[7]
Some
have preferred to give each of these points separate
treatment, fearing that if they undertook them as
a whole the burden would be greater than they
[p. 7]
could bear, and consequently have published several
books on each individual point. I have ventured
to treat them altogether and foresee such infinite
labour that I feel weary at the very thought of the
task I have undertaken. But I have set my hand to
the plough and must not look back. My strength
may fail me, but my courage must not fail.
1. The commencement or exorditum as we call it in
Latin is styled a proem by the Greeks. This seems
to me a more appropriate name, because whereas we
merely indicate that we are beginning our task, they
clearly show that this portion is designed as an introduction to the subject on which the orator has to
speak.
Quintilian. With An English Translation. Harold Edgeworth Butler. Cambridge. Cambridge, Mass., Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann, Ltd. 1921.
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