Kitap 3
2.3
Wherefore we should give our language a foreignIt is impossible to find a satisfactory English equivalent for the terms ξένος, ξενικός, τὸ ξενίζον, as applied to style. Foreign does not really convey the idea, which is rather that of something opposed to home-like,—out-of-the-way, as if from abroad. Jebb suggests distinctive. air; for men admire what is remote, and that which excites admiration is pleasant. In poetry many things conduce to this and there it is appropriate; for the subjects and persons spoken of are more out of the common. But in prose such methods are appropriate in much fewer instances, for the subject is less elevated; and even in poetry, if fine language were used by a slave or a very young man, or about quite unimportant matters, it would be hardly becoming; for even here due proportion consists in contraction and amplification as the subject requires.
2.4
Wherefore those who practise this artifice must conceal it and avoid the appearance of speaking artificially instead of naturally; for that which is natural persuades, but the artificial does not. For men become suspicious of one whom they think to be laying a trap for them, as they are of mixed wines. Such was the case with the voice of Theodorus as contrasted with that of the rest of the actors; for his seemed to be the voice of the speaker, that of the others the voice of someone else.
2.5
Art is cleverly concealed when the speaker chooses his words from ordinary languageCp. Hor. AP. 46, where it is said that the choice and use of words requires subtlety and care, skill in making an old word new by clever combination (callida iunctura) being especially praised. and puts them together like Euripides, who was the first to show the way.
