Cicero's Influence on the Emergence of Philosophy as a Textual Tradition

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CICERO AND PHILOSOPHY AS TEXT*

Abstract: Philosophy for Cicero implies not only a way of life taught orally in a school but also
reading and writing. This foreshadows his influence on the later Latin tradition, which identified
philosophy with the meaning and evaluation of texts, and ultimately replaced its conception as an
autonomous way of life. I propose four factors in Ciceros influence: initiating the tradition of
Latin philosophical prose; developing its vocabulary; the choice of a rhetorical over a dialectical
mode; and locating discussion in the context of libraries, reading and book production.
y writing philosophical texts in Latin that achieved such a wide circulation,

Cicero had a decisive influence on the growth in the western Roman world
of a conception of philosophy he had not intended to promote, but which
subsequently became dominant. I will argue that, owing to certain distinctive
features of these Ciceronian texts, their reception in late antiquity contributed
significantly to the cultural reinterpretation of philosophy itself in western
Europe as primarily located in the meaning of certain kinds of texts, and
secondarily the activity of studying those texts. This is to be contrasted with the
conception of philosophy, ubiquitous in antiquity, as essentially a way of life, to
which Cicero himself subscribed. 1
!
" A version of this paper was presented at a meeting of the Pacific Rim Latin Literature Seminar at the University of British Columbia in August, 2008. Thanks to Toph Marshall for making
that such a valuable experience; to Marcus Wilson, Lisa Bailey and Jon Hall for their occasional
advice; and to the journals referees for useful criticism and suggestions. Remaining errors are my
own. Schofield (2008) unfortunately did not become available to me before the present paper was
finalised; it is concerned with a different topic, Cicero's authorial presence in the dialogues, but
there are significant points of convergence with several parts of my argument, and disagreements
are minor.
1
For the latter as characteristic of ancient philosophy generally, see Hadot (1995) 25163;
(2002) 25 and passim. His view has become standard: see Marrone (2003) 1112 with n. 1;
Marenbon (2007) 7; cf. Markus (1967) 345 (writing of Augustine); Bnatoul (2006) 421, 424;
Trapp (2007) xiii and 127. Hadot (2002) 23 dates the emergence of the idea or concept of philosophy, in the ancient sense of a way of life, to the schools founded by the various followers of
Socrates. But whether or not Pythagoreans used the term (see Hadot (2002) 15 n. 1), their school
surely anticipates the phenomenon. Hadot (2002) 9 rightly notes that the identification of the
THE CLASSICAL JOURNAL 106.1 (2010) 7198
72
DOUGAL BLYTH
Admittedly Cicero both aimed at the wide readership he reached, 2 and

intended to establish philosophical writing as a recognized genre of Latin
literature. 3 But for him philosophy was fundamentally an approach to the whole
of life, both public and private, cultivated within a school by means of intellectual
activity pursued in oral discourse. 4 Ciceros references to his own education, his
revival of the dialogue form and his treatment of philosophical questions in terms
of debates among schools, together make clear to a reader with knowledge of
earlier Greek philosophy that his texts are meant to represent an oral practice
informing a lifestyle. He wrote with the aim of promoting philosophy in this
sense among his fellow citizens, and explicitly as an activity to be transacted in
Latin. 5
I first offer a brief account of the emergence of the new conception of
philosophy as primarily related to the meanings of texts in the late antique Latin
west and later. Second, I discuss Ciceros understanding of the relation between
philosophy and writing. Finally, I identify four factors that unintentionally
contributed to the later reconceptualization of the nature of philosophy.
Two initial qualifications must be made. 6 First, there were of course other
factors at work in this transformation. Greek philosophers had themselves pro!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
other presocratics as philosophers stems from Aristotle (who seeks to locate his own conception
of first philosophy, i.e., a life devoted to theoria of the first principles of nature, as the fulfillment of
anticipations by the physikoi).
2
E.g., Ac. 1.18; Fin. 1.10; N.D. 1.7.
3
E.g., Ac. 1.1012; Fin. 1.412; Tusc. 1.56; 2.48; 4.6; N.D. 1.78, 1314; Div. 2.17; cf.
Jones (1959) 26.
4
The same is the case for Ciceros Epicurean contemporary Lucretius. On the Hellenistic
schools, see generally Lynch (1972); Glucker (1978); and in particular Hadot (2002) 91145;
Bnatoul (2006), with extensive bibliography at 41529.
5
For Ciceros literary aims, see n. 3 above. For his ordinary conception of philosophy, most
reliably inferred from prefaces in his philosophical works, e.g. Fin. 3.4 (ars est philosophia vitae);
Tusc. 2.13 (cultura animi philosophia est), 2.16 (magistra vitae philosophia); 5.5 (o vitae philosophia
dux); cf. Off. 2.5 (nec quicquam aliud est philosophia praeter studium sapientiae). For the range of
his use of the terms philosophia, philosophari and philosophus see Merguet (1971) 3.7484.
6
The present essay can be seen as a response to the question posed by Gigon (1957): what is
new in Ciceros philosophical works? Gigons own answer is that the novelty is not Ciceros, but
consists in the fact that Panaetius, Posidonius and Antiochus, his near Greek influences, revived the
authority of the ancients, in particular Plato and Aristotle. This belittles Ciceros own importance.
The apologia by Striker (1995) does not correct that impression; cf. Long (1986) 22931. Davies
(1971), by contrast, recognizes that the question of Ciceros originality cannot be reduced to a
matter of doctrine or abstract inquiry, nor to any other single factor; my concern is rather with
innovation in the conception of philosophy itself.
CICERO AND PHILOSOPHY AS TEXT
73
duced texts, many of which circulated outside schools; the Hellenistic schools by
the 1st century BC were already being dispersed or disbanded; 7 and Roman mores
among the educated aristocracy at this time seem fairly resistant to the abandonment of their traditional social role, and in particular to the adoption of the
role of a professional philosopher. 8 All these factors dating from Ciceros time
or before are relevant to the subsequent change, and more will appear in the discussion below of later Latinate philosophy.
Second, the textual conception of philosophy took a long time to replace the
older understanding. Later writers, particularly in the Stoic tradition, continued
to present philosophy in the old way. Even within the Neoplatonic schools of late
antiquity it is clear from biographical material that, notwithstanding the focus on
texts, philosophy was considered a comprehensive approach to life involving
ascetic discipline, religious worship and theurgy, and was not yet regarded exclusively as a literary-intellectual activity or product. 9 Nevertheless, the change in the
Latin tradition, when it came, was in large measure due to Ciceros influence.
!
On the end or dispersal of the Hellenistic schools, see briefly, e.g., Bnatoul (2006) 418;
Trapp (2007) x; in more detail Lynch (1972) 1612, 1802, 18993, 197207; Glucker (1978)
3739, and generally 226379.
8
E.g., de Orat. 1.2212; Tac. Ag. 4. Against Quintus Lucilius Balbus, depicted as a full-time
Stoic at N.D. 1.15, we should weigh, e.g., the model of Marcus Porcius Cato the Younger (interlocutor in Fin. 34), first and foremost an active Roman politician and only second a Stoic; Marcus
Junius Brutus (author of a de Virtute and dedicatee of N.D., Tusc. and Fin.: see esp. Fin. 1.8 and 3.6), a
follower of Antiochus; Gaius Aurelius Cotta (N.D. 3.5) as an Academic; and even the Epicureans
Gaius Velleius, a senator (N.D. 1.15), and Lucius Manlius Torquatus (Fin. 12). Cf. also Marcus
Varro (Ac. 1), another Antiochean (1.7; Fam. 9.8.1; Aug. C.D. 19.13); and some of the characters
of Fin. 5 (Marcus Pupius Piso Calpurnianus and Ciceros brother Quintus, also in Leg. and Div.); on
the other hand Atticus and Lucretius, as Epicureans, do seem to have made philosophical commitments to avoid political life. The role of the professional philosopher no doubt seemed to the
Roman elite a Greek, and therefore servile, life choice. (Cicero and many contemporaries supported such philosophers in their own households: Cicero was host to the Stoic Diodotus from
8459 BC; cf. N.D. 1.6.)
9
See generally, e.g., Fowden (1982); on theurgy, see Shaw (1995) 45 and passim; for the biographies of Plotinus and Proclus, see Edwards (2000); and especially Hadot (2002) 14671 with
references. I make no claim here for or against the interpretation of philosophical texts as evidence
and material for spiritual exercises constituting the core of philosophical activity in antiquity, for
which see Hadot (1995) 4977, 12644 and (2002) 172233, esp. 179211; cf. 1226, 1359,
1445. My concern is with the reformulation of the referent of the term philosophy (philosophia,
primarily in Latin) as the significatum of a text, or the activity of apprehending or evaluating that
significatum by mediation of the text (reading, interpretation and criticism); the reading or related
reflection might or might not be construed as a spiritual exercise.
74
DOUGAL BLYTH
The Subsequent Transformation of Philosophy

