st him by a tribune of the people, instead of
making his defence: "Let us go, citizens," said he, "let us go render
thanks to the gods for the victory they gave me over the Carthaginians as
this day," and advancing himself before towards the Temple, he had
presently all the assembly and his very accuser himself following at his
heels. And Petilius, having been set on by Cato to demand an account of
the money that had passed through his hands in the province of Antioch,
Scipio being come into the senate to that purpose, produced a book from
under his robe, wherein he told them was an exact account of his receipts
and disbursements; but being required to deliver it to the prothonotary
to be examined, he refused, saying, he would not do himself so great a
disgrace; and in the presence of the whole senate tore the book with his
own hands to pieces. I do not believe that the most seared conscience
could have counterfeited so great an assurance. He had naturally too
high a spirit and was accustomed to too high a fortune, says Titius
Livius, to know how to be criminal, and to lower himself to the meanness
of defending his innocence. The putting men to the rack is a dangerous
invention, and seems to be rather a trial of patience than of truth.
Both he who has the fortitude to endure it conceals the truth, and he who
has not: for why should pain sooner make me confess what really is, than
force me to say what is not? And, on the contrary, if he who is not
guilty of that whereof he is accused, has the courage to undergo those
torments, why should not he who is guilty have the same, so fair a reward
as life being in his prospect? I believe the ground of this invention
proceeds from the consideration of the force of conscience: for, to the
guilty, it seems to assist the rack to make him confess his fault and to
shake his resolution; and, on the other side, that it fortifies the
innocent against the torture. But when all is done, 'tis, in plain
truth, a trial full of uncertainty and danger what would not a man say,
what would not a man do, to avoid so intolerable torments?

"Etiam innocentes cogit mentiri dolor."

["Pain will make even the innocent lie."--Publius Syrus, De Dolore.]

Whence it comes to pass, that him whom the judge has racked that he may
not die innocent, he makes him die both innocent and racked. A thousand
and a thousand have charged their own heads by false confessions, amongst
whom I