508 CRITICAL NOTES, 



sary. Cicei'O has been arguing against the vulgar notion that the 

 laws and enactments of nations have of themselves an inherent power 

 exhorting to virtue and restraining from vice ; at the same time he 

 concedes that laws, generally speaking, do possess this salutary power: 

 but, in accordance with the principle which he follows throughout 

 this treatise, he asserts that this power is, in its origin, anterior not 

 only to all written laws, but even to all states and peoples, being, in 

 fact, coeval with the supreme deity. The reason why this passage 

 has been generally misunderstood is that in the sentence qum vis, etc., 

 we have apparently a mere explanation of that which immediately 

 precedes ; whereas it is in reality opposed to it, in the nature of a 

 qualification. We may, I think, obviate all difficulties with regard 

 to the mutual relation of these two sentences, and at the same time 

 explain certam anomalies in the various readings of the MSS., other- 

 wise unaccounted for, if we read quce tamen vis instead of quce vis. 

 This reading, which seems to be required in order to elucidate 'the 

 meaning, will also account for the several corruptions (qtcce tuis, B., 

 quinte avis, C, quinte tuis, E.) found in what are generally considered 

 to be the most trustworthy MSS. Nor, if we consider that the letters 

 m and n in MSS., are usually indicated merely by a horizontal stroke 

 (e. g., ccelo for ccelom), is it less difficult to account for the presence of 

 the superfluous letters, if we read quce vis, than for the absence of one 

 or other of the letters wanted to form tamen, which again is actually 

 required by the sense. 



Ibid: II. viii, 19. "Bivos et eos, qui codestes semper habiti, colunto 

 et olios, quos endo coilo merita locaverunt, Herculem, etc." The MSS. 

 all exhibit vocaveruni, but the editors with almost equal unanimity, 

 have altered this into locaverunt or locaverint; simply on the grovind 

 that it is so quoted by Lactantius [Inst. Div. I. 15, 23). On the 

 other hand, not only does Lactantius elsewhere, when quoting from 

 •this treatise, intersperse his own words among those of Cicero, but 

 vv^e have here an additional reason for adhering to the reading endo 

 coilom merita vocaverunt given by the MSS., in the fact that the 

 archaic forms endo and indu (for in) appear to have been used respec- 

 tively, the former with an accusative case, and the latter with an 

 ablative; at least such seems to have been the usage of Emiius, 

 according to Munro (Lucret. I. 82.) 



Ibid : II. viii, 20. ^'Alterum, quod interpretetur fatidicorum et 

 vatum effata incognita, quorum senatus populusque adsciverit." In 



