Cicero, On the Good Life

Cicero, On the Good Life, transl. Michael Grant, Penguin, New York, 1971.

Discussions at Tusculum (Book V) Then Pythagoras, the story continues, answered that human life seemed to him comparable with the festival to which people flocked from all over Greece in order to see those magnificent Games. This is an occasion for which some people have gone into physical training in the hope of winning the splendid distinction of a crown, while others are attracted by the prospect of buying or selling for profit, whereas a further category again—and these represent an especially good class of person—are interested in winning neither applause nor profit, but come merely for the sake of the spectacle, to get a thorough look at what is going on and how it is done. (56)

But there are also a few people who devote themselves wholly to the study of the universe, believing everything else to be trivial in comparison. These call themselves students of wisdom, in other words philosophers; and just as a festival attracts individuals of the finest type who just watch the proceedings without a thought of getting anything for themselves, so too, in life generally, the contemplation and study of nature are far superior to the whole range of other human activities. /
Nor did Pythagoras only invent the name of philosophy, for he extended its subject matter as well. (56-7)

Or do we prefer to follow Epicurus? He often makes imposing pronouncements—for the very good reason that he does not bother to be too consistent or logical! For example, he praise plain living. That is good philosopher’s language: but only if it is on the lips of Socrates or Antisthenes—not of the man who believes the supreme good is identical with pleasure. It is true that Epicurus then goes on to explain that no one can get pleasure out of life unless his conduct is honourable, wise and just. This is thoroughly noble, the sort of thing that is very appropriate to philosophy. Or rather, it would be, if only he did not see these virtues of honour, wisdom and justice in terms of pleasure. (67)

…the wise man is free from all those disturbances of the soul which I describe as passions; his heart is full of tranquil calm for ever. And anyone who is self-controlled, unwavering, fearless, undistressed, the victim of no cravings or desires, must inevitably be happy. (78)

Consider, for example, a man who is morally imperfect enough to feel distress. Then he is also certain to feel fear as well: since fear is the anxious anticipation of distress to come. And if he is likely to feel fear, that is the same as admitting that he is susceptible to every sort of panic, faint-heartedness, hysteria and cowardice. … man we have in mind will be defeated; he is bound to be reduced to a state of slavery. Whereas something free and undefeated: the whole point of morality is its independence. (80)

And this leads to that famous threefold division of intellectual study. [According the Stoics there were three parts of philosophy: Physics, Ethics, and Dialectic. The Epicureans only recognized the first two.] One part constitutes the knowledge of the universe, the understanding of nature. The second consists of distinguishing between the things we ought to aim at and the things we ought to avoid—in other words, this is the art of the [88] good life. The third subdivision comprises the assessment of logical consequences and incompatibilities, which is the basic requirement for accurate discussion and analysis. [89] … These are occupations for a man’s private life. (88-90)

The real remedies for pain—moral force, distaste for wrongdoing, constant practice in endurance, manly toughness—these are all things that Epicurus has not bothered to acquire. All he troubles to say is that he derives satisfaction from recollecting the pleasures of the past. It is as though a man who was feeling extremely, unbearably, hot chose to comfort himself by remembering a bathe he once had in one of our cool streams back home at Arpinum! (92)

This is the sort of person a truly wise man has to be. He will never do anything he might regret—or anything he does not want to do. Every action he performs will always be dignified, consistent, serious, upright. (95)

Let us begin, if we may, with Epicurus. We call him an effeminate pleasure-love. However, it would, as I have said [99] be impossible to accuse him of being afraid of death or pain. He even goes so far as to assert that the day of his death is an occasion of happiness; and at that very moment, he tells us, when he is afflicted with the most grievous pain he suppresses the agony by thinking about all the philosophical discoveries he has made. And when he assures us of that, he is not just indulging in casual talk. (99-100)

Epicurus himself is content with very little indeed to live on. No one has used more emphatic language than he has about the desirability of plain living. Other men are keen to make money to enable them to pay for their love affairs and their careers and their day-to-day living; but since none of these activities has the slightest importance for Epicurus, he has no reason to feel any great desire for money. (100)

On sexual pleasures… In general, maintain the Epicureans, pleasures in this category may be welcomed, unless there happens to be some particular object; but they can never be of any positive advantage. (102)

