E ulogy of Smoke and Dust
? 139 A.D.
Fronto to his own Caesar.
The majority of readers may perhaps from the heading despise the subject, on the ground that nothing serious could be made of smoke and dust. You, with your excellent abilities, will soon see whether my labour is lost or well laid out.
But the subject seems to require a little to be said first on the method of composition, for no writing of this kind of sufficient note exists in the Roman tongue,1 except some attempts by poets in comedies or Atellane farces. Anyone who practises this kind of composition will choose out an abundance of thoughts and pack them closely and cleverly interweave them, but will not stuff in superfluously many duplicate words, nor forget to round off every sentence concisely and skilfully. It is different with forensic speeches, where we take especial care that many sentences shall end now and again somewhat roughly and clumsily. But here, on the contrary, pains must be taken that there should be nothing left uncouth and disconnected, but that everything, as in a fine robe, should be woven with borders and trimmed with edgings. Finally, as the last lines in an epigram ought to have some sparkle, so the sentence should be closed with some sort of fastening or brooch.
But the chief thing to be aimed at is to please. For this kind of discourse is not meant as a speech for the defence in a criminal trial, nor to carry a law, nor to hearten an army, nor to impassion the multitude, but for pleasantry and amusement. The topic, however, must everywhere be treated as if it were an important and splendid one, and trifling things must be likened and compared to great ones. Finally, the highest merit in this kind of discourse is an attitude of seriousness. Tales of gods or men must be brought in where appropriate; so, too, pertinent verses and proverbs that are applicable, and ingenious fictions, provided that the fiction is helped out by some witty reasoning.
One of the chief difficulties, however, is so to marshal our materials that their order may rest on logical connexion. The fault for which Plato blames Lysias in the Phaedrus, that he has mingled his thoughts in such careless confusion that the first could change places with the last and the last with the first without any loss, is one which we can only escape if we arrange our arguments in classes, and so concatenate them, not in a scattered way and indiscriminately piled together like a dish of mixed ingredients, but so that the preceding thought in some sort overlaps the subsequent one and dovetails into it; that the second thought may begin where the first left off; for so we seem to step rather than jump from one to the other.
But these do not . . . . Variety even with some sacrifice is more welcome in the discourse than a correct continuity . . . . Merry things must be severely said, brave things with a smile . . . . . . . only let that sweetness be untainted and chaste, of Tusculan and Ionian strain, that is in the style of Cato or Herodotus . . . . In every case it is easier to master the method of speaking than to possess the power of performing . . . . to wish (others) well and to pray for their welfare, things which are compassed by voice and mind without aid.
Accordingly the more generously disposed a man shews himself, the more persons will he praise, nor those only whom others before him decked with praises; but he will choose out gods and men that have been most passed by in the praises of others, and there give proofs of his generous disposition, just as a farmer shews his industry, if he sows a field never before ploughed, and a priest his devotion, if he sacrifices at a desolate and inaccessible shrine.
I will therefore praise gods who are indeed not much in evidence in the matter of praises, but are very much in evidence in the experience and life of men, Smoke and Dust, without whom neither altars, nor hearths, nor highways, as people say, nor paths can be used. But if any cavil at this, whether Smoke can be counted among gods, let him consider that Winds too are held to be gods and though they can scarcely be distinguished from Smoke, Clouds and Mists, are reckoned goddesses and are seen in the sky, and according to the poets gods "are clad in clouds,"2 and a cloud shielded from onlookers Jove and Juno as they couched.3 Again, and this is a property peculiar to the divine nature, you cannot grasp smoke in the hand any more than sunlight, nor bind nor beat nor keep it in nor, if there be the slightest chink open, shut it out . . . . . . . .4