History of Famous Orators | Page 7

that the
fate of both commanders was remarkably similar. Each of them, after
distinguishing himself as an excellent citizen, being driven from his
country by the wrongs of an ungrateful people, went over to the enemy:
and each of them repressed the efforts of his resentment by a voluntary
death. For though you, my Atticus, have represented the exit of

Coriolanus in a different manner, you must give me leave to dispatch
him in the way I have mentioned."--"You may use your pleasure,"
replied Atticus with a smile: "for it is the privilege of rhetoricians to
exceed the truth of history, that they may have an opportunity of
embellishing the fate of their heroes: and accordingly, Clitarchus and
Stratocles have entertained us with the same pretty fiction about the
death of Themistocles, which you have invented for Coriolanus.
Thucydides, indeed, who was himself an Athenian of the highest rank
and merit, and lived nearly at the same time, has only informed us that
he died, and was privately buried in Attica, adding, that it was
suspected by some that he had poisoned himself. But these ingenious
writers have assured us, that, having slain a bull at the altar, he caught
the blood in a large bowl, and, drinking it off, fell suddenly dead upon
the ground. For this species of death had a tragical air, and might be
described with all the pomp of rhetoric; whereas the ordinary way of
dying afforded no opportunity for ornament. As it will, therefore, suit
your purpose, that Coriolanus should resemble Themistocles in every
thing, I give you leave to introduce the fatal bowl; and you may still
farther heighten the catastrophe by a solemn sacrifice, that Coriolanus
may appear in all respects to have been a second Themistocles."
"I am much obliged to you," said I, "for your courtesy: but, for the
future, I shall be more cautious in meddling with History when you are
present; whom I may justly commend as a most exact and scrupulous
relator of the Roman History; but nearly at the time we are speaking of
(though somewhat later) lived the above-mentioned Pericles, the
illustrious son of Xantippus, who first improved his eloquence by the
friendly aids of literature;--not that kind of literature which treats
professedly of the art of Speaking, of which there was then no regular
system; but after he had studied under Anaxagoras the Naturalist, he
easily transferred his capacity from abstruse and intricate speculations
to forensic and popular debates.
"All Athens was charmed with the sweetness of his language; and not
only admired him for his fluency, but was awed by the superior force
and the terrors of his eloquence. This age, therefore, which may be
considered as the infancy of the Art, furnished Athens with an Orator

who almost reached the summit of his profession: for an emulation to
shine in the Forum is not usually found among a people who are either
employed in settling the form of their government, or engaged in war,
or struggling with difficulties, or subjected to the arbitrary power of
Kings. Eloquence is the attendant of peace, the companion of ease and
prosperity, and the tender offspring of a free and a well established
constitution. Aristotle, therefore, informs us, that when the Tyrants
were expelled from Sicily, and private property (after a long interval of
servitude) was determined by public trials, the Sicilians Corax and
Tisias (for this people, in general, were very quick and acute, and had a
natural turn for controversy) first attempted to write precepts on the art
of Speaking. Before them, he says, there was no one who spoke by
method, and rules of art, though there were many who discoursed very
sensibly, and generally from written notes: but Protagoras took the
pains to compose a number of dissertations, on such leading and
general topics as are now called common places. Gorgias, he adds, did
the same, and wrote panegyrics and invectives on every subject: for he
thought it was the province of an Orator to be able either to exaggerate,
or extenuate, as occasion might require. Antiphon the Rhamnusian
composed several essays of the same species; and (according to
Thucydides, a very respectable writer, who was present to hear him)
pleaded a capital cause in his own defence, with as much eloquence as
had ever yet been displayed by any man. But Lysias was the first who
openly professed the Art; and, after him, Theodorus, being better versed
in the theory than the practice of it, begun to compose orations for
others to pronounce; but reserved the method of doing it to himself. In
the same manner, Isocrates at first disclaimed the Art, but wrote
speeches for other people to deliver; on which account, being often
prosecuted for assisting, contrary to law, to circumvent