it a sort of observation and not an art. But this opinion is not there
asserted as truth, but only to keep up the character of Antonius, who
was a connoisseur at concealing art. Lysias seems to be of the same
opinion, which he defends by saying that the most simple and ignorant
people possess a kind of rhetoric when they speak for themselves. They
find something like an exordium, they make a narration, they prove,
refute, and their prayers and entreaties have the force of a peroration.
Lysias and his adherents proceed afterward to vain subtleties. "That
which is the effect of art," say they, "could not have existed before
art. In all times men have known how to speak for themselves and against
others, but masters of rhetoric have been only of a late date, first
known about the time of Tisias and Corax; therefore oratorical speech
was prior to art, consequently it could not be the result of art, and
therefore, rhetoric is not an art." We shall not endeavor to enquire
into the time when rhetoric began to be taught, but this we may say,
that it is certain Homer makes mention not only of Phoenix, who was a
master, skilled in both speaking and fighting, but also of many other
orators. We may observe likewise from Homer, that all the parts of a
discourse are found in the speech of the three captains deputed to
Achilles, that several young men dispute for the prize of eloquence, and
that among other ornaments of sculpture on the buckler of Achilles,
Vulcan did not forget law-causes and the pleaders of them.

It will be sufficient, however, to answer that "Everything perfected by
art has its source in nature." If it were not so, we should exclude
medicine from the catalog of arts, the discovery of which was owing to
observations made on things conducive or harmful to public health, and
in the opinion of some it is wholly grounded on experiments. Before it
was reduced to an art, tents and bandages were applied to wounds, rest
and abstinence cured fever; not that the reason of all this was then
known, but the nature of the ailment indicated such curative methods and
forced men to this regimen. In like manner architecture can not be an
art, the first men having built their cottages without its direction.
Music must undergo the same charge, as every nation has its own
peculiarities in dancing and singing. Now, if by rhetoric be meant any
kind of speech, I must own it prior to art; but if not everyone who
speaks is an orator, and i