Shall we not imitate the fruitful fields, which return more than they receive?
Cicero: “Shall we not imitate the fruitful fields, which return more than they receive?”
Editor's note · Context
In his work on moral obligations, Cicero uses an agricultural metaphor to encourage generosity and giving back more than one receives.
Share
More from Cicero
For we may well be guided by those fundamental principles of justice which I laid down at the outset: first, that no harm be done to anyone; second, that the common interests be conserved.
For they secure one sort of justice, to be sure, in that they do no positive wrong to anyone, but they fall into the opposite injustice; for hampered by their pursuit of learning they leave to their fate those whom they ought to defend.
It is, therefore, only a madman who, in a calm, would pray for a storm; a wise man's way is, when the storm does come, to withstand it with all the means at his command, and especially, when the advantages to be expected in case of a…
It is, therefore, an excellent rule that they give who bid us not to do a thing, when there is a doubt whether it be right or wrong; for righteousness shines with a brilliance of its own, but doubt is a sign that we are thinking of a…





