Candidatus Rhetoricae (or Novus Candidatus).

Abstract

This little book is a find whatever it finally turns out to be! For now it seems to be a Jesuit collegium text in rhetoric following the Progymnasmata of Aphthonius. If one works from the back of the book, there is an apparently independent 48-page work, Angelus Pacis by Nicolas Caussini (Latinized name), S.J. The rest of the book seems to be a commentary on or presentation of Aphthonius' Progymnasmata in 3 parts covering 435 pages, followed by a T of C and an AI, which is often one page off. Pars II is titled Rhetoricae Praecepta, Pars III De Panegyrico seu Laudatione. Pars I seems to be Apparatus ad Fabulam et Narrationem. Fable is handled on 15-31. After the famous Greek definition of Theion done into Latin ( sermo falsus veritatem effingens ), the author distinguishes rational (human) and moral (animal) fables, with mixed fables including both. He holds (19) that the sense of the fable generally needs to be expressed; otherwise people often miss the point of a fable. His Latin for promythium is praefabulatio, for epimythium affabulatio. Apologus and parabola are identical for him with fabula. After describing the qualities and uses of fables, the author presents some nine fables that exemplify various levels of style, twice telling the same stories on two levels (WL and FC). The last example is of the florid style: The Silkworm and the Spider takes four pages to tell! I found this book sitting in a box of disparate, unmarked, old books. It pays to look!