[68]
does in the pro
Caecina, when he asks, “If this is not the point at issue,
what is?” For thus all other points are eliminated at
one swoop. Or again two contrary propositions may be
advanced, either of which if established would suffice
[p. 239]
to prove the case. Take the following example
from Cicero:1 “There can be no one so hostile to
Cluentius as not to grant me one thing: if it be a
fact that the verdict then given was the result of
bribery, the bribes must have proceeded either
from Habitus or Oppianicus: if I show that they
did not proceed from Habitus I prove that they
proceeded from Oppianicus: if I demonstrate that
they were given by Oppianicus, I clear Habitus.”
1 pro Cluent. xxiii. 64.
Quintilian. With An English Translation. Harold Edgeworth Butler. Cambridge. Cambridge, Mass., Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann, Ltd. 1921.
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