Apollodorus Against Stephanus, Charged with False Testimony I (20-22)

It was a simple thing, men of the jury, for the one who gave this testimony to add and this is the document which the deponent exhibits, and to put the document into the box. But, I presume, he thought that this falsehood would deserve your indignation, and that you would punish him for it, whereas to testify that a document had been bequeathed to him was a trifling matter and one of no consequence. And yet it is this very thing that makes the whole matter clear, and proves that they have concocted it.

For if the inscription on the will had been the property of Pasio and Phormio or in the matter of Phormio, or something of that sort, he would naturally have kept it for him; but if, as he has testified, the inscription was the will of Pasio, I should certainly have appropriated it, knowing that I was about to go to law, and knowing further that, if its contents were as represented, it was prejudicial to my interests; for I was the heir, and if the will was my father’s, it belonged to me, as did also all the rest of my father’s estate.

Well then, by its having been produced to Phormio, by its having been inscribed the will of Pasio, and yet ignored by me, it is proved that the will is a forgery and that the testimony of Cephisophon is false. But no more of Cephisophon; it is not with him that I have to do at present, and he has given no testimony as to the contents of the will.