Three further factors in this change help to identify when and how it
occurred. These are the disappearance of competence in Greek in the Latin west,
the cultural form in which the Latin tradition accepted Greek philosophical developments and the influence of Christianity. By the middle of the 4th century AD,
knowledge of Greek in the western empire, previously a standard feature of
Roman education, was in serious decline; within a further century it was almost
extinct. 10 Surveys of Roman writers in the west (i.e., central and northern Italy,
Gaul, Spain and Africa) from the second half of the 4th century onwards show
that the ability even to read Greek became limited to those few old aristocratic
families who maintained Roman cultural tradition by keeping private tutors, and
to the increasingly rare individuals who learned Greek while living in the east. 11
By contrast, the Greek taught in schools was elementary, hardly ever used, and
usually forgotten by adulthood.
During this period translations into Latin of Greek philosophical works
became increasingly common. Cicero had translated Platos Protagoras and part
of the Timaeus, and Apuleius in the 2nd century AD translated the Phaedo. But
translations of three further kinds of philosophical works began to appear around
the middle of the 4th century: Aristotelian logic, 12 recent Neoplatonic metaphys!
10
See McGuire (1959), esp. 1317; Courcelle (1969), esp. 1428 (Italy in the 5th century
20823 (Africa); and, contra the claims of Courcelle (1969) 23870 for a renaissance of
Greek in late 5th-century Gaul associated with Sidonius Apollinaris and Mamertus Claudianus,
Brittain (2001), esp. 259. On the initial development of a literature in Latin in the ages of Cicero
and Augustus as a key factor in the decline of Roman Hellenism in the west, cf. Marrou (1956)
25564; the development of a Christian Latin literature, particularly that of Augustine, was also
important in the late period; see McGuire (1959) 1112.
11
On Augustines late learning of Greek, see Courcelle (1969) 14965; McGuire (1959) 15
is more sceptical.
12
Before his conversion (c. AD 354), Marius Victorinus translated Porphyrys Isagoge and Aristotles Categories and de Interpretatione, while Vettius Agorius Praetextatus (d. 385) translated
Themistius paraphrases of Aristotles Prior and Posterior Analytics, and probably produced the
Decem Categoriae, possibly a translation of a Greek work. See Hadot (1971) 17990; Gersh (1986)
716; and more briefly Bianchi and Cacouros (2000); Falcon (2008). Earlier works in Latin synthesizing Aristotelian and Stoic logic were Aelius Stilos lost treatise; the book on dialectic in his
student Varros lost Nine Disciplines; and Apuleius Peri Hermeneias, on which Book 4 of Martianus
Capellas Marriage of Philology and Mercury (early 5th century AD) drew. Boethius logical works (see
next page) were followed by Cassiodorus Institutes 2.3 (later 6th century AD).
AD),
75
ics, 13 and histories of philosophical opinions. 14 In addition (perhaps c. AD 350)

