Institutio Oratoria

Quintilian

Quintilian. Institutio Oratoria, Volume 1-4. Butler, Harold Edgeworth, translator. Cambridge, Mass; London: Harvard University Press, William Heinemann Ltd., 1920-1922.

For sometimes, though there may be no doubt as to a term, there is a question as to what it includes, or, on the other hand, there may be no doubt about the thing, but no agreement as to the term to be applied to it. When the term is agreed, but the thing doubtful, conjecture may sometimes come into play, as, for instance, in the question,

What is god?

For the man who denies that god is a spirit permeating all things, assuredly asserts that the epithet

divine

is falsely applied to his nature, like Epicurus, who gives him a human form and makes him reside in the intermundane space. While both use the same term god, both have to employ conjecture to decide which of the two meanings is consistent with fact.

Sometimes again we have recourse to quality, as in the question,

What is
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rhetoric? Is it the power to persuade or the science of speaking well?

This form of question is of frequent occurrence in the courts. For instance, the question may arise whether a man caught in a brothel with another man's wife is an adulterer. Here there is no doubt about the name; it is the significance of the act which is in doubt, since the question is whether he has committed any sin at all. For if he has sinned, his sin can only be adultery.

There is a different type of question where the dispute is concerned with the term to be applied, which depends on the letter of the law: it is a form of question which can only arise in the courts from the actual words on which the dispute turns. Take as examples the questions, whether suicide is a form of homicide, or whether the man who forces a tyrant to kill himself can be considered a tyrannicide, or whether magical incantations are equivalent to the crime of poisoning. In all these cases there is no doubt about the facts, for it is well known that there is a difference between killing oneself and killing another, between slaying a tyrant and forcing him to suicide, between employing incantations and administering a deadly draught, but we enquire whether we are justified in calling them by the same name.

Though I hardly like to differ from Cicero, [*](cp. III. vi. 31. ) who follows many authorities in saying that definition is concerned with identity and difference (since he who denies the applicability of one term must always produce another term which he regards as preferable), for my own part I consider that definition falls into three types, which I may perhaps call species.

For at times it is convenient merely to

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enquire whether one particular term is applicable to a given thing, as in the question whether an act committed in a brothel is adultery. If we deny that it is adultery, there is no need to state what it should be called, since we have given a total denial to the charge. Secondly, there are occasions when the question is which of two terms is to be applied to a thing, as in the question whether an act is theft or sacrilege. It may be sufficient for the defence that it is not sacrilege, but it is still necessary to show what else it is, and therefore we must define both.