Book 3
5.90
As regards questions of quantity, number, relation, and, as some have thought, comparison, the case is different. For these have no connexion with the complexities of the law, but are concerned with reason only. Consequently they must always be regarded as coming under conjecture or quality, as, for instance, when we ask with what purpose, or at what time, or place something was done.
5.91
But I will speak of individual questions when I come to handle the rules for division. Book VII. This much is agreed to by all writers, that one cause possesses one basis, but that as regards secondary questions related to the main issue of the trial, there may frequently be a number in one single cause.
5.92
I also think there is at times some doubt as to which basis should be adopted, when many different lines of defence are brought to meet a single charge; and, just as in regard to the complexion to be given to the statement of the facts of the case, that complexion is said to be the best which the speaker can best maintain, so in the present connexion I may say that the best basis to choose is that which will permit the orator to develop a maximum of force.
5.93
It is for this reason that we find Cicero and Brutus taking up different lines in defence of Milo. Cicero says that Clodius was justifiably killed because he sought to waylay Milo, but that Milo had not designed to kill him; while Brutus, who wrote his speech merely as a rhetorical exercise, also exults that Milo has killed a bad citizen.
