Recovering the Ancient View of Founding

<i>Recovering the Ancient View of Founding</i> questions the consensus view of contemporary scholars who view Cicero as an eclectic and unoriginal political thinker. For them <i>De Legibus</i> is perhaps the most striking example of this eclecticism. They say that Cicero claims a universal ground for laws that would restore the political privileges of his own aristocratic class. Yet Timothy Caspar shows that Cicero offers a unified coherent and original teaching about politics whose aim is justice for the entire republic not just a part of it. Contrary to the prevailing view Cicero does not embrace but rejects Stoicism—and any philosophy that culminates in a community of the wise—as a standard for politics. Instead nature serves as the foundation of Cicero's laws and he elucidates a political standard grounded in nature and applicable to all citizens. Thus the law codes of <i>De Legibus</i> are not only in harmony with but required by Cicero's natural law principles.Caspar's <i>Recovering the Ancient View of Founding</i> is a reinterpretation of a key work of ancient Roman political philosophy and belongs on the bookshelf of anyone interested in philosophy politics or ancient Rome.