Letter 100

You write that you have read most eagerly the books of Fabianus Papirius which are entitled 'On Civil Affairs,' and that they have not answered your expectation; then, forgetting that it is a philosopher who is in question, you find fault with his style. Suppose it is as you say, and that the words pour out and are not driven home; in the first place that has its own charm, and there is a comeliness proper to a discourse that glides gently. For I think it makes a great difference whether it has fallen out or flowed. Add now this difference too, which I am about to mention. Fabianus seems to me not to let his words fall, but to pour them out; they are so copious that they are sent forth without disorder, yet move with a certain order.

He plainly confesses and prefers this, that he is not over-finished. But, as you say, the matter itself, not the mind, drew forth those words. You will find nothing slack, nothing low; the words are choice, not hunted, nor, after the fashion of this age, set against their own nature and turned inside out; yet splendid, though taken from common speech. You will find noble sentiments, expressed nobly, though not pointed into epigrams. We shall see in this man what is wanting, what is uneven, what stands out beyond the polish of our age; but when you have surveyed the whole, you will find nothing empty.

Besides, while he himself was speaking, you would have had no leisure to look at the parts, so would the whole have carried you away; and as a rule the things that please by their onset furnish less when brought to the test in the hand. But this too is much, to have caught the eyes at first sight, even if a careful contemplation is going to find something to fault.

If you ask me, he is the greater who has carried off the verdict than he who has deserved it; and I know that this man is the safer, I know that he may more boldly promise himself of the future. An anxious style does not become a philosopher; when at last will he be brave and steadfast, when will he make trial of himself in peril, who is afraid of words?

Fabianus was not careless in his style, but unconcerned. And so you will find nothing mean: the words are chosen, not snatched, nor set against their own nature and inverted after the manner of this age; splendid nonetheless, though they are taken from the open. The sentiments are honourable, magnificent, not compressed into maxims, but spoken more freely. We shall see what is too little finished, what is somewhat too low, what wants the cultivation now in use; but when you have run your eye over the whole, you will see no idle words.

Let there be lacking, by all means, the variety of marbles, and the channel of waters flowing between the bedrooms, and the poor man's cell, and whatever else luxury, not content with simple comeliness, mingles in; as the saying is, the house is sound. Add now that there is no agreement about style. Some wish it to be adorned out of the rough, some so delight in roughness that they break up on purpose even what chance has set out more smoothly, and snap off their clauses lest they answer to what was expected.

Read Cicero: his style is one; it bends its foot, supple and soft without disgrace. But, on the contrary, the style of Asinius Pollio is rugged and leaping, and ready to leave you where you least expect. In short, in Cicero everything comes to a close, in Pollio everything falls abruptly, except a very few which are bound to a fixed measure and to a single model.

Besides, you say that everything seems to you low and too little uplifted; from which fault I judge him to be free. For those things are not low but placid, and composed to the calm tenor of the mind, and undisturbed; not lowly, but level. There is wanting that platform-eloquence, and those stings sought after, and the unexpected turns of the sentences; but see how the whole, though without comeliness in its parts, is comely. Look upon his life; it is composed, glad, with no ostentation.

Bring forward someone whom you can set above Fabianus. Name Cicero, whose books pertaining to philosophy are almost as many as Fabianus's; I will yield, but it is not at once a paltry thing if something is less than the greatest. Name Asinius Pollio; I will yield, and we shall answer: in so great a matter to be eminent is to be after two. Name still more. Titus Livius, for he wrote both dialogues, which you could no more reckon to philosophy than to history, and books professedly containing philosophy; to him too I will give a place. Yet see how many he surpasses, who is conquered by three, and three most eloquent.

But he does not furnish everything: his style is not strong, though it is lofty; it is not violent nor torrential, though it is full; it is not transparent, but pure. 'You would wish,' you say, 'that something were said harshly against the vices, bravely against perils, proudly against fortune, insultingly against ambition; I want luxury to be rebuked, lust to be exposed, ungovernableness to be broken. Let there be something oratorically keen, tragically grand, comically slight.' You wish him to sit down to a petty thing, to words; he has given himself to the greatness of his matters, and is borne along with his eloquence as with a following gale, not hastening but flowing.

Without doubt the single phrases will not be looked round about, nor gathered into themselves, nor will every word rouse and prick you; I grant it. Yet the whole oration is comely, and, though there is not in it the comeliness sought after, the comeliness of itself is great. Add that there will be a man whom you would prefer to him; but you would not prefer those who follow.

I do not doubt that his writings are such, even though I remember them rather than hold them, and the colour of them clings to me not from a recent and familiar acquaintance, but summarily, as is wont from an old knowledge. When I heard him, at any rate, such things seemed to me, not solid but full, such as would lift up a young man of good disposition and call him forth to imitation of himself without despair of conquering, which seems to me the most effective kind of exhortation. For he discourages who has roused the desire of imitating and taken away the hope. For the rest, he abounded in words, magnificent in the whole without the commendation of single parts. Farewell.