Cicero's Tusculan disputations .. online

cal strains were invented, and then, that much
greater pleasure may be derived from reading poetry
than from hearing it sung. Then too, as I just now
commended the blind to the pleasure of hearing, so
I may equally commend the deaf to the pleasure of
seeing. It must be remembered also that he who can
talk with himself has no need of another's conver-
sation. Suppose, however, that all misfortunes are
heaped together upon one man, that he has the use
neither of eyes nor of ears, and is at the same time

1 Cicero, we cannot doubt, here refers to the unlawfully ambi-
tious views imputed to Crassus on account of his connection in
the triumvirate with Caesar and Pompey, charges of which he
was probably innocent. Cicero was certainly never his friend, and
in De Offkiis (iii. 18) he tells a story of him indicative of his
dishonesty and his well-known greed of money.

2 The harp was generally played as an accompaniment to the
human voice.



320 Cicero's Tusculan Disputations.

afflicted with the severest bodily pains. In the first
place, these accumulated infirmities of themselves
generally put an end to a man's life ; but if they
chance to be prolonged, and inflict more torment than
there is reason for one's bearing, why, ye good gods,
should we hesitate ? There is a port at hand ; for
death is an eternal refuge where there is no more
consciousness. Theodorus said to Lysimachus, who
threatened him with death, " You have indeed done
something great, if you have acquired the power of
a Spanish fly." * When Perseus begged Paullus not
to lead him in triumph, he replied, " The matter is
entirely within your own power." Much was said
about death on the first day, when death was the
subject, not a little on the second day, when pain
was under discussion ; and whoever bears in mind
what was said will be in no danger of not thinking
that death is either to be desired, or certainly not to
be dreaded.

41. I would indeed apply to the preservation of
life the rule that prevails at the festive entertain-
ments of the Greeks : " Let the guest either drink
or go." This is as it ought to be. It is fitting for
one either to enjoy equally with the rest the pleas-
ure of drinking, or else to depart before he is ex-
posed to the violence of those who drink to excess.

1 Cantharides were not only used, as now, for remedial pur-
poses, but by some process well known to the practitioners of the
not uncommon art of poisoning, a deadly poison was extracted
from them.



Virtue sufficient for Happiness. 321

In like manner, you should leave by flight the
wrongs of fortune which you cannot bear. These
same things which Epicurus says, Hieronymus re-
peats in as many words. But if those philosophers
whose opinion it is that virtue has no validity of its
own, and who say that all which we call right and
praiseworthy is void, and is dressed up with empty
words, nevertheless think that the wise man is
always happy, what ground ought to be taken by
philosophers who are in the line of descent from
Socrates and Plato, some of whom maintain that
the goods of the mind are of such surpassing ex-
cellence as utterly to eclipse those of the body and
of the outside world, while the others do not deem
these last as in any sense goods, but confine that
name to what the mind possesses ? The controversy
between these schools Carneades, as an honorary
umpire, used to settle in his own way. Inasmuch
as whatever things the Peripatetics called goods
were regarded as conveniences by the Stoics, nor
yet did the Peripatetics attach more value than the
Stoics to riches, good health and other things of the
same kind, and since these matters ought to be
weighed by reality, not by words, he maintained
that there was no reason for their disagreeing.
Therefore I will leave it for philosophers of other
schools to show how they establish the principle
for which I have been contending ; while it is a
source of pleasure to me that something worthy of
being said by philosophers is professed by them

21



322 Cicero's Tusculan Disputations.

concerning the capacity of always living well that
belongs to the wise.

Since we must go to-morrow morning, let us keep
in memory the discussions of these five days. In-
deed I think that I shall write them out ; for in
what way can I better employ this leisure such as
it is ? I will send these five additional books * to
my friend Brutus, by whom I have been not only
urged, but importuned to write on philosophy; in
doing which I cannot easily say of how much
benefit I may be to others, but I certainly could
else have found no relief for my intensely bitter
and various griefs and for the causes of annoyance
that beset me on every side.

1 The five books De Finibus had already been dedicated to
Brutus.



INDEX.



ACADEMY, the New, refraining from positive affirma-
tion, 271.

An ach arsis the Scythian, simple living of, 304.
Anger, accounted as useful by the Peripatetics, 226.

absurdly so regarded, 227.

harmful, even when it seems justified, 228.

worthless in an orator, 231.

equivalent to madness, 245.
Antonius, Marcus, 127 n.

Aquinius, a worthless poet, satirized by Catullus, 288 n.
Archimedes, tomb of, discovered "by Cicero, 289.
Aristotle, fifth element of, constituting the soul, 17.
Avernus, 28 n.

Blindness, no bar to happiness, 315.

illustrious instances of, that have been bravely

borne, 316.

Brutus, Lucius Junius, the Tusculan Disputations in-
scribed to, xxii.
family of, 196.

