treatise
De Divinatione. But in this, De Legibus, we may presume that he intends
to give instructions for the guidance of the public, whereas in the
other he is communicating to a few chosen friends those esoteric
doctrines which it would be dangerous to give to the world at large.
There is a charming passage, in which we are told not to devote the rich
things of the earth to the gods. Gold and silver will create impure
desire. Ivory, taken from the body of an animal, is a gift not simple
enough for a god. Metals, such as iron, are for war rather than for
worship. An image, if it is to be used, let it be made of one bit of
wood, or one block of stone. If cloth is given, let it not be more than
a woman can make in a month. Let there be no bright colors. White is
best for the gods; and so on.[310] Here we have the wisdom of Plato, or
of those from whom Plato had borrowed it, teaching us a lesson against
which subsequent ages have rebelled. It is not only that a god cannot
want our gold and silver, but that a man does want them. That rule as to
the woman's morsel of cloth was given in some old assembly, lest her
husband or her brother should lose the advantage of her labor. It was
seen what superstition would do in collecting the wealth of the world
round the shrines of the gods. How many a man has since learned to
regret the lost labor of his household; and yet what god has been the
better? There may be a question of aesthetics, indeed, with which Cicero
does not meddle.

In the third book he descends to practical and at the same time
political questions. There had been no matter contested so vehemently
among Romans as that of the establishment and maintenance of the
Tribunate. Cicero defends its utility, giving, with considerable wit,
the task of attacking it to his brother Quintus. Quintus, indeed, is
very violent in his onslaught. What can be more "pestiferous," or more
prone to sedition? Then Cicero puts him down. "O Quintus," he says, "you
see clearly the vices of the Tribunate! but can there be anything more
unjust than, in discussing a matter, to remember all its evils and to
forget all its merits? You might say the same of the Consuls; for the
very possession of power is an evil in itself. But without that evil you
cannot have the good which the institution contains. The power of the
Tribunes is too great, you say. Who denies it? But the violence of the
people, always cruel and immodest, is less so under their own