Institutio Oratoria

But all credibility, and it is with credibility that the great majority of arguments are concerned, turns on questions such as the following: whether it is credible that a father has been killed by his son, or that a father has committed incest with his daughter, or to take questions of an opposite character, whether it is credible that a stepmother has poisoned her stepchild, or that a man of luxurious life has committed adultery; or again whether a crime has been openly committed, or false evidence given for a small bribe, since each of these crimes is the result of a special cast of character as a rule, though not always; if it were

always so, there would be no room for doubt, and no argument.

Let us now turn to consider the

places

of arguments, although some hold that they are identical with the topics which I have already discussed above. [*](In previous chapter.) But I do not use this term in its usual acceptance, namely, commonplaces [*](See ii. iv. 22, v. xii. 6 and xiii. 57.) directed against luxury, adultery, and the like, but in the sense of the secret places where arguments reside, and from which they must be drawn forth.