Cicero's Tusculan Disputations
permanent good. What, then, is this opinion of theirs? So that I think
that saying of the Spartan may be applied to them, who, on some
merchant's boasting before him that he had despatched ships to every
maritime coast, replied that a fortune which depended on ropes was not
very desirable. Can there be any doubt that whatever may be lost cannot
be properly classed in the number of those things which complete a
happy life? for of all that constitutes a happy life, nothing will
admit of withering, or growing old, or wearing out, or decaying; for
whoever is apprehensive of any loss of these things cannot be happy:
the happy man should be safe, well fenced, well fortified, out of the
reach of all annoyance, not like a man under trifling apprehensions,
but free from all such. As he is not called innocent who but slightly
offends, but he who offends not at all, so it is he alone who is to be
considered without fear who is free from all fear, not he who is but in
little fear. For what else is courage but an affection of mind that is
ready to undergo perils, and patient in the endurance of pain and labor
without any alloy of fear? Now, this certainly could not be the case if
there were anything else good but what depended on honesty alone. But
how can any one be in possession of that desirable and much-coveted
security (for I now call a freedom from anxiety a security, on which
freedom a happy life depends) who has, or may have, a multitude of
evils attending him? How can he be brave and undaunted, and hold
everything as trifles which can befall a man? for so a wise man should
do, unless he be one who thinks that everything depends on himself.
Could the Lacedaemonians without this, when Philip threatened to prevent
all their attempts, have asked him if he could prevent their killing
themselves? Is it not easier, then, to find one man of such a spirit as
we are inquiring after, than to meet with a whole city of such men?
Now, if to this courage I am speaking of we add temperance, that it may
govern all our feelings and agitations, what can be wanting to complete
his happiness who is secured by his courage from uneasiness and fear,
and is prevented from immoderate desires and immoderate insolence of
joy by temperance? I could easily show that virtue is able to produce
these effects, but that I have explained on the foregoing days.
XV. But as the perturbations of the mind make life miserable, and
tranquillity renders it happy; and as these perturbations are of two
sorts, grief and fear, proceeding from imagined evils, and as
immoderate joy and lust arise from a mistake about what is good, and as
all these feelings are in opposition to reason and counsel; when you
see a man at ease, quite free and disengaged from such troublesome
commotions, which are so much at variance with one another, can you
hesitate to pronounce such a one a happy man? Now, the wise man is
always in such a disposition; therefore the wise man is always happy.
Besides, every good is pleasant; whatever is pleasant may be boasted
and talked of; whatever may be boasted of is glorious; but whatever is
glorious is certainly laudable, and whatever is laudable doubtless,
also, honorable: whatever, then, is good is honorable (but the things
which they reckon as goods they themselves do not call honorable);
therefore what is honorable alone is good. Hence it follows that a
happy life is comprised in honesty alone. Such things, then, are not to
be called or considered goods, when a man may enjoy an abundance of
them, and yet be most miserable. Is there any doubt but that a man who
enjoys the best health, and who has strength and beauty, and his senses
flourishing in their utmost quickness and perfection--suppose him
likewise, if you please, nimble and active, nay, give him riches,
honors, authority, power, glory--now, I say, should this person, who is
in possession of all these, be unjust, intemperate, timid, stupid, or
an idiot--could you hesitate to call such a one miserable? What, then,
are those goods in the possession of which you may be very miserable?
Let us see if a happy life is not made up of parts of the same nature,
as a heap implies a quantity of grain of the same kind. And if this be
once admitted, happiness must be compounded of different good things,
which alone are honorable; if there is any mixture of things of another
sort with these, nothing honorable can proceed from such a composition:
now, take away honesty, and how can you imagine anything happy? For
whatever is good is desirable on that account; whatever is desirable
must certainly be approved of; whatever you approve of must be looked
on as acceptable and welcome. You must consequently impute dignity to
this; and if so, it must necessarily be laudable: therefore, everything
that is laudable is good. Hence it follows that what is honorable is
the only good. And should we not look upon it in this light, there will
be a great many things which we must call good.
