M. CORNELIUS FRONTO
Phidias to produce sportive works or Canachus images of Gods, or Calamis delicate statuary or Polycletus rough handiwork? What if one bade Parrhasius paint rainbow hues or Apelles monochromes, or Nealces grand canvasses or Protogenes miniature[1] ones, or Nicias sombre pictures or Dionysius brilliant ones, or Euphranor subjects all licence or Pausias all austerity?
2. Among poets, who does not know how Lucilius is graceful,[2] Albucius dry, Lucretius sublime, Pacuvius mediocre, Accius unequal, Ennius many-sided? History, too, has been written by Sallust symmetrically by Pictor without method, by Claudius pleasantly by Antias without charm, by Sisenna[3] at length, by Cato with many words abreast by Caelius with words in single harness.[4] In harangue, again, Cato is savage, Gracchus violent, Tully copious, while at the bar Cato rages, Cicero triumphs, Gracchus riots, Calvus quarrels.
3. But perhaps you would make light of these Instances. What? have not philosophers themselves used different styles in their speaking? No one could be fuller in exposition than Zeno, more captious in argument than Socrates, more ready than Diogenes at denunciation; Heraclitus was obscure enough to mystify everything, Pythagoras wonderfully prone to give everything religious sanction with secret symbols, Clitomachus agnostic enough to call everything in question. What, pray, would your wisest of
- ↑ Hauler says this refers to detailed work and not to size.
- ↑ Aul. Gell. vii. 14, defines gracilis of style as combining venustas and subtilitas (= Greek ἰσχνός), and says Varro attributed gracilitas to Lucilius.
- ↑ As the names go in pairs, the contrast to Sisenna must have dropped out, and longinque may belong to his vis-à-vis.
- ↑ For Cato's trick of using atque . . . atque see i. p. 152.
