Cicero's Tusculan Disputations
that it was a reproach to young men if they had no lovers.
Not only as at Sparta, where boys learn to steal and plunder.
And our master Plato, even more than Lycurgus, who would have
everything to be common, so that no one should be able to
call anything his own property.
I would send him to the same place whither he sends Homer,
crowned with chaplets and anointed with perfumes, banishing
him from the city which he is describing.
VI. The judgment of the censor inflicts scarcely anything
more than a blush on the man whom he condemns. Therefore as
all that adjudication turns solely on the name (_nomen_), the
punishment is called ignominy.
Nor should a prefect be set over women, an officer who is
created among the Greeks; but there should be a censor to
teach husbands to manage their wives.
So the discipline of modesty has great power. All women
abstain from wine.
And also if any woman was of bad character, her relations
used not to kiss her.
So petulance is derived from asking (_petendo_); wantonness
(_procacitas_) from _procando_, that is, from demanding.
VII. For I do not approve of the same nation being the ruler
and the farmer of lands. But both in private families and in
the affairs of the Commonwealth I look upon economy as a
revenue.
Faith (_fides_) appears to me to derive its name from that
being done (_fit_) which is said.
In a citizen of rank and noble birth, caressing manners,
display, and ambition are marks of levity.
Examine for a while the books on the Republic, and learn that
good men know no bound or limit in consulting the interests
of their country. See in that treatise with what praises
frugality, and continency, and fidelity to the marriage tie,
and chaste, honorable, and virtuous manners are extolled.
VIII. I marvel at the elegant choice, not only of the facts,
but of the language. If they dispute (_jurgant_). It is a
contest between well-wishers, not a quarrel between enemies,
that is called a dispute (_jurgium_),
Therefore the law considers that neighbors dispute
(_jurgare_) rather than quarrel (_litigare_) with one
another.
The bounds of man's care and of man's life are the same; so
by the pontifical law the sanctity of burial * * *
They put them to death, though innocent, because they had
left those men unburied whom they could not rescue from the
sea because of the violence of the storm.
Nor in this discussion have I advocated the cause of the
populace, but of the good.
For one cannot easily resist a powerful people if one gives
them either no rights at all or very little.
In which case I wish I could augur first with truth and
fidelity * * *
IX. Cicero saying this in vain, when speaking of poets, "And
when the shouts and approval of the people, as of some great
and wise teacher, has reached them, what darkness do they
bring on! what alarms do they cause! what desires do they
excite!"
Cicero says that if his life were extended to twice its
length, he should not have time to read the lyric poets.
X. As Scipio says in Cicero, "As they thought the whole
histrionic art, and everything connected with the theatre,
discreditable, they thought fit that all men of that
description should not only be deprived of the honors
belonging to the rest of the citizens, but should also be
deprived of their franchise by the sentence of the censors."
And what the ancient Romans thought on this subject Cicero
informs us, in those books which he wrote on the
Commonwealth, where Scipio argues and says * * *
Comedies could never (if it had not been authorized by the common
customs of life) have made theatres approve of their scandalous
exhibitions. And the more ancient Greeks provided a certain correction
for the vicious taste of the people, by making a law that it should be
expressly defined by a censorship what subjects comedy should treat,
and how she should treat them.
Whom has it not attacked? or, rather, whom has it not wounded? and whom
has it spared? In this, no doubt, it sometimes took the right side, and
lashed the popular demagogues and seditious agitators, such as Cleon,
Cleophon, and Hyperbolus. We may tolerate that; though indeed the
censure of the magistrate would, in these cases, have been more
efficacious than the satire of the poet. But when Pericles, who
governed the Athenian Commonwealth for so many years with the highest
authority, both in peace and war, was outraged by verses, and these
were acted on the stage, it was hardly more decent than if, among us,
Plautus and Naevius had attacked Publius and Cnaeus, or Caecilius had
ventured to revile Marcus Cato.
Our laws of the Twelve Tables, on the contrary--so careful to attach
capital punishment to a very few crimes only--have included in this
class of capital offences the offence of composing or publicly reciting
verses of libel, slander, and defamation, in order to cast dishonor and
infamy on a fellow-citizen. And they have decided wisely; for our life
and character should, if suspected, be submitted to the sentence of
judicial tribunals and the legal investigations of our magistrates, and
not to the whims and fancies of poets. Nor should we be exposed to any
charge of disgrace which we cannot meet by legal process, and openly
refute at the bar.
In our laws, I admire the justice of their expressions, as well as
their decisions. Thus the word _pleading_ signifies rather an amicable
suit between friends than a quarrel between enemies.
It is not easy to resist a powerful people, if you allow them no
rights, or next to none.
