ions, then, are there in this part of the argument?

_C. P._ One urges either that what has been done has been lawfully
done, for the sake either of warding off or of avenging an injury, or
under pretext of piety, or chastity, or religion, or one's country, or
else that it has been done through necessity, out of ignorance, or by
chance. For those things which have been done in consequence of some
motion or agitation of the mind, without any positive intention, have,
in legal proceedings, no defence if they are impeached, though they
may have an excuse if discussed on principles unfettered by strict
rules of law. In this class of discussion, in which the question is,
what the character of the act is, one inquires, in the terms of the
controversy, whether the act has been rightly and lawfully done or
not; and the discussion on these points turns on a definition of the
before-mentioned topics.

_C. F._ Since, then, you have divided the topics to give credit to an
oration into confirmation and reprehension, and since you have fully
discussed the one, explain to me now the subject of reprehension.

_C. P._ You must either deny the whole of what the adversary has
assumed in argumentation, if you can show it to be fictitious or
false, or you must refute what he has assumed as probable. First of
all, you must urge that he has taken what is doubtful as if it were
certain; in the next place, that the very same things might be said in
cases which were evidently false; and lastly, that these things which
he has assumed do not produce the consequences which he wishes to be
inferred from them. And you must attack his details, and by that means
break down his whole argument. Instances also must be brought forward
which were overruled in a similar discussion; and you must wind up
with the complaints of the condition of the general danger, if the
life of innocent men is exposed to the ingenuity of men devoted to
calumny.

XIII. _C. F._ Since I know now whence arguments can be derived which
have a tendency to create belief, I am waiting to hear how they are
severally to be handled in speaking.

_C. P._ You seem to be inquiring about argumentation, and as to how to
develop arguments.

_C. F._ That is the very thing that I want to know.

_C. P._ The development, then, of an argument is argumentation; and
that is when you assume things which are either certain or at least
probable, from which to derive a conclusion, which taken by i