[103]
"What keen-witted men! With how very few
words they think the business dispatched! But to
establish their syllogism they take propositions for
granted which are not conceded at all; yet a chain
of reasoning, to be valid, should proceed from premises which are not doubtful to the conclusion
which is in dispute.
50. "Pray observe the neat way in which Epicurus
(whom you Stoics usually call a blundering idiot)
proves that what we term ' the universe' is infinite.
'That,' said he, 'which is finite has an end.' Who
would deny that? Again, 'That which has an end
is seen from some point outside itself.' That, too,
must be granted. 'But the universe is not seen
from without itself.' We cannot question that
proposition either. 'Therefore, since it has no end
the universe must be infinite.'
Cicero: De Senectute De Amicitia De Divinatione. With An English Translation. William Armistead Falconer. Cambridge. Harvard University Press; Cambridge, Mass., London, England. 1923.
The Annenberg CPB/Project provided support for entering this text.
This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License.
An XML version of this text is available for download, with the additional restriction that you offer Perseus any modifications you make. Perseus provides credit for all accepted changes, storing new additions in a versioning system.