s long as it is used only once. If repeated or often
renewed it then makes the rhythm conspicuous and too remarkable. If
we use these changes, numerous and varied as they are, it will not be
seen how much of our rhythm is the result of study, and we shall avoid
wearying our hearers.

LXV. And because it is not only rhythm which makes a speech
rhythmical, but since that effect is produced also by the arrangement
of the words, and by a kind of neatness, as has been said before, it
may be understood by the arrangement when words are so placed that
rhythm does not appear to have been purposely aimed at, but to have
resulted naturally, as it is said by Crassus:--

"Nam ubi libido dominatur innocentiae leve praesidium est."

For here the order of the words produces rhythm without any apparent
design on the part of the orator. Therefore, the suitable and
rhythmical sentences which occur in the works of the ancients, I mean
Herodotus, and Thucydides, and all the writers of that age, were
produced, not by any deliberate pursuit of rhythm, but by the
arrangement of the words. For there are some forms of oratory in which
there is so much neatness, that rhythm unavoidably follows. For when
like is referred to like, or contrary opposed to contrary, or when
words which sound alike are compared to other words, whatever sentence
is wound up in that manner must usually sound rhythmically. And of
this kind of sentence we have already spoken and given instances, so
that this abundance of kinds enables a man to avoid always ending a
sentence in the same manner.

Nor are these rules so strict and precise that we are unable to relax
them when we wish to. It makes a great difference whether an oration
is rhythmical--that is to say, like rhythm--or whether it consists of
nothing but rhythm. If it is the latter, that is an intolerable fault;
if it is not the former, then it is unconnected, and barbarous, and
languid.

LXVI. But since it is not only not a frequent occurrence, but actually
even a rare one, that we ought to speak in compressed and rhythmical
periods, in serious or forensic causes, it appears to follow that we
ought to consider what these clauses and short members which I have
spoken of are. For in serious causes they occupy the greater part of
the speech. For a full and perfect period consists of four divisions,
which we call members, so as to fill the ears, and not be either
shorter or longer than is just sufficient. Althou