Calcidius partial translation of the Timaeus with commentary appeared. This
process culminated in Boethius plan at the beginning of the 6th century to translate and comment upon the whole of Plato and Aristotle,15 fulfilled only partially
for Aristotles Organon (with Porphyrys Isagoge).
The demand for translations is evidence of the general loss of direct access
to Greek philosophy among educated Latin speakers from the 4th century
onwards. Nor is there evidence of any major philosophical school teaching in
Latin at any time during the empire, and perhaps there was no formal teaching of
philosophy in Latin at all, 16 apart from dialectic. If this is all correct, the preconditions for an exclusively textual approach to philosophy were already present in
the Latin west at this time. 17
The case of dialectic, taught formallyand presumably orallyin a
scholastic setting, is interesting. The separation of logic from ethics and physics,
as the culmination of a Latin rhetorical education, suggests by contrast that the
!
13
Marius Victorinus translated some of Plotinus Enneads, possibly with commentary by Porphyry, and probably other works of Porphyry such as the de Regressu animae. See Courcelle (1969)
16596, esp. 17189; Hadot (1971) 20110; Brittain (2001) 259.
14
For references to these, see Courcelle (1969) 1345 with n. 37, 1401, 231 with n. 47,
2568; Brittain (2001) 243.
15
Boethius de Interp. ed. sec. 2; PL 64, 433CD (quoted by Courcelle (1969) 277 n. 32 from
Meiser ([1880] 1987) 79.9).
16
Note the absence of any other western locations in Fowden (1982) 3848, apart from
Rome (for which see p. 40). For Mamertus Claudianus, see Brittain (2001), esp. 244 and 260. The
Neoplatonist circle in Milan to which Augustine belonged cannot be called a philosophical school
in the Greek sense, insofar as its main members (Ambrose, Simplicianus, Manlius Theodorus)
subscribed to Christianity as their way of life; see further Courcelle (1969) 1823, 231; Hadot
(1971) 204. Only Maximus of Madaura (vir eximie, qui a mea secta deviasti, Ep. ad Aug. 16.4; PL 33,
82, of AD 390, cited by Courcelle (1969) 181) seems to have thought differently. The subscription
to the poetry of Sedulius (c. AD 425450), in Italia philosophiam didicit, bears no weight; see Courcelle (1969) 141 n. 1. On the absence of trained professional teachers of philosophy in the Latin
west, cf. Bolgar (1958) 36: a grammarian would lecture on philosophy when he came across a
philosophical passage in an author, much after the style of Macrobius commentary on the Somnium Scipionis. If he did this well, if he was interested and made full use of his opportunities, he
would earn the title of a philosopher.
17
This can be correlated with wider cultural developments: Vessey in Halporn (2004) 37 asserts that a collective articulation of a Latin Christian textual culture that had been set in train by
the great masters of the later 4th and early 5th centuries had a momentum and visible direction of its
own long before Cassiodorus, observing that his Institutes is uniquely redolent of the new world of
texts (his emphasis).
76
DOUGAL BLYTH
rest of philosophy was not an oral discipline in the later Latin tradition. 18 This
isolation of dialectic from philosophy as a part, or sister-art, of rhetoric 19 can be
traced through the developing conception of the liberal arts in Latin literature,
from Cicero and Varro to Cassiodorus, 20 by way of Seneca, Quintilian, Augustine
and Martianus Capella. 21
Despite the lack of direct access to the practice of philosophy as a way of life,
resulting from the demise of fluency in Greek and the absence of Latin philosophical schools, Romans in the late west could not yet be said to be unaware of this
possibility. So long as the Greek schools in the east remained active and continued to influence western ideas through the medium of translation, philosophy
undoubtedly continued to be conceived, if not practiced, in the old sense. Even in
late 5th-century Gaul the Christian Faustus disdain for philosophers, as opposed
to philosophical thought, indicates the survival of this idea. 22
The key development here is the conflict between philosophy in the old
sense, as a distinctly pagan ethos, and Christianity. The Christian church at the
!
18
Augustine came upon Aristotles Categories as the pinnacle of his rhetorical training (Conf.
4.28), no doubt in Marius Victorinus translation. Victorinus had taught rhetoric in Rome using
Ciceros de Inventione as his textbook, followed by Ciceros Topics, on both of which he produced
commentaries; his own works on hypothetical syllogisms and definitions, and his translations of
logical works by Porphyry and Aristotle were clearly meant to be used in his school. See Hadot
(1971) 10398, esp. 1956. Since Victorinus was a teacher of rhetoric, he presumably did not
teach the metaphysical texts of Plotinus and Porphyry he translated.
19
See Hadot (1971) 191: La dialectique a t dabord Rome une discipline dinspiration
stocienne, intimement lie la rhetorique; cf. Hadot (1971) 195; Ramelli (2008).
20
Cassiodorus Inst. 2.3.47 prefaces his summary of dialectic by treating it as part of philosophy, but in doing so he borrows directly from recent Greek Neoplatonism, as the parallels from
Ammonius quoted by Halporn (2004) 18990 nn. 8895 show; see Vessey in Halporn (2004)
724 on his sources, with p. 85 for further references. By contrast, the texts Cassiodorus prescribes
for the study of dialectic (Inst. 2.3.18; cf. 817) are the standard translations and original works of
the Latin tradition, supplemented by Boethius recent commentaries.
21
The origin of this conception is clearly the Greek idea of an enkyklios paideia. Precisely when
it developed into the form in which it was transmitted to the middle ages as the trivium and
quadrivium is a matter partly of definition, partly of interpretation; see Hadot (2005) passim. But
whether Porphyrys conception influenced Latin writers from Augustine on is a real question.
Hadot (2005) 100, followed by Vessey in Halporn (2004) 65, answers yes, but cf. Gwynn (1926)
8292, who finds the standard seven subjects first in Ciceros de Orat. (p. 84); similarly Marrou
(1956) 177. On Martianus Capella, see Stahl et al. (1977) 232; on Cassiodorus, see Vessey in
Halporn (2004) 6479. On the significance of the inclusion of logic, see Bolgar (1958) 367;
Ramelli (2008).
22
See Brittain (2001) 247 with n. 45; cf. the letter from Eucherius to Valerian of AD 432 (PL
50, 724A, cited in Courcelle (1969) 231 n. 46).
77
end of antiquity seems to have sealed off the possibility of pursuing philosophy as
an autonomous way of life. Thus philosophy became thereafter either merely a
literary-intellectual adjunct to religion or at most a purely theoretical pursuit, and
the church alone retained the authority to prescribe and embody a way of life.
This apparently occurred in two related ways. First, the Neoplatonist school in
Athens disappeared, either as an eventual result of the edicts of Justinian of AD
529 and probably 531 (Cod.Just. 1.5.18.4 and 1.11.10.2) or at the latest by the
time of the Slavonic invasions (c. AD 580). 23 In any case, with the cessation of the
oral dimension of independent Neoplatonic teaching there was an end to the
practical autonomy of philosophy within the empire as a spiritual vision. The
school in Alexandria accommodated to Christianity from the late 5th or early 6th
century AD. Under Olympiodorus it seems to have restricted itself to innocuous
textual exegesis, and it eventually ceased teaching Plato entirely, moving to Constantinople in AD 610. The beginnings of Syriac textual work on Aristotle are
contemporary with this. But there was a clear break even in the east until Arabic
philosophy (in the medieval sense) emerged after AD 750. 24
Second, more generally in the west, Latin Christian philosophy developed
the role of handmaiden to faith. 25 The originally autonomous spiritual vision of
Neoplatonism as a way of life, the only prominent form of philosophy in late antiquity, became assimilated to and appropriated by Christianity, as is evidenced
for instance in the case of Augustines conversion. 26 This is strikingly confirmed
by Cassiodorus (c. AD 490 c. 590) in a series of definitions of philosophy bor!
23
Cf. Malalas Chronicle 18.47; Agathias 2.301. Watts (2004) 17980 dates the decrees. For
doubt about the significance of Justinians measure, see Cameron (1969); followed by Lynch
(1972) 1639, 177; Glucker (1978) 3229. For a defence of their effect, see Watts (2004). For
extended bibliography, see Wildberg (2005) 330 n. 39.
24
On philosophical activity outside the schools in the east, see Wildberg (2005) 3224 (324:
philosphical inquiry and debate, understood as a search for the truth, never ceased to be of central
concern, despite the marginalization of the pagan sage as a type; i.e., philosophy continued but
not as a way of life). On the Alexandrian school, see Wildberg (2005) 325 and 3336. On the period generally and the break before Arabic philosophy, see Marenbon (2007) 5660.
25
Cf. Hadot (2002) 25361 with further references; Marrone (2003), esp. 1618, 43, 456.
The conception behind the expression philosophia ancilla theologiae began with Philo (e.g., Congr.
14.7980), from whom ancient Christian writers adopted it (e.g., Clement of Alexandria, Stromata
1.5; PG 8, 721A724A), and it attained its classic formulation with the medieval Peter Damian (de
Divina omnipotentia 5; PL 145, 603CD, velut ancilla dominae); see further Wolfson (1948) 145
57.
26
See Conf. 7.9.13, 7.20; 8.1.2, 2.3, 8.19; cf. de Beata vita 1.4. For the clearly similar conversion
of Marius Victorinus, see Hadot (1971) 23552.
78
DOUGAL BLYTH
rowed from Neoplatonists (Inst. 2.3.5). 27 The first three are consistent with a
textual conception of philosophy. But the fourth, of philosophy as a preparation
for dying (meditatio mortis), derived from Platos Phaedo (e.g., 64a, 67e) and
repeated by Cicero at Tusc. 1.74, clearly represents the older view of a way of life;
Cassiodorus immediately appropriates this with the words which is better suited
to Christians (quod magis convenit Christianis). Following the demise of Latin
philosophical writing after Cassiodorus, there was a break, corresponding to but
longer than that in the east, before the Carolingian revival at the end of the 8th
century AD.28 John Marenbon concludes from the study of Carolingian texts: 29
the three ways in which philosophy would take place in the Latin world up to about 1200
are already evident: in the form of, and in thinking stimulated by, logic; in presenting and
analysing Christian doctrine; andso Alcuins use of the Confessions and the citation of
Chalcidius among his followers hintin connection with a small group of ancient
philosophical works, which would come properly into use, along with a wider range of
logical texts in the following century.
This analysis makes clear by omission that by the time of Charlemagne the
conception of philosophy as a way of life had completely disappeared in the west,
replaced by a conception that locates it exclusively in the meaning of designated
texts and methods of reasoning about them and about Christian doctrine.
Subsequently, as a secular pursuit in modernity, academic philosophy has for
long been reconceived almost exclusively as the realm of intellectual justification
or more generally of abstract inquiry. 30
!
27
See Courcelle (1969) 3423; Halporn (2004) 190 nn. 925.

See Marenbon (2007) 467, 702.
29
Marenbon (2007) 72; cf. Bolgar (1958) 133. In addition to the recovery of the logica vetus,
on Latin Platonist texts available from this time forth, see Klibansky (1981) 219 (noting the importance of Cicero as a source for knowledge of Plato, p. 22), supplemented by Gersh (1986) 22
3. On the evidence for medieval study of Ciceros philosophical works, see Bolgar (1958) 197, 249;
Gersh (1986) 78796, 806 and n. 123.
30
Hadot (2002) 26170 also documents repeated occasional recognitions since antiquity of
the potential of philosophy to define a way of life, while Marenbon (2007) 7 states: The contrast
between ancient philosophy as a way of life and philosophy in later centuries is not, however, absolute. And, in the Middle Ages, at certain moments, for certain thinkers, philosophyas distinct
from theology, and in spite of institutional structuresdid seem to offer, as it had done to the
ancients, a way of life. But Marenbon provides no further explanation of his first claim, and the
qualifications in the second make clear that he acknowledges that in the medieval period what was
generally called philosophy was indeed something quite different from the norm in antiquity.
28
79
Ciceros Own Conceptions of Philosophy and his Task

