never to use an aspirate except before a vowel, used to speak in this way:  pulcros, Cetegos, triumpos, Cartaginem; when at last, and after a long time, the truth was forced upon me by the admonition of my own ears, I yielded to the people the right of settling the rule of speaking; and was contented to reserve to myself the knowledge of the proper rules and reasons for them.  Still we say Orcivii, and Matones and Otones, Coepiones, sepulchra, coronas, lacrymas, because that pronunciation is always sanctioned by the judgment of our ears.

Ennius always used Burrum, never Pyrrhum:  he says,—­

“Vi patefecerunt Bruges;”

not Phryges; and so the old copies of his poems prove, for they had no Greek letters in them.  But now those words have two; and though when they wanted to say Phrygum and Phrygibus, it was absurd either to use a Greek character in the barbarous cases only, or else in the nominative case alone to speak Greek, still we say Phrygum and Phrygibus for the sake of harmonizing our ears.  Moreover (at present it would seem like the language of a ploughman, though formerly it was a mark of politeness) our ancestors took away the last letter of those words in which the two last letters were the same, as they are in optumus, unless the next word began with a vowel.  And so they avoided offending the ear in their verse; as the modern poets avoid it now in a different manner.  For we used to say,—­

“Qui est omnibu’ princeps,” not “omnibus princeps;”

and—­

“Vita illa, dignu’ locoquc,” not “dignus.”

But if unlettered custom is such an artist of euphony, what must we think is required by scientific art and systematic learning?

I have put all this more briefly than if I were discussing this matter by itself; (for this topic is a very extensive one, concerning the use and nature of words;) but still I have been more prolix than the plan I originally proposed to myself required.

XLIX.  But because the choice of subjects and words is in the department of prudence, but of sounds and rhythm it is the ears that are the judges; because the one is referable to one’s understanding, the other only to one’s pleasure; therefore in the one case it is reason and in the other sensation that has been the inventor of the system.  For it was necessary for us either to disregard the pleasure of those men by whom we wished to be approved of; or else it was necessary to discover a system by which to gain their good-will.

There are then two things which soothe the ears; sound and rhythm.  Concerning rhythm we will speak presently; at this moment we are inquiring into sound.  As I said before, words must be selected which as much as possible shall sound well; but they must not be, like the words of a poet, sought purely for sound, but taken from ordinary language.