Final Speech

Ancient Speech:

Parts 18-21
This, however, I do feel first of all — that friendship cannot exist except among good men; nor do I go into that too deeply,15 as is done by those16 who, in discussing this point with more than usual accuracy, and it may be correctly, but with too little view to practical results, say that no one is good unless he is wise. We may grant that; but they understand wisdom to be a thing such as no mortal man has yet attained.17 I, however, am bound to look at things as they are in the experience of everyday life and not as they are in fancy or in hope. Never could I say that Gaius Fabricius, Manius Curius, and Tiberius Coruncanius, whom our ancestors adjudged to be wise, were wise by such a standard as that. p129Therefore, let the Sophists keep their unpopular18 and unintelligible word to themselves, granting only that the men just named were good men. They will not do it though; they will say that goodness can be predicated only of the "wise" man. 19 Let us then proceed "with our own dull wits," as the saying is. Those who so act and so live as to give proof of loyalty and uprightness, of fairness and generosity; who are free from all passion, caprice, and insolence, and have great strength of character — men like those just mentioned — such men let us consider good, as they were accounted good in life, and also entitled to be called by that term because, in as far as that is possible for man, they follow Nature, who is the best guide to good living.

For it seems clear to me that we were so created that between us all there exists a certain tie which strengthens with our proximity to each other. Therefore, fellow countrymen are preferred to foreigners and relatives19a to strangers, for with them Nature herself engenders friendship, but it is one that is lacking in constancy. For friendship excels relationship19b in this, that goodwill may be eliminated from relationship while from friendship it cannot; since, if you remove goodwill from friendship the very name of friendship is gone; if you remove it from relationship, the name of relationship still remains. 20 Moreover, how great the power of friendship is may most clearly be recognized from the fact that, in comparison with the infinite ties uniting the human race and fashioned by Nature herself, this thing called friendship has been so narrowed that the bonds of affection always united two persons only, or, at most, a few.

p131 6 For friendship is nothing else than an accord in all things, human and divine, conjoined with mutual goodwill and affection, and I am inclined to think that, with the exception of wisdom, no better thing has been given to man by the immortal gods. Some prefer riches, some good health, some power, some public honours, and many even prefer sensual pleasures. This last is the highest aim of brutes; the others are fleeting and unstable things and dependent less upon human foresight than upon the fickleness of fortune. Again, there are those who place the "chief good" in virtue and that is really a noble view; but this very virtue is the parent and preserver of friendship and without virtue friendship cannot exist at all. 21 To proceed then, let us interpret the word "virtue" by the familiar usage of our everyday life and speech, and not in pompous phrase apply to it the precise standards which certain philosophers use; and let us include in the number of good men those who are so considered — men like Paulus, Cato, Gallus, Scipio, and Philus — who satisfy the ordinary standard of life; but let us pass by such men as are nowhere to be found at all.20





My Imitatio:

First of all, let me start off saying that this is a real issue. Obesity does not exist just among the United States, it exists everywhere and it can happen to anyone. It can be an addiction, and it can take over someone’s wellbeing. It surrounds us and yet we are too okay with it. We see and experience it all around us, but do nothing about it. So let us make a change. Let those McDonald and Taco Bell fast food chains think you are unpopular because you won’t choose to eat there anymore. Their food is filled with preservatives and saturated fats and you much rather consume home grown greens and vitamins. However, don’t get me wrong, they will still try to persuade you to buy their food. With commercials on every channel of TV and the convenience that they offer, they will fight for you and will try to win you back. But, we are stronger than that. So let me proceed “with the unpopular choice” by saying this: Those who act and live to prove that they are head strong and determined, willing to fight for a healthy lifestyle, and are free from caring what other people think, are the people we should listen too. The people who fight for the feeling of confidence in themselves, feeling beautiful and feeling determined to never give up a lifestyle they know is right. These people are the ones that have the best guide to good living. The ones that strive to live a healthy life.
  
 “For it seems to clear to me that we were created that between us all there exists a certain tie which strengthens with our proximity to each other.” (Cicero) Therefore, my fellow students, we should prefer living an active and healthy lifestyle together. Because our generation is what excels the norm. We surpass the older generations and create higher standards for younger ones. We are considered to be the “failed” generation; the one’s who depend too heavily on technology to survive. Well, so what if we do this? We should take these things that supposedly ruined us and let it help create us instead. Help us become a better and more advanced society than the standard our parents left behind. So let us take this advantage we have and make it grow. By combining the ties that we all share, we can strengthen and develop healthy lifestyles.
 
