The world: historical and actual . ory known tohave been written in the Greek language, were pro-duced in Sicily by Corax, Tisias and Gorgias, thelatter having transported the art to Athens, andfounded the first school of eloquence and composi-tion in Attica and Greece proper. Besides Isocratesthere was Issus, who did much as a professor of elo-cution. yEschines, of whose orations we have onlythree, was acotemporary and rival of and Quintilian pronounced him almost equalto Demosthenes. Hyperides (B. C. 396) was alsocompared with Demosthenes. We have no speci-mens of his eloq
The world: historical and actual . ory known tohave been written in the Greek language, were pro-duced in Sicily by Corax, Tisias and Gorgias, thelatter having transported the art to Athens, andfounded the first school of eloquence and composi-tion in Attica and Greece proper. Besides Isocratesthere was Issus, who did much as a professor of elo-cution. yEschines, of whose orations we have onlythree, was acotemporary and rival of and Quintilian pronounced him almost equalto Demosthenes. Hyperides (B. C. 396) was alsocompared with Demosthenes. We have no speci-mens of his eloquence. The one supreme name in Greek oratory notonly, but in the entire art of eloquence, is the onelast mentioned. Demosthenes was born in the Attictown of Paeonia, B. C. 385. He had some seri-ous natural defects of speech to overcome. Hisfirst attempt at oratory was a failure. But hewas not discouraged. His physical infirmity, stam-mering, was overcome, or turned to positive advan-tage. His powers of persuasion were almost irri-. Dimostheneb. sistible, even with a people as intelligent as theAthenians. He was a master of invective. Hisorations against Philip,the father of Alexanderthe Great, have been formore than two thousandyears, a synonym for in-vective discourse. Phi-lippics is the familiarname for that class oforations. His series ofspeeches called Con-cerning the Crown, areadmirably judicious andlofty in tone. We have sixty of his addresses, andthey have been of incalculable importance as mod-els of oratory, studied and practised in all civilizedlauds almost ever since they were pronounced. Acoward in battle, he was a true hero in debate, anda wise counselor. The claims and merits of Demos-thenes, as they have come to be estimated by thesettled judgment of mankind, may be stated thus:1. Purity in ethical character; 2. Intellectualmastery of the subject in hand; 3. The magicforce of felicitous language, thanks partly to hisown genius, and partly* to the matchless beauty
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