Resumen: Cicero regards character education both as a main goal of the intellectual life and as an important basis for rhetorical training of the young elite, in line with the Isocratean oratorical tradition of liberal arts. In contrast, several points from his works belonging to different periods and literary genres underscore that liberal studies are suitable for any age. This chapter analyses how Cicero stresses in three of his works (In defence of the poet Archias, On the orator and On old age) that character education for the good man, i.e. the ideal orator and philosopher engaged in public life, is not only a task for initial stages of instruction but also should encompass a lifelong habit of cultivating intellectual and moral virtue. Cicero¿s viewpoints in this respect could shed some light on the aims of contemporary core curricula, the mission of teachers involved in such programs and recent debate on the habits of lifelong learning.
