Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology (1870) - Volume 1.djvu/750

 we must pursue when the honestum and the utile are at variance. Moreover, the honestum and the utile each admit of degrees which also fall to be examined in order that we may make choice of the highest. The general plan being thus sketched, it is followed out by a discussion of the four constituent elements into which the honestum may be resolved: a. Sapientia, the power of discerning truth; b. Justitia et Beneficentia, which consist in studying the welfare of those around us, in rendering to every one his own, and in preserving contracts inviolate; c. Fortitudo, greatness and strength of mind; d. Temperantia, the faculty of doing and saying everything in a becoming manner, in the proper place, and to the proper extent. Each of these is explained at length, and the book closes with a debate on the degrees of the honestum, that is, the method of deciding, when each of two lines of conduct is honestum, which is to be preferred as superior (honestius) to the other.

The second book is devoted to the utile, and considers how we may best conciliate the favour of our fellow-men, apply it to our own advancement, and thus arrive at wealth and public distinction, enlarging peculiarly on the most pure and judicious mode of displaying liberality, whether by pecuniary gifts or by aid of any other description. This is succeeded by a short notice of two utilitates passed over by Panaetius-the care of the health and the care of the purse, after which a few words are added on the comparison of things expedient with each other.

In the third book it is demonstrated that there never can be any real collision between the honestum and the utile ; but that when an action is viewed through a proper medium the honestum will invariably be found to be inseparable from the utile and the utile from the honestum, a proposition which had been briefly enunciated at the beginning of book second, but is here fully developed and largely illustrated. A number of difficult cases are then stated, which serve as exercises in the application of the rules laid down, among which a prominent place is assigned to the story of Regulus.

The Editio Princeps of the De Officiis is one of the oldest specimens of classical typography in existence, having been printed along with the Paradoxa by Fust and Schöffer at Mayence in 1465 and again in 1466, both in small 4to. These are not of excessive rarity, and occur more frequently upon vellum than upon paper. Next copies an edition in 4to., without date or name of place or of printer, but generally recognised as from the press of Ulric Zell, at Cologne, about 1467, which were followed by that of Ulric Hann, fol., Rome, 1468-9, also without name or date, that of Sweynheym and Pannartz, Rome, fol., 1469, of Vindelin de Spira, Venice, fol., 1470, and of Eggesteyn, Strasburg, 4to., 1770. Many of these have given rise to lengthened controversies among bibliographers, the substance of which will be found in Dibdin's "Introduction to the Classics," Lond. 1827. Among the almost countless editions which have appeared since the end of the 15th century, it is sufficient to specify those of Heusinger, Brunswick, 8vo., 1783, which first presented a really pure text and has been repeatedly reprinted; of Gernhard, Leipzig, 8vo., 1811; and of Beier, 2 vols. 8vo., Leipzig, 1820-21, which may be considered as the best.

Literature : — A. Buscher, Ethicae Ciceronianae Libri II.'', Hamb. 1610; R. G. Rath, Cicero de Officiis in brevi conspectu, Hall. 1803; Thorbecke, ''Princip. phil. mor. e Ciceronis Op.'', Leyden, 1817 ; and the remarks which accompany the translation of Garve, of which a sixth edition was published at Breslau in 1819.

2. De Virtutibus.

This work, if it ever existed, which is far from being certain, must have been intended as a sort of supplement to the De Officiis, just as Aristotle added a tract, 🇬🇷, to his Ethics. (Hieron. in Zachar. Prophet. Comment. i. 2; Charisius, ii. p. 186.)

3. Cato Major s. De Senectute.

This little tract, drawn up at the end of в. с. 45 or the commencement of в. с. 44, for the purpose of pointing out how the burden of old age may be most easily supported, is addressed to Atticus, who was now in his sixty-eighth year, while Cicero himself was in his sixty-second or sixty-third. It is first mentioned in a letter written from Puteoli on the 11th of May, в. с. 44 (ad Att. xiv. 21, comp. xvii. 11), and is there spoken of as already in the hands of his friend. In the short introductory dialogue, Scipio Aemilianus and Laelius are supposed to have paid a visit during the consulship of T. Quinctius Flamininus and M.' Acilius Balbus (в. с. 150; see c. 5 and 10) to Cato the censor, at that time 84 years old. Beholding with admiration the activity of body and cheerfulness of mind which he displayed, they request him to point out by what means the weight of increasing years may be most easily borne. Cato willingly complies, and commences a dissertation in which he seeks to demonstrate how unreasonable are the complaints usually urged regarding the miseries which attend the close of a protracted life. The four principal objections are stated and refuted in regular succession. It is held that old age is wretched, 1. Because it incapacitates men for active business; 2. Because it renders the body feeble; 3. Because it deprives them of the enjoyment of almost all pleasures ; 4. Because it heralds the near approach of death. The first three are met by producing examples of many illustrious personages in whom old age was not attended by any of these evils, by arguing that such privations are not real but imaginary misfortunes, and that if the relish for some pleasures is lost, other delights of a more desirable and substantial character are substituted. The fourth objection is encountered still more boldly, by an eloquent declaration that the chief happiness of old age in the eyes of the philosopher arises from the conviction, that it indicates the near approach of death, that is, the near approach of the period when the soul shall be released from its debasing connexion with the body, and enter unfettered upon the paths of immortality.

This piece has always been deservedly esteemed as one of the most graceful moral essays bequeathed to us by antiquity. The purity of the language, the liveliness of the illustrations, the dignity of the sentiments, and the tact with which the character of the strong-minded but self-satisfied and garrulous old man is maintained, have excited universal applause. But however pleasing the picture here presented to us, every one must perceive that it is a fancy sketch, not the faithful copy of a scene