Cicero's Tusculan Disputations, On the Nature of the Gods, and On the Commonwealth

noon into a gallery called the Academy, which he had built for the purpose of philosophical conferences. There, after the manner of the Greeks, he held a school, as they called it, and invited the company to suggest any subject they desired to hear explained. Once proposed by someone in the audience, it immediately became the subject of that day’s debate. These five conferences, or dialogues, he collected afterward into writing in the very words and manner in which they actually took place, and published them under the title of his Tusculan Disputations, named after the villa in which they were held.

BOOK I.

ON THE CONTEMPT OF DEATH.

I. At a time when I had entirely, or to a great degree, released myself from my labors as an advocate and from my duties as a senator, I turned again, Brutus, primarily by your advice, to those studies which had never been out of my mind, although neglected at times, and which I resumed after a long interval. Now, since the principles and rules of all arts that relate to living well depend on the study of wisdom—which is called philosophy—I have thought it an employment worthy of me to illustrate them in the Latin tongue. This is not because philosophy could not be understood in the Greek language, or by the teaching of Greek masters, but it has always been my opinion that our countrymen have, in some instances, made wiser discoveries than the Greeks concerning those subjects to which they have devoted their attention, and in others have improved upon their discoveries, so that one way or another we surpass them in every point. Regarding the manners and habits of private life and family and domestic affairs, we certainly manage them with more elegance and better than they did; and as to our republic, our ancestors have, beyond all dispute, formed it on better customs and laws. What shall I say of our military affairs, in which our ancestors have been most eminent in valor, and still more so...