On Duties
De Officiis
Headnote
De Officiis — On Duties — is Cicero’s last completed prose work, written in the autumn of 44 BC in the months after the assassination of Caesar, while Mark Antony’s power was rising and the proscriptions that would cost Cicero his life were less than a year away. He cast it as a long letter of instruction to his only son Marcus, then twenty and studying philosophy at Athens under the Peripatetic Cratippus — a son whose record was uneven and whose father’s anxiety shows through the work’s affectionate, admonitory tone. For the first two books Cicero follows the treatise of the Stoic Panaetius on appropriate action (peri tou kathēkontos); the third part, which Panaetius announced but never wrote, Cicero supplies himself, and says so plainly. The subject is officium — duty, the fitting act — not as abstract theory but as the practical question of how a decent man should conduct himself in a commonwealth coming apart.
The work falls into three books on a single rising argument. The first treats the honorable (honestum) and traces it to four sources: the perception of truth, which yields wisdom; the preservation of human fellowship, which yields justice and generosity; the greatness and strength of an unconquered spirit, which yields courage; and order and measure in word and deed, which yield the seemly — the decorum that is Cicero’s distinctive contribution to ethics. The second turns to the expedient (utile): how goodwill, trust, and glory are truly won, with the insistence — against the cynic — that nothing genuinely advantageous is ever at odds with the honorable. The third confronts the cases where advantage seems to clash with honor and dissolves the conflict through a gallery of tests: the grain-merchant sailing to famine-struck Rhodes, the ring of Gyges that confers invisibility, and above all Regulus, the consul who kept his oath to Carthage though it meant returning to torture and death.
No other work of Cicero’s has had so long an afterlife. Its Roman, example-driven ethics — duty argued through Fabricius and Regulus rather than through syllogism — made it a schoolbook for seventeen centuries, a favorite of the Fathers, of the humanists, and of Frederick the Great, and among the first books to be set in type after the Bible. Yet beneath the public teaching runs a private urgency: a father writing in haste and in danger, handing his son the distilled conviction of a lifetime in the Forum — that the honorable and the expedient are finally one, and that a man who betrays the first to grasp the second has miscalculated even his own advantage. Within the year Cicero would be dead at the hands of the men this book quietly judges; it stands as something close to his testament.
Cato — who was roughly Scipio’s contemporary — wrote that Publius Scipio, my son, the man who was first called Africanus, used to say that he was never less idle than when at leisure, never less alone than when alone. A magnificent saying, and worthy of a great and wise man; for it tells us that he was accustomed, even in leisure, to think on affairs of state, and even in solitude to converse with himself — so that he was never truly idle, and at times had no need of another’s company. The very two things that bring languor to other men sharpened him: leisure and solitude. I wish I could truly say the same of myself; but if I cannot reach so great an eminence of talent by imitation, I am at least near it in intention — for I too pursue leisure, shut out by armed impiety and force from public life and the business of the courts, and for that reason, having left the city to wander through the countryside, I am often alone.
Quamquam te, Marce fili, annum iam audientem Cratippum, idque Athenis, abundare oportet praeceptis institutisque philosophiae propter summam et doctoris auctoritatem et urbis, quorum alter te scientia augere potest, altera exemplis, tamen, ut ipse ad meam utilitatem semper cum Graecis Latina coniunxi neque id in philosophia solum, sed etiam in dicendi exercitatione feci, idem tibi censeo faciendum, ut par sis in utriusque orationis facultate. Quam quidem ad rem nos, ut videmur, magnum attulimus adiumentum hominibus nostris, ut non modo Graecarum litterarum rudes, sed etiam docti aliquantum se arbitrentur adeptos et ad dicendum et ad iudicandum.
Yet this leisure cannot be compared with Africanus’s leisure, nor this solitude with his. For he would take leisure occasionally as a rest from the most splendid duties of public life, and would withdraw from the crowds and company of men into solitude as into a harbor; whereas my leisure has been imposed by the want of anything to do, not chosen out of desire for rest. When the Senate is extinguished and the courts destroyed, what is there that I, as I should be, can worthily do in the curia or in the Forum?
Quam ob rem disces tu quidem a principe huius aetatis philosophorum, et disces, quam diu voles; tam diu autem velle debebis, quoad te, quantum proficias, non paenitebit; sed tamen nostra legens non multum a Peripateticis dissidentia, quoniam utrique Socratici et Platonici volumus esse, de rebus ipsis utere tuo iudicio (nihil enim impedio), orationem autem Latinam efficies profecto legendis nostris pleniorem. Nec vero hoc arroganter dictum existimari velim. Nam philosophandi scientiam concedens multis, quod est oratoris proprium, apte, distincte, ornate dicere, quoniam in eo studio aetatem consumpsi, si id mihi assumo, videor id meo iure quodam modo vindicare.
And so, having once lived amid the greatest throng and in the eyes of my fellow citizens, I now flee the sight of the criminals who overflow everything, withdraw as much as I may, and am often alone. But since we have learned from men of learning that one ought not merely to choose the least among evils but also to draw out of those evils themselves whatever good may be lodged in them, I therefore make use of my leisure — not, to be sure, the leisure that ought to have been enjoyed by one who had once won leisure for his country — and I do not allow the solitude, which necessity and not choice imposes on me, to sink into languor.
Quam ob rem magnopere te hortor, mi Cicero, ut non solum orationes meas, sed hos etiam de philosophia libros, qui iam illis fere se aequarunt, studiose legas; vis enim maior in illis dicendi, sed hoc quoque colendum est aequabile et temperatum orationis genus. Et id quidem nemini video Graecorum adhuc contigisse, ut idem utroque in genere elaboraret sequereturque et illud forense dicendi et hoc quietum disputandi genus, nisi forte Demetrius Phalereus in hoc numero haberi potest, disputator subtilis, orator parum vehemens, dulcis tamen, ut Theophrasti discipulum possis agnoscere. Nos autem quantum in utroque profecerimus, aliorum sit iudicium, utrumque certe secuti sumus.
Though Africanus, in my judgment, achieves the greater glory. For there survive no written records of his genius, no work of his leisure, no gift of his solitude; from which we must understand that he was never truly idle or alone, thanks to the activity of his mind and the investigation of those matters he reached by thought. We, who have not strength enough to be drawn out of solitude by silent reflection, have turned all our zeal and care to this work of writing. And so in a short time of public collapse we have written more than we wrote in many years when the republic stood.
Equidem et Platonem existimo, si genus forense dicendi tractare voluisset, gravissime et copiosissime potuisse dicere, et Demosthenem, si illa, quae a Platone didicerat, tenuisset et pronuntiare voluisset, ornate splendideque facere potuisse; eodemque modo de Aristotele et Isocrate iudico, quorum uterque suo studio delectatus contempsit alterum. Sed cum statuissem scribere ad te aliquid hoc tempore, multa posthac, ab eo ordiri maxime volui, quod et aetati tuae esset aptissimum et auctoritati meae. Nam cum multa sint in philosophia et gravia et utilia accurate copioseque a philosophis disputata, latissime patere videntur ea, quae de officiis tradita ab illis et praecepta sunt. Nulla enim vitae pars neque publicis neque privatis neque forensibus neque domesticis in rebus, neque si tecum agas quid, neque si cum altero contrahas, vacare officio potest, in eoque et colendo sita vitae est honestas omnis et neglegendo turpitudo.
But though all philosophy, my dear Cicero, is fertile and fruitful and no part of it lies untilled and waste, still no region within it is more productive or more rich than that on duty, from which the precepts for a life of honor and consistency are drawn. Therefore, although I am confident that you hear and receive these things constantly from our friend Cratippus — the foremost philosopher of this age — yet I think it will be advantageous to have your ears resounding with such words on every side, and, if possible, to have them hear nothing else.
Atque haec quidem quaestio communis est omnium philosophorum; quis est enim, qui nullis officii praeceptis tradendis philosophum se audeat dicere? Sed sunt non nullae disciplinae, quae propositis bonorum et malorum finibus officium omne pervertant. Nam qui summum bonum sic instituit, ut nihil habeat cum virtute coniunctum, idque suis commodis, non honestate metitur, hic, si sibi ipse consentiat et non interdum naturae bonitate vincatur neque amicitiam colere possit nec iustitiam nec liberalitatem; fortis vero dolorem summum malum iudicans aut temperans voluptatem summum bonum statuens esse certe nullo modo potest.
This must be done by all who are minded to enter upon an honorable life, but I am not sure it must be done by anyone more than by you. You bear no small expectation of following in my own industry, a great one of equalling my honors, and some, perhaps, of my name. You have taken on besides the considerable burden of Athens and of Cratippus; since you went out to them as to a mart of the finest accomplishments, it would be most shameful to return empty, bringing discredit on the authority both of the city and of your teacher. Therefore, strain your mind as hard as you can, press as hard in your labor — if studying is a labor and not a pleasure — and see to it that you succeed, and do not allow it to appear that, when everything has been supplied by me, you have been wanting to yourself. But enough of this; I have written to you often by way of encouragement. Let me now return to the remaining part of the division I laid out.
Quae quamquam ita sunt in promptu, ut res disputatione non egeat, tamen sunt a nobis alio loco disputata. Hae disciplinae igitur si sibi consentaneae velint esse, de officio nihil queant dicere, neque ulla officii praecepta firma, stabilia, coniuncta naturae tradi possunt nisi aut ab iis, qui solam, aut ab iis, qui maxime honestatem propter se dicant expetendam. Ita propria est ea praeceptio Stoicorum, Academicorum, Peripateticorum, quoniam Aristonis, Pyrrhonis, Erilli iam pridem explosa sententia est; qui tamen haberent ius suum disputandi de officio, si rerum aliquem dilectum reliquissent, ut ad officii inventionem aditus esset. Sequemur igitur hoc quidem tempore et hac in quaestione potissimum Stoicos non ut interpretes, sed, ut solemus, e fontibus eorum iudicio arbitrioque nostro, quantum quoque modo videbitur, hauriemus.
Panaetius, then — who beyond all question discussed duty with the greatest exactness, and whom I have followed above all others, with some correction — set out three categories in which men ordinarily deliberate and take counsel about duty: first, when they are in doubt whether what they are considering is honorable or base; second, whether it is expedient or inexpedient; and third, when something that bears the appearance of the honorable conflicts with what seems expedient, how those two are to be distinguished. He worked through the first two categories in three books; but of the third he wrote that he would treat it next, and he did not fulfill what he had promised.
Placet igitur, quoniam omnis disputatio de officio futura est, ante definire, quid sit officium; quod a Panaetio praetermissum esse miror. Omnis enim, quae a ratione suscipitur de aliqua re institutio, debet a definitione proficisci, ut intellegatur, quid sit id, de quo disputetur Omnis de officio duplex est quaestio: unum genus est, quod pertinet ad finem bonorum, alterum, quod positum est in praeceptis, quibus in omnis partis usus vitae conformari possit. Superioris generis huius modi sunt exempla: omniane officia perfecta sint, num quod officium aliud alio maius sit, et quae sunt generis eiusdem. Quorum autem officiorum praecepta traduntur, ea quamquam pertinent ad finem bonorum, tamen minus id apparet, quia magis ad institutionem vitae communis spectare videntur; de quibus est nobis his libris explicandum. Atque etiam alia divisio est officii.
This surprises me the more, because a disciple of his, Posidonius, records that Panaetius lived thirty years after those books were published. I find it remarkable that Posidonius touched on that topic only briefly in certain notes — especially since he writes that there is no topic in all of philosophy so necessary.
Nam et medium quoddam officium dicitur et perfectum. Perfectum officium rectum, opinor, vocemus, quoniam Graeci kato/rqwma, hoc autem commune officium kaqh=kon vocant. Atque ea sic definiunt, ut, rectum quod sit, id officium perfectum esse definiant; medium autem officium id esse dicunt, quod cur factum sit, ratio probabilis reddi possit.
I am by no means persuaded by those who claim that this topic was not passed over by Panaetius but deliberately left aside, and that it should not have been written on at all, because expediency can never conflict with the honorable. Whether it was proper to include this third category, as Panaetius did, or to omit it entirely is a question that admits of debate; but there can be no doubt that Panaetius undertook it and left it unfinished. For a man who has completed two parts of a three-part division must necessarily have a third remaining; and furthermore, at the end of the third book he promises to treat this part next.
Triplex igitur est, ut Panaetio videtur, consilii capiendi deliberatio. Nam aut honestumne factu sit an turpe dubitant id, quod in deliberationem cadit; in quo considerando saepe animi in contraries sententias distrahuntur. Tum autem aut anquirunt aut consultant, ad vitae commoditatem iucunditatemque, ad facultates rerum atque copias, ad opes, ad potentiam, quibus et se possint iuvare et suos, conducat id necne, de quo deliberant; quae deliberatio omnis in rationem utilitatis cadit. Tertium dubitandi genus est, cum pugnare videtur cum honesto id, quod videtur esse utile; cum enim utilitas ad se rapere, honestas contra revocare ad se videtur, fit ut distrahatur in deliberando animus afferatque ancipitem curam cogitandi.
A credible witness is added to this in Posidonius, who also writes in a certain letter that Publius Rutilius Rufus — who had heard Panaetius — used to say that just as no painter had been found to complete that portion of the Coan Venus which Apelles had left unfinished (for the beauty of the face robbed all hope of imitating the rest of the body), so no one had followed up what Panaetius had left aside and unfinished — because of the surpassing excellence of what he had finished.
Hac divisione, cum praeterire aliquid maximum vitium in dividendo sit, duo praetermissa sunt; nec enim solum utrum honestum an turpe sit, deliberari solet, sed etiam duobus propositis honestis utrum honestius, itemque duobus propositis utilibus utrum utilius. Ita, quam ille triplicem putavit esse rationem, in quinque partes distribui debere reperitur. Primum igitur est de honesto, sed dupliciter, tum pari ratione de utili, post de comparatione eorum disserendum.
On Panaetius’s intention, therefore, there can be no doubt. Whether he was right to add this third inquiry into duty, or otherwise, is perhaps open to discussion. For if the honorable alone is good, as the Stoics hold, or if what is honorable is the highest good in such a way — as your Peripatetics think — that everything placed on the other side barely has the weight of the slightest moment, then there can be no doubt that expediency can never contend with the honorable. And so we are told that Socrates used to curse those who first, by mere opinion, had separated things naturally bound together. The Stoics have agreed with him to the extent that they judge whatever is honorable to be expedient, and nothing expedient that is not honorable.
Principio generi animantium omni est a natura tributum, ut se, vitam corpusque tueatur, declinet ea, quae nocitura videantur, omniaque, quae sint ad vivendum necessaria, anquirat et paret, ut pastum, ut latibula, ut alia generis eiusdem. Commune item animantium omnium est coniunctionis adpetitus procreandi causa et cura quaedam eorum, quae procreata sint; sed inter hominem et beluam hoc maxime interest, quod haec tantum, quantum sensu movetur, ad id solum, quod adest quodque praesens est, se accommodat paulum admodum sentiens praeteritum aut futurum; homo autem, quod rationis est particeps, per quam consequentia cernit, causas rerum videt earumque praegressus et quasi antecessiones non ignorat, similitudines comparat rebusque praesentibus adiungit atque annectit futuras, facile totius vitae cursum videt ad eamque degendam praeparat res necessarias.
Now if Panaetius were the kind of man who said virtue is to be cultivated because it produces expediency — as those do who measure desirable objects by pleasure or freedom from pain — it would be open to him to say that expediency sometimes conflicts with the honorable. But since he is one who judges nothing good except what is honorable, and holds that those things which resist it under some appearance of expediency neither make life better by their addition nor worse by their removal, he does not seem to have been right to introduce deliberation of the kind in which what appears expedient is weighed against what is honorable.
Eademque natura vi rationis hominem conciliat homini et ad orationis et ad vitae societatem ingeneratque in primis praecipuum quendam amorem in eos, qui procreati sunt, impellitque, ut hominum coetus et celebrationes et esse et a se obiri velit ob easque causas studeat parare ea, quae suppeditent ad cultum et ad victum, nec sibi soli, sed coniugi, liberis ceterisque, quos caros habeat tuerique debeat; quae cura exsuscitat etiam animos et maiores ad rem gerendam facit.
Indeed what the Stoics call the highest good — to live in accordance with nature — contains, as I understand it, this meaning: to be always in harmony with virtue, and to choose the remaining things that accord with nature, so long as they do not conflict with virtue. This being so, some think that this comparison was wrongly introduced and that nothing at all should be prescribed in that category. And indeed that honorable thing properly and truly so called exists in the wise alone and can never be severed from virtue; but among those in whom wisdom is not perfect, perfect honor is in no way possible, though likenesses of the honorable can be.
In primisque hominis est propria veri inquisitio atque investigatio. Itaque cum sumus necessariis negotiis curisque vacui, tum avemus aliquid videre, audire, addiscere cognitionemque rerum aut occultarum aut admirabilium ad beate vivendum necessariam ducimus. Ex quo intellegitur, quod verum, simplex sincerumque sit, id esse naturae hominis aptissimum. Huic veri videndi cupiditati adiuncta est appetitio quaedam principatus, ut nemini parere animus bene informatus a natura velit nisi praecipienti aut docenti aut utilitatis causa iuste et legitime imperanti; ex quo magnitudo animi exsistit humanarumque rerum contemptio.
For the duties discussed in these books the Stoics call intermediate; they are common and widely shared, and many attain them through natural goodness of character and through progress in learning. But that other duty which they likewise call right is perfect and complete and, as they say, fully rounded, and can fall to none but the wise man.
Nec vero illa parva vis naturae est rationisque. quod unum hoc animal sentit, quid sit ordo, quid sit, quod deceat, in factis dictisque qui modus. Itaque eorum ipsorum, quae aspectu sentiuntur, nullum aliud animal pulchritudinem, venustatem, convenientiam partium sentit; quam similitudinem natura ratioque ab oculis ad animum transferens multo etiam magis pulchritudinem, constantiam, ordinem in consiliis factisque conservandam putat cavetque, ne quid indecore effeminateve faciat, tum in omnibus et opinionibus et factis ne quid libidinose aut faciat aut cogitet. Quibus ex rebus conflatur et efficitur id, quod quaerimus, honestum, quod etiamsi nobilitatum non sit, tamen honestum sit, quodque vere dicimus, etiamsi a nullo laudetur, natura esse laudabile.
But when something is done in which these intermediate duties appear, it tends to look fully perfect — because the common run of men do not generally grasp what is lacking from the perfect, whereas as far as they do grasp it they think nothing has been left out. The same thing happens with poetry, with painting, and many other things: ordinary folk take delight in them and praise what should not be praised, I suppose for this reason — that there is in those works something sound that catches the untrained, who are unable to judge what flaw each work contains; and so, when the learned have instructed them, they readily abandon their earlier view. These duties, then, of which we treat in these books, they call a kind of secondary honorableness — not the property of the wise man alone, but shared with the whole human race.
Formam quidem ipsam, Marce fili, et tamquam faciem honesti vides, quae si oculis cerneretur, mirabiles amores, ut ait Plato, excitaret sapientiae. Sed omne, quod est honestum, id quattuor partium oritur ex aliqua: aut enim in perspicientia veri sollertiaque versatur aut in hominum societate tuenda tribuendoque suum cuique et rerum contractarum fide aut in animi excelsi atque invicti magnitudine ac robore aut in omnium, quae fiunt quaeque dicuntur, ordine et modo, in quo inest modestia et temperantia. Quae quattuor quamquam inter se colligata atque implicata sunt, tamen ex singulis certa officiorum genera nascuntur, velut ex ea parte, quae prima discripta est, in qua sapientiam et prudentiam ponimus, inest indagatio atque inventio veri, eiusque virtutis hoc munus est proprium.
And so all in whom there is an aptitude for virtue are moved by them. Yet when the two Decii or the two Scipiones are called brave men, or when Fabricius or Aristides is named as just, it is not from any of these, as from a wise man, that an example of courage or of justice is sought. For none of them is wise in the sense in which we intend the word "wise man," nor were those who were counted and called wise — Marcus Cato and Gaius Laelius — truly wise, nor indeed those seven; but through the constant practice of intermediate duties they carried a certain likeness and appearance of the wise.
Ut enim quisque maxime perspicit, quid in re quaque verissimum sit. quique acutissime et celerrime potest et videre et explicare rationem, is prudentissimus et sapientissimus rite haberi solet. Quocirca huic quasi materia, quam tractet et in qua versetur, subiecta est veritas.
Therefore it is not permissible to weigh what is truly honorable against any competing claim of expediency; nor is that which we call honorable in the common usage — the quality cultivated by those who wish to be regarded as good men — ever to be set against advantage; and that honorable thing which falls within our ordinary understanding is to be kept and preserved by us just as steadfastly as that which is called honorable in the strict and true sense is to be kept by the wise. For no progress toward virtue can be sustained on any other footing. But this concerns those who are judged good men by their observance of duty.
Reliquis autem tribus virtutibus necessitates propositae sunt ad eas res parandas tuendasque, quibus actio vitae continetur, ut et societas hominum coniunctioque servetur et animi excellentia magnitudoque cum in augendis opibus utilitatibusque et sibi et suis comparandis, tum multo magis in his ipsis despiciendis eluceat. Ordo autem et constantia et moderatio et ea, quae sunt his similia, versantur in eo genere, ad quod est adhibenda actio quaedam, non solum mentis agitatio. Iis enim rebus, quae tractantur in vita, modum quendam et ordinem adhibentes honestatem et decus conservabimus.
Those, however, who measure everything by profit and advantage, and refuse to let honor outweigh these, are accustomed in their deliberations to compare what is honorable with what they take to be expedient; good men are not accustomed to do so. For my part, I believe that when Panaetius said men usually hesitate over this comparison, he meant precisely what he said: that they usually do — not that they ought to. In fact, not only to count what seems expedient as worth more than what is honorable, but even to compare the two and to be in any doubt between them, is the most shameful thing imaginable. What is it, then, that occasionally seems to occasion hesitation and to call for consideration? I believe it is when we are in doubt about the actual character of what we are considering.
Ex quattuor autem locis, in quos honesti naturam vimque divisimus, primus ille, qui in veri cognitione consistit, maxime naturam attingit humanam. Omnes enim trahimur et ducimur ad cognitionis et scientiae cupiditatem, in qua excellere pulchrum putamus, labi autem, errare, nescire, decipi et malum et turpe ducimus. In hoc genere et naturali et honesto duo vitia vitanda sunt, unum, ne incognitapro cognitis habeamus iisque temere assentiamur; quod vitium effugere qui volet (omnes autem velle debent), adhibebit ad considerandas res et tempus et diligentiam.
For circumstances often bring it about that what is generally held to be disgraceful turns out not to be disgraceful. Take an example that is broad in its application: what greater crime can there be than to kill a man — to kill, moreover, someone close to you? And yet does a man incur the guilt of crime if he kills a tyrant, however intimate his connection with him? The Roman people, at any rate, does not think so — of all splendid deeds they count that the most splendid. Did expediency, then, defeat honor? No: honor followed hard upon expediency. The right rule to follow is therefore this: so that we may judge without error whenever what we call the expedient appears to conflict with what we recognize as honorable, we must establish a kind of formula; and if we hold to that formula in comparing things, we shall never depart from duty.
Alterum est vitium, quod quidam nimis magnum studium multamque operam in res obscuras atque difficiles conferunt easdemque non necessarias. Quibus vitiis declinatis quod in rebus honestis et cognitione dignis operae curaeque ponetur, id iure laudabitur, ut in astrologia C. Sulpicium audivimus, in geometria Sex. Pompeium ipsi cognovimus, multos in dialecticis, plures in iure civili, quae omnes artes in veri investigatione versantur; cuius studio a rebus gerendis abduci contra officium est. Virtutis enim laus omnis in actione consistit; a qua tamen fit intermissio saepe multique dantur ad studia reditus; tum agitatio mentis, quae numquam acquiescit, potest nos in studiis cognitionis etiam sine opera nostra continere. Omnis autem cogitatio motusque animi aut in consiliis capiendis de rebus honestis et pertinentibus ad bene beateque vivendum aut in studiis scientiae cognitionisque versabitur. Ac de primo quidem officii fonte diximus.
That formula will be most fully in accord with the reasoning and discipline of the Stoics. I follow them in these books because, although the older Academics and your Peripatetics — who were once one and the same with the Academics — do place what is honorable above what appears expedient, nevertheless those men argue the point more brilliantly for whom whatever is honorable is also expedient, and nothing expedient that is not honorable, than those for whom something honorable can fail to be expedient and something expedient can fail to be honorable. Our own Academy gives us wide latitude to defend whatever strikes us as most persuasive. But I return to the formula.
De tribus autem reliquis latissime patet ea ratio, qua societas hominum inter ipsos et vitae quasi communitas continetur; cuius partes duae, iustitia, in qua virtutis est splendor maximus, ex qua viri boni nominantur, et huic coniuncta beneficentia, quam eandem vel benignitatem vel liberalitatem appellari licet. Sed iustitiae primum munus est, ut ne cui quis noceat nisi lacessitus iniuria, deinde ut communibus pro communibus utatur, privatis ut suis.
To strip something from another, then, and to enlarge one’s own advantage at the cost of another person’s loss — this is more contrary to nature than death, than poverty, than pain, than all the other things that can befall the body or external circumstances. For in the first place it destroys human fellowship and community. If we are so disposed that each man pillages or violates another for his own profit, then that fellowship of the human race which is most in accord with nature must inevitably be torn apart.
Sunt autem privata nulla natura, sed aut vetere occupatione, ut qui quondam in vacua venerunt, aut victoria, ut qui bello potiti sunt, aut lege, pactione, condicione, sorte; ex quo fit, ut ager Arpinas Arpinatium dicatur, Tusculanus Tusculanorum; similisque est privatarum possessionum discriptio. Ex quo, quia suum cuiusque fit eorum, quae natura fuerant communia, quod cuique obtigit, id quisque teneat; e quo si quis sibi appetet, violabit ius humanae societatis.
Just as, if each limb of the body had this understanding — that it could thrive by drawing the health of the nearest limb into itself — the whole body would necessarily weaken and perish, so, if each of us were to snatch the advantages of others to himself and strip away whatever he could from each for the sake of his own gain, human fellowship and community would inevitably be overturned. For while it is allowed, with nature making no objection, that each person should prefer to acquire for himself rather than for another the things that serve the needs of life, nature does not permit us to enlarge our own resources, wealth, and power by plundering what belongs to others.
Sed quoniam, ut praeclare scriptum est a Platone, non nobis solum nati sumus ortusque nostri partem patria vindicat, partem amici, atque, ut placet Stoicis, quae in terris gignantur, ad usum hominum omnia creari, homines autem hominum causa esse generatos, ut ipsi inter se aliis alii prodesse possent, in hoc naturam debemus ducem sequi, communes utilitates in medium afferre mutatione officiorum, dando accipiendo, tum artibus, tum opera, tum facultatibus devincire hominum inter homines societatem.
And indeed this is established not only by nature — that is, by the law of nations — but also by the statutes of individual peoples, by which the commonwealth of each city is held together: that it is not lawful to harm another for one’s own advantage. For this is the aim of the laws, this their intent: that the bond uniting citizens shall remain unbroken; those who tear it apart they restrain with death, exile, imprisonment, or fine. And nature’s own reason — which is the law both divine and human — achieves this far more powerfully. Whoever is willing to obey it (and all who wish to live in accordance with nature will obey it) will never bring himself to covet what belongs to another or to take for himself what he has stripped from someone else.
Fundamentum autem est iustitiae fides, id est dictorum conventorumque constantia et veritas. Ex quo, quamquam hoc videbitur fortasse cuipiam durius, tamen audeamus imitari Stoicos, qui studiose exquirunt, unde verba sint ducta, credamusque, quia fiat, quod dictum est, appellatam fidem. Sed iniustitiae genera duo sunt, unum eorum, qui inferunt, alterum eorum, qui ab iis, quibus infertur, si possunt, non propulsant iniuriam. Nam qui iniuste impetum in quempiam facit aut ira aut aliqua perturbatione incitatus, is quasi manus afferre videtur socio; qui autem non defendit nec obsistit, si potest, iniuriae, tam est in vitio, quam si parentes aut amicos aut patriam deserat.
For greatness and elevation of soul, and likewise affability, justice, and generosity, are far more in accord with nature than pleasure, than life itself, than riches — things which a great and lofty spirit will hold in contempt and count for nothing when it weighs them against the common advantage. To strip something from another for one’s own gain is more contrary to nature than death, than pain, than all else of that kind.
Atque illae quidem iniuriae, quae nocendi causa de industria inferuntur, saepe a metu proficiscuntur, cum is, qui nocere alteri cogitat, timet ne, nisi id fecerit, ipse aliquo afficiatur incommodo. Maximam autem partem ad iniuriam faciendam aggrediuntur, ut adipiscantur ea, quae concupiverunt; in quo vitio latissime patet avaritia.
Likewise it is more in accord with nature to take upon oneself the greatest toils and troubles, if they can be borne, for the sake of all peoples — preserving or aiding them — in imitation of that Hercules whom, in grateful memory of his benefactions, men’s tradition placed in the council of the gods above, than to live in solitude not only free from all troubles but surrounded by pleasures in abundance and excelling even in beauty and strength. Therefore every man of the finest and most distinguished character places that life far ahead of this one by a long distance. From this it follows that a person who obeys nature cannot harm another person.
Expetuntur autem divitiae cum ad usus vitae necessarios, tum ad perfruendas voluptates. In quibus autem maior est animus, in iis pecuniae cupiditas spectat ad opes et ad gratificandi facultatem, ut nuper M. Crassus negabat ullam satis magnam pecuniam esse ei, qui in re publica princeps vellet esse, cuius fructibus exercitum alere non posset. Delectant etiam magnifici apparatus vitaeque cultus cum elegantia et copia; quibus rebus effectum est, ut infinita pecuniae cupiditas esset. Nec vero rei familiaris amplificatio nemini nocens vituperanda est, sed fugienda semper iniuria est.
Then again, whoever wrongs another in order to gain some advantage for himself either thinks he is doing nothing contrary to nature, or considers death, poverty, pain, and even the loss of children, kinsmen, and friends more to be avoided than doing wrong to anyone. If he thinks that nothing contrary to nature is done when men are wronged, how can one argue with someone who strips all humanity out of the human being? But if he does think it is to be avoided, yet judges those other things far worse — death, poverty, pain — he is in error in counting any defect of body or fortune as more serious than defects of character. All people, therefore, should have one and the same goal before them: that the advantage of each and the advantage of all should be identical. If each person snatches that advantage to himself, all human fellowship will be dissolved.
Maxime autem adducuntur plerique, ut eos iustitiae capiat oblivio, cum in imperiorum, honorum, gloriae cupiditatem inciderunt. Quod enim est apud Ennium: Núlla sancta sócietas Néc fides regni ést. id latius patet. Nam quicquid eius modi est, in quo non possint plures excellere, in eo fit plerumque tanta contentio, ut difficillimum sit servare sanctam societatem. Declaravit id modo temeritas C. Caesaris, qui omnia iura divina et humana pervertit propter eum, quem sibi ipse opinionis errore finxerat, principatum. Est autem in hoc genere molestum, quod in maximis animis splendidissimisque ingeniis plerumque exsistunt honoris, imperii, potentiae, gloriae cupiditates. Quo magis cavendum est, ne quid in eo genere peccetur.
And further: if nature prescribes that a human being should want what is good for another human being, whoever he may be, simply because he is a human being, then it necessarily follows from that same nature that the advantage of all is held in common. If that is so, we are all bound by one and the same law of nature; and if that in turn is so, we are certainly forbidden by nature’s law to harm another. The first premise is true; therefore the conclusion is true as well.
Sed in omni iniustitia permultum interest, utrum perturbatione aliqua animi, quae plerumque brevis est et ad tempus, an consulto et cogitata fiat iniuria. Leviora enim sunt ea, quae repentino aliquo motu accidunt, quam ea, quae meditata et praeparata inferuntur. Ac de inferenda quidem iniuria satis dictum est.
For this, certainly, is absurd — what some people say: that they would take nothing from a parent or a brother for their own advantage, but that their relationship with the rest of their fellow citizens stands on a different footing. These people settle nothing of right, no fellowship of common interest, between themselves and their fellow citizens — a view that tears apart all the community of the state. Those who say the interests of citizens must be considered but deny the same of foreigners tear apart the common fellowship of the human race; and when that is removed, beneficence, generosity, goodness, and justice are utterly destroyed. Those who destroy these things must also be judged impious toward the immortal gods — for it is a fellowship established among human beings by the gods that they are overturning, and the closest bond of that fellowship is the conviction that it is more contrary to nature to deprive another person of something for one’s own advantage than to endure every disadvantage, whether external, bodily, or even of the soul itself — provided those disadvantages are free from injustice; for justice alone is mistress and queen of all the virtues.
Praetermittendae autem defensionis deserendique officii plures solent esse causae; nam aut inimicitias aut laborem aut sumptus suscipere nolunt aut etiam neglegentia, pigritia, inertia aut suis studiis quibusdam occupationibusve sic impediuntur, ut eos, quos tutari debeant, desertos esse patiantur. Itaque videndum est, ne non satis sit id, quod apud Platonem est in philosophos dictum, quod in veri investigatione versentur quodque ea, quae plerique vehementer expetant, de quibus inter se digladiari soleant, contemnant et pro nihilo putent, propterea iustos esse. Nam alterum iustitiae genus assequuntur, ut inferenda ne cui noceant iniuria, in alterum incidunt; discendi enim studio impediti, quos tueri debent, deserunt. Itaque eos ne ad rem publicam quidem accessuros putat nisi coactos. Aequius autem erat id voluntate fieri; namhoc ipsum ita iustum est, quod recte fit, si est voluntarium.
Perhaps someone will say: "Then will the wise man not, if he is himself dying of hunger, take food from another who is utterly useless?" Not at all; my life is not worth more to me than the disposition of soul that keeps me from wronging anyone for my own advantage. "What if a man of good character could, to keep himself from perishing in the cold, strip of his clothing Phalaris — that savage and monstrous tyrant — would he not do it?"
Sunt etiam, qui aut studio rei familiaris tuendae aut odio quodam hominum suum se negotium agere dicant nec facere cuiquam videantur iniuriam. Qui altero genere iniustitiae vacant, in alterum incurrunt; deserunt enim vitae societatem, quia nihil conferunt in eam studii, nihil operae, nihil facultatum. Quando igitur duobus generibus iniustitiae propositis adiunximus causas utriusque generis easque res ante constituimus, quibus iustitia contineretur, facile, quod cuiusque temporis officium sit, poterimus, nisi nosmet ipsos valde amabimus, iudicare;
These cases are the easiest to judge. For if you strip something for your own advantage from a man who is of no use to anyone, you act inhumanly and contrary to nature’s law. But if you are the kind of person who, should you remain alive, could bring great advantage to the commonwealth and to human fellowship, then if for that reason you take something from another, it is not to be blamed. In all other cases, each person should bear his own hardship rather than deprive another of his advantage. Disease or poverty or anything of that kind is therefore no more contrary to nature than the act of stripping and seizing what belongs to another; rather it is the abandonment of the common advantage that is contrary to nature — for that is an act of injustice.
est enim difficilis cura rerum alienarum. Quamquam Terentianus ille Chremes humani nihil a se alienum putat; sed tamen, quia magis ea percipimus atque sentimus, quae nobis ipsis aut prospera aut adversa eveniunt, quam illa, quae ceteris, quae quasi longo intervallo interiecto videmus, aliter de illis ac de nobis iudicamus. Quocirca bene praecipiunt, qui vetant quicquam agere, quod dubites aequum sit an iniquum. Aequitas enim lucet ipsa per se, dubitatio cogitationem significat iniuriae.
And so nature’s law itself, which preserves and upholds the advantage of human beings, will surely determine that the necessities of life be transferred from a man who is idle and useless to one who is wise, good, and brave — a man whose death would subtract greatly from the common advantage — but only on the condition that he who does this does not thereby take high regard for himself and love of self as a justification for wrongdoing. In this way he will always fulfil his duty, serving the advantage of human beings and of that human fellowship which I so often invoke.
Sed incidunt saepe tempora, cum ea, quae maxime videntur digna esse iusto homine eoque, quem virum bonum dicimus, commutantur fiuntque contraria, ut reddere depositum, facere promissum quaeque pertinent ad veritatem et ad fidem, ea migrare interdum et non servare fit iustum. Referri enim decet ad ea, quae posui principio, fundamenta iustitiae, primum ut ne cui noceatur, deinde ut communi utilitati serviatur. Ea cum tempore commutantur, commutatur officium et non semper est idem.
As for the case of Phalaris, the judgment is perfectly straightforward. We have no fellowship with tyrants; on the contrary, there is the sharpest estrangement from them; and it is not contrary to nature to despoil a man whom it is honorable to kill. Indeed the whole of this pestilential and impious breed must be driven out from human community entirely. For just as certain limbs are amputated when they have begun to drain away blood and, as it were, vital spirit from the rest, and when they are doing harm to the other parts of the body, so that ferocity in the form of a man, that savagery of beast, must be cut away from what we might call the common body of humanity. Of this kind are all those questions in which duty must be sought out according to the circumstances of the moment.
Potest enim accidere promissum aliquod et conventum, ut id effici sit inutile vel ei, cui promissum sit, vel ei, qui promiserit. Nam si, ut in fabulis est, Neptunus, quod Theseo promiserat, non fecisset, Theseus Hippolyto filio non esset orbatus; ex tribus enim optatis, ut scribitur, hoc erat tertium, quod de Hippolyti interitu iratus optavit; quo impetrato in maximos luctus incidit. Nec promissa igitur servanda sunt ea, quae sint iis, quibus promiseris, inutilia, nec, si plus tibi ea noceant quam illi prosint, cui promiseris, contra officium est maius anteponi minori; ut, si constitueris cuipiam te advocatum in rem praesentem esse venturum atque interim graviter aegrotare filius coeperit, non sit contra officium non facere, quod dixeris, magisque ille, cui promissum sit, ab officio discedat, si se destitutum queratur. Iam illis promissis standum non esse quis non videt, quae coactus quis metu, quae deceptus dolo promiserit? quae quidem pleraque iure praetorio liberantur, non nulla legibus.
I believe this was the ground Panaetius meant to cover, had not some accident or press of business cut short his design. The earlier books have already supplied rules enough for the kinds of question he addressed, from which it can be seen what is to be avoided on account of its baseness, and what need not be avoided because it is not base at all. But since I am now setting the capstone on a work that has been begun and is almost finished — as geometers are accustomed to demand that certain things be granted them, so as to explain what they want to explain more easily — I ask you, my son, to grant me, if you can, that nothing is to be sought for its own sake except what is honorable. If Cratippus will not permit that, you will at any rate allow me this much: that what is honorable is to be sought above all else for its own sake. Either position satisfies me, and at different times each strikes me as more probable; beyond those two nothing seems probable at all.
Exsistunt etiam saepe iniuriae calumnia quadam et nimis callida, sed malitiosa iuris interpretatione. Ex quo illud Summum ius summa iniuria factum est iam tritum sermone proverbium. Quo in genere etiam in re publica multa peccantur, ut ille, qui, cum triginta dierum essent cum hoste indutiae factae, noctu populabatur agros, quod dierum essent pactae, non noctium indutiae. Ne noster quidem probandus, si verum est Q. Fabium Labeonem seu quem alium (nihil enim habeo praeter auditum) arbitrum Nolanis et Neapolitanis de finibus a senatu datum, cum ad locum venisset, cum utrisque separatim locutum, ne cupide quid agerent, ne appetenter, atque ut regredi quam progredi mallent. Id cum utrique fecissent, aliquantum agri in medio relictum est. Itaque illorum finis sic, ut ipsi dixerant, terminavit; in medio relictum quod erat, populo Romano adiudicavit. Decipere hoc quidem est, non iudicare. Quocirca in omni est re fugienda talis sollertia. Sunt autem quaedam officia etiam adversus eos servanda, a quibus iniuriam acceperis. Est enim ulciscendi et puniendi modus; atque haud scio an satis sit eum, qui lacessierit, iniuriae suae paenitere, ut et ipse ne quid tale posthac et ceteri sint ad iniuriam tardiores.
And first Panaetius must be defended on this point: he did not say that the expedient could sometimes stand against what is honorable — that would have been impiety for him — but that what seemed expedient could. He frequently declares that nothing is truly expedient that is not at the same time honorable, and nothing honorable that is not at the same time expedient; and he maintains that no plague has entered human life greater than the opinion of those who have pulled the two apart. What he introduced was not a real conflict but an apparent one — not so that we might sometimes prefer the expedient over the honorable, but so that, when such cases arose, we might judge between them without error. This remaining portion, then, I shall fill in on my own resources, without props — fighting, as they say, under my own standard. For nothing has been worked out on this part of the subject since Panaetius, at least nothing that has come into my hands and won my approval.
Atque in re publica maxime conservanda sunt iura belli. Nam cum sint duo genera decertandi, unum per disceptationem, alterum per vim, cumque illud proprium sit hominis, hoc beluarum, confugiendum est ad posterius, si uti non licet superiore.
When, then, some semblance of the expedient is set before us, we cannot help being moved. But if, on close attention, you see that baseness is bound up with whatever has offered the appearance of advantage, then it is not the advantage that must be abandoned but the understanding that must be reached: wherever there is baseness, there can be no advantage. And if nothing runs so contrary to nature as baseness — for nature demands what is upright, consistent, and harmonious, and rejects the contrary — and if nothing is so fully in accord with nature as advantage, then surely in one and the same thing advantage and baseness cannot coexist. Moreover, if we are born for what is honorable, and honorable conduct is either the only thing to be sought, as Zeno held, or at any rate to be weighed heavier than everything else, as Aristotle believed, then it follows that what is honorable is either the only good or the supreme good; and what is good is surely advantageous; and so whatever is honorable is advantageous.
Quare suscipienda quidem bella sunt ob eam causam, ut sine iniuria in pace vivatur, parta autem victoria conservandi ii, qui non crudeles in bello, non immanes fuerunt, ut maiores nostri Tusculanos, Aequos, Volscos, Sabinos, Hernicos in civitatem etiam acceperunt, at Carthaginem et Numantiam funditus sustulerunt; nollem Corinthum, sed credo aliquid secutos, opportunitatem loci maxime, ne posset aliquando ad bellum faciendum locus ipse adhortari. Mea quidem sententia paci, quae nihil habitura sit insidiarum, semper est consulendum. In quo si mihi esset optemperatum, si non optimam, at aliquam rem publicam, quae nunc nulla est, haberemus. Et cum iis, quos vi deviceris, consulendum est, tum ii, qui armis positis ad imperatorum fidem confugient, quamvis murum aries percusserit, recipiendi. In quo tantopere apud nostros iustitia culta est, ut ii, qui civitates aut nationes devictas bello in fidem recepissent, earum patroni essent more maiorum.
Hence the error of dishonest men: when they seize upon something that has seemed expedient, they at once separate it from what is honorable. From this source spring daggers, poisons, forged wills; from this source thefts, embezzlement, plunder and spoliation of allies and fellow citizens; from this source the greed for excessive wealth, for intolerable power, and finally, even in free states, the desire to reign — desires than which nothing fouler or more repellent can be conceived. For such men see, with their false judgment, the material gains; they do not see the punishment — I mean not that of the laws, which they often break through, but the punishment of baseness itself, which is the most bitter of all.
Ac belli quidem aequitas sanctissime fetiali populi Romani iure perscripta est. Ex quo intellegi potest nullum bellum esse iustum, nisi quod aut rebus repetitis geratur aut denuntiatum ante sit et indictum. Popilius imperator tenebat provinciam, in cuius exercitu Catonis filius tiro militabat. Cum autem Popilio videretur unam dimittere legionem, Catonis quoque filium, qui in eadem legione militabat, dimisit. Sed cum amore pugnandi in exercitu remansisset, Cato ad Popilium scripsit, ut, si eum patitur in exercitu remanere, secundo eum obliget militiae sacramento, quia priore amisso iure cum hostibus pugnare non poterat.Adeo summa erat observatio in bello movendo.
That breed of deliberators, therefore, must be driven from our midst entirely — for it is criminal through and through — the kind who deliberate whether to follow what they see to be honorable, or to soil themselves with crime in full knowledge of what they do. In the very act of doubting, the crime is already present, even if they never carry it out. Accordingly, matters should never come to deliberation at all when deliberating itself would be base. And more: from every deliberation the expectation and hope of concealment must be cleared away. For if we have made any progress in philosophy, we ought to be thoroughly persuaded that even if we could hide what we do from all the gods and from all mankind, we must still commit nothing through greed, nothing through injustice, nothing through lust, nothing through want of self-command.
M. quidem Catonis senis est epistula ad M. filium, in qua scribit se audisse eum missum factum esse a consule, cum in Macedonia bello Persico miles esset. Monet igitur, ut caveat, ne proelium ineat; negat enim ius esse, qui miles non sit, cum hoste pugnare. Equidem etiam illud animadverto, quod, qui proprio nomine perduellis esset, is hostis vocaretur, lenitate verbi rei tristitiam mitigatam. Hostis enim apud maiores nostros is dicebatur, quem nunc peregrinum dicimus. Indicant duodecim tabulae: aut status dies cum hoste, itemque: adversus hostem aeterna auctoritas. Quid ad hanc mansuetudinem addi potest, eum, quicum bellum geras, tam molli nomine appellare? Quamquam id nomen durius effect iam vetustas; a peregrino enim recessit et proprie in eo, qui arma contra ferret, remansit.
It is with this in mind that Plato introduces the story of Gyges. When the earth had opened after heavy rains, Gyges descended into the chasm and saw there, as the story goes, a bronze horse, with doors in its flanks; these he opened and found the body of a man of extraordinary size, with a gold ring on his finger. He drew it off and put it on himself — he was a shepherd belonging to the king — and then made his way to the assembly of shepherds. There, whenever he turned the bezel of the ring toward his palm, he became invisible to the rest, while he saw everything; when he turned it back to its place, he was visible again. Using this opportunity the ring afforded, he violated the queen, with her help killed the king his master, did away with those he thought stood in his way, and in none of these crimes could anyone see him. So, suddenly, by the favor of the ring, he was king of Lydia. If the wise man had that very ring, he would think himself no more permitted to do wrong than if he had it not; for what honorable men seek is honorable conduct, not concealment.
Cum vero de imperio decertatur belloque quaeritur gloria, causas omnino subesse tamen oportet easdem, quas dixi paulo ante iustas causas esse bellorum. Sed ea bella, quibus imperii proposita gloria est, minus acerbe gerenda sunt Ut enim cum civi aliter contendimus, si est inimicus, aliter, si competitor (cum altero certamen honoris et dignitatis est, cum altero capitis et famae), sic cum Celtiberis, cum Cimbris bellum ut cum inimicis gerebatur, uter esset, non uter imperaret, cum Latinis, Sabinis, Samnitibus, Poenis, Pyrrho de imperio dimicabatur. Poeni foedifragi, crudelis Hannibal, reliqui iustiores. Pyrrhi quidem de captivis reddendis illa praeclara: Nec mi aurum posco nec mi pretium dederitis, Nec cauponantes bellum, sed belligerantes Ferro, non auro vitam cernamus utrique. Vosne velit an me regnare era, quidve ferat Fors, Virtute experiamur. Et hoc simul accipe dictum: Quorum virtuti belli fortuna pepercit, Eorundem libertati me parcere certum est. Dono, ducite, doque volentibus cum magnis dis. Regalis sane et digna Aeacidarum genere sententia.
At this point certain philosophers — by no means bad men, but insufficiently sharp — say that the story Plato offers is a fiction and a fabrication. As though Plato were maintaining that the thing happened, or even could have! The force of the ring and of the example is this: if no one were going to know, no one so much as to suspect, when you had done something for the sake of wealth, power, domination, or desire — if it were going to remain forever unknown to gods and men alike — would you do it? They say that is impossible. Quite so; it cannot be done. But I am asking: what would they do if it could be done, given that they deny it can? They press their objection rather crudely; they say it cannot be done and stick to that point, unable to see the force of the word. For when we ask what they would do if they could hide it, we are not asking whether they can hide it, but we apply a kind of pressure, as it were, so that if they answer they would act on what profits them when impunity is on offer, they confess themselves criminals; if they deny it, they concede that everything base is to be avoided for its own sake. But let us return to our subject.
Atque etiam si quid singuli temporibus adducti hosti promiserunt, est in eo ipso fides conservanda, ut primo Punico bello Regulus captus a Poenis cum de captivis commutandis Romam missus esset iurassetque se rediturum, primum, ut venit, captivos reddendos in senatu non censuit, deinde, cum retineretur a propinquis et ab amicis, ad supplicium redire maluit quam fidem hosti datam fallere.
Many situations arise that trouble minds with the appearance of the expedient — not the question whether honorable conduct is to be abandoned for the greatness of some gain (that would be wicked), but the question whether something that appears expedient can be done without baseness. When Brutus stripped his colleague Collatinus of his command, it might have seemed unjust; for Collatinus had been a partner in Brutus’s counsels and a helper in the expulsion of the kings. But when the leading men had resolved that the name of Tarquin, the kinship with Superbus, and all memory of kingship must be extirpated, what was expedient — to consult the good of the fatherland — was at the same time so honorable that it ought to have been welcome to Collatinus himself. And so expediency prevailed on account of its honor; without that honor it could not have been expediency at all. But with the king who founded the city it was otherwise: there the appearance of the expedient misled his mind;
Secundo autem Punico bello post Cannensem pugnam quos decem Hannibal Romam astrictos misit iure iurando se redituros esse, nisi de redimendis iis, qui capti erant, impetrassent, eos omnes censores, quoad quisquc eorum vixit, qui peierassent, in aerariis reliquerunt nec minus ilium, qui iuris iurandi fraude culpam invenerat. Cum enim Hannibalis permissu exisset de castris, rediit paulo post, quod se oblitum nescio quid diceret; deinde egressus e castris iure iurando se solutum putabat, et erat verbis, re non erat. Semper autem in fide quid senseris, non quid dixeris, cogitandum. Maximum autem exemplum est iustitiae in hostem a maioribus nostris constitutum, cum a Pyrrho perfuga senatui est pollicitus se venenum regi daturum et cum necaturum, senatus et C. Fabricius perfugam Pyrrho dedidit. Ita ne hostis quidem et potentis et bellum ultro inferentis interitum cum scelere approbavit.
for when it seemed to him more expedient to reign alone than to reign with another, he killed his brother. He abandoned both fraternal love and common humanity to get what seemed expedient but was not; and yet he offered the wall as his pretext, a show of honor that was neither convincing nor, frankly, adequate. He sinned, therefore — with all respect, be it said, to Quirinus or Romulus.
Ac de bellicis quidem officiis satis dictum est. Meminerimus autem etiam adversus infimos iustitiam esse servandam. Est autem infima condicio et fortuna servorum, quibus non male praecipiunt qui ita iubent uti, ut mercennariis: operam exigendam, iusta praebenda. Cum autem duobus modis, id est aut vi aut fraude, fiat iniuria, fraus quasi vulpeculae, vis leonis videtur; utrumque homine alienissimum, sed fraus odio digna maiore. Totius autem iniustitiae nulla capitalior quam eorum, qui tum, cum maxime fallunt, id agunt, ut viri boni esse videantur. De iustitia satis dictum.
And yet we are not to abandon our own interests and hand them over to others when we need them ourselves; each person must attend to his own advantage in whatever can be done without injury to another. Chrysippus put it neatly, as he did so many things: the man who runs in the stadium, he said, must put forth every effort and strain to win, but he has no business tripping up his competitor or pushing him aside with his hand; so in life it is not unjust for each person to seek what falls to his own use, but to wrest it from another is not right.
Deinceps, ut erat propositum, de beneficentia ae de liberalitate dicatur, qua quidem nihil est naturae hominis accommodatius, sed habet multas cautiones. Videndum est enim, primum ne obsit benignitas et iis ipsis, quibus benigne videbitur fieri et ceteris, deinde ne maior benignitas sit quam facultates, tum ut pro dignitate cuique tribuatur; id enim est iustitiae fundamentum, ad quam haec referenda sunt omnia. Nam et qui gratificantur cuipiam, quod obsit illi, cui prodesse velle videantur, non benefici neque liberales, sed perniciosi assentatores iudicandi sunt, et qui aliis nocent, ut in alios liberales sint, in eadem sunt iniustitia, ut si in suam rem aliena convertant.
It is in friendships, however, that the demands of duty are most disturbed: both to withhold from a friend what you may rightly give, and to give what is not right, are contrary to duty. But on this whole topic the rule is brief and not difficult. What seem to be advantages — offices, riches, pleasures, and the rest of that kind — these are never to be preferred to friendship. On the other hand, a good man will not act against the commonwealth, or against an oath or sworn faith, for a friend’s sake — not even if he sits as judge on the friend’s very case; for he lays aside the character of friend when he puts on that of judge. He will grant this much to friendship: that he may prefer his friend’s cause to be a just one, and arrange the time for pleading the case, so far as the law allows.
Sunt autem multi, et quidem cupidi splendoris et gloriae, qui eripiunt aliis, quod aliis largiantur, iique arbitrantur se beneficos in suos amicos visum iri, si locupletent eos quacumque ratione. Id autem tantum abest ab officio, ut nihil magis officio possit esse contrarium. Videndum est igitur, ut ea liberalitate utamur, quae prosit amicis, noceat nemini. Quare L. Sullae, C. Caesaris pecuniarum translatio a iustis dominis ad alienos non debet liberalis videri; nihil est enim liberale, quod non idem iustum.
But when he must deliver a verdict on oath, he will remember that he calls a god to witness — that is, in my judgment, his own mind, than which the god himself has given man nothing more divine. And so we have received from our ancestors the fine custom of asking a judge, if he has one in his court, what he can do consistently with his sworn obligation. That question reaches to what I said a moment ago: what a judge may properly grant a friend. If everything a friend wanted had to be done, such relationships ought to be called not friendships but conspiracies.
Alter locus erat cautionis, ne benignitas maior esset quam facultates, quod, qui benigniores volunt esse, quam res patitur, primum in eo peccant, quod iniuriosi sunt in proximos; quas enim copias his et suppeditari aequius est et relinqui, eas transferunt ad alienos. Inest autem in tali liberalitate cupiditas plerumque rapiendi et auferendi per iniuriam, ut ad largiendum suppetant copiae. Videre etiam licet plerosque non tam natura liberales quam quadam gloria ductos, ut benefici videantur, facere multa, quae proficisci ab ostentatione magis quam a voluntate videantur. Talis autem sinulatio vanitati est coniunctior quam aut liberalitati aut honestati.
I speak, however, of ordinary friendships; among truly wise and perfect men there can be nothing of that kind. They tell of the Pythagoreans Damon and Phintias, who were so disposed toward each other that when the tyrant Dionysius had fixed a day of death for one of them, and that man asked for a few days to provide for his family, the other stood surety for his friend’s appearance, on the condition that if the first did not return, the surety must die in his place. When the condemned man came back on the appointed day, the tyrant, in admiration of their loyalty, asked to be enrolled as a third in their friendship.
Tertium est propositum, ut in beneficentia dilectus esset dignitatis; in quo et mores eius erunt spectandi, in quem beneficium conferetur, et animus erga nos et communitas ac societas vitae et ad nostras utilitates officia ante collata; quae ut concurrant omnia, optabile est; si minus, plures causae maioresque ponderis plus habebunt.
When, therefore, what seems expedient in friendship is weighed against what is honorable, let the appearance of advantage fall, let honor prevail. When things that are not honorable are demanded in friendship, let scruple and good faith take precedence over friendship. In this way we shall arrive at the proper judgment of duty that we are seeking. In affairs of state, however, men err by the appearance of expediency all too often — as in the destruction of Corinth by our own countrymen; and still more harshly did the Athenians, who voted that the thumbs of the Aeginetans, strong as they were at sea, should be cut off. This seemed expedient: Aegina, from its nearness, threatened Piraeus too dangerously. But nothing cruel is expedient; cruelty is in the highest degree at war with human nature, which we are bound to follow.
Quoniam autem vivitur non cum perfectis hominibus planeque sapientibus, sed cum iis, in quibus praeclare agitur si sunt simulacra virtutis, etiam hoc intellegendum puto, neminem omnino esse neglegendum, in quo aliqua significatio virtutis appareat, colendum autem esse ita quemque maxime, ut quisque maxime virtutibus his lenioribus erit ornatus, modestia, temperantia, hac ipsa, de qua multa iam dicta sunt, iustitia. Nam fortis animus et magnus in homine non perfecto nec sapiente ferventior plerumque est, illae virtutes bonum virum videntur potius attingere. Atque haec in moribus.
They also do wrong who bar foreigners from using the cities and expel them — as Pennus did in the time of our fathers, and Papius recently. For it is right not to allow someone who is not a citizen to pass for one; the consuls Crassus and Scaevola, men of the highest wisdom, carried a law to that effect. But to bar foreigners from the use of the city altogether is quite inhuman. There are splendid examples of cases where the appearance of public advantage is despised for the sake of honor. Our commonwealth furnishes many such, none more so than during the Second Punic War; after the disaster at Cannae our ancestors showed more spirit than ever in times of success — not a sign of fear, not a word of peace. So great is the force of what is honorable that it obscures the very appearance of advantage.
