Cicero's Tusculan Disputations by Marcus Tullius Cicero

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[13] The Simonides here meant is the celebrated poet of Ceos, the
perfecter of elegiac poetry among the Greeks. He flourished about the
time of the Persian war. Besides his poetry, he is said to have been
the inventor of some method of aiding the memory. He died at the court
of Hiero, 467 B.C.

[14] Theodectes was a native of Phaselis, in Pamphylia, a distinguished
rhetorician and tragic poet, and flourished in the time of Philip of
Macedon. He was a pupil of Isocrates, and lived at Athens, and died
there at the age of forty-one.

[15] Cineas was a Thessalian, and (as is said in the text) came to Rome
as ambassador from Pyrrhus after the battle of Heraclea, 280 B.C., and
his memory is said to have been so great that on the day after his
arrival he was able to address all the senators and knights by name. He
probably died before Pyrrhus returned to Italy, 276 B.C.

[16] Charmadas, called also Charmides, was a fellow-pupil with Philo,
the Larissaean of Clitomachus, the Carthaginian. He is said by some
authors to have founded a fourth academy.

[17] Metrodorus was a minister of Mithridates the Great; and employed
by him as supreme judge in Pontus, and afterward as an ambassador.
Cicero speaks of him in other places (De Orat. ii. 88) as a man of
wonderful memory.

[18] Quintus Hortensius was eight years older than Cicero; and, till
Cicero's fame surpassed his, he was accounted the most eloquent of all
the Romans. He was Verres's counsel in the prosecution conducted
against him by Cicero. Seneca relates that his memory was so great that
he could come out of an auction and repeat the catalogue backward. He
died 50 B.C.

[19] This treatise is one which has not come down to us, but which had
been lately composed by Cicero in order to comfort himself for the loss
of his daughter.

[20] The epigram is,

[Greek: Eipas Helie chaire, Kleombrotos Hombrakiotes
helat' aph' hypselou teicheos eis Aiden,
axion ouden idon thanatou kakon, alla Platonos
hen to peri psyches gramm' analexamenos.]

Which may be translated, perhaps,

Farewell, O sun, Cleombrotus exclaim'd,
Then plunged from off a height beneath the sea;
Stung by pain, of no disgrace ashamed,
But moved by Plato's high philosophy.

[21] This is alluded to by Juvenal:

Provida Pompeio dederat Campania febres
Optandas: sed multae urbes et publica vota
Vicerunt. Igitur Fortuna ipsius et Urbis,
Servatum victo caput abstulit.--Sat. x. 283.

[22] Pompey's second wife was Julia, the daughter of Julius Caesar, she
died the year before the death of Crassus, in Parthia. Virgil speaks of
Caesar and Pompey as relations, using the same expression (socer) as
Cicero:

Aggeribus socer Alpinis atque arce Monoeci
Descendens, gener adversis instructus Eois.--AEn. vi. 830.

[23] This idea is beautifully expanded by Byron:

Yet if, as holiest men have deem'd, there be
A land of souls beyond that sable shore
To shame the doctrine of the Sadducee
And sophist, madly vain or dubious lore,
How sweet it were in concert to adore
With those who made our mortal labors light,
To hear each voice we fear'd to hear no more.
Behold each mighty shade reveal'd to sight,
The Bactrian, Samian sage, and all who taught the right!
_Childe Harold_, ii.

[24] The epitaph in the original is:

[Greek: O xein' angeilon Lakedaimoniois hoti tede
keimetha, tois keinon peithomenoi nomimois.]

[25] This was expressed in the Greek verses,

[Greek: Arches men me phynai epichthonioisin ariston,
phynta d' hopos okista pylas Aidyo peresai]

which by some authors are attributed to Homer.

[26] This is the first fragment of the Cresphontes.--Ed. Var. vii., p.
594.

[Greek: Edei gar hemas syllogon poioumenous
Ton phynta threnein, eis hos' erchetai kaka.
Ton d' au thanonta kai ponon pepaumenon
chairontas euphemointas ekpemein domon]

[27] The Greek verses are quoted by Plutarch:

[Greek: Epou nepie, elithioi phrenes andron
Euthynoos keitai moiridio thanato
Ouk en gar zoein kalon auto oute goneusi.]

