Institutio Oratoria

The legal questions were according to Hermagoras of five kinds. First the letter of the law and its intention; the names which he gives to these are κατὰ ῥητόν and ὑπεξαίρεσις, that is to say the letter of the law and the exceptions thereto: the first of these classes is found in all writers, but the term exception is less in use. The number is completed by the ratiocinative basis and those dealing with ambiguity and contradictory laws.

Albutius adopts this classification, but eliminates competence, including it under the juridical basis. Further he holds that in legal questions there is no ratiocinative basis. I know that those who are prepared to read ancient writers on rhetoric more carefully than I have, will be able to discover yet more on this subject, but I fear that I may have been too lengthy even in saying what I have said.