For a healthy and active lifestyle is nothing else than just a habit. I am inclined to think that we are given a body to live in, so why not take the best care of it that we can so it can keep giving back to us? For us to excel and conquer and live to our fullest potentials. If we are weighed down by unnecessary fat, our body will not function at it’s best, cheating us from years of life, those years of adventure. Some prefer money, some prefer material items, some prefer food. But preferring a healthy lifestyle is what will get you past the rest of those preferences and into the ones that count, the good ones. Without a body to rely on, you won’t be able to get that six figure salary or that car you always dreamed of. So let us reflect on our everyday habits and lifestyle. Let us realize the balance of exercise, diet and being happy that comes along with choosing this lifestyle and let us realize that this body you are living in now, is the only one that you have. There are no second chances, just blessings and good health.
  
 So the next time you pass McDonald’s or Taco Bell, consider if that is the best way you can live a healthy lifestyle. Will your body thank you once you have eaten it? Your tastes bud might, but your brain will not.


"Laelius on Friendship Parts 18-21." Laelius De Amicitia by Cicero. 17 Nov. 2013. Web. 12 Sept. 2014. <http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/Cicero/Laelius_de_Amicitia/text*.html>.

Reflection to Imitatio:

Reflection to Imitatio’s

Throughout the last four to five weeks, Professor Condon kept reminding us about this Imitatio speech. In my head I kept thinking, “Oh, this won’t be that bad. It’s just taking a speech and translating it into something different. Simple enough, no problem.” I found a speech by Cicero on friendship, which in Latin translates to Laelius de Amicitia. After about an hour of research and thought that the speech was ideal for my Imitatio, I read through the stanzas until I settled on stanzas 18-21. From that point on, I didn’t think much of it, falsely imagining I have this Imitatio in the bag. The weeks went by until about Thursday the eighteenth when we went over the prompt in class. My initial thought about the project being easy, dramatically shifted into “I am extremely confused” and the stress of the project became extreme.    
   
Once I read Cicero’s few stanza’s on friendship about 100 times, I finally thought that I should sit down and write the speech. I am very passionate about living a very active and healthy lifestyle, so I knew that choosing that topic would be very easy due to it being so present in my every day life. One of the most difficult aspects I found in this project was literally just getting started. I spent more than just a few minutes staring at my computer screen, wondering how I should go about dissecting this speech written by a man of rhetoric. Cicero, being a man of philosophy, law and politics, as well as an orator, was best known for the pieces of literature that he produced over the years. By trying to understand and learn how his writing style was structured, the idea of trying to create and mimic his strategies behind his friendship speech was very difficult. I felt as though my topic of Imitatio did not match up as well I had hoped. I considered trying to look for another speech that would be more consistent with the idea of my speech. I searched for awhile, striking out on every speech I came across. (Looking for rhetoric speeches is harder than I imagined.) So finally, after procrastinating for as long as I did, I just decided to write it.
   
While composing my Imitatio, I attempted to parallel with Cicero’s speech. For example in the second stanza of my speech I addressed my “fellow students” like Cicero addressed his “fellow countrymen.” However, the longer I tested that theory, the harder it became. I continued to try to use very similar wording and structure that he did, however, with the way things were translated into English it did not come out making sense. Understanding what he was trying to say made sense, however, word choice among sentence structure did not, so that made creating my speech difficult.
   
During Cicero’s speech, he tried to go back and forth to state both sides of the argument, as well as give credit to the one’s surrounding him in society. That was hard to execute well due to a couple of different reasons. One, I don’t believe that my topic worked well with the structure that Cicero used. The contemporary issue that I used could be considered internal, meaning that this is an independent issue and you cannot reel others into what you consume and how much you exercise. His speech on friendship considered many outsiders and became dependent on others to talk about in his speech. Furthermore, I believe that the difference in writing skill also played a part. Cicero again, was a professional at public speaking and writing, so trying to match up with his skill level seemed tough right out of the gate. However, as soon I got over the hump of following Cicero’s speech pattern, creating my speech easily spilled out all over the page. I was able to become consistent enough with Cicero, evening taking quotes from his speech and adding them into my mine.
  
After doing the assignment and now reflecting upon it, there are a few things that I learned from the ancient rhetoric. I am happy I live in the days we do now, because we are able to express ourselves more freely than they were able to. Cicero was looked upon as being a man of high value and high profession, so he had a harder time stating his opinion if it was not already pre-approved by other politicians in that system. The majority of his writing had a political undertone, so Cicero always had to make a choice in his argument and stick too it. Also, grammatically speaking, the difference in sentence structure and context is huge! I found that many sentences of Cicero’s were long and very drawn out. If speaking in public, that would be extremely hard to talk that long without a slight pause. I found it hard to keep writing sentences without the urge to use some sort of punctuation.   

In the end, once I was able to get over the difficulty of initially starting the process, I enjoyed writing about an issue that I cared about. Studying and dissecting Cicero’s speech on friendship taught me about the structure and context of the ancient rhetorics. The lack of structure from the assignment created a challenge for all of us, which was actually something I enjoyed once the process was over. I enjoyed hearing the differences in speeches among each student and what speech those chose to mock. Overall, it was a hard assignment, but taught many things about the ancient rhetorics and turned out very rewarding in the end.