§5.11.12maius minoris, pro Milone, negant intueri lucem esse fas ei qui a se hominem occisum esse fateatur.
An example of the greater from the less is in the speech for Milo: "They deny that it is lawful for him to look upon the light who confesses that a man has been slain by him.
in qua tandem urbe hoc homines stultissimi disputant? nempe in ea quae primum iudicium de capite vidit M. Horatii, fortissimi viri, qui nondum libera civitate tamen populi Romani comitiis liberatus est, cum sua mann sororem esse interfectam fateretur. minus maioris: occidi, occidi, non Spurium Maelium, qui annona levanda iacturisque rei familiaris, quia nimis amplecti plebem videbatur, in suspicionem incidit regni adfectandi, et cetera, deinde, sed eum (auderet enim dicere, cum patriam periculo liberasset) cuius nefandum adulterium in pulvinaribus, et totus in Clodium locus.
In what city, pray, do these most foolish men dispute this? Surely in that which saw the first trial concerning the life of Marcus Horatius, a most brave man, who, although the state was not yet free, was nevertheless acquitted by the assembly of the Roman people, though he confessed that his sister had been killed by his own hand." An example of the less from the greater: "I have slain, I have slain, not Spurius Maelius, who, by lowering the price of grain and sacrificing his family property, because he seemed to embrace the plebeians too much, fell into suspicion of aiming at royal power, and so forth," and then, "but him (for he would dare to say so when he had freed his country from danger) whose unspeakable adultery in the chapels," and the whole passage against Clodius.
§5.11.13dissimile plures causas habet, fit enim genere, modo, tempore, loco, ceteris, per quae fere omnia Cicero praeiudicia, quae de Cluentio videbantur facta, subvertit;
A dissimilar example has more causes; for it occurs in kind, manner, time, place, and other things, by almost all of which Cicero subverted the prejudgments which seemed to have been made concerning Cluentius.
contrario vero exemplo censoriam notam laudando censorem Africanum, qui eum, quem peierasse conceptis verbis palam dixisset, testimonium etiam pollicitus, si quis contra diceret, nullo accusante, traducere equum passus esset;
On the contrary, indeed, by an opposite example, he overthrew the censorial mark by praising the censor Africanus, who had permitted him, whom he had openly declared to have committed perjury in set terms, even promising his testimony if anyone should speak to the contrary, to lead his horse past when no one accused him.
quae, quia erant longiora, non suis verbis exposui.
These things, because they were rather long, I have set forth not in his own words.
§5.11.14breve autem apud Vergilium contrarii exemplum est:
"
at non ille, satum quo te mentiris, Achilles
talis in hoste fuit Priamo. " §5.11.15quaedam autem ex iis, quae gesta sunt, tota narrabimus, ut Cicero pro Milone: pudicitiam cum eriperet militi tribunus militaris in exercitu C. Marii, propinquus eius imperatoris, interfectus ab eo est, cui vim adferebat.
But a short example of the contrary is in Virgil: "But not that Achilles, from whom you falsely claim you are sprung, was such toward his enemy Priam." But some of those things which have been done we shall narrate in full, as Cicero in the speech for Milo: "When a military tribune in the army of Gaius Marius, a relative of that general, was attempting to violate a soldier, he was killed by the one to whom he was offering violence.
facere enim probus adolescens periculose quam perpeti turpiter maluit; atque hunc ille summus vir scelere solutum periculo liberavit. §5.11.16quaedam significare satis erit, ut idem ac pro eodem: neque enim posset Ahala ille Servilius aut P. Nasica aut L. Opimius aut me consule senatus non nefarius haberi, si sceleratos interfici nefas esset. haec ita dicentur, prout nota erunt vel utilitas causae aut decor postulabit.
For the honest youth preferred to act dangerously than to suffer shamefully; and that greatest of men freed him from danger, absolved of crime." Some things it will be enough to point out, as the same author and in the same speech: "For neither could that Servilius Ahala, or Publius Nasica, or Lucius Opimius, or the senate during my consulship, be considered other than wicked, if it were unlawful for wicked men to be killed." These things will be said in this way, as they are known, or as the utility of the cause or propriety shall demand.
§5.11.17eadem ratio est eorum, quae ex poeticis fabulis ducuntur, nisi quod iis minus adfirmationis adhibetur; cuius usus qualis esse deberet, idem optimus auctor ac magister eloquentiae ostendit.
The same principle applies to those things which are drawn from poetic fables, except that less affirmation is applied to them; what its use ought to be, the same best author and teacher of eloquence has shown.
§5.11.18nam huius quoque generis in eadem oratione reperietur exemplum itaque hoc, iudices, non sine causa etiam fictis fabulis doctissimi homines memoriae prodiderunt, eum, qui patris ulciscendi causa matrem necauisset, variatis hominum sententiis, non solum divina sed sapientissimae deae sententia liberatum. §5.11.19illae quoque fabellae, quae, etiamsi originem non ab Aesopo acceperunt (nam uidetur earum primus auctor Hesiodus), nomine tamen Aesopi maxime celebrantur, ducere animos solent praecipue rusticorum et imperitorum, qui et simplicius, quae ficta sunt, audiunt, et capti voluptate facile iis quibus delectantur consentiunt: siquidem et Menenius Agrippa plebem cum patribus in gratiam traditur reduxisse nota ilia de membris humanis adversus ventrem discordantibus fabula.
For an example of this kind also will be found in the same speech: "And so this, judges, not without cause, even by fictitious fables, most learned men have handed down to memory, that he who had slain his mother for the sake of avenging his father, when the opinions of men varied, was acquitted not only by a divine sentence but by that of the wisest goddess." Those little fables also, which, even if they did not receive their origin from Aesop (for Hesiod seems to be their first author), are nevertheless celebrated chiefly under the name of Aesop, are accustomed to draw the minds especially of rustic and unlearned men, who both hear what is fictitious more simply and, captured by pleasure, easily agree with those things in which they take delight. Indeed, Menenius Agrippa is handed down to have reconciled the plebeians with the patricians by that well-known fable of the human members disagreeing against the belly.
§5.11.20et Horatius ne in poemate quidem humilem generis huius usum putavit in illis versibus, Quod dixit uulpes aegroto cauta leoni. Αἶνον Graeci vocant et αἰσωπείους ut dixi, λόγους et λιβυκούς; nostrorum quidam, non sane recepto in usum nomine, apologationem.
And Horace did not think the use of this kind humble even in a poem, in those verses: "What the cunning fox said to the sick lion." The Greeks call it "ainos", and, as I said, "Aesopian" or "Libyan" tales; some of our writers, though the name is certainly not received into common use, call it "apologatio".
§5.11.21cui confine est παροιμίας genus illud, quod est velut fabella brevior et per allegorian accipitur: non nostrum inquit onus; bos clitellas. §5.11.22proximas exempli vires habet similitudo, praecipue illa, quae ducitur citra ullam translationum mixturam ex rebus paene paribus: ut, qui accipere in Campo consuerunt, iis candidatis, quorum nummos suppressos esse putant, inimicissimi solent esse, sic eiusmodi indices infesti tum reo venerunt.
Bordering on this is that kind of "paroimia", which is like a shorter fable and is understood allegorically: "Not our burden," he says, "the ox carries the pack-saddle." Similitude has powers closest to an example, especially that which is drawn without any mixture of metaphors from almost equal things: "Just as those who are accustomed to receive bribes in the Campus are accustomed to be most hostile to those candidates whose money they think has been withheld, so judges of that kind came hostile to the defendant at that time."