XVI. I forbear to mention riches, which, as any one, let him be ever so
unworthy, may have them, I do not reckon among goods; for what is good
is not attainable by all. I pass over notoriety and popular fame,
raised by the united voice of knaves and fools. Even things which are
absolute nothings may be called goods; such as white teeth, handsome
eyes, a good complexion, and what was commended by Euryclea, when she
was washing Ulysses's feet, the softness of his skin and the mildness
of his discourse. If you look on these as goods, what greater encomiums
can the gravity of a philosopher be entitled to than the wild opinion
of the vulgar and the thoughtless crowd? The Stoics give the name of
excellent and choice to what the others call good: they call them so,
indeed; but they do not allow them to complete a happy life. But these
others think that there is no life happy without them; or, admitting it
to be happy, they deny it to be the most happy. But our opinion is,
that it is the most happy; and we prove it from that conclusion of
Socrates. For thus that author of philosophy argued: that as the
disposition of a man's mind is, so is the man; such as the man is, such
will be his discourse; his actions will correspond with his discourse,
and his life with his actions. But the disposition of a good man's mind
is laudable; the life, therefore, of a good man is laudable; it is
honorable, therefore, because laudable; the unavoidable conclusion from
which is that the life of good men is happy. For, good Gods! did I not
make it appear, by my former arguments--or was I only amusing myself
and killing time in what I then said?--that the mind of a wise man was
always free from every hasty motion which I call a perturbation, and
that the most undisturbed peace always reigned in his breast? A man,
then, who is temperate and consistent, free from fear or grief, and
uninfluenced by any immoderate joy or desire, cannot be otherwise than
happy; but a wise man is always so, therefore he is always happy.
Moreover, how can a good man avoid referring all his actions and all
his feelings to the one standard of whether or not it is laudable? But
he does refer everything to the object of living happily: it follows,
then, that a happy life is laudable; but nothing is laudable without
virtue: a happy life, then, is the consequence of virtue. And this is
the unavoidable conclusion to be drawn from these arguments.
XVII. A wicked life has nothing which we ought to speak of or glory in;
nor has that life which is neither happy nor miserable. But there is a
kind of life that admits of being spoken of, and gloried in, and
boasted of, as Epaminondas saith,
The wings of Sparta's pride my counsels clipp'd.
And Africanus boasts,
Who, from beyond Maeotis to the place
Where the sun rises, deeds like mine can trace?
If, then, there is such a thing as a happy life, it is to be gloried
in, spoken of, and commended by the person who enjoys it; for there is
nothing excepting that which can be spoken of or gloried in; and when
that is once admitted, you know what follows. Now, unless an honorable
life is a happy life, there must, of course, be something preferable to
a happy life; for that which is honorable all men will certainly grant
to be preferable to anything else. And thus there will be something
better than a happy life: but what can be more absurd than such an
assertion? What! when they grant vice to be effectual to the rendering
life miserable, must they not admit that there is a corresponding power
in virtue to make life happy? For contraries follow from contraries.
And here I ask what weight they think there is in the balance of
Critolaus, who having put the goods of the mind into one scale, and the
goods of the body and other external advantages into the other, thought
the goods of the mind outweighed the others so far that they would
require the whole earth and sea to equalize the scale.
XVIII. What hinders Critolaus, then, or that gravest of philosophers,
Xenocrates (who raises virtue so high, and who lessens and depreciates
everything else), from not only placing a happy life, but the happiest
possible life, in virtue? And, indeed, if this were not the case,
virtue would be absolutely lost. For whoever is subject to grief must
necessarily be subject to fear too, for fear is an uneasy apprehension
of future grief; and whoever is subject to fear is liable to dread,
timidity, consternation, cowardice. Therefore, such a person may, some
time or other, be defeated, and not think himself concerned with that
precept of Atreus,
And let men so conduct themselves in life,
As to be always strangers to defeat.
But such a man, as I have said, will be defeated; and not only
defeated, but made a slave of. But we would have virtue always free,
always invincible; and were it not so, there would be an end of virtue.
But if virtue has in herself all that is necessary for a good life, she
is certainly sufficient for happiness: virtue is certainly sufficient,
too, for our living with courage; if with courage, then with a
magnanimous spirit, and indeed so as never to be under any fear, and
thus to be always invincible. Hence it follows that there can be
nothing to be repented of, no wants, no lets or hinderances. Thus all
things will be prosperous, perfect, and as you would have them, and,
consequently, happy; but virtue is sufficient for living with courage,
and therefore virtue is able by herself to make life happy. For as
folly, even when possessed of what it desires, never thinks it has
acquired enough, so wisdom is always satisfied with the present, and
never repents on her own account.
XIX. Look but on the single consulship of Laelius, and that, too, after
having been set aside (though when a wise and good man like him is
outvoted, the people are disappointed of a good consul, rather than be
disappointed by a vain people); but the point is, would you prefer,
were it in your power, to be once such a consul as Laelius, or be
elected four times, like Cinna? I have no doubt in the world what
answer you will make, and it is on that account I put the question to
you.
I would not ask every one this question; for some one perhaps might
answer that he would not only prefer four consulates to one, but even
one day of Cinna's life to whole ages of many famous men. Laelius would
have suffered had he but touched any one with his finger; but Cinna
ordered the head of his colleague consul, Cn. Octavius, to be struck
off; and put to death P. Crassus[58], and L. Caesar[59], those excellent
men, so renowned both at home and abroad; and even M. Antonius[60], the
greatest orator whom I ever heard; and C. Caesar, who seems to me to
have been the pattern of humanity, politeness, sweetness of temper, and