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Would you even do this, O Fannius? And if you were able to receive
such profits, would you not act with all your gestures, and even at the risk of your
life? Say now that you have been cheated of fifty thousand sesterces by Roscius, who has refused such enormous sums, not because he
was too indolent to labour for them, but out of a magnificence of liberality. What now
shall I say of these things which I know to a certainty occur to your minds, O judges?
Roscius cheated you in a partnership. There are laws, there are formularies 1 established for
every case, that no one may make a blunder, either as to the legal description of injury
which he has suffered, or as to the sort of action he should bring; for public formulae
have been given by the praetor to suit every evil, or vexation, or inconvenience, or
calamity, or injury which any one can suffer and to them each private action is adapted.
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1 “As the formulae comprehended, or were supposed to comprehend, every possible form of action that could be required by a plaintiff; it was presumed that he could find among all the formulae some one which was adapted to his case; and he was accordingly supposed to be without excuse if he did not take pains to select the proper formula.”—Cic. pro Rosc. Com. 8. Smith, Dict. Ant. p. 9, v. Actio.
M. Tullius Cicero. The Orations of Marcus Tullius Cicero, literally translated by C. D. Yonge. London. George Bell & Sons. 1903.
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