But he soon found
that in that way if he used again the very words of his author
he got no advantage, and if he used other language of his
own, the author had already occupied the ground with the best
expression, and he was left with the second best. So he gave
up the practice and adopted instead that of translating from
the Greek.
But to go back to what makes an orator. As I have said,
his object is to excite the emotions which, being excited, will
be most likely to impel his audience to think or act as he
desires. He must never disgust them, he must never excite
their contempt. He can use to great advantage the most varied
learning, the profoundest philosophy, the most compelling
logic. He must master the subject with which he has to deal,
and he must have knowledge adequate to illustrate and adorn
it. When every other faculty of the orator is acquired, it
sometimes almost seems as if the voice were nine-tenths, and
everything else but one-tenth, of the consummate orator. It
is impossible to overrate the importance to his purpose of
that matchless instrument, the human voice.
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