Tusculan Disputations

What It's About

Written in 45 BC and set as a series of conversations at Cicero's country villa at Tusculum, this work is structured as five books, each tackling a different question central to living well: the fear of death, the endurance of physical pain, the management of grief, the control of mental disturbances, and whether virtue alone is sufficient for a happy life. Cicero takes the role of teacher, arguing through dialogue with an unnamed pupil.

Key Concepts

Drawing heavily on Stoic thought, alongside Academic and Peripatetic ideas, Cicero contends that death should not be feared, since the soul is either immortal or dissolution is simply the end of sensation; that pain, though real, can be endured through force of will; and that grief and other passions are the product of mistaken judgments rather than unavoidable facts of nature. The work builds toward its central claim: that virtue, not external circumstance, is what makes a life happy.

About the Author

Cicero was a Roman statesman, lawyer and orator who rose to become consul in 63 BC. Alongside his political and legal career, he wrote extensively on rhetoric and philosophy, often adapting Greek philosophical ideas for a Roman audience. After opposing Mark Antony in a series of speeches following Julius Caesar's assassination, he was proscribed as an enemy of the state and killed on Antony's orders.

About This Edition

This is an 1877 translation by Charles Duke Yonge.