[28] This refers to the story that when Eumolpus, the son of Neptune,
whose assistance the Eleusinians had called in against the Athenians,
had been slain by the Athenians, an oracle demanded the sacrifice of
one of the daughters of Erechtheus, the King of Athens. And when one
was drawn by lot, the others voluntarily accompanied her to death.

[29] Menoeceus was son of Creon, and in the war of the Argives against
Thebes, Teresias declared that the Thebans should conquer if Menoeceus
would sacrifice himself for his country; and accordingly he killed
himself outside the gates of Thebes.

[30] The Greek is,

[Greek: mede moi aklaustos thanatos moloi, alla philoisi
poiesaimi thanon algea kai stonachas.]

[31] Soph. Trach. 1047.

[32] The lines quoted by Cicero here appear to have come from the Latin
play of Prometheus by Accius; the ideas are borrowed, rather than
translated, from the Prometheus of AEschylus.

[33] From _exerceo_.

[34] Each soldier carried a stake, to help form a palisade in front of
the camp.

[35] Insania--from _in_, a particle of negative force in composition,
and _sanus_, healthy, sound.

[36] The man who first received this surname was L. Calpurnius Piso,
who was consul, 133 B.C., in the Servile War.

[37] The Greek is,

[Greek: Alla moi oidanetai kradie cholo hoppot' ekeinou
Mnesomai hos m' asyphelon en Argeioisin erexen.]--Il. ix. 642.

I have given Pope's translation in the text.

[38] This is from the Theseus:

[Greek: Ego de touto para sophou tinos mathon
eis phrontidas noun symphoras t' eballomen
phygas t' emauto prostitheis patras emes.
thanatous t' aorous, kai kakon allas hodous
hos, ei ti paschoim' on edoxazon pote
Me moi neorton prospeson mallon dakoi.]

[39] Ter. Phorm. II. i. 11.

[40] This refers to the speech of Agamemnon in Euripides, in the
Iphigenia in Aulis,

[Greek: Zelo se, geron,
zelo d' andron hos akindynon
bion exeperas', agnos, aklees.]--v. 15.

[41] This is a fragment from the Hypsipyle:

[Greek: Ephy men oudeis hostis ou ponei broton
thaptei te tekna chater' au ktatai nea,
autos te thneskei. kai tad' achthontai brotoi
eis gen pherontes gen anankaios d' echei
bion therizein hoste karpimon stachyn.]

[42]
[Greek: Pollas ek kephales prothelymnous helketo chaitas.]--Il. x. 15.

[43]
[Greek: Etoi ho kappedion to Aleion oios alato
hon thymon katedon, paton anthropon aleeinon.]--Il. vi. 201.

[44] This is a translation from Euripides:

[Greek: Hosth' himeros m' hypelthe ge te k' ourano
lexai molouse deuro Medeias tychas.]--Med. 57.

[45]
[Greek: Lien gar polloi kai epetrimoi emata panta
piptousin, pote ken tis anapneuseie ponoio;
alla chre ton men katathaptemen, hos ke thanesi,
nelea thymon echontas, ep' emati dakrysantas.]--
Hom. Il. xix. 226.

[46] This is one of the fragments of Euripides which we are unable to
assign to any play in particular; it occurs Var. Ed. Tr. Inc. 167.

[Greek: Ei men tod' emar proton en kakoumeno
kai me makran de dia ponon enaustoloun
eikos sphadazein en an, hos neozyga
polon, chalinon artios dedegmenon
nyn d' amblys eimi, kai katertykos kakon.]

[47] This is only a fragment, preserved by Stobaeus:

[Greek: Tous d' an megistous kai sophotatous phreni
toiousd' idois an, oios esti nyn hode,
kalos kakos prassonti symparainesai
hotan de daimon andros eutychous to prin
mastig' epise tou biou palintropon,
ta polla phrouda kai kakos eiremena.]