De benivolentia autem, quam quisque habeat erga nos, primum illud est in officio, ut ei plurimum tribuamus, a quo plurimum diligamur, sed benivolentiam non adulescentulorum more ardore quodam amoris, sed stabilitate potius et constantia iudicemus. Sin erunt merita, ut non ineunda, sed referenda sit gratia, maior quaedam cura adhibenda est; nullum enim officium referenda gratia magis necessarium est.
When the Athenians could no way withstand the Persian onslaught and resolved to abandon the city, leaving their wives and children at Troezen, embark their fleet, and defend the freedom of Greece by sea, a certain Cyrsilus who urged them to stay in the city and receive Xerxes was stoned to death. He seemed to be following the expedient; but there was no expediency there, with honor standing against it.
Quodsi ea, quae utenda acceperis, maiore mensura, si modo possis, iubet reddere Hesiodus, quidnam beneficio provocati facere debemus? an imitari agros fertiles, qui multo plus efferunt quam acceperunt? Etenim si in eos, quos speramus nobis profuturos, non dubitamus officia conferre, quales in eos esse debemus, qui iam profuerunt? Nam cum duo genera liberalitatis sint, unum dandi beneficii, alterum reddendi, demus necne, in nostra potestate est, non reddere viro bono non licet, modo id facere possit sine iniuria.
Themistocles, after the victory in that war against Persia, said in public assembly that he had a plan of service to the state, but that it need not be known; he asked only that the people appoint someone with whom he could share it. Aristides was given. Themistocles told him that the Spartan fleet, which lay beached at Gytheum, could be secretly burned — and that by this act the power of Sparta would necessarily be broken. When Aristides heard this, he came before the assembly to great expectation and said: the plan Themistocles proposed was exceedingly useful, but by no means honorable. The Athenians accordingly judged that what was not honorable was not useful either, and they rejected the whole scheme outright on Aristides’ authority — a scheme they had not even heard. Better they than we, who grant pirates immunity and levy tribute on our allies. Let it stand, then: what is base is never useful — not even when you gain by it the very thing you thought useful; for this very thing, thinking it useful when it is base, is ruinous.
Acceptorum autem beneficiorum sunt dilectus habendi, nec dubium, quin maximo cuique plurimum debeatur. In quo tamen in primis, quo quisque animo, studio, benivolentia fecerit, ponderandum est. Multi enim faciunt multa temeritate quadam sine iudicio vel morbo in omnes vel repentino quodam quasi vento impetu animi incitati; quae beneficia aeque magna non sunt habenda atque ea, quae iudicio, considerate constanterque delata sunt. Sed in collocando beneficio et in referenda gratia, si cetera paria sunt, hoc maxime officii est, ut quisque maxime opis indigeat, ita ei potissimum opitulari; quod contra fit a plerisque; a quo enim plurimum sperant, etiamsi ille iis non eget, tamen ei potissimum inserviunt.
But cases arise, as I said above, in which expediency appears to conflict with what is honorable, so that we must consider whether the conflict is genuine or whether the two can be reconciled. Such questions take this form: suppose, for instance, a good man has shipped a large cargo of grain from Alexandria to Rhodes, where there is famine and scarcity and the price of corn is desperately high; suppose further that this same man knows several other merchants have put out from Alexandria and has seen their ships under sail with full cargoes heading for Rhodes. Will he tell the Rhodians, or hold his tongue and sell his grain as dearly as he can? We are imagining a man both good and wise; the question we are asking concerns the deliberation and judgment of a man who would not conceal the facts from the Rhodians if he held it to be base, but is uncertain whether it is base at all.
Optime autem societas hominum coniunctioque servabitur, si, ut quisque erit coniunctissimus, ita in eum benignitatis plurimum conferetur. Sed, quae naturae principia sint communitatis et societatis humanae, repetendum videtur altius; est enim primum, quod cernitur in universi generis humani societate. Eius autem vinculum est ratio et oratio, quae docendo, discendo, communicando, disceptando, iudicando conciliat inter se homines coniungitque naturali quadam societate; neque ulla re longius absumus a natura ferarum, in quibus inesse fortitudinem saepe dicimus, ut in equis, in leonibus, iustitiam, aequitatem, bonitatem non dicimus; sunt enim rationis et orationis expertes.
In cases of this kind the view of Diogenes of Babylon, a great and weighty Stoic, regularly differs from that of his pupil Antipater, a man of the keenest mind. Antipater holds that everything must be disclosed, so that the buyer knows nothing the seller knows and has not told him; Diogenes holds that the seller is obliged to declare whatever defects the civil law requires him to declare, and for the rest to proceed without sharp dealing, and since he is selling, to aim at the best price he can get. "I brought the grain, I put it on the market, I am selling my own goods at no higher a price than others — perhaps even lower, given the abundance arriving. Who is wronged?"
Ac latissime quidem patens hominibus inter ipsos, omnibus inter omnes societas haec est; in qua omnium rerum, quas ad communem hominum usum natura genuit, est servanda communitas, ut, quae discripta sunt legibus et iure civili, haec ita teneantur, ut sit constitutum legibus ipsis, cetera sic observentur, ut in Graecorum proverbio est, amicorum esse communia omnia. Omnium autem communia hominum videntur ea, quae sunt generis eius, quod ab Ennio positum in una re transferri in permultas potest: Homó, qui erranti cómiter monstrát viam, Quasi lúmen de suo lúmine accendát, facit. Nihiló minus ipsi lúcet, cum illi accénderit. Una ex re satis praecipit, ut, quicquid sine detrimento commodari possit, id tribuatur vel ignoto;
Antipater’s line of reasoning rises from the other side: "What are you saying? You who ought to take thought for other men and serve human society, who were born under that law and hold those first principles of nature which you are bound to obey and follow — that your advantage is the common advantage and equally the common advantage is yours — will you conceal from men what abundance and supply are at their door?" Diogenes will perhaps reply as follows: "Concealing is one thing, staying silent another. I am not concealing anything from you right now when I fail to tell you what the nature of the gods is, or what the ultimate good is — knowledge that would benefit you more than information about the price of wheat; but it does not follow that whatever is useful for you to hear is thereby necessary for me to say."
ex quo sunt illa communia: non prohibere aqua profluente, pati ab igne ignem capere, si qui velit, consilium fidele deliberanti dare, quae sunt iis utilia, qui accipiunt, danti non molesta. Quare et his utendum est et semper aliquid ad communem utilitatem afferendum. Sed quoniam copiae parvae singulorum sunt, eorum autem, qui his egeant, infinita est multitudo, vulgaris liberalitas referenda est ad illum Ennii finem: Nihilo minus ipsi lucet, ut facultas sit, qua in nostros simus liberales.
"On the contrary," Antipater will say, "it is necessary, if you remember that there is a fellowship among men bound together by nature." "I remember it," Diogenes will reply; "but is that fellowship such that nothing belongs to any individual? If it is, then nothing should be sold at all — only given away." You see that throughout this entire debate the point at issue is never stated as: "This, though base, I will do because it is expedient" — but rather, on one side, as: "This is expedient and therefore not base"; and on the other: "This must not be done because it is base." A good man brings these two adversaries before us; let us now resolve the case.
Gradus autem plures sunt societatis hominum. Ut enim ab illa infinita discedatur, propior est eiusdem gentis, nationis, linguae, qua maxime homines coniunguntur; interius etiam est eiusdem esse civitatis; multa enim sunt civibus inter se communia, forum, fana, porticus, viae, leges, iura: iudicia, suffragia, consuetudines praeterea et familiaritates multisque cum multis res rationesque contractae. Artior vero colligatio est societatis propinquorum; ab illa enim immensa societate humani generis in exiguum angustumque concluditur.
A good man is selling a house. The house has certain defects which he knows and others do not: it is unhealthy but held to be sound; every bedroom shows snakes; the timber is poor, the structure ruinous — none of which anyone but the owner knows. I ask: if the seller does not disclose any of this to the buyers and sells the house for far more than he expected to get — has he acted unjustly or dishonestly?
Nam cum sit hoc natura commune animantium, ut habeant libidinem procreandi, prima societas in ipso coniugio est, proxima in liberis, deinde una domus, communia omnia; id autem est principium urbis et quasi seminarium rei publicae. Sequuntur fratrum coniunctiones, post consobrinorum sobrinorumque, qui cum una domo iam capi non possint, in alias domos tamquam in colonias exeunt. Sequuntur conubia et affinitates, ex quibus etiam plures propinqui; quae propagatio et suboles origo est rerum publicarum. Sanguinis autem coniunctio et benivolentia devincit homines et caritate;
He has, says Antipater. For what else is it than to fail to show a man who has lost his way the road? — an act consecrated at Athens with public curses. If this is not that, then it is something worse: to stand by and let a buyer rush headlong into catastrophe and into the gravest fraud through his own error. More than failing to show the road — it is deliberately leading another astray. Diogenes replies: "Did he compel you to buy? Did he even solicit you? He put on the market what he did not want; you bought what you did want. If those who advertise a villa as fine and well-built are not thought to have cheated, though it is neither fine nor soundly built, how much less has a man cheated who did not praise his house at all? Where the buyer’s own judgment operates, what room is there for the seller’s fraud? And if not everything one says is warranted, do you think everything one does not say is warranted too? What could be more foolish than for a seller to recite the defects of what he is selling? What more absurd than for an auctioneer, at the owner’s instruction, to cry: ’I am selling a house that is unhealthy’?"
magnum est enim eadem habere monumenta maiorum, eisdem uti sacris, sepulcra habere communia. Sed omnium societatum nulla praestantior est, nulla firmior, quam cum viri boni moribus similes sunt familiaritate coniuncti; illud enim honestum quod saepe dicimus, etiam si in alio cernimus, tamen nos movet atque illi, in quo id inesse videtur, amicos facit.
So in certain disputed cases one side defends what is honorable, the other argues expediency in such a way that what appears expedient is shown to be not only compatible with honor to do, but base to leave undone. This is that apparent conflict between the expedient and the honorable which so often seems to arise. These cases must be adjudicated; for we set them out not to leave them open but to resolve them.
Et quamquam omnis virtus nos ad se allicit facitque, ut eos diligamus, in quibus ipsa inesse videatur, tamen iustitia et liberalitas id maxime efficit. Nihil autem est amabilius nec copulatius quam morum similitudo bonorum; in quibus enim eadem studia sunt, eaedem voluntates, in iis fit ut aeque quisque altero delectetur ac se ipso, efficiturque id, quod Pythagoras vult in amicitia, ut unus fiat ex pluribus. Magna etiam illa communitas est, quae conficitur ex beneficiis ultro et citro datis acceptis, quae et mutua et grata dum sunt, inter quos ea sunt, firma devinciuntur societate.
Neither the grain-merchant, then, nor the house-seller ought, it seems to me, to have concealed anything from the buyers. Concealment is not simply keeping silent about something; it is the deliberate choice that those who have an interest in knowing something should remain ignorant of it, for the sake of your own gain. What kind of concealment is that, and what kind of man practices it? Everyone can see plainly enough: not an open man, not a straightforward man, not a candid man, not a just man, not a good man — a schemer rather, a shadow-dweller, a contriver, a deceiver, a cheat, a trickster, a worn old hand, a sly one. Is it not a bad bargain to earn all these names and more besides?
Sed cum omnia ratione animoque lustraris, omnium societatum nulla est gravior, nulla carior quam ea, quae cum re publica est uni cuique nostrum. Cari sunt parentes, cari liberi, propinqui, familiars, sed omnes omnium caritates patria una complexa est, pro qua quis bonus dubitet mortem oppetere, si ei sit profuturus? Quo est detestabilior istorum immanitas, qui lacerarunt omni scelere patriam et in ea funditus delenda occupati et sunt et fuerunt.
And if those who stayed silent deserve censure, what are we to think of those who resorted to outright falsehood in their words? Gaius Canius — a Roman knight, a man of some wit and decent learning — had made his way to Syracuse, as he used to say himself, for a holiday, not on business, and was letting it be known that he wanted to buy some small garden property where he could invite friends and amuse himself without being pestered. When this got about, one Pythius, a banker at Syracuse, told him he had no gardens for sale, but that Canius was welcome to use his as his own; and at the same time he invited the man to dinner in the gardens the following day. Canius accepted. Pythius, who as a banker was on good terms with all classes, called his fishermen together and asked them to fish in front of his gardens the next morning; he told them exactly what he wanted them to do. Canius came to dinner on time; Pythius had laid on a lavish spread; a whole flotilla of boats lay before their eyes; each fisherman brought up what he had caught and laid his fish at Pythius’s feet.
Sed si contentio quaedam et comparatio fiat, quibus plurimum tribuendum sit officii, principes sint patria et parentes, quorum beneficiis maximis obligati sumus,proximi liberi totaque domus, quae spectat in nos solos neque aliud ullum potest habere perfugium, deinceps bene convenientes propinqui, quibuscum communis etiam fortuna plerumque est. Quam ob rem necessaria praesidia vitae debentur iis maxime, quos ante dixi, vita autem victusque communis, consilia, sermones, cohortationes, consolationes, interdum etiam obiurgationes in amicitiis vigent maxime, estque ea iucundissima amicitia, quam similitudo morum coniugavit.
Then Canius: "I ask you, Pythius — what is all this? So many fish, so many boats?" And Pythius: "What is surprising? This is where Syracuse keeps everything in the way of fish; this is where their fresh water is; this property is indispensable to those men." Canius was on fire with desire and pressed Pythius to sell. Pythius was reluctant at first. But in short — he got his way. The man, eager and rich, paid whatever Pythius asked, and bought the property furnished as it stood; he had the names entered in the accounts and the transaction completed. The next day Canius invited his friends; he arrived himself early on. He saw not a single thwart-pin. He asked a neighbor whether there was some fishermen’s holiday that he could see none of them. "No holiday that I know of," the man said; "but no one fishes here as a rule — so I was puzzled yesterday about what had happened."
Sed in his omnibus officiis tribuendis videndum erit, quid cuique maxime necesse sit, et quid quisque vel sine nobis aut possit consequi aut non possit. Ita non iidem erunt necessitudinum gradus, qui temporum; suntque officia, quae aliis magis quam aliis debeantur; ut vicinum citius adiuveris in fructibus percipiendis quam aut fratrem aut familiarem, at, si lis in iudicio sit, propinquum potius et amicum quam vicinum defenderis. Haec igitur et talia circumspicienda sunt in omni officio et consuetudo exercitatioque capienda, ut boni ratiocinatores officiorum esse possimus et addendo deducendoque videre, quae reliqui summa fiat, ex quo, quantum cuique debeatur, intellegas.
Canius was furious. But what could he do? My colleague and friend Gaius Aquilius had not yet introduced his formulas for fraud — the dolus malus actions — though in those very formulas, when he was asked what dolus malus was, he used to answer: when one thing is pretended and another done. A definition admirably put, as one would expect from a man skilled in making definitions. So Pythius, and all who do one thing while pretending another, are faithless, dishonest, and malicious. No act of theirs can be useful when it is stained with so many vices.
Sed ut nec medici nec imperatores nec oratores, quamvis artis praecepta perceperint, quicquam magna laude dignum sine usu et exercitatione consequi possunt, sic officii conservandi praecepta traduntur illa quidem, ut facimus ipsi, sed rei magnitude usum quoque exercitationemque desiderat. Atque ab iis rebus, quae sunt in iure societatis humanae, quem ad modum ducatur honestum, ex quo aptum est officium, satis fere diximus.
And if Aquilius’s definition is sound, then all pretense and concealment must be banished from life entire. A good man will not pretend or conceal anything, whether to buy more cheaply or to sell more dearly. Moreover, this dolus malus had already been made actionable by law — guardianship under the Twelve Tables, defrauding of young men under the Lex Plaetoria — and without any statutory basis in the courts, where the formula adds the words ex fide bona, "in good faith." Among the other formulas these phrases especially stand out: in the arbitration for recovery of a wife’s dowry, melius aequius, "what is better and more equitable"; and in the action on fiduciary deposit, ut inter bonos bene agier, "that dealings be upright between good men." Can there be any trace of fraud in what is "better and more equitable"? Or when dealings are said to be "upright between good men," can anything be done by deceit or malice? Fraud, as Aquilius says, consists in pretense. All lying must therefore be expelled from dealings and contracts. The seller will not plant a shill to bid up the price; the buyer will not plant one to bid against himself. Each, if it comes to the point of a declaration, will make it once and once only.
Intelligendum autem est, cum proposita sint genera quattuor, e quibus honestas officiumque manaret, splendidissimum videri, quod animo magno elatoque humanasque res despiciente factum sit. Itaque in probris maxime in promptu est si quid tale dici potest: Vós enim, iuvenes, ánimum geritis múliebrem, ílla virgo viri et si quid eius modi: Salmácida, spolia sÍne sudore et sánguine. Contraque in laudibus, quae magno animo et fortiter excellenterque gesta sunt, ea nescio quo modo quasi pleniore ore laudamus. Hinc rhetorum campus de Marathone, Salamine, Plataeis, Thermopylis, Leuctris, hine noster Cocles, hinc Decii, hinc Cn. et P. Scipiones, hinc M. Marcellus, innumerabiles alii, maximeque ipse populus Romanus animi magnitudine excellit. Declaratur autem studium bellicae gloriae, quod statuas quoque videmus ornatu fere militari.
Quintus Scaevola, son of Publius, once required that a piece of land of which he was the buyer be named to him at a single price, and when the seller had done so, said he valued it at more, and added a hundred thousand sesterces. There is no one who denies this was the act of a good man; the wise men deny it, on the grounds that he had sold for less than he could have got. This then is that ruinous division: some they count good men, others wise men. Hence Ennius: "Wisdom is wasted on the wise man who cannot profit himself." True enough — if only Ennius and I agreed on what profit means.
Sed ea animi elatio, quae cernitur in periculis et laboribus, si iustitia vacat pugnatque non pro salute communi, sed pro suis commodis, in vitio est; non modo enim id virtutis non est, sed est potius immanitatis omnem humanitatem repellentis. Itaque probe definitur a Stoicis fortitudo, cum eam virtutem esse dicunt propugnantem pro aequitate. Quocirca nemo, qui fortitudinis gloriam consecutus est insidiis et malitia, laudem est adeptus; nihil enim honestum esse potest, quod iustitia vacat.
I find that Hecaton of Rhodes, the pupil of Panaetius, says in the books on duty he wrote for Quintus Tubero that the wise man’s duty in managing his own estate is to do nothing against custom, law, or established practice. We do not want riches for ourselves alone, after all, but for our children, our relations, our friends, and above all for the state; for the resources and means of individuals are the wealth of the community. Scaevola’s act, of which I spoke just now, can in no way satisfy this man; indeed Hecaton flatly says he will do nothing for his own profit that is not lawful. Such a man deserves neither great praise nor gratitude.
Praeclarum igitur illud Platonis: Non, inquit, solum scientia, quae est remota ab iustitia, calliditas potius quam sapientia est appellanda, verum etiam animus paratus ad periculum, si sua cupiditate, non utilitate communi impellitur, audaciae potius nomen habeat quam fortitudinis. Itaque viros fortes et magnanimnos eosdem bonos et simplices, veritatis amicos minimeque fallaces esse volumus; quae sunt ex media laude iustitiae.
But if both pretense and concealment constitute dolus malus, there are very few transactions in which that fraud does not play some part; or if a good man is one who helps whom he can and harms no one, then assuredly such a good man is not easily found. In sum: it is never useful to do wrong, because it is always base; and because it is always honorable to be a good man, it is always useful.
Sed illud odiosum est, quod in hac elatione et magnitudine animi facillime pertinacia et nimia cupiditas principatus innascitur. Ut enim apud Platonem est, omnem morem Lacedaemoniorum inflammatum esse cupiditate vincendi, sic, ut quisque animi magnitudine maxime excellet, ita maxime vult princeps omnium vel potius solus esse. Difficile autem est, cum praestare omnibus concupieris, servare aequitatem, quae est iustitiae maxime propria. Ex quo fit, ut neque disceptatione vinci se nec ullo publico ac legitimo iure patiantur, exsistuntque in re publica plerumque largitores et factiosi, ut opes quam maximas consequantur et sint vi potius superiores quam iustitia pares. Sed quo difficilius, hoc praeclarius; nullum enim est tempus, quod iustitia vacare debeat.
Now, on the subject of property sales, our civil law has a firm rule: any defects known to the seller must be declared. For under the Twelve Tables it was enough to guarantee what had been formally stated aloud — the seller who denied those statements faced a penalty of double the price — but the jurists went further and established a penalty for silence as well: they ruled that whatever defect existed in a property, if the seller knew of it and did not name it expressly, he was bound to make it good.
Fortes igitur et magnanimi sunt habendi, non qui faciunt, sed qui propulsant iniuriam. Vera autem et sapiens animi magnitudo honestum illud, quod maxime natura sequitur, in factis positum, non in gloria iudicat principemque se esse mavult quam videri; etenim qui ex errore imperitae multitudinis pendet, hic in magnis viris non est habendus. Facillime autem ad res iniustas impellitur, ut quisque altissimo animo est, gloriae cupiditate; qui locus est sane lubricus, quod vix invenitur, qui laboribus susceptis periculisque aditis non quasi mercedem rerum gestarum desideret gloriam.
Consider what happened when the augurs were about to conduct an augury on the Citadel and ordered Tiberius Claudius Centumalus, who owned a building on the Caelian Hill, to demolish those parts of it whose height interfered with the taking of auspices. Claudius put the block up for sale and sold it; Publius Calpurnius Lanarius bought it. The augurs gave him the same notice. When Calpurnius had demolished the building and discovered that Claudius had put it up for sale only after being ordered by the augurs to demolish it, he brought him before an arbitrator with the formula: whatever he ought by good faith to give or do for him. The verdict was pronounced by Marcus Cato, father of the Cato who is ours — for as other men are named from their fathers, this one, who was the father of that great light, is rightly named from his son. The judge ruled that since the seller had known of the defect at the time of sale and had not disclosed it, he was bound to make good the buyer’s loss.
Omnino fortis animus et magnus duabus rebus maxime cernitur, quarum una in rerum externarum despicientia ponitur, cum persuasum est nihil hominem, nisi quod honestum decorumque sit, aut admirari aut optare aut expetere oportere nullique neque homini neque perturbationi animi nec fortunae succumbere. Altera est res, ut, cum ita sis affectus animo, ut supra dixi, res geras magnas illas quidem et maxime utiles, sed ut vehementer arduas plenasque laborum et periculorum cum vitae, tum multarum rerum, quae ad vitam pertinent.
He held, then, that it falls under good faith for the buyer to be informed of a defect the seller knows of. If that judgment was right, then the grain merchant I described was not acting rightly, nor was the seller of the plague-ridden house, in keeping silent. But silences of this kind cannot be reached by the civil law; those that can be reached, however, are firmly held. Marcus Marius Gratidianus, a kinsman of mine, had sold to Gaius Sergius Orata a house which he himself had bought from that same man only a few years before. The property was encumbered by a servitude, but Marius had not declared this in the conveyance. The matter was brought to court. Crassus appeared for Orata, Antonius for Gratidianus. Crassus pressed the law: that a seller who knowingly failed to declare a defect was bound to make it good. Antonius argued equity: since the servitude had been no secret to Sergius, who had originally sold the house, there had been no need to declare it, and a man could not be said to have been deceived who held what he had bought with full knowledge of its legal standing.
Harum rerum duarum splendor omnis, amplitudo, addo etiam utilitatem, in posteriore est, causa autem et ratio efficiens magnos viros in priore; in eo est enim illud, quod excellentes animos et humana contemnentes facit. Id autem ipsum cernitur in duobus, si et solum id, quod honestum sit, bonum iudices et ab omni animi perturbatione liber sis. Nam et ea. quae eximia plerisque et praeclara videntur, parva ducere eaque ratione stabili firmaque contemnere fortis animi magnique ducendum est, et ea, quae videntur acerba, quae multa et varia in hominum vita fortunaque versantur, ita ferre, ut nihil a statu naturae discedas, nihil a dignitate sapientis, robusti animi est magnaeque constantiae.
What is the point of all this? To show you that our ancestors had no patience for sharp dealing. But legal rules and philosophy do away with sharp dealing by different means: the law, so far as it can lay hold of it with its hand; philosophy, so far as reason and understanding can reach. Reason, then, demands this: no scheming, no dissembling, no deception. Does it count as setting a trap to put out bait — even if you do not intend to flush or drive the quarry? Wild animals themselves, with no one in pursuit, often fall into the net. So when you list a house for sale, put up a sign like a net, and sell a home riddled with defects — if some unwary buyer runs into it, have you set no trap?
Non est autem consentaneum, qui metu non frangatur, eum frangi cupiditate nec, qui invictum se a labore praestiterit, vinci a voluptate. Quam ob rem et haec vitanda et pecuniae fugienda cupiditas; nihil enim est tam angusti animi tamque parvi quam amare divitias, nihil honestius magnificentiusque quam pecuniam contemnere, si non habeas, si habeas, ad beneficentiam liberalitatemque conferre. Cavenda etiam est gloriae cupiditas, ut supra dixi; eripit enim libertatem, pro qua magnanimis viris omnis debet esse contentio. Nee vero imperia expetenda ac potius aut non accipienda interdum aut deponenda non numquam.
I can see that, given the corruption of our habits, this is held neither shameful by custom nor prohibited by statute or civil law. Yet the law of nature forbids it. For human society — and though I have said this often, I must say it yet again — extends in its widest reach to all men without exception; within that comes the narrower fellowship of those who share a nation, and narrower still of those who share a city. Our ancestors accordingly chose to distinguish the law of nations from the civil law: what is civil law is not necessarily also the law of nations, but what is the law of nations ought also to be civil law. We, however, hold no solid and clearly stamped likeness of true law and genuine justice; we work with shadows and images. Would that we followed even those — for they are drawn from nature’s finest and truest patterns.
Vacandum autem omni est animi perturbatione, cum cupiditate et metu, tum etiam aegritudine et voluptate nimia et iracundia, ut tranquillitas animi et securitas adsit, quae affert cum constantiam, tum etiam dignitatem. Multi autem et sunt et fuerunt, qui eam, quam dico, tranquillitatem expetentes a negotiis publicis se removerint ad otiumque perfugerint; in his et nobilissimi philosophi longeque principes et quidam homines severi et graves nec populi nec principum mores ferre potuerunt, vixeruntque non nulli in agris delectati re sua familiari.
Consider what force those words carry: that I not be cheated or defrauded through you or your good faith! And those golden ones: that dealings between good men be conducted well and without fraud! But who the good men are, and what it means to deal well — that is a great question. Quintus Scaevola, the pontifex maximus, used to say that the greatest force lay in all those arbitrations to which the phrase ex fide bona — “in accordance with good faith” — was appended, and that the name of good faith spread itself across the widest ground: it ran, he said, through guardianships, partnerships, trusts, mandates, purchases, sales, lettings, hirings — all the dealings on which the life of society is built. In these cases, he held, it was the mark of a great judge to determine what each party owed the other, especially since the judgments in most of them could run in either direction.
His idem propositum fuit, quod regibus, ut ne qua re egerent, ne cui parerent, libertate uterentur, cuius proprium est sic vivere, ut velis. Quare cum hoc commune sit potentiae cupidorum cum iis, quos dixi, otiosis, alteri se adipisci id posse arbitrantur, si opes magnas habeant, alteri, si contenti sint et suo et parvo. In quo neutrorum omnino contemnenda sententia est, sed et facilior et tutior et minus aliis gravis aut molesta vita est otiosorum, fructuosior autem hominum generi et ad claritatem amplitudinemque aptior eorum, qui se ad rem publicam et ad magnas res gerendas accommodaverunt.
Sharp dealing, then, must be rooted out — and that malice which wants to pass itself off as wisdom but stands as far from it as can be. For wisdom is seated in the discernment of good and evil; malice, if everything that is dishonorable is also evil, sets evil before good. And it is not only in the sale of land that the civil law, derived from nature, punishes malice and fraud: in the sale of slaves too all fraud on the seller’s part is excluded. The seller who was bound to know about health, liability to flight, and past thefts is answerable under the aediles’ edict. The case of heirs is different.
Quapropter et iis forsitan concedendum sit rem publicam non capessentibus, qui excellenti ingenio doctrinae sese dediderunt, et iis, qui aut valetudinis imbecillitate aut aliqua graviore causa impediti a re publica recesserunt, cum eius administrandae potestatem aliis laudemque concederent. Quibus autem talis nulla sit causa, si despicere se dicant ea, quae plerique mirentur, imperia et magistratus, iis non modo non laudi, verum etiam vitio dandum puto; quorum iudicium in eo, quod gloriam contemnant et pro nihilo putent, difficile factu est non probare; sed videntur labores et molestias, tum offensionum et repulsarum quasi quandam ignominiam timere et infamiam. Sunt enim, qui in rebus contrariis parum sibi constent, voluptatem severissime contemnant, in dolore sint molliores, gloriam neglegant, frangantur infamia, atque ea quidem non satis constanter.
From this it follows — since nature is the source of law — that it accords with nature for no man to prey on another’s ignorance. Nor can any greater ruin of human life be found than in malice that wears the mask of wisdom. It is from this that all those countless cases arise in which the expedient appears to war with what is honorable. How rare is the man who, if he knew he would go unpunished and that no one would ever know, could hold himself back from wrong?
Sed iis, qui habent a natura adiumenta rerum gerendarum, abiecta omni cunctatione adipiscendi magistratus et gerenda res publica est; nec enim aliter aut regi civitas aut declarari animi magnitudo potest. Capessentibus autem rem publicam nihilo minus quam philosophis, haud scio an magis etiam et magnificentia et despicientia adhibenda est rerum humanarum, quam saepe dico, et tranquillitas animi atque securitas, siquidem nec anxii futuri sunt et cum gravitate constantiaque victuri.
Let us put it to the test, if you will — and in examples where common people may perhaps see nothing wrong. We need not deal here with assassins, poisoners, forgers, thieves, and embezzlers; they are to be worn down not with the arguments of philosophers but with chains and prison. Let us consider instead what men do who are held to be good. Certain persons brought a forged will from Greece to Rome in the name of Lucius Minucius Basilus, a man of great wealth. To make it easier to establish, they named as co-heirs Marcus Crassus and Quintus Hortensius, the most powerful men of that generation. These men, though they suspected the will was a forgery, were not themselves conscious of any wrongdoing; and so they did not refuse a small gift from another man’s crime. Is that enough, then, for them to appear guiltless? In my judgment, no — though the one I loved while he lived, and the other I do not hate now that he is dead.
Quae faciliora sunt philosophis, quo minus multa patent in eorum vita, quae fortuna feriat, et quo minus multis rebus egent, et quia, si quid adversi eveniat, tam graviter cadere non possunt. Quocirca non sine causa maiores motus animorum concitantur maioraque studia efficiendi rem publicam gerentibus quam quietis, quo magis iis et magnitudo est animi adhibenda et vacuitas ab angoribus. Ad rem gerendam autem qui accedit, caveat, ne id modo consideret, quam illa res honesta sit, sed etiam ut habeat efficiendi facultatem; in quo ipso considerandum est, ne aut temere desperet propter ignaviam aut nimis confidat propter cupiditatem. In omnibus autem negotiis, prius quam aggrediare, adhibenda est praeparatio diligens.
But when Basilus had wished his sister’s son, Marcus Satrius, to bear his name and had made him his heir — the same Satrius who is patron of the Picene and Sabine territory; what a shameful mark on the age, that that name should survive in such hands! — it was not right that the leading men of the state should get the estate while nothing came to Satrius but the name. For if a man who fails to prevent or repel an injustice when he is able to is himself acting unjustly — as I argued in the first book — what must we think of one who not merely fails to resist an injustice but actually assists it? Even genuine inheritances, to my mind, are not honorable when they are sought through fawning flattery, through the performance of services not in truth but in pretense. And yet in cases of this kind it seems, at times, that expediency and honor pull in opposite directions.
Sed cum plerique arbitrentur res bellicas maiores esse quam urbanas, minuenda est haec opinio. Multi enim bella saepe quaesiverunt propter gloriae cupiditatem, atque id in magnis animis ingeniisque plerumque contingit, eoque magis, si sunt ad rem militarem apti et cupidi bellorum gerendorum; vere autem si volumus iudicare, multae res exstiterunt urbanae maiores clarioresque quam bellicae.
That is an error. For the rule of expediency and the rule of honor are one and the same. Whoever fails to see this will find no fraud, no crime, beyond his reach. He will think: “That course is no doubt honorable, but this one pays” — and with that error he will dare to sever what nature has joined together, which is the very source of all fraud, all wrongdoing, all crime. Suppose a good man had the power that, if he snapped his fingers, his name would slip into the wills of wealthy men — he would not use that power, not even if he were certain no one would ever suspect it. But grant that power to Marcus Crassus, so that by a snap of the fingers he could be written in as heir where he was not truly heir — believe me, he would dance for joy in the Forum. The just man, however, the man we mean when we say a man is good, takes nothing from anyone to transfer to himself. Whoever marvels at this admits he does not know what a good man is.
Quamvis enim Themistocles iure laudetur et sit eius nomen quam Solonis illustrius citcturque Salamis clarissimae testis victoriae, quae anteponatur consilio Solonis ei, quo primum constituit Areopagitas, non minus praeclarum hoc quam illud iudicandum est; illud enim semel profuit, hoc semper proderit civitati; hoc consilio leges Atheniensium, hoc maiorum instituta servantur; et Themistocles quidem nihil dixerit, in quo ipse Areopagum adiuverit, at ille vere a se adiutum Themistoclem; est enim bellum gestum consilio senatus eius, qui a Solone erat constitutus.
But if anyone cares to unroll the conception of a good man that is folded up in his mind, he will come to understand for himself that the good man is one who helps those he can and harms no one except when provoked by wrong. What then? Does the man who contrives — by some poison, as it were — to displace the true heirs and step into their place, not harm anyone? Let him not do, some will say, what pays and profits him? No: let him understand that nothing is profitable, nothing expedient, that is unjust. Whoever has not learned this lesson will never be a good man.
Licet eadem de Pausania Lysandroque dicere, quorum rebus gestis quamquam imperium Lacedaemoniis partum putatur, tamen ne minima quidem ex parte Lycurgi legibus et disciplinae confercndi sunt; quin etiam ob has ipsas causas et parentiores habuerunt exercitus et fortiores. Mihi quidem neque pueris nobis M. Scaurus C. Mario neque, cum versaremur in re publica, Q. Catulus Cn. Pompeio cedere videbatur; parvi enim sunt foris arma, nisi est consilium domi; nec plus Africanus, singularis et vir et imperator, in exscindenda Numantia rei publicae profuit quam eodem tempore P. Nasica privatus, cum Ti. Gracchum interemit; quamquam haec quidem res non solum ex domestica est ratione (attingit etiam bellicam, quoniam vi manuque confecta est), sed tamen id ipsum est gestum consilio urbano sine exercitu.
As a boy I used to hear from Gaius Fimbria, a man of consular rank, that our father had once served as judge in the case of Marcus Lutatius Pinthia, a thoroughly honorable Roman knight, who had entered into a wager on the condition that he was a man of good character. Fimbria declared that he would never pronounce on that matter: otherwise he would either strip a man of established probity of his reputation by ruling against him, or appear to have ruled that someone was a man of good character — when in fact that status rests on an endless accumulation of duties and distinctions. This good man, then — recognized as such by Fimbria, and not only by Socrates — can plainly never suppose that anything is expedient which is not also honorable. And so such a man will dare not only to do nothing but even to think nothing that he would not be willing to proclaim aloud. Is it not shameful that philosophers should hesitate over questions which even plain country people do not hesitate over? From them has come that proverb, worn smooth by age: when they want to praise someone’s reliability and goodness they say he is a man worth matching fingers with in the dark. What does that amount to, if not this: nothing is expedient that is not also fitting, even if you could gain it with no one there to refute you?
Illud autem optimum est, in quod invadi solere ab improbis et invidis audio: Cedant arma togae, concedat laurea laudi. Ut enim alios omittam, nobis rem publicam gubernantibus nonne togae arma cesserunt? neque enim periculum in re publica fuit gravius umquam nec maius otium. Ita consiliis diligentiaque nostra celeriter de manibus audacissimorum civium delapsa arma ipsa ceciderunt.
Do you see what this proverb implies — that no pardon can be given to that famous Gyges, nor to the man I was imagining a moment ago who could sweep in all the inheritances in the world with a snap of his fingers? For just as what is shameful can never become honorable however deeply concealed, so what is not honorable can never be made expedient when nature herself stands against it and fights back.
Quae res igitur gesta umquam in bello tanta? qui triumphus conferendus? licet enim mihi, M. fill, apud te gloriari, ad quem et hereditas huius gloriae et factorum imitatio pertinet. Mihi quidem certe vir abundans bellicis laudibus, Cn. Pompeius, multis audientibus hoc tribuit, ut diceret frustra se triumphum tertium deportaturum fuisse, nisi meo in rem publicam beneficio, ubi triumpharet, esset habiturus. Sunt igitur domesticae fortitudines non inferiores militaribus; in quibus plus etiam quam in his operae studiique ponendum est.
“But,” someone will say, “when the rewards are very great, there is good cause to go wrong.” Gaius Marius had long been far from any hope of the consulship and had been lying idle for seven years since his praetorship, with no prospect, it seemed, of ever standing for the consulship at all. Yet when Quintus Metellus, that finest of men and citizens, under whom he was serving as legate, sent him to Rome on dispatch, he went before the Roman people and brought false charges against Metellus, his own commander, claiming that Metellus was dragging the war out, and promising that if the people made him consul he would deliver Jugurtha, alive or dead, into the power of Rome within a short time. And so he was indeed made consul — but he departed from good faith and justice, in that he brought an excellent and weighty citizen, his own general, the man who had dispatched him, into popular hatred through a false accusation.
Omnino illud honestum, quod ex animo excelso magnificoque quaerimus, animi efficitur, non corporis viribus. Exercendum tamen corpus et ita afficiendum est, ut oboedire consilio rationique possit in exsequendis negotiis et in labore tolerando. Honestum autem id, quod exquirimus, totum est positum in animi cura et cogitatione; in quo non minorem utilitatem afferunt, qui togati rei publicae praesunt, quam qui bellum gerunt. Itaque eorum consilio saepe aut non suscepta aut confecta bella sunt, non numquam etiam illata, ut M. Catonis bellum tertium Punicum, in quo etiam mortui valuit auctoritas.
Nor did our kinsman Gratidianus discharge the duty of a good man at the time when he was praetor and the college of praetors had brought in the tribunes of the plebs to draw up a common policy on the currency — for in those days the coinage had become so unstable that no one could know what he was worth. Together they drafted a joint edict with its penalties and procedures, and agreed that they would all mount the Rostra together after noon to announce it. The others dispersed in various directions; Marius came straight from the benches to the Rostra and announced on his own what had been drawn up jointly. That action, if you want to know, brought him tremendous glory: statues in every neighborhood, incense and candles set before them — in short, no man was ever more beloved by the people.
Quare expetenda quidem magis est decernendi ratio quam decertandi fortitudo, sed cavendum, ne id bellandi magis fuga quam utilitatis ratione faciamus. Bellum autem ita suscipiatur, ut nihil aliud nisi pax quaesita videatur. Fortis vero animi et constantis est non perturbari in rebus asperis nec tumultuantem de gradu deici, ut dicitur, sed praesenti animo uti et consilio nec a ratione discedere.
These are the cases that sometimes unsettle the mind in deliberation, when the wrong that will be done to justice appears to be no great matter, while the advantage arising from it appears very great — as it seemed to Marius no very disgraceful thing to steal from his colleagues and the tribunes of the plebs a moment of popular favor, but an enormous advantage to be made consul by that means, which was his aim at the time. But there is one rule for all, and I want you to know it thoroughly: either let what seems expedient not be dishonorable, or, if it is dishonorable, let it not seem expedient. Can we then judge either that Marius, or this other man, a good man? Test and examine your own understanding, to see what is the image, the form, the idea of a good man that dwells in it. Does it fall to a good man to lie for his own gain, to slander, to steal a march, to deceive? Surely nothing could be further from it.
Quamquam hoc animi, illud etiam ingenii magni est, praecipere cogitatione futura et aliquanto ante constituere, quid accidere possit in utramque partem, et quid agendum sit, cum quid evenerit, nec committere, ut aliquando dicendum sit: Non putaram. Haec sunt opera magni animi et excelsi et prudentia consilioque fidentis; temere autem in acie versari et manu cum hoste confligere immane quiddam et beluarum simile est; sed cum tempus necessitasque postulat, decertandum manu est et mors servituti turpitudinique anteponenda.
Is there any matter of such weight, or any advantage so much to be desired, that it is worth losing the luster and the name of a good man? What could expediency, so called, possibly bring us that is commensurate with what it takes away, if it has stripped us of the name of a good man and robbed us of good faith and justice? For what difference does it make whether a man transforms himself from a human being into a beast outright, or carries the inward savagery of a beast beneath the outward form of a man? And again: those who trample all that is right and honorable underfoot so long as they may gain power — are they not doing exactly what the man did who chose to have as his father-in-law the one by whose audacity he himself might be powerful? He thought it supremely expedient to have the greatest influence through another man’s unpopularity; he did not see how unjust to his country and how dishonorable that was. And the father-in-law himself always had on his lips those Greek verses from the Phoenissae — which I shall render as best I can, roughly perhaps, but clearly enough to convey the meaning: If wrong must be done, let it be done for a kingdom’s sake; in all else, keep your piety. A monstrous utterance — or rather it is Euripides who is monstrous, for making the one exception that is the most criminal thing of all.
De evertendis autem diripiendisque urbibus valde considerandum est ne quid temere, ne quid crudeliter. Idque est magni viri, rebus agitatis punire sontes, multitudinem conservare, in omni fortuna recta atque honesta retinere. Ut enim sunt, quem ad modum supra dixi, qui urbanis rebus bellicas anteponant, sic reperias multos, quibus periculosa et calida consilia quietis et cogitatis splendidiora et maiora videantur.
Why then do we go collecting petty cases — inheritances, trading deals, fraudulent sales? Here before you stands a man who lusted to be king of the Roman people and master of all nations, and carried it through! If anyone calls such an ambition honorable, he is out of his mind; for he is endorsing the destruction of law and liberty and taking a hideous, abhorrent tyranny for glory. But if a man admits that it is not honorable to be king in a city that was free and should remain free, yet says that for the man who can manage it, it is expedient — with what rebuke, or with what reproach rather, should I attempt to tear him from so great an error? Can it be expedient, by the immortal gods, for anyone to commit the most abominable and atrocious parricide against his country, even if the man who has bound himself to that crime is hailed as “father” by the citizens he has crushed? Expediency, then, must be governed by honor — and so governed that these two are seen to differ in word, but in substance to sound as one.
Numquam omnino periculi fuga committendum est, ut imbelles timidique videamur, sed fugiendum illud etiam, ne offeramus nos periculis sine causa, quo esse nihil potest stultius. Quapropter in adeundis periculis consuetudo imitanda medicorum est, qui leviter aegrotantes leniter curant, gravioribus autem morbis periculosas curationes et ancipites adhibere coguntur. Quare in tranquillo tempestatem adversam optare dementis est, subvenire autem tempestati quavis ratione sapientis, eoque magis, si plus adipiscare re explicata boni quam addubitata mali. Periculosae autem rerum actiones partim iis sunt, qui eas suscipiunt, partim rei publicae. Itemque alii de vita, alii de gloria et benivolentia civium in discrimen vocantur. Promptiores igitur debemus esse ad nostra pericula quam ad communia dimicareque paratius de honore et gloria quam de ceteris commodis.
In the common opinion I find no advantage that can be greater than being king; and yet when I begin to bring reason back to the truth, I find nothing less expedient for the man who has won it unjustly. For can anguish, anxiety, and fear by day and by night, a life beset by treachery and thick with peril — can any of this be expedient for anyone? “Many are unjust and faithless to a king; few are well-disposed,” says Accius. But to what king? The one who held his throne by right, as the heir of Tantalus and Pelops. How much more do you think those words apply to the king who, with the army of the Roman people, had crushed the Roman people themselves, and compelled a city that was not only free but mistress of nations to serve him?
Inventi autem multi sunt, qui non modo pecuniam, sed etiam vitam profundere pro patria parati essent, iidem gloriae iacturam ne minimam quidem facere vellent, ne re publica quidem postulante; ut Callicratidas, qui, cum Lacedaemoniorum dux fuisset Peloponnesiaco bello multaque fecisset egregie, vertit ad extremum omnia, cum consilio non paruit eorum, qui classem ab Arginusis removendam nec cum Atheniensibus dimicandum putabant; quibus ille respondit Lacedaemonios classe illa amissa aliam parare posse, se fugere sine suo dedecore non posse. Atque haec quidem Lacedaemoniis plaga mediocris, illa pestifera, qua, cum Cleombrotus invidiam timens temere cum Epaminonda conflixisset, Lacedaemoniorum opes corruerunt. Quanto Q. Maximus melius! de quo Ennius: Unus homo nobis cunctando restituit rem. Noenum rumores ponebat ante salutem. Ergo postque magisque viri nunc gloria claret. Quod genus peccandi vitandum est etiam in rebus urbanis. Sunt enim, qui, quod sentiunt, etsi optimum sit, tamen invidiae metu non audeant dicere.
What stains of conscience do you think he had in his soul, what wounds? Whose life, moreover, can be truly advantageous to him if the terms of that life are such that whoever destroys it will stand in the highest favor and glory? But if things that seem supremely advantageous are not so, because they are full of shame and dishonor, it ought by now to be thoroughly plain that nothing is expedient which is not honorable.
Omnino qui rei publicae praefuturi sunt, duo Platonis praecepta teneant, unum, ut utilitatem civium sic tueantur, ut, quaecumque agunt, ad eam referant obliti commodorum suorum, alterum, ut totum corpus rei publicae curent, ne, dum partem aliquam tuentur, reliquas deserant. Ut enim tutela, sic procuratio rei publicae ad eorum utilitatem, qui commissi sunt, non ad eorum, quibus commissa est, gerenda est. Qui autem parti civium consulunt, partem neglegunt, rem perniciosissimam in civitatem inducunt, seditionem atque discordiam; ex quo evenit, ut alii populares, alii studiosi optimi cuiusque videantur, pauci universorum.
This principle has indeed been affirmed many times on other occasions, and in particular during the war with Pyrrhus, by the consul Gaius Fabricius in his second consulship and by our Senate. When King Pyrrhus had made war on the Roman people of his own accord, and the contest for supremacy was with a noble and powerful king, a deserter came from his camp to Fabricius and promised that, for a reward, he would return to Pyrrhus’s camp as secretly as he had come, and kill him with poison. Fabricius saw to it that the man was taken back to Pyrrhus, and this act of his was commended by the Senate. Yet if it was the appearance of expediency and popular esteem we were after, that one deserter would have removed a great war and a dangerous opponent of Rome’s supremacy; but it would have been great dishonor and infamy to have defeated by crime, not by courage, the man with whom we were competing for glory.
Hinc apud Atheniensis magnae discordiae, in nostra re publica non solum seditiones, sed etiam pestifera bella civilia; quae gravis et fortis civis et in re publica dignus principatu fugiet atque oderit tradetque se totum rei publicae neque opes aut potentiam consectabitur totamque eam sic tuebitur, ut omnibus consulat; nec vero criminibus falsis in odium aut invidiam quemquam vocabit omninoque ita iustitiae honestatique adhaerescet, ut, dum ea conservet, quamvis graviter offendat mortemque oppetat potius quam deserat illa, quae dixi.
Which was the more expedient, then — for Fabricius, who was in this city what Aristides was in Athens, or for our Senate, which never severed expediency from worth — to contend with the enemy in arms or in poison? If command is to be sought for the sake of glory, let crime be absent, for there can be no glory in crime; if it is power itself that is sought by whatever means, it cannot be expedient with infamy attached to it. That resolution of Lucius Philippus, son of Quintus, was therefore not expedient either: that those states which Lucius Sulla had made free in exchange for money by a decree of the Senate should again become tributaries, and that we should not return the money they had paid for their freedom. The Senate assented. A shameful exercise of power! The good faith of pirates is better than the good faith of the Senate. “But the revenues were increased — it is therefore expedient.” How long will people dare to call anything expedient that is not honorable?
Miserrima omnino est ambitio honorumque contentio, de qua praeclare apud eundem est Platonem, similiter facere eos, qui inter se contenderent, uter potius rem publicam administraret, ut si nautae certarent, quis eorum potissimum gubernaret. Idemque praecipit, ut eos adversaries existimemus, qui arma contra ferant, non eos, qui suo iudicio tueri rem publicam velint, qualis fuit inter P. Africanum et Q. Metellum sine acerbitate dissensio.
Can hatred and infamy be expedient for any empire, which ought to rest on the glory and goodwill of its allies? I have often disagreed even with my dear Cato: he seemed to me to take too rigid a line in defending the treasury and the revenues, in refusing everything to the tax-collectors, much to the allies — when we ought to have been generous to the latter and to have dealt with the former as we customarily deal with our own tenants. And so too Curio was wrong when he would say that the cause of the Transpadanes was just, but always added: “Let expediency prevail!” He should have shown instead that their cause was not just, because it was not in the Republic’s interest — not confessed, while saying it was not expedient, that it was just.
Nec vero audiendi, qui graviter inimicis irascendum putabunt idque magnanimi et fortis viri esse censebunt; nihil enim laudabilius, nihil magno et praeclaro viro dignius placabilitate atque clementia. In liberis vero populis et in iuris aequabilitate exercenda etiam est facilitas et altitudo animi, quae dicitur, ne, si irascamur aut intempestive accedentibus aut impudenter rogantibus, in morositatem inutilem et odiosam incidamus. Et tamen ita probanda est mansuetudo atque dementia, ut adhibeatur rei publicae causa severitas, sine qua administrari civitas non potest. Omnis autem et animadversio et castigatio contumelia vacare debet neque ad eius, qui punitur aliquem aut verbis castigat, sed ad rei publicae utilitatem referri.
The sixth book of Hecato’s On Duties is full of questions like these: is it the act of a good man, in a time of severe famine, not to feed his slaves? He argues both sides, but in the end directs duty more by what he takes to be expediency than by humanity. He asks: if a cargo must be thrown overboard at sea, should one sacrifice a valuable horse or a cheap little slave? One consideration pulls toward property, another toward humanity. If a fool has seized the one plank from a shipwreck, will the wise man wrest it from him by force if he can? Hecato says no, because it would be unjust. What, then — will the ship’s owner take back what is his? Not at all; no more than he would wish to throw a passenger overboard into the deep because the ship is his. For until the ship has reached its destination, it does not belong to the owner but to the passengers.
Cavendum est etiam, ne maior poena quam culpa sit, et ne isdem de causis alii plectantur, alii ne appellentur quidem. Prohibenda autem maxime est ira in puniendo; numquam enim, iratus qui accedet ad poenam, mediocritatem illam tenebit, quae est inter nimium et parum, quae placet Peripateticis, et recte placet, modo ne laudarent iracundiam et dicerent utiliter a natura datam. Illa vero omnibus in rebus repudianda est optandumque, ut ii, qui praesunt rei publicae, legum similes sint, quae ad puniendum non iracundia, sed aequitate dicuntur.
What if there is but one plank, and two shipwrecked men, both of them wise — should each snatch it for himself, or should one yield it to the other? One should yield, but to the man whose life matters more — whether for his own sake or for the sake of the Republic. But if that consideration is equal on both sides? There will be no contest; one will give way to the other, as if by lot or by a throw of the hand. What if a father is plundering temples, driving tunnels to the treasury — should his son report this to the magistrates? That would be an abomination; he should even defend his father if accused. Does country, then, not take precedence over all our duties? Yes, but country itself is served by citizens who are devoted to their parents. But what if the father is attempting to seize a tyranny, or to betray his country — should the son say nothing? On the contrary, he will beg his father not to do it. If that does no good, he will reproach him, he will even threaten him; and in the last resort, if the matter is heading toward the ruin of his country, he will set his country’s safety above his father’s.
Atque etiam in rebus prosperis et ad voluntatem nostram fluentibus superbiam magnopere, fastidium arrogantiamque fugiamus. Nam ut adversas res, sic secundas immoderate ferre levitatis est, praeclaraque est aequabilitas in omni vita et idem semper vultus eademque frons, ut de Socrate itemque de C. Laelio accepimus. Philippum quidem, Macedonum regem, rebus gestis et gloria superatum a filio, facilitate et humanitate video superiorem fuisse; itaque alter semper magnus, alter saepe turpissimus; ut recte praecipere videantur, qui monent, ut, quanto superiores simus, tanto nos geramus summissius. Panaetius quidem Africanum, auditorem et familiarem suum, solitum ait dicere, ut equos propter crebras contentiones proeliorum ferocitate exsultantes domitoribus tradere soleant, ut iis facilioribus possint uti, sic homines secundis rebus effrenatos sibique praefidentes tamquam in gyrum rationis et doctrinae duci oportere, ut perspicerent rerum humanarum imbecillitatem varietatemque fortunae.
Hecato also asks: if a wise man has unknowingly accepted counterfeit coins as genuine, and discovers what they are, should he pass them on as genuine in payment of a debt? Diogenes says yes; Antipater says no, and I agree with the latter. The man who is selling wine that he knows is going bad — must he declare it? Diogenes thinks it unnecessary; Antipater judges that a good man must. These are, as it were, the disputed points of Stoic jurisprudence. In selling a slave, must his faults be declared — not those which, if you fail to disclose them, give the buyer legal recourse for recovery, but such things as: the slave is a liar, a gambler, a thief, a drunkard? One side thinks they must be declared, the other does not.
Atque etiam in secundissimis rebus maxime est utendum consilio amicorum iisque maior etiam quam ante tribuenda auctoritas. Isdemque temporibus cavendum est, ne assentatoribus patefaciamus auris neve adulari nos sinamus, in quo falli facile est; tales enim nos esse putamus, ut iure laudemur; ex quo nascuntur innumerabilia peccata, cum homines inflati opinionibus turpiter irridentur et in maximis versantur erroribus. Sed haec quidem hactenus.
If a man selling gold thinks he is selling copper, should a good man tell him it is gold, or buy for a denarius what is worth a thousand? By now it is plain enough both what my own view is and what the dispute is between the philosophers I have named. Must agreements and promises always be kept — those, that is, made without force or fraud, as the praetor’s formula has it? If a man has given another a certain medicine against dropsy, and stipulated that, once cured, the man shall never use that medicine again; and the man recovers, but some years later falls into the same disease, and the one with whom he made the agreement will not allow him to use it again — what is to be done? The man is inhuman in refusing, and no wrong is done to him by using it; life and health must be consulted.
Illud autem sic est iudicandum, maximas geri res et maximi animi ab iis, qui res publicas regant, quod earum administratio latissime pateat ad plurimosque pertineat; esse autem magni animi et fuisse multos etiam in vita otiosa, qui aut investigarent aut conarentur magna quaedam seseque suarum rerum finibus continerent aut interiecti inter philosophos et eos, qui rem publicam administrarent, delectarentur re sua familiari non eam quidem omni ratione exaggerantes neque excludentes ab eius usu suos potiusque et amicis impertientes et rei publicae, si quando usus esset. Quae primum bene parta sit nullo neque turpi quaestu neque odioso, deinde augeatur ratione, diligentia, parsimonia, tum quam plurimis, modo dignis, se utilem praebeat nec libidini potius luxuriaeque quam liberalitati et beneficentiae pareat. Haec praescripta servantem licet magnifice, graviter animoseque vivere atque etiam simpliciter, fideliter, ° vere hominum amice.
What if a wise man has been asked by someone who means to make him his heir — and ten million sesterces will be left to him by the will — to dance openly in the Forum in broad daylight before entering upon the inheritance, and has promised to do so, since the other would not have named him heir otherwise — should he do what he promised, or not? He ought not to have promised; that, I judge, would have been the dignified course. But since he has promised: if he thinks it shameful to dance in the Forum, he will act more honorably by going back on his word and taking nothing from the inheritance than by taking it; unless he were to put that money to some great crisis of the Republic, so that even dancing, in the service of his country, might not be shameful.
