The Academic Questions, Treatise De Finibus, and Tusculan Disputations, of M.T. Cicero, With a Sketch of the Greek Philosophers Mentioned by CiceroCicero, Marcus Tullius
Philosophy
The Academic Questions, Treatise De Finibus, and Tusculan Disputations, of M.T. Cicero, With a Sketch of the Greek Philosophers Mentioned by Cicero
Cicero, Marcus Tullius
Ethics -- Early works to 1800; Happiness -- Early works to 1800
But what a grand and magnificent and consistent character is that of the
wise man which is drawn by them! For he, after reason has taught him that
that which is honourable is alone good, must inevitably be always happy,
and must have a genuine right to those names which are often ridiculed by
the ignorant. For he will be more properly called king than Tarquin, who
was able to govern neither himself nor his family; he will deserve to be
called the master of the people more than Sylla, who was only the master
of three pestiferous vices, luxury, avarice, and cruelty; he will be
called rich more properly than Crassus, who would never have desired to
cross the Euphrates without any legitimate cause for war, if he had not
been in want of something. Everything will be properly said to belong to
that man, who alone knows how to make use of everything. He will also
rightly be called beautiful, for the features of the mind are more
beautiful than those of the body: he will deservedly be called the only
free man, who is neither subject to the domination of any one, nor
subservient to his own passions. He will fairly be called invincible, on
whose mind, even though his body be bound with chains, no fetters can ever
be imposed. Nor will he wait till the last period of his life, so as to
have it decided whether he has been happy or not, after he has come to the
last day of life and closed his eyes in death, in the spirit of the
warning which one of the wise men gave to Crœsus, without showing much
wisdom in so doing. For if he had ever been happy, then he would have
borne his happy life with him, even as far as the funeral pile built for
him by Cyrus.
But if it be true that no one except a good man is happy, and that all
good men are happy, then what deserves to be cultivated more than
philosophy, or what is more divine than virtue?
Fourth Book Of The Treatise On The Chief Good And Evil.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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