“O tempora, o mores!”
First Catilinarian Oration
Cicero rose from a provincial family to the consulship and crushed the Catilinarian conspiracy. His speeches defined Latin style for two thousand years, and his letters are a private record of the Republic's last years.
In De Natura Deorum he stages a debate between Stoic, Epicurean and Academic views of the gods, sceptically surveying what Romans actually believed. He was executed in 43 BCE during the proscriptions that followed Caesar's death.
Legacy
His philosophical works passed Greek ideas to Latin readers and, through them, to Europe.