[69]
Consequently he must
proceed with greater wariness and circumspection;
since the actual manner in which offence is given
is a matter of indifference, and if a figure is perfectly
obvious, it ceases to be a figure. Therefore such
devices are absolutely repudiated by some authorities, whether the meaning of the figure be intelligible or not. But it is possible to employ such
figuress in moderation, the primary consideration
being that they should not be too obvious. And
this fault can be avoided, if the figre does not
depend on the employment of words of doubtful
or double meaning, such, for instance, as the words
which occur in the theme of the suspected daughter-in-law:1 “I married the wife who pleased my
father.”
1 i.e. suspected of an intrigue with her father-in-law.
Quintilian. With An English Translation. Harold Edgeworth Butler. Cambridge. Cambridge, Mass., Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann, Ltd. 1922.
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