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 prætorship and the consulship seemed to offer themselves
to them,
ORATORY VITAL IN REPUBLIC |
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.