and accurate.[267] Brutus and Calvus have been before
noticed as the advocates of the dry sententious mode of speaking, which
they dignified by the name of Attic; a kind of eloquence which seems to
have been popular from the comparative facility with which it was
attained.

In the Ciceronian age the general character of the oratory was dignified
and graceful. The popular nature of the government gave opportunities
for effective appeals to the passions; and, Greek literature being as
yet a novelty, philosophical sentiments were introduced with
corresponding success. The republican orators were long in their
introductions, diffuse in their statements, ample in their divisions,
frequent in their digressions, gradual and sedate in their
perorations.[268] Under the Emperors, however, the people were less
consulted in state affairs; and the judges, instead of possessing an
almost independent authority, being but delegates of the executive, from
interested politicians became men of business; literature, too, was now
familiar to all classes; and taste began sensibly to decline. The
national appetite felt a craving for stronger and more stimulating
compositions. Impatience was manifested at the tedious majesty and
formal graces, the parade of arguments, grave sayings, and shreds of
philosophy,[269] which characterized their fathers; and a smarter and
more sparkling kind of oratory succeeded,[270] just as in our own
country the minuet of the last century has been supplanted by the
quadrille, and the stately movements of Giardini have given way to
Rossini's brisker and more artificial melodies. Corvinus, even before
the time of Augustus, had shown himself more elaborate and fastidious in
his choice of expressions.[271] Cassius Severus, the first who openly
deviated from the old style of oratory, introduced an acrimonious and
virulent mode of pleading.[272] It now became the fashion to decry
Cicero as inflated, languid, tame, and even deficient in ornament;[273]
Mecaenas and Gallio followed in the career of degeneracy; till flippancy
of attack, prettiness of expression, and glitter of decoration prevailed
over the bold and manly eloquence of free Rome.

FOOTNOTES:

[93] De Legg. i. 1, ii. 1.

[94] Contra Rull. ii. 1.

[95] De Legg. ii. 1, iii. 16; de Orat. ii. 66.

[96] Plutarch, in Vita.

[97] Middleton's Life, vol. i. p. 13. 4to; de Clar. Orat. 89.

[98] Ibid.

[99] Pro Muraena, 11; de Orat. i. g.

[100] In Catil.