...This book concludes with a discussion of rhetoric's apparent demise in early modern Europe. It begins with an analysis of Cicero's myth of the orator and how it provided one of the enabling fictions not only of Renaissance humanism but also of the particular form of vernacular humanism articulated...

...' attack on apprehension that the Stoics considered to be a necessary precursor to knowledge. It then provides an overview of the basics of Stoic epistemology before discussing the apprehensible impression by looking at an imaginary dialogue that Cicero constructs between Arcesilaus and Zeno. It also...

... to respond to the tradition of skepticism with which he was familiar. This was the tradition of Academic skepticism, which had its home in Plato's Academy and was transmitted to the Roman world through the writings of Cicero (106–43 BCE). This book is the first comprehensive treatment of Augustine's critique...

...This book examines the critique of Academic skepticism fashioned by Augustine of Hippo in the fourth and fifth centuries. Although there is no evidence that he knew anything of the Pyrrhonian tradition, Augustine was intimately familiar with the Academic tradition from his reading of Cicero, who...

... on authority within it. In particular, it considers three problems that the Academics identified with belief on authority, all of which are found in the writings of Cicero and which were therefore known to Augustine: the Problem of Dubious Benefit, the Problem of Lack of Authority, and the Problem...

...This chapter examines Augustine of Hippo's critique of Academic skepticism by drawing on his narrative of the history of the Academy and the broader development of Platonism. It first considers how reading Cicero's book Hortensius led Augustine to the path of philosophy...