For it is obviously necessary to propound what you are going to prove as well as to conclude. Why then, if proposition is a part of a speech, should not conclusion be also? Partition on the other hand is merely one aspect of arrangement, and arrangement is a part of rhetoric itself, and is equally distributed through every theme of oratory and their whole body, just as are invention and style.

Consequently we must regard partition not as one part of a whole speech, but as a part of each individual question that may be involved. For what question is there in which an orator cannot set forth the order in which he is going to make his points? And this of course is the function of partition. But how ridiculous it is to make each question an aspect of proof, but partition which is an aspect of a question a part of the whole speech.

As for digression (egressio, now more usually styled excessus ), if it lie outside the case, it cannot be part of it, while, if it lie within it, it is merely an accessory or ornament of that portion of the case from which digression is made. For if anything that lies within the case is to be called part of it, why not call argument, comparison, commonplace, pathos, illustration parts of the case?

On the other hand I disagree with those who, like Aristotle, Rhet. ii. 26. would remove refuation from the list on the ground that it forms part of the proof: for the proof is constructive, and the reputation destructive. Aristotle Rhet. iii. 13. also introduces another slight novelty in making proposition, not statement of facts, follow the exordium. This however he does because he regards proposition as the genus and statement of facts as the species, with the result that he holds that, whereas the former is always and everywhere necessary, the latter may sometimes be dispensed with.

It is however necessary to point out as regards these five parts which I have established, that that which has to be spoken first is not necessarily that which requires our first consideration. But above all we must consider the nature of the case, the question at issue and the arguments for and against. Next we must consider what points are to be made, and what refuted, and then how the facts are to be stated.

For the stalement of facts is designed to prepare the way for the proofs and must needs be unprofitable, unless we have first determined what proofs. are to be promised in the statement. Finally we must consider how best to win the judge to take our view. For we cannot be sure until we have subjected all the parts of the case to careful scrutiny, what sort of impression we wish to make upon the judge: are we to mollify him or increase his severity, to excite or relax his interest in the case, to render him susceptible to influence or the reverse?

I cannot however approve the view of those who think that the exordium should actually be written last. For though we must collect all our material and determine the proper place for each portion of it, before we begin to speak or write, we must commence with what naturally comes first.

No one begins a portrait by painting or modelling the feet, and no art finds its completion at the point where it should begin. Otherwise what will happen if we have not time to write our speech? Will not the result of such a reversal of the proper order of things be that we shall be caught napping? We must therefore review the subject-matter in the order laid down, but write our speech in the order in which we shall deliver it.

X. Every cause in which one side attacks and the other defends consists either of one or more controversial questions. In the first case it is called simple, in the second complex. An example of the first is when the subject of enquiry is a theft or an adultery taken by itself. In complex cases the several questions may all be of the same kind, as in cases of extortion, or of different kinds, as when a man is accused at one and the same time of homicide and sacrilege. Such cases no longer arise in the public courts, since the praetor allots the different charges to different courts in accordance with a definite rule; but they still are of frequent occurrence in the Imperial or Senatorial courts, and were frequent in the days when they came up for trial before the people. In the permanent courts ( quaestiones perpetuae ). There were separate courts for, different offences. In cases brought before the Senate or the Emperor a number of different charges might be dealt with at once. Private suits again are often tried by one judge, who may have to determine many different points of law.

There are no other species of forensic causes, not even when one person brings the same suit on the same grounds against two different persons, or two persons bring the same suit against one, or several against several, as occasionally occurs in lawsuits about inheritances. Because although a number of parties may be involved, there is still only one suit, unless indeed the different circumstances of the various parties alter the questions at issue.

There is however said to be a third and different class, the comparative. Questions of comparison frequently require to be handled in portions of a cause, as for instance in the centum viral court, A civil court specially concerned with questions of inheritance. when after other questions have been raised the question is discussed as to which of two claimants is the more deserving of an inheritance. It is rare however for a case to be brought into court on such grounds alone, as in divinations Divinatio is a trial to decide between the claims of two persons to appear as accuser, there being no public prosecutor at Rome. cp. Cicero's Divinatio in Caecilium. which take place to determine who the accuser shall be, and occasionally when two informers dispute as to which has earned the reward.

Some again have added a fourth class, namely mutual accusation, which they call ἀντικατηγορία Others, however, regard it as belonging to the comparative group, to which indeed the common case of reciprocal suits on different grounds bears a strong resemblance. If this latter case should also be called ἀντικατηγορία (for it has no special name of its own), we must divide mutual accusation into two classes, in one of which the parties bring the same charge against each other, while in the other they bring different charges. The same division will also apply to claims.

As soon as we are clear as to the kind of cause on which we are engaged, we must then consider whether the act that forms the basis of the charge is denied or defended, or given another name or excepted from that class of action. Thus we determine the basis of each case.

XI. As soon as these points are ascertained, the next step, according to Hermagoras, should be to consider what is the question at issue, the line of defence, the point for the judge's decision and the central point, or, as others call it, the foundation of the case. This highly technical chapter will be largely unintelligible to those who have not read chapter vi. Those who have no stomach for such points would do well to skip §§ 1–20; they will however find consolation in § 21 sqq., where Quintilian says what he really thinks of such technicalities. The question in its more general sense is taken to mean everything on which two or more plausible opinions may be advanced.

In forensic subjects however it must be taken in two senses: first in the sense in which we say that a controversial matter involves many questions, thereby including all minor questions; secondly in the sense of the main question on which the case turns. It is of this, with which the basis originates, that I am now speaking. We ask whether a thing has been done, what it is that has been done, and whether it was rightly done.

To these Hermagoras and Apollodorus and many other writers have given the special name of questions; Theodorus on the other hand, as I have already said, calls them general heads, while he designates minor questions or questions dependent on these general heads as special heads. For it is agreed that question may spring from question, and species be subdivided into other species.

This main question, then, they call the ζήτημα. The line of defence is the method by which an admitted act is defended. I see no reason why I should not use the same example to illustrate this point that has been used by practically all my predecessors. Orestes has killed his mother: the fact is admitted. He pleads that he was justified in so doing: the basis will be one of quality, the question, whether he was justified in his action, the line of defence that Clytemnestra killed her husband, Orestes' father. This is called the αἴτιον or motive. The point for the decision of the judge is known as the κρινόμενον and in this case is whether it was right that even a guilty mother should be killed by her son.

Some have drawn a distinction between αἴτιον and αἰτίαν making αἴτιον mean the cause of the trial, namely the murder of Clytemnestra, αἰτία the motive urged in defence, namely the murder of Agamemnon. But there is such lack of agreement over these two words, that some make αἰτία the cause of the trial and αἴτιον the motive of the deed, while others reverse the meanings. If we turn to Latin writers we find that some have given these causes the names of initinum, the beginning, and ratio, the reason, while others give the same name to both.