THE SAYINGS OF MARCUS
power to demand it, but because Marcus said that everything, both money and all else, belonged to the Senate and the people; for We, he said,[1] speaking to the Senate so far from having anything of our own, even live in a house that is yours.[2]
(19) Philostratus, Vit. Soph. ii. 9, p. 240 Kays.
Of this Lucius[3] another surprising story is told. The Emperor Marcus was an eager disciple of Sextus the Boeotian philosopher,[4] being often in his company and frequenting his house. Lucius, who had just come to Rome, asked the Emperor, whom he met on his way, where he was going to and on what errand, and Marcus answered, It is good even for an old man to learn;[5] I am now on my way to Sextus the philosopher to learn what I do not yet know. And Lucius, raising his hand to heaven, said, “O Zeus, the king of the Romans in his old age takes up his tablets and goes to school. But my king Alexander died before he was thirty-two."[6]
(20) Capit. xxviii.
When he began to sicken, he sent for his son,[7] and at first besought him not to neglect the relics of the war,[8]
- ↑ The date would be in 178, just before the Emperor's last departure for the war.
- ↑ The Emperor, if he said these words, can hardly be acquitted of some affectation, as he had a very large fortune in his own right, inherited from his mother and also through Faustina.
- ↑ A philosopher friend of Herodes Atticus.
- ↑ Sextus was grandson of Plutarch and a teacher of Marcus; see Capit. iii. 2, and Marcus himself (i. 9 and note), from which we see what he learnt "in his old age." He also "shewed off" his philosophy before Sextus; see Themistius, Orat. xi. 145b.
- ↑ In this he was in the good company of our own great Alfred. cp. also Seneca, Ep. 76: tamdiu discendum est, quamdiu nescias; Solon, Fragm. 8. Bergk, γηράσκων δ᾽ αἰεὶ πολλὰ διδασκόμενος.
- ↑ For this anecdote cp. Dio, 71. 1, § 2: λέγεται καὶ αὐτο κράτωρ ἂν μὴ αἰδεῖσθαι ἐς διδασκάλου φοιτῶν, ἀλλὰ καὶ Σέξτῳ προσιέναι τῷ ἐκ Βοιωτῶν φιλοσόφῳ καὶ ἐς ἀκρόασιν τῶν ῥητορικῶν Ερμογένους λόγων μὴ ὀκνῆσαι παραγενέσθαι. The date is most likely 177–8, before the last departure to the war. At this time Marcus was engaged himself in giving lectures on philosophy. See Aur. Victor, De Caes. xvi. 9; cp. Vulc. Gallicanus, Vit. Cassii, iii. 7.
- ↑ His son Commodus, now 19 years old. He was perhaps more weak than vicious. As a matter of fact Pompeianus and the other amici of Marcus persuaded Commodus to remain for six months.
- ↑ The parallel with our Edward II. is very close.
