But I say this. If, when first Aebutius told Caecina, when in the castle, that he had collected men and armed them, and that, if he came thither, he would never go away again, Caecina had at once departed, you ought not to have doubted whether violence had been offered to Caecina. But if, as soon as he had beheld the armed men, he had then departed, you would have doubted still less. For everything is violence, which, by means of danger, either compels us to depart from any place, or prevents our approaching any place. But if you determine otherwise, take care lest what you determine amounts to this, that no violence has been offered to a man who goes away alive,—take care lest you prescribe this to all men, in all disputes about possession, to think that they have a right to do battle, and to engage in actual combat, lest, just as in battle punishments are appointed for cowards by the generals, so, in courts of justice, the cause of those men who have fled may have a worse appearance than that of those men who have striven on to the last.

As we are speaking of law and of legal disputes between men, when in these matters we speak of violence, a very little violence must be considered enough. I have seen armed men—as few as you please—that is great violence. I departed, being alarmed at the weapon of one individual; I was driven away and put to flight. If you establish this rule, there will not only be no instance here after of any one wishing to have a battle for the sake of possession, but there will be no instance even of any one resisting. But if you refuse to think anything violence where there has been no slaughter, no wounding, no bloodshed, then it will follow that men ought to be more anxious about establishing their ownership, than about saving their lives.

Come now, in the matter of violence I will make you yourself the judge, O Aebutius. Answer, if you please. Was Caecina unwilling to come on his farm, or was he unable? As you say that you opposed and repelled him, surely you will admit that he wished to do so. Can you then say that it was not violence which hindered him, when, by reason of armed men, he was unable to come to a place, when he wished to come there, and had gone out with that intention? For, if he was by no means able to do what he was exceedingly desirous to do, beyond all question some violence or other hindered him, or else tell me why, when he wished to come on the land, he did not come.

Now, then, you cannot deny that violence was offered. The question now is, how he was driven away who was prevented from approaching. For a man who is driven away must manifestly be removed and thrust down from the place which he is occupying. And how can that happen to a man who absolutely never was in the place at all from which he says that he was driven? What shall we say? If he had been there, and if under the influence of fear, he had fled from the place when he saw the armed men, would you then say that he had been driven away? I think so. Will you then, who decide disputes with such care and such subtlety, by expressions and not by equity,—you who interpret laws, not by the common advantage of the citizen, but by their letter,—will you be able to say that a man has been driven away who has never been touched? What! Will you say that he has been thrust down from his place? For that was the word which the praetors used formerly to use in their interdicts. What do you say? Can any one be thrust down who is not touched? Must we not, if we will stick to the strict letter, understand that that man only is thrust down on whom hands are laid? It is quite inevitable, I say, if we wish to make words and facts tally exactly with each other, that no one should be decided to have been thrust down, unless he be understood to have had hands laid on him, and so to have been removed and pushed headlong down by personal violence. But how can any one have been treated so, unless he has been removed from a higher place to a lower one?

A man may have been driven away, he may have been put to flight, he may have been cast out; but it is absolutely impossible for any one to have been pushed down, not only who has never been touched, but who, if he has been touched, has been touched on even and level ground. What then? Are we to think that this interdict was framed for the sake of those men alone, who could say that they had been precipitated from high ground? for those are the only people who can properly be said to have been driven down. The whole of this is quite untranslatable so as to give in English the sense which the Latin bears. The truth is, that it is a sort of play on the word dejicio, which is the Latin word used, and which not only means to drive away, its technical and proper meaning here, but also to throw down, which is the meaning which Cicero harps upon. Shall we not, when the intention, and design, and meaning of the interdict is thoroughly understood, think it the most excessive impudence, or the most extraordinary folly, to haggle about a verbal mistake? and not only to pass over, but even to desert and betray the real merits of the case, and the common advantage of all the citizens?