“If you have a garden and a library, you have everything you need”;

“A room without books is like a body without a soul”;

“To err is human, but only a fool persists in his error”;

“Friendship can unite only worthy people. True friendship must be frank and free of pretence and flattery”;

“The greatest victory is victory over oneself”;

“One should eat and drink only as much as restores our strength rather than oppresses it”;

“When there is nothing to be proud of in the present, people boast of yesterday’s achievements”;

“Boastful talk is the first sign of weakness, while those capable of great deeds keep their tongues behind their teeth”;

“A speech should begin and end with the strongest argument, since one must seize minds at the start and win them over at the end”;

“Impunity is the greatest encouragement to crime”.

(Marcus Tullius Cicero (106–43 BC) was one of the greatest orators in history, a Roman statesman and politician of the republican period (the era in ancient Rome between the kingdom and the empire), and a philosopher and scholar.)

Cicero is considered one of the greatest figures in the history of Western civilisation. Thanks to his brilliant oratory, he entered the senate of the Roman Republic in 73 BC and became consul in 63 BC. He was one of the most consistent supporters of preserving the republican order in ancient Rome. He was executed by members of the Second Triumvirate, who sought unlimited power in Rome.

The Second Triumvirate took shape when, in October 43 BC, Mark Antony, Octavian and Marcus Aemilius Lepidus, united against the assassins of Julius Caesar — Marcus Junius Brutus and Gaius Cassius Longinus — met on the river Reno near the town of Bononia in northern Italy and concluded an agreement. The triumvirs used their power to divide the provinces among themselves and to organise proscriptions against political opponents.

Cicero left an extensive literary legacy, which acquired a reputation as a model of style and is a vital source on every aspect of life in Rome in the 1st century BC. His numerous letters became the foundation of European epistolary culture, and his speeches rank among the most outstanding examples of the genre. Cicero’s philosophical treatises are a uniquely comprehensive exposition of ancient Greek philosophy and played an important role in the development of ancient Roman culture.