[21]
For, if the world is
governed by providence, it will certainly be the
duty of all good men to bear their part in the
administration of the state. If the origin of our
souls be divine, we must win our way towards virtue
and abjure the service of the lusts of our earthly
body. Are not these themes which the orator will
frequently be called upon to handle? Again there
are questions concerned with auguries and oracles
or any other religious topic (all of them subjects
that have often given rise to the most important debates in the senate) on which the orator will have to
[p. 395]
discourse, if he is also to be the statesman we
would have him be. And finally, how can we conceive of any real eloquence at all proceeding from
a man who is ignorant of all that is best in the
world?
Quintilian. With An English Translation. Harold Edgeworth Butler. Cambridge. Cambridge, Mass., Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann, Ltd. 1922.
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