Cicero: On Duties (De Officiis)

Cicero addresses this text to his son, Marcus, who lives in Athens and studies under Cratippus, the Peripatetic philosopher. The Peripatetics were a school of philosophers in Ancient Greece founded by Aristotle. In this text, Cicero aims to guide his son through a consideration of duty, or "appropriate action" (24) and the issues that may arise when one decides what that action might be. He explains that appropriate action can be either an "entirely," or "correct" action, or an "ordinarily," or "common" action (25). He aims to address the latter actions in this text. When one makes an ordinarily appropriate action, it is based on a decision as to whether the action will be honorable or useful, whether its utility is at odds with its honorability, and vice versa.

He defines duty as arising from one of four kinds of virtue: the recognition of truth, or wisdom;the preservation of communal, humanconnections, or justice; the power of a "lofty and unconquerable spirit," (28) or greatness; and the observation of social mores, or moderation. The first virtue concerns truth, while the other three concern what Cicero calls "necessities" (27). Necessities sustainhuman life, both physical and spiritual.

Concerning wisdom, Cicero explains that humans concern themselves with survival, like animals, but unlike animals, have awareness of the past and future, and thus use reasoning in their decision-making. Humans orient themselves to "examination and investigation" (27) into the abstract concept of "the truth" (27). In doing so, he warns against blindly accepting things as truth without thinking them over first, and against spending too much time devoted to trivial matters.

In its preservation of communal connections, duty should concern itself with justice, which, to Cicero, means abstaining from harming another "unless provoked by injury," (30) and by using communal property for communal good, and private property for personal interests. People typically cause harm to others out of fear for their own safety, but also to "secure those things that they fervently desire," (31) as in land or power acquisition. Cicero also indicts those people who stand by while injury is inflicted on another.

Most noble to Cicero are honorable actions driven by "a spirit great and elevated and contemptuous of human concerns" (47). He cautions against taking actions that simply glorify the self, and praises those done with courage "on behalf of communal well-being" (47). He admits that this kind of altruistic spirit is rare. It has two distinctions: "contempt for external goods," (48) such as material wealth, and a desire to do useful things that require hard work and may put one's life in danger, such as going to war. For Cicero, though, officials should engage in war sparingly, and with the only objective being to "seek peace" (54).

Propriety comprises the final component of honorable actions. Cicero links a definition of propriety inextricably with honorability. For him, it becomes a chicken-and-egg situation in which propriety "pertains to all aspects of honorableness" (61). Acts of propriety both conform to "human excellence" (61) as different from that of other living entities, and are also "consistent with nature" (61). Human excellence derives from the human capacity for reasoning and reflection. Nature, for Cicero, eschews indulgence and desire.

Although every human possesses the capacity for reasoning, Cicero explains that humans differ from each other greatly in terms of both body and spirit. Individuals should strive to honor and act in accordance with their particularities of spirit, rather than "oppose nature" or "pursue anything that you cannot obtain" (67). Doing so is itself an act of propriety. Cicero tries to guide his son in his choice of life path, as he understands that this is "the most difficult deliberation of all" (69), especially given that it often happens during adolescence when "good judgment is weakest" (69).

Propriety includes conduct of not only the spirit, but of the body. In corporeal matters, as in spiritual matters, Cicero urges temperance, harmoniousness, and a healthy sense of shame. This applies to physical appearance, movement, and speech. One should conduct themselves at all times in accordance to honorability.

To conclude, Cicero reiterates the four things from which honorableness "emanates" (82): wisdom, justice,greatness of spirit, and moderation. He concedes that at times of decision-making, one considers which of these things would be best served by an appropriate action. Cicero prefers community-driven honorableness to wisdom-driven, as he finds wisdom without action futile. He believes that actions oriented towards the preservation of human community supersede all others, and that they should be ordered as follows: first to honor the gods, then the home country, then parents, then others in one's life.