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the name of Peripatetics, or the Walking Philofophers. These two fects, though differing in name, agreed generally in things, or in all the principal points of their philofophy: they placed the chief happiness of man in virtue, with a competency of external goods; taught the existence of a God, a providence, the immortality of the foul, and a future ftate of rewards and punishments.

But we have hitherto been confidering the exterior part of Cicero's character, and fhall now attempt to penetrate the receffes of his mind, and difcover the real fource and principle of his actions, from a view of that philofophy which he profeffed to follow, as the general rule of his life. This, as he often declares, was drawn from the academic fect; which derived its origin from Socrates, and its name from a celebrated gymnafium, or place of exercife in the fuburbs of Athens, called the Academy, where the profeflors of that school ufed to hold their lectures and philofophical difputations. Socrates was the first who banished phyfics out of philofophy, which till his time had been the fole object of it, and drew it off from the obfcure and intricate inquiries into nature, and the conftitution of the heavenly bodies, to questions of morality; of more immediate ufe and importance to the happiness of man, concerning the true notions of virtue and vice, and the natural difference of good and ill; and as he found the world generally prepoffeffed with falfe notions on thofe fubjects, fo his method was not to affert any opinion of his own, but to refute the opinions of others, and attack the errors in vogue; as the first step towards preparing men for the reception of truth, or what came the nearest to it, probability. While he himself therefore profeffed to know nothing, he used to fift out the feveral doctrines of all the pretenders to science, and then tease them with a series of queftions, fo contrived as to reduce them, by the course of their anfwers, to an evident abfurdity, and the impoflibility of defending what they had at first affirmed.

But Plato did not strictly adhere to the method of his mafter Socrates, and his followers wholly deferted it: for inftead of the Socratic modefty of affirming nothing, and examining every thing, they turned philofophy, as it were, into an art, and formed a fyftem of opinions, which they delivered to their difciples, as the peculiar tenets of their fect. Plato's nephew Speufippus, who was left the heir of his fchool, continued his lectures, as his fucceffors alfo did in the academy, and preferved the name of academics; whilft Aristotle, the most eminent of Plato's scholars, retired to another gymnafium, called the Lyceum; where, from a cuftom which he and his followers obferved, of teaching and difputing as they walked in the portico's of the place, they obtained

This was the ftate of the academic fchool under five fucceffive mafters, who governed it after Plato; Speufippus, Xenoerates, Polemo, Crates, Crantor; till Arcefilas the fixth difcarded at once all the fyftems of his predeceffors, and revived the Socratic way, of affirming nothing, doubting of all things, and expofing the vanity of the reigning opinions. He alledged the neceflity of making this reformation, from that cbfcurity of things, which had reduced Socrates, and all the ancients before him, to a confeffion of their ignorance: he obferved, as they had all likewife done, that the fenfes were narrow, reason infirm, life short, truth immersed in the deep, opinion and custom every where predominant, and all things involved in darkness. He taught therefore, "That there was no certain knowledge or perception of any thing "in nature, nor any infallible criterion of " truth and falfehood; that nothing was fo "deteftable as rafhnefs, nothing fo fcan"dalous to a philofopher, as to profefs "what was either falfe or unknown to "him; that we ought to affert nothing

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dogmatically, but in all cafes to fuf"pend our affent; and inftead of pretend"ing to certainty, content ourselves with "opinion, grounded on probability, which

was all that a rational mind had to ac"quiefce in." This was called the new academy, in diftinction from the Platonic, or the old: which maintained its credit down to Cicero's time, by a fucceffion of able matters; the chief of whom was Carneades, the fourth from Arcefilas, who carried it to its utmost height of glory, and is greatly celebrated by antiquity for the vivacity of his wit, and force of his eloquence.

