| C. Titius, qui meo iudicio eo pervenisse videtur quo potuit fere Latinus orator sine Graecis litteris et sine multo usu pervenire. Huius orationes tantum argutiarum, tantum exemplorum tantum exemplorum secl. Kayser , tantum urbanitatis habent, ut paene Attico stilo scriptae esse videantur. Easdem argutias in tragoedias satis ille quidem acute, sed parum tragice transtulit. Quem studebat imitari L. Afranius poeta, homo perargutus, in fabulis quidem etiam, ut scitis, disertus. | Nearly of the same age was C. Titius, a Roman knight, who, in my judgment, arrived at as high a degree of perfection as a Roman orator was able to do, without the assistance of the Greek literature, and a good share of practice. His orations have so many delicate turns, such a number of well-chosen examples, and such an agreeable vein of politeness, that they almost seem to have been composed in the true Attic style. He likewise transferred his delicacies into his very tragedies, with ingenuity enough, I confess, but not in the tragic taste. But the poet L. Afranius, whom he studiously imitated, was a very smart writer, and, as you well know, a man of great expression in the dramatic way. |