The old Romans would not allow any living man to be either
praised or blamed on the stage.
XI. Cicero says that comedy is an imitation of life; a mirror
of customs, an image of truth.
Since, as is mentioned in that book on the Commonwealth, not
only did AEschines the Athenian, a man of the greatest
eloquence, who, when a young man, had been an actor of
tragedies, concern himself in public affairs, but the
Athenians often sent Aristodemus, who was also a tragic
actor, to Philip as an ambassador, to treat of the most
important affairs of peace and war.
* * * * *
INTRODUCTION TO THE FIFTH BOOK,
BY THE ORIGINAL TRANSLATOR.
In this fifth book Cicero explains and enforces the duties of
magistrates, and the importance of practical experience to
all who undertake their important functions. Only a few
fragments have survived the wreck of ages and descended to
us.
BOOK V.
FRAGMENTS.
I. Ennius has told us--
Of men and customs mighty Rome consists;
which verse, both for its precision and its verity, appears to me as if
it had issued from an oracle; for neither the men, unless the State had
adopted a certain system of manners--nor the manners, unless they had
been illustrated by the men--could ever have established or maintained
for so many ages so vast a republic, or one of such righteous and
extensive sway.
Thus, long before our own times, the force of hereditary manners of
itself moulded most eminent men; and admirable citizens, in return,
gave new weight to the ancient customs and institutions of our
ancestors. But our age, on the contrary, having received the
Commonwealth as a finished picture of another century, but one already
beginning to fade through the lapse of years, has not only neglected to
renew the colors of the original painting, but has not even cared to
preserve its general form and prominent lineaments.
For what now remains of those antique manners, of which the poet said
that our Commonwealth consisted? They have now become so obsolete and
forgotten that they are not only not cultivated, but they are not even
known. And as to the men, what shall I say? For the manners themselves
have only perished through a scarcity of men; of which great misfortune
we are not only called to give an account, but even, as men accused of
capital offences, to a certain degree to plead our own cause in
connection with it. For it is owing to our vices, rather than to any
accident, that we have retained the name of republic when we have long
since lost the reality.
II. * * * There is no employment so essentially royal as the exposition
of equity, which comprises the true interpretation of all laws. This
justice subjects used generally to expect from their kings. For this
reason, lands, fields, woods, and pastures were reserved as the
property of kings, and cultivated for them, without any labor on their
part, in order that no anxiety on account of their personal interests
might distract their attention from the welfare of the State. Nor was
any private man allowed to be the judge or arbitrator in any suit; but
all disputes were terminated by the royal sentence.
And of all our Roman monarchs, Numa appears to me to have best
preserved this ancient custom of the kings of Greece. For the others,
though they also discharged this duty, were for the main part employed
in conducting military enterprises, and in attending to those rights
which belonged to war. But the long peace of Numa's reign was the
mother of law and religion in this city. And he was himself the author
of those admirable laws which, as you are aware, are still extant. And
this character is precisely what belongs to the man of whom we are
speaking. * * *
III. [_Scipio._ Ought not a farmer] to be acquainted with the nature of
plants and seeds?
_Manilius._ Certainly, provided he attends to his practical business
also.
_Scipio._ Do you think that knowledge only fit for a steward?
_Manilius._ Certainly not, inasmuch as the cultivation of land often
fails for want of agricultural labor.
_Scipio._ Therefore, as the steward knows the nature of a field, and
the scribe knows penmanship, and as both of them seek, in their
respective sciences, not mere amusement only, but practical utility, so
this statesman of ours should have studied the science of jurisprudence
and legislation; he should have investigated their original sources;
but he should not embarrass himself in debating and arguing, reading
and scribbling. He should rather employ himself in the actual
administration of government, and become a sort of steward of it, being
perfectly conversant with the principles of universal law and equity,
without which no man can be just: not unfamiliar with the civil laws of
states; but he will use them for practical purposes, even as a pilot
uses astronomy, and a physician natural philosophy. For both these men
bring their theoretical science to bear on the practice of their arts;
and our statesman [should do the same with the science of politics, and
make it subservient to the actual interests of philanthropy and
patriotism]. * * *
IV. * * * In states in which good men desire glory and approbation, and
shun disgrace and ignominy. Nor are such men so much alarmed by the
threats and penalties of the law as by that sentiment of shame with
which nature has endowed man, which is nothing else than a certain fear
of deserved censure. The wise director of a government strengthens this
natural instinct by the force of public opinion, and perfects it by
education and manners. And thus the citizens are preserved from vice
and corruption rather by honor and shame than by fear of punishment.
But this argument will be better illustrated when we treat of the love