M. Tullius Cicero, For Flaccus
C. D. Yonge, Ed.

[40] Let them be quiet then, and allow me to set this down as so much gain, said to turn to something else. They will not allow me to do so. For some one or other gives them a lift, and says that he, as a private person, had given him money. But this cannot possibly be endured. He who reads things from those public documents which have been in the power of the prosecutor, ought not to carry any weight with him; but, nevertheless, a formal trial appears to take place when the documents themselves, of whatever character they may be, are produced. But when a man, whom not one of you has ever seen, whom no living mortal has ever heard of only says, “I gave,” will you hesitate, O judges, to save a most noble citizen from this most unknown of Phrygians? And this very man was lately disbelieved by three honourable and worthy Roman knights, when in a case in which a man's liberty was at stake, he said that the man who was claimed was his own kinsman. How has it come about that the man who was not considered a trustworthy witness as to his own blood and family is a credible authority concerning a public injury?