Cicero strove to give vividness to the dialogue and to keep it perfectly free from anachronisms. Diodotus is spoken of as still living, although when the words were written he had been dead for many years[282]. The surprise of Hortensius, who is but a learner in philosophy, at the wisdom of Lucullus, is very dramatic[283]. The many political and private troubles which were pressing upon Cicero when he wrote the work are kept carefully out of sight. Still we can catch here and there traces of thoughts and plans which were actively employing the author's mind at Astura. His intention to visit Tusculum has left its mark on the last section of the book, while in the last but one the _De Finibus_, the _De Natura Deorum_ and other works are shadowed forth[284]. In another passage the design of the _Tusculan Disputations_, which was carried out immediately after the publication of the _Academica_ and _De Finibus_, is clearly to be seen[285]. Hortensius and Catulus now sink to a secondary position in the conversation, which is resumed by Lucullus. His speech is especially acknowledged by Cicero to be drawn from the works of Antiochus[286]. Nearly all that is known of the learning of Lucullus is told in Cicero's dialogue, and the passages already quoted from the letters. He seems at least to have dallied with culture, although his chief energy, as a private citizen, was directed to the care of his fish-ponds[287]. In his train when he went to Sicily was the poet Archias, and during the whole of his residence in the East he sought to attach learned men to his person. At Alexandria he was found in the company of Antiochus, Aristus, Heraclitus Tyrius, Tetrilius Rogus and the Selii, all men of philosophic tastes[288]. He is several times mentioned by Pliny in the _Natural History_ as the patron of Greek artists. Yet, as we have already seen, Cicero acknowledged in his letters to Atticus that Lucullus was no philosopher. He has to be propped up, like Catulus, by the authority of another person. All his arguments are explicitly stated to be derived from a discussion in which he had heard Antiochus engage. The speech of Lucullus was, as I have said, mainly a reply to that of Cicero in the _Catulus_. Any closer examination of its contents must be postponed till I come to annotate its actual text. The same may be said of Cicero's answer.