18
Now accusations and lies can be indulged in at will, as they are at the command of each one of us. But that what never happened should be transformed into fact, that an innocent man should be transformed into a criminal is not, I feel, a matter which depends upon the eloquence of the prosecution; it is a question of what is right and what is true. Admittedly, with a deliberately planned murder, carried out in secret and with none to witness it, the truth can only be determined from the accounts given by the prosecutor and the defendant, and from them alone; their statements must be followed up with care and suspected on the slightest grounds and the final verdict must necessarily be the result of conjecture rather than certain knowledge.
19
But in the present instance, the prosecution themselves admit to begin with that the boy’s death was not due to premeditation or design: and secondly, everything which happened happened publicly and before numerous witnesses, men and boys, free men and slaves, who would have ensured the complete exposure of the criminal, had there been one, and the instant refutation of anyone who accused an innocent person.Antiph. 6.19 in the Greek consists of an intricate dependent clause without a main verb to complete the grammatical construction. By the time ἐξελέγχοιτο has been reached, the initial ὅπου has been forgotten.