[48]
[Greek: Ok. Oukoun Prometheu touto gignoskeis hoti
orges nosouses eisin iatroi logoi.
Pr. ean tis en kairo ge malthasse kear
kai me sphrigonta thymon ischnaine bia.]--
AEsch. Prom. v. 378.

[49] Cicero alludes here to Il. vii. 211, which is thus translated by
Pope:

His massy javelin quivering in his hand,
He stood the bulwark of the Grecian band;
Through every Argive heart new transport ran,
All Troy stood trembling at the mighty man:
E'en Hector paused, and with new doubt oppress'd,
Felt his great heart suspended in his breast;
'Twas vain to seek retreat, and vain to fear,
Himself had challenged, and the foe drew near.

But Melmoth (Note on the Familiar Letters of Cicero, book ii. Let. 23)
rightly accuses Cicero of having misunderstood Homer, who "by no means
represents Hector as being thus totally dismayed at the approach of his
adversary; and, indeed, it would have been inconsistent with the
general character of that hero to have described him under such
circumstances of terror."

[Greek: Ton de kai Argeioi meg' egetheon eisoroontes,
Troas de tromos ainos hypelythe gyia hekaston,
Hektori d' auto thymos eni stethessi patassen.]

But there is a great difference, as Dr. Clarke remarks, between [Greek:
thymos eni stethessi patassen] and [Greek: kardee exo stetheon
ethrosken], or [Greek: tromos ainos hypelythe gyia].--_The Trojans_,
says Homer, _trembled_ at the sight of Ajax, and even Hector himself
felt some emotion in his breast.

[50] Cicero means Scipio Nasica, who, in the riots consequent on the
reelection of Tiberius Gracchus to the tribunate, 133 B.C., having
called in vain on the consul, Mucius Scaevola, to save the republic,
attacked Gracchus himself, who was slain in the tumult.

[51] _Morosus_ is evidently derived from _mores_--"_Morosus_, _mos_,
stubbornness, self-will, etc."--Riddle and Arnold, Lat. Dict.

[52] In the original they run thus:

[Greek: Ouk estin ouden deinon hod' eipein epos,
Oude pathos, oude xymphora theelatos
hes ouk an aroit' achthos anthropon physis.]

[53] This passage is from the Eunuch of Terence, act i., sc. 1, 14.

[54] These verses are from the Atreus of Accius.

[55] This was Marcus Atilius Regulus, the story of whose treatment by
the Carthaginians in the first Punic War is well known to everybody.

[56] This was Quintus Servilius Caepio, who, 105 B.C., was destroyed,
with his army, by the Cimbri, it was believed as a judgment for the
covetousness which he had displayed in the plunder of Tolosa.

[57] This was Marcus Aquilius, who, in the year 88 B.C., was sent
against Mithridates as one of the consular legates; and, being
defeated, was delivered up to the king by the inhabitants of Mitylene.
Mithridates put him to death by pouring molten gold down his throat.

[58] This was the elder brother of the triumvir Marcus Crassus, 87 B.C.
He was put to death by Fimbria, who was in command of some of the
troops of Marius.

[59] Lucius Caesar and Caius Caesar were relations (it is uncertain in
what degree) of the great Caesar, and were killed by Fimbria on the same
occasion as Octavius.

[60] M. Antonius was the grandfather of the triumvir; he was murdered
the same year, 87 B.C., by Annius, when Marius and Cinna took Rome.

[61] This story is alluded to by Horace:

Districtus ensis cui super impia
Cervice pendet non Siculae dapes
Dulcem elaborabunt saporem,
Non avium citharaeve cantus
Somnum reducent.--iii. 1. 17.

[62] Hieronymus was a Rhodian, and a pupil of Aristotle, flourishing
about 300 B.C. He is frequently mentioned by Cicero.

[63] We know very little of Dinomachus. Some MSS. have Clitomachus.

[64] Callipho was in all probability a pupil of Epicurus, but we have
no certain information about him.

[65] Diodorus was a Syrian, and succeeded Critolaus as the head of the
Peripatetic School at Athens.

[66] Aristo was a native of Ceos, and a pupil of Lycon, who succeeded
Straton as the head of the Peripatetic School, 270 B.C. He afterward
himself succeeded Lycon.

