How to Think Like a Roman Emperor
If you have anger issues, this one is a great tool (h/t mindyourbusiness.
Today’s lesson comes from: Musonious Rufus’s Lectures
We don”t know much about Rufus’s life, he was born between 20-30 AD. By the rein of Nero he was a leading Stoic teacher. He was banished twice under different Emperors. His most famous student was Epictetus and like him, Rufus did not write any of his own lessons. The lessons and fragments that remain were written by his students. We do not now when he died, but in 101 AD Pliny mentions him as deceased.
Disclaimer: I’m not your Supervisor. These are my opinions after reading through these books a few times.
That kings also should study philosophy.
1 When one of the kings from Syria once came to him (for at that time there were still kings in Syria, vassals of the Romans),[1] amongst many other things he had to say to the man were the following words in particular. Do not imagine, he said, that it is more appropriate for anyone to study philosophy than for you, nor for any other reason than because you are a king. For the first duty of a king is to be able to protect and benefit his people, and a protector and benefactor must know what is good for a man and what is bad, what is helpful and what harmful, what advantageous and what disadvantageous, inasmuch as it is plain that those who ally themselves with evil come to harm, while those who cleave to good enjoy protection, and those who are deemed worthy of help and advantage enjoy benefits, while those who involve themselves in things disadvantageous and harmful suffer punishment.
As an unimportant person, I wish the “important” people that rule our Government understood this. Instead we get evil disguised as caring and disdain for people that actually lift up others.
2 But to distinguish between good and bad, advantageous and disadvantageous, helpful and harmful is the part of none other than the philosopher, who constantly occupies himself with this very question, how not to be ignorant of any of these things, and has made it his art to understand what conduces to a man’s happiness or unhappiness. Therefore it appears that the king should study philosophy. 6Furthermore it is fitting for a king, or rather it is an absolute necessity for him, to arbitrate justice as between subjects so that no one may have more or less than his just deserts, but may receive honor or punishment as he deserves.
Marcus Aurelius, who was Emperor about 100 years after Rufus, understood this. His writings are full of reminders of what is important and telling himself how to be a good ruler and person.
3 But how would anyone who was not just ever be able to manage this? And how would anyone ever be just if he did not understand the nature of justice? Here again is a reason the king should study philosophy, for without such study it would not be plain that he knew justice and the just. For one cannot deny either that the one who has learned it will understand justice better than the one who has not learned it, or that all who have not studied philosophy are ignorant of its nature. The truth of this statement appears from the fact that men disagree and contend with one another about justice, some saying that it is here, others that it is there.
Studying something does not make one a master of the subject. Barack Obama studied the Constitution, but did not understand the underlying principle. Many people have studied things in order to find loopholes and ways to attack it. I think if a person studies Stoicism with an open mind and honest intentions, it can be beneficial, no matter their station in life.
4 Yet about things of which men have knowledge there is no difference of opinion, as for example about white and black, or hot and cold, or soft and hard, but all think the same about them and use the same words. In just the same way they would agree about justice if they knew what it was, but in their very lack of agreement they reveal their ignorance. Indeed I am inclined to think that you are not far from such ignorance yourself, and you ought therefore more than anyone else to concern yourself with this knowledge, the more disgraceful it is for a king than for a private citizen to be ignorant about justice.
So many people are ignorant about important concepts like justice. Unfortunately a lot of them are willfully so. Even so, it is possible to have honest disagreement about what constitutes justice in individual cases. The problems start when someone uses the phrase “social justice.” Once the underlying concept is changed then it becomes impossible to have honest disagreements.
I got to practice my Stoicism because the electric cooktop cracked while my wife was using it (scared the hell out of her). I had to take her to buy one and then install it. If she doesn’t find me handsome, at least she will find me handy. It wasn’t as difficult as I thought it would be, although I did have to cut the hole slightly bigger to accommodate the new one.
Good Times
I’ll be on a ship all day Friday, o feel free to go off topic as soon as this drops. Although that applies to every week, I really don’t care.
It was good seeing all of the Honey Harvest folks. That is always a good time well spent with fellow miscreants.
Assuming you are MIA, but surprised you couldn’t just buy a new piece of glass. Although depending on age and how much you liked it I can see getting new one instead.
You assume much. In a third world democracy? Yeah, he’s got more records than the KGB.
It’s the attendees that make the HH a success. Good to see all the Glibs and the locals and no mud wrestling this year.
Wait, there was mud wrestling in past years?
I…ah…might pay money to see some honeys honey wrestle…
Best we can do is some fat old libertarians.
Rule 34 Bro.
Next year in Emily!
We all want to be in Emily.
Although that applies to every week, I really don’t care.
