by Cicero
Abstention from public life was recommended principally by the Epicureans, though this was subject to qualification (1. 10 below), and in fact many members of the Roman ruling class combined an interest in Epicurean philosophy with an active political career. At the point where our text begins, Cicero is using a familiar argument from the exploits of Roman patriots, a type of argument which he employed also in different philosophical contexts (Paradoxa 1. 12, Tusculan Disputations 1. 39, Cato Maior 75).
the two Scipios: Gnaeus and Publius: the latter was the father of Scipio Africanus the elder.
Publius Africanus: Scipio Africanus the elder.
Cato: Cato the Elder, for whom Cicero had particular admiration as a ‘new man’ like himself; cf. R. 2. 1. Cato remained active in politics until his death in 149 BC, at the age of 85. His political career was indeed stormy; he is said to have survived 44 prosecutions.
Tusculum: now Frascati. This Latin community had received full Roman citizenship in 323 BC; cf. L 2. 5.
moral excellence (virtus): see Note on the Translation. Cicero here touches on a question that was much discussed in ancient ethics; Socrates in Plato’s dialogues constantly draws the analogy between moral virtues and practical skills or branches of knowledge (such as medicine or carpentry), and the Stoics, taking over the Socratic principle that virtue is a kind of knowledge, maintained that the truly wise and virtuous man was good at everything, including politics, regardless of whether he ever put his knowledge into practice. Cicero here maintains the common-sense (and Peripatetic) view that only the practical display of virtue qualifies a person to be called morally excellent.
most important field of practice . . . is in the government of a state: cf. R. 6. 13 (in the Dream of Scipio).
statesman: Latin civis, literally ‘citizen’, but Cicero when using this word always envisages a leading member of a community who will take responsibility for governing it; cf. 1. 45 ‘a great citizen’ and the phrase optimus civis ‘best citizen’, alias the rector rei publicae ‘ruler’, ‘statesman’ (see Introd. p. xxii).
in wisdom itself: the word sapientia ‘wisdom’ was often used to refer to philosophy without further qualification, although it equally often referred to practical wisdom and common sense. Cicero’s argument here plays on the two meanings.
Camillus’ exile, etc.: the first two of these examples belong to earlier Roman history; the others all belong to the turbulent period since the Gracchi. Nasica was the killer of Tiberius Gracchus: cf. on 6. 8.
murder of his chief supporters: something appears to be missing from the text after C. Mari clades. We have assumed that Cicero is speaking only of the massacre of Marians by Sulla. It is clear from Appian Bella Civilia 1.71 ff. that Marius gave as good as he got, but Cicero was loyal to his fellow-townsman. For a similar context (possibly of relevance for the reconstruction of the text here) cf. De Oratore 3. 2. 8.
that the state had been saved: Cicero was prevented by the tribune Metellus Nepos from making a speech on laying down his office as consul at the end of 63 BC ; so he merely took the customary oath, adding to it the words that he had ‘saved the state’ (referring to his defeat of the Catilinarian conspiracy). Evidently the public, or such of it as was present on the occasion, approved. Cf. Earn. 5. 2. 7 (letter to Metellus Nepos’ brother, Metellus Celer), In Pisonem 6.
maintenance: normally owed by children to their parents, in the absence of old-age pensions. The image is as old as Aeschylus, Seven against Thebes 477 θαvώv τϱoφεία πληϱώσει χθovί; cf. also Lysias 2. 70, Plato, Republic 520b.
excuses: in De Officiis 1. 71, Cicero in a more reflective mood admits two classes of persons who need not take part in politics: (a) those with uncertain health (he was perhaps thinking of his own father, cf. L. 2. 3), and (b)‘those with outstanding intellect who have devoted themselves to learning’; but in the case of others he reiterates the arguments here advanced.
proviso: this was the Epicurean doctrine. Cicero’s objection to it is telling, and this paragraph establishes the idea, important for the rest of the argument, that politics is a career or profession involving specific skills, training, and experience.
men who enjoy a very great authority: Plato and Aristotle.