[67] Pyrrho was a native of Elis, and the originator of the sceptical
theories of some of the ancient philosophers. He was a contemporary of
Alexander.

[68] Herillus was a disciple of Zeno of Cittium, and therefore a Stoic.
He did not, however, follow all the opinions of his master: he held
that knowledge was the chief good. Some of the treatises of Cleanthes
were written expressly to confute him.

[69] Anacharsis was (Herod., iv., 76) son of Gnurus and brother of
Saulius, King of Thrace. He came to Athens while Solon was occupied in
framing laws for his people; and by the simplicity of his way of
living, and his acute observations on the manners of the Greeks, he
excited such general admiration that he was reckoned by some writers
among the Seven Wise Men of Greece.

[70] This was Appius Claudius Caecus, who was censor 310 B.C., and who,
according to Livy, was afflicted with blindness by the Gods for
persuading the Potitii to instruct the public servants in the way of
sacrificing to Hercules. He it was who made the Via Appia.

[71] The fact of Homer's blindness rests on a passage in the Hymn to
Apollo, quoted by Thucydides as a genuine work of Homer, and which is
thus spoken of by one of the most accomplished scholars that this
country or this age has ever produced: "They are indeed beautiful
verses; and if none worse had ever been attributed to Homer, the Prince
of Poets would have had little reason to complain.

"He has been describing the Delian festival in honor of Apollo and
Diana, and concludes this part of the poem with an address to the women
of that island, to whom it is to be supposed that he had become
familiarly known by his frequent recitations:

[Greek: Chairete d' hymeis pasai, emeio de kai metopisthe
mnesasth', hoppote ken tis epichthonion anthropon
enthad' aneiretai xeinos talapeirios elthon
o kourai, tis d' hymmin aner hedistos aoidon
enthade poleitai kai teo terpesthe malista;
hymeis d' eu mala pasai hypokrinasthe aph' hemon,
Typhlos aner, oikei de Chio eni paipaloesse,
tou pasai metopisthen aristeuousin aoidai.]

Virgins, farewell--and oh! remember me
Hereafter, when some stranger from the sea,
A hapless wanderer, may your isle explore,
And ask you, 'Maids, of all the bards you boast,
Who sings the sweetest, and delights you most?'
Oh! answer all, 'A blind old man, and poor,
Sweetest he sings, and dwells on Chios' rocky shore.'

_Coleridge's Introduction to the Study
of the Greek Classic Poets._

[72] Some read _scientiam_ and some _inscientiam;_ the latter of which
is preferred by some of the best editors and commentators.

[73] For a short account of these ancient Greek philosophers, see the
sketch prefixed to the Academics (_Classical Library_).

[74] Cicero wrote his philosophical works in the last three years of
his life. When he wrote this piece, he was in the sixty-third year of
his age, in the year of Rome 709.

[75] The Academic.

[76] Diodorus and Posidonius were Stoics; Philo and Antiochus were
Academics; but the latter afterward inclined to the doctrine of the
Stoics.

[77] Julius Caesar.

[78] Cicero was one of the College of Augurs.

[79] The Latinae Feriae was originally a festival of the Latins, altered
by Tarquinius Superbus into a Roman one. It was held in the Alban
Mount, in honor of Jupiter Latiaris. This holiday lasted six days: it
was not held at any fixed time; but the consul was never allowed to
take the field till he had held them.--_Vide_ Smith, Dict. Gr. and Rom.
Ant., p. 414.

[80] _Exhedra_, the word used by Cicero, means a study, or place where
disputes were held.

[81] M. Piso was a Peripatetic. The four great sects were the Stoics,
the Peripatetics, the Academics, and the Epicureans.

[82] It was a prevailing tenet of the Academics that there is no
certain knowledge.

[83] The five forms of Plato are these: [Greek: ousia, tauton, heteron,
stasis, kinesis.]

[84] The four natures here to be understood are the four
elements--fire, water, air, and earth; which are mentioned as the four
principles of Empedocles by Diogenes Laertius.

[85] These five moving stars are Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, Mercury, and
Venus. Their revolutions are considered in the next book.

[86] Or, Generation of the Gods.

