FRONTO, THE ORATOR AND THE MAN
criticism of Seneca they find an effective place. He never grasped the fact that comparatio is not ratio. Whether he was proof against the seductive powers of the simile in the speeches which earned for him the epithets gravis and siccus we do not know, but the fragment on overseas wills is not free from this favourite device. One thing seems highly probable, that, if the bulk of Fronto's speeches should ever be recovered, we should form a much higher opinion of his abilities. As it is we can say of him, and this is surely much, that he was vir bonus dicendi peritus.
xlii
