QUINTILIANO VS. CICERONE: PER UNA DEFINIZIONE DELLA RETORICA IN QUINT. INST. II 15*

Abstract

Quintilian stated in the second book of the Institutio oratoria that the purpose
of rhetoric does not consist in persuading but in bene dicere. In this passage, he not only cor-
rected the false opinions that were circulating on the doctrine of Plato, but he refuted what
Cicero had argued in his Rhetorici libri on this topic. Quintilian illustrated his point with
examples drawn from the works of Cicero.