marks a division of panegyrics, the ordinary subjects of the ἐπιδεικτικὸν γένος of Rhetoric. A panegyric may be written and delivered ‘with or without a serious purpose (σπουδή）’; the latter are burlesques. On these, and the subjects of encomiastic speeches in general, see Introd. p. 121—123. In the burlesque kind, anything however mean and trifling, ‘inanimate things, or any insignificant animal’, may be made the object of the panegyric. But as the materials, the topics which furnish the arguments, are the same in both, we may include the burlesque with the serious in our treatment of them in the way of examples or illustrations. ἄψυχα καὶ τῶν ἄλλων ζῴων τὸ τυχόν] Thus Polycrates, the Sophist, wrote in praise of pots, and pebbles, and mice (see note on II 24. 2); and others on humble-bees and salt (Isocr. Hel. § 12). As an extant specimen of these trifling productions we have the μυίας ἐχκώμιον of Lucian (cf. note on Isocr. Paneg. § 189). S.]
Commentary on the Rhetoric of Aristotle. Edward Meredith Cope. Cambridge. Cambridge University Press. 1877.
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