Cicero, Tusculan Disputations 1.2

It was, therefore, late before poets were either known or received among us; though we find in Cato’s Origins that the guests used, at their entertainments, to sing the praises of famous men to the sound of the flute; but a speech of Cato’s shows this kind of poetry to have been in no great esteem, as he censures Marcus Nobilior for carrying poets with him into his province; for that consul, as we know, carried Ennius with him into Aetolia. 

 

Therefore, the less esteem poets were in, the less were those studies pursued; though even then those who did display the greatest abilities that way were not very inferior to the Greeks. Do we imagine that if it had been considered commendable in Fabius, a man of the highest rank, to paint, we should not have had many Polycleti and Parrhasii? 

 

Honor nourishes art, and glory is the spur with all to studies; while those studies are always neglected in every nation which are looked upon disparagingly. 

 

The Greeks held skill in vocal and instrumental music as a very important accomplishment, and therefore it is recorded of Epaminondas, who, in my opinion, was the greatest man among the Greeks, that he played excellently on the flute; and Themistocles, some years before, was deemed ignorant because at an entertainment he declined the lyre when it was offered to him. 

 

For this reason, musicians flourished in Greece; music was a general study, and whoever was unacquainted with it was not considered as fully instructed in learning. Geometry was in high esteem with them, therefore none were more honorable than mathematicians. But we have confined this art to bare measuring and calculating.

The Romans came to the arts later than the Greeks, and they developed them more slowly, and yet they still learned to excel at them in their own way. Cicero understood that the quality of their expression could still be admired on its own merits. 

 

Nevertheless, Cicero also recognized that a crop will grow most vigorously in the richest soul, and that the Romans had not always held the arts in as high esteem as the Greeks. Accordingly, the values that a society most honors and respects will directly influence how many individuals choose to pursue vocations like poetry, or music, or mathematics, or philosophy. 

 

Where a love of truth and beauty is encouraged, we will find an outpouring of learning and creativity; where it is discouraged, we will be left with only a trickle. 

 

I do find myself thinking on this matter regularly, and I wonder how the experiences of the Romans can reflect the situations of our modern day and age. I wish to avoid hasty generalizations, but the culture I have grown up in tends, more often than not, to elevate profit in favor of prudence, the goods of the body at the expense of the goods of the soul. It has been quite rare for me to be told that wisdom and virtue matter the most, very common for me to be told that power and wealth matter the most. 

 

Each person ultimately makes his own decisions, and yet the force of popular opinion has a mighty effect. Over the years I have seen so many people, with greatly varied gifts and talents, toss away their hopes and dreams, all because they were convinced that no one was interested in what they had to offer. 

 

Where is the paycheck? Where is the praise? Who will listen or who will look? We give up, because others have assured us that we are wasting our time. 

 

“How is your book, or your painting, or your obscure pondering useful to anyone?” We all know we have heard it, and many of us have also said it. Once a poem is only as good as how much it sells for to a publisher, or a song is only as good as how far it rises up the charts, or scientific research is only as good as how many technological conveniences it can produce, I fear we have grown terribly confused. 

 

What we have perhaps neglected is the fact that even answering the very questions about what is beneficial or useful in this life is already a philosophical concern to begin with, and it requires a sincere willingness to think critically, before we start with all the buying and the selling. 

 

I suppose we will have as many stockbrokers and lawyers as we deserve, and as many poets and philosophers as we deserve. We must be very careful what we wish for, knowing that our principles and priorities will determine the kind of world we must live in, and the kind of world we will pass on to the next generation. 

 

The Muses can only share something noble when we are willing to listen. The noise of shallow diversions is what makes us believe that they don’t matter. 

Written in 2/1996

IMAGE: Roman, The Muses Sarcophagus (c. 150 AD)