same principle was developed in our state too the eloquence of
antiquity. Although even the modern orator has attained all that the
circumstances of a settled, quiet, and prosperous community allow, still in the
disorder and licence of the past more seemed to be within the reach of the
speaker, when, amid a universal confusion that needed one guiding hand, he
exactly adapted his wisdom to the bewildered people’s capacity of conviction.
Hence, laws without end and consequent popularity; hence, speeches of
magistrates who, I may say, passed nights on the Rostra; hence, prosecutions of
influential citizens brought to trial, and feuds transmitted to whole families;
hence, factions among the nobles, and incessant strife between the senate and
the people. In each case the state was torn asunder, but the eloquence of the
age was exercised, and, as it seemed, was loaded with great rewards. For the
more powerful a man was as a speaker, the more easily did he obtain office, the
more decisively superior was he to his colleagues in office, the more influence
did he acquire with the leaders of the state, the more weight in the senate,
the more notoriety and fame with the people. Such men had a host of clients,
even among foreign nations; the magistrates, when leaving Rome for the
provinces, showed them respect, and courted their favour as soon as they
returned. The praetorship and the consulship seemed to offer themselves to
them, and even when they were out of office, they were not out of power, for
they swayed both people and senate with their counsels and influence. Indeed,
they had quite convinced themselves that without eloquence no one could win or
retain a distinguished and eminent position in the state. And no wonder. Even
against their own wish they had to show themselves before the people. It was
little good for them to give a brief vote in the senate without supporting
their opinion with ability and eloquence. If brought into popular odium, or
under some charge, they had to reply in their own words. Again, they were under
the necessity of giving evidence in the public courts, not in their absence by
affidavit, but of being present and of speaking it openly. There was thus a
strong stimulus to win the great prizes of eloquence, and as the reputation of
a good speaker was considered an honour and a glory, so it was thought a
disgrace to seem mute and speechless. Shame therefore quite as much as hope of
reward prompted men not to take the place of a pitiful client rather than that
of a patron, or to see hereditary connections transferred to others, or to seem
spiritless and incapable of office from either failing to obtain it or from
holding it weakly when obtained.
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