We must not however imagine, that these academics continued doubting and fluctuating all their lives in fcepticism and irrefolution, without any precife opinions, or fettled principle of judging and acting: no; their rule was as certain and confiftent as that of any other fect, as it is fre quently explained by Cicero, in many parts of his works. "We are not of that fort," 3 A

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fays he," whofe mind is perpetually wandering in error, without any particular end or object of its purfuit: for what "would fuch a mind or fuch a life indeed "be worth, which had no determinate "rule or method of thinking and acting? "But the difference between, us and the "reft is, that whereas they call fome things certain, and others uncertain; we call the one probable, the other improba"ble. For what reafon then, fhould not "I puriue the probable, reject the contrary, "and, declining the arrogance of affirming, avoid the imputation of rafhnefs, which "of all things is the fartheft removed from wisdom?" Again; "we do not pre"tend to fay that there is no fuch thing as truth; but that all truths have fome "falfehood annexed to them, of fo near a "refemblance and fimilitude, as to afford "no certain note of distinction, whereby "to determine our judgment and affent: "whence it follows alfo of courfe, that "there are many things probable; which, "though not perfectly comprehended, yet "on account of their attractive and fpe"cious appearance, are fufficient to go"vern the life of a wife man." In another place, "there is no difference, fays he, "between us, and thofe who pretend to know things; but that they never doubt "of the truth of what they maintain: "whereas we have many probabilities, "which we readily embrace, but dare "not affirm. By this we preferve our judgment free and unprejudiced, and "are under no neceffity of defending what "is prefcribed and enjoined to us; where"as in other fects, men are tied down to "certain doctrines, before they are capa"ble of judging what is the beft; and in "the most infirm part of life, drawn "either by the authority of a friend, or "charmed with the first mafter whom they happen to hear, they form a judgment of things unknown to them; and "to whatever ichool they chance to be "driven by the tide, cleave to it as fast as "the oyster to the rock."

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Thus the academy held the proper medium between the rigid ftoic, and the indifference of the fceptic: the ftoics embraced all their doctrines, as fo many fixed and immutable truths, from which it was infamous to depart; and by making this their point of honour, held all their difciples in an inviolable attachment to them. The fceptics, on the other hand, cbferved a perfect neutrality towards all opinions; main

taining all of them to be equally uncertain; and that we could not affirm of any thing, that it was this or that, fince there was as much reafon to take it for the one as for the other, or for neither of them; and wholly indifferent which of them we thought it to be: thus they lived, without ever engaging themselves on any fide of a question, directing their lives in the mean time by natural affections, and the laws and customs of their country. But the academics, by adopting the probable inftead of the certain, kept the balance in an equal poife between the two extremes, making it their general principle to obferve a moderation in all their opinions; and as Plutarch, who was one of them, tells us, paying a great regard always to that old maxim,

Mudiy ayao; ne quid nimis.

As this fchool then was in no particular oppofition to any, but an equal adverfary to all, or rather to dogmatical philofophy in general, fo every other fect, next to itself, readily gave it the preference to the reft; which univerfal conceffion of the fecond place, is commonly thought to infer a right to the firft: and if we reflect on the flate of the heathen world, and what they themfelves fo often complain of, the darkness that furrounded them, and the infinite diffenfions of the beft and wifeft on the fundamental queftions of religion and morality, we must neceffarily allow, that the academic manner of philofophizing was of all others the moft rational and modeft, and the beft adapted to the difcevery of truth, whofe peculiar character it was to encourage enquiry; to fift every queftion to the bottom; to try the force of every argument, till it had found its real moment, or the precife quantity of its weight.