Sequitur, ut de una reliqua parte honestatis dicendum sit, in qua verecundia et quasi quidam ornatus vitae, temperantia et modestia omnisque sedatio perturbationum animi et rerum modus cernitur. Hoc loco continetur id, quod dici Latine decorum potest; Graece enim pre/pon dicitur. Huius vis ea est, ut ab honesto non queat separari;
Those promises too must not be kept which are of no advantage to the very persons to whom they were made. To return to myth: the Sun promised his son Phaëthon that he would do whatever he wished; the boy wished to be lifted into his father’s chariot. He was lifted into it — and before he could stand firm, he was struck by a thunderbolt and consumed in flames. How much better it would have been in this case if the father’s promise had not been kept! And what of Theseus, who exacted his promise from Neptune? When Neptune had granted him three wishes, he prayed for the death of his son Hippolytus, whom he suspected on account of his stepmother; his prayer was granted, and Theseus fell into the deepest grief.
nam et, quod decet, honestum est et, quod honestum est, decet; qualis autem differentia sit honesti et decori, facilius intellegi quam explanari potest. Quicquid est enim, quod deceat, id tum apparet, cum antegressa est honestas. Itaque non solum in hac parte honestatis, de qua hoc loco disserendum est, sed etiam in tribus superioribus quid deceat apparet. Nam et ratione uti atque oratione prudenter et agere, quod agas, considerate omnique in re quid sit veri videre et tueri decet, contraque falli, errare, labi, decipi tam dedecet quam delirare et mente esse captum; et iusta omnia decora sunt, iniusta contra, ut turpia, sic indecora. Similis est ratio fortitudinis. Quod enim viriliter animoque magno fit, id dignum viro et decorum videtur, quod contra, id ut turpe, sic indecorum.
And Agamemnon, who had vowed to Diana the most beautiful thing born in his kingdom in that year, and sacrificed Iphigenia — than whom nothing more beautiful had been born that year? The promise should have gone unkept rather than so monstrous a crime been committed. Promises, then, are sometimes not to be kept; nor are deposits always to be restored. If a man has deposited a sword with you in his right mind, and demands it back in a fit of madness, to return it would be wrong; it is your duty not to return it. What if the man who deposited money with you is making war on your country — are you to restore the deposit? I think not; you would be acting against the Republic, which ought to be your dearest obligation. Thus many things that seem honorable by nature become, when circumstances change, not honorable: to keep a promise, to stand by an agreement, to restore a deposit — all these, when advantage shifts, cease to be honorable. This, I think, is enough to have said about the apparent advantages that run contrary to justice under the guise of wisdom.
Quare pertinet quidem ad omnem honestatem hoc, quod dico, decorum, et ita pertinet, ut non recondita quadam ratione cernatur, sed sit in promptu. Est enim quiddam, idque intellegitur in omni virtute, quod deceat; quod cogitatione magis a virtute potest quam re separari. Ut venustas et pulchritudo corporis secerni non potest a valetudine, sic hoc, de quo loquimur, decorum totum illud quidem est cum virtute confusum, sed mente et cogitatione distinguitur.
But since in the first book we derived our duties from the four springs of what is honorable, let us remain within those same springs as we show how hostile to virtue are things that merely seem advantageous but are not. Of wisdom, which wickedness tries to counterfeit, and likewise of justice, which is always expedient, we have already treated. The remaining two parts of what is honorable are these: one is perceived in the greatness and pre-eminence of a high-minded soul; the other in the shaping and governance of self-restraint and temperance.
Est autem eius discriptio duplex; nam et generale quoddam decorum intellegimus, quod in omni honestate versatur, et aliud huic subiectum, quod pertinet ad singulas partes honestatis. Atque illud superius sic fere definiri solet: decorum id esse, quod consentaneum sithominis excellentiae in eo, in quo natura eius a reliquis animantibus differat. Quae autem pars subiecta generi est, eam sic definiunt, ut id decorum velint esse, quod ita naturae consentaneum sit, ut in eo moderatio et temperantia appareat cum specie quadam liberali.
It seemed expedient for Ulysses — or so the tragic poets would have us believe; for in Homer, the best of all authorities, there is no such suspicion about him — but the tragedies charge him with wanting to evade military service by feigning madness. Not an honorable plan; yet expedient, someone might perhaps say: to reign and live at ease in Ithaca with his parents, his wife, his son. Do you suppose any distinction earned through daily labors and dangers is to be compared with such tranquility? I for my part hold it entirely contemptible and to be cast aside, since what is not honorable I judge to be not even expedient.
Haec ita intellegi possumus existimare ex eo decoro, quod poetae sequuntur; de quo alio loco plura dici solent. Sed tum servare illud poëtas, quod deceat, dicimus, cum id, quod quaque persona dignum est, et fit et dicitur; ut, si Aeacus aut Minos diceret: óderint, dum métuant, aut: natís sepulchre ipse ést parens, indecorum videretur, quod eos fuisse iustos accepimus; at Atreo dicente plausus excitantur; est enim digna persona oratio. Sed poëtae, quid quemque deceat, ex persona iudicabunt; nobis autem personam imposuit ipsa natura magna cum excellentia praestantiaque animantium reliquarum.
What do you suppose Ulysses would have heard, had he persisted in that pretense? He who accomplished the greatest deeds in the war is still made to hear this from Ajax: "He himself was first to take the oath that all of you well know, yet he alone despised the keeping of his pledge; he set about feigning madness, that he might not march to war. And had not Palamedes, with keen discernment, seen through the crafty audacity of this man’s scheme, he would have gone on cheating, in perpetuity, the sacred bond of an oath."
Quocirca poëtae in magna varietate personarum, etiam vitiosis quid conveniat et quid deceat, videbunt, nobis autem cum a natura constantiae, moderationis, temperantiae, verecundiae partes datae sint, cumque eadem natura doceat non neglegere, quem ad modum nos adversus homines geramus, efficitur, ut et illud, quod ad omnem honestatem pertinet, decorum quam late fusum sit, appareat et hoc, quod spectatur in uno quoque genere virtutis. Ut enim pulchritudo corporis apta compositione membrorum movet oculos et delectat hoc ipso, quod inter se omnes partes cum quodam lepore consentiunt, sic hoc decorum, quod elucet in vita, movet approbationem eorum, quibuscum vivitur, ordine et constantia et moderatione dictorum omnium atque factorum.
For him it was surely better to fight not only against the enemy but against the very waves — as he did — than to abandon a Greece united in arms against a barbarian foe. But let us set myths and foreign examples aside and come to what was done, and done by our own people. Marcus Atilius Regulus, serving his second consulship in Africa, was taken prisoner by ambush under the Spartan commander Xanthippus, with Hamilcar — father of Hannibal — as the Carthaginian general in command. He was sent to the Senate under oath: unless certain noble prisoners were returned to the Carthaginians, he was to come back to Carthage himself. When he arrived at Rome, he saw what appeared to be the expedient course — but judged it, as the event makes plain, to be false. That course was this: to remain in his homeland, to stay with his wife and children in his own house, to reckon the disaster he had suffered in war as the common fortune of arms, and to hold the rank of a former consul. Who denies these things are expedient? Who, do you think? Greatness of soul denies it, and courage.
Adhibenda est igitur quaedam reverentia adversus homines et optimi cuiusque et reliquorum. Nam neglegere, quid de se quisque sentiat, non solum arrogantis est, sed etiam omnino dissoluti. Est autem, quod differat in hominum ratione habenda inter iustitiam et verecundiam. Iustitiae partes sunt non violare homines, verecundiae non offendere; in quo maxime vis perspicitur decori. His igitur expositis, quale sit id, quod decere dicimus, intellectum puto.
Do you want weightier authorities? These are the virtues proper to those who fear nothing, look down on all things human, count nothing that can befall a man as intolerable. So what did he do? He came before the Senate, reported his instructions, declined to give his vote — so long as he was bound by the enemy’s oath, he said, he was not a senator. And further — "O what a fool!" someone might cry, "fighting against his own interest!" — he declared it was not expedient to return the prisoners: they were young men and good commanders, while he was already spent with age. When his counsel prevailed, the prisoners were kept; he himself returned to Carthage. Neither love of country held him back, nor love of those who were his. Nor was he unaware that he was setting out toward a most savage enemy and toward torture elaborately devised; but he judged that the oath he had sworn must be kept. And so, when he was being killed by sleep-deprivation, his cause was better than it would have been had he remained at home — an old man, a prisoner, a perjurer, a former consul.
Officium autem, quod ab eo ducitur, hanc primum habet viam, quae deducit ad convenientiam conservationemque naturae; quam si sequemur ducem, numquam aberrabimus sequemurque et id, quod acutum et perspicax natura est, et id, quod ad hominum consociationem accommodatum, et id, quod vehemens atque forte. Sed maxima vis decori in hac inest parte, de qua disputamus; neque enim solum corporis, qui ad naturam apti sunt, sed multo etiam magis animi motus probandi, qui item ad naturam accommodati sunt.
"But it was foolish of him: not only to have declined to vote for returning the prisoners, but even to have spoken against it." Foolish — in what way? Even if it served the commonwealth? Can anything that is of no use to the state be useful to any citizen at all? Men overturn the very foundations of nature when they divorce the expedient from the honorable. For we all seek what is expedient and are swept toward it, and there is no other way for us to be; for who is there who flees what is expedient — or rather, who is there who does not pursue it with the greatest eagerness? But because nowhere can we find the expedient except in what is praiseworthy, seemly, and honorable, we therefore hold those things first and supreme, and regard the name of expediency as less splendid than necessary.
Duplex est enim vis animorum atque natura; una pars in appetitu posita est, quae est o(rmh/ Graece, quae hominem huc et illuc rapit, altera in ratione, quae docet et explanat, quid faciendum fugiendumque sit. Ita fit, ut ratio praesit, appetitus obtemperet. Omnis autem actio vacare debet temeritate et neglegentia nec vero agere quicquam, cuius non possit causam probabilem reddere; haec est enim fere discriptio officii.
"What, then," someone may ask, "is the force of an oath? Are we afraid of an angry Jupiter?" Now on this point all philosophers agree — not only those who hold that the god himself has no business of his own and takes no trouble for others, but even those who hold that the god is always active and at work — that the god is never angry and never harms. What more could an angry Jupiter have done to Regulus than Regulus did to himself? The sanction of religion, then, had no power to overturn so great an apparent advantage? "Or was it to avoid acting dishonorably?" — first, we should choose the lesser of evils. Was that disgrace so great an evil as that torture? And then there is that line in Accius: "Have you broken faith?" — "I have given faith to no faithless man, nor do I give it now" — though it is spoken by an impious king, it is finely said.
Efficiendum autem est, ut appetitus rationi oboediant eamque neque praecurrant nee propter pigritiam aut ignaviam deserant sintque tranquilli atque omni animi perturbatione careant; ex quo elucebit omnis constantia omnisque moderatio. Nam qui appetitus longius evagantur et tamquam exsultantes sive cupiendo sive fugiendo non satis a ratione retinentur, ii sine dubio finem et modum transeunt; relinquunt enim et abiciunt oboedientiam nec rationi parent, cui sunt subiecti lege naturae; a quibus non modo animi perturbantur, sed etiam corpora. Licet ora ipsa cernere iratorum aut eorum, qui aut libidine aliqua aut metu commoti sunt aut voluptate nimia gestiunt; quorum omnium voltus, voces, motus statusque mutantur.
They add this further argument: just as we say that some things appear expedient but are not, so they say that some things appear honorable but are not — as this very thing appears honorable, to have returned to torture for the sake of keeping an oath; but it is not in fact honorable, because what was done under the enemy’s compulsion ought never to have been held binding. They add also that whatever is greatly expedient thereby becomes honorable, even if it did not appear so before. These are roughly the arguments against Regulus. But let us consider them one by one.
Ex quibus illud intellegitur, ut ad officii formam revertamur, appetitus omnes contrahendos sedandosque esse excitandamque animadversionem et diligentiam, ut ne quid temere ac fortuito, inconsiderate neglegenterque agamus. Neque enim ita generati a natura sumus, ut ad ludum et iocum facti esse videamur, ad severitatem potius et ad quaedam studia graviora atque maiora. Ludo autem et ioco uti illo quidem licet, sed sicut somno et quietibus ceteris tum, cum gravibus seriisque rebus satis fecerimus. Ipsumque genus iocandi non profusum nec immodestum, sed ingenuum et facetum esse debet. Ut enim pueris non omnem ludendi licentiam damus, sed eam, quae ab honestatis actionibus non sit aliena, sic in ipso ioco aliquod probi ingenii lumen eluceat.
Jupiter was not to be feared as one who in his anger would do harm — for it is not his nature to be angry, nor to harm. This argument has no more force against Regulus than against every oath whatsoever. But in an oath what we should understand is not who may be feared, but what the force of the thing is. An oath is a solemn affirmation made with religious sanction; and what you have promised with such affirmation, as it were with the god as witness, must be kept. At stake is no longer the anger of the gods — which does not exist — but justice and good faith. For Ennius says it finely: "O nurturing Faith, winged and apt, and sworn pledge of Jupiter!" Whoever violates an oath, then, violates Faith — whom our ancestors wished to dwell, as Cato’s speech records, on the Capitol, neighbor to Jupiter Greatest and Best.
Duplex omnino est iocandi genus, unum illiberale, petulans, flagitiosum, obscenum, alterum elegans, urbanum, ingeniosum, facetum. Quo genere non modo Plautus noster et Atticorum antiqua comoedia, sed etiam philosophorum Socraticorum libri referti sunt, multaque multorum facete dicta, ut ea, quae a sene Catone collecta sunt, quae vocant a)pofqe/gmata. Facilis igitur est distinctio ingenui et illiberalis ioci. Alter est, si tempore fit, ut si remisso animo, gravissimo homine dignus, alter ne libero quidem, si rerum turpitudini adhibetur verborum obscenitas. Ludendi etiam est quidam modus retinendus, ut ne nimis omnia profundamus elatique voluptate in aliquam turpitudinem delabamur. Suppeditant autem et campus noster et studia venandi honesta exempla ludendi.
"But even an angry Jupiter could not have harmed Regulus more than Regulus harmed himself." Certainly — if pain is the only evil. But that pain is not the highest evil — not even an evil at all — is affirmed with the greatest authority by philosophers. For that authority do not, I beg you, reproach Regulus — not a slight witness, but perhaps the weightiest of all. What worthier witness shall we seek than the foremost man of the Roman people, who endured torture willingly for the sake of discharging his duty? Now as for their argument — "choose the lesser evil," meaning disgrace rather than calamity — is there any evil greater than disgrace? If disgrace in the body’s deformity has some power to offend, how great must the corruption and foulness of a dishonored soul appear!
Sed pertinet ad omnem officii quaestionem semper in promptu habere, quantum natura hominis pecudibus reliquisque beluis antecedat; illae nihil sentiunt nisi voluptatem ad eamque feruntur omni impetu, hominis autem mens discendo alitur et cogitando, semper aliquid aut anquirit aut agit videndique et audiendi delectatione ducitur. Quin etiam, si quis est paulo ad voluptates propensior, modo ne sit ex pecudum genere (sunt enim quidam homines non re, sed nomine), sed si quis est paulo erectior, quamvis voluptate capiatur, occultat et dissimulat appetitum voluptatis propter verecundiam.
And so those who reason more rigorously dare say that the only evil is what is disgraceful; those who reason more loosely do not hesitate to call it the highest evil. As for that line: "I have given faith to no faithless man, nor do I give it now" — the poet is right to put it thus, because when Atreus was the character being played, the part had to be served. But if they take from this the principle that no pledge need be kept with a faithless man, let them beware they are not finding a hiding-place for perjury.
Ex quo intellegitur corporis voluptatem non satis esse dignam hominis praestantia, eamque contemni et reici oportere; sin sit quispiam, qui aliquid tribuat voluptati, diligenter ei tenendum esse eius fruendae modum. Itaque victus cultusque corporis ad valetudinem referatur et ad vires, non ad voluptatem. Atque etiam si considerare volumus, quae sit in natura excellentia et dignitas, intellegemus, quam sit turpe diffluere luxuria et delicate ac molliter vivere quamque honestum parce, continenter, severe, sobrie.
There is, moreover, a law of war, and the keeping of an oath pledged to an enemy is frequently required. For what is sworn with the sincere intention that it ought to be performed must be kept; what is sworn otherwise — if it is not performed, there is no perjury in that. For instance: if you have agreed to pay a price for your life to pirates and have not paid it, there is no fraud, not even if you swore an oath — for a pirate is not a recognized member of the class of public enemies but the common enemy of all; with such a man there ought to be no bond of faith and no shared oath.
Intellegendum etiam cst duabus quasi nos a natura indutos esse personis; quarum una communis est ex eo, quod omnes participes sumus rationis praestantiaeque eius, qua antecellimus bestiis, a qua omne honestum decorumque trahitur, et ex qua ratio inveniendi officii exquiritur, altera autem, quae proprie singulis est tributa. Ut enim in corporibus magnae dissimilitudines sunt (alios videmus velocitate ad cursum, alios viribus ad luctandum valere, itemque in formis aliis dignitatem inesse, aliis venustatem), sic in animis exsistunt maiores etiam varietates.
For to swear falsely is not in itself perjury; perjury is to fail to do what you have sworn, as our formula puts it, from the honest conviction of your mind. Euripides puts it shrewdly: "My tongue has sworn; my mind remains unsworn." hē glōssa omōmoch’, hē de phrēn anōmotos. Regulus, however, had no business disturbing the terms and agreements of a war by perjury. For the war was being waged against a just and lawful enemy, against whom the entire law of heralds and many shared legal customs apply. Were it otherwise, the Senate would never have surrendered distinguished men in chains to the enemy.
Erat in L. Crasso, in L. Philippo multus lepos, maior etiam magisque de industria in C. Caesare L. filio; at isdem temporibus in M. Scauro et in M. Druso adulescente singularis severitas, in C. Laelio multa hilaritas, in eius familiari Scipione ambitio maior, vita tristior. De Graecis autem dulcem et facetum festivique sermonis atque in omni oratione simulatorem, quem ei)/rwna Graeci nominarunt, Socratem accepimus, contra Pythagoram et Periclem summam auctoritatem consecutos sine ulla hilaritate. Callidum Hannibalem ex Poenorum, ex nostris ducibus Q. Maximum accepimus, facile celare, tacere, dissimulare, insidiari, praeripere hostium consilia. In quo genere Graeci Themistoclem et Pheraeum Iasonem ceteris anteponunt; in primisque versutum et callidum factum Solonis, qui, quo et tutior eius vita esset et plus aliquanto rei publicae prodesset, furere se simulavit.
Consider: Titus Veturius and Spurius Postumius, serving their second consulship, had made peace with the Samnites after our legions had fought badly at the Caudine Forks and been sent under the yoke. They were surrendered to the Samnites — because they had acted without the authorization of the people and the Senate. And at the same time Tiberius Numicius and Quintus Maelius, who were then tribunes of the people and on whose authority the peace had been made, were surrendered so that the peace with the Samnites might be repudiated. Postumius himself, the very man being surrendered, was the advocate and author of his own surrender. Many years later the same course was taken by Gaius Mancinus, who urged passage of the bill that Lucius Furius and Sextus Atilius were carrying by senatorial decree — that he be surrendered to the people of Numantia, with whom he had made a treaty without the Senate’s authorization; the bill was passed and he was surrendered to the enemy. More honorable this than the conduct of Quintus Pompeius, who was in the same position, yet pleaded against it and the law was not passed. With Pompeius, what appeared to be the expedient prevailed over what was honorable; with the others, the false appearance of expediency was overcome by the authority of what is honorable.
Sunt his alii multum dispares, simplices et aperti. qui nihil ex occulto, nihil de insidiis agendum putant, veritatis cultores, fraudis inimici, itemque alii, qui quidvis perpetiantur, cuivis deserviant, dum, quod velint, consequantur, ut Sullam et M. Crassum videbamus. Quo in genere versutissimum et patientissimum Lacedaemonium Lysandrum accepimus, contraque Callicratidam, qui praefectus classis proximus post Lysandrum fuit; itemque in sermonibus alium quemque, quamvis praepotens sit, efficere, ut unus de multis esse videatur; quod in Catulo, et in patre et in filio, itemque in Q. Mucio ° Mancia vidimus. Audivi ex maioribus natu hoc idem fuisse in P. Scipione Nasica, contraque patrem eius, illum qui Ti. Gracchi conatus perditos vindicavit, nullam comitatem habuisse sermonis ne Xenocratem quidem, severissimum philosophorum, ob eamque rem ipsam magnum et clarum fuisse. Innumerabiles aliae dissimilitudines sunt naturae morumque, minime tamen vituperandorum.
"But it ought not to have been binding — it was done under compulsion." As though compulsion can really be applied to a brave man. Why, then, did he go to the Senate at all, especially since he was going to argue against returning the prisoners? The very thing that is greatest in what he did is what you find fault with. He did not stand by his own private judgment: he took up the cause so that the judgment would rest with the Senate; and if he had not been himself the advocate of that course, the prisoners would certainly have been returned to the Carthaginians, and so Regulus would have stayed safe at home in his own country. Because he judged that course not expedient for the state, he believed it honorable both to hold that opinion and to suffer the consequence. And as for their claim that what is greatly expedient thereby becomes honorable — rather, it is honorable, not becomes so. For nothing is expedient that is not at the same time honorable, and the reason a thing is honorable is not that it is expedient, but the reason it is expedient is that it is honorable. Of all the admirable examples, therefore, it would not be easy to name one more praiseworthy or more distinguished than this.
Admodum autem tenenda sunt sua cuique non vitiosa, sed tamen propria, quo facilius decorum illud, quod quaerimus, retineatur. Sic enim est faciendum, ut contra universam naturam nihil contendamus, ea tamen conservata propriam nostram sequamur, ut, etiamsi sint alia graviora atque meliora, tamen nos studia nostra nostrae naturae regula metiamur; neque enim attinet naturae repugnare nec quicquam sequi, quod assequi non queas. Ex quo magis emergit, quale sit decorum illud, ideo quia nihil decet invita Minerva, ut aiunt, id est adversante et repugnante natura.
Yet in all the glory that surrounds Regulus, there is one thing pre-eminently worthy of admiration: his voting that the prisoners be kept. As for his return — to us now it seems remarkable; but in those times he could not have acted otherwise. That praise accordingly belongs not to the man but to the age. For our ancestors wished there to be no stronger bond for keeping faith than the oath. The laws of the Twelve Tables bear witness to this; the sacred laws bear witness; the treaties bear witness, by which faith is bound even with an enemy; the findings and censures of the censors bear witness — and no subject did they judge with more exacting care than the keeping of an oath.
Omnino si quicquam est decorum, nihil est profecto magis quam aequabilitas cum universae vitae, tum singularum actionum, quam conservare non possis, si aliorum naturam imitans omittas tuam. Ut enim sermone eo debemus uti, qui innatus est nobis, ne, ut quidam, Graeca verba inculcantes iure optimo rideamur, sic in actiones omnemque vitam nullam discrepantiam conferre debemus.
When Lucius Manlius, son of Aulus, had been dictator, Marcus Pomponius, a tribune of the people, indicted him on the ground that he had added several days beyond his term to the dictatorship; he also charged him with having banished his son Titus — the one who was later called Torquatus — from human society and ordered him to live in the country. When the young son heard that his father was being harassed, he is said to have rushed to Rome and arrived at Pomponius’s house at first light. When it was announced to him, Pomponius supposed the young man was furious and bringing something to lay against his father, and rose from his bed; he had the witnesses removed and bade the young man come in to him alone. But the moment he stepped inside, the son drew his sword and swore on the spot that he would kill him then and there unless Pomponius swore an oath to drop the case against his father. Pomponius, compelled by this terror, swore the oath; he reported the matter to the people, explained why he was obliged to abandon the case, and released Manlius. Such was the force of an oath in those times. And this Titus Manlius is the same man who, at the river Anio, killed the Gaul who had challenged him to single combat, stripped the torque from him, and so found his surname — a very great man indeed; and he who was so indulgent to his father was equally and harshly severe toward his own son.
Atque haec differentia naturarum tantam habet vim, ut non numquam mortem sibi ipse consciscere alius debeat, alius in eadem causa non debeat. Num enim alia in causa M. Cato fuit, alia ceteri, qui se in Africa Caesari tradiderunt? Atqui ceteris forsitan vitio datum esset, si se interemissent, propterea quod lenior eorum vita et mores fuerant faciliores, Catoni cum incredibilem tribuisset natura gravitatem eamque ipse perpetua constantia roboravisset semperque in proposito susceptoque consilio permansisset, moriendum potius quam tyranni vultus aspiciendus fuit.
But while Regulus deserves praise for keeping faith with his oath, those ten men whom Hannibal, after the battle of Cannae, sent to the Senate under oath to return to the camp in which the Carthaginians held power, should they fail to win the release of the prisoners — those ten, if they did not return, deserve censure. Yet not all of them are judged in the same way. Polybius, a thoroughly reliable authority, records that of the ten noblemen sent at that time, nine returned when the Senate refused their petition; but one of the ten, who had left the camp and then gone back a little while later as though he had forgotten something, remained in Rome — for he supposed that by returning briefly to the camp he had discharged himself from the oath. He supposed wrongly; for deceit tightens the bonds of perjury, it does not loosen them. It was, then, a piece of foolish cunning, a perverse counterfeit of wisdom. And so the Senate decreed that this crafty schemer be put in chains and returned to Hannibal.
Quam multa passus est Ulixes in illo errore diuturno, cum et mulieribus, si Circe et Calypso mulieres appellandae sunt, inserviret et in omni sermone omnibus affabilem et iucundum esse se vellet! domi vero etiam contumelias servorun ancillarumque pertulit, ut ad id aliquando, quod cupiebat, veniret. At Aiax, quo animo traditur, milies oppetere mortem quam illa perpeti maluisset. Quae contemplantes expendere oportebit, quid quisque habeat sui, eaque moderari nee velle experiri, quam se aliena deceant; id enim maxime quemque decet, quod est cuiusque maxime suum.
But here is the most telling point of all: Hannibal held eight thousand men — not men taken in the field of battle, nor men who had fled in fear of death, but men left behind in the camp by the consuls Paullus and Varro. The Senate resolved that these should not be ransomed, even though it could have been done at small expense, in order that the lesson be bred into our soldiers: conquer or die. When Hannibal heard this, the same author records that his spirit broke — because even in ruin the Senate and people of Rome had shown such loftiness of soul. So it is that when you set what is honorable in the scales, those things that appear expedient are overcome.
Suum quisque igitur noscat ingenium acremque se et bonorum et vitiorum suorum iudicem praebeat, ne scaenici plus quam nos videantur habere prudentiae. Illi enim non optimas, sed sibi accommodatissimas fabulas eligunt; qui voce freti sunt, Epigonos Medumque, qui gestu, Melanippam, Clytemnestram, semper Rupilius, quem ego memini, Antiopam, non saepe Aesopus Aiacem. Ergo histrio hoc videbit in scaena, non videbit sapiens vir in vita? Ad quas igitur res aptissimi erimus, in iis potissimum elaborabimus; sin aliquando necessitas nos ad ea detruserit, quae nostri ingenii non erunt, omnis adhibenda erit cura, meditatio, diligentia, ut ea si non decore, at quam minime indecore facere possimus; nec tam est enitendum, ut bona, quae nobis data non sint, sequamur, quam ut vitia fugiamus.
Gaius Acilius, who wrote a history in Greek, says that there were more who returned to the camp by the same subterfuge, to discharge themselves from the oath — and that the censors marked them with every form of disgrace. Let this be the end of the present topic. For it is plain enough that what is done in a spirit of cowardice, baseness, abjection, and broken will — as Regulus’s conduct would have been, had he voted on the prisoners according to his own convenience rather than the public good, or had he chosen to remain at home — is not expedient, precisely because it is shameful, foul, and base.
Ac duabus iis personis, quas supra dixi, tertia adiungitur, quam casus aliqui aut tempus imponit; quarta etiam, quam nobismet ipsi iudicio nostro accommodamus. Nam regna, imperia, nobilitas, honores, divitiae, opes eaque, quae sunt his contraria, in casu sita temporibus gubernantur; ipsi autem gerere quam personam velimus, a nostra voluntate proficiscitur. Itaque se alii ad philosophiam, alii ad ius civile, alii ad eloquentiam applicant, ipsarumque virtutum in alia alius mavult excellere.
There remains the fourth part, which is contained in propriety, moderation, self-restraint, self-command, and temperance. Can anything expedient, then, be opposed to this chorus of such virtues? And yet the Cyrenaics and those named Annicereans, following Aristippus, placed all good in pleasure and held that virtue deserves praise only because it is the producer of pleasure. After these men faded, Epicurus flourished — the champion and co-author, one might say, of much the same position. Against these men we must fight, as the saying goes, with all our horse and foot, if our purpose is to hold and defend what is honorable.
Quorum vero patres aut maiores aliqua gloria praestiterunt, ii student plerumque eodem in genere laudis excellere, ut Q. Mucius P. f. in iure civili, Pauli filius Africanus in re militari. Quidam autem ad eas laudes, quas a patribus acceperunt, addunt aliquam suam, ut hic idem Africanus eloquentia cumulavit bellicam gloriam; quod idem fecit Timotheus Cononis filius, qui cum belli laude non inferior fuisset quam pater, ad eam laudem doctrinae et ingenii gloriam adiecit. Fit autem interdum, ut non nulli omissa imitatione maiorum suum quoddam institutum consequantur, maximeque in eo plerumque elaborant ii, qui magna sibi proponunt obscuris orti maioribus.
For if not only expediency but the whole of the happy life rests, as Metrodorus wrote, on a sound constitution of the body and reliable hope of maintaining it, then this expediency — and indeed the highest expediency, as they reckon it — will be at war with what is honorable. Where, first of all, does wisdom find its place? In scouring the world for pleasures? What a wretched servitude that is — virtue waiting upon pleasure. And what is the office of wisdom, then? Selecting pleasures with discernment? Suppose nothing were more agreeable than that; what could be imagined more base? Again: for a man who calls pain the supreme evil, what room is there for courage — which is the contempt of pains and toils? However boldly Epicurus may speak of pain in many passages, as he does, we must look not at what he says but at what is consistent for him to say — a man who has defined good by pleasure and evil by pain. And if I listen to him on self-restraint and temperance, he says much in many places, but, as they put it, the water sticks: for how can a man praise temperance who places the highest good in pleasure? Temperance is the enemy of appetites; appetites, however, are the pursuers of pleasure.
Haec igitur omnia, cum quaerimus, quid deceat, complecti animo et cogitatione debemus; in primis autem constituendum est, quos nos et quales esse velimus et in quo genere vitae, quae deliberatio est omnium difficillima. Ineunte enim adulescentia, cum est maxima imbecillitas consilii, tur id sibi quisque genus aetatis degendae constituit, quod maxime adamavit; itaque ante implicatur aliquo certo genere cursuque vivendi, quam potuit, quod optimum esset, iudicare.
In these three areas, all the same, they maneuver not without some dexterity, making what shifts they can. They bring in wisdom as the knowledge of how to supply pleasures and drive away pains; they manage courage too after a fashion, by teaching a way of thought that disregards death and endures pain; they even introduce temperance — with no great ease, to be sure, but in whatever way they can — arguing that the magnitude of pleasure is determined by the subtraction of pain. Justice, however, staggers, or rather falls flat entirely, as do all the virtues concerned with community and human fellowship. For goodness, generosity, and courtesy can no more exist than friendship can, if these things are sought not for their own sake but referred to pleasure or advantage. Let us therefore gather our argument into brief compass.
Nam quodHerculem Prodicus dicit, ut est apud Xenophontem, cum primum pubesceret, quod tempus a natura ad deligendum, quam quisque viam vivendi sit ingressurus, datum est, exisse in solitudinem atque ibi sedentem diu secum multumque dubitasse, cum duas cerneret vias, unam Voluptatis, alteram Virtutis, utram ingredi melius esset, hoc Herculi Iovis satu edito potuit fortasse contingere, nobis non item, qui imitamur, quos cuique visum est, atque ad eorum studia institutaque impellimur; plerumque autem parentium praeceptis imbuti ad eorum consuetudinem moremque deducimur; alii multitudinis iudicio feruntur, quaeque maiori parti pulcherrima videntur, ea maxime exoptant; non nulli tamen sive felicitate quadam sive bonitate naturae sine parentium disciplina rectam vitae secuti sunt viam.
For just as we have shown that no expediency exists that is contrary to what is honorable, so we say that every pleasure is contrary to what is honorable. The more, then, do I find fault with Calliphon and Dinomachos, who thought they would resolve the controversy by yoking pleasure to what is honorable — as if they were coupling a beast with a human being. What is honorable does not admit that union; it spurns it, it repels it. Nor indeed can the end of good and evil — which must be single and simple — be compounded and blended out of things so utterly unlike each other. But on this question — it is a large one — I shall say more elsewhere; for now, let us return to our subject.
Illud autem maxime rarum genus est eorum, qui aut excellenti ingenii magnitudine aut praeclara eruditione atque doctrina aut utraque re ornati spatium etiam deliberandi habuerunt, quem potissimum vitae cursum sequi vellent; in qua deliberatione ad suam cuiusque naturam consilium est omne revocandum. Nam cum in omnibus, quae aguntur, ex eo, quo modo quisque natus est, ut supra dictum est, quid deceat, exquirimus, tum in tota vita constituenda multo est ei rei cura maior adhibenda, ut constare in perpetuitate vitae possimus nobismet ipsis nec in ullo officio claudicare.
The question, then, of how to decide when what appears expedient conflicts with what is honorable has been argued sufficiently above. But if pleasure too is to be said to carry the appearance of expediency, there can be no junction between it and what is honorable. For granted that we allow pleasure some standing — perhaps as a kind of seasoning — it will have nothing of expediency, nothing of substance, about it at all.
Ad hanc autem rationem quoniam maximam vim natura habet, fortuna proximam, utriusque omnino habenda ratio est in deligendo genere vitae, sed naturae magis; multo enim et firmior est et constantior, ut fortuna non numquam tamquam ipsa mortalis cum immortali natura pugnare videatur. Qui igitur ad naturae suae non vitiosae genus consilium vivendi omne contulerit, is constantiam teneat (id enim maxime decet), nisi forte se intellexerit errasse in deligendo genere vitae. Quod si acciderit (potest autem accidere), facienda morum institutorumque mutatio est. Eam mutationem si tempora adiuvabunt, facilius commodiusque faciemus; sin minus, sensim erit pedetemptimque facienda, ut amicitias, quae minus delectent et minus probentur, magis decere censent sapientes sensim diluere quam repente praecidere.
You have from your father a gift, my son Marcus — in my own judgment a great one, but its worth will depend on how you receive it. These three books must be welcomed among the lectures of Cratippus as visitors received into a house; but just as, had I come to Athens in person — and I should have done so, had not my country called me back from mid-voyage with a voice too clear to refuse — you would sometimes have heard me as well, so now, since it is my voice that has made its way to you in these volumes, give them as much of your time as you can — and you will be able to give as much as you wish. When I have come to see that this kind of learning gives you joy, I shall speak with you both in person before long, as I hope, and in absence through these pages. And so farewell, my son; be persuaded that you are indeed dearest to me — but will be far dearer still if you take delight in these counsels and instructions.
Commutato autem genere vitae omni ratione curandum est, ut id bono consilio fecisse videamur. Sed quoniam paulo ante dictum est imitandos esse maiores, primum illud exceptum sit, ne vitia sint imitanda, deinde si natura non feret, ut quaedam imitari posit (ut superioris filius Africani, qui hunc Paulo natum adoptavit, propter infirmitatem valetudinis non tam potuit patris similis esse, quam ille fuerat sui); si igitur non poterit sive causas defensitare sive populum contionibus tenere sive bella gerere, illa tamen praestare debebit, quae erunt in ipsius potestate, iustitiam, fidem, liberalitatem, modestiam, temperantiam, quo minus ab eo id, quod desit, requiratur. Optima autem hereditas a patribus traditur liberis omnique patrimonio praestantior gloria virtutis rerumque gestarum, cui dedecori esse nefas et vitium iudicandum est.
And since the same duties are not assigned to men of different ages — some belonging to the young, others to the old — something must also be said about this distinction. It is the duty of a young man to show deference to his elders and to choose from among them those of the highest reputation and soundest judgment, on whose counsel and authority he may lean; for the inexperience of early life must be formed and guided by the wisdom of age. This time of life above all must be kept from sensual indulgence and exercised in endurance of effort, in body and in mind, so that industry may be vigorous in both military and civic duties. And when young men wish to relax their minds and give themselves over to enjoyment, they should guard against excess and remember modesty — which will be easier if they do not object to having their elders present even on such occasions.
Et quoniam officia non eadem disparibus aetatibus tribuuntur aliaque sunt iuvenum, alia seniorum, aliquid etiam de hac distinctione dicendum est. Est igitur adulescentis maiores natu vereri exque iis deligere optimos et probatissimos, quorum consilio atque auctoritate nitatur; ineuntis enim aetatis inscitia senum constituenda et regenda prudentia est. Maxime autem haec aetas a libidinibus arcenda est exercendaque in labore patientiaque et animi et corporis, ut eorum et in bellicis et in civilibus officiis vigeat industria. Atque etiam cum relaxare animos et dare se iucunditati volent, caveant intemperantiam, meminerint verecundiae, quod erit facilius, si ne in eius modi quidem rebus maiores natu nolent interesse.
Old men, on the other hand, should lighten the physical exertions while increasing the exercises of the mind; and they should make it their object to be of as much service as possible to friends, to the young, and above all to the state through counsel and practical wisdom. There is nothing old age should guard against more than yielding to languor and idleness. Self-indulgence is shameful at every age, but at old age it is most degrading of all; and if intemperance in physical desire is added as well, the evil is twofold — for old age itself incurs disgrace, and it makes the intemperance of the young more shameless.
Senibus autem labores corporis minuendi, exercitationes animi etiam augendae videntur; danda vero opera, ut et amicos et iuventutem et maxime rem publicam consilio et prudentia quam plurimum adiuvent. Nihil autem magis cavendum est senectuti, quam ne languori se desidiaeque dedat; luxuria vero cum omni aetati turpis, tum senectuti foedissima est; sin autem etiam libidinum intemperantia accessit, duplex malum est, quod et ipsa senectus dedecus concipit et facit adulescentium impudentioren intemperantiarn.
Nor is it beside the point to speak of the duties of those in office, of private citizens, of the native-born, and of foreigners. It is the peculiar office of a magistrate to understand that he bears the role of the state, and that he must sustain its dignity and honor, uphold the laws, administer justice, and remember that all this has been entrusted to his fidelity. A private citizen, for his part, ought to live on equal and level terms with his fellow citizens — neither submissive and self-abasing, nor puffed up with self-importance — and in public affairs to desire what is peaceable and honorable; such is the man we are accustomed to call, and to regard as, a good citizen.
Ac ne illud quidem alienum est, de magistratuum, de privatorum, de civium, de peregrinorum officiis dicere. Est igitur proprium munus magistratus intellegere se gerere personam civitatis debereque eius dignitatem et decus sustinere, servare leges, iura discribere, ea fidei suae commissa meminisse. Privatum autem oportet aequo et pari cum civibus iure vivere neque summissum et abiectum neque se efferentem, tum in re publica ea velle, quae tranquilla et honesta sint; talem enim solemus et sentire bonum civem et dicere.
The duty of a foreigner or resident alien is to attend to his own affairs, not to inquire into others’, and to be as little as possible concerned with matters that belong to another state. In this way duties will generally be discovered when we ask what is fitting and what suits persons, times, and ages. Nothing, however, becomes a man so well as consistency in every action and every decision.
Peregrini autem atque incolae officium est nihil praeter suum negotium agere, niihil de alio anquirere minimeque esse in aliena re publica curiosum. Ita fere officia reperientur, cum quaeretur, quid deceat, et quid aptum sit personis, temporibus, aetatibus. Nihil est autem, quod tam deceat, quam in omni re gerenda consilioque capiendo servare constantiam.
But since that fitness shows itself in all our actions and words, and in the very movement and bearing of the body, and since it rests on three things — beauty, order, and an adornment suited to action (things difficult to put into words, but sufficient to be understood) — and since under these three heads lies also the care to win approval from those among whom and before whom we live, a few words should be said on these matters too. Nature herself appears to have taken great thought for our body: the form and figure she has given us, whatever in it has a noble appearance, she has set in view; but those parts of the body that have been given to serve the needs of nature, parts whose aspect would be unsightly and unseemly, she has covered and hidden away.
Sed quoniam decorum il!id in omnibus factis, dictis, in corporis denique motu et statu cernitur idque positum est in tribus rebus, formositate, ordine, ornatu ad actionem apto, difficilibus ad eloquendum, sed satis erit intellegi, in his autem tribus continetur cura etiam illa, ut probemur iis, quibuscum apud quosque vivamus, his quoque de rebus pauca dicantur. Principio corporis nostri magnam natura ipsa videtur habuisse rationem, quae formam nostram reliquamque figuram, in qua esset species honesta, eam posuit in promptu, quae partes autem corporis ad naturae necessitatem datae aspectum essent deformem habiturae atque foedum, eas contexit atque abdidit.
Human modesty has imitated this careful workmanship of nature. What nature has concealed, all persons of sound mind remove from sight, and they take pains to comply with natural necessity as privately as possible; and the parts of the body whose functions are necessary they do not name, either the parts themselves or their uses, by their proper names. To do what is not in itself shameful, provided it is done privately, is one thing; to speak of it openly is obscene. And so neither the open performance of such acts escapes the charge of wantonness, nor does obscene language.
Hanc naturae tam diligentem fabricam imitata est hominum verecundia. Quae enim natura occultavit, eadem omnes, qui sana mente sunt, removent ab oculis ipsique necessitati dant operam ut quam occultissime pareant; quarumque partium corporis usus sunt necessarii, eas neque partes neque earum usus suis nominibus appellant; quodque facere turpe non est, modo occulte, id dicere obscenum est. Itaque nec actio rerum illarum aperta petulantia vacat nec orationis obscenitas.
Nor are we to listen to the Cynics, or to those among the Stoics who were very nearly Cynics, when they reproach and mock us for thinking it shameful in word what is not shameful in deed, and for naming by their proper names those things that are shameful. Robbery, fraud, adultery — these are shameful in fact, yet are spoken of without obscenity; to beget children is honorable in fact, yet the name is obscene. And much more is argued by these same men against modesty along the same lines. But let us follow nature and flee everything that gives offence to the eyes and ears. In standing, in walking, in sitting, in reclining, in expression, in the eyes, in the movement of the hands, let that fitness hold its ground.
Nec vero audiendi sunt Cynici, aut si qui filerunt Stoici paene Cynici, qui reprehendunt et irrident, quod ea, quae turpia non sint, verbis flagitiosa ducamus, illa autem, quae turpia sint, nominibus appellemus suis. Latrocinari, fraudare, adulterare re turpe est, sed dicitur non obscene; liberis dare operam re honestum est, nomine obscenum; pluraque in ear sententiam ab eisdem contra verecundiam disputantur. Nos autem naturam sequamur et ab omni, quod abhorret ab oculorum auriumque approbatione, fugiamus; status incessus, sessio accubitio, vultus oculi manuum motus teneat illud decorum.
In these matters two things above all are to be avoided: anything effeminate or soft, and anything harsh or boorish. Nor ought we to concede to actors and orators that such things become them while they are unbecoming for us. The customs of the stage have, under the old discipline, such a degree of modesty that no one comes on without a loincloth; they are afraid that if, by some chance, certain parts of the body should be exposed, they will be seen indecently. Among our own people it is customary that sons who have come of age do not bathe with their fathers, nor sons-in-law with their fathers-in-law. Modesty of this kind, then, is to be preserved — especially with nature herself as teacher and guide.
Quibus in rebus duo maxime sunt fugienda, ne quid effeminatum aut molle et ne quid durum aut rusticum sit. Nec vero histrionibus oratoribusque concedendum est, ut iis haec apta sint, nobis dissoluta. Scaenicorum quidem mos tantam habet vetere disciplina verecundiam, ut in scaenam sine subligaculo prodeat nemo; verentur enim, ne, si quo casn evenerit, ut corporis partes quaedam aperiantur, aspiciantur non decore. Nostro quidem more cum parentibus puberes filii, cum soceris generi non lavantur. Retinenda igitur est huius generis verecundia, praesertim natura ipsa magistra et duce.
Now beauty is of two kinds: in one there is grace, in the other dignity. Grace we should regard as womanly, dignity as manly. Therefore let every adornment unworthy of a man be removed from his person, and let a similar fault be guarded against in gesture and movement. The exercises of the wrestling-ground are often quite repugnant; certain gestures of actors are not free from absurdity; in both arts what is upright and simple is praised. Dignity of appearance is to be maintained by a good complexion, and the complexion by bodily exercise. Beyond this, a certain neatness is called for — not offensive, not too refined, just enough to avoid a rustic and ungentlemanly slovenliness. The same principle holds for dress: here, as in most things, the mean is best.
Cum autem pulchritudinis duo genera sint, quorum in altero venustas sit, in altero dignitas, venustatem muliebrem ducere debemus, dignitatem virilem. Ergo et a forma removeatur omnis viro non dignus ornatus, et huic simile vitium in gestu motuque caveatur. Nam et palaestrici motus sunt saepe odiosiores, et histrionum non nulli gestus ineptiis non vacant, et in utroque genere quae sunt recta et simplicia, laudantur. Formae autem dignitas coloris bonitate tuenda est, color exercitationibus corporis. Adhibenda praeterea munditia est non odiosa neque exquisita nimis, tantum quae fugiat agrestem et inhumanam neglegentiam. Eadem ratio est habenda vestitus, in quo, sicut in plerisque rebus, mediocritas optima est.
We must take care not to walk with steps that are too languid and slow, so that we seem to resemble the bearers in a procession, nor to adopt a pace so hurried that we gasp for breath, our face contorts, our features twist — all of which are strong signals that self-possession is absent. But we must take far greater care that the motions of the mind do not depart from nature. This we shall achieve if we guard against falling into agitations and disturbances, and if we keep our minds attentive to the preservation of what is fitting.
Cavendum autem est, ne aut tarditatibus utamur in ingressu mollioribus, ut pomparum ferculis similes esse videamur, aut in festinationibus suscipiamus nimias celeritates, quae cum fiunt, anhelitus moventur, vultus mutantur, ora torquentur; ex quibus magna significatio fit non adesse constantiam. Sed multo etiam magis elaborandum est, ne animi motus a natura recedant; quod assequemur, si cavebimus, ne in perturbationes atque exanimationes incidamus, et si attentos animos ad decoris conservationem tenebimus.
The motions of the mind are of two kinds: one belongs to thought, the other to desire. Thought is chiefly concerned with seeking out the truth; desire impels us to action. We must therefore take care to employ our thought on the best possible subjects, and to render desire obedient to reason. Now the power of speech is great, and it falls into two kinds: one is disputation, the other conversation. Disputation should be given to the contests of the courts, the assemblies, and the Senate; conversation should move in gatherings, in discussions, in the company of friends — following the dinner-table as well. The rules of disputation belong to the rhetoricians; there are none for conversation, though I am not sure there could not be such rules. But students in the one find teachers; those who seek instruction in the other find none, while everything is crammed with schools of rhetoric — though whatever precepts govern words and thoughts will apply equally to conversation.
Motus autem animorum duplices sunt, alteri cogitationis, alteri appetitus; cogitatio in vero exquirendo maxime versatur, appetitus impellit ad agendum. Curandum est igitur, ut cogitatione ad res quam optimas utamur, appetitum rationi oboedientem praebeamus. Et quoniam magna vis orationis est, eaque duplex, altera contentionis, altera sermonis, contentio disceptationibus tribuatur iudiciorum, contionum, senatus, sermo in circulis, disputationibus, congressionibus familiarium versetur, sequatur etiam convivia. Contentionis praecepta rhetorum sunt, nulla sermonis, quamquam haud scio an possint haec quoque esse. Sed discentium studiis inveniuntur magistri, huic autem qui studeant, sunt nulli, rhetorum turba referta omnia; quamquam, quae verborum sententiarumque praecepta sunt, eadem ad sermonem pertinebunt.
But since we have the voice as the index of the mind, and in the voice two things are to be sought — that it be clear, and that it be pleasing — both must ultimately be sought from nature; yet exercise will improve the one, and imitation of those who speak with precision and ease will improve the other. The Catuli gave no impression — if you were to judge finely — of any particular learning in literature, though they were in fact learned men; but they were thought to use the Latin tongue supremely well. The sound was sweet; letters neither over-pronounced nor swallowed, so that speech was neither obscure nor affected; the voice without strain, neither slack nor singsong. The oratory of Lucius Crassus was richer and no less lively; but the reputation for elegant speech was no less attached to the Catuli. In wit and pleasantry, however, Caesar, the brother of Catulus the elder, surpassed everyone, so that in that very genus of forensic advocacy he overcame the contests of rivals by the quality of his conversation. In all these matters, then, we must take pains, if in everything we are asking what is fitting.
Sed cum orationis indicem vocem habeamus, in voce autem duo sequamur, ut clara sit, ut suavis, utrumque omnino a natura petundum est, verum alterum exercitatio augebit, alterum imitatio presse loquentium et leniter. Nihil fuit in Catulis, ut eos exquisite iudicio putares uti litterarum, quamquam erant litterati; sed et alii; hi autem optime uti lingua Latina putabantur; sonus erat dulcis, litterae neque expressae neque oppressae, ne aut obscurum esset aut putidum, sine contentione vox nec languens nec canora. Uberior oratio L. Crassi nec minus faceta, sed bene loquendi de Catulis opinio non minor. Sale vero et facetiis Caesar, Catuli patris frater, vicit omnes, ut in illo ipso forensi genere dicendi contentiones aliorum sermone vinceret. In omnibus igitur his elaborandum est, si in omni re quid deceat exquirimus.
Let conversation be, then — and it is here that the Socratics most excel — gentle and by no means combative; let it have charm. And let the one who converses not act as though he has come into his own possession and must shut out others, but, as in all other things, so in conversation, let him think a fair give-and-take no bad thing. Let him first notice what subjects he is speaking on: if serious ones, let him bring gravity; if light ones, wit. Above all let him take care that the conversation betrays no fault in his character — which is most likely to happen when people take deliberate pleasure in speaking maliciously of those who are absent, whether in ridicule or in harsh and insulting language, with the aim of blackening their name.
Sit ergo hic sermo, in quo Socratici maxime excellunt, lenis minimeque pertinax, insit in eo lepos; nec vero, tamquam in possessionem suam venerit, excludat alios, sed cum reliquis in rebus, tum in sermone communi vicissitudinem non iniquam putet; ac videat in primis, quibus de rebus loquatur; si seriis, severitatem adhibeat, si iocosis, leporem; in primisque provideat, ne sermo vitium aliquod indicet inesse in moribus; quod maxime tum solet evenire, cum studiose de absentibus detrahendi causa aut per ridiculum aut severe maledice contumelioseque dicitur.
Conversation is for the most part on domestic affairs, or public business, or the pursuits of learning and scholarship. Care must therefore be taken that, even if it begins to drift elsewhere, it is brought back to one of these; though we must also watch what company is present, since we do not all take equal pleasure in the same subjects, at the same moment, or to the same degree. One must also judge how far conversation holds its delight, and just as there was a way of beginning, so let there be a measure in ending.
Habentur autem plerumque sermones aut de domesticis negotiis aut de re publica aut de artium studiis atque doctrina. Danda igitur opera est, ut, etiamsi aberrare ad alia coeperit, ad haec revocetur oratio, sed utcumque aderunt; neque enim isdem de rebus nec omni tempore nec similiter delectamur. Animadvertendum est etiam, quatenus sermo delectationem habeat, et, ut incipiendi ratio fuerit, ita sit desinendi modus.
But as the most sound precept in all of life is to flee disturbances — that is, the excessive motions of the mind that do not answer to reason — so conversation ought to be free of such motions, lest anger flare, or some craving, or sluggishness, or faint-heartedness, or anything of that kind appear. Above all we must take care to seem to respect and to esteem those with whom we speak. Rebukes too sometimes become necessary; and in them one must perhaps use a louder and more forceful voice and sharper, weightier words — even seeming to act from anger. But as we come to cauterizing and cutting only rarely and with reluctance, so to this kind of chastisement we shall come seldom and against our will, and never except of necessity, when no other remedy can be found. Yet anger must be far away — for with anger nothing can be done rightly, nothing with deliberation.
Sed quo modo in omni vita rectissime praecipitur, ut perturbationes fugiamus, id est motus animi nimios rationi non optemperantes, sic eius modi motibus sermo debet vacare, ne aut ira exsistat aut cupiditas aliqua aut pigritia aut ignavia aut tale aliquid appareat, maximeque curandum est, ut eos, quibuscum sermonem conferemus, et vereri et diligere videamur. Obiurgationes etiam non numquam incidunt necessariae, in quibus utendum est fortasse et vocis contentione maiore et verborum gravitate acriore, id agendum etiam, ut ea facere videamur irati. Sed, ut ad urendum et secandum, sic ad hoc genus castigandi raro invitique veniemus nec umquam nisi necessario, si nulla reperietur alia medicina; sed tamen ira procul absit,cum qua nihil recte fieri, nihil considerate potest.
For the most part a mild rebuke is permitted, accompanied by gravity, so that severity is brought to bear while insult is repelled; and even that bitterness which a reproach carries should be made clear to be undertaken for the sake of the very person being reproached. In disputes too with the bitterest of enemies — even when we hear things unworthy of us — it is right to maintain composure and drive out anger. For what is done in a state of agitation cannot be done steadily, and will not win approval from those present. It is also unbecoming to boast about oneself — especially to assert things that are false — and to play the braggart soldier to the laughter of one’s audience.
Magnam autem partem clementi castigatione licet uti, gravitate tamen adiuncta, ut severitas adhibeaturetcontumelia repellatur, atque etiam illud ipsum, quod acerbitatis habet obiurgatio, significandum est, ipsius id causa, qui obiurgetur, esse susceptum. Rectum est autem etiam in illis contentionibus, quae cum inimicissimis fiunt, etiamsi nobis indigna audiamus, tamen gravitatem retinere, iracundiam pellere. Quae enim cum aliqua perturbatione fiunt, ea nec constanter fieri possunt neque iis, qui adsunt, probari. Deforme etiam est de se ipsum praedicare falsa praesertim et cum irrisione audientium imitari militem gloriosum.
And since we intend to go through everything — or certainly wish to — something must be said about the kind of house that suits a man of honor and standing. Its purpose is use, and to use the design of building must be adapted; yet a care for comfort and dignity must also be brought to bear. Gnaeus Octavius, who was the first of his family to become consul, is said to have owed his distinction to having built on the Palatine a splendid house, full of dignity: when crowds came to see it, it was thought to have won votes for its owner, a new man, in his campaign for the consulship. It was this house that Scaurus later demolished and added as an extension to his own. So Octavius first brought the consulship into his house; Scaurus, son of a great and celebrated man, brought into his enlarged house not merely defeat but disgrace and ruin as well.
Et quoniam omnia persequimur, volumus quidem certe, dicendum est etiam, qualem hominis honorati et principis domum placeat esse, cuius finis est usus, ad quem accommodanda est aedificandi descriptio et tamen adhibenda commoditatis dignitatisque diligentia. Cn. Octavio, qui primus ex illa familia consul factus est, honori fuisse accepimus, quod praeclaram aedificasset in Palatio et plenam dignitatis domum; quae cum vulgo viseretur, suffragata domino, novo homini, ad consulatum putabatur; hanc Scaurus demolitus accessionem adiunxit aedibus. Itaque ille in suam domum consulatum primus attulit, hic, summi et clarissimi viri filius, in domum multiplicatam non repulsam solum rettulit, sed ignominiam etiam et calamitatem.
For dignity is to be adorned by a house, not wholly derived from one; nor should the master be glorified by the house, but the house by the master. And just as in everything else a man must have regard not only for himself but for others, so in the house of a man of note — a house into which many guests must be received and crowds of every kind admitted — care for space is required. Otherwise a large house often brings dishonor on its owner if it stands empty, and especially if it was once accustomed under a different owner to be full. It is unpleasant to hear passersby say: O ancient house, alas, how unlike a master now controls you — a line one may apply to many houses in these times.
Ornanda enim est dignitas domo, non ex domo tota quaerenda, nec domo dominus, sed domino domus honestanda est, et, ut in ceteris habenda ratio non sua solum, sed etiam aliorum, sic in domo clari hominis, in quam et hospites multi recipiendi et admittenda hominum cuiusque modi multitudo, adhibenda cura est laxitatis; aliter ampla domus dedecori saepe domino fit, si est in ea solitudo, et maxime, si aliquando alio domino solita est frequentari. Odiosum est enim, cum a praetereuntibus dicitur: O domus ántiqua, heu quam dispari domináre domino! quod quidem his temporibus in multis licet dicere.
Great care must be taken, especially if you are building yourself, not to go beyond measure in expenditure and splendor — and in this there is also much harm in the example set. Most people eagerly imitate the great in this particular direction: who imitates the virtue of Lucius Lucullus, a man of the highest distinction? Yet how many have copied the magnificence of his villas? To those villas a limit must certainly be set and they must be brought back to a mean. And that same principle of moderation must be carried over into every part of the use and furnishing of life. But enough of this.
Cavendum autem est, praesertim si ipse aedifices, ne extra modum sumptu et magnificentia prodeas; quo in genere multum mali etiam in exemplo est. Studiose enim plerique praesertim in hanc partem facta principum imitantur, ut L. Luculli, summi viri, virtutem quis? at quam multi villarum magnificentiam imitati! quarum quidem certe est adhibendus modus ad mediocritatemque revocandus. Eademque mediocritas ad omnem usum cultumque vitae transferenda est. Sed haec hactenus.
