Institutio Oratoria

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.

The definition produced by the accuser will run as follows:

The man whose act leads to another's death is the cause of his death.

He who wittingly commits an act which must necessarily lead

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to another's death, is the cause of his death.

You were the cause of his death, for it was your act that led to his death: but for your act he would still be alive.

To which the accused might answer,

It does not necessarily follow that the man whose act leads to another's death should be condemned forthwith. Were this so, the accuser, witnesses and judges in a capital case would all be liable to condemnation. Nor is the cause of death always a guilty cause. Take for instance the case of a man who persuades another to go on a journey or sends for his friend from overseas, with the result that the latter perishes in a shipwreck, or again the case of a man who invites another to dine, with the result that the guest dies of indigestion. Nor is the act of the young men to be regarded as the sole cause of death. The credulity of the old man and his inability to bear the shock of grief were contributory causes. Finally, had lie been wiser or made of sterner stuff, he would still be alive. Moreover the young men acted without the least thought of doing harm, and the father might have suspected from the position of the tomb and the traces of haste in its construction that it was not a genuine tomb. What ground then is there for condemning them, for everything else that constitutes homicide is lacking save only the contributory act?

Sometimes we have a settled definition on which both parties are agreed, as in the following example from Cicero: [*](Part. Or. xxx. 105. maiestatem iminuere = to commit lèse-majesté or treason. )

Majesty resides in the dignity of the Roman power and the Roman people.