This it was that induced Cicero, in his advanced life and ripened judgment, to defert the old academy, and declare for the new; when, from a long experience of the vanity of thofe fects who called themfelves the proprietors of truth, and the fole guides of life, and through a despair of finding any thing certain, he was glad, after all his pains, to take up with the probable. But the genius and general character of both the academies was in fome meafure fill the fame: for the old, though it profeffed to teach a peculiar fyftem of doctrines, yet it was ever diffident and cautious of affirming; and the new, only

the

the more fcrupulous and fceptical of the two; this appears from the writings of Plato, the first master of the old, in which, as Cicero obferves, nothing is abfolutely affirmed, nothing delivered for certain, but all things freely inquired into, and both fides of the question impartially difcuffed. Yet there was another reafon that recommended this philofophy in a peculiar manner to Cicero, its being, of all others, the belt fuited to the profeffion of an orator; fince by its practice of difputing for and against every opinion of the other fects, it gave him the best opportunity of perfecting his oratorical faculty, and acquiring a habit of speaking readily upon all fubjects. He calls it therefore the parent of elegance and copiousness; and declares, that he owed all the fame of his eloquence, not to the mechanic rules of the rhetoricians, but to the enlarged and generous principles of the academy.

This fchool, however, was almost defert ed in Greece, and had but few difciples at Rome, when Cicero undertook its patronage, and endeavoured to revive its drooping credit. The reafon is obvious: it impofed a hard task upon its scholars, of difputing against every feet, and on every question in philofophy; and if it was dif ficult, as Cicero fays, to be mafter of any one, how much more of them all? which was incumbent on those who profeffed themfelves academics. No wonder then that it loft ground every where, in proportion as eafe and luxury prevailed, which naturally difpofed people to the doctrine of EpicuTas; in relation to which there is a fmart faying recorded of .Arcefilas, who being aked, why so many of all fects went over to the Epicureans, but none ever came back from them, replied, that men might be made eanu:bs, but eunuchs could never be made men again.

This general view of Cicero's philofophy, will help us to account, in fome meafure, for that difficulty which people frequently complain of in difcovering his real fentiments, as well as for the miftakes which they are apt to fall into in that fearch; fince it was the diftinguishing principle of the academy to refute the opinions, of others, rather than declare any of their Yet the chief difficulty does not lie here; for Cicero was not fcrupulous on that head, nor affected any obfcurity in the delivery of his thoughts, when it was bis bufinefs to explain them; but it is the variety and different characters of his fe

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veral writings, that perplexes the generality of his readers: for wherever they dip into his works, they are apt to fancy themfelves poffeffed of his fentiments, and to quote them indifferently as fuch, whether from his Orations, his Dialogues, or his Letters, without attending to the peculiar nature of the work, or the different perfon that he affumes in it.

His orations are generally of the judicial kind; or the pleadings of an advocate, whofe bufinefs it was to make the beft of his caufe; and to deliver, not fo much what was true, as what was ufeful to his cli ent; the patronage of truth belonging in fuch cafes to the judge, and not to the pleader. It would be abfurd therefore to require a fcrupulous veracity, or ftrict declaration of his fentiments in them: the thing does not admit of it; and he himself for bids us to expect it; and in one of thofe orations frankly declares the true nature of them all." That man," fays he, "is much "mistaken, who thinks, that in these ju"dicial pleadings, he has an authentic

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fpecimen of our opinions; they are the fpeeches of the caufes and the times; "not of the men or the advocates: if the "caufes could fpeak of themselves, no body would employ an orator; but we are employed to fpeak, not what we "would undertake to affirm upon our au

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thority, but what is fuggeited by the "caufe and the thing itfelf." Agreeably to this notion, Quintilian tells us, "that "those who are truly wife, and have spent "their time in public affairs, and not in "idle difputes, though they have refolved "with themselves to be ftrict and honest "in all their actions, yet will not fcruple "to use every argument that can be of "fervice to the caufe which they have "undertaken to defend." In his orations, therefore, where we often meet with the fentences and maxims of philofophy, we cannot always take them for his own, but as topics applied to move his audience, or add an air of gravity and probability to his fpeech.

His letters indeed to familiar friends, and especially thofe to Atticus, place the real man before us, and lay open his very heart; yet in thefe fome diftinction must neceffarily be obferved; for in letters of compliment, condolence, or recommendation, or where he is foliciting any point of importance, he adapts his arguments to the occafion; and ufes fuch as would induce his friend the most readily to grant 3 A 2

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what he defired. But as his letters in general feldom touch upon any questions of philofophy, except flightly and incidentally, fo they will afford very little help to us in the discovery of his Philofophical Opinions, which are the subject of the prefent inquiry, and for which we muft wholly recur to his philofophical works.