In every undertaking three things must be kept in mind: first, that desire obey reason — nothing is better fitted to the preservation of duty; second, that we consider how great is the thing we wish to accomplish, so that neither more nor less care and effort is given to it than the matter demands; third, that we take care to keep whatever pertains to honorable appearance and dignity within due measure. The best measure is to hold to that very fitness of which we spoke earlier, and not to go beyond it. Of these three, however, the most excellent is that desire answer to reason.
In omni autem actione suscipienda tria sunt tenenda, primum ut appetitus rationi pareat, quo nihil est ad officia conservanda accommodatius, deinde ut animadvertatur, quanta illa res sit, quam efficere velimus, ut neve maior neve minor cura et opera suscipiatur, quam causa postulet. Tertium est, ut caveamus, ut ea, quae pertinent ad liberalem speciem et dignitatem, moderata sint. Modus autem est optimus decus ipsum tenere, de quo ante diximus, nec progredi longius. Horum tamen trium praestantissimum est appetitum optemperare rationi.
Next, we must speak of the ordering of actions and the opportune moment for each. This is the knowledge contained in what the Greeks call eutaxia — not the thing we translate as modestia, though the word modus is in it, but rather that eutaxia in which the preservation of order is understood. Thus, that we may call it modestia as well, the Stoics define it as the knowledge of arranging in its proper place each thing that is to be done or said. Order is defined in the same way: the arrangement of things in apt and fitting positions; and the fitting position of an action they say is the opportune moment in time — the opportune moment for action being called in Greek eukairia, and in Latin occasio. So it comes about that this modestia, as we interpret it in the way I have described, is the knowledge of the opportune moments suited to action.
Deinceps de ordine rerum et de opportunitate temporum dicendum est. Haec autem scientia continentur ea, quam Graeci eu)taci/an nominant, non hanc, quam interpretamur modestiam, quo in verbo modus inest, sed illa est eu)taci/a, in qua intellegitur ordinis conservatio. Itaque, ut eandem nos modestiam appellemus, sic definitur a Stoicis, ut modestia sit scientia rerum earum, quae agentur aut dicentur, loco suo collocandarum. Ita videtur eadem vis ordinis et collocationis fore; nam et ordinem sic definiunt: compositionem rerum aptis et accommodatis locis; locum autem actionis opportunitatem temporis esse dicunt; tempus autem actionis opportunum Graece eu)kairi/a Latine appellatur occasio. Sic fit, ut modestia haec, quam ita interpretamur, ut dixi, scientia sit opportunitatis idoneorum ad agendum temporum.
But the same definition may belong to prudence, of which I spoke at the outset; here, however, we are inquiring into moderation, self-control, and the virtues akin to these. What was proper to prudence has already been said in its place; what belongs to these virtues of which we have long been speaking — the virtues that pertain to modesty and to winning the approval of those with whom we live — must now be set out.
Sed potest eadem esse prudentiae definitio, de qua principio diximus; hoc autem loco de moderatione et temperantia et harum similibus virtutibus quaerimus. Itaque, quae erant prudentiae propria, suo loco dicta sunt; quae autem harum virtutum, de quibus iam diu loquimur, quae pertinent ad verecundiam et ad eorum approbationem, quibuscum vivimus, nunc dicenda sunt.
Such, then, is the order that must be observed in actions: that, just as in a well-knit speech, so in life everything be coherent and consistent with everything else. It is ugly and gravely wrong to introduce into a serious matter any remark fit for the dinner-table, or something self-indulgent. Pericles gave a fine example: when the poet Sophocles was his colleague in the command and they had met on a matter of joint duty, a handsome boy chanced to pass by, and Sophocles said, "What a beautiful boy, Pericles!" — to which Pericles replied: "A general, Sophocles, ought to keep not only his hands but his eyes under control." And yet if Sophocles had said the same thing at a review of athletes, there would have been no just ground for reproach. Such is the force of place and occasion. As when a man who is about to plead a case meditates silently to himself while walking along the road, or thinks carefully about something else, he is not to be blamed; but if he does the same at a dinner party he will seem boorish — ignorant of the demands of the moment.
Talis est igitur ordo actionum adhibendus, ut, quem ad modum in oratione constanti, sic in vita omnia sint apta inter se et convenientia; turpe enimn valdeque vitiosum in re severa convivio digna aut delicatum aliquem inferre sermonem. Bene Pericles, cum haberet collegam in praetura Sophoclem poëtam iique de communi officio convenissent et casu formosus puer praeteriret dixissetque Sophocles: O puerum pulchrum, Pericle! At enim praetorem, Sophocle, decet non solum manus, sed etiam oculos abstinentes habere. Atqui hoc idem Sophocles si in athletarum probatione dixisset, iusta reprehensione caruisset. Tanta vis est et loci et temporis. Ut, si qui, cum causam sit acturus, in itinere aut in ambulatione secum ipse meditetur, aut si quid aliud attentius cogitet, non reprehendatur, at hoc idem si in convivio faciat, inhumanus videatur inscitia temporis.
Those departures from humanity that are glaring — singing in the Forum, say, or any other gross absurdity — are plain to see and need little by way of counsel or instruction. But the smaller lapses, the ones most people cannot even detect, demand more careful avoidance. Just as with strings or pipes, even a slight dissonance is something a practiced ear catches at once, so we must watch that nothing in our lives slips out of tune — and with all the more vigilance, since the harmony of deeds is greater and better than any harmony of sound.
Sed ea, quae multum ab humanitate discrepant, ut si qui in foro cantet, aut si qua est alia magna perversitas, facile apparet nec magnopere admonitionem et praecepta desiderat; quae autem parva videntur esse delicta neque a multis intellegi possunt, ab iis est diligentius declinandum. Ut in fidibus aut tibiis, quamvis paulum discrepent, tamen id a sciente animadverti solet, sic videndum est in vita ne forte quid diserepet, vel multo etiam magis, quo maior et melior actionum quam sonorum concentus est.
Just as the ears of trained musicians catch even the smallest false note, so we, if we wish to be sharp and diligent observers of faults, will often read great things from small signs. From a glance of the eyes, from the ease or tightening of the brow, from sadness, from cheerfulness, from laughter, from speech, from silence, from the raising or lowering of the voice, from all such things, we shall easily judge what in each case is fitting and what falls away from duty and from nature. In this it is no bad thing to judge each quality by what we see in others, so that, if anything unbecoming appears in them, we may avoid it in ourselves. For it happens, I know not how, that we see the faults of others more clearly than our own. And so those pupils whose faults their masters deliberately imitate by way of correction find them easiest to put right.
Itaque, ut in fidibus musicorum aures vel minima sentiunt, sic nos, si acres ac diligentes esse volumus animadversores que vitiorum, magna saepe intellegemus ex parvis. Ex oculorum optutu, superciliorum aut remissione aut contractione, ex maestitia, ex hilaritate, ex risu, ex locutione, ex reticentia, ex contentione vocis, ex summissione, ex ceteris similibus facile iudicabimus, quid eorum apte fiat, quid ab officio naturaque discrepet. Quo in genere non est incommodum, quale quidque eorum sit, ex aliis iudicare, ut, si quid dedeceat in illis, vitemus ipsi; fit enim nescio quo modo, ut magis in aliis cernamus quam in nobismet ipsis, si quid delinquitur. Itaque facillime corriguntur in discendo, quorum vitia imitantur emendandi causa magistri.
Nor is it out of place, when choosing between actions that raise difficulty, to consult men of learning or those experienced by practice, and to enquire what each considers right in every kind of duty. For the larger part of people generally follow wherever nature herself leads. In such consultations we must consider not only what each person says but also what each person thinks, and why he thinks it. Just as painters, sculptors, and poets alike want their own work judged by the public — so that whatever many find fault with may be corrected — and seek out from themselves and from others what is wrong in it, so there are many things that, by the judgment of others, we must do and leave undone, change and correct.
Nec vero alienum est ad ea eligenda, quae dubitationem afferunt, adhibere doctos homines vel etiam usu peritos et, quid iis de quoque officii genere placeat, exquirere. Maior enim pars eo fere deferri solet, quo a natura ipsa deducitur. In quibus videndum est, non modo quid quisque loquatur, sed etiam quid quisque sentiat atque etiam de qua causa quisque sentiat. Ut enim pictores et ii, qui signa fabricantur, et vero etiam poeitae suum quisque opus a vulgo considerari vult, ut, si quid reprehensum sit a pluribus, id corrigatur, iique et secum et ab aliis, quid in eo peccatum sit, exquirunt, sic aliorum iudicio permulta nobis et facienda et non facienda et mutanda et corrigenda sunt.
As for what is to be done according to established custom and civic institutions, no instruction is needed; those customs are themselves the instruction. And no one should be led into this error: that because Socrates or Aristippus did or said something contrary to civic custom and convention, he therefore supposes the same license is open to him. Those men earned that license by great and extraordinary gifts. The Cynic system is to be rejected entirely: it is hostile to that sense of shame without which nothing can be right or honorable.
Quae vero more agentur institutisque civilibus, de iis nihil est praecipiendum; illa enim ipsa praecepta sunt, nec quemquam hoc errore duci oportet, ut, si quid Socrates aut Aristippus contra rnorem consuetudinemque civilem fecerint locutive sint, idem sibi arbitretur licere; magnis illi et divinis bonis hanc licentiam assequebantur. Cynicorum vero ratio tota est eicienda; est enim inimica verecundiae, sine qua nihil rectum esse potest, nihil honestum.
Those whose whole lives have been proved in honorable and great pursuits — men who have thought well of the commonwealth and served it well or are serving it still — men invested with some office or command — these we must respect and honor. We must also give much to age, yield to those who hold magistracies, distinguish between citizen and foreigner, and, in the foreigner himself, between one who has come on private and one who has come on public business. To put it briefly, without going through every case: we must cherish, maintain, and preserve the fellowship and community of the whole human race.
Eos autem, quorum vita perspecta in rebus honestis atque magnis est, bene de re publica sentientes ac bene meritos aut merentes sic ut aliquo honore aut imperio affectos observare et colere debemus, tribuere etiam multum senectuti, cedere iis, qui magistratum habebunt, habere dilectum civis et peregrini in ipsoque peregrino, privatimne an publice venerit. Ad summam, ne agam de singulis, communem totius generis hominum conciliationem et consociationem colere, tueri, servare debemus.
Now, as to trades and livelihoods — which are to be counted respectable, which sordid — this is roughly what we have received by tradition. First, those livelihoods are condemned that earn men’s hatred: tax-collecting, for instance, and money-lending. Illiberal and sordid are the occupations of all hired laborers whose work, not whose skill, is purchased — for in their case the wage itself is the contract of servitude. Sordid too must be reckoned those who buy from merchants in order to sell again at once; for they can profit only by lying outright, and there is nothing more base than dishonesty. All craftsmen, moreover, are engaged in a sordid trade, for no workshop can have anything gentlemanly about it. Least of all to be commended are the trades that serve pleasure: fishmongers, butchers, cooks, sausage-makers, fishermen — as Terence says. To these add, if you like, perfumers, dancers, and the whole gaming-table crowd.
Iam de artificiis et quaestibus, qui liberales habendi, qui sordidi sint, haec fere accepimus. Primum improbantur ii quaestus, qui in odia hominum incurrunt, ut portitorum, ut faeneratorum. Illiberales autem et sordidi quaestus mercennariorum omnium, quorum operae, non quorum artes emuntur; est enim in illis ipsa merces auctoramentum servitutis. Sordidi etiam putandi, qui mercantur a mercatoribus, quod statim vendant; nihil enim proficiant, nisi admodum mentiantur; nec vero est quicquam turpius vanitate. Opificesque omnes in sordida arte versantur; nec enim quicquam ingenuum habere potest officina. Minimeque artes eae probandae, quae ministrae sunt voluptatum: Cetárii, lanií, coqui, fartóres, piscatóres, ut ait Terentius; adde hue, si placet, unguentarios, saltatores totumque ludum talarium.
But those pursuits in which either greater wisdom is at work or from which a not inconsiderable benefit is sought — medicine, architecture, the teaching of honorable subjects — these are respectable for those whose station fits them. Commerce, if it is conducted on a small scale, is to be counted sordid; but if it is large and well-stocked, bringing goods in from everywhere and distributing them to many without misrepresentation, it is not altogether to be condemned; and if the merchant, satisfied with — or rather, content with — his profit, sails, so to speak, from open sea into harbor, and then from the harbor into his lands and estates, he seems deserving of the highest praise. Of all the pursuits by which something is gained, however, none is better than farming, none more fruitful, none more pleasant, none more worthy of a free man. Since I have said enough about this in the Cato Maior, you will draw from that book what applies here.
Quibus autem artibus aut prudentia maior inest aut non mediocris utilitas quaeritur, ut medicina, ut architectura, ut doctrina rerum honestarum, eae sunt iis, quorum ordini conveniunt, honestae. Mercatura autem, si tenuis est. sordida putanda est; sin magna et copiosa, multa undique apportans multisque sine vanitate impertiens, non est admodum vituperanda, atque etiam, si satiata quaestu vel contenta potius, ut saepe ex alto in portum, ex ipso portu se in agros possessionesque contulit, videtur iure optimo posse laudari. Omnium autem rerum, ex quibus aliquid acquiritur, nihil est agri cultura melius, nihil uberius, nihil dulcius, nihil homine libero dignius; de qua quoniam in Catone Maiore satis multa diximus, illim assumes, quae ad hunc locum pertinebunt.
It seems that enough has now been said about how duties are derived from the parts of what is honorable. Among honorable things themselves, however, there often arises a conflict and a question of comparison: when two honorable courses present themselves, which is the more honorable? This is a topic that Panaetius passed over. For since all honor flows from four sources — one being knowledge, another fellowship, a third greatness of spirit, the fourth self-control — it is inevitable that in choosing a duty these will often have to be weighed against one another.
Sed ab iis partibus, quae sunt honestatis, quem ad modum officia ducerentur, satis expositum videtur. Eorum autem ipsorum, quae honesta sunt, potest incidere saepe contentio et comparatio, de duobus honestis utrum honestius, qui locus a Panaetio est praetermissus. Nam cum omnis honestas manet a partibus quattuor, quarum una sit cognitionis, altera communitatis, tertia magnanimitatis, quarta moderationis, haec in deligendo officio saepe inter se comparentur necesse est.
It is held, then, that duties derived from fellowship are better suited to nature than those derived from knowledge, and this can be confirmed by the following argument: if a wise man’s life were arranged so that, with all things flowing to him in abundance, he might at perfect leisure contemplate and investigate by himself everything worth knowing — yet if his solitude were so complete that he could see no other human being, he would quit life entirely. The foremost of all virtues is that wisdom which the Greeks call sophia σοφία — for what we call prudentia, which the Greeks name phronesis φρόνησις, we understand as something else: the knowledge of things to be sought and avoided. But that wisdom I called foremost is the knowledge of things divine and human, and it contains within itself the fellowship of gods and men and the community of men with one another. If this is the greatest virtue — as it surely is — it follows necessarily that the duty derived from fellowship is the greatest duty. And indeed, the study and contemplation of nature would be in some way incomplete and unfinished if no action followed upon it. That action shows itself most fully in safeguarding the interests of men; it therefore pertains to the fellowship of the human race. The study of nature must accordingly yield to it.
Placet igitur aptiora esse naturae ea officia, quae ex communitate, quam ea, quae ex cognitione ducantur, idque hoc argumento confirmari potest, quod, si contigerit ea vita sapienti, ut omnium rerum affluentibus copiis quamvis omnia, quae cognitione digna sint, summo otio secum ipse consideret et contempletur, tamen, si solitudo tanta sit, ut hominem videre non possit, excedat e vita. Princepsque omnium virtutum illa sapientia, quam sofi/an Graeci vocant—prudentiam enim, quam Graeci fro/nhsin dicunt, aliam quandam intellegimus, quae est rerum expetendarum fugiendarumque scientia; illa autem sapientia, quam principem dixi, rerum est divinarum et humanarum scientia, in qua continetur deorum et hominum communitas et societas inter ipsos; ea si maxima est, ut est certe, necesse est, quod a communitate ducatur officium, id esse maximum. Etenim cognitio contemplatioque naturae manca quodam modo atque inchoata sit, si nulla actio rerum consequatur. Ea autem actio in hominum commodis tuendis maxime cernitur; pertinet igitur ad societatem generis humani; ergo haec cognition anteponenda est.
This is shown and confirmed by the best of men in their own conduct. What man is so intent on observing and understanding the nature of things that, if while he is examining and contemplating matters supremely worth knowing some sudden danger and crisis faces his country — one he can address and relieve — he will not abandon and cast aside all those studies, even though he supposes himself capable of counting the stars or measuring the magnitude of the universe? And he would do the same for a parent’s emergency, or a friend’s.
Atque id optimus quisque re ipsa ostencit et iudicat. Quis enim est tam cupidus in perspicienda cognoscendaque rerum natura, ut, si ei tractanti contemplantique res cognitione dignissimas subito sit allatum periculum discrimenque patriae, cui subvenire opitularique possit, non illa omnia relinquat atque abiciat, etiamsi dinumerare se stellas aut metiri mundi magnitudinem posse arbitretur? atque hoc idem in parentis, in amici re aut periculo fecerit.
These considerations make clear that the duties of justice, which bear on men’s welfare, must take precedence over the pursuits and duties of knowledge — and that nothing ought to be more prized by a man than that welfare. Even those whose whole study and life has been taken up with the pursuit of knowledge have not withdrawn from adding to men’s advantage and benefit; for they educated many, making them better citizens and more useful to their communities — as the Pythagorean Lysis educated Epaminondas of Thebes, as Plato educated Dion of Syracuse, and as many educated many others. And I myself, whatever I contributed to public life — if indeed I contributed anything — came prepared and equipped with the education and teaching I had received from my teachers.
Quibus rebus intellegitur studiis officiisque scientiae praeponenda esse officia iustitiae, quae pertinent ad hominum utilitatem,qua nihil homini esse debet antiquius. Atque illi, quorum studia vitaque omnis in rerum cognitione versata est, tamen ab augendis hominum utilitatibus et commodis non recesserunt; nam et erudiverunt multos, quo meliores cives utilioresque rebus suis publicis essent, ut Thebanum Epaminondam Lysis Pythagoreus, Syracosium Dionem Plato multique multos, nosque ipsi, quicquid ad rem publicam attulimus, si modo aliquid attulimus, a doctoribus atque doctrina instructi ad eam et ornati accessimus.
Nor do learned men instruct and educate their students only while alive and present; they accomplish the very same thing after death through the monuments of their writings. No topic that touches on law, on custom, or on the ordering of the commonwealth has been left untreated by them, so that they seem to have devoted their leisure to our practical concerns. Even those dedicated to the pursuits of learning and wisdom bring their wisdom and intelligence to bear above all for the benefit of men; and for this very reason, to speak with abundance and yet with judgment is better than to think with the greatest acuity but without eloquence — for thought turns in upon itself, while eloquence embraces those with whom we are joined in fellowship.
Neque solum vivi atque praesentes studiosos discendi erudiunt atque docent, sed hoc idem etiam post mortem monumentis litterarum assequuntur. Nec enim locus ullus est praetermissus ab iis, qui ad leges, qui ad mores, qui ad disciplinam rei publicae pertineret, ut otium suum ad nostrum negotium contulisse videantur. Ita illi ipsi doctrinae studiis et sapientiae dediti ad hominum utilitatem suam prudentiam intellegentiamque potissimum conferunt; ob eamque etiam causam eloqui copiose, modo prudenter, melius est quam vel acutissime sine eloquentia cogitare, quod cogitatio in se ipsa vertitur, eloquentia complectitur eos, quibuscum communitate iuncti sumus.
And just as swarms of bees do not gather in order to make honeycomb but, being by nature creatures of assembly, make honeycomb as a result, so human beings — and far more so — have by nature gathered together and bring to bear their ingenuity in action and in thought. Thus, if that virtue which consists in protecting men — that is, in the fellowship of the human race — does not touch the study of nature, that study becomes an isolated and barren thing; and in the same way, greatness of spirit, cut off from human community and connection, would be a kind of savagery and brutishness. It follows that the fellowship and community of men overcomes the love of knowledge.
Atque ut apium examina non fingendorum favorum causa congregantur, sed, cum congregabilia natura sint, fingunt favos, sic homines, ac multo etiam magis, natura congregati adhibent agendi cogitandique sollertiam. Itaque, nisi ea virtus, quae constat ex hominibus tuendis, id est ex societate generis humani, attingat cognitionem rerum, solivaga cognitio et ieiuna videatur, itemque magnitudo animi remota communitate coniunctioneque humana feritas sit quaedam et immanitas. Ita fit, ut vincat cognitionis studium consociatio hominum atque communitas.
Nor is it true, as some claim, that community and fellowship with other men were entered into because without others we could not obtain and secure what nature requires for our life. If all that bears on sustenance and comfort were supplied to us by some magic wand, as they say, then every man of fine spirit would lay aside all business and devote himself wholly to knowledge and learning. Not so; for he would flee solitude and seek a partner in study, he would want to teach and to learn, to listen and to speak. Every duty, therefore, that serves the joining of men and the preservation of their community must take precedence over the duty that lies in knowledge and learning.
Nec verum est, quod dicitur a quibusdam, propter necessitatem vitae, quod ea, quae natura desideraret, consequi sine aliis atque efficere non possemus, idcirco initam esse cum hominibus communitatem et societatem; quodsi omnia nobis, quae ad victum cultumque pertinent, quasi virgula divina, ut aiunt, suppeditarentur, tum optimo quisque ingenio negotiis omnibus omissis totum se in cognitione et scientia collocaret. Non est ita; nam et solitudinem fugeret et socium studii quaereret, tum docere tum discere vellet, tum audire tum dicere. Ergo omne officium, quod ad coniunctionem hominum et ad societatem tuendam valet, anteponendum est illi officio, quod cognitione et scientia continetur.
It may perhaps be asked whether this fellowship, which is most in accord with nature, must always take precedence even over self-control and modesty. I think not; for there are certain things so foul in part, and in part so flagitious, that a wise man would not do them even for the sake of preserving his country. Posidonius has assembled a great many such things, but some are so repulsive, so obscene, that they seem shameful even to name. These, then, a man will not undertake for his country’s sake, nor will his country wish them undertaken on its behalf. But the matter resolves itself more conveniently than one might fear, since there can never arise a time when it is in the interest of the commonwealth for a wise man to do any of those things.
Illud forsitan quaerendum sit, num haec communitas, quae maxime est apta naturae, sit etiam moderationi modestiaeque semper anteponenda. Non placet; sunt enim quaedam partim ita foeda, partim ita flagitiosa, ut ea ne conservandae quidem patriae causa sapiens facturus sit. Ea Posidonius collegit permulta, sed ita taetra quaedam, ita obscena, ut dictu quoque videantur turpia. Haec igitur non suscipiet rei publicae causa, ne res publica quidem pro se suscipi volet. Sed hoc commodius se res habet, quod non potest accidere tempus, ut intersit rei publicae quicquam illorum facere sapientem.
Let this therefore be settled: in choosing among duties, that class of duty which rests on human fellowship is supreme. And indeed, considered action will follow knowledge and wisdom; so that to act with deliberation is worth more than to think with merely speculative wisdom. So much for that. For the territory has now been opened up enough that it is not difficult to see, in the search for duty, what must take precedence over what. Within the fellowship itself, moreover, there are gradations of duty, from which we can understand what is owed to each: first to the immortal gods, second to one’s country, third to one’s parents, and then in descending order to the rest.
Quare hoc quidem effectum sit, in officiis deligendis id genus officiorum excellere, quod teneatur hominum societate. Etenim cognitionem prudentiamque sequetur considerata actio; ita fit, ut agere considerate pluris sit quam cogitare prudenter. Atque haec quidem hactenus. Patefactus enim locus est ipse, ut non difficile sit in exquirendo officio, quid cuique sit praeponendum, videre. In ipsa autem communitate sunt gradus officiorum, ex quibus, quid cuique praestet, intellegi possit, ut prima dis immortalibus, secunda patriae, tertia parentibus, deinceps gradatim reliquis debeantur.
From this brief discussion it becomes clear that what men customarily find perplexing is not only whether a thing is honorable or base, but also — when two honorable courses are before them — which of the two is the more honorable. This topic, as I said above, was passed over by Panaetius. But let us now proceed to what remains.
Quibus ex rebus breviter disputatis intellegi potest non solum id homines solere dubitare, honestumne an turpe sit, sed etiam duobus propositis honestis utrum honestius sit. Hie locus a Panaetio est, ut supra dixi, praetermissus. Sed iam ad reliqua pergamus.
Cato — who was roughly Scipio’s contemporary — wrote that Publius Scipio, my son, the man who was first called Africanus, used to say that he was never less idle than when at leisure, never less alone than when alone. A magnificent saying, and worthy of a great and wise man; for it tells us that he was accustomed, even in leisure, to think on affairs of state, and even in solitude to converse with himself — so that he was never truly idle, and at times had no need of another’s company. The very two things that bring languor to other men sharpened him: leisure and solitude. I wish I could truly say the same of myself; but if I cannot reach so great an eminence of talent by imitation, I am at least near it in intention — for I too pursue leisure, shut out by armed impiety and force from public life and the business of the courts, and for that reason, having left the city to wander through the countryside, I am often alone.
Quem ad modum officia ducerentur ab honestate, Marce fili, atque ab omni genere virtutis, satis explicatum arbitror libro superiore. Sequitur, ut haec officiorum genera persequar, quae pertinent ad vitae cultum et ad earum rerum, quibus utuntur homines, facultatem, ad opes, ad copias; in quo tur quaeri dixi, quid utile, quid inutile, tur ex utilibus quid utilius aut quid maxime utile. De quibus dicere aggrediar, si pauca prius de instituto ac de iudicio meo dixero.
Yet this leisure cannot be compared with Africanus’s leisure, nor this solitude with his. For he would take leisure occasionally as a rest from the most splendid duties of public life, and would withdraw from the crowds and company of men into solitude as into a harbor; whereas my leisure has been imposed by the want of anything to do, not chosen out of desire for rest. When the Senate is extinguished and the courts destroyed, what is there that I, as I should be, can worthily do in the curia or in the Forum?
Quamquam enim libri nostri complures non modo ad legendi, sed etiam ad scribendi studium excitaverunt, tamen interdum vereor, ne quibusdam bonis viris philosophiae nomen sit invisum mirenturque in ea tantum me operae et temporis ponere. Ego autem, quam diu res publica per eos gerebatur, quibus se ipsa commiserat, omnis meas curas cogitationesque in eam conferebam; cum autem dominatu unius omnia tenerentur neque esset usquam consilio aut auctoritati locus, socios denique tuendae rei publicae, summos viros, amisissem, nec me angoribus dedidi, quibus essem confectus, nisi iis restitissem, nec rursum indignis homine docto voluptatibus.
And so, having once lived amid the greatest throng and in the eyes of my fellow citizens, I now flee the sight of the criminals who overflow everything, withdraw as much as I may, and am often alone. But since we have learned from men of learning that one ought not merely to choose the least among evils but also to draw out of those evils themselves whatever good may be lodged in them, I therefore make use of my leisure — not, to be sure, the leisure that ought to have been enjoyed by one who had once won leisure for his country — and I do not allow the solitude, which necessity and not choice imposes on me, to sink into languor.
Atque utinam res publica stetisset, quo coeperat, statu nec in homines non tam commutandarum quam evertendarum rerum cupidos incidisset! Primum enim, ut stante re publica facere solebamus, in agendo plus quam in scribendo operae poneremus, deinde ipsis scriptis non ea, quae nunc, sed actiones nostras mandaremus, ut saepe fecimus. Cum autem res publica, in qua omnis mea cura, cogitatio, opera poni solebat, nulla esset omnino, illae scilicet litterae conticuerunt forenses et senatoriae.
Though Africanus, in my judgment, achieves the greater glory. For there survive no written records of his genius, no work of his leisure, no gift of his solitude; from which we must understand that he was never truly idle or alone, thanks to the activity of his mind and the investigation of those matters he reached by thought. We, who have not strength enough to be drawn out of solitude by silent reflection, have turned all our zeal and care to this work of writing. And so in a short time of public collapse we have written more than we wrote in many years when the republic stood.
Nihil agere autem cum animus non posset, in his studiis ab initio versatus aetatis existimavi honestissime molestias posse deponi, si me ad philosophiam rettulissem. Cui cum multum adulescens discendi causa temporis tribuissem, posteaquam honoribus inservire coepi meque totum rei publicae tradidi, tantum erat philosophiae loci, quantum superfuerat amicorum et rei publicae temporibus; id autem omne consumebatur in legendo, scribendi otium non erat.
But though all philosophy, my dear Cicero, is fertile and fruitful and no part of it lies untilled and waste, still no region within it is more productive or more rich than that on duty, from which the precepts for a life of honor and consistency are drawn. Therefore, although I am confident that you hear and receive these things constantly from our friend Cratippus — the foremost philosopher of this age — yet I think it will be advantageous to have your ears resounding with such words on every side, and, if possible, to have them hear nothing else.
Maximis igitur in malis hoc tamen boni assecuti videmur, ut ea litteris mandaremus, quae nec erant satis nota nostris et erant cognitione dignissima. Quid enim est, per deos, optabilius sapientia, quid praestantius, quid homini melius, quid homine dignius? Hanc igitur qui expetunt, philosophi nominantur, nec quicquam aliud est philosophia, si interpretari velis, praeter studium sapientiae. Sapientia autem est, ut a veteribus philosophis definitum est, rerum divinarum et humanarum causarumque, quibus eae res continentur, scientia; cuius studium qui vituperat, haud sane intellego, quidnam sit, quod laudandum putet.
This must be done by all who are minded to enter upon an honorable life, but I am not sure it must be done by anyone more than by you. You bear no small expectation of following in my own industry, a great one of equalling my honors, and some, perhaps, of my name. You have taken on besides the considerable burden of Athens and of Cratippus; since you went out to them as to a mart of the finest accomplishments, it would be most shameful to return empty, bringing discredit on the authority both of the city and of your teacher. Therefore, strain your mind as hard as you can, press as hard in your labor — if studying is a labor and not a pleasure — and see to it that you succeed, and do not allow it to appear that, when everything has been supplied by me, you have been wanting to yourself. But enough of this; I have written to you often by way of encouragement. Let me now return to the remaining part of the division I laid out.
Nam sive oblectatio quaeritur animi requiesque curarum, quae conferri cum eorum studiis potest, qui semper aliquid anquirunt, quod spectet et valeat ad bene beateque vivendum? sive ratio constantiae virtutisque ducitur, aut haec ars est aut nulla omnino, per quam eas assequamur. Nullam dicere maximarum rerum artem esse, cum minimarum sine arte nulla sit, hominum est parum considerate loquentium atque in maximis rebus errantium. Si autem est aliqua disciplina virtutis, ubi ea quaeretur, cum ab hoc discendi genere discesseris? Sed haec, cum ad philosophiam cohortamur, accuratius disputari solent, quod alio quodam libro fecimus; hoc autem tempore tantum nobis declarandum fuit, cur orbati rei publicae muneribus ad hoc nos studium potissimum contulissemus.
Panaetius, then — who beyond all question discussed duty with the greatest exactness, and whom I have followed above all others, with some correction — set out three categories in which men ordinarily deliberate and take counsel about duty: first, when they are in doubt whether what they are considering is honorable or base; second, whether it is expedient or inexpedient; and third, when something that bears the appearance of the honorable conflicts with what seems expedient, how those two are to be distinguished. He worked through the first two categories in three books; but of the third he wrote that he would treat it next, and he did not fulfill what he had promised.
Occurritur autem nobis, et quidem a doctis et eruditis quaerentibus, satisne constanter facere videamur, qui, cum percipi nihil posse dicamus, tamen et aliis de rebus disserere soleamus et hoc ipso tempore praecepta officii persequamur. Quibus vellem satis cognita esset nostra sententia. Non enim sumus ii, quorum vagetur animus errore nec habeat umquam, quid sequatur. Quae enim esset ista mens vel quae vita potius non modo disputandi, sed etiam vivendi ratione sublata? Nos autem, ut ceteri alia certa, alia incerta esse dicunt, sic ab his dissentientes alia probabilia, contra alia dicimus.
This surprises me the more, because a disciple of his, Posidonius, records that Panaetius lived thirty years after those books were published. I find it remarkable that Posidonius touched on that topic only briefly in certain notes — especially since he writes that there is no topic in all of philosophy so necessary.
Quid est igitur, quod me impediat ea, quae probabilia mihi videantur, sequi, quae contra, improbare atque affirmandi arrogantiam vitantem fugere temeritatem, quae a sapientia dissidet plurimum? Contra autem omnia disputatur a nostris, quod hoc ipsum probabile elucere non posset, nisi ex utraque parte causarum esset facta contentio. Sed haec explanata sunt in Academicis nostris satis, ut arbitror, diligenter. Tibi autem, mi Cicero, quamquam in antiquissima nobilissimaque philosophia Cratippo auctore versaris iis simillimo, qui ista praeclara pepererunt, tamen haec nostra finitima vestris ignota esse nolui. Sed iam ad instituta pergamus.
I am by no means persuaded by those who claim that this topic was not passed over by Panaetius but deliberately left aside, and that it should not have been written on at all, because expediency can never conflict with the honorable. Whether it was proper to include this third category, as Panaetius did, or to omit it entirely is a question that admits of debate; but there can be no doubt that Panaetius undertook it and left it unfinished. For a man who has completed two parts of a three-part division must necessarily have a third remaining; and furthermore, at the end of the third book he promises to treat this part next.
Quinque igitur rationibus propositis officii persequendi, quarum duae ad decus honestatemque pertinerent, duae ad commoda vitae, copias, opes, facultates, quinta ad eligendi iudicium, si quando ea, quae dixi, pugnare inter se viderentur, honestatis pars confecta est, quam quidem tibi cupio esse notissimam. Hoc autem, de quo nune agimus, id ipsum est, quod utile appellatur. In quo verbo lapsa consuetudo deflexit de via sensimque eo deducta est, ut honestatem ab utilitate secernens constitueret esse honestum aliquid, quod utile non esset, et utile, quod non honestum, qua nulla pernicies maior hominum vitae potuit afferri.
A credible witness is added to this in Posidonius, who also writes in a certain letter that Publius Rutilius Rufus — who had heard Panaetius — used to say that just as no painter had been found to complete that portion of the Coan Venus which Apelles had left unfinished (for the beauty of the face robbed all hope of imitating the rest of the body), so no one had followed up what Panaetius had left aside and unfinished — because of the surpassing excellence of what he had finished.
Summa quidem auctoritate philosophi severe sane atque honeste haec tria genera confusa cogitatione distinguunt. Quicquid enim iustum sit, id etiam utile esse censent, itemque quod honestum, idem iustum; ex quo efficitur, ut, quicquid honestum sit, idem sit utile. Quod qui parum perspiciunt, ii saepe versutos homines et callidos admirantes malitiam sapientiam iudicant. Quorum error eripiendus est opinioque omnis ad eam spem traducenda, ut honestis consiliis iustisque factis, non fraude et malitia se intellegant ea, quae velint, consequi posse.
On Panaetius’s intention, therefore, there can be no doubt. Whether he was right to add this third inquiry into duty, or otherwise, is perhaps open to discussion. For if the honorable alone is good, as the Stoics hold, or if what is honorable is the highest good in such a way — as your Peripatetics think — that everything placed on the other side barely has the weight of the slightest moment, then there can be no doubt that expediency can never contend with the honorable. And so we are told that Socrates used to curse those who first, by mere opinion, had separated things naturally bound together. The Stoics have agreed with him to the extent that they judge whatever is honorable to be expedient, and nothing expedient that is not honorable.
Quae ergo ad vitam hominum tuendam pertinent, partim sunt inanima, ut aurum, argentum, ut ea, quae gignuntur e terra, ut alia generis eiusdem, partim animalia, quae habent suos impetus et rerum appetitus. Eorum autem alia rationis expertia sunt, alia ratione utentia; expertes rationis equi, boves, reliquae pecudes, apes, quarum opere efficitur aliquid ad usum hominum atque vitam; ratione autem utentium duo genera ponunt, deorum unum, alterum hominum. Deos placatos pietas efficiet et sanctitas, proxime autem et secundum deos homines hominibus maxime utiles esse possunt.
Now if Panaetius were the kind of man who said virtue is to be cultivated because it produces expediency — as those do who measure desirable objects by pleasure or freedom from pain — it would be open to him to say that expediency sometimes conflicts with the honorable. But since he is one who judges nothing good except what is honorable, and holds that those things which resist it under some appearance of expediency neither make life better by their addition nor worse by their removal, he does not seem to have been right to introduce deliberation of the kind in which what appears expedient is weighed against what is honorable.
Earumque item rerum, quae noceant et obsint, eadem divisio est. Sed quia deos nocere non putant, iis exceptis homines hominibus obesse plurimum arbitrantur. Ea enim ipsa, quae inanima diximus, pleraque sunt hominum operis effecta; quae nec haberemus, nisi manus et ars accessisset, nec iis sine hominum administratione uteremur. Neque enim valetudinis curatio neque navigatio neque agri cultura neque frugum fructuumque reliquorum perceptio et conservatio sine hominum opera ulla esse potuisset.
Indeed what the Stoics call the highest good — to live in accordance with nature — contains, as I understand it, this meaning: to be always in harmony with virtue, and to choose the remaining things that accord with nature, so long as they do not conflict with virtue. This being so, some think that this comparison was wrongly introduced and that nothing at all should be prescribed in that category. And indeed that honorable thing properly and truly so called exists in the wise alone and can never be severed from virtue; but among those in whom wisdom is not perfect, perfect honor is in no way possible, though likenesses of the honorable can be.
Iam vero et earum rerum, quibus abundaremus, exportatio et earum, quibus egeremus, invectio certe nulla esset, nisi his muneribus homines fungerentur. Eademque ratione nec lapides ex terra exciderentur ad usum nostrum necessarii, nec ferrum, aes, aurum, argentum effoderetur penitus abditum sine hominum labore et manu. Tecta vero, quibus et frigorum vis pelleretur et calorum molestiae sedarentur, unde aut initio generi humano dari potuissent aut postea subveniri, si aut vi tempestatis aut terrae motu aut vetustate cecidissent, nisi communis vita ab hominibus harum rerum auxilia petere didicisset?
For the duties discussed in these books the Stoics call intermediate; they are common and widely shared, and many attain them through natural goodness of character and through progress in learning. But that other duty which they likewise call right is perfect and complete and, as they say, fully rounded, and can fall to none but the wise man.
Adde ductus aquarum, derivationes fluminum, agrorum irrigationes, moles oppositas fluctibus, portus manu factos, quae unde sine hominum opere habere possemus? Ex quibus multisque aliis perspicuum est, qui fructus quaeque utilitates ex rebus iis,quae sint inanimae,percipiantur,eas nosnullo modo sine hominum manu atque opera capere potuisse. Qui denique ex bestiis fructus aut quae commoditas, nisi homines adiuvarent, percipi posset? Nam et qui principes inveniendi fuerunt, quem ex quaque belua usum habere possemus, homines certe fuerunt, nec hoc tempore sine hominum opera aut pascere eas aut domare aut tueri aut tempestivos fructus ex iis capere possemus; ab eisdemque et, quae nocent, interficiuntur et, quae usui possunt esse, capiuntur.
But when something is done in which these intermediate duties appear, it tends to look fully perfect — because the common run of men do not generally grasp what is lacking from the perfect, whereas as far as they do grasp it they think nothing has been left out. The same thing happens with poetry, with painting, and many other things: ordinary folk take delight in them and praise what should not be praised, I suppose for this reason — that there is in those works something sound that catches the untrained, who are unable to judge what flaw each work contains; and so, when the learned have instructed them, they readily abandon their earlier view. These duties, then, of which we treat in these books, they call a kind of secondary honorableness — not the property of the wise man alone, but shared with the whole human race.
Quid enumerem artium multitudinem, sine quibus vita omnino nulla esse potuisset? Qui enim aegris subveniretur, quae esset oblectatio valentium, qui victus aut cultus, nisi tam multae nobis artes ministrarent? quibus rebus exculta hominum vita tantum distat a victu et cultu bestiarum. Urbes vero sine hominum coetu non potuissent nec aedificari nec frequentari; ex quo leges moresque constituti, tum iuris aequa discriptio certaque vivendi disciplina; quas res et mansuetudo animorum consecuta et verecundia est effectumque, ut esset vita munitior, atque ut dando et accipiendo mutuandisque facultatibus et commodandis nulla re egeremus.
And so all in whom there is an aptitude for virtue are moved by them. Yet when the two Decii or the two Scipiones are called brave men, or when Fabricius or Aristides is named as just, it is not from any of these, as from a wise man, that an example of courage or of justice is sought. For none of them is wise in the sense in which we intend the word "wise man," nor were those who were counted and called wise — Marcus Cato and Gaius Laelius — truly wise, nor indeed those seven; but through the constant practice of intermediate duties they carried a certain likeness and appearance of the wise.
Longiores hoc loco sumus, quam necesse est. Quis est enim, cui non perspicua sint illa, quae pluribus verbis a Panaetio commemorantur, neminem neque ducem bello nec principem domi magnas res et salutares sine hominum studiis gerere potuisse? Commemoratur ab eo Themistocles, Pericles, Cyrus, Agesilaus, Alexander, quos negat sine adiumentis hominum tantas res efficere potuisse. Utitur in re non dubia testibus non necessariis. Atque ut magnas utilitates adipiscimur conspiratione hominum atque consensu, sic nulla tam detestabilis pestis est, quae non homini ab homine nascatur. Est Dicaearchi liber de interitu hominum, Peripatetici magni et copiosi, qui collectis ceteris causis eluvionis, pestilentiae, vastitatis, beluarum etiam repentinae multitudinis, quarum impetu docet quaedam hominum genera esse consumpta, deinde comparat, quanto plures deleti sint homines hominum impetu, id est bellis aut seditionibus, quam omni reliqua calamitate.
Therefore it is not permissible to weigh what is truly honorable against any competing claim of expediency; nor is that which we call honorable in the common usage — the quality cultivated by those who wish to be regarded as good men — ever to be set against advantage; and that honorable thing which falls within our ordinary understanding is to be kept and preserved by us just as steadfastly as that which is called honorable in the strict and true sense is to be kept by the wise. For no progress toward virtue can be sustained on any other footing. But this concerns those who are judged good men by their observance of duty.
Cum igitur hie locus nihil habeat dubitationis, quin homines plurimum hominibus et prosint et obsint, proprium hoc statuo esse virtutis, conciliare animos hominum et ad usus suos adiungere. Itaque, quae in rebus inanimis quaeque in usu et tractatione beluarum fiunt utiliter ad hominum vitam, artibus ea tribuuntur operosis, hominum autem studia ad amplificationem nostrarum rerum prompta ac parata virorum praestantium sapientia et virtute excitantur.
Those, however, who measure everything by profit and advantage, and refuse to let honor outweigh these, are accustomed in their deliberations to compare what is honorable with what they take to be expedient; good men are not accustomed to do so. For my part, I believe that when Panaetius said men usually hesitate over this comparison, he meant precisely what he said: that they usually do — not that they ought to. In fact, not only to count what seems expedient as worth more than what is honorable, but even to compare the two and to be in any doubt between them, is the most shameful thing imaginable. What is it, then, that occasionally seems to occasion hesitation and to call for consideration? I believe it is when we are in doubt about the actual character of what we are considering.
Etenim virtus omnis tribus in rebus fere vertitur, quarum una est in perspiciendo, quid in quaque re verum sincerumque sit, quid consentaneum cuique, quid consequens, ex quo quaeque gignantur, quae cuiusque rei causa sit, alterum cohibere motus animi turbatos, quos Graeci pa/qh nominant, appetitionesque, quas illi o(rma/s, oboedientes efficere rationi, tertium iis, quibuscum congregemur, uti moderate et scienter, quorum studiis ea, quae natura desiderat, expleta cumulataque habeamus, per eosdemque, si quid importetur nobis incommodi, propulsemus ulciscamurque eos, qui nocere nobis conati sint, tantaque poena afficiamus, quantam aequitas humanitasque patitur.
For circumstances often bring it about that what is generally held to be disgraceful turns out not to be disgraceful. Take an example that is broad in its application: what greater crime can there be than to kill a man — to kill, moreover, someone close to you? And yet does a man incur the guilt of crime if he kills a tyrant, however intimate his connection with him? The Roman people, at any rate, does not think so — of all splendid deeds they count that the most splendid. Did expediency, then, defeat honor? No: honor followed hard upon expediency. The right rule to follow is therefore this: so that we may judge without error whenever what we call the expedient appears to conflict with what we recognize as honorable, we must establish a kind of formula; and if we hold to that formula in comparing things, we shall never depart from duty.
Quibus autem rationibus hanc facultatem assequi possimus, ut hominum studia complectamur eaque teneamus, dicemus, neque ita multo post, sed pauca ante dicenda sunt. Magnam vim esse in fortuna in utramque partem, vel secundas ad res vel adversas, quis ignorat? Nam et, cum prospero flatu eius utimur, ad exitus pervehimur optatos et, cum reflavit, affligimur. Haec igitur ipsa fortuna ceteros casus rariores habet, primum ab inanimis procellas, tempestates, naufragia, ruinas, incendia, deinde a bestiis ictus, morsus, impetus; haec ergo, ut dixi, rariora.
That formula will be most fully in accord with the reasoning and discipline of the Stoics. I follow them in these books because, although the older Academics and your Peripatetics — who were once one and the same with the Academics — do place what is honorable above what appears expedient, nevertheless those men argue the point more brilliantly for whom whatever is honorable is also expedient, and nothing expedient that is not honorable, than those for whom something honorable can fail to be expedient and something expedient can fail to be honorable. Our own Academy gives us wide latitude to defend whatever strikes us as most persuasive. But I return to the formula.
At vero interitus exercituum, ut proxime trium, saepe multorum, clades imperatorum, ut nuper summi et singularis viri, invidiae praeterea multitudinis atque ob eas bene meritorum saepe civium expulsiones, calamitates, fugae, rursusque secundae res, honores, imperia, victoriae, quamquam fortuita sunt, tamen sine hominum opibus et studiis neutram in partem effici possunt. Hoc igitur cognito dicendum est, quonam modo hominum studia ad utilitates nostras allicere atque excitare possimus. Quae si longior fuerit oratio, cum magnitudine utilitatis comparetur; ita fortasse etiam brevior videbitur.
To strip something from another, then, and to enlarge one’s own advantage at the cost of another person’s loss — this is more contrary to nature than death, than poverty, than pain, than all the other things that can befall the body or external circumstances. For in the first place it destroys human fellowship and community. If we are so disposed that each man pillages or violates another for his own profit, then that fellowship of the human race which is most in accord with nature must inevitably be torn apart.
Quaecumque igitur homines homini tribuunt ad eum augendum atque honestandum, aut benivolentiae gratia faciunt, cum aliqua de causa quempiam diligunt, aut honoris, si cuius virtutem suspiciunt, quemque dignum fortuna quam amplissima putant, aut cui fidem habent et bene rebus suis consulere arbitrantur, aut cuius opes metuunt, aut contra, a quibus aliquid exspectant, ut cum reges popularesve homines largitiones aliquas proponunt, aut postremo pretio ac mercede ducuntur, quae sordidissima, est illa quidem ratio et inquinatissima et iis, qui ea tenentur, et illis, qui ad eam confugere conantur;
Just as, if each limb of the body had this understanding — that it could thrive by drawing the health of the nearest limb into itself — the whole body would necessarily weaken and perish, so, if each of us were to snatch the advantages of others to himself and strip away whatever he could from each for the sake of his own gain, human fellowship and community would inevitably be overturned. For while it is allowed, with nature making no objection, that each person should prefer to acquire for himself rather than for another the things that serve the needs of life, nature does not permit us to enlarge our own resources, wealth, and power by plundering what belongs to others.
male enim se res habet, cum, quod virtute effici debet, id temptatur pecunia. Sed quoniam non numquam hoc subsidium necessarium est, quem ad modum sit utendum eo, dicemus, si prius iis de rebus, quae virtuti propiores sunt, dixerimus. Atque etiam subiciunt se homines imperio alterius et potestati de causis pluribus. Ducuntur enim aut benivolentia aut beneficiorum magnitudine aut dignitatis praestantia aut spe sibi id utile futurum aut metu ne vi parere cogantur, aut spe largitionis promissisque capti aut postremo, ut saepe in nostra re publica videmus, mercede conducti.
And indeed this is established not only by nature — that is, by the law of nations — but also by the statutes of individual peoples, by which the commonwealth of each city is held together: that it is not lawful to harm another for one’s own advantage. For this is the aim of the laws, this their intent: that the bond uniting citizens shall remain unbroken; those who tear it apart they restrain with death, exile, imprisonment, or fine. And nature’s own reason — which is the law both divine and human — achieves this far more powerfully. Whoever is willing to obey it (and all who wish to live in accordance with nature will obey it) will never bring himself to covet what belongs to another or to take for himself what he has stripped from someone else.
Omnium autem rerum nec aptius est quicquam ad opes tuendas ac tenendas quam diligi nec alienius quam timeri. Praeclare enim Ennius: Quém metuunt, odérunt; quem quisque ódit, periisse éxpetit. Multorum autem odiis nullas opes posse obsistere, si antea fuit ignotum, nuper est cognitum. Nec vero huius tyranni solum, quem armis oppressa pertulit civitas ac paret cum maxime mortuo, interitus declarat, quantum odium hominum valeat ad pestem, sed reliquorum similes exitus tyrannorum, quorum haud fere quisquam talem interitum effugit; malus enim est custos diuturnitatis metus contraque benivolentia fidelis vel ad perpetuitatem.
For greatness and elevation of soul, and likewise affability, justice, and generosity, are far more in accord with nature than pleasure, than life itself, than riches — things which a great and lofty spirit will hold in contempt and count for nothing when it weighs them against the common advantage. To strip something from another for one’s own gain is more contrary to nature than death, than pain, than all else of that kind.
Sed iis, qui vi oppresses imperio coercent, sit sane adhibenda saevitia, ut eris in famulos, si aliter teneri non possunt; qui vero in libera civitate ita se instruunt, ut metuantur, iis nihil potest esse dementius. Quamvis enim sint demersae leges alicuius opibus, quamvis timefacta libertas, emergunt tamen haec aliquando aut iudiciis tacitis aut occultis de honore suffragiis. Acriores autem morsus sunt intermissae libertatis quam retentae. Quod igitur latissime patet neque ad incolumitatem solum, sed etiam ad opes et potentiam valet plurimum, id amplectamur, ut metus absit, caritas retineatur. Ita facillime, quae volemus, et privatis in rebus et in re publica consequemur. Etenim qui se metui volent, a quibus metuentur, eosdem metuant ipsi necesse est.
Likewise it is more in accord with nature to take upon oneself the greatest toils and troubles, if they can be borne, for the sake of all peoples — preserving or aiding them — in imitation of that Hercules whom, in grateful memory of his benefactions, men’s tradition placed in the council of the gods above, than to live in solitude not only free from all troubles but surrounded by pleasures in abundance and excelling even in beauty and strength. Therefore every man of the finest and most distinguished character places that life far ahead of this one by a long distance. From this it follows that a person who obeys nature cannot harm another person.
Quid enim censemus superiorem ilium Dionysium quo cruciatu timoris angi solitum, qui cultros metuens tonsorios candente carbone sibi adurebat capillum? quid Alexandrum Pheraeum quo animo vixisse arbitramur? qui, ut scriptum legimus, cum uxorem Theben admodum diligeret, tamen ad ear ex epulis in cubiculum veniens barbarum, et eum quidem, ut scriptum est, compunctum notis Thraeciis, destricto gladio iubebat anteire praemittebatque de stipatoribus suis, qui scrutarentur arculas muliebres et, ne quod in vestimentis telum occultaretur, exquirerent. O miserum, qui fideliorem et barbarum et stigmatiam putaret quam coniugem! Nec eum fefellit; ab ea est enim ipsa propter pelicatus suspicionem interfectus. Nec vero ulla vis imperii tanta est, quae premente metu possit esse diuturna.
Then again, whoever wrongs another in order to gain some advantage for himself either thinks he is doing nothing contrary to nature, or considers death, poverty, pain, and even the loss of children, kinsmen, and friends more to be avoided than doing wrong to anyone. If he thinks that nothing contrary to nature is done when men are wronged, how can one argue with someone who strips all humanity out of the human being? But if he does think it is to be avoided, yet judges those other things far worse — death, poverty, pain — he is in error in counting any defect of body or fortune as more serious than defects of character. All people, therefore, should have one and the same goal before them: that the advantage of each and the advantage of all should be identical. If each person snatches that advantage to himself, all human fellowship will be dissolved.
Testis est Phalaris, cuius est praeter ceteros nobilitata crudelitas, qui non ex insidiis interiit, ut is, quem modo dixi, Alexander, non a paucis, ut hic noster, sed in quem universa Agrigentinorum multitudo impetum fecit. Quid? Macedones nonne Demetrium reliquerunt universique se ad Pyrrhum contulerunt? Quid? Lacedaemonios iniuste imperantes nonne repente omnes fere socii deseruerunt spectatoresque se otiosos praebuerunt Leuctricae calamitatis? Externa libentius in tali re quam domestica recordor. Verum tamen, quam diu imperium populi Romani beneficiis tenebatur, non iniuriis, bella aut pro sociis aut de imperio gerebantur, exitus erant bellorum aut mites aut necessarii, regum, populorum, nationum portus erat et refugium senatus,
And further: if nature prescribes that a human being should want what is good for another human being, whoever he may be, simply because he is a human being, then it necessarily follows from that same nature that the advantage of all is held in common. If that is so, we are all bound by one and the same law of nature; and if that in turn is so, we are certainly forbidden by nature’s law to harm another. The first premise is true; therefore the conclusion is true as well.
nostri autem magistratus imperatoresque ex hac una re maximam laudem capere studebant, si provincias, si socios aequitate et fide defendissent; itaque illud patrocinium orbis terrae verius quam imperium poterat nominari. Sensim hanc consuetudinem et disciplinam iam antea minuebamus, post vero Sullae victoriam penitus amisimus; desitum est enim videri quicquam in socios iniquum, cum exstitisset in cives tanta crudelitas. Ergo in illo secuta est honestam causam non honesta victoria; est enim ausus dicere, hasta posita cum bona in foro venderet et bonorum virorum et locupletium et certe civium, praedam se suam vendere. Secutus est, qui in causa impia, victoria etiam foediore non singulorum civium bona publicaret, sed universas provincias regionesque uno calamitatis iure comprehenderet.
For this, certainly, is absurd — what some people say: that they would take nothing from a parent or a brother for their own advantage, but that their relationship with the rest of their fellow citizens stands on a different footing. These people settle nothing of right, no fellowship of common interest, between themselves and their fellow citizens — a view that tears apart all the community of the state. Those who say the interests of citizens must be considered but deny the same of foreigners tear apart the common fellowship of the human race; and when that is removed, beneficence, generosity, goodness, and justice are utterly destroyed. Those who destroy these things must also be judged impious toward the immortal gods — for it is a fellowship established among human beings by the gods that they are overturning, and the closest bond of that fellowship is the conviction that it is more contrary to nature to deprive another person of something for one’s own advantage than to endure every disadvantage, whether external, bodily, or even of the soul itself — provided those disadvantages are free from injustice; for justice alone is mistress and queen of all the virtues.
Itaque vexatis ac perditis exteris nationibus ad exemplum amissi imperii portari in triumpho Massiliam vidimus et ex ea urbe triumphari, sine qua numquam nostri imperatores ex Transalpinis bellis triumpharunt. Multa praeterea commemorarem nefaria in socios, si hoc uno quicquam sol vidisset indignius, lure igitur plectimur. Nisi enim multorum impunita scelera tulissemus, numquam ad unum tanta pervenisset licentia; a quo quidem rei familiaris ad paucos, cupiditatum ad multos improbos venit hereditas.
Perhaps someone will say: "Then will the wise man not, if he is himself dying of hunger, take food from another who is utterly useless?" Not at all; my life is not worth more to me than the disposition of soul that keeps me from wronging anyone for my own advantage. "What if a man of good character could, to keep himself from perishing in the cold, strip of his clothing Phalaris — that savage and monstrous tyrant — would he not do it?"
Nec vero umquam bellorum civilium semen et causa deerit, dum homines perditi hastam illam cruentam et meminerint et sperabunt; quam P. Sulla cum vibrasset dictatore propinquo suo, idem sexto tricesimo anno post a sceleratiore hasta non recessit; alter autem, qui in illa dictatura scriba fuerat, in hac fuit quaestor urbanus. Ex quo debet intellegi talibus praemiis propositis numquam defutura bella civilia. Itaque parietes modo urbis stant et manent, iique ipsi iam extrema scelera metuentes, rem vero publicam penitus amisimus. Atque in has clades incidimus (redeundum est enim ad propositum), dum metui quam carl esse et diligi malumus. Quae si populo Romano iniuste imperanti accidere potuerunt, quid debent putare singuli? Quod cum perspicuum sit, benivolentiae vim esse magnam, metus imbecillam, sequitur, ut disseramus, quibus rebus facillime possimus eam, quam volumus, adipisci cum honore et fide caritatem.