Cicero characteristically identifies philosophical theories in terms of schools
and depicts philosophy in his dialogues as transacted by oral discussion. Nevertheless this image of a socially located, intellectual way of life coincides with
frequent indications that his idea of philosophy is actually broader and less
precise than that. The evidence even contains elements implying a quite different
conception, a rhetorical conception of the nature of philosophy in which, moreover, texts play a central part. This is suggested by the literary form of Ciceros
philosophical works, and his letters occasionally reveal explicitly this different
conception of philosophy itself.
First, philosophy can be an activity properly involving writing. Thus in a
letter to Atticus (15.13a.2) referring to his composition of de Officiis in late 44 BC
Cicero writes, nos hic (quid enim aliud?) et
magnifice explicamus (Here I philosophizewhat else?and
expound the subject of what is appropriate on a magnificent scale, trans. after
Shackleton Bailey). The connective et is epexegetic: his philosophizing here is his
writing. 31
But philosophizing for Cicero can also occasionally be reading, in a way that
demonstrates that books for him have to some extent replaced oral discourse,
although still within the older conception of philosophy as an activity conducive
to the life or health of the soul. In another letter to Atticus written several months
earlier (14.21.3), after fretting about Marcus Antonius actions since Caesars
death, Cicero observes wryly, legendus mihi saepius est Cato maior ad te missus.
amariorem enim me senectus facit. stomachor omnia. (I should read more often the
Cato the Elder I dedicated to you. Old age makes me increasingly irritable; I get
upset at everything). 32 The word saepius (more often) might suggest repeated
reading of the text such as would constitute a spiritual exercise of the kind Pi-
31
Cf. Tusc. 2.1: in justifying the writing of this work, Cicero explains that he must philosophari.
Similarly at 2.5: philosophy should be born in Latin writing (here Cicero is justifying writing in
Latin as such, not the writing of philosophy, but what he says is nonetheless indicative of his assumption that writing is required for Latinate philosophy).
32
Unattributed translations are my own. Cf. Hoffer (2007) 95 on the display of emotion in
this passage.
80
DOUGAL BLYTH
erre Hadot argues characterizes ancient philosophy. 33 But more generally the
proposed aim is clearly therapeutic, for the reason that the cited work is meant to
be persuasive (in a manner similar to a consolatio or the discourses in the Tusculan
Disputations). Cicero thus implies that written philosophy falls within the ambit
of oratory.
At this point we can broaden our perspective and identify three reasons why
Cicero occasionally emphasizes the identification of philosophy with texts. 34 The
first is the role he attributes to writing in rhetorical preparation; the second is his
use of letters to discuss philosophy with friends; and the third is his literary
project, to found a Latin genre of philosophical texts. The first reason can be
elaborated from points Cicero has Crassus make in de Oratore. Reference to this
text helps, since rhetoric, the art of persuasion, is the key element in Ciceros way
of thinking here. At 1.150 (and cf. 1513) Crassus advises, quam plurimum
scribere. stilus optimus et praestantissimus dicendi effector et magister (write as much
as possible. The pen is the best and most eminent author and teacher of eloquence, trans. Rackham). Even a primarily aural effect such as prose rhythm,
absolute mastery of which was one of the reasons for Ciceros own eminence, 35
should be practiced not only by declamation but by writing, according to Crassus
at 3.1901; this provides a measure of how comprehensively Cicero identifies
rhetorical preparation with writing. He himself, of course, wrote up many of his
speeches, but he also wrote and published speeches that were never delivered,
and he sometimes wrote speeches out in full before delivery. 36 His own practice
thus confirms the close connection between oratory and writing.
!
33
For references, see n. 9 above. Shackleton Baileys (1999) translation (I ought to re-read
the Cato the Elder, SB no. 375) obscures the possibility.
34
There are no doubt also biographical reasons, relating to changes in Ciceros political fortunes and opportunities, and also to his grief at his daughters death, for his focus on writing at
different periods of his life. Yet these circumstantial developments, important as they are for understanding Ciceros own actions, do not contribute directly to an understanding of the conception
behind his references to reading and writing as forms of philosophizing.
35
See e.g., Dyck (2003) 2045, with earlier bibiography.
36
On two speeches written to be delivered ex scripto after Ciceros recall in 57 BC, see Lintott
(2008) 89. In the event, only the speech to the senate was so delivered; for other instances, see
Lintott (2008) 9 n. 18. On the importance of writing in Ciceros oratory generally, see Butler
(2002). I tend to agree with an anonymous reviewer for this journal that Ciceros ongoing frustrations in practical politics dating from the time of his exile and recall are responsible for his innovations in circulating texts as a replacement for, and not merely a supplement to oral delivery, an
observation that extends to his political theoretical writings, including de Orat., published in 54.
81
The relevance of this to Ciceros tendency to associate philosophy with texts

is evident from one particular requirement by Crassus. Clearly influenced by
Platos Phaedrus (although disputed by his companion Antonius: see 1.2212),
Crassus is given to state that the orator requires a thorough knowledge of at least
moral philosophy (1.689), and if he is to say anything about them, similarly of
logic and physics, the other parts of philosophy (1.65). At 3.60 he goes further,
blaming Socrates for separating philosophy and rhetoric, which in reality belong
together (re cohaerentes).37 Philosophy can thus be identified closely with or as a
part of the art of oratory. 38
What is important here, and possibly original to Cicero, is the association of
this unified conception of philosophy and rhetoric with the practice of writing. I
argued above that Cicero means that writing is involved comprehensively in the
preparation of practically every part of oratory (except of course the techniques
of oral delivery), and certainly for the invention and exposition of the content.
The implication here is then that mastery of philosophy too will come by writing.
Cicero himself states this explicitly in his preface to de Natura deorum, at 1.9:
omnes autem eius [i.e., philosophiae] partes atque omnia membra tum facillime
noscuntur, cum totae quaestiones scribendo explicantur (Every part and every branch
of [philosophy] can be grasped most easily when the whole range of its subject
matter is discussed in writing). The specific motive for covering all schools of
philosophy is Ciceros adherence to a form of Academic scepticism. 39 Owing to
his plan to found the genre of Latin philosphical writing, Cicero devotes much
more space in such prefaces to justifying writing in Latin (as opposed to Greek)
!
37
For dispute about the origin of the theory of the unity of philosophy and rhetoric, see Marrou (1956) 212; Hadot (2005) 4651 with references. Both scholars derive it from the New Academy (cf. Part. 139), and suggest that Cicero learned it orally from Philo of Larissa.
38
Cf. de Orat. 3.76, and note Tusc. 1.67 (just as philosophy is necessary for expertise in oratory, oratory is necessary for the fulfillment of the promise of philosophy); Div. 2.4 (appealing to
the example of Aristotle and Theophrastus in adding his works on rhetoric to his list of philosophical writings). MacKendrick (1989) 13 asserts as his major thesis that the whole structure of
Ciceros philosophy was shaped by the rhetorical foundations of his thought. See also Grimal
(1962), an appreciation of Michel (1960). Zetzel (2003) 1324 similarly relates this to Ciceros
idea of a distinctly Roman prudential virtue embodied in the thinking leader, to be contrasted with
the Greek case.
39
See N.D. 1.11, quod facere iis necesse est quibus propositum est ueri reperiendi causa et contra omnes philosophos et pro omnibus dicere (This is what we must do if in the interests of discovering the
truth we decide both to criticize and to support the views of each individual philosopher, trans.
Walsh).
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DOUGAL BLYTH
than to justifying writing about philosophy as such. Nevertheless the latter is, in
effect, the point: to philosophize in Latin, he must write in Latin. 40
The passives in the Latin quoted above leave it ambiguous whether the
beneficiary of such written exposition is the writer or a different reader. Cicero
presumably means both, 41 although the implied benefit for the writer is more
illuminating. Just as the orator benefits by writing out any rhetorical speech, since
this helps him clarify to himself the required points, arguments and progression
of topics, so the philosopher benefits philosophically by writing. Writing thus
tends to replace dialectic in Ciceros oratorical conception of philosophy as the
means to conceptual clarification. I discuss his use of dialectic further below.
Philippa Smith has questioned whether Cicero is justified in writing
philosophy rhetorically, on the ground that this involves a certain degree of nonrational manipulation of the reader. She canvasses three answers: that arguing
both sides of a philosophical case as Cicero does in the dialogues is just as well
designed to reach the truth as in the adversarial court system; that rhetorical
features are necessary to the goal of entertaining as well as instructing; and that it
is impossible to separate rhetoric from philosophy. 42 The first two answers do
not really address the charge of manipulation, and the third seems to come closest to the truth, although it overlooks the key consideration. Philosophy itself is
not obviously inseparable from rhetoric, at least when conceived as a way of life
devoted to the oral, dialectical pursuit of truth. The latter is implied in Ciceros
letter to Papirius Paetus (Fam. 9.24.3), in which he admonishes him that
happiness most of all depends on spending time with good and pleasant friends;
here Cicero calls this informal advice itself philosophizing (philosophando). 43
!
40
At the end of N.D. 1.7 Cicero begins the first of two reasons for the present work, viz, that it
will explain philosophy in Latin to his fellow citizens. Dyck (2003) ad loc. notes that this is contrasted (primum etiam) with the second reason at 1.9, that writing is a means to knowledge.
41
This point is obscured by the otherwise elegant translation of Walsh (1998), The easiest
way to gain acquaintance with all [philosophys] constituent parts and branches is to deal with the
topics fully in writing.
42
Smith (1995) 31723.
43
On shared life rather than books as true philosophy, cf. Tusc. 2.1113; 4.5; Sen. Ep. 6.6.
Powell (1995b) 2 refers to what he considers Ciceros definition of philosophy at Ac. 2.29 as aiming
at the judgment of truth and falsity, good and bad, right and wrong. But this is Antiochus reported
view not Ciceros own, and is designed tactically to support his historical claim to represent the Old
Academy doctrinally; see Brittain (2006) 19 n. 37 ad loc., who notes that Cicero himself rejects the
implied position at 2.10910.
83
What is inseparable from rhetoric is, by contrast, written philosophy, philosophy