[87] The [Greek: prolepsis] of Epicurus, before mentioned, is what he
here means.

[88] [Greek: Steremnia] is the word which Epicurus used to distinguish
between those objects which are perceptible to sense, and those which
are imperceptible; as the essence of the Divine Being, and the various
operations of the divine power.

[89] Zeno here mentioned is not the same that Cotta spoke of before.
This was the founder of the Stoics. The other was an Epicurean
philosopher whom he had heard at Athens.

[90] That is, there would be the same uncertainty in heaven as is among
the Academics.

[91] Those nations which were neither Greek nor Roman.

[92] _Sigilla numerantes_ is the common reading; but P. Manucius
proposes _venerantes_, which I choose as the better of the two, and in
which sense I have translated it.

[93] Fundamental doctrines.

[94] That is, the zodiac.

[95] The moon, as well as the sun, is indeed in the zodiac, but she
does not measure the same course in a month. She moves in another line
of the zodiac nearer the earth.

[96] According to the doctrines of Epicurus, none of these bodies
themselves are clearly seen, but _simulacra ex corporibus effluentia_.

[97] Epicurus taught his disciples in a garden.

[98] By the word _Deus_, as often used by our author, we are to
understand all the Gods in that theology then treated of, and not a
single personal Deity.

[99] The best commentators on this passage agree that Cicero does not
mean that Aristotle affirmed that there was no such person as Orpheus,
but that there was no such poet, and that the verse called Orphic was
said to be the invention of another. The passage of Aristotle to which
Cicero here alludes has, as Dr. Davis observes, been long lost.

[100] A just proportion between the different sorts of beings.

[101] Some give _quos non pudeat earum Epicuri vocum;_ but the best
copies have not _non;_ nor would it be consistent with Cotta to say
_quos non pudeat_, for he throughout represents Velleius as a perfect
Epicurean in every article.

[102] His country was Abdera, the natives of which were remarkable for
their stupidity.

[103] This passage will not admit of a translation answerable to the
sense of the original. Cicero says the word _amicitia_ (friendship) is
derived from _amor_ (love or affection).

[104] This manner of speaking of Jupiter frequently occurs in Homer,

----[Greek: pater andron te theon te,]

and has been used by Virgil and other poets since Ennius.

[105] Perses, or Perseus, the last king of Macedonia, was taken by
Cnaeus Octavius, the praetor, and brought as prisoner to Paullus AEmilius,
167 B.C.

[106] An exemption from serving in the wars, and from paying public
taxes.

[107] Mopsus. There were two soothsayers of this name: the first was
one of the Lapithae, son of Ampycus and Chloris, called also the son of
Apollo and Hienantis; the other a son of Apollo and Manto, who is said
to have founded Mallus, in Asia Minor, where his oracle existed as late
as the time of Strabo.

[108] Tiresias was the great Theban prophet at the time of the war of
the Seven against Thebes.

[109] Amphiaraus was King of Argos (he had been one of the Argonauts
also). He was killed after the war of the Seven against Thebes, which
he was compelled to join in by the treachery of his wife Eriphyle, by
the earth opening and swallowing him up as he was fleeing from
Periclymenus.

[110] Calchas was the prophet of the Grecian army at the siege of Troy.

[111] Helenus was a son of Priam and Hecuba. He is represented as a
prophet in the Philoctetes of Sophocles. And in the AEneid he is also
represented as king of part of Epirus, and as predicting to AEneas the
dangers and fortunes which awaited him.

[112] This short passage would be very obscure to the reader without an
explanation from another of Cicero's treatises. The expression here,
_ad investigandum suem regiones vineae terminavit_, which is a metaphor
too bold, if it was not a sort of augural language, seems to me to have
been the effect of carelessness in our great author; for Navius did not
divide the regions, as he calls them, of the vine to find his sow, but
to find a grape.

[113] The Peremnia were a sort of auspices performed just before the
passing a river.

[114] The Acumina were a military auspices, and were partly performed
on the point of a spear, from which they were called Acumina.

[115] Those were called _testamenta in procinctu_, which were made by
soldiers just before an engagement, in the presence of men called as
witnesses.

