Pro Fonteio

What, then, are the opportunities which wisdom has of distinguishing itself? When can a foolish and credulous auditor be distinguished from a scrupulous and discerning judge? When, forsooth, the statements which are made by the witnesses are committed to his conjectures, to his opinion, as to the authority, the impartiality of mind, the modesty; the good faith, the scrupulousness, the regard for a fair reputation, the care, and the fear with which they are made. Or will you, in the case of the testimonies of barbarians, hesitate to do what very often within our recollection and that of our fathers, the wisest judges have not thought that they ought to hesitate to do with respect to the most illustrious men of our state? For they refused belief to the evidence of Cnaeus and Quintus Caepio, and to Lucius and Quintus Metellus, when they were witnesses against Quintus Pompeius, a new man; for virtuous, and noble, and valiant as they were, still the suspicion of some private object to be gamed, and some private grudge to be gratified, detracted from their credibility and authority as witnesses.

Have we seen any man, can we with truth speak of any man, as having been equal in wisdom, in dignity, in consistency, in all other virtues, in all the distinguishing qualities of honour, and genius, and splendid achievements, to Marcus Aemilius Scaurus? And yet, though, when he was not on his oath, almost the whole world was governed by his nod, yet, when he was on his oath, his evidence was not believed against Caius Fimbria, nor against Caius Memmius. They, who were the judges, were unwilling that such a road should be opened to enmities, as for every man to be able to destroy by his evidence who ever he hated. Who is there who does not know how great was the modesty, how great the abilities, how great the influence of Lucius Crassus? And yet he, whose mere conversation had the authority of evidence, could not, by his actual evidence, establish the things which he had stated against Marcus Marcellus with hostile feelings.

There was—there was in the judges of those times, O judges, a divinely-inspired and singular acuteness, as they thought that they were judges, not only of the defendant, but also of the accuser and of the witness, as to what was invented, what was brought into the case by chance or by the opportunity, what was imported into it through corruption, what was distorted by hope or by fear, what appeared to proceed from any private desire, or any private enmity. And if the judge does not embrace all these considerations in his deliberation, if he does not survey and comprehend them all in his mind,—if he thinks that whatever is said from that witness-box, proceeds from some oracle, then in truth it will be sufficient, as I have said before, for any judge to preside over this court, and to discharge this duty, who is not deaf. There will be no reason in the world for requiring any one, whoever he may be, to be either able or experienced, to qualify him for judging causes.

Had then those Roman knights, whom we ourselves have seen who have lately flourished in the republic, and in the courts, so much courage and so much vigour as to refuse belief to Marcus Scaurus when a witness; and are you afraid to disbelieve the evidence of the Volcae and of the Allobroges? If it was not right to give credence to a hostile witness, was Crassus more hostile to Marcellus, or Scaurus to Fimbria, on account of any political differences, or any domestic quarrels, than the Gauls are to Fonteius? For of the Gauls, those even who stand on the best ground have been compelled once and again, and sorely against their will, to furnish cavalry, money, and corn; and of the rest, some have been deprived of their land in ancient wars, some have been overwhelmed and subdued in war by this very man.

If those men ought not to be believed who appear to say anything covetously with a view to some private gain, I think that the Caepios and Metelli proposed to themselves a greater gain from the condemnation of Quintus Pompeius, as by that they would have got rid of a formidable adversary to all their views, than all the Gauls hoped for from the disaster of Marcus Fonteius, in which that province believed that all its safety and liberty consisted. If it is proper to have a regard to the men themselves, (a thing which in truth in the case of witnesses ought to be of the greatest weight,) is any one, the most honourable man in all Gaul to be compared, I will not say with the most honourable men of our city, but even with the meanest of Roman citizens? Does Induciomarus know what is the meaning of giving evidence? Is he affected with that awe which moves every individual among us when he is brought into that box?

Recollect, O judges, with how much pains you are accustomed to labour, considering not only what you are going to state in your evidence, but even what words you shall use, lest any word should appear to be used too moderately, or lest on the other hand any expression should appear to have escaped you from any private motive. You take pains even so to mould your countenances, that no suspicion of any private motive may be excited; that when you come forward there may be a sort of silent opinion of your modesty and scrupulousness, and that, when you leave the box, that reputation may appear to have been carefully preserved and retained.

I suppose Induciomarus, when he gave his evidence, had all these fears and all these thoughts; he, who left out of his whole evidence that most considerate word, to which we are all habituated, “I think,” a word which we use even when we are relating on our oath what we know of our own knowledge, what we ourselves have seen; and said that he knew everything he was stating. He feared, forsooth, lest he should lose any of his reputation in your eyes and in those of the Roman people; lest any such report should get abroad that Induciomarus, a man of such rank, had spoken with such partiality, with such rashness. The truth was, he did not understand that in giving his evidence there was anything which he was bound to display either to his own countrymen or to our accusers, except his voice, his countenance, and his audacity.

Do you think that those nations are influenced in giving their evidence by the sanctity of an oath, and by the fear of the immortal gods, which are so widely different from other nations in their habits and natural disposition? For other nations undertake wars in defence of their religious feelings; they wage war against the religion of every people; other nations when waging war beg for sanction and pardon from the immortal gods; they have waged war with the immortal gods themselves. These are the nations which formerly marched to such a distance from their settlements, as far as Delphi, to attack and pillage the Pythian Apollo, and the oracle of the whole world. By these same nations, so pious, so scrupulous in giving their evidence, was the Capitol besieged, and that Jupiter, under the obligations of whose name our ancestors decided that the good faith of all witnesses should be pledged.

Lastly, can anything appear holy or solemn in the eyes of those men, who, if ever they are so much influenced by any fear as to think it necessary to propitiate the immortal gods, defile their altars and temples with human victims? So that they cannot pay proper honour to religion itself without first violating it with wickedness. For who is ignorant that, to this very day, they retain that savage and barbarous custom of sacrificing men? What, therefore, do you suppose is the good faith, what the piety of those men, who think that even the immortal gods can be most easily propitiated by the wickedness and murder of men? Will you connect your own religious ideas with these witnesses? Will you think that anything is said holily or moderately by these men?