hen describing his logic is not systematic or organized, and clearly his Greek counterparts were more convincing. As a stoic Cicero held far too much esteem to the past and traditions of Rome, as the major part of the second book of the commonwealth is dedicated to that notion of the roman tradition. It is easy to see how a man such as Cicero transfused his sentiment of roman accomplishments into a rationalized logic. The point on roman tradition can more carefully be examined, and reveals another aspect in which Cicero changed stoicism. Early stoics did not have a patronage in the ancient roman or Greek sense, rather they believed in the universe being full of divine reason. Thus, the stoics adhered to the universe and divine plan as god. Most ancient Greek philosophies denied the existence of traditional gods and pathos. A conflict arised between the Greek world of the intellect and the Roman world of traditional sentiment. On the subject of divinity Cicero had a dual nature to his beliefs. On one hand he spoke dispassionately on the inability of the gods to exist, on the other hand he made great oratories to Jupiter and the other gods who he believed helped and guided the state.8 Cicero gives an example of the roman sentiment on religion, which we hear through the mouth of Cotta in De Natura Derum: " I will always defend, and always have defended, the traditional Roman religious opinions, rites and ceremonies, and nothing that anyone, learned or unlearned, says will move me from the view I have inherited from our forefathers about the worship of the immortal gods. On any question of religion I follow men who held the office of pontifex maximus, like Coruncanius, Scipio and Scaevola, not Zeno, Cleanthes or Chrysippus....I have never held that any branch of traditional Roman religion should be despised, and am persuaded that Romulus be establishing the auspices and Numa by instituting our sacred rites laid the foundation of our state."...
