Please Enjoy:
It’s impossible to overstate the terror and uncertainty that swarmed Marcus’ life. Just while writing Meditations, Rome fought a war against the Parthians that lasted five years. The River Tiber had one of the worst floods in history, destroying homes and livestock, and delivering a famine. Eventually victorious against the Parthians, celebrations were short-lived because returning soldiers brought home a deadly contagion, which became known as the Antonine Plague. Marcus would lose eight children, his co-emperor, most of the Praetorian Guard, his top commander, his most trusted colleague Furius Victorinus—all to the plague. Fate, seemingly testing Marcus with one catastrophe after the next, wasn’t done yet. With Rome crippled by famine and plague, hostile tribes jumped on the opportunity to attack. Rome now faced the duel evils of war and plague.
“All were aware that Rome faced a grave crisis,” biographer Frank McLynn writes, “and the emperor had to tack between stressing the urgency of the situation and not affecting the morale of Romans by anything that smacked of panic.” The first step was obvious: he needed help—more troops, medical experts, leaders. Less obvious was how he’d afford it. Rome’s economy was primitive and brittle before wars and plagues broke out. “Leading by example,” McLynn continues, Marcus “conducted a two-month sale of imperial effects and possessions, putting under the hammer not just sumptuous furniture from the imperial apartments, gold goblets, silver flagons, crystals and chandeliers, but also his wife’s silken, gold-embroidered robes and her jewels.”
We tell this story in The Boy Who Would Be King, too—because it’s such a simple beautiful lesson, worth considering whatever your age. Even in the worst times, we have more than we need; even in the worst times, we can find some way to be generous to others.
The Four Virtues obligate us to do this. It takes courage to give, when we have little. It takes discipline to do without. It takes wisdom to know who and how to help. It is justice to share and to help. That’s what Marcus was doing: Facing the problem, not running from it. Valuing his responsibilities, not his material possessions. Prioritizing his people’s wellbeing, not his own. Finding solutions, not excuses.
What can you do today? Who can you help? What good can you do for the common good? And how can you teach your kids, your employees, your neighbors, to do the same?