Cicero, circumstances of, when this book was written, xiii.

altered aims of, xv.
Consolatio, Cicero's, when and why written, xiv.

quoted, 27.

referred to, 55, 60, 189.
Courage, in bearing pain, examples of, 124.



324 Index.

Courage, how to be acquired, 125.

lack of, disgraceful in a man, 127.

denned, 229.

Cyrenaics, theory of the, as regards grief, 157, 172.
refuted, 158, 175.

Damocles, story of, 286.

Horace's verses concerning, 287 n.
Damon and Phintias, story of, 288.
Deafness, not fatal to happiness, 318.
Death, not miserable if it be the extinction of being, 9.
often saving one from evil, 61.
attended by no sensation of want, 63.
instances of boldly incurring, 65.
naturalness of, 67.

unconsciousness of suffering or indignity in, 77.
how to be met cheerfully, 80.
in full prosperity desirable, 81.
instances of the conferment of, as a good gift of the

gods, 83.

desirable whatever its issue, 87.
Democritus, theory of, concerning the soul, 32, 60.
Desire, inordinate, the several forms of, 208.

under the classification of Epicurus, 305.
Dicaearchus, theory of, concerning the soul, 16, 18, 56.
Diodotus, long blind, yet none the less happy, busy, and

useful, 317.

Diogenes, contempt of, for death, 77.
Dionysius, misery of, 285.

compared with Archimedes, 289.
Diseases of the mind, curable, 136.

cherished by education and by the

poets, 137.

cherished also by popular opinion, 138.
more numerous and harmful than
those of the body, 139.



Index. 325

Diseases of the mind, akin to insanity, 141.
how produced, 209.
ultimate sources of, 210.
different proclivities to, 212.
less easily eradicated than those of

the body, 217.
transient discriminated from chronic,

248.
Divine element, in all that is great in man, 47.

discerned, as God himself is discerned, 51.

Eleusinian mysteries, 22 n.

Emulation of a vicious type, never serviceable, 232.

Ephemera, 69 n.

Epicharmus, 12 n.

Epicurus, inconsistency of, as regards pain, 99, 118.

remedy of, for grief, 162.

subjected to a reductio ad dbsurdum, 166.

pleasure as defined by, 169.

ground of Cicero's opposition to, 171.

provides insufficiently for happiness, 295.

yet maintains that virtue must create happiness,
303.

the advocate of simple modes of living, 304.
Erasmus, extract from the preface of, to the Tusculan Dis-
putations, xxi.
Euphorion, 168 n.
Excluded middle, law of, 11.
Exile, no evil, 313.

Fear, the several forms of, 207.

wrongly accounted as useful by the Peripatetics, 225.

denned, 238.
Frugal living, in accordance with nature, 307.

Gladiators, hardy endurance of, 118.

Good, the supreme, according to the Stoics, 300.



326 Index.

Good, the supreme, the several opinions concerning, 301.
Grief, incompatible with courage, 146.

with the virtues comprehended under the term fru-
galitas, 148.

unbefitting for a wise man, 150.

as regarded by the Stoics, 152.

a matter of opinion, 153.

often shameless, 156.

caused, according to the Cyrenaics, by the sudden-
ness of its occasion, 157.

really not caused, but enhanced, by suddenness, 158.

sometimes the more severe, because its cause is fore-
seen, 160.

viewed in the light of the several virtues, 162.

not relieved by the pleasures of sense, 168.

examples of fortitude in, 176.

relieved by contemplation of its necessity, 178.

enhanced by the feeling that it ought to be cher-
ished, 179.

capable of being omitted or postponed, 181.

therefore unnecessary, 182.

reasons for assuming, 184.

removed by time, though its cause remains, 187.

means of consolation for, 189.

modes of consoling, differing with occasion and
person, 191.

special forms of, treated separately by the Greek
philosophers, 192.

the several forms of, 206.

effect of example in the endurance of, 237.
Gymnasium, the Greek, a nurse of licentiousness, 242.

Happiness, made imperfect by the existence of any evil,

265.

not contingent on fortune, 267.
contingent solely on virtue, 269.



Index. 327

Happiness, stability essential to, 275.

belongs always to the wise man, 277.

to be gloried in, 281.

requisites to, 291.

compelled to keep company with virtue, even

in torment, 299.
Hercules, lamentation of, from the Trachiniae, 101.

appeal for vengeance to his son, 102.
Heredity, asserted by Panaetius, 57.

denied by Cicero, 58.

Honor, the sentiment of, an inspirer of courage, 132.
Hyrcanian dogs, 79 n.

Immortality of the soul, believed by the ancients, 20.

taught in the Eleusinian mys-
teries, 22.
implied in what men do for times

beyond their own, 24.
implied in the desire for posthu-
mous fame, 25.