as text, because this literature is a form of oratory.
Comparison and contrast with Plato may be of use here. 44 Scholars increasingly acknowledge that rhetoric pervades Platos dialogues in the form of
protreptic arguments, occasionally extended dramatic attempts at practical
persuasion, and deliberate and sometimes insincere manipulation by Socrates of
his interlocutors beliefs during refutation. It is not difficult to describe certain
passages in Plato effectively in terms of technical parts of rhetoric such as discovery of arguments, arrangement, control and variation in diction, establishment of
ethos and even solicitation of pathos. 45 Platos dialogues, unlike Ciceros, are not
normally structured on explicitly forensic principles, with formal speeches for
and against a position. On the contrary, Plato shows that philosophical rhetoric
need not be forensic (contrary to Smiths first suggestion) but still threatens (at
least) to be manipulative. Again, Plato clearly uses his rhetorical abilities to entertain, but he is quite capable of using these same skills protreptically to persuade
the reader of the essential seriousness of philosophy (contra Smiths second
claim). Rhetoricality is a natural consequence of producing philosophical writing
for a public readership, as both Plato and Cicero do, rather than for students in a
school; addressing the public is the business of oratory. I discuss Ciceros choice
of a non-Platonic, forensic mode of rhetoric below. At this stage it is sufficient to
note how his practical assimilation of oratory to writing, along with his both
theoretical and practical association of philosophy with rhetoric, help to explain
his conception of writing as a mode of philosophizing. This then tends to lead
him to conceive of philosophy itself as associated with texts.
A second reason for this tendency can be found in Ciceros epistolatory
practices. As his letters make abundantly clear, he communicated with his contemporaries in the Roman ruling class as much by writing as face to face, and we
may assume that his correspondents did the same with one another, if perhaps
not quite so copiously. No doubt there are good reasons for this: responsibilities
and power relations required contact, yet limited the occasions for meeting;
events and opportunities dispersed these Romans around Italy and the Mediterranean world; and their wealth led to possession of and frequent residence at
widely dispersed villas. While letters here replace and in some respects imitate the
!
44
Thanks are due to an anonymous referee for this journal, who suggested that I clarify my
point here by reference to Plato.
45
The literature is huge. For a start, see Sprague (1962); Rutherford (1995); Michelini
(2003).
84
DOUGAL BLYTH
varieties of personal conversation, such imitation is itself a literary effect. Ciceros

correspondence demonstrates artful construction and is in any case disciplined
by the mechanical and social conventions involved in formulating ones thoughts
as text.
As a result of the pervasiveness of this practice in maintaining his social relationships, Cicero not infrequently uses letters to discuss philosophy in addition
to his many other interests and concerns. Miriam Griffin identifies 17 correspondents expected to understand philosophical remarks to some degree or other. 46
Accordingly, quite apart from his literary-philosophical projects, Cicero is used to
writing in Latin about philosophy in discussing it with his contemporaries.
Nearly all of them would have learned their philosophy in Greek, and Cicero
frequently uses Greek philosophical terms. Nevertheless he does not do so
exclusively, and in some letters he discusses philosophical ideas with no resort to
Greek (e.g. Fam. 9.16.56, in which in July 46 BC he gives the Epicurean Paetus a
Stoic moral justification of his relations with Caesar). 47 Ciceros use of letters, an
artful and conventional genre in which texts are exchanged independent of oral
contact, as the location of philosophy thus helps explain his tendency to conceive
of philosophy in terms of writing.
The third reason for this conception is Ciceros own literary project, repeatedly expressed in the prefaces to the series of works from 4643 BC, of establishing philosophy as a Latin genre of literature. 48 Cicero locates his project as the
culmination of the achievements of earlier Roman writers in emulating and mastering Greek genres, and in this respect his aim would not have been possible or
!
46
See Griffin (1995) 330. See especially Fam. 7.12; 9.4, 9.16.56; 15.16.13, 15.17.3, and
15.19 (by Cassius, in defence of Epicureanism).
47
Baldwin (1992) 45 notes that about half of Ciceros letters to Paetus contain Greek; yet
Adams (2003) 31316 shows that most of this is not code-switching (expressing himself in
Greek), but quotations, references to Greek expressions and so forth. For code-switching in philosophical letters, see Adams (2003) 31618. On the distribution of Greek in the letters and the
reasons for its use, see Steele (1900) 38990; Baldwin (1992) 2 and passim; Dunkel (2000) 127
9; Adams (2003) 30847, esp. 3213, 3447.
48
See n. 3 above. Note particularly Tusc. 1.5 (claiming that while Roman oratory is measured
by speakers, the lack of philosophy in Rome is measured by the absence of texts in Latin); cf. Tusc.
2.6. See Davies (1971) 10510, 11819 for a balanced appreciation of Ciceros originality in this
regard, which he shows is a comprehensively cultural influence. MacKendrick (1989) 6, 25 suggests that Ciceros literary innovation extends not merely to the Latin philosophical dialogue as
such, along with its prologue, but also to the revival of a form not even used by the Greeks since
Aristotle, but this is uncertain, and perhaps the Sosus of Antiochus was a dialogue: see Glucker
(1978) 41720 with refs.
85
motivated without the existence of an authoritative body of Greek philosophical

texts. Nevertheless, among the Greeks down to Ciceros own times production of
philosophical texts was always an addendum to the oral activity of the schools, as
Loveday Alexander has clearly demonstrated. 49
Ciceros philosophical literature is nominally linked to the sceptical Academy by his own protestations of allegiance and the form the texts take, presenting
the doctrines of both Epicureans and Stoics and following each with sceptical
criticism. But the school had formally ended with the death of Philo, Ciceros
teacher, in 84/3 BC and, whether he supported Philos own teaching or Clitomachus divergent interpretation of Carneades scepticism, 50 apart from Ciceros
literary revival these were no longer living schools of thought.51 Unlike his Greek
models, then, Ciceros Latin philosophical texts are not merely epiphenomenal
to an ongoing institutional presence. He no doubt did expect philosophy to
continue in the informal private conversational and epistolatory mode to which
he was accustomed. But the formal public expression that would support it
!
49
Alexander (1990) 2307; see her conclusions pp. 2367, and cf. pp. 23742 on the special
case of Plato.
50
Ac. 2.12 makes clear that in the lost first book of the first edition of the work (the Catulus)
the form of scepticism discussed was not Philos; in the lost books of the second edition this was
presumably expounded by the character Cicero. Later in Book 2 of the first edition (2.64147)
Cicero responds to Lucullus presentation of Antiochus views with Clitomachus version of
Carneades scepticism: Clitomachus books are cited for what follows at 2.98 and 102. See also
Brittain (2006) xvixix and n. 23. Confusingly, on the other hand, at Fam. 9.8.1 Cicero identifies his
role as Philos spokesman (mihi sumpsi Philonis).
51
In some works (e.g. Rep., Leg., Tusc., Parad.) Cicero supports Stoic views, and on occasion
he explains that sceptical probabilism allows him to adopt them provisionally as most likely for
practical purposes. But this does not amount to conversion to the Stoic school, whose epistemology he clearly rejects (see especially the Ac.), while he rejects Epicureanism totally. This together
implies that he does not aim to revive school philosophizing of the sort he and his contemporaries
had temporarily experienced as students either in Rome with Philo, or in Athens with Antiochus or
Rhodes with Posidonius. Grimal (1962) 1212 argues that since Panaetius, Greek philosophy
served Romans not as a search for truth but as a justification of Roman certainties. While this suits
the political works of Cicero he focuses on, it does not do justice to the late works. Somewhat similarly, but more plausibly, Habinek (1994) suggests that Ciceros aims during his retirements
involved a pursuit of politics by other means: championing cultural as opposed to military, leadership. Yet this does not explain why philosophy in particular should be the flagship of culture. The
comment by Lvy (1992a) 292 on Tusc. 5.5 o vitae philosophia dux is especially pertinent: Ciceros
conception of philosophy here transcends the differences among the schools, unified with respect
to the end they all pursue, the human good.
86
DOUGAL BLYTH
thereafter among his compatriots would no longer be the Greek school but a
genre of Latin literature.52
Ciceros Contribution to the Transformation of Philosophy
I turn now to the factors I identify in Ciceros contribution to the way this
conception, by the end of antiquity in the west, had generally supplanted the
older one of philosophy as an oral-intellectual way of life. The most immediately
obvious factor in this transformation was the development, stimulated largely by
Cicero, of an autonomous Latin tradition of philosophical writing. 53 While this
tradition was continually sensitive to evolving Greek modes of philosophy, it
produced enough figures of independent literary-intellectual authority (Seneca,
Apuleius, the Latin church fathers, in particular Lactantius, Minucius Felix,
Marius Victorinus and Augustine, and also Macrobius, Martianus Capella and
Boethius) 54 that the post-Roman Latin-speaking west maintained its core intellectual traditions by reference to these writers despite the iconoclastic influence
of Christianity and ultimately quite independent of the Greek philosophical
schools.
!
52
Cf. Powell (1995b) 32: The actual writing of philosophy was, of course, only the tip of
what must have been a fairly large iceberg of both formal and informal philosophical discussion
both in Greek and Latin. King (1927) xxiiixxiv puts together Ciceros report (Fam. 9.16.7) that in
July 46 BC he was teaching Hirtius and Dollabella oratory with the statement in Tusc. 2.9 (written
45 BC) that M and his interlocutors spend their mornings at rhetoric and afternoons on the philosophical discussion depicted in that dialogue, to speculate that Cicero himself actually led disputationes of this sort with other Roman citizens, as a school. But I find this implausible, given the lack of
corroborating evidence (see, on the contrary, the invitation to Varro, Fam. 9.8.2, which suggests an
exchange between equals, comparable with those in the dialogues with named interlocutors, and in
particular the Posterior Ac., in which Varro converses with Cicero). Douglas (1995) 204 comments: It is not enough to suggest that what went on in Greek schools has been simply transferred to the more typically Roman setting found in Ciceros other theoretical writings.
53
Cf. Trapp (2007) x on Cicero, Lucretius and Varro as pioneers of Roman philosophy or
rather philosophy in Latin; Powell (1995b) 302. On Ciceros philosophical influence on posterity, see Zielinski (1912); supplemented by MacKendrick (1989); and briefly Dyck (2003) 1416.
54
On the importance of Latin to the later philosophical tradition, see Grimal (1992). Morford (2002) 190 identifies Apuleius as the only Roman philosopher writing in Latin after Seneca,
but he excludes Christian writers. Trapp (2007) 245, although not distinguishing by language and
similarly limiting his range, provides a list of later philosophical writers that is more sensitive to the
ancient conception of philosophy. For Ciceros influence on the Latin Christian writers, see
Zielinski (1912) 87130; cf. Hadot (1995) 23850. On the correlated importance of Ciceros
Topics for Roman dialectic, see briefly Hadot (1971) 180, 192.
87
Ciceros significance here is revealed by the very contingency of this

development. It is possible that without his model Romans writing philosophy
subsequently would have chosen to continue using Greek, the language of the
schools and of the only texts they might (in that case) have read. As it was, in later
antiquity after the loss of Greek in the west all that was available was the work of
this Latin tradition dating from Cicero, of which Augustine was the most important exponent, and the limited number of translations discussed above. Cicero is
directly influential on both accounts, as an inspiration to Augustine and as an
originator of Latin translations of Greek philosophical works (Platos Protagoras
and Timaeus, and Aratus), as well as indirectly, by initiating the tradition of Latin
philosophical literature.
Ciceros influence on Augustine is particularly significant in this regard.
Augustines citations of the Latin classics show both that Cicero had the most
influence on him of any pagan writer, and that the philosophical works were by
far the most important in this regard. 55 But Augustine himself was, if not the most,
certainly one of the two or three most important philosophers for later western
antiquity and the whole medieval period. 56 These two points combined offer an
overall external measure of Ciceros role in establishing the new textual conception of philosophy that emerged at the end of antiquity, particularly given that
Augustines frequent citations of him, and the survival of his philosophical works,
ensured a continuing readership. 57
There were Epicureans before Cicero who wrote in Latin, although
poorlyat least according to himof whom we have the names Amafinius,
!
55
See Hagendahl (1967) vol. 1: one third of the testimonia from the Latin classics (134 out of
359 pages: 324 out of 969 items) are for Cicero, and three quarters of these (104 pages; 221 items)
are from the philosophica exclusive of the rhetorica; cf. Hagendahl (1967) 570 for his own analysis.
Augustine attributes his philosophical awakening to reading Ciceros Hortensius (Conf. 3.567; de
Beata vita 1.4; Soliloquies 1.10.17). Hagendahl (1967) 586 identifies Cicero as Augustines most
important source of information on Greek philosophy; cf. Courcelle (1969) 16771. Gersh
(1986) 782 notes that he is also, uniquely among pagan writers, a source of doctrine; cf. Hagendahl
(1967) 585: Much as Augustine owes to Cicero in matters of language and eloquence, he is perhaps still more indebted to the philosopher. For the stages of Ciceros influence on Augustine, see
Hagendahl (1967) 5708; Gersh (1986) 7834; see also Riley (1969).
56
This is uncontroversial, but see, e.g., Spade (1994) 578 (Augustine was much more important than Aristotle until late, and than Plato, who was known only indirectly, mainly through
Augustine); Marenbon (2008): Along with Augustine and Aristotle he [Boethius] is the fundamental philosophical or theological author of the Latin tradition.
57
On the medieval reception of Cicero, see the references in nn. 29 and 534.
88
DOUGAL BLYTH
Rabirius and Catius. 58 There were also unnamed Latin Stoic writers, 59 while
Ciceros friend Brutus wrote a de Virtute presumably along the lines of his Greek
philosophical teacher, the dogmatic synthesist Antiochus. 60 Yet it was Cicero
who effectively initiated the surviving tradition of writing and reading philosophy
in Latin, as his influence, explicitly acknowledged by later writers such as Lactantius and Augustine, demonstrates. 61
A second factor in Ciceros contribution to the transformation of the
primary sense of philosophy from a way of life to the meanings of texts and their
evaluation arose from the fact that he, like Lucretius, faced and solved the
problems of expressing philosophical ideas in Latin. Unlike Lucretius, Cicero did
not regard the poverty of his native tongue (Lucretius 1.1369) as an obstacle
to philosophy; he even dared to boast that in certain respects Latin is more suited
to philosophy than Greek (see, e.g. Fin. 1.10). Not only did Cicero thus provide
the material means for later Latin philosophizing, but the textual selfconsciousnessness of this challenge (shared with Lucretius) focuses attention on
the written formulation of ideas and suggests that philosophy culminates in its
written expression, rather than as a way of life.
The development over centuries of an abstract Latin vocabulary, including
Ciceros contribution, has been studied by Marouzeau, 62 and Ciceros techniques
in translating Greek terms and his literary discussions of his innovations have
been analyzed by numerous scholars. 63 But the frequency, extent and detail of
Ciceros commentary on terminology in the philosophical works, as nowhere
else, are an index of how intimately this challenge is connected with his selfappointed task of initiating a Latin literary philosophical genre.
!
58
Ac. 1.5; Tusc. 4.6 (cf. 1.6; 2.78); Fam. 15.16.1 (to Cassius) and 15.19.12 (from Cassius).
Rusticos Stoicos (Cassius at Fam. 15.19.1). On the Roman reception of philosophy before
Cicero, see Lynch (1972) 15960; Powell (1995b) 1417; Morford (2002). On earlier Latin
philosophical writers, see further Bardon (1952) 20511; Powell (1988) 8 and (1995b) 2630.
60
E.g., Att. 13.25.3; cf. Tusc. 5.1, 12, 121.
61
E.g., M. Tullius, qui non tantum perfectus orator, sed etiam philosophus (Lactantius, de Falsa
religione 1.15); ipse itaque ut vir magnus et doctus et vitae humanae plurimum ac peritissime consulens
(Augustine, C.D. 5.9); unus e numero doctissimorum hominum idemque eloquentissimus omnium, Marcus Tullius Cicero (C.D. 22.6).
62
Marouzeau (1949) 10724, esp. 11922 on Ciceros contribution.
63
See briefly Jones (1959) 313; Douglas (1962) 49; Dyck (2003) 1213; at greater length
Lvy (1992b); Michel (1992); Powell (1995c); Nicolas (2005). Passages that illustrate Ciceros
achievement in self-consciously defining a Latin philosophical vocabulary include Ac. 1.4041;
2.1718, 22, 3031; Fin. 3.35, 15, 201, 24, 26, 325, 3940, 45, 517, 69; 4.72; N.D. 2.29, 47, 53,
58; Tusc. 3.711, 1618.
59
89
A third factor is Ciceros choice of a non-Platonic style of philosophical

