A shrewd retort! Could it be otherwise?
A foolish question makes for smart replies.Origin unknown.
[42]
A change
in the tactics of defence is also often selected for
censure. For example, Attius1 in his speech against
Cluentius complains that Cicero insists on the letter
of the law, and Aeschines2 in his speech against
Ctesiphon complains that Demosthenes refuses to
consider the legal aspect of the case.
It is however necessary to issue a special warning
to declaimers that they should not put forward
objections that can easily be met or assume that
their opponent is a fool. As it is, owing to our
tendency to think that the subject-matter of our
speech may be drawn from our own fancy, florid
commonplaces and epigrams designed to bring down
the house occur to our minds with the utmost
[p. 339]
readiness, with the result that we should do well to
bear in mind the lines:
Quintilian. With An English Translation. Harold Edgeworth Butler. Cambridge. Cambridge, Mass., Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann, Ltd. 1921.
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