A great many of Marcus Aurelius’ sayings seem almost as if they might have been in the Bible. Indeed, some people keep his book by their bedside as if it were a Bible.
One of his rules was, “Forgive your enemies,” and he seemed almost glad to have enemies so that he might have a chance to forgive them. Indeed, he took such a special delight in forgiving his enemies that he even went out of his way to do so. Though Marcus Aurelius was not a Christian, nevertheless he was more Christian in the way he acted than some of the later emperors who were supposed to be Christians.
But like many people who are very good themselves, Marcus Aurelius was unable to bring up his son to be so. His son was named Commodus, and Commodus was just as bad as his father was good. He may have been bored when a child by too many of his father’s instructions, for when he grew up and was able to choose for himself and do as he pleased, instead of following Zeno and joining the Stoics, he joined the society of another philosopher called Epicurus.
Epicurus had lived about the same time as Zeno. But he had taught what at first seems almost the opposite of what Zeno taught. Epicurus said that the chief end and aim of man and the only good in the world was pleasure; but, said he, the pleasure must be of the right kind. Nowadays people who are very fond of eating nice things, whose whole thought in life is the pleasure of eating, are called “epicures.”
Commodus’s one thought was pleasure, and the worst kind of pleasure at that. A friend of mine thought Marcus Aurelius was such a fine man that he named his son after him, “Marcus Aurelius Jones,” but when the son grew up he was not at all like his namesake. The name “Commodus” would have suited him much better, for instead of being good and pious, he thought of nothing but pleasure and he was so bad that he ended in jail.
Commodus thought nothing of giving his people a good government; he only thought of giving himself a good time. He was an athlete and had beautiful muscles and a handsome figure, of which he was so proud that he had a statue made of himself. The statue showed him as the strong and muscular god Hercules. Commodus made the people worship him as if he were this god. Just to show off his muscles and his muscular ability, he himself took part in prize-fights—quite bad taste for an emperor. He poisoned or killed any one who found fault with or criticized him. He led a wild and dissipated life, but at last he met the end he deserved. He was strangled to death by a wrestler.
Lycurgus would have said again:
“I told you so.”
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