Julian

Wilmer Cave Wright

Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: PANEGYRIC IN HONOUR OF THE EMPEROR CONSTANTIUS I Have long desired, most mighty Emperor, to sing the praises of your valour and achievements, to recount your campaigns, and to tell how you suppressed the tyrannies; how your persuasive eloquence drew away one usurper's1 bodyguard; how you overcame another2 by force of arms. But the vast scale of your exploits deterred me, because what I had to dread was not that my words would fall somewhat short of your achievements, but that I should prove wholly unequal to my theme. That men versed in political debate, or poets, should find it easy to compose a panegyric on your career is not at all surprising. Their practice in speaking, their habit of declaiming in public supplies them abundantly with a well-warranted confidence. But those who have neglected this field and chosen another branch of literary study which devotes itself to a form of composition little adapted to win popular favour and that has not the hardihood to exhibit itself in its nakedness in every theatre, no matter what, would naturally hesitate to make speeches of the epideictic sort. As for the poets, their Muse, and the general belief that it is she who inspires their verse, obviously gives them unlimited 1 Vetranio, 2 Magnentius, i rrjv eovcriav Tov TrXacr/iaro?1 rot? prfropcri Be r/ Te%w) rrjV lrrv Trapeaev aBeiav, To [lev 7rXaTTe dj)o/u,evr), To Be KOa,Keveii' ovBa/J.af dirayopevcraaa, ovBe alcrvvrjv 0/10X07011- /j,evf]v To) eyovTL To T/reuSw? 1 eiraivelv roi/9 ov/c aiot/5 eiraivov Kpivava. aX' 01 p,ev eireiSav icaivov Ttva fjivdov Koi /ArjoeTTW rot? Ttpoadev eTTivorjBevTa avrol vvQevres, To %evu Tow aicovovTa; C TTiov davfdovraf ol Se Tt)? tnroavffai (facnv ev To Bvvaaffai fu/cpuv /4ei%6vci); oie6eiv, ical To /j,eye Twv epycav T 6j(a, ical 0X0)9 .....

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