xiv. and xv. _Ed. cit. inf._ (p. 279 _note_), pp. 154-169. Footnote 293: Ibid., xii. The so-called _Pasti Cadaveribus_. _Ed. cit. inf._, p. 126. A very little consideration will show that both these classes of composition must have had great, permanent, and not altogether [Sidenote: _Their influence on style._] good effects on style. Both dealt with hackneyed subjects, and in both success was most likely to be achieved by “peppering higher,” in various ways. The epideictic subjects suggested various forms of bombast, conceit, trick, from the use of poetical, archaic, or otherwise unfamiliar diction to the device of the mouther of whom Seneca tells us,[294] and who, declaiming on Greeks and Persians, stood a-tiptoe and cried, “I rejoice! I rejoice!” and only after a due pause explained the cause of his rejoicing. The forensic subjects tempted the racking of the brain for some new quibble, some fresh refinement or hair-splitting. Especially was this the case in the subdivision of what were called the _colores_—ingenious excuses for the parties, whence comes the special sense of our word colourable, and whereof Seneca makes a special heading, usually at the end of his articles. No pitch of mental wiredrawing, no extravagance of play on word or phrase, was too great for some declaimers, of whom a certain Murredius is Seneca’s favourite Helot. In fact, in both classes, epideictic and forensic, one can see that a plain, forcible, manly style could only be commended by a combination of very unusual genius on the part of the speaker, and still more unusual taste and receptivity on the part of the audience. Their _sophos_, their _euge_, their _belle_,[295] were much more likely to be evoked by ingenious and far-fetched conceit than by solid reasoning and Attic style, which latter, indeed, on such trite subjects were nearly impossible. Footnote 294: _Suas._, ii. 17. _His_ name, too, was Seneca; and the text is curiously worded.