does it follow that we should require several lives to learn several sciences; for they did not continue adding to their knowledge in these sciences to the time of old age, but were content with having merely learned them, and spent that great number of years rather in practising than in acquiring.

21. To say nothing of Homer, in whom either instruction, or at least indisputable indications of knowledge in every kind of art are to be found; to make no mention of Hippias of Elis, who not only professed a knowledge of every liberal science, but used to have his dress, and ring, and shoes, all made with his own hand, and had so qualified himself as to require no one's assistance in anything;* Gorgias,† even in extreme old age, was accustomed to ask his auditors in his lecture-room to name the subject on which they wished him to speak. 22. What knowledge, of any value for literature, was wanting in Plato? How many lives did Aristotle spend in learning, so as not only to embrace within his knowledge all that relates to philosophers and orators, but to make researches into the nature of all animals and plants? Those great men had to discover branches of knowledge which we have only to learn. Antiquity has provided us with so many teachers, and so many models, that no age can be imagined more eligible for us, in regard to being born in it,‡ than our own, for the instruction of which preceding ages have toiled.

23. If we look to our own countrymen, we see that Marcus Cato the Censor, an orator, a writer of history, eminently skilled alike in law and agriculture, amidst so many occupations in war, and so many contentions at home, and in an unpolished age, learned the Greek language in the very decline of life, as if to give an example to mankind that even old men may acquire what they desire to learn. 24. How much has Varro told us, or, let us rather say, has he not told us almost everything? What qualification for speaking was deficient in Cicero? But why should I multiply examples, when even Cornelius Celsus, a man of but *Cic. de Orat. iii. 32.

Buttmann very justly remarks that he does not see why Quintilian should pass over Homer and Hippias, to fix, as it were, upon Gorgias; and therefore thinks that there must be some corruption in the text. He proposes, accordingly, to read, instead of what we now have, ut Gorgiam (sc. transeam), qui summæ senectutis, &c., quæ tandem ars Platoni defuit? This would be a great improvement.

+ Sorte nascendi.] Non omni sorte, sed eâ quâ nascimur. Buttmann.

moderate ability, has not only written on all literary studies, but has besides left treatises on the military art, on husbandry, and on medicine? Well worthy was he, if only for the extent of his design, to enjoy the credit of having known everything on which he wrote.

25. But, it may be said, to accomplish such a task is difficult, and no one has accomplished it. I answer, that in the first place, it is sufficient for encouragement in study, to know that it is not a law of nature that what has not been done cannot be done; and, in the second, that everything great and admirable had some peculiar time at which it was brought to its highest excellence. 26. Whatever lustre poetry received from Homer and Virgil, eloquence received equal lustre from Demosthenes and Cicero. Whatever is best, had at one time no existence. But though a man despair of reaching the highest excellence, (and yet why should he despair who has genius, health, aptitude, and teachers?) yet it is · honourable, as Cicero says,† to gain a place in the second or third rank. 27. If a man cannot attain the glory of Achilles in war, he is not, therefore, to despise the merit of Ajax or Diomede; if he cannot rival the fame of Homer, he is not to contemn that of Tyrtæus. If men, indeed, had been inclined to think that no one would be better than he who was best at any given time, those who are now accounted best would never have distinguished themselves; Virgil would not have written after Lucretius and Macer; ‡ Cicero would not have pleaded after Crassus and Hortensius; nor would others, in other pursuits, have excelled their predecessors.

28. Even though there be no hope of excelling the greatest masters of eloquence, it is yet a great honour to follow closely behind them. Did Pollio and Messala, who began to plead when Cicero held the highest place in eloquence, attain but little estimation during their lives, or transmit but little reputation to posterity? The advancement of the arts to the highest possible excellence would be but an unhappy service to mankind, if what was best at any particular moment was to be

See x. 1, 24. That the judgment of Quintilian on Celsus may not appear too unfavourable to those who have given their attention to him, we must consider that he is here compared with the greatest men of every age. Gesner.

Orat. c. 1.

VI. 3, 96.

the last.* 29. It may be added that moderate attainments in eloquence are productive of great profit; and, if an orator esti mates his studies merely by the advantage to be derived from them, the gain from inferior oratory is almost equal to that from the best. It would be no difficult matter to show, as well from ancient as from modern instances, that from no other pursuit has greater wealth, honour, and friendship, greater present and future fame, resulted to those engaged in it, than from that of the orator, were it not dishonourable to learning to look for such inferior recompence from one of the noblest of studies, of which the mere pursuit and acquirement confer on us an ample reward for our labour; for to be thus mercenary would be to resemble those philosophers† who say that virtue is not the object of their pursuit, but the pleasure that arises from virtue.

30. Let us then pursue, with our whole powers, the true dignity of eloquence, than which the immortal gods have given nothing better to mankind, and without which all nature would be mute, and all our acts would be deprived alike of present honour and of commemoration among posterity; and let us aspire to the highest excellence, for, by this means, we shail either attain the summit, or at least see many below us.

31. Such were the observations, Marcellus Victor, from which thought that the art of oratory might, as far as was in my power, derive some assistance from me; and attention to what I have said, if it does not bring great advantage to studious youth, will at least excite in them, what I desire even more, a love for doing well.

* All the texts have si, quod optimum fuisset, defuisset. My transla tion is in conformity with the emendation proposed by Buttmann, si, quod optimum, idem ultimum fuisset.

† As the followers of Aristippus and Epicurus; Cicero de Off. iii. 33.

INDEX.

The Roman numbers refer to the book; the Arabic to the chapters and

sections.

Academic Philosophers, xii. 1, 35; 2, | Agrippa, Menenius, v. 11, 19.