Seven Wise Men: the usual list was: Thales, Pittacus, Bias, Solon, Cleobulus, Periander, and Chilon (though there were many variants).
Thales is the only one who was not a leading politician and the only one who is now counted as a philosopher.
preserving: this echoes Cicero’s own claim to have ‘saved’ the state.
Since I have had the good fortune ...: cf. L. 3. 14.
(I am not unqualified. . .): there is clearly a gap in the text; the insertion necessary for the sense is here made before auctores, following Keyes (NB full details of modern sources are given in the Bibliography).
to you and me: Cicero is in all probability addressing his brother Quintus. The alleged reporting of the conversation by Rutilius Rufus is a transparent but plausible fiction. Rutilius had been an associate of Scipio and his circle; he was in exile in Asia Minor from 92 BC until his death in 77, and Cicero and his brother visited him there during their tour of Greece and the East in 78–77 BC (cf. Brutus 83). Rutilius was something of a historian of his own times and Cicero doubtless learned from his writings as well as from his conversation.
this whole matter: reading ad rationem omnium (harum) rerum with Ziegler.
consulship of Tuditanus and Aquilius: 129 BC, the year in which Scipio Aemilianus died.
Latin holidays: the feriae Latinae commemorated the alliance between Rome and the Latins and traditionally marked the beginning of the campaigning season; all the magistrates left Rome to offer sacrifice on the Alban Mount together with the leaders of other Latin communities. Scipio and his friends, not being magistrates in that year, could treat the period of the festival simply as a holiday. It was a ‘moveable feast’, the date being fixed by the consuls on entering office. In the earlier period of the Republic it took place in the spring, but from 153 BC the beginning of the consular year was changed to coincide with the beginning of the civil year on 1 January (cf. note on L. 2. 54; see Michels 97–9) and the Latin festival was apparently moved earlier; in the present dialogue it is still winter (1. 18), though a fine day.
a second sun: this portent is referred to by Cicero also at De Natura Deorum 2. 14 and there is no reason to doubt that the report of it came from historical records; similar occurrences are mentioned from time to time, e.g. Cic. De Divinatione 1. 97, Livy 28. 11. 3, 4T. IT. 13, Pliny, Natural History 2. 99. In the passage from De Natura Deorum it is taken to foreshadow the death of Scipio Aemilianus; if this was the usual interpretation there would be a dramatic irony in making Scipio and his friends discuss it here with such rational confidence. The phenomenon is a well-recognized natural one, and there is no need either to suppose that the portent was mere invention or hallucination, or to invoke literary precedents like the distressing experience of Pentheus in Euripides, Bacchae 918. Images of the sun may appear in different parts of the sky, caused by reflection and/or refraction of light by ice crystals in the atmosphere. The commonest such phenomenon is the parhelion or ‘sun-dog’, which occurs to one side of the sun itself; there may be two, one on either side. Parhelia appear significantly smaller and fainter than the sun; they are not round but usually appear the shape of a tear-drop with the narrow end pointing away from the sun; and they show rainbow-like colour effects due to refraction of light. A parhelion may have been thought of as a second sun, but a more likely candidate is the anthelion or counter-sun, which appears at the same altitude as the sun but opposite to it in the sky. It is not so often observed, but descriptions indicate that it appears about the same size, shape and colour as the sun, although significantly fainter. Being uncoloured it is assumed to arise from reflection alone, not refraction. (The fact that the anthelion appears opposite the sun would also enhance its status as a symbol of political confrontation.) Ancient scient
ists were well aware of these phenomena. Aristotle, Meteorologica 3. 2. 6. 372a gives a brief account; Seneca, Naturales Quaestiones 1. 11. 2–3 refers to the double or triple suns reported as omens, and explains them as parhelia, the cause of which he gets approximately right; cf. also Pliny, Natural History 2. 99. For a modern meteorological account see Geddes, 326–3 T. We are most grateful to Dr David Jones of the Chemistry Department, University of Newcastle upon Tyne, for information on this subject.
