The generation which followed Cicero, represented by Asinius Pollio and Messala, revolted completely against Cicero’s ornate prose and adopted the plain, matter-of-fact speech which was called Atticistic. Again it seems to me not only incorrect but contrary to the penetrating observations of Tacitus[42] to attribute this revolt to the victory of a stylistic theory. Calvus, to be sure, represented the new style in a few speeches as early as 58 B.C. when he was but twenty-four years of age; Calidius began to speak earlier, but whether or not in the new manner is unknown. Brutus, controlled by a temperamental bluntness, supported the same tendency a few years later. But these men would not have been able to undermine the power of Ciceronian style had not events worked in their favor. It was the dominating political influence of Caesar that did the work. The first blow was Caesar’s quiet introduction of stenographers into the senate in 59. By publishing the minutes of the senatorial proceedings he compelled the speakers to consider the outside public, to drop the orotund periods addressed to their colleagues alone, and to confine themselves to pertinent details. Caesar himself had no time to waste on model orations. When opposed by the senate he carried his bills to the assembly to which he put his arguments in plain and pithy sentences. Cicero had scented the meaning of these effects enough to feel the need of stating his doctrine in full in the _De Oratore_ published in 55, and Calvus and Calidius were quietly profiting by the new trend. Presently, in 52, the triumvirs closed the second nursery of ornate prose, by passing a bill which severely limited the time of pleas in court. The purpose was, of course, to expedite the business of the overburdened courts, but the act reveals once more that the new politics were concerned with getting results, not with encouraging a time-consuming oratory. Two years later Caesar crossed the Rubicon, and thereafter, so long as Caesar lived, addresses in the senate all partook of the nature of business-like reports in committees that met before a curt presiding officer; and in the courts, whose judges were now appointed by Caesar, persuasive oratory gave way to a rapid estimation of facts.