[Sidenote: Cicero as an orator.] Cicero’s chief ambition was to be a great orator, and he spared no pains to attain his end. Richly endowed by nature, he was not content to employ his natural gifts without careful cultivation. He studied the orators of earlier times, especially the great masters of Greek eloquence, made many translations from the Greek for the sake of perfecting his style, and was a diligent student of rhetorical theories. His conception of the proper qualities of the orator was high and noble. In the essay _De Oratore_, he makes Crassus say: Wherefore, if one wishes to define and embrace the proper power of an orator in all its extent, that man will be, in my opinion, an orator worthy of this great name, who can speak wisely, in an orderly and polished manner, from memory, and even with some dignity of action, upon whatever subject arises that needs to be set forth in speech.[39] And again: I assert that by the moderation and wisdom of the perfect orator not only his own dignity, but the welfare of very many persons and of the entire commonwealth is preserved.[40] In short, the orator should be, in Cicero’s opinion, not only a great and practised speaker, but a man of varied learning, and at the same time a man of the highest character. This was the ideal he set before himself and strove throughout his life to attain. Certainly it was no low ideal, nor was the man who strove to attain it a character to be despised. [Sidenote: Oratorical style.] Cicero’s oratorical style is always careful and finished, but is far from that monotonous smoothness which study often gives to the speech of those who are not by nature gifted orators. In the narrative parts of his speeches he is clear, straightforward, and lucid; in his arguments he is logical, incisive, and full of force; in his appeals to the feelings of his hearers he is vivid, quick and powerful, sometimes, according to the demands of the occasion, violent or pathetic. [Sidenote: Irony.] The elaborate periodic structure of his sentences is varied by many short questions or exclamations, and the habitual dignity of his utterance is softened and enlivened by frequent touches of wit, humor, and irony. So in his defence of Quintus Ligarius, who had served in the senatorial army in Africa, although he knew that Cæsar, before whom the case was argued, was perfectly acquainted with the facts, he began his speech as follows: