Cicero's Tusculan Disputations Also, Treatises On The Nature Of The Gods, And On The Commonwealth · Marcus Tullius Cicero
I. Ennius has told us--
Of men and customs mighty Rome consists; which verse, both for its precision and its verity, appears to me as if it had issued from an oracle; for neither the men, unless the State had adopted a certain system of manners--nor the manners, unless they had been illustrated by the men--could ever have established or maintained for so many ages so vast a republic, or one of such righteous and extensive sway. Thus, long before our own times, the force of hereditary manners of itself moulded most eminent men; and admirable citizens, in return, gave new weight to the ancient customs and institutions of our ancestors. But our age, on the contrary, having received the Commonwealth as a finished picture of another century, but one already beginning to fade through the lapse of years, has not only neglected to renew the colors of the original painting, but has not even cared to preserve its general form and prominent lineaments. For what now remains of those antique manners, of which the poet said that our Commonwealth consisted? They have now become so obsolete and forgotten that they are not only not cultivated, but they are not even known. And as to the men, what shall I say? For the manners themselves have only perished through a scarcity of men; of which great misfortune we are not only called to give an account, but even, as men accused of capital offences, to a certain degree to plead our own cause in connection with it. For it is owing to our vices, rather than to any accident, that we have retained the name of republic when we have long since lost the reality.
II. * * * There is no employment so essentially royal as the exposition of equity, which comprises the true interpretation of all laws. This justice subjects used generally to expect from their kings. For this reason, lands, fields, woods, and pastures were reserved as the property of kings, and cultivated for them, without any labor on their part, in order that no anxiety on account of their personal interests might distract their attention from the welfare of the State. Nor was any private man allowed to be the judge or arbitrator in any suit; but all disputes were terminated by the royal sentence. And of all our Roman monarchs, Numa appears to me to have best preserved this ancient custom of the kings of Greece. For the others, though they also discharged this duty, were for the main part employed in conducting military enterprises, and in attending to those rights which belonged to war. But the long peace of Numa's reign was the mother of law and religion in this city. And he was himself the author of those admirable laws which, as you are aware, are still extant. And this character is precisely what belongs to the man of whom we are speaking. * * * III. [_Scipio._ Ought not a farmer] to be acquainted with the nature of plants and seeds?
VI. I therefore consume all my time in considering what is the power of that man, whom, as you think, we have described carefully enough in our books. Do you, then, admit our idea of that governor of a commonwealth to whom we wish to refer everything? For thus, I imagine, does Scipio speak in the fifth book: "For as a fair voyage is the object of the master of a ship, the health of his patient the aim of a physician, and victory that of a general, so the happiness of his fellow-citizens is the proper study of the ruler of a commonwealth; that they may be stable in power, rich in resources, widely known in reputation, and honorable through their virtue. For a ruler ought to be one who can perfect this, which is the best and most important employment among mankind." And works in your literature rightly praise that ruler of a country who consults the welfare of his people more than their inclinations. VII. Tully, in those books which he wrote upon the Commonwealth, could not conceal his opinions, when he speaks of appointing a chief of the State, who, he says, must be maintained by glory; and afterward he relates that his ancestors did many admirable and noble actions from a desire of glory. Tully, in his treatise on the Commonwealth, wrote that the chief of a state must be maintained by glory, and that a commonwealth would last as long as honor was paid by every one to the chief.
Text from Project Gutenberg, public domain in the United States.