On the topic of rhetoric Machiavelli, in his introduction, stated that "I have not embellished or crammed this book with rounded periods or big, impressive words, or with any blandishment or superfluous decoration of the kind which many are in the habit of using to describe or adorn what they have produced". This has been interpreted as showing a distancing from traditional rhetoric styles, but there are echoes of classical rhetoric in several areas. In Chapter 18, for example, he uses a metaphor of a lion and a fox, examples of force and cunning; according to , "the Roman author from whom Machiavelli in all likelihood drew the simile of the lion and the fox" was Cicero. The "Rhetorica ad Herennium", a work which was believed during Machiavelli's time to have been written by Cicero, was used widely to teach rhetoric, and it is likely that Machiavelli was familiar with it. Unlike Cicero's more widely accepted works however, according to , "Ad Herennium ... offers a model of an ethical system that not only condones the practice of force and deception but appears to regard them as habitual and indeed germane to political activity". This makes it an ideal text for Machiavelli to have used.