But now let us come to the point, that is the actual working out. Let this working out be as follows: first, brief encomium of the sayer or doer; then paraphrase of the chria itself; then proof or explanation. For example, Isocrates said that the root of education is bitter, but its fruit sweet: (1) encomium, “Isocrates was wise,” and you will slightly develop this topic; (2) chria, “said, etc.,” and you will not leave this bare, but develop the significance; (3) proof, (a) direct, “the greatest affairs are usually established through toil, and, once established, bring happiness”; (b) by contrast, “those affairs which succeed by chance require no toil and their conclusion brings no happiness; quite the contrary with things that demand our zeal”; (c) by illustration, “as the farmers who toil ought to reap the fruit, so with speeches”; (d) by example, “Demosthenes, who shut himself up in his room and labored much, finally reaped his fruit, crowns and public proclamations.” (e) You may also cite authority, as “Hesiod says, ‘Before virtue the gods have put sweat’; and another poet says, ‘The gods sell all good things for labor.’” (4) Last you will put an exhortation to follow what was said or done. So much for now; fuller instructions you will learn later. PROVERB A proverb is a summary saying, in a statement of general application, dissuading from something or persuading toward something, or showing what is the nature of each: dissuading, as in that line “a counsellor should not sleep all night”; persuading, as in the lines “he who flees poverty, Cyrnus, must cast himself upon the monster-haunted deep and down steep crags.” Or it does neither of these, but makes a declaration concerning the nature of the thing: “Faring well undeservedly is for the unintelligent the beginning of thinking ill.” Again, some proverbs are true, others plausible; some simple, others compound, others hyperbolic: (1) true, such as “no one can find a life without pain”; (2) plausible, such as “never have I asked what manner of man takes pleasure in bad company, knowing that birds of a feather flock together”; (3) simple, such as “wealth may make men even benevolent”; (4) compound, such as “no good comes of many rulers; let there be one”; (5) hyperbolic, such as “earth breeds nothing feebler than man.”