218 ROMAN PHILOSOPHY. 



we must remember that mere soundness of thought, without talent for 

 display, has few charms for those who have not yet imbibed a taste 

 even for the outward form of knowledge, 1 that system nearly precludes 

 variety, and depth almost implies obscurity. It was this very absence 

 of scientific exactness, which constituted in Roman eyes a principal 

 charm of Cicero's compositions. 2 



Nor must his profession as a pleader be forgotten in enumerating 

 the circumstances which concurred to give his writings their peculiar 

 character. For however his design of interesting his countrymen in 

 Greek literature, however too his particular line of talent, may have 

 led him to explain rather than to invent ; yet he expressly informs us 

 it was principally with a view to his own improvement in oratory that 

 he devoted himself to philosophical studies. 3 This induced him to 

 undertake successively the cause of the Stoic, the Epicurean, or the 

 Platonist, as an exercise for his powers of argumentation ; while the 

 wavering and unsettled state of mind, occasioned by such habits of 

 disputation, led him in his private judgment to prefer the sceptical 

 tenets of the New Academy. 



Here, then, before examining Cicero's philosophical writings, an 

 opportunity is presented to us of redeeming the pledge we gave in our 

 memoir of PLATO, by considering the system of doctrine which the 

 reformers (as they thought themselves) of the Academic school intro- 

 duced about 300 years before the Christian era. 



The New We have already traced the history of the OLD ACADEMY, and 



Academy, spoken of the innovations on the system of Plato, silently introduced 



by the austere Polemo. When Zeno, however, who was his pupil, 



advocated the same rigid tenets in a more open and dogmatic ibrm, 4 



Arcesiias. the Academy at length took the alarm, and reaction ensued. Arcesilas, 



who had succeeded Polemo and Crates, determined on reverting to 



the principles of the elder schools ; 5 but mistaking the profession of 



1 De Off. i. 5, init. 



2 Johnson's observations on Addison's writings may be well applied to those of 

 Cicero, who would have been eminently successful in short miscellaneous essays, 

 like those of the Spectators, had the manners of the age allowed it. 



3 Orat. iii. 4; Tusc. Qusest. ii. 3; de Off. i. 1. prcefat. Paradox. Quint, de 

 Instit. xii. 2. Lactantius, Inst. iii. 16. 



4 Acad. Qusest. i. 10, &c. ; Lucullus, 5 ; de Legg. i. 20 ; iii. 3, &c. 



5 Acad. Qusest. i. 4, 12, 13 ; Lucullus, 5 and 23 ; de Nat. Deor. i. 5 ; de Fin. 

 ii. 1; de Orat. iii. 18; Augustin. contra Acad. ii. 6. Sext. Emp. adv. Mathem. 

 lib. vii- 'O 'Ap/ce(rtAaos roffovrov aWSei TOV KaivoTo^las riva 86av aya-rrav Kcxl 

 viroTTOte'iffQai T&V TraAcucoj/, &<TTG tyKaXtiv TOVS r6rf. ffo^iffras on irpo(TTpi^rai 

 ScoKparei Kal FlAa-rcci/i Kal Tlap/Aevifir) Kal 'Hpa/cAe^Ta? ra -jrepl TTJS eirox^s S6y- 

 f.iara Kal TT)S aKaraATjiJ/ias, ouSej/ Seo/ieVois, aAAa olov avaywyrjv Kal fiefialuffiv 

 avT&v els avSpas ev86ovs TTOIOV/J.I/OS. (Plutarch, in Colot. 26.) [" Arcesilas 

 was so far from aiming at the reputation of originality while availing himself of the 

 ancients, that the sophists of that time accused him of assenting implicitly to 

 Socrates, and Plato, and Parmenides, and Heraclitus, in respect of his opinions on 

 the suspension [of assent] and the incomprehensibility [of things], as to perfect autho- 

 rities, and referring to them for confirmation as to persons of eminence." Editor.'] 



