The Revival of Platonism in Cicero’s Late Philosophy The Revival of Platonism In Cicero’s Late Philosophy Platonis aemulus and the Invention of Cicero William H. F. Altman Published by Lexington Books An imprint ofThe Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group, Inc. 4501 Forbes Boulevard, Suite 200, Lanham, Maryland 20706 www.rowman.com Unit A, Whitacre Mews, 26-34 Stannary Street, London SEl 1 4AB Copyright© 2016 by Lexington Books All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote passages in a review. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Information Available Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Altman, William H.F., 1955-author. Title: The revival of Platonism in Cicero's late philosophy : Platonis aemulus and the invention of Cicero I William H.F. Altman. Description: Lanham : Lexington Books, 2016. I Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2016000935 (print) I LCCN 2016004367 (ebook) I ISBN 9781498527118 (cloth: alk. paper) I ISBN 9781498527125 (Electronic) Subjects: LCSH: Cicero, Marcus Tullius. I Platonists. I Plato. Classification: LCC B553 .A88 2016 (print) I LCC B553 (ebook) I DDC 186--dc23 LC record available at http://lccn.loc.gov/2016000935 9= The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information Sciences-Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI/NISO Z39. 48-1992. Printed in the United States of America in memoriam I. F. Stone (1907-1989) who persuaded me to study Latin and B. D. Gordon (1894-1986) who encouraged me to teach nec ulli bonarum artium magistri non beati putandi Contents Acknowledgements ix Preface xi Introduction: Cicero as Platonis aemulus 1 Part 1: The Foundations of Cicero’s Platonic Revival 27-123 Chapter 1. Cicero’s Platonic personae and the Problem of De legibus 29 Chapter 2. Augustine’s Hortensius and the Invention of “Cicero” 57 Chapter 3. Self-Contradictory Skepticism in the Academica 81 Chapter 4. The Limits of Stoicism and Tullia’s Shrine in De finibus 101 Part 2: The Literary Fruits of Cicero’s Platonism 125-236 Chapter 5. Womanly Humanism in the Tusculanae Disputationes 127 Chapter 6. Phaedo and Timaeus in De natura deorum 159 Chapter 7. Interpreting Plato’s Dreams in De divinatione 179 Chapter 8. Epicurus, Chrysippus, and Homer in De fato 197 Chapter 9. The Ciceronian Renaissance in De senectute and De amicitia 217 Part 3: Cicero’s Platonism in Action 237-284 Chapter 10. Returning in Topica, De officiis, and the Philippics 239 Chapter 11. Brutus as Funeral Oration 259 Chapter 12. Ending with Orator 277 Bibliography 285 Index 303 Index verborum 333 Index locorum 341 About the Author 353 vii Acknowledgements Particularly in the case of this book, many of those whom I most need to thank must remain anonymous. To begin with, the nucleus of several chapters first appeared as peer-reviewed articles, and in every case, going back to 2007, I have profited greatly from that process. In addition to this older class of nameless ones, there are the anonymous reviewers of the book itself to be considered, especially the last of them. Until a very late stage in the process, the manuscript was subtitled “Studies in Cicero’s Late Philosophy,” and it is because of Lexing- ton’s anonymous referee that it has been recast in its present form. While it is easy to recommend that an author more fully integrate a work, it is difficult to make one see how this both should and can be done; it is this invaluable service that an anonymous reader performed for me. Of all the many reader-responses I have received over the last decade, this one stands out for its seriousness, depth of insight, detail of attention, and overall helpfulness. The general suggestion that the book could be more fully integrated by breaking it into three was a bril- liant one, as was the recommendation that chapter 9 should be the end of the middle, and chapter 10 the beginning of the last part. In ways both large and small, this comprehensive report was so useful that emphasizing its impact on the final product here in the second-person seems the only fair way to proceed: thanks to your help, this book has become as much ours as mine. There are, of course, names to be mentioned. Among the scholars with whom I have most profitably discussed Cicero are Elisabeth Begemann, David Fott, Jon Hall, James Kasteley, David Konstan, Carlos Lévy, Tony Long, Gesine Manuwald, Walter Nicgorski, Matt Sharpe, Gisela Striker, David West, and Raphael Woolf. I likewise owe an important debt of gratitude to all who con- tributed to Brill’s Companion to the Reception of Cicero; working with them in tandem with completing this project proved to be a very great help indeed. But where Cicero is concerned, my most important debts are considerably older, and stretch back to the Roman section of the ninth-grade course “Three Democra- cies.” Allan Mason Ward was my mentor on that project from the start thanks in no small part to his grandmother Katie. My colleagues at Harwood Union High School—Tom Dean, John Nelson, and Cathy Weeks-Cadwell—daily deepened my appreciation for the “new man from Arpinum” in ways both large and small, and I will never forget the feeling of joy I experienced when the eminently sober and balanced Mr. Nelson finally decided that Cicero really was “the noblest Roman of them all.” All of the Vermonters who chose between Lucretia, Cin- ix