CICKBO. MABCC8 TOLLIUS. 



CICERO. MARCUS TULLIUS. 



Clbber wrou and altered * few unimportant dramaa. and WM con 

 ceraed in a work entitled An Account of UM Lire* of the Poet* of 

 OrreABriMin *^lrek^'vo*i. llmo, which WM p.bli*kd under 

 hfeacaaeonlT. 



8ra*a Mail* CIBBM WM tk aster of Dr. Thoauu Arne tb 

 cosMoser, and made her tot siiiiMiciins before the public M * riant 

 IB 1TM ahe married Theophilus Cibber. son of the laureat, and in 

 1TM attempted Ik* part of bra in 11.11'. trag, .ly of that name. Her 

 (MOMS wme most decided, and she rapidly became a great and deterred 

 fcioifre: at her death the WM by many regarded at the beat tragic 

 eetrvo* OB UM sUfe. She died January 80, 17M, and waa buried in 



Sue died January 80, 

 Ike dluhHr* of W.etmineUr Abbe*. 



KHO, MARCUS TULUU8, WM bora at Arpinum on the 3rd 

 of January, m.a KM, in the con.uUi.ip of Q. Servilius Cwpio and 

 Atilias Serrano*, and wai thui a few month, older than Pompey, who 

 WM born on the kit day of September in the *ame year. The family 

 ant WM on the couth bank of the HtUe etream Fibreou* (flume dclla 

 poste). Mar its junction with the Uric (Gariglano), where the itream 

 of the Kibrenu* dividing, form* an ielejifl and cascade, the eoenery ol 

 which i* the eubjeeToF the dialogue at the beginning of the Mcond 

 " ' De Legibaa.' The villa Ciceroni* is now occupied ai a Domini 



The graodfcthor of Cicero WM liring here at the time of the birth 

 of Marco* Tulliua, and appear* to have been a man of influence at 

 where, on a petty Male, the political disputes formed a 

 boae at Rome. The old man seems to haT enter- 

 view* of public polity M hi. son, and vehemently 

 Ofj|iOMrt the introduction of the rote by ballot into the municipal pro- 

 nesltJM.1 at Arpinum, when a law to that effect was proposed by one 

 Uratidhw, wboM family WM intimately connected with the Marii, and 



whoM tister, it may be obeerved, WM the wife of old Cicero, and con 

 saaently the grandmother of the orator. The matter in dispute wai 

 lefctred to the oonsul Scaurus at Rome, who expressed his regret that 



man of old Cicero'* energy should have preferred to exert his talents 

 in a petty corporation rather than on the great theatre at Kome. 

 There i* likewise a characteristic saying of his recorded by his graud- 

 oo, that the men of hi* day wre like Syrian slave*, " the more Greek 

 they knew the greater knave* they were," an observation probably 

 Will at hi* opponent Gratidius, who WM well acquainted with that 

 hufQaf*. Tail Marcus Cierro bad two sons, Marcus and Lucius. 

 The younger of these, together with his uncle Gratidius, who wan 

 killed there, served under Antony the orator in his government of 

 CdrajL Luriiu left a eon of the same name, to whom his cousin Cicero 

 was much attached, and whose death he deplores in one of his earliest 

 letter* to Attioua, 



Marctu Cicero, the father of the orator, though he WM on intimate 

 term* with the leading men of the times, WM compelled by the delicacy 

 of hi* health to lire in retirement ; but this enabled him to pay the 

 more attention to the education of hi. two sons, Marcus and Quintus. 

 His wife Helria had a broth, r, Aculeo, the intimate friend of L. C'rassus, 

 a man equally dutinguinhed for hi* oratory and the public offices he 

 bed hold ; and the two son* of Aculeo, with their cousins the young 

 Ciecroa, received their education together under teachers selected by 

 Crac.ua, It i* to this circumstance probably that we must attribute 

 the special direction of Cicero's talent* to the study of oratory. He 

 WM afterward* removed by his father to Kome, where he had the 

 iclciim of Greek instructors, more particularly the poet Archias, 

 who WM living under the roof of L. LucuUua. As soon M he had 

 WMMMil the boy'* drcsc for the toga he WM placed under the care 

 of Q. Mocin* Sowola, the augur, and father-in-law of his father's friend 

 Crae.ua, and upon bis death attached himself to the poutifex of the 

 am* name, who excelled all hi* contemporaries in his knowledge of 

 law, cad added to hie other acoompliahuient* considerable powers of 

 dnqiiMS.. While Cioero WM thus preparing himself for the forum, 

 he relieved the severity of his legal and philosophical studies by an 

 ketcmUtore of poetry. Even M a boy he had composed a poem 

 called Pootin* QUocu*,' which WM extant in Plutarch's time, and he 

 now translated the Phenomena* of Aratoa into Latin verse, besides 

 writing two original poems, one called Marius,' in honour of hi. 

