CHAPTER II.

Of Imitation.

§§ 1-3. While the command of words, figures, and arrangement is to be acquired by the study of the best authors, as recommended in the foregoing chapter, the mind must also be exercised in the imitation of all the good qualities which such authors exemplify. The place of imitation in art: a natural and universal instinct. The very ease of imitation has its dangers.

§§ 4-13. Only a dull and sluggish spirit will be content to do nothing but imitate, without inventing anything new. With our advantages of training, we are even more bound than our predecessors to progress. We ought even to surpass our models: if we confine ourselves to imitation alone, shall we ever realise the ideal in oratory? Nature herself does not achieve exact resemblance in reproduction. Moreover, there is much in oratory that is characteristic of individual speakers, and due to natural gifts: this cannot be made matter of imitation. You may imitate the language and rhythmical arrangement of a great speech; but the fashion of words changes, and as for arrangement, there must always be an adaptation of sound to sense.

§§ 14-18. Imitation is therefore a part of study in regard to which great circumspection must be used,—first in the choice of models, and, secondly, in determining 6 the good points we would seek to reproduce; for even good authors have their defects. Again, we must know the difference between superficial imitation and that in which the inner spirit is represented. In cases where only the outward manner is caught elevation becomes bombast, and simplicity carelessness; roughness of form and insipidity in substance pass for antique plainness; want of polish and point, for Attic restraint; artificial obscurity claims to rank above Sallust and Thucydides; the dull and spiritless challenge comparison with Pollio; easy-going drawlers call their diffuse periods Ciceronian, delighted if they can finish off a sentence with _Esse videatur_.

§§ 19-21. The student must consider which models his own gifts qualify him to imitate. A bold rugged style, for example, is appropriate to the form of genius which would make shipwreck by an excessive affectation of refinement. It is of course within the province of the teacher to supply the natural defects of his pupils; but it is a far harder matter to mould and form one’s own nature. Even the teacher will not keep up a prolonged struggle against obstacles of natural disposition.

§§ 21-26. In oratory we ought not to imitate the characteristic qualities of poets and historians, and _vice versa_: each kind of composition has its own appropriate laws. Let us imitate what is common to eloquence in all its manifestations. We must adapt our style to the topic and occasion: even different parts of one and the same speech call for different treatment. And we should not blindly follow any one model exclusively.

§§ 27-28. Imitation must not be confined to words only: we should study also propriety, arrangement, exordium, narrative, argument, pathos, &c. The perfect orator, whom our age may hope to see, will be he who shall unite all the good qualities of his predecessors and reject all the bad.