In De Inventione, Cicero has just finished his schooling and
writing a book to demonstrate what his years of schooling have taught him. He
is only beginning his career as a rhetorician. When I first read De Inventione,
I thought, “This is good stuff” or “I hadn’t noticed that about rhetoric
before”, Cicero did an excellent job of adding a fine touch to Aristotle’s
system of rhetoric. You can tell that Cicero thinks he knows a lot about rhetoric.
Now let us fast forward 30 years…
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| Each of us must carve our own path. We are just at the begining. There is so much ahead of us! |
It was hard for me to
believe that the writers of De Inventione and De Oratore were the same person.
His writing and his ideas were very powerful. I enjoyed his insights on what he
projected were the needed skills of a rhetorician because I think I could tell
that this particular writer possessed many of them.
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| Cicero sculpted his own life as he followed his passions and goals |
Things take time. I was very inspired by the works of
Cicero, mainly because he didn’t give up on his dream. He began a journey as an
eager and promising student, but it was what he did with his life after his schooling was over that
really defined him. Like it was for Cicero, so let it be for us.
I think a great lesson to learn from Cicero is to follow
your heart and to stick with your goals. Who we are now is not a reflection of
what we are forever destined to be. Regardless of where we are now with hard
work, consistency, and time we can sculpt our lives into something beautiful.
I think that Cicero focuses a lot more on the person in De Oratore rather than simply the speech in De Inventione. He expounds more upon education, humor, decorum, and eloquence than in De Invention. I think this is almost the main difference between the two speeches. Good post!
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed reading your post. I really liked how you applied the lessons that we learn from Cicero to us students personally. I think it's sometimes hard to relate to these ancient scholars, and you did a great job of applying his ambitions and goals to each of us.
ReplyDeleteNice and to the point. It was a good read and helped me to put my head around some of the concepts that Cicero goes over in his De Oratore. I think that it is because of the kairos that more humor, and eloquence are present, but of course with 30 years of experience now under his belt Cicero is going to be a master at applying these things into his oratory.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the inspirational words James! Today I worried over not being able to become who I want to become, but you are right when you say, "With hard work, consistency, and time we can sculpt our lives into something beautiful." I haven't actually read De Oratore yet but I'll look for that theme as I read!
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