5.
But such criticism on Cicero as Lyttelton's proceeds on an entire misconception of the design and purpose with which the ancients prosecuted philosophical studies. The motives and principles of morals were not so seriously acknowledged as to lead to a practical application of them to the conduct of life. Even when they proposed them in the form of precept, they still regarded the perfectly virtuous man as the creature of their imagination rather than a model for imitation—a character whom it was a mental recreation rather than a duty to contemplate; and if an individual here or there, as Scipio or Cato, attempted to conform his life to his philosophical conceptions of virtue, he was sure to be ridiculed for singularity and affectation.
Even among the Athenians, by whom philosophy was, in many cases, cultivated to the exclusion of every active profession, intellectual amusement, not the discovery of Truth, was the principal object of their discussions. That we must thus account for the ensnaring questions and sophistical reasonings of which their disputations consisted, has been noticed by writers on Logic;[133] and it was their extension of this system to the case of morals which brought upon their Sophists the irony of Socrates and the sterner rebuke of Aristotle. But if this took place in a state of society in which the love of speculation pervaded all ranks, much more was it to be expected among the Romans, who, busied as they were in political enterprises, and deficient in philosophical acuteness, had neither time nor inclination for abstruse investigations; and who considered philosophy simply as one of the many fashions introduced from Greece, "a sort of table furniture," as Warburton well expresses it, a mere refinement in the arts of social enjoyment.[134] This character it bore both among friends and enemies. Hence the popularity which attended the three Athenian philosophers who had come to Rome on an embassy from their native city; and hence the inflexible determination with which Cato procured their dismissal, through fear, as Plutarch tells us,[135] lest their arts of disputation should corrupt the Roman youth. And when at length, by the authority of Scipio,[136] the literary treasures of Sylla, and the patronage of Lucullus, philosophical studies had gradually received the countenance of the higher classes of their countrymen, still, in consistency with the principle above laid down, we find them determined in their adoption of this or that system, not so much by the harmony of its parts, or by the plausibility of its reasonings, as by its suitableness to the particular profession and political station to which they severally belonged. Thus, because the Stoics were more minute than other sects in inculcating the moral and social duties, we find the Roman jurisconsults professing themselves followers of Zeno;[137] the orators, on the contrary, adopted the disputatious system of the later Academics;[138] while Epicurus was the master of the idle and the wealthy. Hence, too, they confined the profession of philosophical science to Greek teachers; considering them the sole proprietors, as it were, of a foreign and expensive luxury, which the vanquished might suitably have the duty of furnishing, and which the conquerors could well afford to purchase.
Before the works of Cicero, no attempts worth considering had been made for using the Latin tongue in philosophical subjects. The natural stubbornness of the language conspired with Roman haughtiness to prevent this application.[139] The Epicureans, indeed, had made the experiment, but their writings were even affectedly harsh and slovenly,[140] and we find Cicero himself, in spite of his inexhaustible flow of rich and expressive diction, making continual apologies for his learned occupations, and extolling philosophy as the parent of everything great, virtuous, and amiable.[141]
Yet, with whatever discouragement his design was attended, he ultimately triumphed over the pride of an unlettered people, and the difficulties of a defective language. He was indeed possessed of that first requisite for eminence, an enthusiastic attachment to the studies he was recommending. But, occupied as he was with the duties of a statesman, mere love of literature would have availed little, if separated from that energy and breadth of intellect by which he was enabled to pursue a variety of objects at once, with equally perserving and indefatigable zeal. "He suffered no part of his leisure to be idle," says Middleton, "or the least interval of it to be lost; but what other people gave to the public shows, to pleasures, to feasts, nay, even to sleep and the ordinary refreshments of nature, he generally gave to his books, and the enlargement of his knowledge. On days of business, when he had anything particular to compose, he had no other time for meditating but when he was taking a few turns in his walks, where he used to dictate his thoughts to his scribes who attended him. We find many of his letters dated before daylight, some from the senate, others from his meals, and the crowd of his morning levee."[142] Thus he found time, without apparent inconvenience, for the business of the State, for the turmoil of the courts, and for philosophical studies. During his Consulate he delivered twelve orations in the Senate, Rostrum, or Forum. His Treatises de Oratore and de Republicâ, the most finished perhaps of his compositions, were written at a time when, to use his own words, "not a day passed without his taking part in forensic disputes."[143] And in the last year of his life he composed at least eight of his philosophical works, besides the fourteen orations against Antony, which are known by the name of Philippics.
Being thus ardent in the cause of philosophy, he recommended it to the notice of his countrymen, not only for the honour which its introduction would reflect upon himself (which of course was a motive with him), but also with the fondness of one who esteemed it "the guide of life, the parent of virtue, the guardian in difficulty, and the tranquillizer in misfortune."[144] Nor were his mental endowments less adapted to the accomplishment of his object than the spirit with which he engaged in the work. Gifted with great versatility of talent, with acuteness, quickness of perception, skill in selection, art in arrangement, fertility of illustration, warmth of fancy, and extraordinary taste, he at once seizes upon the most effective parts of his subject, places them in the most striking point of view, and arrays them in the liveliest and most inviting colours. His writings have the singular felicity of combining brilliancy of execution with never-failing good sense. It must be allowed that he is deficient in depth; that he skims over rather than dives into the subjects of which he treats; that he had too great command of the plausible to be a patient investigator or a sound reasoner. Yet if he has less originality of thought than others, if he does not grapple with his subject, if he is unequal to a regular and lengthened disquisition, if he is frequently inconsistent in his opinions, we must remember that mere soundness of view, without talent for display, has few recommendations for those who have not yet imbibed a taste even for the outward form of knowledge,[145] that system nearly precludes freedom, and depth almost implies obscurity. It was this very absence of scientific exactness which constituted in Roman eyes a principal charm of Cicero's compositions.[146]
Nor must his profession as a pleader be forgotten in enumerating the circumstances which concurred to give his writings their peculiar character. For, however his design of interesting his countrymen in Greek literature, however too his particular line of talent, may have led him to explain rather than to invent; yet he expressly informs us it was principally with a view to his own improvement in Oratory that he devoted himself to philosophical studies.[147] This induced him to undertake successively the cause of the Stoic, the Epicurean, or the Platonist, as an exercise for his powers of argumentation; while the wavering and unsettled state of mind, occasioned by such habits of disputation, led him in his personal judgment to prefer the sceptical tenets of the New Academy.