These cases are the easiest to judge. For if you strip something for your own advantage from a man who is of no use to anyone, you act inhumanly and contrary to nature’s law. But if you are the kind of person who, should you remain alive, could bring great advantage to the commonwealth and to human fellowship, then if for that reason you take something from another, it is not to be blamed. In all other cases, each person should bear his own hardship rather than deprive another of his advantage. Disease or poverty or anything of that kind is therefore no more contrary to nature than the act of stripping and seizing what belongs to another; rather it is the abandonment of the common advantage that is contrary to nature — for that is an act of injustice.
Sed ea non pariter omnes egemus; nam ad cuiusque vitam institutam accommodandum est, a multisne opus sit an satis sit a paucis diligi. Certum igitur hoc sit, idque et primum et maxime necessarium, familiaritates habere fidas amantium nos amicorum et nostra mirantium; haec enim una res prorsus, ut non multum differat inter summos et mediocris viros, aeque utrisque est propemodum comparanda.
And so nature’s law itself, which preserves and upholds the advantage of human beings, will surely determine that the necessities of life be transferred from a man who is idle and useless to one who is wise, good, and brave — a man whose death would subtract greatly from the common advantage — but only on the condition that he who does this does not thereby take high regard for himself and love of self as a justification for wrongdoing. In this way he will always fulfil his duty, serving the advantage of human beings and of that human fellowship which I so often invoke.
Honore et gloria et benivolentia civium fortasse non aeque omnes egent, sed tamen, si cui haec suppetunt, adiuvant aliquantum cum ad cetera, tum ad amicitias comparandas. Sed de amicitia alio libro dictum est, qui inscribitur Laelius; nunc dicamus de gloria, quamquam ea quoque de re duo sunt nostri libri, sed attingamus, quandoquidem ea in rebus maioribus administrandis adiuvat plurimum. Summa igitur et perfecta gloria constat ex tribus his: si diligit multitudo, si fidem habet, si cum admiratione quadam honore dignos putat. Haec autem, si est simpliciter breviterque dicendum, quibus rebus pariuntur a singulis, eisdem fere a multitudine. Sed est alius quoque quidam aditus ad multitudinem, ut in universorum animos tamquam influere possimus.
As for the case of Phalaris, the judgment is perfectly straightforward. We have no fellowship with tyrants; on the contrary, there is the sharpest estrangement from them; and it is not contrary to nature to despoil a man whom it is honorable to kill. Indeed the whole of this pestilential and impious breed must be driven out from human community entirely. For just as certain limbs are amputated when they have begun to drain away blood and, as it were, vital spirit from the rest, and when they are doing harm to the other parts of the body, so that ferocity in the form of a man, that savagery of beast, must be cut away from what we might call the common body of humanity. Of this kind are all those questions in which duty must be sought out according to the circumstances of the moment.
Ac primum de illis tribus, quae ante dixi, benivolentiae praecepta videamus; quae quidem capitur beneficiis maxime, secundo autem loco voluntate benefica benivolentia movetur, etiamsi res forte non suppetit; vehementer autem amor multitudinis commovetur ipsa fama et opinione liberalitatis, beneficentiae, iustitiae, fidei omniumque earum virtutum, quae pertinent ad mansuetudinem morum ac facilitatem. Etenim illud ipsum, quod honestum decorumque dicimus, quia per se nobis placet animosque omnium natura et specie sua commovet maximeque quasi perlucet ex iis, quas commemoravi, virtutibus, idcirco illos, in quibus eas virtutes esse remur, a natura ipsa diligere cogimur. Atque hae quidem causae diligendi gravissimae; possunt enim praetcrea non nullae esse leviores.
I believe this was the ground Panaetius meant to cover, had not some accident or press of business cut short his design. The earlier books have already supplied rules enough for the kinds of question he addressed, from which it can be seen what is to be avoided on account of its baseness, and what need not be avoided because it is not base at all. But since I am now setting the capstone on a work that has been begun and is almost finished — as geometers are accustomed to demand that certain things be granted them, so as to explain what they want to explain more easily — I ask you, my son, to grant me, if you can, that nothing is to be sought for its own sake except what is honorable. If Cratippus will not permit that, you will at any rate allow me this much: that what is honorable is to be sought above all else for its own sake. Either position satisfies me, and at different times each strikes me as more probable; beyond those two nothing seems probable at all.
Fides autem ut habeatur, duabus rebus effici potest, si existimabimur adepti coniunctam cum iustitia prudentiam. Nam et iis fidem habemus, quos plus intellegere quam nos arbitramur quosque et futura prospicere credimus et, cum res agatur in discrimenque ventum sit, expedire rem et consilium ex tempore capere posse; hanc enim utilem homines existimant veramque prudentiam. Iustis autem et fidis hominibus, id est bonis viris, ita fides habetur, ut nulla sit in iis fraudis iniuriaeque suspicio. Itaque his salutem nostram, his fortunas, his liberos rectissime committi arbitramur.
And first Panaetius must be defended on this point: he did not say that the expedient could sometimes stand against what is honorable — that would have been impiety for him — but that what seemed expedient could. He frequently declares that nothing is truly expedient that is not at the same time honorable, and nothing honorable that is not at the same time expedient; and he maintains that no plague has entered human life greater than the opinion of those who have pulled the two apart. What he introduced was not a real conflict but an apparent one — not so that we might sometimes prefer the expedient over the honorable, but so that, when such cases arose, we might judge between them without error. This remaining portion, then, I shall fill in on my own resources, without props — fighting, as they say, under my own standard. For nothing has been worked out on this part of the subject since Panaetius, at least nothing that has come into my hands and won my approval.
Harum igitur duarum ad fidem faciendam iustitia plus pollet, quippe cum ea sine prudentia satis habeat auctoritatis, prudentia sine iustitia nihil valet ad faciendam fidem. Quo enim quis versutior et callidior, hoc invisior et suspectior est detracta opinione probitatis. Quam ob rem intellegentiae iustitia coniuncta, quantum volet, habebit ad faciendam fidem virium; iustitia sine prudentia multum poterit, sine iustitia nihil valebit prudentia.
When, then, some semblance of the expedient is set before us, we cannot help being moved. But if, on close attention, you see that baseness is bound up with whatever has offered the appearance of advantage, then it is not the advantage that must be abandoned but the understanding that must be reached: wherever there is baseness, there can be no advantage. And if nothing runs so contrary to nature as baseness — for nature demands what is upright, consistent, and harmonious, and rejects the contrary — and if nothing is so fully in accord with nature as advantage, then surely in one and the same thing advantage and baseness cannot coexist. Moreover, if we are born for what is honorable, and honorable conduct is either the only thing to be sought, as Zeno held, or at any rate to be weighed heavier than everything else, as Aristotle believed, then it follows that what is honorable is either the only good or the supreme good; and what is good is surely advantageous; and so whatever is honorable is advantageous.
Sed ne quis sit admiratus, cur, cum inter omnes philosophos constet a meque ipso saepe disputatum sit, qui unam haberet, omnes habere virtutes, nune ita seiungam, quasi possit quisquam, qui non idem prudens sit, iustus esse, alia est illa, cum veritas ipsa limatur in disputatione, subtilitas, alia, cum ad opinionem communem omnis accommodatur oratio. Quam ob rem, ut volgus, ita nos hoc loco loquimur, ut alios fortes, alios viros bonos, alios prudentes esse dicamus; popularibus enim verbis est agendum et usitatis, cum loquimur de opinione populari, idque eodem modo fecit Panaetius. Sed ad propositum revertamur.
Hence the error of dishonest men: when they seize upon something that has seemed expedient, they at once separate it from what is honorable. From this source spring daggers, poisons, forged wills; from this source thefts, embezzlement, plunder and spoliation of allies and fellow citizens; from this source the greed for excessive wealth, for intolerable power, and finally, even in free states, the desire to reign — desires than which nothing fouler or more repellent can be conceived. For such men see, with their false judgment, the material gains; they do not see the punishment — I mean not that of the laws, which they often break through, but the punishment of baseness itself, which is the most bitter of all.
Erat igitur ex iis tribus, quae ad gloriam pertinerent, hoc tertium, ut cum admiratione hominum honore ab iis digni iudicaremur. Admirantur igitur communiter illi quidem omnia, quae magna et praeter opinionem suam animadverterunt, separatim autem, in singulis si perspiciunt necopinata quaedam bona. Itaque eos viros suspiciunt maximisque efferunt laudibus, in quibus existimant se excellentes quasdam et singulares perspicere virtutes, despiciunt autem eos et contemnunt, in quibus nihil virtutis, nihil animi, nihil nervorum putant. Non enim omnes eos contemnunt, de quibus male existimant. Nam quos improbos, maledicos, fraudulentos putant et ad faciendam iniuriam instructos, eos haud contemnunt quidem, sed de iis male existimant. Quam ob rem, ut ante dixi, contemnuntur ii, qui nec sibi nec alteri, ut dicitur, in quibus nullus labor, nulla industria, nulla cura est.
That breed of deliberators, therefore, must be driven from our midst entirely — for it is criminal through and through — the kind who deliberate whether to follow what they see to be honorable, or to soil themselves with crime in full knowledge of what they do. In the very act of doubting, the crime is already present, even if they never carry it out. Accordingly, matters should never come to deliberation at all when deliberating itself would be base. And more: from every deliberation the expectation and hope of concealment must be cleared away. For if we have made any progress in philosophy, we ought to be thoroughly persuaded that even if we could hide what we do from all the gods and from all mankind, we must still commit nothing through greed, nothing through injustice, nothing through lust, nothing through want of self-command.
Admiratione autem afficiuntur ii, qui anteire ceteris virtute putantur et cum omni carere dedecore, tum vero iis vitiis, quibus alii non facile possunt obsistere. Nam et voluptates, blandissimae dominae. maioris partis animos a virtute detorquent et, dolorum cum admoventur faces, praeter modum plerique exterrentur; vita mors, divitiae paupertas omnes homines vehementissime permovent. Quae qui in utramque partem excelso animo magnoque despiciunt, cumque aliqua iis ampla et honesta res obiecta est, totos ad se convertit et rapit, tum quis non admiretur splendorem pulchritudinemque virtutis?
It is with this in mind that Plato introduces the story of Gyges. When the earth had opened after heavy rains, Gyges descended into the chasm and saw there, as the story goes, a bronze horse, with doors in its flanks; these he opened and found the body of a man of extraordinary size, with a gold ring on his finger. He drew it off and put it on himself — he was a shepherd belonging to the king — and then made his way to the assembly of shepherds. There, whenever he turned the bezel of the ring toward his palm, he became invisible to the rest, while he saw everything; when he turned it back to its place, he was visible again. Using this opportunity the ring afforded, he violated the queen, with her help killed the king his master, did away with those he thought stood in his way, and in none of these crimes could anyone see him. So, suddenly, by the favor of the ring, he was king of Lydia. If the wise man had that very ring, he would think himself no more permitted to do wrong than if he had it not; for what honorable men seek is honorable conduct, not concealment.
Ergo et haec animi despicientia admirabilitatem magnam facit et maxime iustitia, ex qua una virtute viri boni appellantur, mirifica quaedam multitudini videtur, nec iniuria; nemo enim iustus esse potest, qui mortem, qui dolorem, qui exsilium, qui egestatem timet, aut qui ea, quae sunt his contraria, aequitati anteponit. Maximeque admirantur eum, qui pecunia non movetur; quod in quo viro perspectum sit, hunc igni spectatum arbitrantur. Itaque illa tria, quae proposita sunt ad gloriarm omnia iustitia conficit, et benivolentiam, quod prodesse vult plurimis, et ob eandem causam fidem et admirationem, quod eas res spernit et neglegit, ad quas plerique inflammati aviditate rapiuntur.
At this point certain philosophers — by no means bad men, but insufficiently sharp — say that the story Plato offers is a fiction and a fabrication. As though Plato were maintaining that the thing happened, or even could have! The force of the ring and of the example is this: if no one were going to know, no one so much as to suspect, when you had done something for the sake of wealth, power, domination, or desire — if it were going to remain forever unknown to gods and men alike — would you do it? They say that is impossible. Quite so; it cannot be done. But I am asking: what would they do if it could be done, given that they deny it can? They press their objection rather crudely; they say it cannot be done and stick to that point, unable to see the force of the word. For when we ask what they would do if they could hide it, we are not asking whether they can hide it, but we apply a kind of pressure, as it were, so that if they answer they would act on what profits them when impunity is on offer, they confess themselves criminals; if they deny it, they concede that everything base is to be avoided for its own sake. But let us return to our subject.
Ac mea quidem sententia omnis ratio atque institutio vitae adiumenta hominum desiderat, in primisque ut habeat, quibuscum possit familiares conferre sermones; quod est difficile, nisi speciem prae te boni viri feras. Ergo etiam solitario homini atque in agro vitam agenti opinio iustitiae necessaria est, eoque etiam magis, quod, eam si non habebunt, iniusti habebuntur, nullis praesidiis saepti multis afficientur iniuriis.
Many situations arise that trouble minds with the appearance of the expedient — not the question whether honorable conduct is to be abandoned for the greatness of some gain (that would be wicked), but the question whether something that appears expedient can be done without baseness. When Brutus stripped his colleague Collatinus of his command, it might have seemed unjust; for Collatinus had been a partner in Brutus’s counsels and a helper in the expulsion of the kings. But when the leading men had resolved that the name of Tarquin, the kinship with Superbus, and all memory of kingship must be extirpated, what was expedient — to consult the good of the fatherland — was at the same time so honorable that it ought to have been welcome to Collatinus himself. And so expediency prevailed on account of its honor; without that honor it could not have been expediency at all. But with the king who founded the city it was otherwise: there the appearance of the expedient misled his mind;
Atque iis etiam, qui vendunt emunt, conducunt locant contrahendisque negotiis implicantur, iustitia ad rem gerendam necessaria est, cuius tanta vis est, ut ne illi quidem, qui maleficio et scelere pascuntur, possint sine ulla particula iustitiae vivere. Nam qui eorum cuipiam, qui una latrocinantur, furatur aliquid aut eripit, is sibi ne in latrocinio quidem relinquit locum, ille autem, qui archipirata dicitur, nisi aequabiliter praedam dispertiat, aut interficiatur a sociis aut relinquatur; quin etiam leges latronum esse dicuntur, quibus pareant, quas observent. Itaque propter aequabilem praedae partitionem et Bardulis Illyrius latro, de quo est apud Theopompum, magnas opes habuit et multo maiores Viriathus Lusitanus; cui quidem etiam exercitus nostri imperatoresque cesserunt; quem C. Laelius, is qui Sapiens usurpatur, praetor fregit et comminuit ferocitatemque eius ita repressit, ut facile bellum reliquis traderet. Cum igitur tanta vis iustitiae sit, ut ea etiam latronum opes firmet atque augeat, quantam eius vim inter leges et iudicia et in constituta re publica fore putamus?
for when it seemed to him more expedient to reign alone than to reign with another, he killed his brother. He abandoned both fraternal love and common humanity to get what seemed expedient but was not; and yet he offered the wall as his pretext, a show of honor that was neither convincing nor, frankly, adequate. He sinned, therefore — with all respect, be it said, to Quirinus or Romulus.
Mihi quidem non apud Medos solum, ut ait Herodotus, sed etiam apud maiores nostros iustitiae fruendae causa videntur olim bene morati reges constituti. Nam cum premeretur inops multitudo ab iis, qui maiores opes habebant, ad unum aliquem confugiebant virtute praestantem; qui cum prohiberet iniuria tenuiores, aequitate constituenda summos cum infimis pari iure retinebat. Eademque constituendarum legum fuit causa, quae regum.
And yet we are not to abandon our own interests and hand them over to others when we need them ourselves; each person must attend to his own advantage in whatever can be done without injury to another. Chrysippus put it neatly, as he did so many things: the man who runs in the stadium, he said, must put forth every effort and strain to win, but he has no business tripping up his competitor or pushing him aside with his hand; so in life it is not unjust for each person to seek what falls to his own use, but to wrest it from another is not right.
Ius enim semper est quaesitum aequabile; neque enim aliter esset ius. Id si ab uno iusto et bono viro consequebantur, erant eo contenti; cum id minus contingeret, leges sunt inventae, quae cum omnibus semper una atque eadem voce loquerentur. Ergo hoc quidem perspicuum est, eos ad imperandum deligi solitos, quorum de iustitia magna esset opinio multitudinis. Adiuncto vero, ut idem etiam prudentes haberentur, nihil erat, quod homines iis auctoribus non posse consequi se arbitrarentur. Omni igitur ratione colenda et retinenda iustitia est cum ipsa per sese (nam aliter iustitia non esset), tum propter amplificationem honoris et gloriae. Sed ut pecuniae non quaerendae solum ratio est, verum etiam collocandae, quae perpetuos sumptus suppeditet, nec solum necessaries, sed etiam liberales, sic gloria et quaerenda et collocanda ratione est.
It is in friendships, however, that the demands of duty are most disturbed: both to withhold from a friend what you may rightly give, and to give what is not right, are contrary to duty. But on this whole topic the rule is brief and not difficult. What seem to be advantages — offices, riches, pleasures, and the rest of that kind — these are never to be preferred to friendship. On the other hand, a good man will not act against the commonwealth, or against an oath or sworn faith, for a friend’s sake — not even if he sits as judge on the friend’s very case; for he lays aside the character of friend when he puts on that of judge. He will grant this much to friendship: that he may prefer his friend’s cause to be a just one, and arrange the time for pleading the case, so far as the law allows.
Quamquam praeclare Socrates hanc viam ad gloriam proximam et quasi compendiariam dicebat esse, si quis id ageret, ut, qualis haberi vellet, talis esset. Quodsi qui simulatione et inani ostentatione et ficto non modo sermone, sed etiam voltu stabilem se gloriam consequi posse rentur, vehementer errant. Vera gloria radices agit atque etiam propagatur, ficta omnia celeriter tamquam flosculi decidunt, nee simulatum potest quicquam esse diuturnum. Testes sunt permulti in utramque partem, sed brevitatis causa familia contenti erimus una. Ti. enim Gracchus P. f. tam diu laudabitur, dum memoria rerum Romanarum manebit; at eius filii nec vivi probabantur bonis et mortui numerum optinent iure caesorum. Qui igitur adipisci veram gloriam volet, iustitiae fungatur officiis. Ea quae essent, dictum est in libro superiore.
But when he must deliver a verdict on oath, he will remember that he calls a god to witness — that is, in my judgment, his own mind, than which the god himself has given man nothing more divine. And so we have received from our ancestors the fine custom of asking a judge, if he has one in his court, what he can do consistently with his sworn obligation. That question reaches to what I said a moment ago: what a judge may properly grant a friend. If everything a friend wanted had to be done, such relationships ought to be called not friendships but conspiracies.
Sed ut facillime, quales simus, tales esse videamur, etsi in eo ipso vis maxima est, ut simus ii, qui haberi velimus, tamen quaedam praecepta danda sunt. Nam si quis ab ineunte aetate habet causam celebritatis et nominis aut a patre acceptam, quod tibi, mi Cicero, arbitror contigisse, aut aliquo casu atque fortuna, in hunc oculi omnium coniciuntur atque in eum, quid agat, quem ad modum vivat, inquiritur et, tamquam in clarissima luce versetur, ita nullum obscurum potest nec dictum eius esse nec factum.
I speak, however, of ordinary friendships; among truly wise and perfect men there can be nothing of that kind. They tell of the Pythagoreans Damon and Phintias, who were so disposed toward each other that when the tyrant Dionysius had fixed a day of death for one of them, and that man asked for a few days to provide for his family, the other stood surety for his friend’s appearance, on the condition that if the first did not return, the surety must die in his place. When the condemned man came back on the appointed day, the tyrant, in admiration of their loyalty, asked to be enrolled as a third in their friendship.
Quorum autem prima aetas propter humilitatem et obscuritatem in hominum ignoratione versatur, ii, simul ac iuvenes esse coeperunt, magna spectare et ad ea rectis studiis debent contendere; quod eo firmiore animo facient, quia non modo non invidetur illi aetati, verum etiam favetur. Prima igitur est adulescenti commendatio ad gloriam, si qua ex bellicis rebus comparari potest, in qua multi apud maiores nostros exstiterunt; semper enim fere bella gerebantur. Tua autem aetas incidit in id bellum, cuius altera pars sceleris nimium habuit, altera felicitatis parum. Quo tamen in bello cum te Pompeius alae alteri praefecisset, magnam laudem et a summo viro et ab exercitu consequebare equitando, iaculando, omni militari labore tolerando. Atque ea quidem tua laus pariter cum re publica cecidit. Mihi autem haec oratio suscepta non de te est, sed de genere toto; quam ob rein pergarnus ad ea, quae restant.
When, therefore, what seems expedient in friendship is weighed against what is honorable, let the appearance of advantage fall, let honor prevail. When things that are not honorable are demanded in friendship, let scruple and good faith take precedence over friendship. In this way we shall arrive at the proper judgment of duty that we are seeking. In affairs of state, however, men err by the appearance of expediency all too often — as in the destruction of Corinth by our own countrymen; and still more harshly did the Athenians, who voted that the thumbs of the Aeginetans, strong as they were at sea, should be cut off. This seemed expedient: Aegina, from its nearness, threatened Piraeus too dangerously. But nothing cruel is expedient; cruelty is in the highest degree at war with human nature, which we are bound to follow.
Ut igitur in reliquis rebus multo maiora opera sunt animi quam corporis, sic eae res, quas ingenio ac ratione persequimur, gratiores sunt quam illae, quas viribus. Prima igitur commendatio proficiscitur a modestia cum pietate in parentes, in suos benivolentia. Facillime autem et in optimam partem cognoscuntur adulescentes, qui se ad claros et sapientes viros bene consulentes rei publicae contulerunt; quibuscum si frequentes sunt, opinionem afferunt populo eorum fore se similes, quos sibi ipsi delegerint ad imitandum.
They also do wrong who bar foreigners from using the cities and expel them — as Pennus did in the time of our fathers, and Papius recently. For it is right not to allow someone who is not a citizen to pass for one; the consuls Crassus and Scaevola, men of the highest wisdom, carried a law to that effect. But to bar foreigners from the use of the city altogether is quite inhuman. There are splendid examples of cases where the appearance of public advantage is despised for the sake of honor. Our commonwealth furnishes many such, none more so than during the Second Punic War; after the disaster at Cannae our ancestors showed more spirit than ever in times of success — not a sign of fear, not a word of peace. So great is the force of what is honorable that it obscures the very appearance of advantage.
P. Rutili adulescentiam ad opinionem et innocentiae et iuris scientiae P. Muci commendavit domus. Nam L. quidem Crassus, cum esset admodum adulescens, non aliunde mutuatus est, sed sibi ipse peperit maximam laudem ex illa accusatione nobili et gloriosa, et, qua aetate qui exercentur, laude affici solent, ut de Demosthene accepimus, ea aetate L. Crassus ostendit id se in foro optime iam facere, quod etiam tum poterat domi cum laude meditari.
When the Athenians could no way withstand the Persian onslaught and resolved to abandon the city, leaving their wives and children at Troezen, embark their fleet, and defend the freedom of Greece by sea, a certain Cyrsilus who urged them to stay in the city and receive Xerxes was stoned to death. He seemed to be following the expedient; but there was no expediency there, with honor standing against it.
Sed cum duplex ratio sit orationis, quarum in altera sermo sit, in altera contentio, non est id quidem dubium, quin contentio orationis maiorem vim habeat ad gloriam (ea est enim, quam eloquentiam dicimus); sed tamen difficile dictu est, quantopere conciliet animos comitas affabilitasque sermonis. Exstant epistulae et Philippi ad Alexandrum et Antipatri ad Cassandrum et Antigoni ad Philippum filium, trium prudentissimorum (sic enim accepimus); quibus praecipiunt, ut oratione benigna multitudinis animos ad benivolentiam alliciant militesque blande appellando sermone deliniant. Quae autem in multitudine cum contentione habetur oratio, ea saepe universam excitat gloriam; magna est enim admiratio copiose sapienterque dicentis; quem qui audiunt, intellegere etiam et sapere plus quam ceteros arbitrantur. Si vero inest in oratione mixta modestia gravitas, nihil admirabilius fieri potest, eoque magis, si ea sunt in adulescente.
Themistocles, after the victory in that war against Persia, said in public assembly that he had a plan of service to the state, but that it need not be known; he asked only that the people appoint someone with whom he could share it. Aristides was given. Themistocles told him that the Spartan fleet, which lay beached at Gytheum, could be secretly burned — and that by this act the power of Sparta would necessarily be broken. When Aristides heard this, he came before the assembly to great expectation and said: the plan Themistocles proposed was exceedingly useful, but by no means honorable. The Athenians accordingly judged that what was not honorable was not useful either, and they rejected the whole scheme outright on Aristides’ authority — a scheme they had not even heard. Better they than we, who grant pirates immunity and levy tribute on our allies. Let it stand, then: what is base is never useful — not even when you gain by it the very thing you thought useful; for this very thing, thinking it useful when it is base, is ruinous.
Sed cum sint plura causarum genera, quae eloquentiam desiderent, multique in nostra re publica adulescentes et apud iudices et apud populum et apud senatum dicendo laudem assecuti sint, maxima est admiratio in iudiciis. Quorum ratio duplex est. Nam ex accusatione et ex defensione constat; quarum etsi laudabilior est defensio, tamen etiam accusatio probata persaepe est. Dixi paulo ante de Crasso; idem fecit adulescens M. Antonius. Etiam P. Sulpici eloquentiam accusatio illustravit, cum seditiosum et inutilem civem, C. Norbanum, in iudicium vocavit.
But cases arise, as I said above, in which expediency appears to conflict with what is honorable, so that we must consider whether the conflict is genuine or whether the two can be reconciled. Such questions take this form: suppose, for instance, a good man has shipped a large cargo of grain from Alexandria to Rhodes, where there is famine and scarcity and the price of corn is desperately high; suppose further that this same man knows several other merchants have put out from Alexandria and has seen their ships under sail with full cargoes heading for Rhodes. Will he tell the Rhodians, or hold his tongue and sell his grain as dearly as he can? We are imagining a man both good and wise; the question we are asking concerns the deliberation and judgment of a man who would not conceal the facts from the Rhodians if he held it to be base, but is uncertain whether it is base at all.
Sed hoc quidem non est saepe faciendum nec umquam nisi aut rei publicae causa, ut ii, quos ante dixi, aut ulciscendi, ut duo Luculli, aut patrocinii, ut nos pro Siculis, pro Sardis in Albucio Iulius. In accusando etiam M’. Aquilio L. Fufi cognita industria est. Semel igitur aut non saepe certe. Sin erit, cui faciendum sit saepius, rei publicae tribuat hoc muneris, cuius inimicos ulcisci saepius non est reprehendendum; modus tamen adsit. Duri enim hominis vel potius vix hominis videtur periculum capitis inferre multis. Id cum periculosum ipsi est, tum etiam sordidum ad famam, committere, ut accusator nominere; quod contigit M. Bruto summo genere nato, illius filio, qui iuris civilis in primis peritus fuit.
In cases of this kind the view of Diogenes of Babylon, a great and weighty Stoic, regularly differs from that of his pupil Antipater, a man of the keenest mind. Antipater holds that everything must be disclosed, so that the buyer knows nothing the seller knows and has not told him; Diogenes holds that the seller is obliged to declare whatever defects the civil law requires him to declare, and for the rest to proceed without sharp dealing, and since he is selling, to aim at the best price he can get. "I brought the grain, I put it on the market, I am selling my own goods at no higher a price than others — perhaps even lower, given the abundance arriving. Who is wronged?"
Atque etiam hoc praeceptum officii diligenter tenendum est, ne quem umquam innocentem iudicio capitis arcessas; id enim sine scelere fieri nullo pacto potest. Nam quid est tam inhumanum quam eloquentiam a natura ad salutem hominum et ad conservationem datam ad bonorum pestem perniciemque convertere? Nec tamen, ut hoc fugiendum est, item est habendum religioni nocentem aliquando, modo ne nefarium impiumque, defendere; vult hoc multitudo, patitur consuetudo, fert etiam humanitas. Iudicis est semper in causis verum sequi, patroni non numquam veri simile, etiamsi minus sit verum, defendere; quod scribere, praesertim cum de philosophia scriberem, non auderem, nisi idem placeret gravissimo Stoicorum, Panaetio. Maxime autem et gloria paritur et gratia defensionibus, eoque maior, si quando accidit, ut ei subveniatur, qui potentis alicuius opibus circumveniri urguerique videatur, ut nos et saepe alias et adulescentes contra L. Sullae dominantis opes pro Sex. Roscio Amerino fecimus, quae, ut scis, exstat oratio.
Antipater’s line of reasoning rises from the other side: "What are you saying? You who ought to take thought for other men and serve human society, who were born under that law and hold those first principles of nature which you are bound to obey and follow — that your advantage is the common advantage and equally the common advantage is yours — will you conceal from men what abundance and supply are at their door?" Diogenes will perhaps reply as follows: "Concealing is one thing, staying silent another. I am not concealing anything from you right now when I fail to tell you what the nature of the gods is, or what the ultimate good is — knowledge that would benefit you more than information about the price of wheat; but it does not follow that whatever is useful for you to hear is thereby necessary for me to say."
Sed expositis adulescentium officiis, quae valeant ad gloriam adipiscendam, deinceps de beneficentia ac de liberalitate dicendum est; cuius est ratio duplex; nam aut opera benigne fit indigentibus aut pecunia. Facilior est haec posterior, locupleti praesertim, sed illa lautior ac splendidior et viro forti claroque dignior. Quamquam enim in utroque inest gratificandi liberalis voluntas, tamen altera ex area, altera ex virtute depromitur, largitioque, quae fit ex re familiari, fontem ipsum benignitatis exhaurit. Ita benignitate benignitas tollitur; qua quo in plures usus sis, eo minus in multos uti possis.
"On the contrary," Antipater will say, "it is necessary, if you remember that there is a fellowship among men bound together by nature." "I remember it," Diogenes will reply; "but is that fellowship such that nothing belongs to any individual? If it is, then nothing should be sold at all — only given away." You see that throughout this entire debate the point at issue is never stated as: "This, though base, I will do because it is expedient" — but rather, on one side, as: "This is expedient and therefore not base"; and on the other: "This must not be done because it is base." A good man brings these two adversaries before us; let us now resolve the case.
At qui opera, id est virtute et industria, benefici et liberales erunt, primum, quo pluribus profuerint, eo plures ad benigne faciendum adiutores habebunt, dein consuetudine beneficentiae paratiores erunt et tamquam exercitatiores ad bene de multis promerendum. Praeclare in epistula quadam Alexandrum filium Philippus accusat, quod largitione benivolentiam Macedonum consectetur: Quae te, malum! inquit, ratio in istam spem induxit, ut eos tibi fideles putares fore, quos pecunia corrupisses? An tu id agis, ut Macedones non te regem suum, sed ministrum et praebitorem sperent fore? Bene ministrum et praebitorem, quia sordidum regi, melius etiam, quod largitionem corruptelam dixit esse; fit enim deterior, qui accipit, atque ad idem semper exspectandum paratior.
A good man is selling a house. The house has certain defects which he knows and others do not: it is unhealthy but held to be sound; every bedroom shows snakes; the timber is poor, the structure ruinous — none of which anyone but the owner knows. I ask: if the seller does not disclose any of this to the buyers and sells the house for far more than he expected to get — has he acted unjustly or dishonestly?
Hoc ille filio, sed praeceptum putemus omnibus. Quam ob rem id quidem non dubium est, quin illa benignitas, quae constet ex opera et industria, et honestior sit et latius pateat et possit prodesse pluribus; non numquam tamen est largiendum, nec hoc benignitatis genus omnino repudiandum est et saepe idoneis hominibus indigentibus de re familiari impertiendum, sed diligenter atque moderate; multi enim patrimonia effuderunt inconsulte largiendo. Quid autem est stultius quam, quod libenter facias, curare, ut id diutius facere non possis? Atque etiam sequuntur largitionem rapinae; cum enim dando egere coeperunt, alienis bonis manus afferre coguntur. Ita, cum benivolentiae comparandae causa benefici esse velint, non tanta studia assequuntur eorum, quibus dederunt, quanta odia eorum, quibus ademerunt.
He has, says Antipater. For what else is it than to fail to show a man who has lost his way the road? — an act consecrated at Athens with public curses. If this is not that, then it is something worse: to stand by and let a buyer rush headlong into catastrophe and into the gravest fraud through his own error. More than failing to show the road — it is deliberately leading another astray. Diogenes replies: "Did he compel you to buy? Did he even solicit you? He put on the market what he did not want; you bought what you did want. If those who advertise a villa as fine and well-built are not thought to have cheated, though it is neither fine nor soundly built, how much less has a man cheated who did not praise his house at all? Where the buyer’s own judgment operates, what room is there for the seller’s fraud? And if not everything one says is warranted, do you think everything one does not say is warranted too? What could be more foolish than for a seller to recite the defects of what he is selling? What more absurd than for an auctioneer, at the owner’s instruction, to cry: ’I am selling a house that is unhealthy’?"
Quam ob rem nec ita claudenda res est familiaris, ut eam benignitas aperire non possit, nec ita reseranda, ut pateat omnibus; modus adhibeatur, isque referatur ad facultates. Omnino meminisse debemus, id quod a nostris hominibus saepissime usurpatum iam in proverbii consuetudinem venit, largitionem fundum non habere; etenim quis potest modus esse, cum et idem, qui consuerunt, et idem illud alii desiderent? Omnino duo sunt genera largorum, quorum alteri prodigi, alteri liberales: prodigi, qui epulis et viscerationibus et gladiatorum muneribus, ludorum venationumque apparatu pecunias profundunt in eas res, quarum memoriam aut brevem aut nullam omnino sint relicturi,
So in certain disputed cases one side defends what is honorable, the other argues expediency in such a way that what appears expedient is shown to be not only compatible with honor to do, but base to leave undone. This is that apparent conflict between the expedient and the honorable which so often seems to arise. These cases must be adjudicated; for we set them out not to leave them open but to resolve them.
liberales autem, qui suis facultatibus aut captos a praedonibus redimunt aut aes alienum suscipiunt amicorum aut in filiarum collocatione adiuvant aut opitulantur in re vel quaerenda vel augenda. Itaque miror, quid in mentem venerit Theophrasto in eo libro, quem de divitiis scripsit; in quo multa praeclare, illud absurde: est enim multus in laudanda magnificentia et apparatione popularium munerum taliumque sumptuum facultatem fructum divitiarum putat. Mihi autem ille fructus liberalitatis, cuius pauca exempla posui, multo et maior videtur et certior. Quanto Aristoteles gravius et verius nos reprehendit! qui has pecuniarum effusiones non admiremur, quae fiunt ad multitudinem deliniendam. Ait enim, qui ab hoste obsidentur, si emere aquae sextarium cogerentur mina, hoc primo incredibile nobis videri, omnesque mirari, sed cum attenderint, veniam necessitati dare, in his immanibus iacturis infinitisque sumptibus nihil nos magnopere mirari, cum praesertim neque necessitati subveniatur nec dignitas augeatur ipsaque illa delectatio multitudinis ad breve exiguumque tempus capiatur, eaque a levissimo quoque, in quo tamen ipso una cum satietate memoria quoque moriatur voluptatis.
Neither the grain-merchant, then, nor the house-seller ought, it seems to me, to have concealed anything from the buyers. Concealment is not simply keeping silent about something; it is the deliberate choice that those who have an interest in knowing something should remain ignorant of it, for the sake of your own gain. What kind of concealment is that, and what kind of man practices it? Everyone can see plainly enough: not an open man, not a straightforward man, not a candid man, not a just man, not a good man — a schemer rather, a shadow-dweller, a contriver, a deceiver, a cheat, a trickster, a worn old hand, a sly one. Is it not a bad bargain to earn all these names and more besides?
Bene etiam colligit, haec pueris et mulierculis et servis et servorum simillimis liberis esse grata, gravi vero homini et ea, quae fiunt, iudicio certo ponderanti probari posse nullo modo. Quamquam intellego in nostra civitate inveterasse iam bonis temporibus, ut splendor aedilitatum ab optimis viris postuletur. Itaque et P. Crassus cum cognomine dives, tum copiis functus est aedilicio maximo munere, et paulo post L. Crassus cum omnium hominum moderatissimo Q. Mucio magnificentissima aedilitate functus est, deinde C. Claudius App. f., multi post, Luculli, Hortensius, Silanus; omnes autem P. Lentulus me consule vicit superiores; hunc est Scaurus imitatus; magnificentissima vero nostri Pompei munera secundo consulatu; in quibus omnibus quid mihi placeat, vides.
And if those who stayed silent deserve censure, what are we to think of those who resorted to outright falsehood in their words? Gaius Canius — a Roman knight, a man of some wit and decent learning — had made his way to Syracuse, as he used to say himself, for a holiday, not on business, and was letting it be known that he wanted to buy some small garden property where he could invite friends and amuse himself without being pestered. When this got about, one Pythius, a banker at Syracuse, told him he had no gardens for sale, but that Canius was welcome to use his as his own; and at the same time he invited the man to dinner in the gardens the following day. Canius accepted. Pythius, who as a banker was on good terms with all classes, called his fishermen together and asked them to fish in front of his gardens the next morning; he told them exactly what he wanted them to do. Canius came to dinner on time; Pythius had laid on a lavish spread; a whole flotilla of boats lay before their eyes; each fisherman brought up what he had caught and laid his fish at Pythius’s feet.
Vitanda tamen suspicio est avaritiae. Mamerco, homini divitissimo, praetermissio aedilitatis consulatus repulsam attulit. Quare et, si postulatur a populo, bonis viris si non desiderantibus, at tamen approbantibus faciundum est, modo pro facultatibus, nos ipsi ut fecimus, et, si quando aliqua res maior atque utilior populari largitione acquiritur, ut Oresti nuper prandia in semitis decumae nomine magno honori fuerunt. Ne M. quidem Seio vitio datum est, quod in caritate asse modium populo dedit; magna enim se et inveterata invidia nec turpi iactura, quando erat aedilis, nec maxima liberavit. Sed honori summo nuper nostro Miloni fuit, qui gladiatoribus emptis rei publicae causa, quae salute nostra continebatur, omnes P. Clodi conatus furoresque compressit. Causa igitur largitionis est, si aut necesse est aut utile.
Then Canius: "I ask you, Pythius — what is all this? So many fish, so many boats?" And Pythius: "What is surprising? This is where Syracuse keeps everything in the way of fish; this is where their fresh water is; this property is indispensable to those men." Canius was on fire with desire and pressed Pythius to sell. Pythius was reluctant at first. But in short — he got his way. The man, eager and rich, paid whatever Pythius asked, and bought the property furnished as it stood; he had the names entered in the accounts and the transaction completed. The next day Canius invited his friends; he arrived himself early on. He saw not a single thwart-pin. He asked a neighbor whether there was some fishermen’s holiday that he could see none of them. "No holiday that I know of," the man said; "but no one fishes here as a rule — so I was puzzled yesterday about what had happened."
In his autem ipsis mediocritatis regula optima est. L. quidem Philippus Q. f., magno vir ingenio in primisque clarus, gloriari solebat se sine ullo munere adeptum esse omnia, quae haberentur amplissima. Dicebat idem Cotta, Curio. Nobis quoque licet in hoc quodam modo gloriari; nam pro amplitudine honorum, quos cunctis suffragiis adepti sumus nostro quidem anno, quod contigit eorum nemini, quos modo nominavi, sane exiguus sumptus aedilitatis fuit.
Canius was furious. But what could he do? My colleague and friend Gaius Aquilius had not yet introduced his formulas for fraud — the dolus malus actions — though in those very formulas, when he was asked what dolus malus was, he used to answer: when one thing is pretended and another done. A definition admirably put, as one would expect from a man skilled in making definitions. So Pythius, and all who do one thing while pretending another, are faithless, dishonest, and malicious. No act of theirs can be useful when it is stained with so many vices.
Atque etiam illae impensae meliores, muri, navalia, portus, aquarum ductus omniaque, quae ad usum rei publicae pertinent. Quamquam, quod praesens tamquam in manum datur, iucundius est; tamen haec in posterum gratiora. Theatra, porticus, nova templa verecundius reprehendo propter Pompeium, sed doctissimi non probant, ut et hic ipse Panaetius, quem nultum in his libris secutus sum, non interpretatus, et Phalereus Demetrius, qui Periclem, principem Graeciae, vituperat, quod tantam pecuniam in praeclara illa propylaea coniecerit. Sed de hoc genere toto in iis libris, quos de re publica scripsi, diligenter est disputatum. Tota igitur ratio talium largitionum genere vitiosa est, temporibus necessaria, et tum ipsum et ad facultates accommodanda et mediocritate moderanda est.
And if Aquilius’s definition is sound, then all pretense and concealment must be banished from life entire. A good man will not pretend or conceal anything, whether to buy more cheaply or to sell more dearly. Moreover, this dolus malus had already been made actionable by law — guardianship under the Twelve Tables, defrauding of young men under the Lex Plaetoria — and without any statutory basis in the courts, where the formula adds the words ex fide bona, "in good faith." Among the other formulas these phrases especially stand out: in the arbitration for recovery of a wife’s dowry, melius aequius, "what is better and more equitable"; and in the action on fiduciary deposit, ut inter bonos bene agier, "that dealings be upright between good men." Can there be any trace of fraud in what is "better and more equitable"? Or when dealings are said to be "upright between good men," can anything be done by deceit or malice? Fraud, as Aquilius says, consists in pretense. All lying must therefore be expelled from dealings and contracts. The seller will not plant a shill to bid up the price; the buyer will not plant one to bid against himself. Each, if it comes to the point of a declaration, will make it once and once only.
In illo autem altero genere largiendi, quod a liberalitate proficiscitur, non uno modo in disparibus causis affecti esse debemus. Alia causa est eius, qui calamitate premitur, et eius, qui res meliores quaerit nullis suis rebus adversis.
Quintus Scaevola, son of Publius, once required that a piece of land of which he was the buyer be named to him at a single price, and when the seller had done so, said he valued it at more, and added a hundred thousand sesterces. There is no one who denies this was the act of a good man; the wise men deny it, on the grounds that he had sold for less than he could have got. This then is that ruinous division: some they count good men, others wise men. Hence Ennius: "Wisdom is wasted on the wise man who cannot profit himself." True enough — if only Ennius and I agreed on what profit means.
Propensior benignitas esse debebit in calamitosos, nisi forte erunt digni calamitate. In iis tamen, qui se adiuvari volent, non ne affligantur, sed ut altiorem gradum ascendant, restricti omnino esse nullo modo debemus, sed in deligendis idoneis iudicium et diligentiam adhibere. Nam praeclare Ennius: Bene fácta male locáta male facta árbitror.
I find that Hecaton of Rhodes, the pupil of Panaetius, says in the books on duty he wrote for Quintus Tubero that the wise man’s duty in managing his own estate is to do nothing against custom, law, or established practice. We do not want riches for ourselves alone, after all, but for our children, our relations, our friends, and above all for the state; for the resources and means of individuals are the wealth of the community. Scaevola’s act, of which I spoke just now, can in no way satisfy this man; indeed Hecaton flatly says he will do nothing for his own profit that is not lawful. Such a man deserves neither great praise nor gratitude.
Quod autem tributum est bono viro et grato, in eo cum ex ipso fructus est, tum etiam ex ceteris. Temeritate enim remota gratissima est liberalitas, eoque eam studiosius plerique laudant, quod summi cuiusque bonitas commune perfugium est omnium. Danda igitur opera est, ut iis beneficiis quam plurimos afficiamus, quorum memoria liberis posterisque prodatur, ut iis ingratis esse non liceat. Omnes enim immemorem beneficii oderunt eamque iniuriam in deterrenda liberalitate sibi etiam fieri eumque, qui faciat, communem hostem tenuiorum putant. Atque haec benignitas etiam rei publicae est utilis, redimi e servitute captos, locupletari tenuiores; quod quidem volgo solitum fieri ab ordine nostro in oratione Crassi scriptum copiose videmus. Hanc ergo consuetudinem benignitatis largitioni munerum longe antepono; haec est gravium hominum atque magnorum, illa quasi assentatorum populi multitudinis levitatem voluptate quasi titillantium.
But if both pretense and concealment constitute dolus malus, there are very few transactions in which that fraud does not play some part; or if a good man is one who helps whom he can and harms no one, then assuredly such a good man is not easily found. In sum: it is never useful to do wrong, because it is always base; and because it is always honorable to be a good man, it is always useful.
Conveniet autem cum in dando munificum esse, tum in exigendo non acerbum in omnique re contrahenda, vendundo emendo, conducendo locando, vicinitatibus et confiniis, aequum, facilem, multa multis de suo iure cedentem, a litibus vero, quantum liceat et nescio an paulo plus etiam, quam liceat, abhorrentem. Est enim non modo liberale paulum non numquam de suo iure decedere, sed interdum etiam fructuosum. Habenda autem ratio est rei familiaris, quam quidem dilabi sinere flagitiosum est, sed ita, ut illiberalitatis avaritiaeque absit suspicio; posse enim liberalitate uti non spoliantem se patrimonio nimirum est pecuniae fructus maximus. Recte etiam a Theophrasto est laudata hospitalitas; est enim, ut mihi quidem videtur, valde decorum patere domus hominum illustrium hospitibus illustribus, idque etiam rei publicae est ornamento, homines externos hoc liberalitatis genere in urbe nostra non egere. Est autem etiam vehementer utile iis, qui honeste posse multum volunt, per hospites apud externos populos valere opibus et gratia. Theophrastus quidem scribit Cimonem Athenis etiam in suos curiales Laciadas hospitalem fuisse; ita enim instituisse et vilicis imperavisse, ut omnia praeberentur, quicumque Laciades in villam suam devertisset.
Now, on the subject of property sales, our civil law has a firm rule: any defects known to the seller must be declared. For under the Twelve Tables it was enough to guarantee what had been formally stated aloud — the seller who denied those statements faced a penalty of double the price — but the jurists went further and established a penalty for silence as well: they ruled that whatever defect existed in a property, if the seller knew of it and did not name it expressly, he was bound to make it good.
Quae autem opera, non largitione beneficia dantur, haec tum in universam rem publicam, tum in singulos cives conferuntur. Nam in iure cavere, consilio iuvare, atque hoc scientiae genere prodesse quam plurimis vehementer et ad opes augendas pertinet et ad gratiam. Itaque cum multa praeclara maiorum, tum quod optime constituti iuris civilis summo semper in honore fuit cognitio atque interpretatio; quam quidem ante hanc confusionem temporum in possessione sua principes retinuerunt, nunc, ut honores, ut omnes dignitatis gradus, sic huius scientiae splendor deletus est, idque eo indignius, quod eo tempore hoc contigit, cum is esset, qui omnes superiores, quibus honore par esset, scientia facile vicisset. Haec igitur opera grata multis et ad beneficiis obstringendos homines accommodata.
Consider what happened when the augurs were about to conduct an augury on the Citadel and ordered Tiberius Claudius Centumalus, who owned a building on the Caelian Hill, to demolish those parts of it whose height interfered with the taking of auspices. Claudius put the block up for sale and sold it; Publius Calpurnius Lanarius bought it. The augurs gave him the same notice. When Calpurnius had demolished the building and discovered that Claudius had put it up for sale only after being ordered by the augurs to demolish it, he brought him before an arbitrator with the formula: whatever he ought by good faith to give or do for him. The verdict was pronounced by Marcus Cato, father of the Cato who is ours — for as other men are named from their fathers, this one, who was the father of that great light, is rightly named from his son. The judge ruled that since the seller had known of the defect at the time of sale and had not disclosed it, he was bound to make good the buyer’s loss.
Atque huic arti finitima est dicendi gravior facultas et gratior et ornatior. Quid enim eloquentia praestabilius vel admiratione audientium vel spe indigentium vel eorum, qui defensi sunt, gratia? Huic quoque ergo a maioribus nostris est in toga dignitatis principatus datus. Diserti igitur hominis et facile laborantis, quodque in patriis est moribus, multorum causas et non gravate et gratuito defendentis beneficia et patrocinia late patent.
He held, then, that it falls under good faith for the buyer to be informed of a defect the seller knows of. If that judgment was right, then the grain merchant I described was not acting rightly, nor was the seller of the plague-ridden house, in keeping silent. But silences of this kind cannot be reached by the civil law; those that can be reached, however, are firmly held. Marcus Marius Gratidianus, a kinsman of mine, had sold to Gaius Sergius Orata a house which he himself had bought from that same man only a few years before. The property was encumbered by a servitude, but Marius had not declared this in the conveyance. The matter was brought to court. Crassus appeared for Orata, Antonius for Gratidianus. Crassus pressed the law: that a seller who knowingly failed to declare a defect was bound to make it good. Antonius argued equity: since the servitude had been no secret to Sergius, who had originally sold the house, there had been no need to declare it, and a man could not be said to have been deceived who held what he had bought with full knowledge of its legal standing.
Admonebat me res, ut hoc quoque loco intermissionem eloquentiae, ne dicam interitum, deplorarem, ni vererer, ne de me ipso aliquid viderer queri. Sed tamen videmus, quibus exstinctis oratoribus quam in paucis spes, quanto in paucioribus facultas, quam in multis sit audacia. Cum autem omnes non possint, ne multi quidem, aut iuris periti esse aut diserti, licet tamen opera prodesse multis beneficia petentem, commendantem iudicibus, magistratibus, vigilantem pro re alterius, eos ipsos, qui aut consuluntur aut defendunt, rogantem; quod qui faciunt, plurimum gratiae consequuntur, latissimeque eorum manat industria.
What is the point of all this? To show you that our ancestors had no patience for sharp dealing. But legal rules and philosophy do away with sharp dealing by different means: the law, so far as it can lay hold of it with its hand; philosophy, so far as reason and understanding can reach. Reason, then, demands this: no scheming, no dissembling, no deception. Does it count as setting a trap to put out bait — even if you do not intend to flush or drive the quarry? Wild animals themselves, with no one in pursuit, often fall into the net. So when you list a house for sale, put up a sign like a net, and sell a home riddled with defects — if some unwary buyer runs into it, have you set no trap?
Iam illud non sunt admonendi (est enim in promptu), ut animadvertant, cum iuvare alios velint, ne quos offendant. Saepe enim aut eos laedunt, quos non debent, aut eos, quos non expedit; si imprudentes, neglegentiae est, si scientes, temeritatis. Utendum etiam est excusatione adversus eos, quos invitus offendas, quacumque possis, quare id, quod feceris, necesse fuerit nec aliter facere potueris, ceterisque aperis et officiis erit id, quod violatum videbitur, compensandum.
I can see that, given the corruption of our habits, this is held neither shameful by custom nor prohibited by statute or civil law. Yet the law of nature forbids it. For human society — and though I have said this often, I must say it yet again — extends in its widest reach to all men without exception; within that comes the narrower fellowship of those who share a nation, and narrower still of those who share a city. Our ancestors accordingly chose to distinguish the law of nations from the civil law: what is civil law is not necessarily also the law of nations, but what is the law of nations ought also to be civil law. We, however, hold no solid and clearly stamped likeness of true law and genuine justice; we work with shadows and images. Would that we followed even those — for they are drawn from nature’s finest and truest patterns.
Sed cum in hominibus iuvandis aut mores spectari aut fortuna soleat, dictu quidem est proclive, itaque volgo loquuntur, se in beneficiis collocandis mores hominum, non fortunam sequi. Honesta oratio est; sed quis est tandem, qui inopis et optimi viri causae non anteponat in opera danda gratiam fortunati et potentis? a quo enim expeditior et celerior remuneratio fore videtur, in eum fere est voluntas nostra propensior. Sed animadvertendum est diligentius, quae natura rerum sit. Nimirum enim inops ille, si bonus est vir, etiamsi referre gratiam non potest, habere certe potest. Commode autem, quicumque dixit, pecuniam qui habeat, non reddidisse, qui reddiderit, non habere, gratiam autem et, qui rettulerit, habere et, qui habeat, rettulisse. At qui se locupletes, honoratos, beatos putant, ii ne obligari quidem beneficio volunt; quin etiam beneficium se dedisse arbitrantur, cum ipsi quamvis magnum aliquod acceperint, atque etiam a se aut postulari aut exspectari aliquid suspicantur, patrocinio vero se usos aut clientes appellari mortis instar putant.
Consider what force those words carry: that I not be cheated or defrauded through you or your good faith! And those golden ones: that dealings between good men be conducted well and without fraud! But who the good men are, and what it means to deal well — that is a great question. Quintus Scaevola, the pontifex maximus, used to say that the greatest force lay in all those arbitrations to which the phrase ex fide bona — “in accordance with good faith” — was appended, and that the name of good faith spread itself across the widest ground: it ran, he said, through guardianships, partnerships, trusts, mandates, purchases, sales, lettings, hirings — all the dealings on which the life of society is built. In these cases, he held, it was the mark of a great judge to determine what each party owed the other, especially since the judgments in most of them could run in either direction.
At vero ille tenuis, cum, quicquid factum sit, se spectatum, non fortunam putet, non modo illi, qui est meritus, sed etiam illis, a quibus exspectat (eget enim multis), gratum se videri studet neque vero verbis auget suum munus, si quo forte fungitur, sed etiam extenuat. Videndumque illud est, quod, si opulentum fortunatumque defenderis, in uno illo aut, si forte, in liberis eius manet gratia; sin autem inopem, probum tamen et modestum, omnes non improbi humiles, quae magna in populo multitudo est, praesidium sibi paratum vident.
Sharp dealing, then, must be rooted out — and that malice which wants to pass itself off as wisdom but stands as far from it as can be. For wisdom is seated in the discernment of good and evil; malice, if everything that is dishonorable is also evil, sets evil before good. And it is not only in the sale of land that the civil law, derived from nature, punishes malice and fraud: in the sale of slaves too all fraud on the seller’s part is excluded. The seller who was bound to know about health, liability to flight, and past thefts is answerable under the aediles’ edict. The case of heirs is different.
Quam ob rem melius apud bonos quam apud fortunatos beneficium collocari puto. Danda omnino opera est, ut omni generi satis facere possimus; sed si res in contentionem veniet, nimirum Themistocles est auctor adhibendus; qui cum consuleretur, utrum bono viro pauperi an minus probato diviti filiam collocaret: Ego vero, inquit, malo virum, qui pecunia egeat, quam pecuniam, quae viro. Sed corrupti mores depravatique sunt admiratione divitiarum; quarum magnitudo quid ad unum quemque nostrum pertinet? Illum fortasse adiuvat, qui habet. Ne id quidem semper; sed fac iuvare; utentior sane sit, honestior vero quo modo? Quodsi etiam bonus erit vir, ne impediant divitiae, quo minus iuvetur, modo ne adiuvent, sitque omne iudicium, non quam locuples, sed qualis quisque sit! Extremum autem praeceptum in beneficiis operaque danda, ne quid contra aequitatem contendas, ne quid pro iniuria; fundamentum enim est perpetuae commendationis et famae iustitia, sine qua nihil potest esse laudabile.
From this it follows — since nature is the source of law — that it accords with nature for no man to prey on another’s ignorance. Nor can any greater ruin of human life be found than in malice that wears the mask of wisdom. It is from this that all those countless cases arise in which the expedient appears to war with what is honorable. How rare is the man who, if he knew he would go unpunished and that no one would ever know, could hold himself back from wrong?
Sed, quoniam de eo genere beneficiorum dictum est, quae ad singulos spectant, deinceps de iis, quae ad universos quaeque ad rem publicam pertinent, disputandum est. Eorum autem ipsorum partim eius modi sunt, ut ad universos cives pertineant, partim, singulos ut attingant; quae sunt etiam gratiora. Danda opera est omnino, si possit, utrisque, nec minus, ut etiam singulis consulatur, sed ita, ut ea res aut prosit aut certe ne obsit rei publicae. C. Gracchi frumentaria magna largitio; exhauriebat igitur aerarium; modica M. Octavi et rei publicae tolerabilis et plebi necessaria; ergo et civibus et rei publicae salutaris.
Let us put it to the test, if you will — and in examples where common people may perhaps see nothing wrong. We need not deal here with assassins, poisoners, forgers, thieves, and embezzlers; they are to be worn down not with the arguments of philosophers but with chains and prison. Let us consider instead what men do who are held to be good. Certain persons brought a forged will from Greece to Rome in the name of Lucius Minucius Basilus, a man of great wealth. To make it easier to establish, they named as co-heirs Marcus Crassus and Quintus Hortensius, the most powerful men of that generation. These men, though they suspected the will was a forgery, were not themselves conscious of any wrongdoing; and so they did not refuse a small gift from another man’s crime. Is that enough, then, for them to appear guiltless? In my judgment, no — though the one I loved while he lived, and the other I do not hate now that he is dead.
