MARCUS TULLIUS CICERO. 233 



We have already had occasion to remark upon the singular activity 

 of his mind, which becomes more and more conspicuous as we ap- 

 proach the period of his death. During the ensuing year, which is 

 the last of his life, in the midst of the confusion and anxieties con- 

 sequent on Caesar's death, he found time to write the ' De Natura 

 Deorum,' * De Divinatione,' * De Fato,' ' De Senectute,' ' De Amicitia,' 

 * De Officiis,' and ' Paradoxa,' besides the treatise on Rhetorical Com- 

 mon Places above mentioned. 



Of these the first three were intended as a full exposition of the 

 opposite opinions entertained on their respective subjects ; the ' De 

 Fato,' however, was not finished according to this plan. 1 His treatise 

 ' De Natura Deorum,' in three books, may be reckoned the most De Natura 

 magnificent of all his works, and shows that neither age nor disap- Deorum -' 

 pointment had done injury to the richness and vigour of his mind. In 

 the first book, Velleius, the Epicurean, sets forth the physical tenets 

 of his sect, and is answered by Cotta, who is of the Academic school. 

 In the second, Balbus, the disciple of the Porch, gives an account of 

 his own system, and is, in turn, refuted by Cotta in the third. The 

 eloquent extravagance of the Epicurean, the solemn enthusiasm of the 

 Stoic, and the brilliant raillery of the Academic, are contrasted with 

 extreme vivacity and humour. While the sublimity of the subject 

 itself imparts to the whole composition a grander and more elevated 

 character, and discovers in the author imaginative powers, which, 

 celebrated as he justly is for playfulness of fancy, might yet appear 

 more the talent of the poet than the orator. 



His treatise * De Divinatione' is conveyed in a discussion between ' p . 

 his brother Quintus and himself, in two books. In the former, Quintus, 

 after dividing Divination into the heads of natural and artificial, argues 

 with the Stoics for its sacred nature, from the evidence of facts, the 

 agreement of all nations, and the existence of gods. In the latter, 

 Cicero questions its authority, with Carneades, from the uncertain 

 nature of its rules, the absurdity and uselessness of the art, and the 

 possibility of accounting from natural causes for the phenomena on 

 which it was founded. This is a curious work, from t-he numerous 

 cases adduced from the histories of Greece and Rome, to illustrate the 

 subject in dispute. , 



His treatise ' De Fato' is quite a fragment ; it purports to be the ' De Fato.' 

 substance of a dissertation in which he explained to Hirtius (soon after 

 consul) the sentiments of Chrysippus, Diodorus, Epicurus, Carneades, 

 and others, upon that abstruse subject. It is supposed to have con- 

 sisted at least of two books, of which we have but the proem of the 

 first, and a small portion of the second. 



In his beautiful compositions * De Senectute' and ' De Amicitia,' < DeSenec- 

 Cato the censor and Lselius are respectively introduced, delivering their 

 sentiments on those subjects. The conclusion of the former, in which 



1 De Nat. Deor. i. 6 ; de Div. i. 4 ; de Fat. 1. 



