Historical+Background

**Information on the author:** Cicero was born on January 3, 106 B.C.E.. His family is from Arpinum, a city about 70 miles from Rome. At and early age, Cicero began st udying the writings in his father's library. When his father noticed this, he sent Cicero and his brother to Rome for the best education. He studied literature, philosophy, and law.
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Cicero had a great deal of political ambition. Like Achilles, his motto was: to always be the best and overtop the rest. Also, Cicero introduced the Romans to the chief schools of Greek philosophy and created a Latin philosophical vocabulary, distinguishing himself as a linguist, translator, and philisopher. **

**As he grew older, he became Rome's greatest speaker and writer. His speeches and writings became models for following generations.****"Condidence is that feeling by which the mind embarks on great and honorable courses with a sure hope and trust in itself" (Cicero).**   **Cicero died on December 7, 43 B.C.E.

 Stoicism: **


 * Stoicism as Cicero understood it held that the gods existed and loved human beings. Both during and after a person's life, the gods rewarded or punished human beings according to their conduct in life. The gods had also provided human beings with the gift of reason. Since humans have this in common with the gods, but animals share our love of pleasure, the Stoics argued, as Socrates had, that the best, most virtuous, and most divine life was one lived according to reason, not according to the search for pleasure. This did not mean that humans had to shun pleasure, only that it must be enjoyed in the right way. For example, it was fine to enjoy sex, but not with another man's wife. It was fine to enjoy wine, but not to the point of shameful drunkenness. Finally, the Stoics believed that human beings were all meant to follow natural law, which arises from reason. The natural law is also the source of all properly made human laws and communities. Because human beings share reason and the natural law, humanity as a whole can be thought of as a kind of community, and because each of us is part of a group of human beings with shared human laws, each of us is also part of a political community. This being the case, we have duties to each of these communities, and the Stoics recognized an obligation to take part in politics (so far as is possible) in order to discharge those duties. The Stoic enters politics not for public approval, wealth, or power (which are meaningless) but in order to improve the communities of which they are a part. If politics is painful, as it would often prove to be for Cicero, that's not important. What matters is that the virtuous life requires it.

Information on the text: **


 * //On Duties//, written by Cicero, was written in a form of a letter to his son Marcus. Cicero addresses the topic of duty, including both the final purpose of life, and the way in which duties should be performed. More explicitly, the letter discusses how to determine what is honorable, and which of two honorable things is more honorable; how to determine what is expedient and how to judge between two expedient things; and what to do when the honorable annd the expedient seem to conflict. "In honorable dealing you should consider what you intended not what you said or thought" (Cicero). **