dialogue consisting of extended speeches, one best suited to his own rhetorical
abilities. This reinforced the effect of his closer Greek sources literary choices of
either the same dialogical style (often called Aristotelian) 64 or the written
discourse modelled on the kind of lecture apparently called either thesis or schol,
or perhaps diatrib. 65 While the format of Ciceros texts may have its origins in an
oral practice, it was already a highly formalized practice, stylistically most like a
written text, and so a model for later writers. In sum, from the outset philosophizing in Latin responded to a model that abandoned effective engagement in interpersonal oral dialectic and thus promoted a literary conception of philosophy. 66
!
64
While Aristotle seems to have made use of long expository speeches in his dialogues, he is
not necessarily the only or the main model for this style of dialogue to influence Cicero, and
Ciceros own reference to an Aristoteleios mos (Att. 13.19.4) is specifically to the writers presentation of himself as the main speaker. In another letter (Q. fr. 3.5.1) Cicero makes a distinction on this
basis between Aristotle in some of his lost dialogues and the early Academic Heraclides Ponticus;
Att. 13.19.4 makes clear that Heraclides regularly included himself as a minor character only, presumably for quasi-historicity, and that until the Ac. (excluding the unpublished Leg., whose character attributions may in any case be late) Cicero only used the deceased as the main speakers of
philosophical works, so as not to give grounds for jealousy to the living (cf. Q. fr. 3.5.2). Accordingly,
Ciceros dialogues take two forms, those set in the relatively remote past with speakers of previous
generations (de Orat., Rep., Sen., Amic.), and those set in contemporary or recent circumstances, in
which he is himself a character (Leg., Brutus, both editions of the Ac., Fin., apparently the Tusc. [M],
N.D. [where he is not a major speaker], Div., and Fat.; the fragmentary Hortensius presumably had
the cast of the prior Ac. I omit the lost de Gloria). Andrieu (1954) 2867, 297300, 31214, 3247
provides analysis of the dialogical technique and literary style of Ciceros philosophical works in
comparison with dialogue in drama and other genres of Greek and Latin literature.
65
Jocelyn (1982) and (1983) argues against use of diatrib to refer to a specific kind of text.
See also Glucker (1978) 15966. Cicero uses schola as a Latin term at Tusc. 1.78 (cf. 2.26), but in a
way that seems to include the possibility of Socratic dialectic, on which see further below. Douglas
(1995) 197204 argues that schol has a meaning vaguer than lecture and should be distinguished from the term thesis (wherein a teacher argues against a students proposition), suggesting
that it implies a therapeutic discourse. Given its original sense, I doubt that schol can be limited in
precisely this way; lesson or class might be more apt (thus including, as one form, the thesis,
since that is the mode of the Tusc. books). On the role of the thesis in teaching in the Greek schools,
see Hadot (2002) 1046; Bnatoul (2006) 421.
66
Musonius Rufus, by contrast, taught in Greek: see Lutz (1947) 17 with n. 62, and cf. 2530
on his oral teaching style. In any case, notwithstanding Lutz defence of his significance (35, 24)
and his role in teaching Epictetus (1720 with n. 79), Musonius seems only to have become particularly well-known as a result of his dealings with emperors. See also Van Geytenbeek (1963);
Gill (2000) 467, cf. 35.
90
DOUGAL BLYTH
In two passages, Fin. 2.117 and Tusc. 1.917, Cicero demonstrates that he
can write Socratic dialectic, drawing out the implications of a speakers claims,
depicting his character by his intellectual reactions, and even producing an
explicitly signalled refutation at Tusc. 1.14. But the de Finibus passage is more selfreflective. It begins by distinguishing Socratic dialectic from the speeches of
Gorgias and notes that, while Arcesilaus, the first sceptic head of the Academy,
revived dialectic (2.2), later Academics, like teachers in other schools, preferred
to deliver a speech to refute a students claim (which is the characteristic procedure Cicero employs in the Tusculans). Cicero, as a character in de Finibus, then
goes on to claim and justify a preference for dialectic (2.3), and after some
methodological remarks he seeks a definition of pleasure from the Epicurean
Torquatus (2.56). This leads to an argument about the equivalence of the Latin
and Greek terms voluptas and hdon, and an extended attack on the Epicurean
distinction between different kinds of pleasure, on the ground that both terms
must mean just one thing (2.717). This attack takes the form of a speech,
occasionally stopping to demand answers from Torquatus, something paralleled
in some passages of Platos Gorgias, for instance where Callicles is grilled at
505d10a. The de Finibus similarly depicts the breakdown of dialectic as a result
of the inability of the respondent. Torquatus finally asks Cicero to give a
continuous speech instead (2.18).
Part of Ciceros point here seems to be to show the consequence of the
Epicurean rejection of logic as a part of philosophy. Nevertheless, if we could not
compare the (not exactly) parallel passage in the Tusculans, we might mistakenly
think that Cicero himself was incapable of writing effective dialectic. This opens
the question as to why he otherwise characteristically avoids it in his dialogues, a
matter well discussed by Douglas. 67 Douglas notes that since Platos time,
rhetoricians had reduced dialectic to a logical game, so that in context it no longer
tended to be persuasive, and also that Ciceros general aim is to explain and
compare systems of thought, for which the continuous speech is more useful. In
fact, ideas and conflicts among ideas are generally foregrounded by Cicero over
personal intellectual progress, or lack of it, as in Plato. Cicero does not usually
write dialectic because his aims include instruction and persuasion: instruction in
the range of theories available on a topic among the schools, and persuasion, if
not to adopt any of them at least to evaluate them critically. This rhetorical,
protreptic aim assimilates his presentation of philosophy to oratory and so (as
!
67
Douglas (1962) 46.
91
with his dissemination of other kinds of oratory in written form) to the requirement of writing speeches that a reader can evaluate.
A fourth and final factor for Ciceros influence on the later conception of
philosophy is the implication of both his dialogic settings and his dedicatory
practices that philosophy is primarily a literary activity. The dialogues do depict
oral philosophical exchanges among their characters, but these are located in a
context of books and libraries often enough to suggest that texts are the primary
location of philosophy, from which oral discussion is derivative. Books 34 of de
Finibus take place in the younger Lucullus library, where Cicero comes to look
for some works of Aristotle and meets Cato, who is studying there (3.7). Discussion of books continues until 3.10. De Divinatione Book 2 takes place in Ciceros
own library (2.8), following, in the preface, the most complete list Cicero offers of
his own philosophical books to that point (2.17). Again, the dialogue in both
the surviving second book of the first version of the Academica and the first book
of the second, revised, version, takes its start from the controversy caused by
Antiochus publication of his Sosus to refute the apparent innovations of Philos
Roman Books (Ac. 2.1112, 18; 1.13).
The location in the dialogues, where specified, is almost always a villa, 68 and
the occasion either explicitly ludi (e.g., in de Re publica) or implicitly a similar
occasion of otium, when otherwise books might be read, disconnected from the
public life of a Roman aristocrat in the forum and curia. The remark at Fin. 3.7
that Cato would even read in the curia while waiting for the senate to assemble is
the exception that proves the rule here. Philosophy is identified with reading as
opposed to practical life. Again, Cicero presents his opportunity to write
philosophy, in both the early political dialogues and the series of later works, as a
consequence of enforced leisure. Perhaps this is politics carried on by other
means, but the means are certainly other than practical politics and public life.
Philosophy is no longer a life but a leisurely, literary adjunct to life. 69
!
68
In the Brutus, the history of oratory that begins Ciceros last period of literary work (47 or
4643 BC), the location seems to be his townhouse. But the depicted contemporary occasion,
following Caesars victory against Pompey, again presents the conversation as occurring during a
hiatus in public life, not as the mode of an entirely alternative form of life.
69
The public presentation of philosophy in Ciceros speeches, by contrast, is clearly contrived, for the purposes of attacking Cato at Mur. 613 and deprecating Ciceros own knowledge in
Pis. 5970, and is thus of little signficance for his influence on later conceptions of philosophy; see
Griffin (1995) 3256.
92
DOUGAL BLYTH
The dedications of Ciceros books in the prefaces contribute further to

