“It is usually said (and I used to say) that smoking facilitates mental work. And that is undoubtedly true if one considers only the quantity of one’s mental output. To a man who smokes, and who consequently ceases strictly to appraise and weigh his thoughts, it seems as if he suddenly had many thoughts. But this is not because he really has many thoughts, but only because he has lost […]
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“Brutus, Orator” by Cicero
“As reason is the glory of man, so the lamp of reason is eloquence.” The Origin and History of Oratory In “Brutus“, Cicero traces the origin and history of oratory in ancient Greece and Rome, and provides a concise and astute critique of various classes of individual orators, ranking their achievements in the five components of rhetoric (invention, arrangement, diction/expression, action/delivery and memory). Demosthenes is considered the greatest among the […]
Read moreCicero On Writing
“To commit one’s reflections to writing, without being able to arrange or express them clearly or attract the reader by some sort of charm, indicates a man who makes an unpardonable misuse of leisure and his pen.” –Cicero “Tusculan Disputations” My dear Cicero, why do you have to be so cruel? How many people can match your eloquence and erudition? A handful in more than two thousand years. Should the […]
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