Marcus Tullius Cicero, orator, statesman and philosopher, is the great commanding figure of the literary period which is designated by his name. With him Latin prose reaches a height never before attained and never afterward surpassed. [Sidenote: Importance of Cicero.] The cooler and more critical judgment of our northern natures and later age may find his eloquence too exuberant, and our scholars, trained in the study of the Greek philosophers, may deny him the title of an original thinker, but no one can fail to appreciate the power of his utterance, the clearness of his exposition, or the lucid elegance of his diction. He found the Latin language the chief dialect of Italy, the speech of a great and mighty city; he made it the language of the world for centuries. To write the life of Cicero in all the known details would be to write the history of Rome during the entire period of his manhood. The historian of literature must content himself with a mere sketch. [Sidenote: Education and early years.] Cicero was born at Arpinum, a small town in the hills of eastern Latium, on the third of January, 106 B. C. The town was also the birthplace of Marius, whose fame no doubt fired the imagination of the young Cicero and helped to rouse his ambition. His father determined to give him the best possible education and sent him to Rome, where he knew the two great orators, M. Antonius and L. Crassus, and also the aged M. Accius and the Greek poet Archias. Since legal knowledge was a necessary part of an orator’s education, he studied with the jurist Q. Scævola (p. 44), and the Augur of the same name. He also paid attention to philosophy, studying with the Epicurean Phædrus, the Academic philosopher Philo, who was a pupil of Clitomachus, and the Stoic Diodotus. His teacher of rhetoric was Molo, of Rhodes, and he also received instruction from the rhetorician M. Antonius Gnipho and the actors Roscius and Æsopus. He acquired a great reputation as an advocate by several speeches, especially by his defense of Quinctius (81 B. C.) and Roscius of Ameria (80 B. C.); but his health failed, and at the same time he wished to perfect his education. He therefore left Rome and spent two years (79-77 B. C.) in Greece and Asia. At Athens he studied under the Academic Antiochus, the Epicurean Zeno, his old teacher Phædrus, and the instructor in oratory, Demetrius. In Asia he became acquainted with the florid Asian style of eloquence, and at Rhodes he studied again under his former teacher Molo, who exerted himself to chasten the exuberance of his style, which had been encouraged by the Asiatic orators. At Rhodes he also became acquainted with the famous Stoic Posidonius.