Institutio Oratoria
Quintilian
Quintilian. Institutio Oratoria, Volume 1-4. Butler, Harold Edgeworth, translator. Cambridge, Mass; London: Harvard University Press, William Heinemann Ltd., 1920-1922.
the conjectural, definitive, qualitative, quantitative and relative. Theodorus, also, as I have said, [*](§ 36.) adopts the same number of general heads, whether a thing is, what it is, of what kind it is, how great it is, and to what it refers. The last he considers to be chiefly concerned with comparison, since better and worse, greater and less
But questions of relation, as I have already pointed out, enter also into translative questions, that is, questions of competence, since in cases such as
Has this man a right to bring an action?or
Is it fitting that he should do such and such a thing, or against this man, or at this time, or in this manner?For all these questions must be referred to a certain standard.
Others hold that there are six bases: conjecture or γένεσις, quality, particularity or ἰδιότης by which word they mean definition, quantity or ἀξία, comparison and competence, for which a new term has been found in μετάστασις I call it new when applied to a basis, for Hermagoras employs it to describe a species of juridical question.
Others think there are seven, while refusing to recognise competence, quantity or comparison, in place of which they substitute four legal bases, [*](See § 46.) completing the seven by the addition of those three which they call rational. [*](Conjectural, definitive, qualitative.)
Others again make eight by the addition of competence to the above-mentioned seven. Some on the other hand have introduced a fresh method of division, reserving the name of bases for the rational, and giving the name of questions to the legal, as I mentioned above, [*](§ 46.) since in the former the problem is concerned with facts, in the latter with the letter of the law. Some on the contrary reverse this nomenclature calling the legal questions bases and the rational grounds questions.