Брут, или О знаменитых ораторах

As the following Rhetorical Pieces have never appeared before in the English language, I thought a Translation of them would be no unacceptable offering to the Public. The character of the Author (Marcus Tullius Cicero) is so universally celebrated, that it would be needless, and indeed impertinent, to say any thing to recommend them. The first of them was the fruit of his retirement, during the remains of the _Civil War_ in Africa; and was composed in the form of a Dialogue. It contains a few short, but very masterly sketches of all the Speakers who had flourished either in Greece or Rome, with any reputation of Eloquence, down to his own time; and as he generally touches the principal incidents of their lives, it will be considered, by an attentive reader, as a _concealed epitome of the Roman history_. The conference is supposed to have been held with Atticus, and their common friend Brutus, in Cicero's garden at Rome, under the statue of Plato, whom he always admired, and usually imitated in his dialogues: and he seems in this to have copied even his _double titles_, calling it _Brutus, or the History of famous Orators_. It was intended as a _supplement_, or _fourth book_, to three former ones, on the qualifications of an Orator. The second, which is intitled _The Orator_, was composed a very short time afterwards (both of them in the 61st year of his age) and at the request of Brutus. It contains a plan, or critical delineation, of what he himself esteemed the most finished Eloquence, or style of Speaking. He calls it _The Fifth Part, or Book_, designed to complete his _Brutus_, and _the former three_ on the same subject.…