Plato: this passage provides one of the most explicit pieces of ancient evidence on the relation of the views expressed by ‘Socrates’ in Plato’s dialogues to those of the historical Socrates—or at least on how it was regarded in Cicero’s time. On the reported journeys of Plato see Riginos; the evidence for a journey to Egypt is regarded as suspect, though the Italian voyages are generally accepted as historical.
Numantia: this Spanish fortress was captured by Scipio in 133 BC, thus bringing to an end the war in Spain.
Laelius: on the friendship of Scipio and Laelius see further Powell (1) 9.
old enough to have been quaestors: on Fannius and Scaevola, see note on Laelius 3, Powell (1) 77–8.
universe: the idea that the whole universe is our home is a Stoic one; cf. L. 1. 23, De Finibus 3. 64, De Natura Deorum 2. 154, Seneca, De Otio 4. 1.
some decree: Manilius was an eminent lawyer, and this passage (like many in Cicero) makes facetious use of very precise Roman legal terminology. The decree referred to is the interdictum uti possidetis, which was the first step in a procedure used in cases of disputed possession of land. The Roman law of actions required that one party should be in actual possession and the other should bring the action; the onus of proof lay with the bringer of the action. It was therefore necessary first to determine who actually had possession. The interdict, granted by the praetor, prohibited either party from disturbing the other’s possession while the preliminary issue of fact was decided. See Gaius 4. 160; Justinian, Institutiones 4. 15. 4; Digest 43. 17. 1; Jolowicz 273–4.
Sulpicius Galus: his astronomical interests are mentioned also by Cicero in Cato Maior 50. His demonstration with the globe was in fact quite irrelevant to the phenomenon of the double sun, except in so far as it established the principle that celestial phenomena in general could be explained rationally.
globe: this passage gives us most of the information we have on the ‘Archimedean sphere’, which was evidently a mechanism for demonstrating the movements of the heavenly bodies, similar to what has in modern times been called an ‘orrery’, although the exact details of its construction remain somewhat obscure. It could well have been as mechanically sophisticated as the first-century BC clockwork calendar of which remains were discovered in a shipwreck off the island of Antikythera (see Peterson 21–32). According to Cicero, De Natura Deorum 1. 88 the philosopher Poseidonius also had such a sphere. In what follows it must be remembered that Archimedes’ model of the solar system would have been geocentric.
temple of Valour (Virtus): near the Porta Capena at the southern entrance to Rome; vowed by M. Marcellus after his triumph over the Gauls in 222, and dedicated by his son seventeen years later (Livy 29. 11. 13).
that other globe: presumably an ordinary geographical globe, made to demonstrate the sphericity of the earth; Eudoxus will have made a celestial globe marked with the constellations (showing the sky inside out, as it were), whereas Archimedes’ ‘sphere’ or ‘globe’ was presumably not solid but based on a framework of interlocking rings or bands (what is called an armillary sphere).
cone-shaped shadow: causing an eclipse of the moon; this is quite correct astronomically as regards the relative positions of sun, moon and earth. To demonstrate this properly, the Archimedean sphere would have needed to incorporate a lamp to represent the sun, which would cast a shadow on the other side of the globe that represented the earth. An eclipse of the sun, at new moon, is often followed two weeks later by an eclipse of the moon, because both happen when the moon’s orbit is in the same plane as the earth’s. Cf. Cic. De Divinatione 2. 17; Pliny, Natural History 2. 7.
in the great war . . . between Athens and Sparta: this eclipse happened on 3 August 431 BC ; Bickerman 87; cf. Thucydides 2. 28; Plutarch, Pericles 35. 2.
the moon and night: this phrase, odd-looking at first sight, is in fact appropriate, as the eclipse referred to took place at sunset (Skutsch ad loc). By our reckoning it was apparently on 21 June 399 BC.
