Among Aristotle's disciples, a writer, singularly elegant and pure, had maintained the pre-eminence of the contemplative life over the political or active one, in a work which Cicero cites with admiration, and to which he seems to have applied for relief whenever he felt harassed and discouraged in public business.

But here this great man was interested by the subject he discusses, and by the whole course of his experience and conduct, to refute the dogmas of that pusillanimous sophistry and selfish indulgence by bringing forward the most glorious examples and achievements of patriotism.

In this strain he had doubtless commenced his exordium, and in this strain we find him continuing it at the point in which the palimpsest becomes legible.

He then proceeds to introduce his illustrious interlocutors, and leads them at first to discourse on the astronomical laws that regulate the revolutions of our planet.

From this, by a very graceful and beautiful transition, he passes on to the consideration of the best forms of political constitutions that had prevailed in different nations, and those modes of government which had produced the greatest benefits in the commonwealths of antiquity.
This first book is, in fact, a splendid epitome of the political science of the age of Cicero, and probably the most eloquent plea in favor of mixed monarchy to be found in all literature.
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