One only can I discern in all the boundless waste of waters, Marcus Tullius Cicero, and even he, though the ship in which he entered these seas is of such size and so well found, begins to lessen sail and to row a slower stroke, and is content to speak merely of the kind of speech to be employed by the perfect orator. But my temerity is such that I shall essay to form my orator's character and to teach him his duties. Thus I have no predecessor to guide my steps and must press far, far on, as my theme may demand. Still an honourable ambition is always deserving of approval, and it is all the less hazardous to dare greatly, when forgiveness is assured us if we fail.Nothing before and nothing behind but the sky and the Ocean.
Aen. iii. 193.
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pr. I now come to what is by far the most arduous
portion of the task which I have set myself to perform. Indeed had I fully realised the difficulties
when I first designed this work, I should have considered betimes whether my strength was sufficient to
support the load that now weighs upon me so heavily.
But to begin with, I felt how shameful it would be
to fail to perform what I had promised, and later,
despite the fact that my labour became more and
more arduous at almost every stage, the fear of
stultifying what I had already written sustained my
courage through every difficulty.
[2]
Consequently
even now, though the burden that oppresses me is
greater than ever, the end is in sight and I am
resolved to faint by the wayside rather than despair.
But the fact that I began with comparatively trivial
details deceived me. Subsequently I was lured still
further on my voyage by the temptations of the
favouring breeze that filled my sails; but the rules
which I was then concerned to give were still of a
familiar kind and had been already treated by most
writers of rhetorical textbooks: thus far I seemed to
myself to be still in sight of shore and I had the
company of many who had ventured to entrust themselves to the self-same winds.
[3]
But presently when
I entered on the task of setting forth a theory of
[p. 355]
eloquence which had been but newly discovered and
rarely essayed, I found but few that had ventured so
far from harbour. And finally now that the ideal
orator, whom it was my design to mould, has been
dismissed by his masters and is either proceeding
on his way borne onward by his own impetus, or
seeking still mightier assistance from the innermost
shrine of wisdom, I begin to feel how far I have
been swept into the great deep.
[4]
Now there is
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