kind of way of arguing.  For the question is not simply what is honourable, what is expedient, what is equitable; but also by comparison, which is more honourable, which is more expedient, which is more equitable; and even which is most honourable, which is most expedient, which is most equitable.  Of which kind are those speculations, which is the most excellent dignity in life.  And all these questions, as I have said before, are parts of investigation.

There remains the question of action.  One kind of which is conversant with the giving of rules which relate to principles of duty; as, for instance, how one’s parents are to be reverenced.  And the other to tranquillising the minds of men and healing them by one’s oration; as in consoling affliction, in repressing ill-temper, in removing fear, or in allaying covetousness.  And this kind is exactly opposed to that by means of which the speaker proposes to engender those same feelings of the mind, or to excite them, which it is often requisite to do in amplifying an oration.  And these are nearly all the divisions of consultation.  XX. C.  F. I understand you.  But I should like to hear from you what in these divisions is the proper system for discovering and arranging the heads of one’s discourse.

C.  P. What?  Do you think it is a different one, and not the same which has been explained, so that everything may be deduced from the same topics, both to create belief, and to discover arguments?  But the system of arrangement which has been explained as appropriate to other kinds of speeches may be transferred to this also.

Since therefore we have now investigated the entire arrangement of the consultations which we proposed to discuss, the kinds of causes are now the principal things which remain.  And their species is twofold; one of which aims at affording gratification to the ears, while the whole object of the other is to obtain, and prove, and effect the purpose which it has in view.  Therefore the former is called embellishment, and as that may be a kind of extensive operation, and sufficiently various, we have selected one instance of it which we adopt for the purpose of praising illustrious men, and of vituperating the wicked ones.  For there is no kind of oration which can be either more fertile in its topics, or more profitable to states, or in which the orator is bound to have a more extensive acquaintance with virtues and vices.  But the other class of causes is conversant either with the foresight of the future, or with discussions on the past.  One of which topics belongs to deliberation and the other to judgment.  From which division three kinds of causes have arisen; one, which, from the best portion of it, is called that of panegyric; another that of deliberation; the third that of judicial decisions.  Wherefore let us first, if you please, discuss the first.

C.  F. Certainly, I do please.