…the wise man will always have a continuous, unbroken succession of enjoyable experiences, since his anticipation of those he is looking forward to in the future will merge with his recollection of those he has enjoyed in the past. (103)

Applying the same arguments to food, Epicurus and the others belittle expensive and sumptuous banquets, on the ground that nature’s needs are modest. And need, anyone can see, is what provides the seasoning for any and every appetite. … There is also a traditions about Socrates. He liked walking, it is recorded, until a late hour of the evening, and when someone asked him why he did this he said he was trying to work up an appetite for his dinner. (103)

And what the contrast demonstrates is that the true satisfaction to be derived from food comes not from repletion but from appetite—the people who run hardest after pleasure are the least likely to catch what they are after. (104)

Indeed, a life so wholly lacking in reason and moderation must of necessity be highly unattractive. That was the mistake of Sardanapalus, the enormously wealthy king of Syria, who had these lines engraved on his tomb: ‘Everything that I have eaten, everything I have consumed to satisfy my appetites, is still within my power: all my other great riches I have left behind me, and they are gone.’ That, remarked Aristotle, is an epitaph fit for an ox, not a king. For Sardanapalus claims, in death, to control things which even when he was alive he only possessed at the very moment of enjoyment. (105)

On the Orator, Book I

All the same, when we discuss the subject, I have noticed that we do not quite see eye to eye! For what I like to argue is that effective speaking requires extremely wide theoretical knowledge; whereas you prefer to maintain that oratory is entirely independent of systematic learning, and merely depends on a special kind of natural gift, supplemented by practice. (237)

A great number of persons want to learn how to speak; there are teachers in abundance; outstanding talent is available; the legal issues that come up display an infinite diversity; and the rewards, as I said, are truly splendid. In view of all these circumstances, there can only be one possible reason for the scarcity of speakers of any competence: the incredible vastness and difficult of the subject. /
For, first, one has to acquire knowledge about a formidable quantity of different matters. To hold forth without this information will just mean a silly flow of windy verbiage. (241)

The Dream of Scipio

Look: do you not see your father Paullus coming towards you?’ /
Indeed I now saw him approaching: and I burst into a flood of tears. But my father put his arms round me and kissed me, and told me not to weep. So when I had suppressed my tears and felt able to speak, I cried out, ‘Since this, most revered and best of fathers, is true life, as I hear Africanus declare, why must I stay any longer upon earth? Why should I not come and join you, with the utmost possible speed?’ /
‘That must not be,’ replied Paullus. ‘For unless God, whose sacred domain is all that you see around you here, [The word templum originally meant a region of the sky marked off for purposes of divination, and then it came to signify a sacred space generally.] has freed you from your confinement in the body, you cannot be admitted to this place. (345)

I surveyed the scene in a stupor. But finally I recovered enough to ask: ‘What is this sound, so strong and so sweet, which fills my ears?’/
‘That,’ he replied, ‘is the music of the spheres. [The doctrine of the harmony of the spheres may have originated early in the fifth century BC. Pythagoras had discovered that the intervals of the musical scale could be expressed as numerical ratios; and later Pythagoreans concluded that the arrangement of the heavens was based on the principles of musical harmony. Venus and Mercury were believed to have the same speed.] They create it by their own motion as they rush upon their way. The intervals between them, although differing in length, are all measured according to a fixed scheme of proportions; and this arrangement produces a melodious blend of high and low notes, from which emerges a varied harmony. For it cannot be that these vast movements should take place in silence, and nature has ordained that the spheres utter music, those at the summit giving forth high sounds, whereas the sounds of those beneath are low and deep. That is to say, the spheres containing the uppermost stars, compromising those regions of the sky where the movements are speediest, give out a high and piercing sound, whereas the Moon, which lies beneath all the others, sends forth the lowest not. /
‘The ninth of the spheres, the earth, fixed at the centre of the universe, is motionless and silent. But the other eight spheres produce seven different sounds on the scale—not eight, since two of these orbs move at identical speeds, but seven, a number which is the key to almost all things that exist. (348)

‘The ears of mankind are filled with this music all the time. But they have become completely deaf to its melody; no other human faculty has become so atrophied as this. (348)

For the sound there is so loud that the people who live nearby have entirely lost their sense of hearing. And that, too, is why the mighty music of the spheres, created by the immeasurably fast rotations of the whole universe, cannot be apprehended by the human ears… (349)