In primis autem videndum erit ei, qui rem publicam administrabit, ut suum quisque teneat neque de bonis privatorum publice deminutio fiat. Perniciose enim Philippus, in tribunatu cum legem agrariam ferret, quam tamen antiquari facile passus est et in eo vehementer se moderatum praebuit—sed cum in agendo multa populariter, tum illud male, non esse in civitate duo milia hominum, qui rem baberent. Capitalis oratio est, ad aequationem bonorum pertinens; qua peste quae potest esse maior? Hanc enim ob causam maxime, ut sua tenerentur, res publicae civitatesque constitutae sunt. Nam, etsi duce natura congregabantur hominess, tamen spe custodiae rerum suarum urbium praesidia quaerebant.
But when Basilus had wished his sister’s son, Marcus Satrius, to bear his name and had made him his heir — the same Satrius who is patron of the Picene and Sabine territory; what a shameful mark on the age, that that name should survive in such hands! — it was not right that the leading men of the state should get the estate while nothing came to Satrius but the name. For if a man who fails to prevent or repel an injustice when he is able to is himself acting unjustly — as I argued in the first book — what must we think of one who not merely fails to resist an injustice but actually assists it? Even genuine inheritances, to my mind, are not honorable when they are sought through fawning flattery, through the performance of services not in truth but in pretense. And yet in cases of this kind it seems, at times, that expediency and honor pull in opposite directions.
Danda etiam opera est, ne, quod apud maiores nostros saepe fiebat propter aerarii tenuitatem assiduitatemque bellorum, tributum sit conferendum, idque ne eveniat, multo ante erit providendum. Sin quae necessitas huius muneris alicui rei publicae obvenerit (malo enim quam nostrae ominari; neque tamen de nostra, sed de omni re publica disputo), danda erit opera, ut omnes intellegant, si salvi esse velint, necessitati esse parendum. Atque etiam omnes, qui rem publicam gubernabunt, consulere debebunt, ut earum rerum copia sit, quae sunt necessariae. Quarum qualis comparatio fieri soleat et debeat, non est necesse disputare; est enim in promptu; tantum locus attingendus fuit.
That is an error. For the rule of expediency and the rule of honor are one and the same. Whoever fails to see this will find no fraud, no crime, beyond his reach. He will think: “That course is no doubt honorable, but this one pays” — and with that error he will dare to sever what nature has joined together, which is the very source of all fraud, all wrongdoing, all crime. Suppose a good man had the power that, if he snapped his fingers, his name would slip into the wills of wealthy men — he would not use that power, not even if he were certain no one would ever suspect it. But grant that power to Marcus Crassus, so that by a snap of the fingers he could be written in as heir where he was not truly heir — believe me, he would dance for joy in the Forum. The just man, however, the man we mean when we say a man is good, takes nothing from anyone to transfer to himself. Whoever marvels at this admits he does not know what a good man is.
Caput autem est in omni procuratione negotii et muneris publici, ut avaritiae pellatur etiam minima suspicio. Utinam, inquit C. Pontius Samnis, ad illa tempora me fortuna reservavisset et tum essem natus, quando Romani dona accipere coepissent! non essem passus diutius eos imperare. Ne illi multa saecula exspectanda fuerunt; modo enim hoc malum in hanc rem publicam invasit. Itaque facile patior tum potius Pontium fuisse, siquidem in illo tantum fuit roboris. Nondum centum et decem anni sunt, cum de pecuniis repetundis a L. Pisone lata lex est, nulla antea cum fuisset. At vero postea tot leges et proximae quaeque duriores, tot rei, tot damnati, tantum Italicum bellum propter iudiciorum metum excitatum, tanta sublatis legibus et iudiciis expilatio direptioque sociorum, ut imbecillitate aliorum, non nostra virtute valeamus.
But if anyone cares to unroll the conception of a good man that is folded up in his mind, he will come to understand for himself that the good man is one who helps those he can and harms no one except when provoked by wrong. What then? Does the man who contrives — by some poison, as it were — to displace the true heirs and step into their place, not harm anyone? Let him not do, some will say, what pays and profits him? No: let him understand that nothing is profitable, nothing expedient, that is unjust. Whoever has not learned this lesson will never be a good man.
Laudat Africanum Panaetius, quod fuerit abstinens. Quidni laudet? Sed in illo alia maiora; laus abstinentiae non hominis est solum, sed etiam temporum illorum. Omni Macedonum gaza, quae fuit maxima, potitus est Paulus tantum in aerarium pecuniae invexit, ut unius imperatoris praeda finem attulerit tributorum. At hic nihil domum suam intulit praeter memoriam nominis sempiternam. Imitatus patrem Africanus nihilo locupletior Carthagine eversa. Quid? qui eius collega fuit in censura. L. Mummius, numquid copiosior, cum copiosissimam urbem funditus sustulisset? Italiam ornare quam domum suam maluit; quamquam Italia ornata domus ipsa mihi videtur ornatior.
As a boy I used to hear from Gaius Fimbria, a man of consular rank, that our father had once served as judge in the case of Marcus Lutatius Pinthia, a thoroughly honorable Roman knight, who had entered into a wager on the condition that he was a man of good character. Fimbria declared that he would never pronounce on that matter: otherwise he would either strip a man of established probity of his reputation by ruling against him, or appear to have ruled that someone was a man of good character — when in fact that status rests on an endless accumulation of duties and distinctions. This good man, then — recognized as such by Fimbria, and not only by Socrates — can plainly never suppose that anything is expedient which is not also honorable. And so such a man will dare not only to do nothing but even to think nothing that he would not be willing to proclaim aloud. Is it not shameful that philosophers should hesitate over questions which even plain country people do not hesitate over? From them has come that proverb, worn smooth by age: when they want to praise someone’s reliability and goodness they say he is a man worth matching fingers with in the dark. What does that amount to, if not this: nothing is expedient that is not also fitting, even if you could gain it with no one there to refute you?
Nullum igitur vitium taetrius est, ut eo, unde egressa est, referat se oratio, quam avaritia, praesertim in principibus et rem publicam gubernantibus. Habere enim quaestui rem publicam non modo turpe est, sed sceleratum etiam et nefarium. Itaque, quod Apollo Pythius oraclum edidit, Spartam nulla re alia nisi avaritia esse perituram, id videtur non solum Lacedaemoniis, sed etiam omnibus opulentis populis praedixisse. Nulla autem re conciliare facilius benivolentiam multitudinis possunt ii, qui rei publicae praesunt, quam abstinentia et continentia.
Do you see what this proverb implies — that no pardon can be given to that famous Gyges, nor to the man I was imagining a moment ago who could sweep in all the inheritances in the world with a snap of his fingers? For just as what is shameful can never become honorable however deeply concealed, so what is not honorable can never be made expedient when nature herself stands against it and fights back.
Qui vero se populares volunt ob eamque causam aut agrariam rem temptant, ut possessores pellantur suis sedibus, aut pecunias creditas debitoribus condonandas putant, labefactant fundamenta rei publicae, concordiam primum, quae esse non potest, cum aliis adimuntur, aliis condonantur pecuniae, deinde aequitatem, quae tollitur omnis, si habere suum cuique non licet. Id enim est proprium, ut supra dixi, civitatis atque urbis, ut sit libera et non sollicita suae rei cuiusque custodia.
“But,” someone will say, “when the rewards are very great, there is good cause to go wrong.” Gaius Marius had long been far from any hope of the consulship and had been lying idle for seven years since his praetorship, with no prospect, it seemed, of ever standing for the consulship at all. Yet when Quintus Metellus, that finest of men and citizens, under whom he was serving as legate, sent him to Rome on dispatch, he went before the Roman people and brought false charges against Metellus, his own commander, claiming that Metellus was dragging the war out, and promising that if the people made him consul he would deliver Jugurtha, alive or dead, into the power of Rome within a short time. And so he was indeed made consul — but he departed from good faith and justice, in that he brought an excellent and weighty citizen, his own general, the man who had dispatched him, into popular hatred through a false accusation.
Atque in hac pernicie rei publicae ne illam quidem consequuntur, quam putant, gratiam; nam cui res erepta est, est inimicus, cui data est, etiam dissimulat se accipere voluisse et maxime in pecuniis creditis occultat suum gaudium, ne videatur non fuisse solvendo; at vero ille, qui accepit iniuriam, et meminit et prae se fert dolorem suum, nec, si plures sunt ii, quibus inprobe datum est, quam illi, quibus iniuste ademptum est, idcirco plus etiam valent; non enim numero haec iudicantur, sed pondere. Quam autem habet aequitatem, ut agrum multis annis aut etiam saeculis ante possessum, qui nullum habuit, habeat, qui autem habuit, amittat?
Nor did our kinsman Gratidianus discharge the duty of a good man at the time when he was praetor and the college of praetors had brought in the tribunes of the plebs to draw up a common policy on the currency — for in those days the coinage had become so unstable that no one could know what he was worth. Together they drafted a joint edict with its penalties and procedures, and agreed that they would all mount the Rostra together after noon to announce it. The others dispersed in various directions; Marius came straight from the benches to the Rostra and announced on his own what had been drawn up jointly. That action, if you want to know, brought him tremendous glory: statues in every neighborhood, incense and candles set before them — in short, no man was ever more beloved by the people.
Ac propter hoc iniuriae genus Lacedaemonii Lysandrum ephorum expulerunt, Agim regem, quod numquam antea apud eos acciderat, necaverunt, exque eo tempore tantae discordiae secutae sunt, ut et tyranni exsisterent et optimates exterminarentur et praeclarissime constituta res publica dilaberetur; nec vero solum ipsa cecidit, sed etiam reliquam Graeciam evertit contagionibus malorum, quae a Lacedaemoniis profectae manarunt latius. Quid? nostros Gracchos, Ti. Gracchi summi viri filios, Africani nepotes, nonne agrariae contentiones perdiderunt?
These are the cases that sometimes unsettle the mind in deliberation, when the wrong that will be done to justice appears to be no great matter, while the advantage arising from it appears very great — as it seemed to Marius no very disgraceful thing to steal from his colleagues and the tribunes of the plebs a moment of popular favor, but an enormous advantage to be made consul by that means, which was his aim at the time. But there is one rule for all, and I want you to know it thoroughly: either let what seems expedient not be dishonorable, or, if it is dishonorable, let it not seem expedient. Can we then judge either that Marius, or this other man, a good man? Test and examine your own understanding, to see what is the image, the form, the idea of a good man that dwells in it. Does it fall to a good man to lie for his own gain, to slander, to steal a march, to deceive? Surely nothing could be further from it.
At vero Aratus Sicyonius iure laudatur, qui, cum eius civitas quinquaginta annos a tyrannis teneretur, profectus Argis Sicyonem clandestine introitu urbe est potitus, cumque tyrannum Nicoclem improviso oppressisset, sescentos exsules, qui locupletissimi fuerant eius civitatis, restituit remque publicam adventu suo liberavit. Sed cum magnam animadverteret in bonis et possessionibus difficultatem, quod et eos, quos ipse restituerat, quorum bona alii possederant, egere iniquissimum esse arbitrabatur et quinquaginta annorum possessiones moveri non nimis aequum putabat, propterea quod tam longo spatio multa hereditatibus, multa emptionibus, multa dotibus tenebantur sine iniuria, iudicavit neque illis adimi nec iis non satis fieri, quorum illa fuerant, oportere.
Is there any matter of such weight, or any advantage so much to be desired, that it is worth losing the luster and the name of a good man? What could expediency, so called, possibly bring us that is commensurate with what it takes away, if it has stripped us of the name of a good man and robbed us of good faith and justice? For what difference does it make whether a man transforms himself from a human being into a beast outright, or carries the inward savagery of a beast beneath the outward form of a man? And again: those who trample all that is right and honorable underfoot so long as they may gain power — are they not doing exactly what the man did who chose to have as his father-in-law the one by whose audacity he himself might be powerful? He thought it supremely expedient to have the greatest influence through another man’s unpopularity; he did not see how unjust to his country and how dishonorable that was. And the father-in-law himself always had on his lips those Greek verses from the Phoenissae — which I shall render as best I can, roughly perhaps, but clearly enough to convey the meaning: If wrong must be done, let it be done for a kingdom’s sake; in all else, keep your piety. A monstrous utterance — or rather it is Euripides who is monstrous, for making the one exception that is the most criminal thing of all.
Cum igitur statuisset opus esse ad eam rem constituendam pecunia, Alexandream se proficisci velle dixit remque integram ad reditum suum iussit esse, isque celeriter ad Ptolomaeum, suum hospitem, venit, qui tum regnabat alter post Alexandream conditam. Cui cum exposuisset patriam se liberare velle causamque docuisset, a rege opulento vir summus facile impetravit, ut grandi pecunia adiuvaretur. Quam cum Sicyonem attulisset, adhibuit sibi in consilium quindecim principes, cum quibus causas cognovit et eorum, qui aliena tenebant, et eorum, qui sua amiserant, perfecitque aestimandis possessionibus, ut persuaderet aliis, ut pecuniam accipere mallent, possessionibus cederent, aliis, ut commodius putarent numerari sibi, quod tanti esset, quam suum recuperare. Ita perfectum est, ut omnes concordia constituta sine querella discederent.
Why then do we go collecting petty cases — inheritances, trading deals, fraudulent sales? Here before you stands a man who lusted to be king of the Roman people and master of all nations, and carried it through! If anyone calls such an ambition honorable, he is out of his mind; for he is endorsing the destruction of law and liberty and taking a hideous, abhorrent tyranny for glory. But if a man admits that it is not honorable to be king in a city that was free and should remain free, yet says that for the man who can manage it, it is expedient — with what rebuke, or with what reproach rather, should I attempt to tear him from so great an error? Can it be expedient, by the immortal gods, for anyone to commit the most abominable and atrocious parricide against his country, even if the man who has bound himself to that crime is hailed as “father” by the citizens he has crushed? Expediency, then, must be governed by honor — and so governed that these two are seen to differ in word, but in substance to sound as one.
O virum magnum dignumque, qui in re publica nostra natus esset! Sic par est agere cum civibus, non, ut bis iam vidimus, hastam in foro ponere et bona civium voci subicere praeconis. At ille Graecus, id quod fuit sapientis et praestantis viri, omnibus consulendum putavit, eaque est summa ratio et sapientia boni civis, commoda civium non divellere atque omnis aequitate eadem continere. Habitent gratis in alieno. Quid ita? ut, cum ego emerim, aedificarim, tuear, impendam, tu me invito fruare meo? Quid est aliud aliis sua eripere, aliis dare aliena?
In the common opinion I find no advantage that can be greater than being king; and yet when I begin to bring reason back to the truth, I find nothing less expedient for the man who has won it unjustly. For can anguish, anxiety, and fear by day and by night, a life beset by treachery and thick with peril — can any of this be expedient for anyone? “Many are unjust and faithless to a king; few are well-disposed,” says Accius. But to what king? The one who held his throne by right, as the heir of Tantalus and Pelops. How much more do you think those words apply to the king who, with the army of the Roman people, had crushed the Roman people themselves, and compelled a city that was not only free but mistress of nations to serve him?
Tabulae vero novae quid habent argumenti, nisi ut emas mea pecunia fundum, eum tu habeas, ego non habeam pecuniam? Quam ob rem ne sit aes alienum, quod rei publicae noceat, providendum est, quod multis rationibus caveri potest, non, si fuerit, ut locupletes suum perdant, debitores lucrentur alienum; nec enim ulla res vehementius rem publicam continet quam fides, quae esse nulla potest, nisi erit necessaria solutio rerum creditarum. Numquam vehementius actum est quam me consule, ne solveretur; armis et castris temptata res est ab omni genere hominum et ordine; quibus ita restiti, ut hoc totum malum de re publica tolleretur. Numquam nec maius aes alienum fuit nec melius nec facilius dissolutum est; fraudandi enim spe sublata solvendi necessitas consecuta est. At vero hic nunc victor, tum quidem victus, quae cogitarat, ea perfecit, cum eius iam nihil interesset. Tanta in eo peccandi libido fuit, ut hoc ipsum eum delectaret, peccare, etiamsi causa non esset.
What stains of conscience do you think he had in his soul, what wounds? Whose life, moreover, can be truly advantageous to him if the terms of that life are such that whoever destroys it will stand in the highest favor and glory? But if things that seem supremely advantageous are not so, because they are full of shame and dishonor, it ought by now to be thoroughly plain that nothing is expedient which is not honorable.
Ab hoc igitur genere largitionis, ut aliis detur, aliis auferatur, aberunt ii, qui rem publicam tuebuntur, in primisque operam dabunt, ut iuris et iudiciorum aequitate suum quisque teneat et neque tenuiores propter humilitatem circumveniantur neque locupletibus ad sua vel tenenda vel recuperanda obsit invidia, praeterea, quibuscumque rebus vel belli vel domi poterunt, rem publicam augeant imperio, agris, vectigalibus. Haec magnorum hominum sunt, haec apud maiores nostros factitata, haec genera officiorum qui persequentur, cum summa utilitate rei publicae magnam ipsi adipiscentur et gratiam et gloriam.
This principle has indeed been affirmed many times on other occasions, and in particular during the war with Pyrrhus, by the consul Gaius Fabricius in his second consulship and by our Senate. When King Pyrrhus had made war on the Roman people of his own accord, and the contest for supremacy was with a noble and powerful king, a deserter came from his camp to Fabricius and promised that, for a reward, he would return to Pyrrhus’s camp as secretly as he had come, and kill him with poison. Fabricius saw to it that the man was taken back to Pyrrhus, and this act of his was commended by the Senate. Yet if it was the appearance of expediency and popular esteem we were after, that one deserter would have removed a great war and a dangerous opponent of Rome’s supremacy; but it would have been great dishonor and infamy to have defeated by crime, not by courage, the man with whom we were competing for glory.
In his autem utilitatum praeceptis Antipater Tyrius Stoicus, qui Athenis nuper est mortuus, duo praeterita censet esse a Panaetio, valetudinis curationem et pecuniae; quas res a summo philosopho praeteritas arbitror, quod essent faciles; sunt certe utiles. Sed valetudo sustentatur notitia sui corporis et observatione, quae res aut prodesse soleant aut obesse, et continentia in victu omni atque cultu corporis tuendi causa praetermittendis voluptatibus, postremo arte eorum, quorum ad scientiam haec pertinent.
Which was the more expedient, then — for Fabricius, who was in this city what Aristides was in Athens, or for our Senate, which never severed expediency from worth — to contend with the enemy in arms or in poison? If command is to be sought for the sake of glory, let crime be absent, for there can be no glory in crime; if it is power itself that is sought by whatever means, it cannot be expedient with infamy attached to it. That resolution of Lucius Philippus, son of Quintus, was therefore not expedient either: that those states which Lucius Sulla had made free in exchange for money by a decree of the Senate should again become tributaries, and that we should not return the money they had paid for their freedom. The Senate assented. A shameful exercise of power! The good faith of pirates is better than the good faith of the Senate. “But the revenues were increased — it is therefore expedient.” How long will people dare to call anything expedient that is not honorable?
Res autem famniliaris quaeri debet iis rebus, a quibus abest turpitude, conservari autem diligentia et parsimonia, eisdem etiam rebus augeri. Has res commodissime Xenophon Socraticus persecutus est in eo libro, qui Oeconomicus inscribitur, quem nos, ista fere aetate cum essemus, qua es tu nunc, e Graeco in Latinum convertimus. Sed toto hoc de genere, de quaerenda, de collocanda pecunia (vellem etiam de utenda), commodius a quibusdam optimis viris ad Ianum medium sedentibus quam ab ullis philosophis ulla in schola disputatur. Sunt tamen ea cognoscenda; pertinent enim ad utilitatem, de qua hoc libro disputatum est.
Can hatred and infamy be expedient for any empire, which ought to rest on the glory and goodwill of its allies? I have often disagreed even with my dear Cato: he seemed to me to take too rigid a line in defending the treasury and the revenues, in refusing everything to the tax-collectors, much to the allies — when we ought to have been generous to the latter and to have dealt with the former as we customarily deal with our own tenants. And so too Curio was wrong when he would say that the cause of the Transpadanes was just, but always added: “Let expediency prevail!” He should have shown instead that their cause was not just, because it was not in the Republic’s interest — not confessed, while saying it was not expedient, that it was just.
Sed utilitatum comparatio, quoniam hic locus erat quartus, a Panaetio praetermissus, saepe est necessaria. Nam et corporis commoda cum externis et externa cum corporis et ipsa inter se corporis et externa cum externis comparari solent. Cum externis corporis hoc modo comparantur, valere ut malis quam dives esse, cum corporis externa hoc modo, dives esse potius quam maximis corporis viribus, ipsa inter se corporis sic, ut bona valetudo voluptati anteponatur, vires celeritati, externorum autem, ut gloria divitiis, vectigalia urbana rusticis.
The sixth book of Hecato’s On Duties is full of questions like these: is it the act of a good man, in a time of severe famine, not to feed his slaves? He argues both sides, but in the end directs duty more by what he takes to be expediency than by humanity. He asks: if a cargo must be thrown overboard at sea, should one sacrifice a valuable horse or a cheap little slave? One consideration pulls toward property, another toward humanity. If a fool has seized the one plank from a shipwreck, will the wise man wrest it from him by force if he can? Hecato says no, because it would be unjust. What, then — will the ship’s owner take back what is his? Not at all; no more than he would wish to throw a passenger overboard into the deep because the ship is his. For until the ship has reached its destination, it does not belong to the owner but to the passengers.
Ex quo genere comparationis illud est Catonis senis: a quo cum quaereretur, quid maxime in re familiari expediret, respondit: Bene pascere; quid secundum: Satis bene pascere; quid tertium: Male pascere; quid quartum: Arare; et cum ille, qui quaesierat, dixisset: Quid faenerari?, tum Cato: Quid hominem, inquit, occidere? Ex quo et multis aliis intellegi debet utilitatum comparationes fieri solere, recteque hoc adiunctum esse quartum exquirendorum officiorum genus. Reliqua deinceps persequemur.
Cato — who was roughly Scipio’s contemporary — wrote that Publius Scipio, my son, the man who was first called Africanus, used to say that he was never less idle than when at leisure, never less alone than when alone. A magnificent saying, and worthy of a great and wise man; for it tells us that he was accustomed, even in leisure, to think on affairs of state, and even in solitude to converse with himself — so that he was never truly idle, and at times had no need of another’s company. The very two things that bring languor to other men sharpened him: leisure and solitude. I wish I could truly say the same of myself; but if I cannot reach so great an eminence of talent by imitation, I am at least near it in intention — for I too pursue leisure, shut out by armed impiety and force from public life and the business of the courts, and for that reason, having left the city to wander through the countryside, I am often alone.
P. Scipionem, M. fili, eum, qui primus Africanus appellatus est, dicere solitum scripsit Cato, qui fuit eius fere aequalis, numquam se minus otiosum esse, quam cum otiosus, nec minus solum, quam cum solus esset. Magnifica vero vox et magno viro ac sapiente digna; quae declarat illum et in otio de negotiis cogitare et in solitudine secum loqui solitum, ut neque cessaret umquam et interdum colloquio alterius non egeret. Ita duae res, quae languorem afferunt ceteris, illum acuebant, otium et solitudo. Vellem nobis hoc idem vere dicere liceret; sed si minus imitatione tantam ingenii praestantiam consequi possumus, voluntate certe proxime accedirnus; nam et a re publica forensibusque negotiis armis impiis vique prohibiti otium persequimur et ob eam causam urbe relicta rura peragrantes saepe soli sumus.
Yet this leisure cannot be compared with Africanus’s leisure, nor this solitude with his. For he would take leisure occasionally as a rest from the most splendid duties of public life, and would withdraw from the crowds and company of men into solitude as into a harbor; whereas my leisure has been imposed by the want of anything to do, not chosen out of desire for rest. When the Senate is extinguished and the courts destroyed, what is there that I, as I should be, can worthily do in the curia or in the Forum?
Sed nec hoc otium cum Africani otio nec haec solitudo cum illa comparanda est. Ille enim requiescens a rei publicae pulcherrimis muneribus otium sibi sumebat aliquando et e coetu hominum frequentiaque interdum tamquam in portum se in solitudinem recipiebat, nostrum autem otium negotii inopia, non requiescendi studio constitutum est. Exstincto enim senatu deletisque iudiciis quid est quod dignum nobis aut in curia aut in foro agere possimus?
And so, having once lived amid the greatest throng and in the eyes of my fellow citizens, I now flee the sight of the criminals who overflow everything, withdraw as much as I may, and am often alone. But since we have learned from men of learning that one ought not merely to choose the least among evils but also to draw out of those evils themselves whatever good may be lodged in them, I therefore make use of my leisure — not, to be sure, the leisure that ought to have been enjoyed by one who had once won leisure for his country — and I do not allow the solitude, which necessity and not choice imposes on me, to sink into languor.
Ita, qui in maxima celebritate atque in oculis civium quondam vixerimus, nunc fugientes conspectum sceleratorum, quibus omnia redundant, abdimus nos, quantum licet, et saepe soli sumus. Sed quia sic ab hominibus doctis accepimus, non solum ex malis eligere minima oportere, sed etiam excerpere ex his ipsis, si quid inesset boni, propterea et otio fruor, non illo quidem, quo debebat is, qui quondam peperisset otium civitati, nec eam solitudinem languere patior, quam mihi affert necessitas, non voluntas.
Though Africanus, in my judgment, achieves the greater glory. For there survive no written records of his genius, no work of his leisure, no gift of his solitude; from which we must understand that he was never truly idle or alone, thanks to the activity of his mind and the investigation of those matters he reached by thought. We, who have not strength enough to be drawn out of solitude by silent reflection, have turned all our zeal and care to this work of writing. And so in a short time of public collapse we have written more than we wrote in many years when the republic stood.
Quamquam Africanus maiorem laudem meo iudicio assequebatur. Nulla enim eius ingenii monumenta mandata litteris, nullum opus otii, nullum solitudinis munus exstat; ex quo intellegi debet illum mentis agitatione investigationeque earum rerum, quas cogitando consequebatur, nec otiosum nec solum umquam fuisse; nos autem, qui non tantum roboris habemus, ut cogitatione tacita a solitudine abstrahamur, ad hanc scribendi operam omne studium curamque convertimus. Itaque plura brevi tempore eversa quam multis annis stante re publica scripsimus.
But though all philosophy, my dear Cicero, is fertile and fruitful and no part of it lies untilled and waste, still no region within it is more productive or more rich than that on duty, from which the precepts for a life of honor and consistency are drawn. Therefore, although I am confident that you hear and receive these things constantly from our friend Cratippus — the foremost philosopher of this age — yet I think it will be advantageous to have your ears resounding with such words on every side, and, if possible, to have them hear nothing else.
Sed cum tota philosophia, mi Cicero, frugifera et fructuosa nec ulla pars eius inculta ac deserta sit, tum nullus feracior in ea locus est nec uberior quam de officiis, a quibus constanter honesteque vivendi praecepta ducuntur. Quare, quamquam a Cratippo nostro, principe huius memoriae philosophorum, haec te assidue audire atque accipere confido, tamen conducere arbitror talibus aures tuas vocibus undique circumsonare, nec eas, si fieri possit, quicquam aliud audire.
This must be done by all who are minded to enter upon an honorable life, but I am not sure it must be done by anyone more than by you. You bear no small expectation of following in my own industry, a great one of equalling my honors, and some, perhaps, of my name. You have taken on besides the considerable burden of Athens and of Cratippus; since you went out to them as to a mart of the finest accomplishments, it would be most shameful to return empty, bringing discredit on the authority both of the city and of your teacher. Therefore, strain your mind as hard as you can, press as hard in your labor — if studying is a labor and not a pleasure — and see to it that you succeed, and do not allow it to appear that, when everything has been supplied by me, you have been wanting to yourself. But enough of this; I have written to you often by way of encouragement. Let me now return to the remaining part of the division I laid out.
Quod cum omnibus est faciendum, qui vitam honestam ingredi cogitant, tum haud scio an nemini potius quam tibi; sustines enim non parvam exspectationem imitandae industriae nostrae, magnam honorum, non nullam fortasse nominis. Suscepisti onus praeterea grave et Athenarum et Cratippi; ad quos cum tamquam ad mercaturam bonarum artium sis profectus, inanem redire turpissimum est dedecorantem et urbis auctoritatem et magistri. Quare, quantum coniti animo potes, quantum labore contendere, si discendi labor est potius quam voluptas, tantum fac ut efficias neve committas, ut, cum omnia suppeditata sint a nobis, tute tibi defuisse videare. Sed haec hactenus; multa enim saepe ad te cohortandi gratia scripsimus; nune ad reliquam partem propositae divisionis revertamur.
Panaetius, then — who beyond all question discussed duty with the greatest exactness, and whom I have followed above all others, with some correction — set out three categories in which men ordinarily deliberate and take counsel about duty: first, when they are in doubt whether what they are considering is honorable or base; second, whether it is expedient or inexpedient; and third, when something that bears the appearance of the honorable conflicts with what seems expedient, how those two are to be distinguished. He worked through the first two categories in three books; but of the third he wrote that he would treat it next, and he did not fulfill what he had promised.
Panaetius igitur, qui sine controversia de officiis accuratissime disputavit, quemque nos correctione quadam adhibita potissimum secuti sumus, tribus generibus propositis, in quibus deliberare homines et consultare de officio solerent, uno, cum dubitarent, honestumne id esset, de quo ageretur, an turpe, altero, utilene esset an inutile, tertio, si id, quod speciem haberet honesti, pugnaret cum eo, quod utile videretur, quo modo ea discerni oporteret, de duobus generibus primis tribus libris explicavit, de tertio autem genere deinceps se scripsit dicturum nec exsolvit id, quod promiserat.
This surprises me the more, because a disciple of his, Posidonius, records that Panaetius lived thirty years after those books were published. I find it remarkable that Posidonius touched on that topic only briefly in certain notes — especially since he writes that there is no topic in all of philosophy so necessary.
Quod eo magis miror, quia scriptum a discipulo eius Posidonio est triginta annis vixisse Panaetium, posteaquam illos libros edidisset. Quen locum miror a Posidonio breviter esse tactum in quibusdam commentariis, praesertim cum scribat nullum esse locum in tota philosophia tam necessarium.
I am by no means persuaded by those who claim that this topic was not passed over by Panaetius but deliberately left aside, and that it should not have been written on at all, because expediency can never conflict with the honorable. Whether it was proper to include this third category, as Panaetius did, or to omit it entirely is a question that admits of debate; but there can be no doubt that Panaetius undertook it and left it unfinished. For a man who has completed two parts of a three-part division must necessarily have a third remaining; and furthermore, at the end of the third book he promises to treat this part next.
Minime vero assentior iis, qui negant eum locum a Panaetio praetermissum, sed consulto relictum, nec omnino scribendum fuisse, quia numquam posset utilitas cum honestate pugnare. De quo alterum potest habere dubitationem, adhibendumne fuerit hoc genus, quod in divisione Panaeti tertium est, an plane omittendum, alterum dubitari non potest, quin a Panaetio susceptum sit, sed relictum. Nam qui e divisione tripertita duas partes absolverit, huic necesse est restare tertiam; praeterea in extremo libro tertio de hac parte pollicetur se deinceps esse dicturum.
A credible witness is added to this in Posidonius, who also writes in a certain letter that Publius Rutilius Rufus — who had heard Panaetius — used to say that just as no painter had been found to complete that portion of the Coan Venus which Apelles had left unfinished (for the beauty of the face robbed all hope of imitating the rest of the body), so no one had followed up what Panaetius had left aside and unfinished — because of the surpassing excellence of what he had finished.
Accedit eodem testis locuples Posidonius, qui etiam scribit in quadam epistula P. Rutilium Rufum dicere solere, qui Panaetium audierat, ut nemo pictor esset inventus, qui in Coa Venere eam partem, quam Apelles inchoatam reliquisset, absolveret (oris enim pulchritudo reliqui corporis imitandi spem auferebat), sic ea, quae Panaetius praetermisisset et non perfecisset propter eorum, quae perfecisset, praestantiam neminem persecutum.
On Panaetius’s intention, therefore, there can be no doubt. Whether he was right to add this third inquiry into duty, or otherwise, is perhaps open to discussion. For if the honorable alone is good, as the Stoics hold, or if what is honorable is the highest good in such a way — as your Peripatetics think — that everything placed on the other side barely has the weight of the slightest moment, then there can be no doubt that expediency can never contend with the honorable. And so we are told that Socrates used to curse those who first, by mere opinion, had separated things naturally bound together. The Stoics have agreed with him to the extent that they judge whatever is honorable to be expedient, and nothing expedient that is not honorable.
Quam ob rem de iudicio Panaeti dubitari non potest; rectene autem hanc tertiam partem ad exquirendum officium adiunxerit an secus, de eo fortasse disputari potest. Nam, sive honestum solum bonum est, ut Stoicis placet, sive, quod honestum est, id ita summum bonum est, quem ad modum Peripateticis vestris videtur, ut omnia ex altera parte collocata vix minimi momenti instar habeant, dubitandum non est, quin numquam possit utilitas cum honestate contendere. Itaque accepimus Socratem exsecrari solitum eos, qui primum haec natura cohaerentia opinione distraxissent. Cui quidem ita sunt Stoici assensi, ut et, quicquid honestum esset, id utile esse censerent nec utile quicquam, quod non honestum.
Now if Panaetius were the kind of man who said virtue is to be cultivated because it produces expediency — as those do who measure desirable objects by pleasure or freedom from pain — it would be open to him to say that expediency sometimes conflicts with the honorable. But since he is one who judges nothing good except what is honorable, and holds that those things which resist it under some appearance of expediency neither make life better by their addition nor worse by their removal, he does not seem to have been right to introduce deliberation of the kind in which what appears expedient is weighed against what is honorable.
Quodsi is esset Panaetius, qui virtutem propterea colendam diceret, quod ea efficiens utilitatis esset, ut ii, qui res expetendas vel voluptate vel indolentia metiuntur, liceret ei dicere utilitatem aliquando cum honestate pugnare; sed cum sit is, qui id solum bonum iudicet, quod honestum sit, quae autem huic repugnent specie quadam utilitatis, eorum neque accessione meliorem vitam fieri nec decessione peiorem, non videtur debuisse eius modi deliberationem introducere, in qua, quod utile videretur, cum eo, quod honestum est, compararetur.
Indeed what the Stoics call the highest good — to live in accordance with nature — contains, as I understand it, this meaning: to be always in harmony with virtue, and to choose the remaining things that accord with nature, so long as they do not conflict with virtue. This being so, some think that this comparison was wrongly introduced and that nothing at all should be prescribed in that category. And indeed that honorable thing properly and truly so called exists in the wise alone and can never be severed from virtue; but among those in whom wisdom is not perfect, perfect honor is in no way possible, though likenesses of the honorable can be.
Etenim quod summum bonum a Stoicis dicitur, convenienter naturae vivere, id habet hanc, ut opinor, sententiam: cum virtute congruere semper, cetera autem, quae secundum naturam essent, ita legere, si ea virtuti non repugnarent. Quod cum ita sit, putant quidam hanc comparationem non recte introductam, nec omnino de eo genere quicquam praecipiendum fuisse. Atque illud quidem honestum, quod proprie vereque dicitur, id in sapientibus est solis neque a virtute divelli umquam potest; in iis autem, in quibus sapientia perfecta non est, ipsum illud quidem perfectum honestum nullo modo, similitudines honesti esse possunt.
For the duties discussed in these books the Stoics call intermediate; they are common and widely shared, and many attain them through natural goodness of character and through progress in learning. But that other duty which they likewise call right is perfect and complete and, as they say, fully rounded, and can fall to none but the wise man.
Haec enim officia, de quibus his libris disputamus, media Stoici appellant; ea communia sunt et late patent; quae et ingenii bonitate multi assequuntur et progressione discendi. Illud autem officium, quod rectum idem appellant, perfectum atque absolutum est et, ut idem dicunt, omnes numeros habet nec praeter sapientem cadere in quemquam potest.
But when something is done in which these intermediate duties appear, it tends to look fully perfect — because the common run of men do not generally grasp what is lacking from the perfect, whereas as far as they do grasp it they think nothing has been left out. The same thing happens with poetry, with painting, and many other things: ordinary folk take delight in them and praise what should not be praised, I suppose for this reason — that there is in those works something sound that catches the untrained, who are unable to judge what flaw each work contains; and so, when the learned have instructed them, they readily abandon their earlier view. These duties, then, of which we treat in these books, they call a kind of secondary honorableness — not the property of the wise man alone, but shared with the whole human race.
Cum autem aliquid actum est, in quo media officia compareant, id cumulate videtur esse perfectum, propterea quod volgus quid absit a perfecto, non fere intellegit; quatenus autem intellegit, nihil putat praetermissum; quod idem in poematis, in picturis usu venit in aliisque compluribus, ut delectentur imperiti laudentque ea, quae laudanda non sint, ob eam, credo, causam, quod insit in iis aliquid probi, quod capiat ignaros, qui quidem, quid in una quaque re vitii sit, nequeant iudicare; itaque, cum sunt docti a peritis, desistunt facile sententia. Haec igitur officia, de quibus his libris disserimus, quasi secunda quaedam honesta esse dicunt, non sapientium modo propria, sed cum omni hominum genere communia.
And so all in whom there is an aptitude for virtue are moved by them. Yet when the two Decii or the two Scipiones are called brave men, or when Fabricius or Aristides is named as just, it is not from any of these, as from a wise man, that an example of courage or of justice is sought. For none of them is wise in the sense in which we intend the word "wise man," nor were those who were counted and called wise — Marcus Cato and Gaius Laelius — truly wise, nor indeed those seven; but through the constant practice of intermediate duties they carried a certain likeness and appearance of the wise.
Itaque iis omnes, in quibus est virtutis indoles, commoventur. Nec vero, cum duo Decii aut duo Scipiones fortes viri commemorantur, aut cum Fabricius aut Aristides iustus nominatur, aut ab illis fortitudinis aut ab hoc iustitiae tamquam a sapiente petitur exemplum; nemo enim horum sic sapiens, ut sapientem volumus intellegi, nec ii, qui sapientes habiti et nominati, M. Cato et C. Laelius, sapientes fuerunt, ne illi quidem septem, sed ex mediorum officiorum frequentia similitudinem quandam gerebant speciemque sapientium.
Therefore it is not permissible to weigh what is truly honorable against any competing claim of expediency; nor is that which we call honorable in the common usage — the quality cultivated by those who wish to be regarded as good men — ever to be set against advantage; and that honorable thing which falls within our ordinary understanding is to be kept and preserved by us just as steadfastly as that which is called honorable in the strict and true sense is to be kept by the wise. For no progress toward virtue can be sustained on any other footing. But this concerns those who are judged good men by their observance of duty.
Quocirca nec id, quod vere honestum est, fas est cum utilitatis repugnantia comparari, nec id, quod communiter appellamus honestum, quod colitur ab iis, qui bonos se viros haberi volunt, cum emolumentis umquam est comparandum, tamque id honestum, quod in nostram intellegentiam cadit, tuendum conservandumque nobis est quam illud, quod proprie dicitur vereque est honestum, sapientibus; aliter enim teneri non potest, si qua ad virtutem est facta progressio. Sed haec quidem de iis, qui conservatione officiorum existimantur boni.
Those, however, who measure everything by profit and advantage, and refuse to let honor outweigh these, are accustomed in their deliberations to compare what is honorable with what they take to be expedient; good men are not accustomed to do so. For my part, I believe that when Panaetius said men usually hesitate over this comparison, he meant precisely what he said: that they usually do — not that they ought to. In fact, not only to count what seems expedient as worth more than what is honorable, but even to compare the two and to be in any doubt between them, is the most shameful thing imaginable. What is it, then, that occasionally seems to occasion hesitation and to call for consideration? I believe it is when we are in doubt about the actual character of what we are considering.
Qui autem omnia metiuntur emolumentis et commodis neque ea volunt praeponderari honestate, ii solent in deliberando honestum cum eo, quod utile putant, comparare, boni viri non solent. Itaque existimo Panaetium, cum dixerit homines solere in hac comparatione dubitare, hoc ipsum sensisse, quod dixerit, solere modo, non etiam oportere. Etenim non modo pluris putare, quod utile videatur, quam quod honestum sit, sed etiam haec inter se comparare et in his addubitare turpissimum est. Quid ergo est, quod non numquam dubitationem afferre soleat considerandumque videatur? Credo, si quando dubitatio accidit, quale sit id, de quo consideretur.
For circumstances often bring it about that what is generally held to be disgraceful turns out not to be disgraceful. Take an example that is broad in its application: what greater crime can there be than to kill a man — to kill, moreover, someone close to you? And yet does a man incur the guilt of crime if he kills a tyrant, however intimate his connection with him? The Roman people, at any rate, does not think so — of all splendid deeds they count that the most splendid. Did expediency, then, defeat honor? No: honor followed hard upon expediency. The right rule to follow is therefore this: so that we may judge without error whenever what we call the expedient appears to conflict with what we recognize as honorable, we must establish a kind of formula; and if we hold to that formula in comparing things, we shall never depart from duty.
Saepe enim tempore fit, ut, quod turpe plerumque haberi soleat, inveniatur non esse turpe; exempli causa ponatur aliquid, quod pateat latius: Quod potest maius esse scelus quam non modo hominem, sed etiam familiarem hominem occidere? Num igitur se astrinxit scelere, si qui tyrannum occidit quamvis familiarem? Populo quidem Romano non videtur, qui ex omnibus praeclaris factis illud pulcherrimum existimat. Vicit ergo utilitas honestatem? Immo vero honestas utilitatem secuta est. Itaque, ut sine ullo errore diiudicare possimus, si quando cum illo, quod honestum intellegimus, pugnare id videbitur, quod appellamus utile, formula quaedam constituenda est; quam si sequemur in comparatione rerum, ab officio numquam recedemus.
That formula will be most fully in accord with the reasoning and discipline of the Stoics. I follow them in these books because, although the older Academics and your Peripatetics — who were once one and the same with the Academics — do place what is honorable above what appears expedient, nevertheless those men argue the point more brilliantly for whom whatever is honorable is also expedient, and nothing expedient that is not honorable, than those for whom something honorable can fail to be expedient and something expedient can fail to be honorable. Our own Academy gives us wide latitude to defend whatever strikes us as most persuasive. But I return to the formula.
Erit autem haec formula Stoicorum rationi disciplinaeque maxime consentanea; quam quidem his libris propterea sequimur, quod, quamquam et a veteribus Academicis et a Peripateticis vestris, qui quondam idem erant, qui Academici, quae honesta sunt, anteponuntur iis, quae videntur utilia, tamen splendidius haec ab eis disseruntur, quibus, quicquid honestum est, idem utile videtur nec utile quicquam, quod non honestum, quam ab iis, quibus et honestum aliquid non utile et utile non honestum. Nobis autem nostra Academia magnam licentiam dat, ut, quodcumque maxime probabile occurrat, id nostro iure liceat defendere. Sed redeo ad formulam.
To strip something from another, then, and to enlarge one’s own advantage at the cost of another person’s loss — this is more contrary to nature than death, than poverty, than pain, than all the other things that can befall the body or external circumstances. For in the first place it destroys human fellowship and community. If we are so disposed that each man pillages or violates another for his own profit, then that fellowship of the human race which is most in accord with nature must inevitably be torn apart.
Detrahere igitur alteri aliquid et hominem hominis incommodo suum commodum augere magis est contra naturam quam mors, quam paupertas, quam dolor, quam cetera, quae possunt aut corpori accidere aut rebus externis. Nam principio tollit convictum humanum et societatem. Si enim sic erimus affecti, ut propter suum quisque emolumentum spoliet aut violet alterum, disrumpi necesse est, eam quae maxime est secundum naturam, humani generis societatem.
Just as, if each limb of the body had this understanding — that it could thrive by drawing the health of the nearest limb into itself — the whole body would necessarily weaken and perish, so, if each of us were to snatch the advantages of others to himself and strip away whatever he could from each for the sake of his own gain, human fellowship and community would inevitably be overturned. For while it is allowed, with nature making no objection, that each person should prefer to acquire for himself rather than for another the things that serve the needs of life, nature does not permit us to enlarge our own resources, wealth, and power by plundering what belongs to others.
Ut, si unum quodque membrum sensum hunc haberet, ut posse putaret se valere, si proximi membri valetudinem ad se traduxisset, debilitari et interire totum corpus necesse esset, sic, si unus quisque nostrum ad se rapiat commoda aliorum detrahatque, quod cuique possit, emolumenti sui gratia, societas hominum et communitas evertatur necesse est. Nam sibi ut quisque malit, quod ad usum vitae pertineat, quam alteri acquirere, concessum est non repugnante natura, illud natura non patitur, ut aliorum spoliis nostras facultates, copias, opes augeamus.
And indeed this is established not only by nature — that is, by the law of nations — but also by the statutes of individual peoples, by which the commonwealth of each city is held together: that it is not lawful to harm another for one’s own advantage. For this is the aim of the laws, this their intent: that the bond uniting citizens shall remain unbroken; those who tear it apart they restrain with death, exile, imprisonment, or fine. And nature’s own reason — which is the law both divine and human — achieves this far more powerfully. Whoever is willing to obey it (and all who wish to live in accordance with nature will obey it) will never bring himself to covet what belongs to another or to take for himself what he has stripped from someone else.
Neque vero hoc solum natura, id est iure gentium, sed etiam legibus populorum, quibus in singulis civitatibus res publica continetur, eodem modo constitutum est, ut non liceat sui commodi causa nocere alteri; hoc enim spectant leges, hoc volunt, incolumem esse civium coniunctionem; quam qui dirimunt, eos morte, exsilio, vinclis, damno coërcent. Atque hoc multo magis efficit ipsa naturae ratio, quae est lex divina et humana; cui parere qui velit (omnes autem parebunt, qui secundum naturam volent vivere), numquam committet, ut alienum appetat et id, quod alteri detraxerit, sibi adsumat.
For greatness and elevation of soul, and likewise affability, justice, and generosity, are far more in accord with nature than pleasure, than life itself, than riches — things which a great and lofty spirit will hold in contempt and count for nothing when it weighs them against the common advantage. To strip something from another for one’s own gain is more contrary to nature than death, than pain, than all else of that kind.
Etenim multo magis est secundum naturam excelsitas animi et magnitudo itemque comitas, iustitia, liberalitas quam voluptas, quam vita, quam divitiae; quae quidem contemnere et pro nihilo ducere comparantem cum utilitate communi magni animi et excelsi est. Detrahere autem de altero sui commodi causa magis est contra naturam quam mors, quam dolor, quam cetera generis eiusdem.
Likewise it is more in accord with nature to take upon oneself the greatest toils and troubles, if they can be borne, for the sake of all peoples — preserving or aiding them — in imitation of that Hercules whom, in grateful memory of his benefactions, men’s tradition placed in the council of the gods above, than to live in solitude not only free from all troubles but surrounded by pleasures in abundance and excelling even in beauty and strength. Therefore every man of the finest and most distinguished character places that life far ahead of this one by a long distance. From this it follows that a person who obeys nature cannot harm another person.
Itemque magis est secundum naturam pro omnibus gentibus, si fieri possit, conservandis aut iuvandis maximos labores molestiasque suscipere imitantem Herculem illum, quem hominum fama beneficiorum memor in concilio caelestium collocavit, quam vivere in solitudine non modo sine ullis molestiis, sed etiam in maximis voluptatibus abundantem omnibus copiis, ut excellas etiam pulchritudine et viribus. Quocirca optimo quisque et splendidissimo ingenio longe illam vitam huic anteponit. Ex quo efficitur hominem naturae oboedientem homini nocere non posse.
Then again, whoever wrongs another in order to gain some advantage for himself either thinks he is doing nothing contrary to nature, or considers death, poverty, pain, and even the loss of children, kinsmen, and friends more to be avoided than doing wrong to anyone. If he thinks that nothing contrary to nature is done when men are wronged, how can one argue with someone who strips all humanity out of the human being? But if he does think it is to be avoided, yet judges those other things far worse — death, poverty, pain — he is in error in counting any defect of body or fortune as more serious than defects of character. All people, therefore, should have one and the same goal before them: that the advantage of each and the advantage of all should be identical. If each person snatches that advantage to himself, all human fellowship will be dissolved.
Deinde, qui alterum violat, ut ipse aliquid commodi consequatur, aut nihil existimat se facere contra naturam aut magis fugiendam censet mortem, paupertatem, dolorem, amissionem etiam liberorum, propinquorum, amicorum quam facere cuiquam iniuriam. Si nihil existimat contra naturam fieri hominibus violandis, quid cum eo disseras, qui omnino hominem ex homine tollat? sin fugiendum id quidem censet, sed multo illa peiora, mortem, paupertatem, dolorem, errat in eo, quod ullum aut corporis aut fortunae vitium vitiis animi gravius existimat. Ergo unum debet esse omnibus propositum, ut eadem sit utilitas unius cuiusque et universorum; quam si ad se quisque rapiet, dissolvetur omnis humana consortio.
And further: if nature prescribes that a human being should want what is good for another human being, whoever he may be, simply because he is a human being, then it necessarily follows from that same nature that the advantage of all is held in common. If that is so, we are all bound by one and the same law of nature; and if that in turn is so, we are certainly forbidden by nature’s law to harm another. The first premise is true; therefore the conclusion is true as well.
Atque etiam, si hoc natura praescribit, ut homo homini, quicumque sit, ob eam ipsam causam, quod is homo sit, consultum velit, necesse est secundum eandem naturam omnium utilitatem esse communem. Quod si ita est, una continemur omnes et eadem lege naturae, idque ipsum si ita est, certe violare alterum naturae lege prohibemur. Verum autem primum; verum igitur extremum.
For this, certainly, is absurd — what some people say: that they would take nothing from a parent or a brother for their own advantage, but that their relationship with the rest of their fellow citizens stands on a different footing. These people settle nothing of right, no fellowship of common interest, between themselves and their fellow citizens — a view that tears apart all the community of the state. Those who say the interests of citizens must be considered but deny the same of foreigners tear apart the common fellowship of the human race; and when that is removed, beneficence, generosity, goodness, and justice are utterly destroyed. Those who destroy these things must also be judged impious toward the immortal gods — for it is a fellowship established among human beings by the gods that they are overturning, and the closest bond of that fellowship is the conviction that it is more contrary to nature to deprive another person of something for one’s own advantage than to endure every disadvantage, whether external, bodily, or even of the soul itself — provided those disadvantages are free from injustice; for justice alone is mistress and queen of all the virtues.
Nam illud quidem absurdum est, quod quidam dicunt, parenti se aut fratri nihil detracturos sui commodi causa, aliam rationem esse civium reliquorum. Hi sibi nihil iuris, nullam societatem communis utilitatis causa statuunt esse cum civibus, quae sententia omnem societatem distrahit civitatis. Qui autem civium rationem dicunt habendam, externorum negant, ii dirimunt communem humani generis societatem; qua sublata beneficentia, liberalitas, bonitas, iustitia funditus tollitur; quae qui tollunt, etiam adversus deos immortales impii iudicandi sunt. Ab iis enim constitutam inter homines societatem evertunt, cuius societatis artissimum vinculum est magis arbitrari esse contra naturam hominem homini detrahere sui commodi causa quam omnia incommoda subire vel externa vel corporis vel etiam ipsius animi, quae vacent iustitia; haec enim una virtus omnium est domina et regina virtutum.
Perhaps someone will say: "Then will the wise man not, if he is himself dying of hunger, take food from another who is utterly useless?" Not at all; my life is not worth more to me than the disposition of soul that keeps me from wronging anyone for my own advantage. "What if a man of good character could, to keep himself from perishing in the cold, strip of his clothing Phalaris — that savage and monstrous tyrant — would he not do it?"
Forsitan quispiam dixerit: Nonne igitur sapiens, si fame ipse conficiatur, abstulerit cibum alteri homini ad nullam rem utili? Minime vero; non enim mihi est vita mea utilior quam animi talis affectio, neminem ut violem commodi mei gratia. Quid? si Phalarim, crudelem tyrannum et immanem, vir bonus, ne ipse frigore conficiatur, vestitu spoliare possit, nonne faciat?
These cases are the easiest to judge. For if you strip something for your own advantage from a man who is of no use to anyone, you act inhumanly and contrary to nature’s law. But if you are the kind of person who, should you remain alive, could bring great advantage to the commonwealth and to human fellowship, then if for that reason you take something from another, it is not to be blamed. In all other cases, each person should bear his own hardship rather than deprive another of his advantage. Disease or poverty or anything of that kind is therefore no more contrary to nature than the act of stripping and seizing what belongs to another; rather it is the abandonment of the common advantage that is contrary to nature — for that is an act of injustice.
Haec ad iudicandum sunt facillima. Nam, si quid ab homine ad nullam partem utili utilitatis tuae causa detraxeris, inhumane feceris contraque naturae legem; sin autem is tu sis, qui multam utilitatem rei publicae atque hominum societati, si in vita remaneas, afferre possis, si quid ob eam causam alteri detraxeris, non sit reprehendendum. Sin autem id non sit eius modi, suum cuique incommodum ferendum est potius quam de alterius commodis detrahendum. Non igitur magis est contra naturam morbus aut egestas aut quid eius modi quam detractio atque appetitio alieni, sed communis utilitatis derelictio contra naturam est; est enim iniusta.
And so nature’s law itself, which preserves and upholds the advantage of human beings, will surely determine that the necessities of life be transferred from a man who is idle and useless to one who is wise, good, and brave — a man whose death would subtract greatly from the common advantage — but only on the condition that he who does this does not thereby take high regard for himself and love of self as a justification for wrongdoing. In this way he will always fulfil his duty, serving the advantage of human beings and of that human fellowship which I so often invoke.
Itaque lex ipsa naturae, quae utilitatem hominum conservat et continet, decernet profecto, ut ab homine inerti atque inutili ad sapientem, bonum, fortem virum transferantur res ad vivendum necessariae, qui si occiderit, multum de communi utilitate detraxerit, modo hoc ita faciat, ut ne ipse de se bene existimans seseque diligens hanc causam habeat ad iniuriam. Ita semper officio fungetur utilitati consulens hominum et ei, quam saepe commemoro, humanae societati.
As for the case of Phalaris, the judgment is perfectly straightforward. We have no fellowship with tyrants; on the contrary, there is the sharpest estrangement from them; and it is not contrary to nature to despoil a man whom it is honorable to kill. Indeed the whole of this pestilential and impious breed must be driven out from human community entirely. For just as certain limbs are amputated when they have begun to drain away blood and, as it were, vital spirit from the rest, and when they are doing harm to the other parts of the body, so that ferocity in the form of a man, that savagery of beast, must be cut away from what we might call the common body of humanity. Of this kind are all those questions in which duty must be sought out according to the circumstances of the moment.
Nam quod ad Phalarim attinet, perfacile iudicium est. Nulla est enim societas nobis cum tyrannis, et potius summa distractio est, neque est contra naturam spoliare eum, si possis, quem est honestum necare, atque hoc omne genus pestiferum atque impium ex hominum communitate exterminandum est. Etenim, ut membra quaedam amputantur, si et ipsa sanguine et tamquam spiritu carere coeperunt et nocent reliquis partibus corporis, sic ista in figura hominis feritas et immanitas beluae a communi tamquam humanitatis corpore segreganda est. Huius generis quaestiones sunt omnes eae, in quibus ex tempore officium exquiritur.
I believe this was the ground Panaetius meant to cover, had not some accident or press of business cut short his design. The earlier books have already supplied rules enough for the kinds of question he addressed, from which it can be seen what is to be avoided on account of its baseness, and what need not be avoided because it is not base at all. But since I am now setting the capstone on a work that has been begun and is almost finished — as geometers are accustomed to demand that certain things be granted them, so as to explain what they want to explain more easily — I ask you, my son, to grant me, if you can, that nothing is to be sought for its own sake except what is honorable. If Cratippus will not permit that, you will at any rate allow me this much: that what is honorable is to be sought above all else for its own sake. Either position satisfies me, and at different times each strikes me as more probable; beyond those two nothing seems probable at all.
Eius modi igitur credo res Panaetium persecuturum fuisse, nisi aliqui casus aut occupatio eius consilium peremisset. Ad quas ipsas consultationes superioribus libris satis multa praecepta sunt, ex quibus perspici possit, quid sit propter turpitudinen fugiendum, quid sit, quod idcirco fugiendum non sit, quod omnino turpe non sit. Sed quoniam operi inchoato, prope tamen absoluto tamquam fastigium imponimus, ut geometrae solent non omnia docere, sed postulare, ut quaedam sibi concedantur, quo facilius, quae volunt, explicent, sic ego a te postulo, mi Cicero, ut mihi concedas, si potes, nihil praeter id, quod honestum sit, propter se esse expetendum. Sin hoc non licet per Cratippum, at illud certe dabis, quod honestum sit, id esse maxime propter se expetendum. Mihi utrumvis satis est et tum hoc, tum illud probabilius videtur nec praeterea quicquam probabile.