identifying philosophy as a literary activity. To Brutus, who had written the lost de
Virtute (see e.g. Fin. 1.8), Cicero dedicates not just his Orator and, by implication,
his history of Roman oratory, the Brutus, but also, more relevantly, de Finibus, the
Tusculans, de Natura Deorum, and the Paradoxa Stoicorum. The conception of
philosophy as transacted by the exchange of books is also suggested by Ciceros
revision of the Academica to include Varro as a character, which amounts to a
dedication. We can trace this through a series of 12 letters. The first, Att. 13.12.3,
of June 45 BC, seems to show that Atticus had reported that Varro sought a
dedication from Cicero, to whom Varro had two years previously promised to
dedicate his not yet forthcoming de Lingua Latina. Cicero responds by remarking
on Varros appropriateness as a spokesman for Antiochus views.
In the sequence of letters over the following month Cicero reports progress
in the revision of Academica, speculates that Varro was motivated by jealousy of
Brutus, and frets as to whether it is a good idea to include Varro, mainly, one
assumes, lest he be offended by the treatment of his role. 70 Finally we have the
letter from Cicero to Varro (Fam. 9.8) that serves as the dedication, presenting
the revised Academica as a reminder that Varro owes him a dedication. The
replacement of oral philosophy by literature is explicitly remarked, puto fore, ut,
cum legeris, mirere, nos id locutos esse inter nos, quod numquam locuti sumus. sed nosti
morem dialogorum ( I suppose that on reading it you will be amazed at our having
discussed between ourselves something we have never discussed; but you know
the practice in dialogues, 9.8.2). Cicero continues by promising real conversations with Varro, but only once the Republic has been re-established. In light of
this comment, the death of the Roman Republic might seem to the modern age
like a fateful omen of the eventual (much later) death of lived philosophy. The
overall implication of these dedicatory practices of Cicero and his literary associates is thus that philosophy is to be pursued by the composition and exchange of
texts, in which oral conversation is at best an imaginary literary artifact, while
ultimately philosophy is a genre of literature. 71
!
70
Att. 13.13/14.1; 14/15.1; 16; 18; 19.35; 21a.1; 22.1; 23.2; 24.1; 25; 35/6.2.
The letters contain other indications of the treatment of philosophy as literature. In addition to many references in the letters to Atticus to the publication of Ciceros own works (see, e.g.,
n. 70), there is for instance Ciceros request in August 45 BC for a book by the Epicurean Phaedrus
Peri then and (on a textual restoration, at least) one by Diogenes of Babylon Peri Pallados (Att.
13.39.2). The latter is cited at N.D. 1.41, and at 1.93 an angry response in person by Phaedrus, who
had taught Cicero, is reported when he pressed the former on the Epicurean conception of the
71
93
Conclusion
This implication was not entirely clear to Cicero himself. As noted above, he
generally and primarily accedes to the contemporary Hellenistic conception of
philosophy as an institutionally committed way of life based on an orally
transacted intellectual practice, although he is not consistent in this regard. I have
argued that, without recognizing this as anything different, Cicero sometimes
implies that he thinks of philosophy as instead a matter of reading and writing
(and moreover as a leisure activity divorced from practical life). This much alone
is not so remarkable, but its importance lies in the fact that these indications that
Cicero himself occasionally conceives of philosophy in terms of texts would have
been recognized by later readers of Cicero as confirming their practice and
conception of philosophy. The post-antique future of philosophy, in this
transformed sense, depended on the survival and revival in western Europe of
practices of reading, interpreting, emulating and innovating upon classical Latin
texts, in particular Latin philosophical texts, beyond the closure of the later Greek
schools in the east. 72 This brings us back to the question as to how this practice
and conception arose and became dominant. My main claim is that, quite apart
from the evidence for Ciceros own thinking, the later reception of his philosophical texts played a significant role. Their formal characteristics, in conjunction
with their foundational influence in the Latin tradition, modelled and insinuated
the idea that philosophy is primarily related to texts. Hence Ciceros philosophical books contributed significantly to the evolution and eventual dominance of
this conception. His works functioned as the primary model of Latin philosophical prose (and of philosophy as prose) in this productive context; he initiated the
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
gods. When he came to write N.D., Cicero presumably checked Phaedrus book to see if there was a
better answer to his question there, but found none. Again this depicts the reference away from
philosophy as a rational and interpersonal mode of life to literature as the location of rationality.
Ciceros philosophical works themselves contain several other references to his reading of Greek
texts, e.g., Div. 1.6 listing Stoic texts on the topic, although the report at 1.7 of Carneades response
may derive from Philos oral teaching. MacKendrick (1989) 13, citing Putz (1925), calls Ciceros
library one of the best private collections of all time.
72
I do not mean to deny the importance of Arabic philosophy, merely to say that later Latinate medieval and modern philosophy would not have developed as they did without the influence
of Cicero in the Latin tradition. Without the responsiveness of this western tradition of philosophical reading and writing, medieval Arabic philosophical texts and ideas would not have had the
influence they did beyond their own culture.
94
DOUGAL BLYTH
process of forging a Latin philosophical vocabulary, both producing terms himself and discussing how to do so; the frequent use in his dialogues of sequences of
extended quasi-formal speeches from different philosophical points of view
minimizes the extent to which philosophy is represented as consisting in oral
conversation; and his depictions of philosophical practice, by himself as author
and by his characters, frequently invoke libraries, reading and book production as
the defining context for philosophizing in Latin.
In these respects the reception of Ciceros philosophical works played a significant part in the evolution of a new understanding of the nature of philosophy,
as primarily a matter of the meanings of texts and the intellectual evaluation of
the claims and arguments presented in them. This conception is already suggested in the Latin intellectual tradition by the late 4th century and became definitive with the late 8th-century Carolingian revival, surviving the general
domination of Christianity in late European antiquity over intellectual and moral
life in a manner the older conception of philosophy as an autonomous way of life
did not.
University of Auckland, dj.blyth@auckland.ac.nz
DOUGAL BLYTH
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CICERO AND PHILOSOPHY AS TEXT*

y writing philosophical texts in Latin that achieved such a wide circulation,

THE CLASSICAL JOURNAL 106.1 (2010) 7198

Admittedly Cicero both aimed at the wide readership he reached, 2 and

CICERO AND PHILOSOPHY AS TEXT

The Subsequent Transformation of Philosophy

CICERO AND PHILOSOPHY AS TEXT

ics, 13 and histories of philosophical opinions. 14 In addition (perhaps c. AD 350)

CICERO AND PHILOSOPHY AS TEXT

See Courcelle (1969) 3423; Halporn (2004) 190 nn. 925.

CICERO AND PHILOSOPHY AS TEXT

Ciceros Own Conceptions of Philosophy and his Task

CICERO AND PHILOSOPHY AS TEXT

The relevance of this to Ciceros tendency to associate philosophy with texts

CICERO AND PHILOSOPHY AS TEXT

What is inseparable from rhetoric is, by contrast, written philosophy, philosophy

varieties of personal conversation, such imitation is itself a literary effect. Ciceros

CICERO AND PHILOSOPHY AS TEXT

motivated without the existence of an authoritative body of Greek philosophical

CICERO AND PHILOSOPHY AS TEXT

Ciceros significance here is revealed by the very contingency of this

CICERO AND PHILOSOPHY AS TEXT

A third factor is Ciceros choice of a non-Platonic style of philosophical

Douglas (1962) 46.

CICERO AND PHILOSOPHY AS TEXT

The dedications of Ciceros books in the prefaces contribute further to

CICERO AND PHILOSOPHY AS TEXT

CICERO AND PHILOSOPHY AS TEXT

CICERO AND PHILOSOPHY AS TEXT

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