Institutio Oratoria

Some hold that the statement of facts should always begin by referring to some person, whom we must

praise if he is on our side, and abuse if he is on the side of our opponents. It is true that this is very often done for the good reason that a law-suit must take place between persons.

Persons may however also be introduced with all their attendant circumstances, if such a procedure is likely to prove useful. For instance,

The father of my client, gentlemen, was Aulus Cluentius Habitus, a man whose character, reputation and birth made him the leading man not only in his native town of Larinum, but in all the surrounding district.

[*](pro Cluent. v. 11. )

Or again they may be introduced without such circumstances, as in the passage beginning

For Quintus Ligarius etc.

[*](pro Lig. i. 2. ) Often, too, we may commence with a fact as Cicero does in the pro Tullio [*](pro Tull. vi. 14. ) :

Marcus Tullius has a farm which he inherited from his father in the territory of Thurium,

or Demosthenes in the speech in defence of Ctesiphonl, [*](§ 18.) —

On the outbreak of the Phocian war.