[116] This especially refers to the Decii, one of whom devoted himself
for his country in the war with the Latins, 340 B.C., and his son
imitated the action in the war with the Samnites, 295 B.C. Cicero
(Tusc. i. 37) says that his son did the same thing in the war with
Pyrrhus at the battle of Asculum, though in other places (De Off. iii.
4) he speaks of only two Decii as having signalized themselves in this
manner.

[117] The Rogator, who collected the votes, and pronounced who was the
person chosen. There were two sorts of Rogators; one was the officer
here mentioned, and the other was the Rogator, or speaker of the whole
assembly.

[118] Which was Sardinia, as appears from one of Cicero's epistles to
his brother Quintus.

[119] Their sacred books of ceremonies.

[120] The war between Octavius and Cinna, the consuls.

[121] This, in the original, is a fragment of an old Latin verse,

_----Terram fumare calentem._

[122] The Latin word is _principatus_, which exactly corresponds with
the Greek word here used by Cicero; by which is to be understood the
superior, the most prevailing excellence in every kind and species of
things through the universe.

[123] The passage of Aristotle to which Cicero here refers is lost.

[124] He means the Epicureans.

[125] Here the Stoic speaks too plain to be misunderstood. His world,
his _mundus_, is the universe, and that universe is his great Deity,
_in quo sit totius naturae principatus_, in which the superior
excellence of universal nature consists.

[126] Athens, the seat of learning and politeness, of which Balbus will
not allow Epicurus to be worthy.

[127] This is Pythagoras's doctrine, as appears in Diogenes Laertius.

[128] He here alludes to mathematical and geometrical instruments.

[129] Balbus here speaks of the fixed stars, and of the motions of the
orbs of the planets. He here alludes, says M. Bonhier, to the different
and diurnal motions of these stars; one sort from east to west, the
other from one tropic to the other: and this is the construction which
our learned and great geometrician and astronomer, Dr. Halley, made of
this passage.

[130] This mensuration of the year into three hundred and sixty-five
days and near six hours (by the odd hours and minutes of which, in
every fifth year, the _dies intercalaris_, or leap-year, is made) could
not but be known, Dr. Halley states, by Hipparchus, as appears from the
remains of that great astronomer of the ancients. We are inclined to
think that Julius Caesar had divided the year, according to what we call
the Julian year, before Cicero wrote this book; for we see, in the
beginning of it, how pathetically he speaks of Caesar's usurpation.

[131] The words of Censorinus, on this occasion, are to the same
effect. The opinions of philosophers concerning this great year are
very different; but the institution of it is ascribed to Democritus.

[132] The zodiac.

[133] Though Mars is said to hold his orbit in the zodiac with the
rest, and to finish his revolution through the same orbit (that is, the
zodiac) with the other two, yet Balbus means in a different line of the
zodiac.

[134] According to late observations, it never goes but a sign and a
half from the sun.

[135] These, Dr. Davis says, are "aerial fires;" concerning which he
refers to the second book of Pliny.

[136] In the Eunuch of Terence.

[137] Bacchus.

[138] The son of Ceres.

[139] The books of Ceremonies.

[140] This Libera is taken for Proserpine, who, with her brother Liber,
was consecrated by the Romans; all which are parts of nature in
prosopopoeias. Cicero, therefore, makes Balbus distinguish between the
person Liber, or Bacchus, and the Liber which is a part of nature in
prosopopoeia.

[141] These allegorical fables are largely related by Hesiod in his
Theogony.

Horace says exactly the same thing:

Hac arte Pollux et vagus Hercules
Enisus arces attigit igneas:
Quos inter Augustus recumbens
Purpureo bibit ore nectar.
Hac te merentem, Bacche pater, tuae
Vexere tigres indocili jugum
Collo ferentes: hac Quirinus
Martis equis Acheronta fugit.--Hor. iii. 3. 9.

[142] Cicero means by _conversis casibus_, varying the cases from the
common rule of declension; that is, by departing from the true
grammatical rules of speech; for if we would keep to it, we should
decline the word _Jupiter_, _Jupiteris_ in the second case, etc.