 Uow-towacmu, which received the commendation of Sonrola, and 

 Hut be WM now arrived (B a 89) at the age 



when he WM 



WM rallrd by tl.e law* of his country to the military pro- 

 - ' served hi* first campaign in the Marsic war under 

 eto. Strabo, the father of the great Pompey, and WM present 

 the Hamnite camp before Nola. The termination 



of the Manic war m the following year gave Cioero an opportunity of 

 Mead**? the lectures of two dirtioguiahed Greek philosopher ; nr , t 

 T?-T^*^ presided over the Academy, and soon after Apolloniu* 

 ihodea, who had been driven from their homes by the arm* 

 UthrvitUa. Thi* priooe had bera long watching for an opportunity 

 j the authority of Rome. The late civil war in Italy had 

 Urn to throw off all diaguise. He had overrun the Roman 

 ' , and WM already mcctor of nearly all Greece, when 

 icladed the war with their Italian allies, with the 

 intention of opposing their formidable enemy in the out Hut 



unhappily that which should have led to a union of their strength 

 WM the cause of division*, still more disastrous. Tho command of the 

 war against Mithridate* WM disputed between old Marius and Sulla, 

 and led to a aerie* of civil commotions. Sulla however, who WM at 

 the time oonsul, had the important province of that war allotted to 

 him. The appointment excited the furious opposition of the Marian 

 party, and Sulla WM unable to maintain the superiority of his party 

 at Kome but by bloodahed and proscription. His departure for the 

 Mithridatio war WM the signal for re-action, and Marina re-entered 

 Rome (11.0. 87) with the support of the consul Cinna, and put to death 

 all the moat distinguished leader* of the aristocratic party, who were 

 unable to make their escape to Sulla'* army in Attica. Cicero's school- 

 fellow Pomponiua WM probably one of the fugitives, for he left Kome 

 about this period, and by a twenty yean' residence in Athens acquired 

 the surname of Atticus. Of Cicero' n pursuits during the three or four 

 next tear* little more U known than that he wrote some rhetorical 

 work*, which dissatisfied hi* maturer judgment ; probably the work 

 entitled 'De Inrentione,' besides translating the '(Economies' of 

 Xenophon, and several dialogue* of Plato. Ho WM also in the habit 

 of declaiming both in Greek and Latin, and received instruction iu 

 philosophy and logic from the stoic Diodotua, whom we find after- 

 wards liring under hi* roof, where in fact he died, leaving his property 

 to Cioero. He had also a second opportunity of hearing Molo at Kome, 

 when the philosopher WM sent on an embassy to remind the senate, of 

 the services of his countrymen in the late war against Mithridate*. 

 In his twenty-sixth year (B.C. 81), when Sulla had extinguished all 

 the democratic elements of the Roman constitution, Cicero made hi* 

 first appearance M an advocate. The speech in favour of Quinotiu*, 

 though not the first he delivered, is the earliest of those which are 

 now extant. In the following year his voice WM first heard in the 

 forum in defence of Sextus Roscius of Auieria on a charge of parricide. 

 The subject matter of the trial was intimately mUnd up with the bite 

 civil dissensions, so that it attracted much public attention. ' 

 fully prepared himself for the occasion, and produced so powerful an 

 impression that, to use his own words, the public roice at once placed 

 him among the first orators of Rome. When he had spent two years in 

 the severe duties of his profession, the delicacy of his health led him 

 to withdraw for a time from Kome. He first visited Athens (n.c. 79), 

 where he devoted six months to Antiochus of Ascalon, the most 

 distinguished philosopher of the old Academy. He also attended 

 Pluedrus and Zeuo of the Epicurean school, in company with hu friend 

 Atticus, and practised declamation under the directions of an able 

 rhetorician named Diogenes of Syria. He next traversed the whole 

 Itoman province of Asia, still cultivating his favourite pursuit of 

 oratory under the first teachers of that country ; and then crossed 

 over into Khodes, where for the third time he placed himself under 

 Molo, and derived considerable benefit from his instruction, in 

 correcting the redundancy of hU style and moderating the vehemence 

 of his voice and action. He studied philosophy likewise under 

 Poaidonius. 



In the year B.C. 77, after a two yean' absence, during which Sulla 

 had died, Cicero returned to Rome, and married Terentia, whoso rank 

 and station in society we may estimate by the fact that her sister Fabia 

 WM one of the vestal virgins. He applied himself again with zeal to 

 the law-courts and the forum, in which at this time the most di-tiu- 

 guished orators were Aurelius Gotta and Hortensius ; but next to them 

 stood Cicero, whose services were in constant demand for causes of the 

 highest importance. But independently of the reputation he WM 

 acquiring, he WM at the same time opening the way to the political 

 liouours of his country ; and it is a somewhat singular coincidence that 

 in the year B.C. 76 the three first orators of Komo, Cotta, Hortensius, 

 aad Cioero, were successful candidates for the several offices of consul, 

 ndile, and qutestor, which they respectively filled iu the following year. 

 The provinces of the quaestors being distributed to them by lot, the 

 island of Sicily fell to Cicero's "hare, or rather the western portion of 

 that island, which had Lilybtoum for it* chief town ; the whole island 

 Ming under the government of S. Peducjcua M protor, with whom 

 Cicero, and above all Atticus, lived on terms of the closest intimacy, 

 until 1'educscus fell with Pansa at the battle before Mutina. Sicily 

 WM one of the granaries M it were of Kome, and the qtuestor'e chief 

 employment in it was to supply corn for tho use of the city ; and as 

 there happened to be a peculiar scarcity this year at Rome, it waa 

 necessary to the public quiet to send large and speedy supplies. This 

 jisk Cicero accomplished, he tells us, and at the same time gave the 

 lighest satisfaction to all parties in the province. In the hours of 

 eiaure he employed himself, as at Koine, iu his rhetorical studio* ; so 

 .hat on bis return from Sicily his abilities M an orator were, according 

 a his own judgment, iu their full perfection and maturity. Before he 

 eft Sicily he mode a tour of the island, and gratified himself by a visit 

 a Syracuse, where he discovered the tomb of Archimedes, which had 

 wen lost sight of by his countrymen, and was found overgrown with 

 iriars. He came away from the island extremely pleased with the 

 cams of hi. administration, and flattering himself that all Rome 

 i celebrating hi* praise. In this imagination ho landed at Puteoli, 

 and WM not a little mortified on being asked by the first friend he 

 met " How long he had left Homo, and what news he brought from 

 thence?" This mortification however led him to reflect that the 

 people of Kome had dull ears, but quick eyes; so that from this 



