Book 7
2.29
I will, however, quote a passage from the pro Caecina XV. 44. in which Cicero includes brief proofs drawn from origins, causes, effects, antecedents and consequents: Why then did they fly? Because they were afraid. What were they afraid of? Obviously of violence. Can you then deny the beginning, when you have admitted the end? But he also argued from similarity: XV. 43. Shall not that which is called violence in war be called violence in peace as well Arguments may also be drawn from contraries, as for instance in the question whether a love-potion can be a poison, in view of the fact that a poison is not a love-potion. In order that my young students (and I call them mine, because the young student is always dear to me) may form a clearer conception of this second kind of definition, I will once more quote a fictitious controversial theme.
2.31
Some young men who were in the habit of making merry together decided to dine on the sea-shore. One of their party failed to put in an appearance, and they raised a tomb to him and inscribed his name thereon. His father on his return from overseas chanced to land at this point of the shore, read the name and hung himself. It is alleged that the youths were the cause of his death.