And first Panaetius must be defended on this point: he did not say that the expedient could sometimes stand against what is honorable — that would have been impiety for him — but that what seemed expedient could. He frequently declares that nothing is truly expedient that is not at the same time honorable, and nothing honorable that is not at the same time expedient; and he maintains that no plague has entered human life greater than the opinion of those who have pulled the two apart. What he introduced was not a real conflict but an apparent one — not so that we might sometimes prefer the expedient over the honorable, but so that, when such cases arose, we might judge between them without error. This remaining portion, then, I shall fill in on my own resources, without props — fighting, as they say, under my own standard. For nothing has been worked out on this part of the subject since Panaetius, at least nothing that has come into my hands and won my approval.
Ac primum in hoc Panaetius defendendus est, quod non utilia cum honestis pugnare aliquando posse dixerit (neque enim ei fas erat), sed ea, quae viderentur utilia. Nihil vero utile, quod non idem honestum, nihil honestum, quod non idem utile sit, saepe testatur negatque ullam pestem maiorem in vitam hominum invasisse quam eorum opinionem, qui ista distraxerint. Itaque, non ut aliquando anteponeremus utilia honestis, sed ut ea sine errore diiudicaremus, si quando incidissent, induxit earn, quae videretur esse, non quae esset, repugnantiam. Hanc igitur partem relictam explebimus nullis adminiculis, sed, ut dicitur, Marte nostro. Neque enim quicquam est de hac parte post Panaetium explicatum, quod quidem mihi probaretur, de iis, quae in manus meas venerunt.
When, then, some semblance of the expedient is set before us, we cannot help being moved. But if, on close attention, you see that baseness is bound up with whatever has offered the appearance of advantage, then it is not the advantage that must be abandoned but the understanding that must be reached: wherever there is baseness, there can be no advantage. And if nothing runs so contrary to nature as baseness — for nature demands what is upright, consistent, and harmonious, and rejects the contrary — and if nothing is so fully in accord with nature as advantage, then surely in one and the same thing advantage and baseness cannot coexist. Moreover, if we are born for what is honorable, and honorable conduct is either the only thing to be sought, as Zeno held, or at any rate to be weighed heavier than everything else, as Aristotle believed, then it follows that what is honorable is either the only good or the supreme good; and what is good is surely advantageous; and so whatever is honorable is advantageous.
Cum igitur aliqua species utilitatis obiecta est, commoveri necesse est; sed si, cum animum attenderis, turpitudinem videas adiunctam ei rei, quae speciem utilitatis attulerit, tum non utilitas relinquenda est, sed intellegendum, ubi turpitude sit, ibi utilitatem esse non posse. Quodsi nihil est tam contra naturam quam turpitudo (recta enim et convenientia et constantia natura desiderat aspernaturque contraria) nihilque tam secundum naturam quam utilitas, certe in eadem re utilitas et turpitudo esse non potest. Itemque, si ad honestatem nati sumus eaque aut sola expetenda est, ut Zenoni visum est, aut certe omni pondere gravior habenda quam reliqua omnia, quod Aristoteli placet, necesse est, quod honestum sit, id esse aut solum aut summum bonum; quod autem bonum, id certe utile; ita, quicquid honestum, id utile.
Hence the error of dishonest men: when they seize upon something that has seemed expedient, they at once separate it from what is honorable. From this source spring daggers, poisons, forged wills; from this source thefts, embezzlement, plunder and spoliation of allies and fellow citizens; from this source the greed for excessive wealth, for intolerable power, and finally, even in free states, the desire to reign — desires than which nothing fouler or more repellent can be conceived. For such men see, with their false judgment, the material gains; they do not see the punishment — I mean not that of the laws, which they often break through, but the punishment of baseness itself, which is the most bitter of all.
Quare error hominum non proborum, cum aliquid, quod utile visum est, arripuit, id continuo secernit ab honesto. Hinc sicae, hinc venena, hinc falsa testamenta nascuntur, hinc furta, peculatus, expilationes dir-ptionesque sociorum et civium, hinc opum nimiarum, potentiae non ferendae, postremo etiam in liberis civitatibus regnandi exsistunt cupiditates, quibus nihil nec taetrius nec foedius excogitari potest. Emolumenta enim rerum fallacibus iudiciis vident, poenam non dico legum, quam saepe perrumpunt, sed ipsius turpitudinis, quae acerbissima est, non vident.
That breed of deliberators, therefore, must be driven from our midst entirely — for it is criminal through and through — the kind who deliberate whether to follow what they see to be honorable, or to soil themselves with crime in full knowledge of what they do. In the very act of doubting, the crime is already present, even if they never carry it out. Accordingly, matters should never come to deliberation at all when deliberating itself would be base. And more: from every deliberation the expectation and hope of concealment must be cleared away. For if we have made any progress in philosophy, we ought to be thoroughly persuaded that even if we could hide what we do from all the gods and from all mankind, we must still commit nothing through greed, nothing through injustice, nothing through lust, nothing through want of self-command.
Quam ob rem hoc quidem deliberantium genus pellatur e medio (est enim totum sceleratum et impium), qui deliberant, utrum id sequantur, quod honestum esse videant, an se scientes scelere contaminent; in ipsa enim dubitatione facinus inest, etiamsi ad id non pervenerint. Ergo ea deliberanda omnlino non sunt, in quibus est turpis ipsa deliberatio. Atque etiam ex omni deliberatione celandi et occultandi spes opinioque removenda est. Satis enim nobis, si modo in philosophia aliquid profecimus, persuasum esse debet, si omnes deos hominesque celare possimus, nihil tamen avare, nihil iniuste, nihil libidinose, nihil incontinenter esse faciendum.
It is with this in mind that Plato introduces the story of Gyges. When the earth had opened after heavy rains, Gyges descended into the chasm and saw there, as the story goes, a bronze horse, with doors in its flanks; these he opened and found the body of a man of extraordinary size, with a gold ring on his finger. He drew it off and put it on himself — he was a shepherd belonging to the king — and then made his way to the assembly of shepherds. There, whenever he turned the bezel of the ring toward his palm, he became invisible to the rest, while he saw everything; when he turned it back to its place, he was visible again. Using this opportunity the ring afforded, he violated the queen, with her help killed the king his master, did away with those he thought stood in his way, and in none of these crimes could anyone see him. So, suddenly, by the favor of the ring, he was king of Lydia. If the wise man had that very ring, he would think himself no more permitted to do wrong than if he had it not; for what honorable men seek is honorable conduct, not concealment.
Hinc ille Gyges inducitur a Platone, qui, cum terra discessisset magnis quibusdam imbribus, descendit in illum hiatum aeneumque equum, ut ferunt fabulae, animadvertit, cuius in lateribus fores essent; quibus apertis corpus hominis mortui vidit magnitudine invisitata anulumque aureum in digito; quem ut detraxit, ipse induit (erat autem regius pastor), tum in concilium se pastorum recepit. Ibi cum palam eius anuli ad palmam converterat, a nullo videbatur, ipse autem omnia videbat; idem rursus videbatur, cum in locum anulum inverterat. Itaque hac opportunitate anuli usus reginae stuprum intulit eaque adiutrice regem dominum interemit, sustulit, quos obstare arbitrabatur, nec in his eum facinoribus quisquam potuit videre. Sic repente anuli beneficio rex exortus est Lydiae. Hunc igitur ipsum anulum si habeat sapiens, nihilo plus sibi licere putet peccare, quam si non haberet; honesta enim bonis viris, non occulta quaeruntur.
At this point certain philosophers — by no means bad men, but insufficiently sharp — say that the story Plato offers is a fiction and a fabrication. As though Plato were maintaining that the thing happened, or even could have! The force of the ring and of the example is this: if no one were going to know, no one so much as to suspect, when you had done something for the sake of wealth, power, domination, or desire — if it were going to remain forever unknown to gods and men alike — would you do it? They say that is impossible. Quite so; it cannot be done. But I am asking: what would they do if it could be done, given that they deny it can? They press their objection rather crudely; they say it cannot be done and stick to that point, unable to see the force of the word. For when we ask what they would do if they could hide it, we are not asking whether they can hide it, but we apply a kind of pressure, as it were, so that if they answer they would act on what profits them when impunity is on offer, they confess themselves criminals; if they deny it, they concede that everything base is to be avoided for its own sake. But let us return to our subject.
Atque hoc loco philosoplis quidam, minime mali illi quidem, sed non satis acuti, fictam et commenticiam fabulam prolatam dicunt a Platone; quasi vero ille aut factum id esse aut fieri potuisse defendat! Ilaec est vis huius anuli et huius exempli: si nemo sciturus, nemo ne suspicaturus quidemn sit, cum aliquid divitiarum, potentiae, dominationis, libidinis causa feceris, si id dis hominibusque futurum sit semper ignotuml, sisne facturus. Negant id fieri posse. Nequaquam potest id quidem; sed quaero, quod negant posse, id si posset, quidnam facerent. Urguent rustice sane; negant enim posse et in eo perstant; hoc verbum quid valeat, non vident. Cum enim quaerimus, si celare possint, quid facturi sint, non quaerimus, possintne celare, sed tamquam tormenta quaedam adhibemus, ut, si responderint se impunitate proposita facturos, quod expediat, facinorosos se esse fateantur, si negent, omnia turpia per se ipsa fugienda esse concedant. Sed iam ad propositum revertamur.
Many situations arise that trouble minds with the appearance of the expedient — not the question whether honorable conduct is to be abandoned for the greatness of some gain (that would be wicked), but the question whether something that appears expedient can be done without baseness. When Brutus stripped his colleague Collatinus of his command, it might have seemed unjust; for Collatinus had been a partner in Brutus’s counsels and a helper in the expulsion of the kings. But when the leading men had resolved that the name of Tarquin, the kinship with Superbus, and all memory of kingship must be extirpated, what was expedient — to consult the good of the fatherland — was at the same time so honorable that it ought to have been welcome to Collatinus himself. And so expediency prevailed on account of its honor; without that honor it could not have been expediency at all. But with the king who founded the city it was otherwise: there the appearance of the expedient misled his mind;
Incidunt multae saepe causae, quae conturbent animos utilitatis specie, non cum hoc deliberetur, relinquendane sit honestas propter utilitatis magnitudinem (nam id quidem improbum est), sed illud, possitne id, quod utile videatur, fieri non turpiter. Cum Collatino collegae Brutus imperium abrogabat, poterat videri facere id iniuste; fuerat enim in regibus expellendis socius Bruti consiliorum et adiutor. Cum autem consilium hoc principes cepissent, cognationem Superbi nomenque Tarquiniorum et memoriam regni esse tollendam, quod erat utile, patriae consulere, id erat ita honestum, ut etiam ipsi Collatino placere deberet. Itaque utilitas valuit propter honestatem, sine qua ne utilitas quidem esse potuisset. At in eo rege, qui urbem condidit, non item; species enim utilitatis animum pepulit eius;
for when it seemed to him more expedient to reign alone than to reign with another, he killed his brother. He abandoned both fraternal love and common humanity to get what seemed expedient but was not; and yet he offered the wall as his pretext, a show of honor that was neither convincing nor, frankly, adequate. He sinned, therefore — with all respect, be it said, to Quirinus or Romulus.
cui cum visum esset utilius solum quam cum altero regnare, fratrem interemit. Omisit hic et pietatem et humanitatem, ut id, quod utile videbatur neque erat, assequi posset, et tamen muri causamopposuit, speciem honestatis nec probabilem nec sane idoneam. Peccavit igitur, pace vel Quirini vel Romuli dixerim.
And yet we are not to abandon our own interests and hand them over to others when we need them ourselves; each person must attend to his own advantage in whatever can be done without injury to another. Chrysippus put it neatly, as he did so many things: the man who runs in the stadium, he said, must put forth every effort and strain to win, but he has no business tripping up his competitor or pushing him aside with his hand; so in life it is not unjust for each person to seek what falls to his own use, but to wrest it from another is not right.
Nec tamen nostrae nobis utilitates omittendae sunt aliisque tradendae, cum iis ipsi egeamus, sed suae cuique utilitati, quod sine alterius iniuria fiat, serviendum est. Scite Chrysippus, ut multa: Qui stadium, inquit, currit, eniti et contendere debet, quam maxime possit, ut vincat, supplantare eum, quicum certet, aut manu depellere nullo modo debet; sic in vita sibi quemque petere, quod pertineat ad usum, non iniquum est, alteri deripere ius non est.
It is in friendships, however, that the demands of duty are most disturbed: both to withhold from a friend what you may rightly give, and to give what is not right, are contrary to duty. But on this whole topic the rule is brief and not difficult. What seem to be advantages — offices, riches, pleasures, and the rest of that kind — these are never to be preferred to friendship. On the other hand, a good man will not act against the commonwealth, or against an oath or sworn faith, for a friend’s sake — not even if he sits as judge on the friend’s very case; for he lays aside the character of friend when he puts on that of judge. He will grant this much to friendship: that he may prefer his friend’s cause to be a just one, and arrange the time for pleading the case, so far as the law allows.
Maxime autem perturbantur officia in amicitiis, quibus et non tribuere, quod recte possis, et tribuere, quod non sit aequum, contra officium est. Sed huius generis totius breve et non difficile praeceptum est. Quae enim videntur utilia, honores, divitiae, voluptates, cetera generis eiusdem, haec amicitiae numquam anteponenda sunt. At neque contra rem publicam neque contra ius iurandum ac fidem amici causa vir bonus faciet, ne si iudex quidem erit de ipso amico; ponit enim personam amici, cum induit iudicis. Tantum dabit amicitiae, ut veram amici causam esse malit, ut orandae litis tempus, quoad per leges liceat, accommodet.
But when he must deliver a verdict on oath, he will remember that he calls a god to witness — that is, in my judgment, his own mind, than which the god himself has given man nothing more divine. And so we have received from our ancestors the fine custom of asking a judge, if he has one in his court, what he can do consistently with his sworn obligation. That question reaches to what I said a moment ago: what a judge may properly grant a friend. If everything a friend wanted had to be done, such relationships ought to be called not friendships but conspiracies.
Cum vero iurato sententia dicenda erit, meminerit deum se adhibere testem, id est, ut ego arbitror, mentem suam, qua nihil homini dedit deus ipse divinius. Itaque praeclarum a maioribus accepimus morem rogandi iudicis, si eum teneremus, quae salva fide facere possit. Haec rogatio ad ea pertinet, quae paulo ante dixi honeste amico a iudice posse concedi; nam si omnia facienda sint, quae amici velint, non amicitiae tales, sed coniurationes putandae sint.
I speak, however, of ordinary friendships; among truly wise and perfect men there can be nothing of that kind. They tell of the Pythagoreans Damon and Phintias, who were so disposed toward each other that when the tyrant Dionysius had fixed a day of death for one of them, and that man asked for a few days to provide for his family, the other stood surety for his friend’s appearance, on the condition that if the first did not return, the surety must die in his place. When the condemned man came back on the appointed day, the tyrant, in admiration of their loyalty, asked to be enrolled as a third in their friendship.
Loquor autem de communibus amicitiis; nam in sapientibus viris perfectisque nihil potest esse tale. Damonem et Phintiam Pythagoreos ferunt hoc animo inter se fuisse, ut, cum eorum alteri Dionysius tyrannus diem necis destinavisset et is, qui morti addictus esset, paucos sibi dies commendandorum suorum causa postulavisset, vas factus sit alter eius sistendi, ut, si ille non revertisset, moriendum esset ipsi. Qui cum ad diem se recepisset, admiratus eorum fidem tyrannus petivit, ut se ad amicitiam tertium ascriberent.
When, therefore, what seems expedient in friendship is weighed against what is honorable, let the appearance of advantage fall, let honor prevail. When things that are not honorable are demanded in friendship, let scruple and good faith take precedence over friendship. In this way we shall arrive at the proper judgment of duty that we are seeking. In affairs of state, however, men err by the appearance of expediency all too often — as in the destruction of Corinth by our own countrymen; and still more harshly did the Athenians, who voted that the thumbs of the Aeginetans, strong as they were at sea, should be cut off. This seemed expedient: Aegina, from its nearness, threatened Piraeus too dangerously. But nothing cruel is expedient; cruelty is in the highest degree at war with human nature, which we are bound to follow.
Cum igitur id, quod utile videtur in amicitia, cum eo, quod honestum est, comparatur, iaceat utilitatis species, valeat honestas; cum autem in amicitia, quae honesta non sunt, postulabuntur, religio et fides anteponatur amicitiae. Sic habebitur is, quem exquirimus, dilectus officii. Sed utilitatis specie in re publica saepissime peccatur, ut in Corinthi disturbatione nostri; durius etiam Athenienses, qui sciverunt, ut Aeginetis, qui classe valebant, pollices praeciderentur. Hoc visum est utile; nimis enim imminebat propter propinquitatem Aegina Piraeo. Sed nihil, quod crudele, utile; est enim hominum naturae, quam sequi debemus, maxime inimica crudelitas.
They also do wrong who bar foreigners from using the cities and expel them — as Pennus did in the time of our fathers, and Papius recently. For it is right not to allow someone who is not a citizen to pass for one; the consuls Crassus and Scaevola, men of the highest wisdom, carried a law to that effect. But to bar foreigners from the use of the city altogether is quite inhuman. There are splendid examples of cases where the appearance of public advantage is despised for the sake of honor. Our commonwealth furnishes many such, none more so than during the Second Punic War; after the disaster at Cannae our ancestors showed more spirit than ever in times of success — not a sign of fear, not a word of peace. So great is the force of what is honorable that it obscures the very appearance of advantage.
Male etiam, qui peregrinos urbibus uti prohibent eosque exterminant, ut Pennus apud patres nostros, Papius nuper. Nam esse pro cive, qui civis non sit, rectum est non licere; quam legem tulerunt sapientissimi consules Crassus et Scaevola; usu vero urbis prohibere peregrinos sane inhumanum est. Illa praeclara, in quibus publicae utilitatis species prae honestate contemnitur. Plena exemplorum est nostra res publica cum saepe, tum maxime bello Punico secundo; quae Cannensi calamitate accepta maiores animos habuit quam umquam rebus secundis; nulla timoris significatio, nulla mentio pacis. Tanta vis est honesti, ut speciem utilitatis obscuret.
When the Athenians could no way withstand the Persian onslaught and resolved to abandon the city, leaving their wives and children at Troezen, embark their fleet, and defend the freedom of Greece by sea, a certain Cyrsilus who urged them to stay in the city and receive Xerxes was stoned to death. He seemed to be following the expedient; but there was no expediency there, with honor standing against it.
Athenienses cum Persarum impetum nullo modo possent sustinere statuerentque, ut urbe relicta coniugibus et liberis Troezene depositis naves conscenderent libertatemque Graeciae classe defenderent, Cyrsilum quendam suadentem ut in urbe manerent Xerxemque reciperent, lapidibus obruerunt. Atqui ille utilitatem sequi videbatur; sed ea nulla erat repugnante honestate.
Themistocles, after the victory in that war against Persia, said in public assembly that he had a plan of service to the state, but that it need not be known; he asked only that the people appoint someone with whom he could share it. Aristides was given. Themistocles told him that the Spartan fleet, which lay beached at Gytheum, could be secretly burned — and that by this act the power of Sparta would necessarily be broken. When Aristides heard this, he came before the assembly to great expectation and said: the plan Themistocles proposed was exceedingly useful, but by no means honorable. The Athenians accordingly judged that what was not honorable was not useful either, and they rejected the whole scheme outright on Aristides’ authority — a scheme they had not even heard. Better they than we, who grant pirates immunity and levy tribute on our allies. Let it stand, then: what is base is never useful — not even when you gain by it the very thing you thought useful; for this very thing, thinking it useful when it is base, is ruinous.
Themistocles post victoriam eius belli, quod cum Persis fuit, dixit in contione se habere consilium rei publicae salutare, sed id sciri non opus ese; postulavit, ut aliquem populus daret, quicum communicaret; datus est Aristides; huic ille, classem Lacedaemoniorum, quae subducta esset ad Gytheum, clam incendi posse, quo facto frangi Lacedaemoniorum opes necesse esset. Quod Aristides cum audisset, in contionem magna exspectatione venit dixitque perutile esse consilium, quod Themistocles afferret, sed minime honestum. Itaque Athenienses, quod honestum non esset, id ne utile quidem putaverunt totamque ear rem, quam ne audierant quidem, auctore Aristide repudiaverunt. Melius hi quam nos, qui piratas immunes, socios vectigales habemus. Maneat ergo, quod turpe sit, id numquam esse utile, ne tur quidem, cum id, quod esse utile putes, adipiscare; hoc enim ipsum, utile putare, quod turpe sit, calamitosum est.
But cases arise, as I said above, in which expediency appears to conflict with what is honorable, so that we must consider whether the conflict is genuine or whether the two can be reconciled. Such questions take this form: suppose, for instance, a good man has shipped a large cargo of grain from Alexandria to Rhodes, where there is famine and scarcity and the price of corn is desperately high; suppose further that this same man knows several other merchants have put out from Alexandria and has seen their ships under sail with full cargoes heading for Rhodes. Will he tell the Rhodians, or hold his tongue and sell his grain as dearly as he can? We are imagining a man both good and wise; the question we are asking concerns the deliberation and judgment of a man who would not conceal the facts from the Rhodians if he held it to be base, but is uncertain whether it is base at all.
Sed incidunt, ut supra dixi, saepe causae, cum repugnare utilitas honestati videatur, ut animadvertendum sit, repugnetne plane an possit cum honestate coniungi. Eius generis hae sunt quaestiones: si exempli gratia vir bonus Alexandrea Rhodum magnum frumenti nurerum advexerit in Rhodiorum inopia et fame summaque annonae caritate, si idem sciat complures mercatores Alexandrea solvisse navesque in cursu frumento onustas petentes Rhodum viderit, dicturusne sit id Rhodiis an silentio suum quam plurimo venditurus. Sapientem et bonum virum fingimus; de eius deliberatione et consultatione quaerimus, qui celaturus Rhodios non sit, si id turpe iudicet, sed dubitet, an turpe non sit.
In cases of this kind the view of Diogenes of Babylon, a great and weighty Stoic, regularly differs from that of his pupil Antipater, a man of the keenest mind. Antipater holds that everything must be disclosed, so that the buyer knows nothing the seller knows and has not told him; Diogenes holds that the seller is obliged to declare whatever defects the civil law requires him to declare, and for the rest to proceed without sharp dealing, and since he is selling, to aim at the best price he can get. "I brought the grain, I put it on the market, I am selling my own goods at no higher a price than others — perhaps even lower, given the abundance arriving. Who is wronged?"
In huius modi causis aliud Diogeni Babylonio videri solet, magno et gravi Stoico, aliud Antipatro, discipulo eius, homini acutissimo. Antipatro omnia patefacienda, ut ne quid om-nino, quod venditor norit, emptor ignoret, Diogeni venditorem, quatenus iure civili constitutum sit, dicere vitia oportere, cetera sine insidiis agere et, quoniam vendat, velle quam optime vendere. Advexi, exposui, vendo meum non pluris quain ceteri, fortasse etiam minoris, cum maior est copia. Cui fit iniuria?
Antipater’s line of reasoning rises from the other side: "What are you saying? You who ought to take thought for other men and serve human society, who were born under that law and hold those first principles of nature which you are bound to obey and follow — that your advantage is the common advantage and equally the common advantage is yours — will you conceal from men what abundance and supply are at their door?" Diogenes will perhaps reply as follows: "Concealing is one thing, staying silent another. I am not concealing anything from you right now when I fail to tell you what the nature of the gods is, or what the ultimate good is — knowledge that would benefit you more than information about the price of wheat; but it does not follow that whatever is useful for you to hear is thereby necessary for me to say."
Exoritur Antipatri ratio ex altera parte: Quid ais? tu cum horninibus consulere debeas et servire humanae societati eaque lege natus sis et ea habeas principia naturae, quibus parere et quae sequi debeas, ut utilitas tua communis sit utilitas vicissimque communis utilitas tua sit, celabis homines, quid iis adsit commoditatis et copiae? Respondebit Diogenes fortasse sic: Aliud est celare, aliud tacere; neque ego nune te celo, si tibi non dico, quae natura deorum sit, qui sit finis bonorum, quae tibi plus prodessent cognita quam tritici vilitas; sed non, quicquid tibi audire utile est, idem mihi dicere necesse est.
"On the contrary," Antipater will say, "it is necessary, if you remember that there is a fellowship among men bound together by nature." "I remember it," Diogenes will reply; "but is that fellowship such that nothing belongs to any individual? If it is, then nothing should be sold at all — only given away." You see that throughout this entire debate the point at issue is never stated as: "This, though base, I will do because it is expedient" — but rather, on one side, as: "This is expedient and therefore not base"; and on the other: "This must not be done because it is base." A good man brings these two adversaries before us; let us now resolve the case.
Immo vero, inquiet ille, necesse est, siquidem meministi esse inter homines natura coniunctam societatem. Memini, inquiet ille; sed num ista societas talis est, ut nihil suum cuiusque sit? Quod si ila est, ne vendendum quidem quicquam est, sed donandum. Vides in hac tota disceptatione non illud dici: Quamvis hoc turpe sit, tamen, quoniam expedit, faciam, sed ita expedire, ut turpe non sit, ex altera autem parte, ea re, quia turpe sit, non esse faciendum.
A good man is selling a house. The house has certain defects which he knows and others do not: it is unhealthy but held to be sound; every bedroom shows snakes; the timber is poor, the structure ruinous — none of which anyone but the owner knows. I ask: if the seller does not disclose any of this to the buyers and sells the house for far more than he expected to get — has he acted unjustly or dishonestly?
Vendat aedes vir bonus propter aliqua vitia, quae ipse norit, ceteri ignorent, pestilentes sint et habeantur salubres, ignoretur in omnibus cubiculis apparere serpentes, male materiatae sint, ruinosae, sed hoc praeter dominum nemo sciat; quaero, si haec emptoribus venditor non dixerit aedesque vendiderit pluris multo, quam se venditurun putarit, num id iniuste aut improbe fecerit.
He has, says Antipater. For what else is it than to fail to show a man who has lost his way the road? — an act consecrated at Athens with public curses. If this is not that, then it is something worse: to stand by and let a buyer rush headlong into catastrophe and into the gravest fraud through his own error. More than failing to show the road — it is deliberately leading another astray. Diogenes replies: "Did he compel you to buy? Did he even solicit you? He put on the market what he did not want; you bought what you did want. If those who advertise a villa as fine and well-built are not thought to have cheated, though it is neither fine nor soundly built, how much less has a man cheated who did not praise his house at all? Where the buyer’s own judgment operates, what room is there for the seller’s fraud? And if not everything one says is warranted, do you think everything one does not say is warranted too? What could be more foolish than for a seller to recite the defects of what he is selling? What more absurd than for an auctioneer, at the owner’s instruction, to cry: ’I am selling a house that is unhealthy’?"
Ille vero, inquit Antipater; quid est enim aliud erranti viam non monstrare, quod Athenis exsecrationibus publicis sanctum est, si hoc non est, emptorem pati ruere et per errorem in maximam fraudem incurrere? Plus etiam est quam viam non monstrare; nam est scientem in errorem alterum inducere. Diogenes contra: Num te emere coegit, qui ne hortatus quidem est? Ille, quod non placebat, proscripsit, tu, quod placebat, emisti. Quodsi, qui proscribunt villain bonam beneque aedificatam, non existimantur fefellisse, etiamsi illa nec bona est nec aedificata ratione, multo minus, qui domum non laudarunt. Ubi enim iudicium emptoris est, ibi fraus venditoris quae potest esse? Sin autem dictum non omne praestandum est, quod dictum non est, id praestandum putas? Quid vero est stultius quam venditorem eius rei, quam vendat, vitia narrare? quid autem tam absurdum, quam si domini iussu ita praeco praedicet: ’Domum pestilentem vendo’?
So in certain disputed cases one side defends what is honorable, the other argues expediency in such a way that what appears expedient is shown to be not only compatible with honor to do, but base to leave undone. This is that apparent conflict between the expedient and the honorable which so often seems to arise. These cases must be adjudicated; for we set them out not to leave them open but to resolve them.
Sic ergo in quibusdam causis dubiis ex altera parte defenditur honestas, ex altera ita de utilitate dicitur, ut id, quod utile videatur, non modo facere honestum sit, sed etiam non facere turpe. Haec est illa, quae videtur utilium fieri cum honestis saepe dissensio. Quae diiudicanda sunt; non enim, ut quaereremus, exposuimus, sed ut explicaremus.
Neither the grain-merchant, then, nor the house-seller ought, it seems to me, to have concealed anything from the buyers. Concealment is not simply keeping silent about something; it is the deliberate choice that those who have an interest in knowing something should remain ignorant of it, for the sake of your own gain. What kind of concealment is that, and what kind of man practices it? Everyone can see plainly enough: not an open man, not a straightforward man, not a candid man, not a just man, not a good man — a schemer rather, a shadow-dweller, a contriver, a deceiver, a cheat, a trickster, a worn old hand, a sly one. Is it not a bad bargain to earn all these names and more besides?
Non igitur videtur nec frumentarius ille Rhodios nec hic aedium venditor celare emptores debuisse. Neque enim id est celare, quicquid reticeas, sed cum, quod tu scias, id ignorare emolumenti tui causa velis eos, quorum intersit id scire. Hoc autem celandi genus quale sit et cuius hominis, quis non videt? Certe non aperti, non simplicis, non ingenui, non iusti, non viri boni, versuti potius, obscuri, astuti, fallacis, malitiosi, callidi, veteratoris, vafri. Haec tot et alia plura nonne inutile est vitiorum subire nomina?
And if those who stayed silent deserve censure, what are we to think of those who resorted to outright falsehood in their words? Gaius Canius — a Roman knight, a man of some wit and decent learning — had made his way to Syracuse, as he used to say himself, for a holiday, not on business, and was letting it be known that he wanted to buy some small garden property where he could invite friends and amuse himself without being pestered. When this got about, one Pythius, a banker at Syracuse, told him he had no gardens for sale, but that Canius was welcome to use his as his own; and at the same time he invited the man to dinner in the gardens the following day. Canius accepted. Pythius, who as a banker was on good terms with all classes, called his fishermen together and asked them to fish in front of his gardens the next morning; he told them exactly what he wanted them to do. Canius came to dinner on time; Pythius had laid on a lavish spread; a whole flotilla of boats lay before their eyes; each fisherman brought up what he had caught and laid his fish at Pythius’s feet.
Quodsi vituperandi, qui reticuerunt, quid de iis existimandum est, qui orationis vanitatem adhibuerunt? C. Canius, eques Romanus, nec infacetus et satis litteratus, cum se Syracusas otiandi, ut ipse dicere solebat, non negotiandi causa contulisset, dictitabat se hortulos aliquos emere velle, quo invitare amicos et ubi se oblectare sine interpellatoribus posset. Quod cum percrebruisset, Pythius ei quidam, qui argentariam faceret Syracusis, venales quidem se hortos non habere, sed licere uti Canio, si vellet, ut suis, et simul ad cenam hominem in hortos invitavit in posterum diem. Cum ille promisisset, tum Pythius, qui esset ut argentarius apud omnes ordines gratiosus, piscatores ad se convocavit et ab iis petivit, ut ante suos hortulos postridie piscarentur, dixitque, quid eos facere vellet. Ad cenam tempori venit Canius; opipare a Pythio apparatum convivium, cumbarum ante oculos multitudo; pro se quisque, quod ceperat, afferebat, ante pedes Pythi pisces abiciebantur.
Then Canius: "I ask you, Pythius — what is all this? So many fish, so many boats?" And Pythius: "What is surprising? This is where Syracuse keeps everything in the way of fish; this is where their fresh water is; this property is indispensable to those men." Canius was on fire with desire and pressed Pythius to sell. Pythius was reluctant at first. But in short — he got his way. The man, eager and rich, paid whatever Pythius asked, and bought the property furnished as it stood; he had the names entered in the accounts and the transaction completed. The next day Canius invited his friends; he arrived himself early on. He saw not a single thwart-pin. He asked a neighbor whether there was some fishermen’s holiday that he could see none of them. "No holiday that I know of," the man said; "but no one fishes here as a rule — so I was puzzled yesterday about what had happened."
Tum Canius: Quaeso, inquit, quid est hoc, Pythi? tantumne piscium? tantumne cumbarum? Et ille: Quid mirum? inquit, hoc loco est Syracusis quicquid est piscium, hic aquatio, hac villa isti carere non possunt. Incensus Canius cupiditate contendit a Pythio, ut venderet; gravate ille primo; quid multa? impetrat. Emit homo cupidus et locuples tanti, quanti Pythius voluit, et emit instructos; nomina facit, negotium conficit. Invitat Canius postridie familiares suos, venit ipse mature; scalmum nullum videt, quaerit ex proximo vicino, num feriae quaedam piscatorum essent, quod eos nullos videret. Nullae, quod sciam, inquit; sed hic piscari nulli solent; itaque heri mirabar, quid accidisset.
Canius was furious. But what could he do? My colleague and friend Gaius Aquilius had not yet introduced his formulas for fraud — the dolus malus actions — though in those very formulas, when he was asked what dolus malus was, he used to answer: when one thing is pretended and another done. A definition admirably put, as one would expect from a man skilled in making definitions. So Pythius, and all who do one thing while pretending another, are faithless, dishonest, and malicious. No act of theirs can be useful when it is stained with so many vices.
Stomachari Canius; sed quid faceret? nondum enim C. Aquilius, collega et familiaris meus, protulerat de dolo malo formulas; in quibus ipsis, cum ex eo quaereretur, quid esset dolus malus, respondebat: cum esset aliud simulatum, aliud actum. Hoc quidem sane luculente ut ab homine perito definiendi. Ergo et Pythius et omnes aliud agentes, aliud simulantes perfidi, improbi, malitiosi. Nullum igitur eorum factum potest utile esse, cum sit tot vitiis inquinatum.
And if Aquilius’s definition is sound, then all pretense and concealment must be banished from life entire. A good man will not pretend or conceal anything, whether to buy more cheaply or to sell more dearly. Moreover, this dolus malus had already been made actionable by law — guardianship under the Twelve Tables, defrauding of young men under the Lex Plaetoria — and without any statutory basis in the courts, where the formula adds the words ex fide bona, "in good faith." Among the other formulas these phrases especially stand out: in the arbitration for recovery of a wife’s dowry, melius aequius, "what is better and more equitable"; and in the action on fiduciary deposit, ut inter bonos bene agier, "that dealings be upright between good men." Can there be any trace of fraud in what is "better and more equitable"? Or when dealings are said to be "upright between good men," can anything be done by deceit or malice? Fraud, as Aquilius says, consists in pretense. All lying must therefore be expelled from dealings and contracts. The seller will not plant a shill to bid up the price; the buyer will not plant one to bid against himself. Each, if it comes to the point of a declaration, will make it once and once only.
Quodsi Aquiliana definitio vera est, ex omni vita simulatio dissimulatioque tollenda est. Ita, nec ut emat melius nec ut vendat, quicquam simulabit aut dissimulabit vir bonus. Atque iste dolus malus et legibus erat vindicatus, ut tutela duodecim tabulis, circumscriptio adulescentium lege Plaetoria, et sine lege iudiciis, in quibus additur EX FIDE BONA. Reliquorum autem iudiciorum haec verba maxime excellunt: in arbitrio rei uxoriae MELIUS AEQUIUS, in fiducia UT INTER BONOS BENE AGIER. Quid ergo? aut in eo, QUOD MELIUS AEQUIUS, potest ulla pars inesse fraudis? aut, cum dicitur INTER BONOS BENE AGIER, quicquam agi dolose aut malitiose potest? Dolus autem malus in simulatione, ut ait Aquilius, continetur. Tollendum est igitur ex rebus contrahendis omne mendacium; non illicitatorem venditor, non, qui contra se liceatur, emptor apponet; uterque, si ad eloquendum venerit, non plus quam semel eloquetur.
Quintus Scaevola, son of Publius, once required that a piece of land of which he was the buyer be named to him at a single price, and when the seller had done so, said he valued it at more, and added a hundred thousand sesterces. There is no one who denies this was the act of a good man; the wise men deny it, on the grounds that he had sold for less than he could have got. This then is that ruinous division: some they count good men, others wise men. Hence Ennius: "Wisdom is wasted on the wise man who cannot profit himself." True enough — if only Ennius and I agreed on what profit means.
Q. quidem Scaevola P. f., cum postulasset, ut sibi fundus, cuius emptor erat, semel indicaretur idque venditor ita fecisset, dixit se pluris aestimare; addidit centum milia. Nemo est, qui hoc viri boni fuisse neget, sapientis negant, ut si minoris, quam potuisset, vendidisset. Haec igitur est illa pernicies, quod alios bonos, alios sapientes existimant. Ex quo Ennius nequiquam sapere sapientem, qui ipse sibi prodesse non quiret. Vere id quidem, si, quid esset prodesse, mihi cum Ennio conveniret.
I find that Hecaton of Rhodes, the pupil of Panaetius, says in the books on duty he wrote for Quintus Tubero that the wise man’s duty in managing his own estate is to do nothing against custom, law, or established practice. We do not want riches for ourselves alone, after all, but for our children, our relations, our friends, and above all for the state; for the resources and means of individuals are the wealth of the community. Scaevola’s act, of which I spoke just now, can in no way satisfy this man; indeed Hecaton flatly says he will do nothing for his own profit that is not lawful. Such a man deserves neither great praise nor gratitude.
Hecatonem quidem Rhodium, discipulum Panaeti, video in iis libris, quos de officio scripsit Q. Tuberoni, dicere sapientis esse nihil contra mores, leges, instituta facientem habere rationem rei familiaris. Neque enim solum nobis divites esse volumus, sed liberis, propinquis, amicis maximeque rei publicae. Singulorum enim facultates et copiae divitiae sunt civitatis. Huic Scaevolae factum, de quo paulo ante dixi, placere nullo modo potest; etenim omnino tantum se negat facturum compendii sui causa, quod non liceat. Huic nec laus magna tribuenda nec gratia est.
But if both pretense and concealment constitute dolus malus, there are very few transactions in which that fraud does not play some part; or if a good man is one who helps whom he can and harms no one, then assuredly such a good man is not easily found. In sum: it is never useful to do wrong, because it is always base; and because it is always honorable to be a good man, it is always useful.
Sed, sive et simulatio et dissimulatio dolus malus est, perpaucae res sunt, in quibus non dolus malus iste versetur, sive vir bonus est is, qui prodest, quibus potest, nocet nemini, certe istum virum bonum non facile reperimus. Numquam igitur est utile peccare, quia semper est turpe, et, quia semper est honestum virum bonum esse, semper est utile.
Now, on the subject of property sales, our civil law has a firm rule: any defects known to the seller must be declared. For under the Twelve Tables it was enough to guarantee what had been formally stated aloud — the seller who denied those statements faced a penalty of double the price — but the jurists went further and established a penalty for silence as well: they ruled that whatever defect existed in a property, if the seller knew of it and did not name it expressly, he was bound to make it good.
Ac de iure quidem praediorum sanctum apud nos est iure civili, ut in iis vendendis vitia dicerentur, quae nota essent venditori. Nam, cum ex duodecim tabulis satis esset ea praestari, quae essent lingua nuncupata, quae qui infitiatus esset, dupli poenam subiret, a iuris consultis etiam reticentiae poena est constituta; quicquid enim esset in praedio vitii, id statuerunt, si venditor sciret, nisi nominatim dictum esset, praestari oportere.
Consider what happened when the augurs were about to conduct an augury on the Citadel and ordered Tiberius Claudius Centumalus, who owned a building on the Caelian Hill, to demolish those parts of it whose height interfered with the taking of auspices. Claudius put the block up for sale and sold it; Publius Calpurnius Lanarius bought it. The augurs gave him the same notice. When Calpurnius had demolished the building and discovered that Claudius had put it up for sale only after being ordered by the augurs to demolish it, he brought him before an arbitrator with the formula: whatever he ought by good faith to give or do for him. The verdict was pronounced by Marcus Cato, father of the Cato who is ours — for as other men are named from their fathers, this one, who was the father of that great light, is rightly named from his son. The judge ruled that since the seller had known of the defect at the time of sale and had not disclosed it, he was bound to make good the buyer’s loss.
Ut, cum in arce augurium augures acturi essent iussissentque Ti. Claudium Centumalum, qui aedes in Caelio monte habebat, demoliri ea, quorum altitudo officeret auspiciis, Claudius proscripsit insulam vendidit, emit P. Calpurnius Lanarius. Huic ab auguribus illud idem denuntiatum est. Itaque Calpurnius cum demolitus esset cognossetque Claudium aedes postea proscripsisse, quam esset ab auguribus demoliri iussus, arbitrum ilium adegit, QUICQUID SIBI DARE FACERE OPORTERET EX FIDE BONA. M. Cato sententiam dixit, huius nostri Catonis pater (ut enim ceteri ex patribus, sic hic, qui illud lumen progenuit, ex filio est nominandus)—is igitur iudex ita pronuntiavit: cum in vendendo rem eam scisset et non pronuntiasset, emptori damnum praestari oportere.
He held, then, that it falls under good faith for the buyer to be informed of a defect the seller knows of. If that judgment was right, then the grain merchant I described was not acting rightly, nor was the seller of the plague-ridden house, in keeping silent. But silences of this kind cannot be reached by the civil law; those that can be reached, however, are firmly held. Marcus Marius Gratidianus, a kinsman of mine, had sold to Gaius Sergius Orata a house which he himself had bought from that same man only a few years before. The property was encumbered by a servitude, but Marius had not declared this in the conveyance. The matter was brought to court. Crassus appeared for Orata, Antonius for Gratidianus. Crassus pressed the law: that a seller who knowingly failed to declare a defect was bound to make it good. Antonius argued equity: since the servitude had been no secret to Sergius, who had originally sold the house, there had been no need to declare it, and a man could not be said to have been deceived who held what he had bought with full knowledge of its legal standing.
Ergo ad fidem bonam statuit pertinere notum esse emptori vitium, quod nosset venditor. Quod si recte iudicavit, non recte frumentarius ille, non recte aedium pestilentium venditor tacuit. Sed huius modi reticentiae iure civili conlprehendi non possunt; quae autem possunt, diligenter tenentur. M. Marius Gratidianus, propinquus noster, C. Sergio Oratae vendiderat aedes eas, quas ab eodem ipse paucis ante annis emerat. Eae serviebant, sed hoc in mancipio Marius non dixerat. Adducta res in iudicium est. Oratam Crassus, Gratidianum defendebat Antonius. Ius Crassus urguebat, quod vitii venditor non dixisset sciens, id oportere praestari, aequitatem Antonius, quoniam id vitium ignotum Sergio non fuisset, qui illas aedes vendidisset, nihil fuisse necesse dici, nec eum esse deceptum, qui, id, quod emerat, quo iure esset, teneret.
What is the point of all this? To show you that our ancestors had no patience for sharp dealing. But legal rules and philosophy do away with sharp dealing by different means: the law, so far as it can lay hold of it with its hand; philosophy, so far as reason and understanding can reach. Reason, then, demands this: no scheming, no dissembling, no deception. Does it count as setting a trap to put out bait — even if you do not intend to flush or drive the quarry? Wild animals themselves, with no one in pursuit, often fall into the net. So when you list a house for sale, put up a sign like a net, and sell a home riddled with defects — if some unwary buyer runs into it, have you set no trap?
Quorsus haec? Ut illud intellegas, non placuisse maioribus nostris astutos. Sed aliter leges, aliter philosophi tollunt astutias, leges, quatenus manu tenere possunt, philosophi, quatenus ratione et intellegentia. Ratio ergo hoc postulat, ne quid insidiose, ne quid simulate, ne quid fallaciter. Suntne igitur insidiae tendere plagas, etiarnsi excitaturus non sis nec agitaturus? ipsae enim ferae nullo insequente saepe incidunt. Sic tu aedes proscribas, tabulam tamquam plagam ponas, domum propter vitia vendas, in ear aliquis incurrat imprudens?
I can see that, given the corruption of our habits, this is held neither shameful by custom nor prohibited by statute or civil law. Yet the law of nature forbids it. For human society — and though I have said this often, I must say it yet again — extends in its widest reach to all men without exception; within that comes the narrower fellowship of those who share a nation, and narrower still of those who share a city. Our ancestors accordingly chose to distinguish the law of nations from the civil law: what is civil law is not necessarily also the law of nations, but what is the law of nations ought also to be civil law. We, however, hold no solid and clearly stamped likeness of true law and genuine justice; we work with shadows and images. Would that we followed even those — for they are drawn from nature’s finest and truest patterns.
Hoc quamquam video propter depravationem consuetudinis neque more turpe haberi neque aut lege sanciri aut iure civili, tamen naturae lege sanctum est. Societas est enim (quod etsi saepe dictum est, dicendum est tamen saepius), latissime quidem quae pateat, omnium inter omnes, interior eorum, qui eiusdem gentis sint, propior eorum, qui eiusdem civitatis. Itaque maiores aliud ius gentium, aliud ius civile esse voluerunt; quod civile, non idem continuo gentium, quod autem gentium, idem civile esse debet. Sed nos veri iuris germanaeque iustitiae solidam et expressam effigiem nullam tenemus, umbra et imaginibus utimur. Eas ipsas utinam sequeremur! feruntur enim ex optimis naturae et veritatis exemplis.
Consider what force those words carry: that I not be cheated or defrauded through you or your good faith! And those golden ones: that dealings between good men be conducted well and without fraud! But who the good men are, and what it means to deal well — that is a great question. Quintus Scaevola, the pontifex maximus, used to say that the greatest force lay in all those arbitrations to which the phrase ex fide bona — “in accordance with good faith” — was appended, and that the name of good faith spread itself across the widest ground: it ran, he said, through guardianships, partnerships, trusts, mandates, purchases, sales, lettings, hirings — all the dealings on which the life of society is built. In these cases, he held, it was the mark of a great judge to determine what each party owed the other, especially since the judgments in most of them could run in either direction.
Nam quanti verba illa: UTI NE PROPTER TE FIDEMVE TUAM CAPTUS FRAUDATUSVE SIM! quam illa aurea: UT INTER BONOS BENE AGIER OPORTET ET SINE FRAUDATIONE! Sed, qui sint boni, et quid sit bene agi, magna quaestio est. Q. quidem Scaevola, pontifex maximus, summam vim esse dicebat in omnibus iis arbitriis, in quibus adderetur EX FIDE BONA, fideique bonae nomen existimabat manare latissime, idque versari in tutelis societatibus, fiduciis mandatis, rebus emptis venditis, conductis locatis, quibus vitae societas contineretur; in iis magni esse iudicis statuere, praesertim cum in plerisque essent iudicia contraria, quid quemque cuique praestare oporteret.
Sharp dealing, then, must be rooted out — and that malice which wants to pass itself off as wisdom but stands as far from it as can be. For wisdom is seated in the discernment of good and evil; malice, if everything that is dishonorable is also evil, sets evil before good. And it is not only in the sale of land that the civil law, derived from nature, punishes malice and fraud: in the sale of slaves too all fraud on the seller’s part is excluded. The seller who was bound to know about health, liability to flight, and past thefts is answerable under the aediles’ edict. The case of heirs is different.
Quocirca astutiae tollendae sunt eaque malitia, quae volt illa quidem videri se esse prudentiam, sed abest ab ea distatque plurimum. Prudentia est enim locata in dilectu bonorum et malorum, malitia, si omnia, quae turpia sunt, mala sunt, mala bonis ponit ante. Nec vero in praediis solum ius civile ductum a natura malitiam fraudemque vindicat, sed etiam in mancipiorum venditione venditoris fraus omnis excluditur. Qui enim scire debuit de sanitate, de fuga, de furtis, praestat edicto aedilium. Heredum alia causa est.
From this it follows — since nature is the source of law — that it accords with nature for no man to prey on another’s ignorance. Nor can any greater ruin of human life be found than in malice that wears the mask of wisdom. It is from this that all those countless cases arise in which the expedient appears to war with what is honorable. How rare is the man who, if he knew he would go unpunished and that no one would ever know, could hold himself back from wrong?
Ex quo intellegitur, quoniam iuris natura fons sit, hoc secundum naturam esse, neminem id agere, ut ex alterius praedetur inscitia. Nec ulla pernicies vitae maior inveniri potest quam in malitia simulatio intellegentiae; ex quo ista innumerabilia nascuntur, ut utilia cum honestis pugnare videantur. Quotus enim quisque reperietur, qui impunitate et ignoratione omnium proposita abstinere possit iniuria?
Let us put it to the test, if you will — and in examples where common people may perhaps see nothing wrong. We need not deal here with assassins, poisoners, forgers, thieves, and embezzlers; they are to be worn down not with the arguments of philosophers but with chains and prison. Let us consider instead what men do who are held to be good. Certain persons brought a forged will from Greece to Rome in the name of Lucius Minucius Basilus, a man of great wealth. To make it easier to establish, they named as co-heirs Marcus Crassus and Quintus Hortensius, the most powerful men of that generation. These men, though they suspected the will was a forgery, were not themselves conscious of any wrongdoing; and so they did not refuse a small gift from another man’s crime. Is that enough, then, for them to appear guiltless? In my judgment, no — though the one I loved while he lived, and the other I do not hate now that he is dead.
Periclitemur, si placet, et in iis quidem exemplis, in quibus peccari volgus hominum fortasse non putet. Neque enim de sicariis, veneficis, testamentariis, furibus, peculatoribus hoc loco disserendum est, qui non verbis sunt et disputatione philosophorum, sed vinclis et carcere fatigandi, sed haec consideremus, quae faciunt ii, qui habentur boni. L. Minuci Basili, locupletis hominis, falsum testamentum quidam e Graecia Romamn attulerunt. Quod quo facilius optinerent, scripserunt heredes secum M. Crassum et Q. Hortensium, homines eiusdem aetatis potentissimos; qui cum illud falsum esse suspicarentur, sibi autem nullius essent conscii culpae, alieni facinoris munusculum non repudiaverunt. Quid ergo? satin est hoc, ut non deliquisse videantur? Mihi quidem non videtur, quamquam alterum vivum amavi, alterum non odi mortuum;
But when Basilus had wished his sister’s son, Marcus Satrius, to bear his name and had made him his heir — the same Satrius who is patron of the Picene and Sabine territory; what a shameful mark on the age, that that name should survive in such hands! — it was not right that the leading men of the state should get the estate while nothing came to Satrius but the name. For if a man who fails to prevent or repel an injustice when he is able to is himself acting unjustly — as I argued in the first book — what must we think of one who not merely fails to resist an injustice but actually assists it? Even genuine inheritances, to my mind, are not honorable when they are sought through fawning flattery, through the performance of services not in truth but in pretense. And yet in cases of this kind it seems, at times, that expediency and honor pull in opposite directions.
sed, cum Basilus M. Satrium, sororis filium, nomen suum ferre voluisset eumque fecisset heredem (hunc dico patronum agri Piceni et Sabini; o turpem notam temporum nomen illorum!), non erat aequum principes civis rem habere, ad Satrium nihil praeter nomen pervenire. Etenim, si is, qui non defendit iniuriam neque propulsat, cum potest, iniuste facit, ut in primo libro disserui, qualis habendus est is, qui non modo non repellit, set etiam adiuvat iniuriam? Mihi quidem etiam verae hereditates non honestae videntur, si sunt malitiosis blanditiis, officiorum non veritate, sed simulatione quaesitae. Atqui in talibus rebus aliud utile interdum, aliud honestum videri solet.
That is an error. For the rule of expediency and the rule of honor are one and the same. Whoever fails to see this will find no fraud, no crime, beyond his reach. He will think: “That course is no doubt honorable, but this one pays” — and with that error he will dare to sever what nature has joined together, which is the very source of all fraud, all wrongdoing, all crime. Suppose a good man had the power that, if he snapped his fingers, his name would slip into the wills of wealthy men — he would not use that power, not even if he were certain no one would ever suspect it. But grant that power to Marcus Crassus, so that by a snap of the fingers he could be written in as heir where he was not truly heir — believe me, he would dance for joy in the Forum. The just man, however, the man we mean when we say a man is good, takes nothing from anyone to transfer to himself. Whoever marvels at this admits he does not know what a good man is.
Falso; nam eadem utilitatis, quae honestatis, est regula. Qui hoc non perviderit, ab hoc nulla fraus aberit, nullum facinus. Sic enim cogitans: Est istuc quidem honestum, verum hoc expedit, res a natura copulatas audebit errore divellere, qui fons est fraudium, maleficiorum, scelerum omnium. Itaque, si vir bonus habeat hanc vim, ut, si digitis concrepuerit, possit in locupletium testamenta nomen eius inrepere, hac vi non utatur, ne si exploratum quidem habeat id omnino neminem umquam suspicaturum. At dares hanc vim M. Crasso, ut digitorum percussione heres posset scriptus esse, qui re vera non esset heres, in foro, mihi crede, saltaret. Homo autem iustus isque, quem sentimus virum bonum, nihil cuiquam, quod in se transferat, detrahet. Hoc qui admiratur, is se, quid sit vir bonus, nescire fateatur.
But if anyone cares to unroll the conception of a good man that is folded up in his mind, he will come to understand for himself that the good man is one who helps those he can and harms no one except when provoked by wrong. What then? Does the man who contrives — by some poison, as it were — to displace the true heirs and step into their place, not harm anyone? Let him not do, some will say, what pays and profits him? No: let him understand that nothing is profitable, nothing expedient, that is unjust. Whoever has not learned this lesson will never be a good man.
At vero, si qui voluerit animi sui complicatam notionem evolvere, iam se ipse doceat cum virum bonum esse, qui prosit, quibus possit, noceat nemini nisi lacessitus iniuria. Quid ergo? hic non noceat, qui quodam quasi veneno perficiat, ut veros heredes moveat, in eorum locum ipse succedat? Non igitur faciat, dixerit quis, quod utile sit, quod expediat? Immo intellegat nihil nec expedire nec utile esse, quod sit iniustum; hoc qui non didicerit, bonus vir esse non poterit.
As a boy I used to hear from Gaius Fimbria, a man of consular rank, that our father had once served as judge in the case of Marcus Lutatius Pinthia, a thoroughly honorable Roman knight, who had entered into a wager on the condition that he was a man of good character. Fimbria declared that he would never pronounce on that matter: otherwise he would either strip a man of established probity of his reputation by ruling against him, or appear to have ruled that someone was a man of good character — when in fact that status rests on an endless accumulation of duties and distinctions. This good man, then — recognized as such by Fimbria, and not only by Socrates — can plainly never suppose that anything is expedient which is not also honorable. And so such a man will dare not only to do nothing but even to think nothing that he would not be willing to proclaim aloud. Is it not shameful that philosophers should hesitate over questions which even plain country people do not hesitate over? From them has come that proverb, worn smooth by age: when they want to praise someone’s reliability and goodness they say he is a man worth matching fingers with in the dark. What does that amount to, if not this: nothing is expedient that is not also fitting, even if you could gain it with no one there to refute you?
C. Fimbriam consularem audiebam de patre nostro puer iudicem M. Lutatio Pinthiae fuisse, equiti Romano sane honesto, cum is sponsionem fecisset. NI VIR BONUS ESSET. Itaque ei dixisse Fimbriam se illam rem numquam iudicaturum, ne aut spoliaret fama probatum hominem, si contra iudicavisset, aut statuisse videretur virum bonum esse aliquem, cum ea res innumerabilibus officiis et laudibus contineretur. Huic igitur viro bono, quem Fimbria etiam, non modo Socrates noverat, nullo modo videri potest quicquam esse utile, quod non honestum sit. Itaque talis vir non modo facere, sed ne cogitare quidem quicquam audebit, quod non audeat praedicare. Haec non turpe est dubitare philosophos, quae ne rustici quidem dubitent? a quibus natum est id, quod iam contritum est vetustate, proverbium. Cum enim fidem alicuius bonitatemque laudant, dignum esse dicunt, quicum in tenebris mices. Hoc quam habet vim nisi illam, nihil expedire, quod non deceat, etiamsi id possis nullo refellente optinere?
Do you see what this proverb implies — that no pardon can be given to that famous Gyges, nor to the man I was imagining a moment ago who could sweep in all the inheritances in the world with a snap of his fingers? For just as what is shameful can never become honorable however deeply concealed, so what is not honorable can never be made expedient when nature herself stands against it and fights back.
Videsne hoc proverbio neque Gygi illi posse veniam dari neque huic, quem paulo ante fingebam digitorum percussione hereditates omnium posse converrere? Ut enim, quod turpe est, id, quamvis occultetur, tamen honestum fieri nullo modo potest, sic, quod honestum non est, id utile ut sit, effici non potest adversante et repugnante natura.
“But,” someone will say, “when the rewards are very great, there is good cause to go wrong.” Gaius Marius had long been far from any hope of the consulship and had been lying idle for seven years since his praetorship, with no prospect, it seemed, of ever standing for the consulship at all. Yet when Quintus Metellus, that finest of men and citizens, under whom he was serving as legate, sent him to Rome on dispatch, he went before the Roman people and brought false charges against Metellus, his own commander, claiming that Metellus was dragging the war out, and promising that if the people made him consul he would deliver Jugurtha, alive or dead, into the power of Rome within a short time. And so he was indeed made consul — but he departed from good faith and justice, in that he brought an excellent and weighty citizen, his own general, the man who had dispatched him, into popular hatred through a false accusation.