Now the general purpose of these works was, to give a history rather of the ancient philofophy, than any account of his own, and to explain to his fellow-citizens in their own language, whatever the philofophers of all fects, and all ages, had taught on every important queftion, in order to enlarge their minds, and reform their morals; and to employ himself moft ufefully to his country, at a time when arms and a fuperior force had deprived him of the power of ferving it in any

other way.

This he declares in his trea

tife called de Finibus, or on the Chief Good or Ill of Man; in that upon the Nature of the Gods; in his Tufculan Difputations; and in his book on the Academic Philofophy; in all which he fometimes takes upon himfelf the part of a Stoic; fometimes of an Epicurean; fometimes of the Peripatetic; for the fake of explaining with more authority the different doctrines of each fect; and as he affumes the perfon of the one to confute the other, fo in his proper character of an Academic, he fometimes difputes against them all; while the unwary reader, not reflecting on the nature of dialogues, takes Cicero ftill for the perpetual fpeaker; and under that mistake, often quotes a fentiment for his, that was delivered by him only in order to be confuted. But in thefe dialogues, as in all his other works, wherever he treats any fubject profeffedly or gives a judgment upon it deliberately, either in his own perfon, or that of an Academic, there he delivers his own opinions; and where he himself does not appear in the fcene, he takes care ufually to inform us, to which of the characters he has affigned the patronage of his own fentiments; who was generally the principal fpeaker of the dialogue; as Craffus in his treatise on the Orator; Scipio, in that of the Republic; Cato, in his piece on Old Age. This key will let us into his real thoughts; and enable us to trace his genuine notions through every part of his writings, from which I fhall now proceed to give a short abftra&t of them.

As to Phyfics, or Natural Philofophy, he. feems to have had the fame notion

with Socrates, that a minute and particu lar attention to it, and the making it the fole end and object of our enquiries, was a ftudy rather curious than profitable, and contributing but little to the improvement of human life. For though he was perfectly acquainted with the various fyftems of all the philofophers of any name, from the earliest antiquity, and has explained them all in his works; yet he did not think it worth while, either to form any diftinct opinions of his own, or at leaft to declare them. From his account, however, of thefe fyftems we may obferve, that feveral of the fundamental principles of modern philofophy, which pafs for the original difcoveries of these later times, are the revival rather of ancient notions maintained by fome of the first philofophers, of whom we have any notice in hiftory; as the Motion of the Earth; the Antipodes; a Vacuum; and an univerfal Gravitation, or attractive Quality of Matter, which holds the World in its prefent Form and Order.

But in all the great points of religion and morality, which are of more immediate relation to the happiness of man, the being of a God; a providence; the immortality of the foul; a future ftate of rewards and punishments; and the eternal difference of good and ill; he has largely and clearly declared his mind in many parts of his writings. He maintained that there was one God, or Supreme Being; incorporeal, etcrual, felf-exiflent, whe created the world by his power, and fuftained it by his providence. This he inferred from the confent of all nations; the order and beauty of the heavenly bodies; the evident marks of counfel, wisdom, and a fitness to certain ends, obfervable in the whole, and in every part of the visible world; and declares that perfon unworthy of the name of a man, who can believe all this to have been made by chance; when with the utmost ftretch of human wisdom, we cannot penetrate the depth of that wifdem which contrived it.

He believed alfo a Divine Providence, conftantly prefiding over the whole fyftem, and extending its care to all the principal members of it, with a peculiar attention to the conduct and actions of men, but leaving the minute and inferior parts to the courfe of his general laws. This he collected from the nature and attributes of the Deity; his omniscience, omnipresence, and infinite goodness; that could never defert

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or neglect what he had once produced into being and declares, that without this belief, there could be no fuch thing as piety or religion in the world.

