[36]
If no such motive can
be alleged, he must take refuge in suggesting that
there must have been some hidden motive, or in
asserting that, if he committed the act, all enquiry
into motive is irrelevant or that a motiveless crime
is even more abominable than one which has a
motive. Counsel for the defence, on the other hand,
will, wherever it be possible, emphasise the point
that it is incredible that any act should be committed
without a motive. Cicero develops this point with
great energy in a number of his speeches, but more
especially in his defence of Varenus, who had everything else against him and was as a matter of fact
condemned.
Quintilian. With An English Translation. Harold Edgeworth Butler. Cambridge. Cambridge, Mass., Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann, Ltd. 1922.
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