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242 Appendix Cicero and the Rebirth of Political Philosophy Walter Nicgorski Judged by the conventional standard of the number of monographs, scholarly articles, and dissertations on Cicero’s philosophy, regard for Cicero as a serious thinker or even a serious political thinker is indeed low. The number of such items appearing in America in the last gene­ ration can be tallied on one hand, or perhaps two, depending on how one would classify several marginal entries.1 A measure of Cicero ’s neglect can be found by simply comparing these items with the amount of public work being done, for example, on the political and moral thought of Plato, Aristotle, Hobbes, Rousseau, or Nietzsche. Are we simply witnessing a desirable winnowing, a sort of natural selection process, or are we being deprived in some ways by this neglect of Cicero? This essay appears here as initially published in The Political Science Reviewer in 1978. Some necessary corrections are made in this version, and the notes appear here as endnotes in the format used throughout this book. Appendix  243 Although one hears an occasional lament for the neglect of Cicero and the Romans in college curricula, humanities’ programs, and political theory courses, this is not a sufficient basis on which to conclude that this curricular gap or the corresponding lacuna in scholarship is inadvertent and deeply or widely regretted. If anything, one suspects that some American scholars share the view that the case is closed on Cicero as a serious thinker and in fact has been for some time; the verdict against Cicero is in, and it appears to have the imposing quality of being the cumulative judgment of generations. Even in the eighteenth century David Hume could write, as if it were a commonplace, that “the abstract philosophy of Cicero has lost its credit,”but “the vehemence of his oratory is still the object of our admiration .”2 A form of that opinion expressed by Hume often held sway even when Cicero was more widely studied, for then as still today he was solely or primarily appreciated as the great orator and rhetorician of Rome and the master prose writer of the Latin language. Cicero the stylist is valued; Cicero the statesman and political thinker is set aside, if not actively eschewed. In any judgment of his own, Cicero would not permit such a severance of form from substance.If he could perceive his own positions as empty and opportunistic as some have regarded them, he would then see his rhetoric, as a few critics have, as but shallow bombast. The tradition of controversy surrounding Cicero and opposition to him is substantial and extraordinary. In its persistence and extent it seems to overshadow such traditions which one finds in the wake of every great thinker and historical figure. Martin Luther for one, himself a center of considerable controversy, thought that Aristotle was a “blind”and “wretched”man,most of whose books but especially the Nicomachean Ethics should be discarded.3 Every age and place appears to have its detractors of Plato. Their opinions are often as outrageous as that of Luther on Aristotle, but such views have not gene­ rally commanded the authority and support that mark the criti­ cisms of Cicero. Although the extent of the controversy around the person and work of more recent figures like Rousseau, Hegel, and­ Nietzsche may be comparable to that swirling around Cicero, they have not, because of their alleged impact on the modern world, lost access to the philosophers’ forum as Cicero has. 244  Walter Nicgorski It is incumbent on one who proposes to reintroduce Cicero for serious consideration as a political thinker to note the extent and nature of the criticisms directed at him. Even if the comparative neglect of Cicero during the rebirth of political philosophy in America over the last generation is not to be accounted for primarily by the long-­ standing hostility to Cicero, this opposition as a historical fact is likely again and again to present itself in one form or another as an obstacle to renewed interest in him. Furthermore the opposition can be instructive at times in calling attention to certain problematic aspects of Cicero’s life and thought. But such is the state of the study of Cicero that it first seems appropriate to say something, elemental and brief though it be, about the life and works that generated such a hearty tradition of hostility and, it should be added, a like tradition of...

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