But the Gauls deny this. But the circumstances of the case and the force of
 arguments prove it. Can then a judge refuse belief to witnesses? He not only can, but he ought,
 if they are covetous men, or angry men, or conspirators, or men utterly void of religion and
 conscience. In fact, if Marcus Fonteius is to be considered guilty just because the Gauls say
 so, what need have I of a wise judge? what need have I of an impartial judge? what need is there
 of an intelligent advocate? For the Gauls say so. We cannot deny it. If you think this is the
 duty of an able and experienced and impartial judge, that he must without the slightest
 hesitation believe a thing because the witnesses say it; then the Goddess of Safety herself
 cannot protect the innocence of brave men. But if, in coming to a decision on such matters, the
 wisdom of the judge has a wide field for its exercise in considering every circumstance, and in
 weighing each according to its importance, then in truth your part in considering the case is a
 more important and serious one than mine is in stating it. 
 For I have only to question the witness as to each circumstance once, and that, too, briefly,
 and often indeed I have not to question him at all; lest I should seem to be giving an angry man
 an opportunity of making a speech, or to be attributing an undue weight to a covetous man. You
 can revolve the same matter over and over again in your minds, you can give a long consideration
 to the evidence of one witness; and, if we have shown an unwillingness to examine any witness,
 you are bound to consider what has been our reason for keeping silence. Wherefore; if you think
 that to believe the witnesses implicitly is enjoined to a judge, either by the law or by his
 duty, there is no reason at all why one man should be thought a better or a wiser judge than
 another. For judgment formed by the mere ears is single and simple enough; it is a power given
 promiscuously to all in common, whether they are fools or wise men. What, then, are the opportunities which wisdom has of distinguishing itself?
 When can a foolish and credulous auditor be distinguished from a scrupulous and discerning
 judge? When, forsooth, the statements which are made by the witnesses are committed to his
 conjectures, to his opinion, as to the authority, the impartiality of mind, the modesty; the
 good faith, the scrupulousness, the regard for a fair reputation, the care, and the fear with
 which they are made. 
 Or will you, in the case of the testimonies of barbarians, hesitate to do what very often
 within our recollection and that of our fathers, the wisest judges have not thought that they
 ought to hesitate to do with respect to the most illustrious men of our state? For they refused
 belief to the evidence of Cnaeus and Quintus Caepio, and to Lucius and Quintus Metellus, when
 they were witnesses against Quintus Pompeius, a new man; for virtuous, and noble, and valiant as
 they were, still the suspicion of some private object to be gamed, and some private grudge to be
 gratified, detracted from their credibility and authority as witnesses. Have we seen any man, can we with truth speak of any man, as having been equal
 in wisdom, in dignity, in consistency, in all other virtues, in all the distinguishing qualities
 of honour, and genius, and splendid achievements, to Marcus Aemilius Scaurus? And yet, though,
 when he was not on his oath, almost the whole world was governed by his nod, yet, when he was on
 his oath, his evidence was not believed against Caius Fimbria, nor against Caius Memmius. They,
 who were the judges, were unwilling that such a road should be opened to enmities, as for every
 man to be able to destroy by his evidence who ever he hated. Who is there who does not know how
 great was the modesty, how great the abilities, how great the influence of Lucius Crassus? And
 yet he, whose mere conversation had the authority of evidence, could not, by his actual
 evidence, establish the things which he had stated against Marcus Marcellus with hostile
 feelings. There was—there was in the judges of those times, O
 judges, a divinely-inspired and singular acuteness, as they thought that they were judges, not
 only of the defendant, but also of the accuser and of the witness, as to what was invented, what
 was brought into the case by chance or by the opportunity, what was imported into it through
 corruption, what was distorted by hope or by fear, what appeared to proceed from any private
 desire, or any private enmity. And if the judge does not embrace all these considerations in his
 deliberation, if he does not survey and comprehend them all in his mind,—if he thinks that
 whatever is said from that witness-box, proceeds from some oracle, then in truth it will be
 sufficient, as I have said before, for any judge to preside over this court, and to discharge
 this duty, who is not deaf. There will be no reason in the world for requiring any one, whoever
 he may be, to be either able or experienced, to qualify him for judging causes.