The Death of Marcus Aurelius

The Death of Marcus Aurelius

Tuesday, September 1, 2020

Musonius Rufus, Lectures 15.1


Lecture 15: Should every child that is born be raised?

Is it not true that the lawgivers, whose special function it was by careful search to discern what is good for the state and what is bad, what promotes and what is detrimental to the common good, all considered the increase of the homes of the citizens the most fortunate thing for the cities and the decrease of them the most shameful thing?

And when the citizens had few or no children, did they not regard it as a loss, but when they had children, yes, plenty of them, did they not regard it as a gain?

So it was for this reason that they forbade women to suffer abortions and imposed a penalty upon those who disobeyed; for this reason they discouraged them from choosing childlessness and avoiding parenthood, and for this reason they gave to both husband and wife a reward for large families, and set a penalty upon childlessness.

I believe this the last of the politically uncomfortable lectures from Musonius, the ones my old professor would not dare to teach in class, because the Pharisees of our age would have nailed him to the wall.

All of Musonius’ lectures are politically uncomfortable, of course, if we only bother to dig beneath the surface. We don’t like doing that, however, so the rest of his lectures are safe, at least for the moment. Only certain “trigger phrases” get us upset.

This passage at first confused me quite a bit, since the “lawgivers” I know would actually prefer it if there were fewer people about. They judge a society by its efficiency, not by its charity, and so having a few wealthy taxpayers is preferable to having more mouths to feed.

The “law” that Musonius describes seems downright insane to our supposedly enlightened age.

This what they tell me:

Consume as much as you can, but produce as little as you have to. Take what you think is yours, but leave the rest to fend for themselves. Have sex whenever you want, but divorce it from its natural context and consequences. Make a child when it is convenient, but dispose of it when it is inconvenient.

Gratify yourself first, and then ask the questions later.

Again, I will usually no longer debate about sex, or family, or abortion with most people, not because these matters are unimportant, but because what is important needs to go back much further, a good three or four steps, to the first principles about what is truly good in this life.

The “law” that Musonius describes begins with something quite contrary to our current customs.

Stoic values, those grounded in Nature instead of selfish profit, are actually deeply countercultural. This is why I have little patience for the current fad of Hipster Stoicism, which glorifies the word but not the task, which wants to maintain all the current conveniences and change nothing of substance in the soul.

A Stoic “law”, not one of coercion but one of conscience, looks at a human life from a different angle. What makes a life, any life at all, worth living? The chance to live well. What makes for such a good life? It will involve none of the usual suspects.  

Virtue makes us good, not pleasure. Virtue makes us good, not wealth. Virtue makes us good, not power. Virtue makes us good, not fame. Give a person the chance to live with wisdom and with love, whatever the other circumstances may be, and everything else is only a footnote.

But how do we raise our children, the few that we still choose to have? To be satiated, to be rich, to be influential, to be admired. We will now obviously have fewer children, not because there isn’t enough to go around, but because we are unwilling to give, unwilling to share what we already have.

“But there are too many people in the world!”

No, there is not enough love in the world. Nature gives us all what we need, if only some didn’t take more than they deserved.

Musonius understood how a society that refuses to procreate is a society that is killing itself. Such a society has all of its priorities confused, because love is no longer the law.

Lust is then the law. I am foolishly looking to the wrong lawgivers.

Written in 2/2000


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