part skeptic, part stoic and all roman. Some of Cicero's peers reject his seemingly over-acceptance of Greek philosophy. Yet Cicero believed he could strike a balance between the two worlds. By his exhortations on the composite state Cicero attempted to create a common accord between the roman state and the universal community of mankind. To say the romanization of stoicism was an abuse upon early stoicism is a inaccurate assumption. Cicero made the survival of stoicism possible by rendering it more appeasing to roman society. At the same instance Cicero was trying to answer the early pragmatic problem facing such stoic topics as the universal community of mankind. Although he may not have been true to the stoic ideal (spirit of), Cicero made a genuine effort to answer the philosophical dilemmas present in stoicism. It is unfortunate that Cicero's historic bias deprived him from being place on the same footing as Aristotle. Cicero's viewed the decay of states to be nothing more than a reoccurrence of history, but he did seem to understand too well the powers at work. However Cicero did not see past the roman republic of the day. The aspect of stoicism that Cicero cannot accept, is religion. Perhaps because of his daughter's death, the inner pain he must have felt to believe she was too much to bear, as such, this influenced his position. This must have made him decide that the stoic belief in this instance to be unacceptable. Cicero the statesman knew that disbelief in roman religion and tradition was an unwise course of action. Tradition and the gods gave Rome its strength, intelligence and resolve. To discredit the gods was to discredit Roman society; something Cicero would never do. But this drew a line into how far Cicero would have believed in stoicism; Cicero would believe in stoicism so long as it did not weaken Rome's strength and integrity. For Cicero, stoicism was something to be admired, read, and used. But stoicism was stil...
