of malignity cannot be supposed to mingle in a decision, which denies
to your own genius, what by common consent is allowed to be your
undoubted right.

I have as yet, replied Messala, seen no reason to make me retract my
opinion; nor do I believe, that my two friends here, or even you
yourself (though you sometimes affect a different tone), can seriously
maintain the opposite doctrine. The decline of eloquence is too
apparent. The causes which have contributed to it, merit a serious
enquiry. I shall be obliged to you, my friends, for a fair solution of
the question. I have often reflected upon the subject; but what seems
to others a full answer, with me serves only to increase the
difficulty. What has happened at Rome, I perceive to have been the
case in Greece. The modern orators of that country, such as the priest
[b] Nicetes, and others who, like him, stun the schools of Mytelene
and Ephesus [c], are fallen to a greater distance from Æschines and
Demosthenes, than Afer and Africanus [d], or you, my friends, from
Tully or Asinius Pollio.


XVI. You have started an important question, said Secundus, and who so
able to discuss it as yourself? Your talents are equal to the
difficulty; your acquisitions in literature are known to be extensive,
and you have considered the subject. I have no objection, replied
Messala: my ideas are at your service, upon condition that, as I go
on, you will assist me with the lights of your understanding. For two
of us I can venture to answer, said Maternus: whatever you omit, or
rather, what you leave for us to glean after you, we shall be ready to
add to your observations. As to our friend Aper, you have told us,
that he is apt to differ from you upon this point, and even now I see