The first object of this book is to offer a contribution to a chapter in the history of Greek Literature which has perhaps received less attention than its importance deserves. The oratorical branch of Attic prose has a more direct and more fruitful relation to the general development than modern analogies would suggest. To trace the course of Athenian oratory from its beginnings as an art to the days of its decline is, necessarily, to sketch the history of Greek prose expression in its most widely influential form, and to show how this form was affected by a series of causes, political or social.

The second object of the book is to supply an aid to the particular study of the Attic orators before Demosthenes. The artistic development of Attic oratory is sketched as a whole. But a separate and minute treatment is given only to Antiphon, Andokides, Lysias, Isokrates and Isaeos. The period thus specially determined has more than a correspondence with a practical need: it has an inner unity, resting on grounds which are stated in the Introduction and which are illustrated at each stage of the subsequent inquiry.

As regards the former and larger of these two purposes, the writer may venture to hope that his attempt, however imperfect, will be recognised at least as one for which, in this country, there is room. The History of Greek Literature by Otfried Müller— translated and continued by Donaldson—had been carried only to Isokrates when the author died, at the early age of forty-three, in 1840.