[8]
For debate the chief requisites are a quick and
nimble understanding and a shrewd and ready judgment. For there is no time to think; the advocate
must speak at once and return the blow almost
before it has been dealt by his opponent. Consequently while it is most important for every portion
of the case that the advocate should not merely have
given a careful study to the whole case, but that he
should have it at his fingers' ends, when he comes
to the debate it is absolutely necessary that he
should possess a thorough acquaintance with all the
persons, instruments and circumstances of time and
place involved: otherwise he will often be reduced
[p. 507]
to silence and forced to give a hurried assent to
those who prompt him as to what he should say,
suggestions which are often perfectly fatuous owing
to excess of zeal on the part of the prompter. As a
result it sometimes happens that we are put to the
blush by too ready acceptance of the foolish suggestions of another.
Quintilian. With An English Translation. Harold Edgeworth Butler. Cambridge. Cambridge, Mass., Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann, Ltd. 1921.
The Annenberg CPB/Project provided support for entering this text.
This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License.
An XML version of this text is available for download, with the additional restriction that you offer Perseus any modifications you make. Perseus provides credit for all accepted changes, storing new additions in a versioning system.