No More Learning

I need not single them out by name: the
men are sufficiently known; it is enough to allude, in general terms,
to the whole class.

We all are sensible that there is a set of critics now existing, who
prefer Lucilius [d] to Horace, and Lucretius [e] to Virgil; who
despise the eloquence of Aufidius Bassus [f] and Servilius Nonianus,
and yet admire Varro and [g] Sisenna. By these pretenders to taste,
the works of our modern rhetoricians are thrown by with neglect, and
even fastidious disdain; while those of Calvus are held in the highest
esteem. We see these men prosing in their ancient style before the
judges; but we see them left without an audience, deserted by the
people, and hardly endured by their clients. The truth is, their cold
and spiritless manner has no attraction. They call it sound oratory,
but it is want of vigour; like that precarious state of health which
weak constitutions preserve by abstinence. What physician will
pronounce that a strong habit of body, which requires constant care
and anxiety of mind? To say barely, that we are not ill, is surely not
enough. True health consists in vigour, a generous warmth, and a
certain alacrity in the whole frame. He who is only not indisposed, is
little distant from actual illness.

With you, my friends, the case is different: proceed, as you well can,
and in fact, as you do, to adorn our age with all the grace and
splendour of true oratory. It is with pleasure, Messala, that I see
you selecting for imitation the liveliest models of the ancient
school. You too, Maternus, and you, my friend, Secundus [h], you both
possess the happy art of adding to weight of sentiment all the dignity
of language. To a copious invention you unite the judgement that knows
how to distinguish the specific qualities of different authors. The
beauty of order is yours.
When the occasion demands it, you can expand
and amplify with strength and majesty; and you know when to be concise
with energy. Your periods flow with ease, and your composition has
every grace of style and sentiment. You command the passions with
resistless sway, while in yourselves you beget a temperance so truly
dignified, that, though, perhaps, envy and the malignity of the times
may be unwilling to proclaim your merit, posterity will do you ample
justice [i].


XXIV. As soon as Aper concluded, You see, said Maternus, the zeal and
ardour of our friend: in the cause of the moderns, what a torrent of
eloquence! against the ancients, what a fund of invective! With great
spirit, and a vast compass of learning, he has employed against his
masters the arts for which he is indebted to them. And yet all this
vehemence must not deter you, Messala, from the performance of your
promise. A formal defence of the ancients is by no means necessary. We
do not presume to vie with that illustrious race. We have been praised
by Aper, but we know our inferiority. He himself is aware of it,
though, in imitation of the ancient manner [a], he has thought proper,
for the sake of a philosophical debate, to take the wrong side of the
question. In answer to his argument, we do not desire you to expatiate
in praise of the ancients: their fame wants no addition. What we
request is, an investigation of the causes which have produced so
rapid a decline from the flourishing state of genuine eloquence. I
call it rapid, since, according to Aper's own chronology, the period
from the death of Cicero does not exceed one hundred and twenty years
[b].


XXV.