At enim, cum permagna praemia sunt, est causa peccandi. C. Marius cum a spe consulatus longe abesset et iam septimum annum post praeturam iaceret, neque petiturus umquam consulatum videretur, Q. Metellum, cuius legatus erat, summum virum et civem, cum ab eo, imperatore suo, Romam missus esset, apud populum Romanum criminatus est bellum illum ducere; si se consulem fecissent, brevi tempore aut vivum aut mortuum Iugurtham se in potestatem populi Romani redacturum. Itaque factus est ille quidem consul, sed a fide iustitiaque discessit, qui optimum et gravissimum civem, cuius legatus et a quo missus esset, in invidiam falso crimine adduxerit.
Nor did our kinsman Gratidianus discharge the duty of a good man at the time when he was praetor and the college of praetors had brought in the tribunes of the plebs to draw up a common policy on the currency — for in those days the coinage had become so unstable that no one could know what he was worth. Together they drafted a joint edict with its penalties and procedures, and agreed that they would all mount the Rostra together after noon to announce it. The others dispersed in various directions; Marius came straight from the benches to the Rostra and announced on his own what had been drawn up jointly. That action, if you want to know, brought him tremendous glory: statues in every neighborhood, incense and candles set before them — in short, no man was ever more beloved by the people.
Ne noster quidem Gratidianus officio viri boni functus est tum, cum praetor esset collegiumque praetorium tribuni plebi adhibuissent, ut res nummaria de communi sententia constitueretur; iactabatur enim temporibus illis nummus sic, ut nemo posset scire, quid haberet. Conscripserunt communiter edictum cum poena atque iudicio constitueruntque, ut omnes simul in rostra post meridiem escenderent. Et ceteri quidem alius alio, Marius ab subselliis in rostra recta idque, quod communiter compositum fuerat, solus edixit. Et ea res, si quaeris, ei magno honori fuit; omnibus vicis statuae, ad eas tus, cerei; quid multa? nemo umquam multitudini fuit carior.
These are the cases that sometimes unsettle the mind in deliberation, when the wrong that will be done to justice appears to be no great matter, while the advantage arising from it appears very great — as it seemed to Marius no very disgraceful thing to steal from his colleagues and the tribunes of the plebs a moment of popular favor, but an enormous advantage to be made consul by that means, which was his aim at the time. But there is one rule for all, and I want you to know it thoroughly: either let what seems expedient not be dishonorable, or, if it is dishonorable, let it not seem expedient. Can we then judge either that Marius, or this other man, a good man? Test and examine your own understanding, to see what is the image, the form, the idea of a good man that dwells in it. Does it fall to a good man to lie for his own gain, to slander, to steal a march, to deceive? Surely nothing could be further from it.
Haec sunt, quae conturbent in deliberatione non numquam, cum id, in quo violatur aequitas, non ita magnum, illud autem, quod ex eo paritur, permagnum videtur, ut Mario praeripere collegis et tribunis plebi popularem gratiam non ita turpe, consulem ob eam rem fieri, quod sibi tum proposuerat, valde utile videbatur. Sed omnium una regula est, quam tibi cupio esse notissimam, aut illud, quod utile videtur, turpe ne sit aut, si turpe est, ne videatur esse utile. Quod igitur? possumusne aut ilium Marium virum bonum iudicare aut hunc? Explica atque excute intellegentiam tuam, ut videas, quae sit in ea species forma et notio viri boni. Cadit ergo in virum bonum mentiri emolumenti sui causa, criminari, praeripere, fallere? Nihil profecto minus.
Is there any matter of such weight, or any advantage so much to be desired, that it is worth losing the luster and the name of a good man? What could expediency, so called, possibly bring us that is commensurate with what it takes away, if it has stripped us of the name of a good man and robbed us of good faith and justice? For what difference does it make whether a man transforms himself from a human being into a beast outright, or carries the inward savagery of a beast beneath the outward form of a man? And again: those who trample all that is right and honorable underfoot so long as they may gain power — are they not doing exactly what the man did who chose to have as his father-in-law the one by whose audacity he himself might be powerful? He thought it supremely expedient to have the greatest influence through another man’s unpopularity; he did not see how unjust to his country and how dishonorable that was. And the father-in-law himself always had on his lips those Greek verses from the Phoenissae — which I shall render as best I can, roughly perhaps, but clearly enough to convey the meaning: If wrong must be done, let it be done for a kingdom’s sake; in all else, keep your piety. A monstrous utterance — or rather it is Euripides who is monstrous, for making the one exception that is the most criminal thing of all.
Est ergo ulla res tanti aut commodum ullum tam expetendum, ut viri boni et splendorem et nomen amittas? Quid est, quod afferre tantum utilitas ista, quae dicitur, possit, quantum auferre, si boni viri nomen eripuerit, fidem iustitiamque detraxerit? Quid enim interest, utrum ex homine se convertat quis in beluam an hominis figura immanitatem gerat beluae? Quid? qui omnia recta et honesta neglegunt, dum modo potentiam consequantur, nonne idem faciunt, quod is, qui etiam socerum habere voluit eum, cuius ipse audacia potens esset? Utile ei videbatur plurimum posse alterius invidia; id quam iniustum in patriam et quam turpe esset, non videbat. Ipse autem socer in ore semper Graecos versus de Phoenissis habebat, quos dicam, ut potero, incondite fortasse, sed tamen, ut res possit intellegi: Nam sí violandum est Iús, regnandi grátia Violándum est; aliis rébus pietatém colas. Capitalis Eteocles vel potius Euripides, qui id unum, quod omnum sceleratissimum fuerit, exceperit!
Why then do we go collecting petty cases — inheritances, trading deals, fraudulent sales? Here before you stands a man who lusted to be king of the Roman people and master of all nations, and carried it through! If anyone calls such an ambition honorable, he is out of his mind; for he is endorsing the destruction of law and liberty and taking a hideous, abhorrent tyranny for glory. But if a man admits that it is not honorable to be king in a city that was free and should remain free, yet says that for the man who can manage it, it is expedient — with what rebuke, or with what reproach rather, should I attempt to tear him from so great an error? Can it be expedient, by the immortal gods, for anyone to commit the most abominable and atrocious parricide against his country, even if the man who has bound himself to that crime is hailed as “father” by the citizens he has crushed? Expediency, then, must be governed by honor — and so governed that these two are seen to differ in word, but in substance to sound as one.
Quid igitur minuta colligimus, hereditates, mercaturas, venditiones fraudulentas? ecce tibi, qui rex populi Romani dominusque omnium gentium esse concupiverit idque perfecerit! Hanc cupiditatem si honestam quis esse dicit, amens est; probat enim legum et libertatis interitum earumque oppressionem taetram et detestabilem gloriosam putat. Qui autem fatetur honestum non esse in ea civitate, quae libera fuerit quaeque esse debeat, regnare, sed ei, qui id facere possit, esse utile, qua hunc obiurgatione aut quo potius convicio a tanto errore coner avellere? Potest enim, di immortales! cuiquam esse utile foedissimum et taeterrimum parricidium patriae, quamvis is, qui se eo obstrinxerit, ab oppressis civibus parens nominetur? Honestate igitur dirigenda utilitas est, et quidem sic, ut haec duo verbo inter se discrepare, re unum sonare videantur.
In the common opinion I find no advantage that can be greater than being king; and yet when I begin to bring reason back to the truth, I find nothing less expedient for the man who has won it unjustly. For can anguish, anxiety, and fear by day and by night, a life beset by treachery and thick with peril — can any of this be expedient for anyone? “Many are unjust and faithless to a king; few are well-disposed,” says Accius. But to what king? The one who held his throne by right, as the heir of Tantalus and Pelops. How much more do you think those words apply to the king who, with the army of the Roman people, had crushed the Roman people themselves, and compelled a city that was not only free but mistress of nations to serve him?
Non habeo, ad volgi opinionem quae maior utilitas quam regnandi esse possit; nihil contra inutilius ei, qui id iniuste consecutus sit,invenio,cum ad veritatem coepi revocare rationem. Possunt enim cuiquam esse utiles angores, sollicitudines, diurni et nocturni metus, vita insidiarur periculorumque plenissima? Múlti iniqui atque ínfideles régno, pauci bénivoli, inquit Accius. At cui regno? Quod a Tantalo et Pelope proditum iure optinebatur. Nam quanto pluris ei regi putas, qui exercitu populi Romani populum ipsum Romanum oppressisset civitatemque non modo liberam, sed etiam gentibus imperantem servire sibi coëgisset?
What stains of conscience do you think he had in his soul, what wounds? Whose life, moreover, can be truly advantageous to him if the terms of that life are such that whoever destroys it will stand in the highest favor and glory? But if things that seem supremely advantageous are not so, because they are full of shame and dishonor, it ought by now to be thoroughly plain that nothing is expedient which is not honorable.
Hunc tu quas conscientiae labes in animo censes habuisse, quae vulnera? Cuius autem vita ipsi potest utilis esse, eum eius vitae ea condicio sit, ut, qui illam eripuerit, in maxima et gratia futurus sit et gloria? Quodsi haec utilia non sunt, quae maxime videntur, quia plena sunt dedecoris ac turpitudinis, satis persuasum esse debet nihil esse utile, quod non honestum sit.
This principle has indeed been affirmed many times on other occasions, and in particular during the war with Pyrrhus, by the consul Gaius Fabricius in his second consulship and by our Senate. When King Pyrrhus had made war on the Roman people of his own accord, and the contest for supremacy was with a noble and powerful king, a deserter came from his camp to Fabricius and promised that, for a reward, he would return to Pyrrhus’s camp as secretly as he had come, and kill him with poison. Fabricius saw to it that the man was taken back to Pyrrhus, and this act of his was commended by the Senate. Yet if it was the appearance of expediency and popular esteem we were after, that one deserter would have removed a great war and a dangerous opponent of Rome’s supremacy; but it would have been great dishonor and infamy to have defeated by crime, not by courage, the man with whom we were competing for glory.
Quamquam id quidem cum saepe alias, tum Pyrrhi bello a C. Fabricio consule iterum et a senatu nostro iudicatum est. Cum enim rex Pyrrhus populo Romano bellum ultro intulisset, cumque de imperio certamen esset cum rege generoso ac potenti, perfuga ab eo venit in castra Fabrici eique est pollicitus, si praemium sibi proposuisset, se, ut clam venisset, sic clam in Pyrrhi castra rediturum et eum veneno necaturum. Hunc Fabricius reducendum curavit ad Pyrrhum, idque eius facturr laudatum a senatu est. Atqui, si speciem utilitatis opinionemque quaerimus, magnum illud bellum perfuga unus et gravem adversarium imperii sustulisset, sed magnum dedecus et flagitium, quicum laudis certamen fuisset, eum non virtute, sed scelere superatum.
Which was the more expedient, then — for Fabricius, who was in this city what Aristides was in Athens, or for our Senate, which never severed expediency from worth — to contend with the enemy in arms or in poison? If command is to be sought for the sake of glory, let crime be absent, for there can be no glory in crime; if it is power itself that is sought by whatever means, it cannot be expedient with infamy attached to it. That resolution of Lucius Philippus, son of Quintus, was therefore not expedient either: that those states which Lucius Sulla had made free in exchange for money by a decree of the Senate should again become tributaries, and that we should not return the money they had paid for their freedom. The Senate assented. A shameful exercise of power! The good faith of pirates is better than the good faith of the Senate. “But the revenues were increased — it is therefore expedient.” How long will people dare to call anything expedient that is not honorable?
Utrum igitur utilius vel Fabricio, qui talis in hac urbe, qualis Aristides Athenis, fuit, vel senatui nostro, qui numquam utilitatem a dignitate seiunxit, armis cum hoste certare an venenis? Si gloriae causa imperium expetendum est, scelus absit, in quo non potest esse gloria; sin ipsae opes expetuntur quoquo modo, non poterunt utiles esse cum infamia. Non igitur utilis illa L. Philippi Q. f. sententia, quas civitates L. Sulla pecunia accepta ex senatus consulto liberavisset, ut eae rursus vectigales essent neque iis pecuniam, quam pro libertate dederant, redderemus. Ei senatus est assensus. Turpe imperio! piratarum enim melior fides quam senatus. At aucta vectigalia, utile igitur. Quousque audebunt dicere quicquam utile, quod non honestum?
Can hatred and infamy be expedient for any empire, which ought to rest on the glory and goodwill of its allies? I have often disagreed even with my dear Cato: he seemed to me to take too rigid a line in defending the treasury and the revenues, in refusing everything to the tax-collectors, much to the allies — when we ought to have been generous to the latter and to have dealt with the former as we customarily deal with our own tenants. And so too Curio was wrong when he would say that the cause of the Transpadanes was just, but always added: “Let expediency prevail!” He should have shown instead that their cause was not just, because it was not in the Republic’s interest — not confessed, while saying it was not expedient, that it was just.
potest autem ulli imperio, quod gloria debet fultum esse et benivolentia sociorum, utile esse odium et infamia? Ego etiam cum Catone meo saepe dissensi; nimis mihi praefracte videbatur aerarium vectigaliaque defendere, omnia publicanis negare, multa sociis, cum in hos benefici esse deberemus, cum illis sic agere, ut cum colonis nostris soleremus, eoque magis, quod illa ordinum coniunctio ad salutem rei publicae pertinebat. Male etiam Curio, cum causam Transpadanorum aequam esse dicebat, semper autem addebat: Vincat utilitas! Potius doceret non esse aequam, quia non esset utilis rei publieae, quam, cum utilem non esse diceret, esse aequam fateretur.
The sixth book of Hecato’s On Duties is full of questions like these: is it the act of a good man, in a time of severe famine, not to feed his slaves? He argues both sides, but in the end directs duty more by what he takes to be expediency than by humanity. He asks: if a cargo must be thrown overboard at sea, should one sacrifice a valuable horse or a cheap little slave? One consideration pulls toward property, another toward humanity. If a fool has seized the one plank from a shipwreck, will the wise man wrest it from him by force if he can? Hecato says no, because it would be unjust. What, then — will the ship’s owner take back what is his? Not at all; no more than he would wish to throw a passenger overboard into the deep because the ship is his. For until the ship has reached its destination, it does not belong to the owner but to the passengers.
Plenusestsextus liber de officiis Hecatonis talium quaestionum: sitne boni viri in maxima caritate annonae familiam non alere. In utramque partem disputat, sed tamen ad extremum utilitate, ut putat, officium dirigit magis quam humanitate. Quaerit, si in mari iactura facienda sit, equine pretiosi potius iacturam faciat an servoli vilis. Hic alio res familiaris, alio ducit humanitas. Si tabulam de naufragio stultus arripuerit, extorquebitne eam sapiens, si potuerit? Negat, quia sit iniurium. Quid? dominus navis eripietne suum? Minime, non plus quam navigantem in alto eicere de navi velit, quia sua sit. Quoad enim perventum est eo, quo sumpta navis est, non domini est navis, sed navigantium.
What if there is but one plank, and two shipwrecked men, both of them wise — should each snatch it for himself, or should one yield it to the other? One should yield, but to the man whose life matters more — whether for his own sake or for the sake of the Republic. But if that consideration is equal on both sides? There will be no contest; one will give way to the other, as if by lot or by a throw of the hand. What if a father is plundering temples, driving tunnels to the treasury — should his son report this to the magistrates? That would be an abomination; he should even defend his father if accused. Does country, then, not take precedence over all our duties? Yes, but country itself is served by citizens who are devoted to their parents. But what if the father is attempting to seize a tyranny, or to betray his country — should the son say nothing? On the contrary, he will beg his father not to do it. If that does no good, he will reproach him, he will even threaten him; and in the last resort, if the matter is heading toward the ruin of his country, he will set his country’s safety above his father’s.
Quid? si una tabula sit, duo naufragi, eique sapientes, sibine uter que rapiat, an alter cedat alteri? Cedat vero, sed ei, cuius magis intersit vel sua vel rei publicae causa vivere. Quid, si haec paria in utroque? Nullum erit certamen, sed quasi sorte aut micando victus alteri cedet alter. Quid? si pater fana expilet, cuniculos agat ad aerarium, indicetne id magistratibus filius? Nefas id quidem est, quin etiam defendat patrem, si arguatur. Non igitur patria praestat omnibus officiis? Immo vero, sed ipsi patriae conducit pios habere cives in parentes. Quid? si tyrannidem occupare, si patriam prodere conabitur pater, silebitne filius? Immo vero obsecrabit patrem, ne id faciat. Si nihil proficiet, accusabit, minabitur etiam, ad extremum, si ad perniciem patriae res spectabit, patriae salutem anteponet saluti patris.
Hecato also asks: if a wise man has unknowingly accepted counterfeit coins as genuine, and discovers what they are, should he pass them on as genuine in payment of a debt? Diogenes says yes; Antipater says no, and I agree with the latter. The man who is selling wine that he knows is going bad — must he declare it? Diogenes thinks it unnecessary; Antipater judges that a good man must. These are, as it were, the disputed points of Stoic jurisprudence. In selling a slave, must his faults be declared — not those which, if you fail to disclose them, give the buyer legal recourse for recovery, but such things as: the slave is a liar, a gambler, a thief, a drunkard? One side thinks they must be declared, the other does not.
Quaerit etiam, si sapiens adulterinos nummos acceperit imprudens pro bonis, cum id rescierit, soluturusne sit eos, si cui debeat, pro bonis. Diogenes ait, Antipater negat, cui potius assentior. Qui vinum fugiens vendat sciens, debeatne dicere. Non necesse putat Diogenes, Antipater viri boni existimat. Haec sunt quasi controversa iura Stoicorum. In mancipio vendendo dicendane vitia, non ea, quae nisi dixeris, redhibeatur mancipium iure civili, sed haec, mendacem esse, aleatorem, furacem, ebriosum? Alteri dicenda videntur, alteri non videntur.
If a man selling gold thinks he is selling copper, should a good man tell him it is gold, or buy for a denarius what is worth a thousand? By now it is plain enough both what my own view is and what the dispute is between the philosophers I have named. Must agreements and promises always be kept — those, that is, made without force or fraud, as the praetor’s formula has it? If a man has given another a certain medicine against dropsy, and stipulated that, once cured, the man shall never use that medicine again; and the man recovers, but some years later falls into the same disease, and the one with whom he made the agreement will not allow him to use it again — what is to be done? The man is inhuman in refusing, and no wrong is done to him by using it; life and health must be consulted.
Si quis aurum vendens orichalcum se putet vendere, indicetne ei vir bonus aurum illud esse an emat denario, quod sit mille denarium? Perspictum est iam, et quid mihi videatur, et quae sit inter eos philosophos, quos nominavi, controversia. Pacta et promissa semperne servanda sint, QUAE NEC VI NEC DOLO MALO, ut praetores solent, FACTA SINT. Si quis medicamentum cuipiam dederit ad aquam intercutem pepigeritque, si eo medicamento sanus factus esset, ne illo medicamento umquam postea uteretur, si eo medicamento sanus factus sit et annis aliquot post incident in eundem morbum nec ab eo, quicumpepigerat, impetret,ut iterum eo liccat uti, quid faciendum sit. Cum sit is inhumanus, qui non concedat, nec ei quicquam fiat iniuriae, vitae et saluti consulendum.
What if a wise man has been asked by someone who means to make him his heir — and ten million sesterces will be left to him by the will — to dance openly in the Forum in broad daylight before entering upon the inheritance, and has promised to do so, since the other would not have named him heir otherwise — should he do what he promised, or not? He ought not to have promised; that, I judge, would have been the dignified course. But since he has promised: if he thinks it shameful to dance in the Forum, he will act more honorably by going back on his word and taking nothing from the inheritance than by taking it; unless he were to put that money to some great crisis of the Republic, so that even dancing, in the service of his country, might not be shameful.
Quid? si qui sapiens rogatus sit ab eo, qui eum heredem faciat, cum ei testamento sestertium milies relinquatur, ut, ante quam hereditatem adeat, luce palam in foro saltet, idque se facturum promiserit, quod aliter heredem eum scripturus ille non esset, faciat, quod promiserit, necne? Promisisse nollem et id arbitror fuisse gravitatis; quoniam promisit, si saltare in foro turpe ducet, honestius mentietur, si ex hereditate nihil ceperit, quam si ceperit, nisi forte eam pecuniam in rei publicae magnum aliquod tempus contulerit, ut vel saltare, cum patriae consulturus sit, turpe non sit.
Those promises too must not be kept which are of no advantage to the very persons to whom they were made. To return to myth: the Sun promised his son Phaëthon that he would do whatever he wished; the boy wished to be lifted into his father’s chariot. He was lifted into it — and before he could stand firm, he was struck by a thunderbolt and consumed in flames. How much better it would have been in this case if the father’s promise had not been kept! And what of Theseus, who exacted his promise from Neptune? When Neptune had granted him three wishes, he prayed for the death of his son Hippolytus, whom he suspected on account of his stepmother; his prayer was granted, and Theseus fell into the deepest grief.
Ac ne illa quidem promissa servanda sunt, quae non sunt iis ipsis utilia, quibus illa promiseris. Sol Phaëthonti filio, ut redeamus ad fabulas, facturum se esse dixit, quicquid optasset; optavit, ut in currum patris tolleretur; sublatus est. Atque is, ante quam constitit, ictu fulminis deflagravit. Quanto melius fuerat in hoc promissum patris non esse servatum! Quid, quod Theseus exegit promissum a Neptuno? cui cum tres optationes Neptunus dedisset, optavit interitum Hippolyti filii, cum is patri suspectus esset de noverca; quo optato impetrato Theseus in maximis fuit luctibus.
And Agamemnon, who had vowed to Diana the most beautiful thing born in his kingdom in that year, and sacrificed Iphigenia — than whom nothing more beautiful had been born that year? The promise should have gone unkept rather than so monstrous a crime been committed. Promises, then, are sometimes not to be kept; nor are deposits always to be restored. If a man has deposited a sword with you in his right mind, and demands it back in a fit of madness, to return it would be wrong; it is your duty not to return it. What if the man who deposited money with you is making war on your country — are you to restore the deposit? I think not; you would be acting against the Republic, which ought to be your dearest obligation. Thus many things that seem honorable by nature become, when circumstances change, not honorable: to keep a promise, to stand by an agreement, to restore a deposit — all these, when advantage shifts, cease to be honorable. This, I think, is enough to have said about the apparent advantages that run contrary to justice under the guise of wisdom.
Quid, quod Agamemnon cum devovisset Dianae, quod in suo regno pulcherrimum natum esset illo anno, immolavit Iphigeniam, qua nihil erat eo quidem anno natum pulchrius? Promissum potius non faciendum quam tam taetrum facinus admittendum fuit. Ergo et promissa non facienda non numquam, neque semper deposita reddenda. Si gladium quis apud te sana mente deposuerit, repetat insaniens, reddere peccatum sit, officium non reddere. Quid? si is, qui apud te pecuniam deposuerit, bellum inferat patriae, reddasne depositum? Non credo; facias enim contra rem publicam, quae debet esse carissima. Sic multa, quae honesta natura videntur esse, temporibus fiunt non honesta; facere promissa, stare conventis, reddere deposita commutata utilitate fiunt non honesta. Ac de iis quidem, quae videntur esse utilitates contra iustitiam simulatione prudentiae, satis arbitror dictum.
But since in the first book we derived our duties from the four springs of what is honorable, let us remain within those same springs as we show how hostile to virtue are things that merely seem advantageous but are not. Of wisdom, which wickedness tries to counterfeit, and likewise of justice, which is always expedient, we have already treated. The remaining two parts of what is honorable are these: one is perceived in the greatness and pre-eminence of a high-minded soul; the other in the shaping and governance of self-restraint and temperance.
Sed quoniam a quattuor fontibus honestatis primo libro officia duximus, in eisdem versemur, cum docebimus ea, quae videantur esse utilia tneque sint, quam sint virtutis inimica. Ac de prudentia quidem, quam vult imitari malitia, itemque de iustitia, quae semper est utilis, disputatum est. Reliquae sunt duae partes honestatis, quarum altera in animi excellentis magnitudine et praestantia cernitur, altera in conforrnatione et moderatione continentiae et temperantiae.
It seemed expedient for Ulysses — or so the tragic poets would have us believe; for in Homer, the best of all authorities, there is no such suspicion about him — but the tragedies charge him with wanting to evade military service by feigning madness. Not an honorable plan; yet expedient, someone might perhaps say: to reign and live at ease in Ithaca with his parents, his wife, his son. Do you suppose any distinction earned through daily labors and dangers is to be compared with such tranquility? I for my part hold it entirely contemptible and to be cast aside, since what is not honorable I judge to be not even expedient.
Utile videbatur Ulixi, ut quidem poëtae tragici prodiderunt (nam apud Homerum, optimum auctorem, talis de Ulixe nulla suspicio est), sed insimulant eum tragoediae simulatione insaniae militiam subterfugere voluisse. Non honestum consilium, at utile, ut aliquis fortasse dixerit, regnare et Ithacae vivere otiose cum parentibus, cum uxore, cum filio. Ullum tu decus in cotidianis laboribus et periculis cum hac tranquillitate conferendum putas? Ego vero istam contemnendam et abiciendam, quoniam, quae honesta non sit, ne utilem quidem esse arbitror.
What do you suppose Ulysses would have heard, had he persisted in that pretense? He who accomplished the greatest deeds in the war is still made to hear this from Ajax: "He himself was first to take the oath that all of you well know, yet he alone despised the keeping of his pledge; he set about feigning madness, that he might not march to war. And had not Palamedes, with keen discernment, seen through the crafty audacity of this man’s scheme, he would have gone on cheating, in perpetuity, the sacred bond of an oath."
Quid enim auditurum putas fuisse Ulixem,si in illa simulatione perseveravisset? qui cummaximas res gesserit in bello, tamen haec audiat ab Aiace: Cuius ípse princeps iúris iurandí fuit, Quod ómnes scitis, sólus neglexít fidem; Furere ássimulare, né coiret, ínstitit. Quodní Palamedi pérspicax prudéntia Istíus percepset málitiosam audáciam, Fidé sacratae iús perpetuo fálleret.
For him it was surely better to fight not only against the enemy but against the very waves — as he did — than to abandon a Greece united in arms against a barbarian foe. But let us set myths and foreign examples aside and come to what was done, and done by our own people. Marcus Atilius Regulus, serving his second consulship in Africa, was taken prisoner by ambush under the Spartan commander Xanthippus, with Hamilcar — father of Hannibal — as the Carthaginian general in command. He was sent to the Senate under oath: unless certain noble prisoners were returned to the Carthaginians, he was to come back to Carthage himself. When he arrived at Rome, he saw what appeared to be the expedient course — but judged it, as the event makes plain, to be false. That course was this: to remain in his homeland, to stay with his wife and children in his own house, to reckon the disaster he had suffered in war as the common fortune of arms, and to hold the rank of a former consul. Who denies these things are expedient? Who, do you think? Greatness of soul denies it, and courage.
Illi vero non modo cum hostibus, verum etiam cum fluctibus, id quod fecit, dimicare melius fuit quam deserere consentientem Graeciam ad bellum barbaris inferendum. Sed omittamus et fabulas et externa; ad rem factam nostramque veniamus. M. Atilius Regulus cum consul iterum in Africa ex insidiis captus esset duce Xanthippo Lacedaemonio, imperatore autem patre Hannibalis Hamilcare, iuratus missus est ad senatum, ut, nisi redditi essent Poenis captivi nobiles quidam, rediret ipse Carthaginem. Is cum Romam venisset, utilitatis speciem videbat, sed eam, ut res declarat, falsam iudicavit; quae erat talis: manere in patria, esse domui suae cum uxore, cum liberis, quam calamitatem accepisset in bello, communem fortunae bellicae iudicantem tenere consularis dignitatis gradum. Quis haec negat esse utilia? quem censes? Magnitudo animi et fortitudo negat.
Do you want weightier authorities? These are the virtues proper to those who fear nothing, look down on all things human, count nothing that can befall a man as intolerable. So what did he do? He came before the Senate, reported his instructions, declined to give his vote — so long as he was bound by the enemy’s oath, he said, he was not a senator. And further — "O what a fool!" someone might cry, "fighting against his own interest!" — he declared it was not expedient to return the prisoners: they were young men and good commanders, while he was already spent with age. When his counsel prevailed, the prisoners were kept; he himself returned to Carthage. Neither love of country held him back, nor love of those who were his. Nor was he unaware that he was setting out toward a most savage enemy and toward torture elaborately devised; but he judged that the oath he had sworn must be kept. And so, when he was being killed by sleep-deprivation, his cause was better than it would have been had he remained at home — an old man, a prisoner, a perjurer, a former consul.
Num locupletiores quaeris auctores? Harum enim est virtutum proprium nihil extimescere, omnia humana despicere, nihil, quod homini accidere possit, intolerandum putare. Itaque quid fecit? In senatum venit, mandata exposuit, sententiam ne diceret recusavit, quam diu iure iurando hostium teneretur, non esse se senatorem. Atque illud etiam ( O stultum hominem, dixerit quispiam, et repugnantem utilitati suae! ), reddi captivos negavit esse utile; illos enim adulescentes esse et bonos duces, se iam confectum senectute. Cuius cum valuisset auctoritas, captivi retenti sunt, ipse Carthaginem rediit, neque eum caritas patriae retinuit nec suorum. Neque vero tur ignorabat se ad crudelissimum hostem et ad exquisita supplicia proficisci, sed ius iurandum conservandum putabat. Itaque turn, cum vigilando necabatur, erat in meliore causa, quam si domi senex captivus, periurus consularis remansisset.
"But it was foolish of him: not only to have declined to vote for returning the prisoners, but even to have spoken against it." Foolish — in what way? Even if it served the commonwealth? Can anything that is of no use to the state be useful to any citizen at all? Men overturn the very foundations of nature when they divorce the expedient from the honorable. For we all seek what is expedient and are swept toward it, and there is no other way for us to be; for who is there who flees what is expedient — or rather, who is there who does not pursue it with the greatest eagerness? But because nowhere can we find the expedient except in what is praiseworthy, seemly, and honorable, we therefore hold those things first and supreme, and regard the name of expediency as less splendid than necessary.
At stulte, qui non modo non censuerit captivos remittendos, verum etiam dissuaserit. Quo modo stulte? etiamne, si rei publicae conducebat? potest autem, quod inutile rei publicae sit, id cuiquam civi utile esse? Pervertunt homines ea, quae sunt fundamenta naturae, cum utilitatem ab honestate seiungunt. Omnes enim expetimus utilitatem ad eamque rapimur nec facere aliter ullo modo possumus. Nam quis est, qui utilia fugiat? aut quis potius, qui ea non studiosissime persequatur? Sed quia nusquam possumus nisi in laude, decore, honestate utilia reperire, propterea illa prima et summa habemus, utilitatis nomen non tam splendidum quam necessarium ducimus.
"What, then," someone may ask, "is the force of an oath? Are we afraid of an angry Jupiter?" Now on this point all philosophers agree — not only those who hold that the god himself has no business of his own and takes no trouble for others, but even those who hold that the god is always active and at work — that the god is never angry and never harms. What more could an angry Jupiter have done to Regulus than Regulus did to himself? The sanction of religion, then, had no power to overturn so great an apparent advantage? "Or was it to avoid acting dishonorably?" — first, we should choose the lesser of evils. Was that disgrace so great an evil as that torture? And then there is that line in Accius: "Have you broken faith?" — "I have given faith to no faithless man, nor do I give it now" — though it is spoken by an impious king, it is finely said.
Quid est igitur, dixerit quis, in iure iurando? num iratum timemus lovem? At hoc quidem commune est omnium philosophorum, non eorum modo, qui deum nihil habere ipsum negotii dicunt, nihil exhibere alteri, sed eorum etiam, qui deum semper agere aliquid et moliri volunt, numquam nec irasci deum nec nocere. Quid autem iratus Iuppiter plus nocere potuisset, quam nocuit sibi ipse Regulus Nulla igitur vis fuit religionis, quae tantam utilitatem perverteret. An ne turpiter faceret? Primum minima de malis. Num igitur tantum mali turpitude ista habebat, quantum ille cruciatus? Deinde illud etiam apud Accium: Fregistín fidem? Néque dedi neque do ínfideli cuíquam quamquam ab impio rege dicitur, luculente tamen dicitur.
They add this further argument: just as we say that some things appear expedient but are not, so they say that some things appear honorable but are not — as this very thing appears honorable, to have returned to torture for the sake of keeping an oath; but it is not in fact honorable, because what was done under the enemy’s compulsion ought never to have been held binding. They add also that whatever is greatly expedient thereby becomes honorable, even if it did not appear so before. These are roughly the arguments against Regulus. But let us consider them one by one.
Addunt etiam, quem ad modum nos dicamus videri quaedam utilia, quae non sint, sic se dicere videri quaedam honesta, quae non sint. ut hoc ipsum videtur honestum, conservandi iris iurandi causa ad cruciatum revertisse; sed fit non honestum, quia, quod per vim hostium esset actum, ratum esse non debuit. Addunt etiam, quicquid valde utile sit, id fieri honestum, etiamsi antea non videretur. Haec fere contra Regulum. Sed prima quaeque videamus.
Jupiter was not to be feared as one who in his anger would do harm — for it is not his nature to be angry, nor to harm. This argument has no more force against Regulus than against every oath whatsoever. But in an oath what we should understand is not who may be feared, but what the force of the thing is. An oath is a solemn affirmation made with religious sanction; and what you have promised with such affirmation, as it were with the god as witness, must be kept. At stake is no longer the anger of the gods — which does not exist — but justice and good faith. For Ennius says it finely: "O nurturing Faith, winged and apt, and sworn pledge of Jupiter!" Whoever violates an oath, then, violates Faith — whom our ancestors wished to dwell, as Cato’s speech records, on the Capitol, neighbor to Jupiter Greatest and Best.
Non fuit Iuppiter metuendus ne iratus noceret, qui neque irasci solet nec nocere. Haec quidem ratio non magis contra Reguli quam contra omne ius iurandum valet. Sed in iure iurando non qui metus, sed quae vis sit, debet intellegi; est enim ius iurandum affirmatio religiosa; quod autem affirmate quasi deo teste promiseris, id tenendum est. Iam enim non ad iram deorum, quae nulla est, sed ad iustitiam et ad fidem pertinet. Nam praeclare Ennius: Ó Fides alma ápta pinnis ét ius iurandúm Iovis! Qui ius igitur iurandum violat, is Fidem violat, quam in Capitolio vicinam Iovis optimi maximi, ut in Catonis oratione est, maiores nostri esse voluerunt.
"But even an angry Jupiter could not have harmed Regulus more than Regulus harmed himself." Certainly — if pain is the only evil. But that pain is not the highest evil — not even an evil at all — is affirmed with the greatest authority by philosophers. For that authority do not, I beg you, reproach Regulus — not a slight witness, but perhaps the weightiest of all. What worthier witness shall we seek than the foremost man of the Roman people, who endured torture willingly for the sake of discharging his duty? Now as for their argument — "choose the lesser evil," meaning disgrace rather than calamity — is there any evil greater than disgrace? If disgrace in the body’s deformity has some power to offend, how great must the corruption and foulness of a dishonored soul appear!
At enim ne iratus quidem Iuppiter plus Regulo nocuisset, quam sibi nocuit ipse Regulus. Certe, si nihil malum esset nisi dolere. Id autem non modo non summum malum, sed ne malum quidem esse maxima auctoritate philosophi affirmant. Quorum quidem testem non mediocrem, sed haud scio an gravissimum Regulum nolite, quaeso, vituperare. Quem enim locupletiorem quaerimus quam principem populi Romani, qui retinendi officii causa cruciatum subierit voluntarium? Nam quod aiunt: minima de malis, id est ut turpiter potius quam calamitose, an est ullum maius malum turpitudine? quae si in deformitate corporis habet aliquid offensionis, quanta illa depravatio et foeditas turpificati animi debet videri!
And so those who reason more rigorously dare say that the only evil is what is disgraceful; those who reason more loosely do not hesitate to call it the highest evil. As for that line: "I have given faith to no faithless man, nor do I give it now" — the poet is right to put it thus, because when Atreus was the character being played, the part had to be served. But if they take from this the principle that no pledge need be kept with a faithless man, let them beware they are not finding a hiding-place for perjury.
Itaque nervosius qui ista disserunt, solum audent malum dicere id, quod turpe sit, qui autem remissius, ii tamen non dubitant summum malum dicere. Nam illud quidem: Néque dedi neque do ínfideli cuíquam idcirco recte a poeta, quia, cum tractaretur Atreus, personae serviendum fuit. Sed si hoc sibi sument, nullam esse fidem, quae infideli data sit, videant, ne quaeratur latebra periurio.
There is, moreover, a law of war, and the keeping of an oath pledged to an enemy is frequently required. For what is sworn with the sincere intention that it ought to be performed must be kept; what is sworn otherwise — if it is not performed, there is no perjury in that. For instance: if you have agreed to pay a price for your life to pirates and have not paid it, there is no fraud, not even if you swore an oath — for a pirate is not a recognized member of the class of public enemies but the common enemy of all; with such a man there ought to be no bond of faith and no shared oath.
Est autem ius etiam bellicum fidesque iuris iurandi saepe cum hoste servanda. Quod enim ita iuratum est, ut mens conciperet fieri oportere, id servandum est; quod aliter, id si non fecerit, nullum est periurium. Ut, si praedonibus pactum pro capite pretium non attuleris, nulla fraus sit, ne si iuratus quidem id non feceris; nam pirata non est ex perduellium nurnero definitus, sed communis hostis omnium; cum hoc nec fides debet nec ius iurandum esse commune.
For to swear falsely is not in itself perjury; perjury is to fail to do what you have sworn, as our formula puts it, from the honest conviction of your mind. Euripides puts it shrewdly: "My tongue has sworn; my mind remains unsworn." hē glōssa omōmoch’, hē de phrēn anōmotos. Regulus, however, had no business disturbing the terms and agreements of a war by perjury. For the war was being waged against a just and lawful enemy, against whom the entire law of heralds and many shared legal customs apply. Were it otherwise, the Senate would never have surrendered distinguished men in chains to the enemy.
Non enim falsum iurare periurare est, sed, quod EX ANIMI TUI SENTENTIA iuraris, sicut verbis concipitur more nostro, id non facere periurium est. Scite enim Euripides: Iurávi lingua, méntem iniuratám gero. Regulus vero non debuit condiciones pactionesque bellicas et hostiles perturbare periurio. Cum iusto enim et legitimo hoste res gerebatur, adversus quem et totum ius fetiale et multa sunt iura communia. Quod ni ita esset, numquam claros viros senatus vinctos hostibus dedidisset.
Consider: Titus Veturius and Spurius Postumius, serving their second consulship, had made peace with the Samnites after our legions had fought badly at the Caudine Forks and been sent under the yoke. They were surrendered to the Samnites — because they had acted without the authorization of the people and the Senate. And at the same time Tiberius Numicius and Quintus Maelius, who were then tribunes of the people and on whose authority the peace had been made, were surrendered so that the peace with the Samnites might be repudiated. Postumius himself, the very man being surrendered, was the advocate and author of his own surrender. Many years later the same course was taken by Gaius Mancinus, who urged passage of the bill that Lucius Furius and Sextus Atilius were carrying by senatorial decree — that he be surrendered to the people of Numantia, with whom he had made a treaty without the Senate’s authorization; the bill was passed and he was surrendered to the enemy. More honorable this than the conduct of Quintus Pompeius, who was in the same position, yet pleaded against it and the law was not passed. With Pompeius, what appeared to be the expedient prevailed over what was honorable; with the others, the false appearance of expediency was overcome by the authority of what is honorable.
At vero T. Veturius et Sp. Postumius cum iterum consules essent, quia, cum male pugnatum apud Caudium esset, legionibus nostris sub iugum missis pacem cum Samnitibus fecerant, dediti sunt iis; iniussu enim populi senatusque fecerant. Eodemque tempore Ti. Nurnicius, Q. Maelius, qui tum tribuni pl. erant, quod eorum auctoritate pax erat facta, dediti sunt, ut pax Samnitium repudiaretur; atque huius deditionis ipse Postumius, qui dedebatur, suasor et auctor fuit. Quod idem multis annis post C. Mancinus, qui, ut Numantinis, quibuscum sine senatus auctoritate foedus fecerat, dederetur, rogationem suasit ear, quam L. Furius, Sex. Atilius ex senatus consulto ferebant; qua accepta est hostibus deditus. Honestius hic quam Q. Pompeius, quo, cum in eadem causa esset, deprecante accepta lex non est. Hic ea, quae videbatur utilitas, plus valuit quam honestas, apud superiores utilitatis species falsa ab honestatis auctoritate superata est.
"But it ought not to have been binding — it was done under compulsion." As though compulsion can really be applied to a brave man. Why, then, did he go to the Senate at all, especially since he was going to argue against returning the prisoners? The very thing that is greatest in what he did is what you find fault with. He did not stand by his own private judgment: he took up the cause so that the judgment would rest with the Senate; and if he had not been himself the advocate of that course, the prisoners would certainly have been returned to the Carthaginians, and so Regulus would have stayed safe at home in his own country. Because he judged that course not expedient for the state, he believed it honorable both to hold that opinion and to suffer the consequence. And as for their claim that what is greatly expedient thereby becomes honorable — rather, it is honorable, not becomes so. For nothing is expedient that is not at the same time honorable, and the reason a thing is honorable is not that it is expedient, but the reason it is expedient is that it is honorable. Of all the admirable examples, therefore, it would not be easy to name one more praiseworthy or more distinguished than this.
At non debuit ratum esse, quod erat actum per vim.—Quasi vero forti viro vis possit adhiberi. Cur igitur ad senatum proficiscebatur, cum praesertim de captivis dissuasurus esset? Quod maximum in eo est, id reprehenditis. Non enim suo iudicio stetit, sed suscepit causam, ut esset iudicium senatus; cui nisi ipse auctor fuisset, captivi profecto Poenis redditi essent; ita incolumis in patria Regulus restitisset. Quod quia patriae non utile putavit, idcirco sibi honestum et sentire illa et pati credidit. Nam quod aiunt, quod valde utile sit, id fieri honestum, immo vero esse, non fieri. Est enim nihil utile, quod idem non honestum, nec, quia utile, honestum, sed, quia honestum, utile. Quare ex multis mirabilibus exemplis haud facile quis dixerit hoc exemplo aut laudabilius aut praestantius.
Yet in all the glory that surrounds Regulus, there is one thing pre-eminently worthy of admiration: his voting that the prisoners be kept. As for his return — to us now it seems remarkable; but in those times he could not have acted otherwise. That praise accordingly belongs not to the man but to the age. For our ancestors wished there to be no stronger bond for keeping faith than the oath. The laws of the Twelve Tables bear witness to this; the sacred laws bear witness; the treaties bear witness, by which faith is bound even with an enemy; the findings and censures of the censors bear witness — and no subject did they judge with more exacting care than the keeping of an oath.
Sed ex tota hac laude Reguli unum illud est admiratione dignum, quod captivos retinendos censuit. Nam quod rediit, nobis nunc mirabile videtur, illis quidem temporibus aliter facere non potuit; itaque ista laus non est hominis, sed temporum. Nullum enim vinculum ad astringendam fidem iure iurando maiores artius esse voluerunt. Id indicant leges in duodecim tabulis, indicant sacratae, indicant foedera, quibus etiam cum hoste devincitur fides, indicant notiones animadversionesque censorum, qui nulla de re diligentius quam de iure iurando iudicabant.
When Lucius Manlius, son of Aulus, had been dictator, Marcus Pomponius, a tribune of the people, indicted him on the ground that he had added several days beyond his term to the dictatorship; he also charged him with having banished his son Titus — the one who was later called Torquatus — from human society and ordered him to live in the country. When the young son heard that his father was being harassed, he is said to have rushed to Rome and arrived at Pomponius’s house at first light. When it was announced to him, Pomponius supposed the young man was furious and bringing something to lay against his father, and rose from his bed; he had the witnesses removed and bade the young man come in to him alone. But the moment he stepped inside, the son drew his sword and swore on the spot that he would kill him then and there unless Pomponius swore an oath to drop the case against his father. Pomponius, compelled by this terror, swore the oath; he reported the matter to the people, explained why he was obliged to abandon the case, and released Manlius. Such was the force of an oath in those times. And this Titus Manlius is the same man who, at the river Anio, killed the Gaul who had challenged him to single combat, stripped the torque from him, and so found his surname — a very great man indeed; and he who was so indulgent to his father was equally and harshly severe toward his own son.
L. Manlio A. f., cum dictator fuisset, M. Pomponius tr. pl. diem dixit, quod is paucos sibi dies ad dictaturam gerendam addidisset; criminabatur etiam, quod Titum filium, qui postea est Torquatus appellatus, ab hominibus relegasset et ruri habitare iussisset. Quod cum audivisset adulescens filius, negotium exhiberi patri, accurrisse Romam et cum primo luci Pomponi domum venisse dicitur. Cui cum esset nuntiatum, qui illum iratum allaturum ad se aliquid contra patrem arbitraretur, surrexit e lectulo remotisque arbitris ad se adulescentem iussit venire. At ille, ut ingressus est, confestim gladium destrinxit iuravitque se illum statim interfecturum, nisi ius iurandum sibi dedisset se patrem missum esse facturum. Iuravit hoc terrore coactus Pomponius; rem ad populum detulit, docuit, cur sibi causa desistere necesse esset, Manlium missum fecit. Tantum temporibus illis ius iurandum valebat. Atque hic T. Manlius is est, qui ad Anienem Galli, quem ab eo provocatus occiderat, torque detracto cognomen invenit, cuius tertio consulatu Latini ad Veserim fusi et fugati, magnus vir in primis et, qui perindulgens in patrem, idem acerbe severus in filium.
But while Regulus deserves praise for keeping faith with his oath, those ten men whom Hannibal, after the battle of Cannae, sent to the Senate under oath to return to the camp in which the Carthaginians held power, should they fail to win the release of the prisoners — those ten, if they did not return, deserve censure. Yet not all of them are judged in the same way. Polybius, a thoroughly reliable authority, records that of the ten noblemen sent at that time, nine returned when the Senate refused their petition; but one of the ten, who had left the camp and then gone back a little while later as though he had forgotten something, remained in Rome — for he supposed that by returning briefly to the camp he had discharged himself from the oath. He supposed wrongly; for deceit tightens the bonds of perjury, it does not loosen them. It was, then, a piece of foolish cunning, a perverse counterfeit of wisdom. And so the Senate decreed that this crafty schemer be put in chains and returned to Hannibal.
Sed, ut laudandus Regulus in conservando iure iurando, sic decem illi, quos post Cannensem pugnam iuratos ad senatum misit Hannibal se in castra redituros ea, quorum erant potiti Poeni, nisi de redimendis captivis impetravissent, si non redierunt, vituperandi. De quibus non omnes uno modo; nam Polybius, bonus auctor in primis, ex decem nobilissimis, qui tum erant missi, novem revertisse dicit re a senatu non impetrata; unum ex decem, qui paulo post, quam erat egressus e castris, redisset, quasi aliquid esset oblitus, Romae remansisse; reditu enim in castra liberatum se esse iure iurando interpretabatur, non recte; fraus enim astringit, non dissolvit periurium. Fuit igitur stulta calliditas perverse imitata prudentiam. Itaque decrevit senatus, ut ille veterator et callidus vinctus ad Hannibalem duceretur.
But here is the most telling point of all: Hannibal held eight thousand men — not men taken in the field of battle, nor men who had fled in fear of death, but men left behind in the camp by the consuls Paullus and Varro. The Senate resolved that these should not be ransomed, even though it could have been done at small expense, in order that the lesson be bred into our soldiers: conquer or die. When Hannibal heard this, the same author records that his spirit broke — because even in ruin the Senate and people of Rome had shown such loftiness of soul. So it is that when you set what is honorable in the scales, those things that appear expedient are overcome.
Sed illud maximum: octo hominum milia tenebat Hannibal, non quos in acie cepisset, aut qui periculo mortis diffugissent, sed qui relicti in castris fuissent a Paulo et a Varrone consulibus. Eos senatus non censuit redimendos, cum id parva pecunia fieri posset, ut esset insitum militibus nostris aut vincere aut emori. Qua quidem re audita fractum animum Hannibalis scribit idem, quod senatus populusque Romanus rebus afflictis tam excelso animo fuisset. Sic honestatis comparatione ea, quae videntur utilia, vincuntur.
Gaius Acilius, who wrote a history in Greek, says that there were more who returned to the camp by the same subterfuge, to discharge themselves from the oath — and that the censors marked them with every form of disgrace. Let this be the end of the present topic. For it is plain enough that what is done in a spirit of cowardice, baseness, abjection, and broken will — as Regulus’s conduct would have been, had he voted on the prisoners according to his own convenience rather than the public good, or had he chosen to remain at home — is not expedient, precisely because it is shameful, foul, and base.
C. Acilius autem, qui Graece scripsit historiam, plures ait fuisse, qui in castra revertissent eadem fraude, ut iure iurando liberarentur, eosque a censoribus omnibus ignominiis notatos. Sit iam huius loci finis. Perspicuum est enim ea, quae timido animo, humili, demisso fractoque fiant, quale fuisset Reguli factum, si aut de captivis, quod ipsi opus esse videretur, non quod rei publicae, censuisset aut domi remanere voluisset, non esse utilia, quia sint flagitiosa, foeda, turpia.
There remains the fourth part, which is contained in propriety, moderation, self-restraint, self-command, and temperance. Can anything expedient, then, be opposed to this chorus of such virtues? And yet the Cyrenaics and those named Annicereans, following Aristippus, placed all good in pleasure and held that virtue deserves praise only because it is the producer of pleasure. After these men faded, Epicurus flourished — the champion and co-author, one might say, of much the same position. Against these men we must fight, as the saying goes, with all our horse and foot, if our purpose is to hold and defend what is honorable.
Restat quarta pars, quae decore, moderatione, modestia, continentia, temperantia continetur. Potest igitur quicquam utile esse, quod sit huic talium virtutum choro contrarium? Atqui ab Aristippo Cyrenaici atque Annicerii philosophi nominati omne bonum in voluptate posuerunt virtutemque censuerunt ob eam em esse laudandam, quod efficiens esset voluptatis. Quibus obsoletis floret Epicurus, eiusdem fere adiutor auctorque sententiae. Cum his viris equisque, ut dicitur, si honestatem tueri ac retinere sententia est, decertandum est.
For if not only expediency but the whole of the happy life rests, as Metrodorus wrote, on a sound constitution of the body and reliable hope of maintaining it, then this expediency — and indeed the highest expediency, as they reckon it — will be at war with what is honorable. Where, first of all, does wisdom find its place? In scouring the world for pleasures? What a wretched servitude that is — virtue waiting upon pleasure. And what is the office of wisdom, then? Selecting pleasures with discernment? Suppose nothing were more agreeable than that; what could be imagined more base? Again: for a man who calls pain the supreme evil, what room is there for courage — which is the contempt of pains and toils? However boldly Epicurus may speak of pain in many passages, as he does, we must look not at what he says but at what is consistent for him to say — a man who has defined good by pleasure and evil by pain. And if I listen to him on self-restraint and temperance, he says much in many places, but, as they put it, the water sticks: for how can a man praise temperance who places the highest good in pleasure? Temperance is the enemy of appetites; appetites, however, are the pursuers of pleasure.
Nam si non modo utilitas, sed vita omnis beata corporis firma constitutione eiusque constitutionis spe explorata, ut a Metrodoro scriptum est, continetur, certe haec utilitas, et quidem summa (sic enim censent), cum honestate pugnabit. Nam ubi primum prudentiae locus dabitur? an ut conquirat undique suavitates? Quam miser virtutis famulatus servientis voluptati! Quod autem munus prudentiae? an legere intellegenter voluptates? Fac nihil isto esse iucundius, quid cogitari potest turpius? Iam, qui dolorem summum malum dicat, apud eum quem habet locum fortitudo, quae est dolorum laborumque contemptio? Quamvis enim multis locis dicat Epicurus, sicuti dicit, satis fortiter de dolore, tamen non id spectandum est, quid dicat, sed quid consentaneum sit ei dicere, qui bona voluptate terminaverit, mala dolore. Et, si illum audiam, de continentia et temperantia dicit ille quidem multa multis locis, sed aqua haeret, ut aiunt; nam qui potest temperantiam laudare is, qui ponat summum bonum in voluptate? est enim temperantia libidinum inimica, libidines autem consectatrices voluptatis.
In these three areas, all the same, they maneuver not without some dexterity, making what shifts they can. They bring in wisdom as the knowledge of how to supply pleasures and drive away pains; they manage courage too after a fashion, by teaching a way of thought that disregards death and endures pain; they even introduce temperance — with no great ease, to be sure, but in whatever way they can — arguing that the magnitude of pleasure is determined by the subtraction of pain. Justice, however, staggers, or rather falls flat entirely, as do all the virtues concerned with community and human fellowship. For goodness, generosity, and courtesy can no more exist than friendship can, if these things are sought not for their own sake but referred to pleasure or advantage. Let us therefore gather our argument into brief compass.
Atque in his tamen tribus generibus, quoquo modo possunt, non incallide tergiversantur; prudentiam introducunt scientiam suppeditantem voluptates. depellentem dolores; fortitudinem quoque aliquo modo expediunt, cum tradunt rationem neglegendae mortis, perpetiendi doloris; etiam temperantiam inducunt non facillime illi quidem, sed tamen quoquo modo possunt; dicunt enim voluptatis magnitudinem doloris detractione finiri. Iustitia vacillat vel iacet potius omnesque eae virtutes, quae in communitate cernuntur et in societate generis humani. Neque enim bonitas nec liberalitas nec comitas esse potest, non plus quam amicitia, si haec non per se expetantur, sed ad voluptatem utilitatemve referantur. Conferamus igitur in pauca.
For just as we have shown that no expediency exists that is contrary to what is honorable, so we say that every pleasure is contrary to what is honorable. The more, then, do I find fault with Calliphon and Dinomachos, who thought they would resolve the controversy by yoking pleasure to what is honorable — as if they were coupling a beast with a human being. What is honorable does not admit that union; it spurns it, it repels it. Nor indeed can the end of good and evil — which must be single and simple — be compounded and blended out of things so utterly unlike each other. But on this question — it is a large one — I shall say more elsewhere; for now, let us return to our subject.
Nam ut utilitatem nullam esse docuimus, quae honestati esset contraria, sic omnem voluptatem dicimus honestati esse contrariam. Quo magis reprehendendos Calliphontem et Dinomachum iudico, qui se dirempturos controversiam putaverunt, si cum honestate voluptatem tamquam cum homine pecudem copulavissent. Non recipit istam coniunctionem honestas, aspernatur, repellit. Nec vero finis bonorum et malorum, qui simplex esse debet, ex dissimillimis rebus misceri et temperari potest. Sed de hoc (magna enim res est) alio loco pluribus; nunc ad propositum.
The question, then, of how to decide when what appears expedient conflicts with what is honorable has been argued sufficiently above. But if pleasure too is to be said to carry the appearance of expediency, there can be no junction between it and what is honorable. For granted that we allow pleasure some standing — perhaps as a kind of seasoning — it will have nothing of expediency, nothing of substance, about it at all.
Quem ad modum igitur, si quando ea, quae videtur utilitas, honestati repugnat, diiudicanda res sit, satis est supra disputatum. Sin autem speciem utilitatis etiam voluptas habere dicetur, nulla potest esse ei cum honestate coniunctio. Nam, ut tribuamus aliquid voluptati, condimenti fortasse non nihil, utilitatis certe nihil habebit.
You have from your father a gift, my son Marcus — in my own judgment a great one, but its worth will depend on how you receive it. These three books must be welcomed among the lectures of Cratippus as visitors received into a house; but just as, had I come to Athens in person — and I should have done so, had not my country called me back from mid-voyage with a voice too clear to refuse — you would sometimes have heard me as well, so now, since it is my voice that has made its way to you in these volumes, give them as much of your time as you can — and you will be able to give as much as you wish. When I have come to see that this kind of learning gives you joy, I shall speak with you both in person before long, as I hope, and in absence through these pages. And so farewell, my son; be persuaded that you are indeed dearest to me — but will be far dearer still if you take delight in these counsels and instructions.
Habes a patre munus, Marce fili, mea quidem sententia magnum, sed perinde erit, ut acceperis. Quamquam hi tibi tres libri inter Cratippi commentarios tamquam hospites erunt recipiendi; sed, ut, si ipse venissem Athenas (quod quidem esset factum, nisi me e medio cursu clara voce patria revocasset), aliquando me quoque audires, sic, quoniam his voluminibus ad te profecta vox est mea, tribues iis temporis quantum poteris, poteris autem, quantum voles. Cum vero intellexero te hoc scientiae genere gaudere, tum et praesens tecum propediem, ut spero, et, dum aberis, absens loquar. Vale igitur, mi Cicero, tibique persuade esse te quidem mihi carissimum, sed multo fore cariorem, si talibus monitis praeceptisque laetabere.