Major Annals: the Annates Maximi were a chronological record of official events, based on the archives of the Pontifex Maximus. Their style was apparently laconic (cf. L. 1. 6). Events such as eclipses, which were thought to be of religious significance, were naturally included in them. Cf. De Oratore z. 52; Cornell 13–15; Frier.
July the seventh in the reign of Romulus: it seems that this eclipse has not been identified with certainty; not surprisingly, since the dates of Romulus’ reign are purely legendary and it is impossible to identify the year or to determine the degree of inaccuracy in the calendar at that time.
Romulus: the deification of Romulus is here treated in a rationalistic manner; cf. 2. 17–20; in the Dream of Scipio, however, we learn that the souls of all good statesmen ascend to heaven (6. 13, 6. 16). There is a gap in the text here, but it is possible to see roughly what the train of thought must have been. Tubero remarks that Scipio appears to have changed his mind (presumably from 1. 15). Scipio will then have responded that he did not mean to disparage scientific study (cf. 1.30 below). On the speech which follows see Powell (4); Zetzel 117. The ideas derive from philosophical ‘protreptic’, i.e. exhortations to philosophical study.
citizen’s . . . right (lus Quiritium): the legal term for civil-law ownership as opposed to mere possession. Cicero plays on the technical language of Roman law.
necessary rather than desirable things: cf. Plato, Republic 347c-d (Lee’s translation): ‘That [the prospect of being governed by someone worse than themselves] is what, I believe, frightens honest men into accepting power, and they approach it not as if it were something desirable out of which they were going to do well, but as if it were something unavoidable, which they cannot find anyone better or equally qualified to undertake.’
doing nothing: i.e. not taking part in public business; this is the language of the Roman senator for whom even the busiest people were living a life of ‘leisure’ (otium) if they were not involved in politics and warfare.
him: Q. Aelius Tubero, here assumed to be related to Sextus Aelius Paetus Catus.
Iphigenia: by Ennius (Jocelyn fr. 95, pp. TO 8, 324–8), based on Euripides’ Iphigenia in Aulis.
Zethus: the debate between the warrior Zethus and his brother Amphion the musician in the Antiope of Euripides (on which Pacuvius’ play of the same name was based) is mentioned by Plato in his Corgias; cf. De Oratore z. 155.
three commissioners: the commission set up under Tiberius Gracchus’ law to reassign the public land, dispossessing the Italian landowners in favour of poorer Roman citizens. The issue split both the Senate and the people, as is made clear here. Scipio supported the status quo and the interests of the Italian landed classes (‘allies and Latins’). This whole passage is written (not surprisingly) from the point of view of the supporters of Scipio and opponents of Gracchus; after all, it is Scipio’s greatest friend who is talking; but Cicero himself also took very much the same line.
Panaetius . . . Polybius: both men were recipients of Scipio’s patronage. The reference to them here has tended to be taken as a coded message that Cicero is about to make detailed use of some work of Panaetius or Polybius or both, but this goes beyond what may legitimately be deduced from the text. It is clear that Cicero’s political theory and account of the Roman constitution has much in common with that of Polybius, but there are also considerable differences (see Zetzel 22–4), and definite influence from Panaetius is difficult to detect. The mention of the two names here is, more than anything else, a piece of imaginative scene-setting.
craftsman:
the Socratic analogy (cf. above, note on 1. 2 ‘moral excellence’); Cicero again insists that politics is an art. His emphasis here on the hereditary duties of the Roman ruling class is worth reflecting on: Cicero himself was not born into the Roman senatorial order but made his own way into it.
toga-wearing people: ‘The Romans, lords of the world, the toga-wearing nation’, as Virgil (Aeneid 1. 282) was later to put it. We are not to think here of the toga as symbol of civilian as opposed to military life, but as a symbol of nationhood.