Another view of the συνταγματα in question is that they are simply the two books, entitled _Catulus_ and _Lucullus_, of the _Priora Academica_. In my opinion the word συνταγμα, the use of which to denote a portion of a work Madvig suspects[155], thus obtains its natural meaning. Cicero uses the word συνταξις of the whole work[156], while συνταγμα[157], and συγγραμμα[158], designate definite portions or divisions of a work. I should be quite content, then, to refer the words of Cicero to the _Catulus_ and _Lucullus_. Krische, however, without giving reasons, decides that this view is unsatisfactory, and prefers to hold that the _Hortensius_ (or _de Philosophia_) and the _Priora Academica_ are the compositions in question. If this conjecture is correct, we have in the disputed passage the only reference to the _Hortensius_ which is to be found in the letters of Cicero. We are quite certain that the book was written at Astura, and published before the _Academica_. This would be clear from the mention in the _Academica Posteriora_ alone[159], but the words of Cicero in the _De Finibus_[160] place it beyond all doubt, showing as they do that the _Hortensius_ had been published a sufficiently long time before the _De Finibus_, to have become known to a tolerably large circle of readers. Further, in the _Tusculan Disputations_ and the _De Divinatione_[161] the _Hortensius_ and the _Academica_ are mentioned together in such a way as to show that the former was finished and given to the world before the latter. Nothing therefore stands in the way of Krische's conjecture, except the doubt I have expressed as to the use of the word συνταγμα, which equally affects the old view maintained by Madvig.
Whatever be the truth on this point, it cannot be disputed that the _Hortensius_ and the _Academica_ must have been more closely connected, in style and tone, than any two works of Cicero, excepting perhaps the _Academica_ and the _De Finibus_. The interlocutors in the _Hortensius_ were exactly the same as in the _Academica Priora_, for the introduction of Balbus into some editions of the fragments of the _Hortensius_ is an error[162]. The discussion in the _Academica Priora_ is carried on at Hortensius' villa near Bauli; in the _Hortensius_ at the villa of Lucullus near Cumae. It is rather surprising that under these circumstances there should be but one direct reference to the _Hortensius_ in the _Lucullus_[163].