He held likewife the immortality of the foul, and its feparate existence after death in a fiate of happiness or mifery. This he inferred from that ardent thirst of immortality, which was always the most confpicuous in the best and moft exalted minds; from which the trueft fpecimen of their nature muft needs be drawn, from its unmixed and indivifible effence, which had nothing feparable or perishable in it; from its wonderful powers and faculties; its principle of felf-motion; its memory, invention, wit, comprehenfion; which were all incompatible with Juggish matter. The Stoics fancied that the foul was a fubtilized, fiery fubftance, which furvived the body after death, and fubfifted a long me, yet not eternally, but was to perith at lait in the general conflagration; in nich they allowed, as Cicero fays, the only thing that was hard to conceive, its jeparate existence from the body; yet denied what was not only easy to imagine, but a confequence of the other; its eternal duration. Ariftotle taught, that befides the four elements of the material world, whence all other things were fuppofed to draw their being, there was a fifth offence or nature, peculiar to God and the foul, which had nothing in it that was common to any of the reft. This opinion Cicero followed, and illuftrated with his ufual perfpicuity in the following paffage:

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"The origin of the human foul," fays he," is not to be found any where on "earth; there is nothing mixed, concrete, or earthly; nothing of water, air, or "fire in it. For thefe natures are not fufceptible of memory, intelligence, or thought; have nothing that can retain "the paft, foresee the future, lay hold on "the prefent; which faculties are purely "divine, and could not poffibly be derived to man, except from God; the nature "of the foul therefore is of a fingular kind, diftinct from these known and ob"vious natures; and whatever it be that "feels and taftes, that lives and moves in us, it must be heavenly and divine, and "for that reafon eternal. Nor is God in"deed himfelf, whofe exiftence we can "clearly discover, to be comprehended by "us in any other manner, but as a free " and pure mind, clear from all mortal "concretion; obferving and moving all things; and indeed with an eternal prin

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ciple of felf-motion: of this kind, and of "the fame nature, is the human foul."

As to a future ftate of rewards aud punishments, he confidered it as a confequence of the foul's immortality, deducible f om the attributes of God, and the condition of man's life on earth; and thought it fo highly probable, that we could hardly doubt of it, he fays, unless it should happen to our minds, when they look into themselves, as it does to our eyes, when they look too intenfely at the fun, that finding their fight dazzled, they give over looking at all. in this opinion he followed Socrates and Plato, for whofe judgment he profeffed fo great a reverence, that if they had given no reafons, where yet they had given many, be jhould have been perfuaded, he fays, by their fole authority. Socrates, therefore, as he tells us, declared in his dying fpeech, “That "there were two ways appointed to the "human fouls at their departure from the "hun an body: that thote who had been "immerfed in fenfual pleafures and lufts, "and had polluted themfelves with pri"vate vices or public crimes against their "country, took an obfcure and devious "road, remote from the feat and affembly "of the gods; whilft thofe who had pre"ferved their integrity, and received little "or no contagion from the body, from "which they had conftantly abftracted "themselves, and in the bodies of men "imitated the life of the gods, had an "eafy afcent lying open before them to "thofe gods, from whom they derived "their being."

From what has already been faid, the reader will eafily imagine what Cicero's opinion must have been concerning the religion of his country: for a mind enlightened by the noble principles juft ftated, could not poffibly harbour a thought of the truth or divinity of fo abfurd a worship; and the liberty which not only he, but all the old writers take, in ridiculing the cha racters of their gods, and the fictions of their infernal torments, fhews, that there was not a man of liberal education, who did not confider it as an engine of ftate, or political fyftem; contrived for the ufes of government, and to keep the people in or der; in this light Cicero always commends it as a wife inftitution, fingularly adapted to the genius of Rome, and conftantly inculcates an adherence to its rights as the duty of all good citizens.

Their religion confifted of two principal branches; the obfervation of the auspi3 A 3

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