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Series Editors' Foreword -- Prefatory Note -- Marcus Tullius Cicero (106-43 B.C.): Chronology of Life and Writings -- Acknowledgments -- Contents -- Introduction -- Chapter 1: Skepticism, Politics, and a Philosophical Foundation -- Cicero's Skepticism -- Skepticism Versus Wisdom -- Skepticism in the Service of Wisdom -- Notes -- Chapter 2: The Critical and Rhetorical Modes of Philosophy -- Socratic Method -- Socratic Irony and Socratic Skepticism -- The Socratic Way of Life -- The Mixed Modes of Cicero -- Perfecta Philosophia -- Chapter 3: Duties and Virtue -- The Right and the Useful

AbstractThis essay treats the inspiration and nature of Yves Simon's philosophical life. His embrace of that life was importantly shaped by his engagement with the republican tradition in France, his passionate opposition to the fascist threat to France, and his later attachment to the aspirations of American democracy. However, his early philosophical interests took direction and inspiration from his encounter with Jacques Maritain who drew him to Thomism. His devotion to the truth was fierce, and he confronted honestly the threats to this defining quality of philosophical life from the pressures of social conformity and from the discouragement of seeing the inadequacies and disagreements in the history of philosophy. He came, as especially evident in his most influential book, Philosophy of Democratic Government, to esteem highly the virtue of prudence, seeking to protect it from both philosophy and social science.