[5]
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.
[p. 523]
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.1 The
question in its more general sense is taken to mean
everything on which two or more plausible opinions
may be advanced.
1 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.
Quintilian. With an English Translation. Harold Edgeworth Butler. Cambridge. Cambridge, Mass., Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann, Ltd. 1920.
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