Imperfection of mind, how related to disease, 213.
Insanity, as distinguished from madness, 143.

Juventas, another name for Hebe, 47 n.

" Know thyself," meaning of the precept, 39.

Labor and pain, wherein alike, and wherein differing, 110.
Laelius, Caius, compared with Cinna, as to happiness, 283.
Lanman, Professor C. R., letter of, on Sanskrit par-
ticles, xxiii.

Life, long or short, only in comparison, 69.
Love, as a passion, shameful, 241.

Platonic, unreal and absurd, 243.

cure of, 244.



328 Index.

Melancholy, 143 n.

Memory, as restoring what was known in a previous state

of being, 42.

remarkable instances of, 43.
proving the soul's immortality, 45.

Military service, as a discipline for hardy endurance, 112.
More, Henry, stanzas of, on the life of the unembodied
soul, 36 n.

Naevius, named as among the earliest Latin poets, 2.

quoted, 240.
Numa, why regarded as a Pythagorean, 196.

Oracles of the dead, 85 n.

Oratory, early proficiency of the Romans in, 4.

Pain, preferable to moral evil, 97, 108.

not so regarded by many of the early philosophers, 98.
how treated by Epicurus, 99.
the capacity of bearing, how cultivated, 132.
indifference to, undesirable, 145.
no hindrance to virtue or to happiness, 296.
Panaetius, reasons of, for denying the soul's immortality, 57.
Uddos, meaning of, 140 n.
Peripatetics, the, virtually in harmony with the Stoics as

to happiness, 321.
Perturbations of mind, classified, 154.

the wise man not liable to, 200.
defined by Zeno, 202.
the result of false opinion, 204.
baseness of subjection to, 218.
remedy for, 219.
not to be temporized with, 222.
not serviceable, as the Peripatetics
account them, 223.



Index. 329

Perturbations of mind, false reasoning of the Peripatetics

with regard to, 225.
different modes of curative treat-
ment of, 233.

how to be made impossible, 235.
voluntary, and therefore needless,

239.

exclude happiness, 260.
Philosophy, cultivated in Greece earlier than in Home, 1,

91, 198.
poorly represented by early Epicurean writers

in Rome, 93.
appropriate work of, 95.
the true culture of the soul, 96.
the sole and sufficient cure for perturbations of

mind, 249.
apostrophized as the supreme guide and joy of

human life, 253.

older in essence than in name, 254.
when, where, and how named, 255.
promises of, to man, 263.
Pity, as regarded by the Stoics, 151 n.
Plato, authority of, as to the immortality of the soul, 37.

the Phaedo of, quoted, as to the soul's past and future

eternity, 38.

Pleasure, the several forms of, 208.
Poetry, of late origin in Rome, 2.

cherishing effeminacy as to the endurance of pain, 105.
Popularity, not essential to happiness, 31.
Posidonius, fortitude of, in suffering, 130.
Prometheus, lamentation of, from Aeschylus, 102.
Pythagoras, establishment of, in Magna Graecia, 196.
vestiges in Rome of the philosophy of, 197.
inventor of the name of " Philosophy," 255.

Quackery of the Epicureans as to the cure of grief, 166, 168.



330 Index.

Reputation, not to be reckoned among goods, 279.

Sardanapalus, brutish luxury of, 310.
Sense, the organs of, not means, but avenues of percep-
tion, 35.
Socrates, teaching of, as to the soul's nature, 52.

as to its destiny, 53.
dying words of, 71.
mode of reasoning of, 73.
the founder of the philosophy of life and morals,

257.

on happiness, in the Gorgias, 272.
Soul, theories concerning the, 15.
destiny of the, after death, 30.
final home of the, 33.
division of the, into two parts, one with, one without

reason, 121, 202.

Spartans, readiness of the, to meet death, 75.
Specialists, in need of large general culture, 89 and n.
Stoics, doctrine of the, as to pain, 106, 117.

Theramenes, death of, 70.

QV/JLOHTIS, used by Cicero, but found in no extant Greek

author, 208 n.
Tusculan Disputations, when written, xiii.

unity of, xvi.

outline of the several books of, xvi-xx.

method of, 6.

Under-world, fictions concerning the, 7.

imagined continuity of life in the, 27.

Virtue, one and indivisible, 109.

personified as exhorting to the brave endurance of

pain, 120.
sole cure of mental disease, 218.



Index. 331

Virtue, supreme over human fortunes, 252.

cannot under any circumstances exclude happi-
ness, 259.
identical with absolute reason, 275.

Wealth, not to be reckoned among goods, 279.

not essential to happiness, 310.
Wisdom, scope and fruits of, 293.

Xenocrates, regarding virtue as the source of perfect happi-
ness, 282.

Xenophon, the simple living of the Persians described
by, 308.

Youth, the goddess of, 47.

Zeno, perturbations of mind denned by, 202.



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