Yes you do
then install it. – i said this before but you dyi is stealing work from honest professionals who can install it for you
My friday evening cigar is good but not great. I blame you people
Patio is done, I shall go have a drink and smoke in a few hours. No more furniture assembly.
You need to be stoic about your vampireness that prevents you from hiking up mountains.
From Sloopy’s AP link:
This summer, the Education Department rescinded a regulation that allowed schools to gauge potential discrimination by comparing outcomes across races, such as the racial breakdown of students in advanced classes.
Allowed, as in required.
These are the times which try men’s stoicism.
Biden on practically Day One said the first duty of every government department and functionary was to root out “systemic racism”. I.e. practice racism. There was no “allow” about it.
https://www.nationalreview.com/news/cambridge-cancels-probe-into-jason-arday-hiring-will-instead-focus-on-university-support/
Of course…
This is why in Run Hide Fight: Infidels I was actively cheering on the terrorists.
#ows948 🔎 5/5 (00:41)
🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟
🔥 streak: 3
puzzlist.com/onewordsearch
And we have the first paradox of governance, wrapped up in a nice little bow…
I’m about to stoically open a can of whoop ass.
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/supreme-court/supreme-court-allows-trump-administration-use-expanded-database-potent-rcna596611
Supreme Court allows Trump administration to use expanded database for potential voter purges
Critics have said the data could lead to U.S. citizens being kicked off the voter rolls, but the justices no
ted the law prohibits broad voter purges in the weeks leading up to an election.
You didn’t seize the opportunity to replace your cook top with gas?
Disappoint, I am.
Dive bar: The Plywood Palace
https://www.perfectduluthday.com/2026/09/15/selective-focus-moquah-bar/#more-3344380
And I thought The Huddle in north Lewiston was tiny and dive.
Holy crap. It got a roof, siding, paint, and a beer garden since I last went but. It’s presentable now. It was a dump. https://www.facebook.com/TheHuddleTavern/
Wow. That’s amazing. Shocking some nanny stater hasn’t had it shut down as a fire hazard.
It’s in an unincorporated area, right?
Shocking some nanny stater hasn’t had it shut down as a fire hazard.
Where are the code inspectors? That place would never pass an energy efficiency audit.
Who will need to be more stoic – the fans of ManCity with whatever trivial punishments are handed out, or the fans of the rest of the Premier League with the wristslap the team gets?
Pity party
GOP Rep. Thomas Massie (Ky.), who lost his primary to an opponent backed by President Trump, predicted a reckoning for the president and the GOP in the midterm elections.
“I think his comeuppance will happen on Election Day, and the day after I think there’s going to be a reckoning,” the Republican lawmaker said during an interview Thursday with CNN’s Kaitlan Collins on “The Source.”
Massie, who was defeated in the GOP primary by Trump-backed challenger Ed Gallrein, has been an outspoken critic of the president and his administration’s policies.
Why isn’t he running as an independent to show Trump who the people really love?
Obviously, Massie wasn’t palling around with Khanna for no reason. Sorry I ever donated that the POS over the years.
Blecch. Really?
I know loss of loved ones can drastically change a person, but man…he is lashing out in some odd areas.
Massie also criticized the president’s decision to host Chinese President Xi Jinping at the White House for a lavish state dinner Thursday evening, saying it sends a “mixed message.”
“He will invite a communist to the White House, but I can’t even go there for the Christmas party,” the Republican said. “His retribution tour on Republicans, I think, stands in stark contrast to the way he’s treating the communist leader of China and also the mayor of New York.
“But you know, that’s just who he is,” Massie added. “He’s not an ideologue. He doesn’t have a true north, or honestly any kind of beliefs.”
Chin up, little buddy. Be stoic.
While he has a point about Donald’s lack of principles, surely he knows how the game is played.
Next year, the V6 is being turned up to 563 hp (420 kW), while the electric motor will be turned down from 469 hp (350 kW) to 402 hp (300 kW), except in boost mode. But making the engine more powerful means making it thirstier. Unfortunately, asking teams to redesign their cars for next year to include larger fuel tanks would be prohibitively expensive for most under the current $215 million annual cost cap and would also make the cars even larger and heavier. So this week, the F1 Commission approved a plan to shorten races next year, from 190 miles (305 km) to 180 miles (290 km). In 2028, the power units will be rebalanced again to achieve a 60:40 split.
Or you could just kill the whole electric race car stupidity, but where is the social signaling in all that?
https://arstechnica.com/cars/2026/09/formula-1-looks-at-3-0-l-v8-turbos-and-smaller-hybrids-for-2030/
In Shapira’s telling, firearms training operates as a feedback loop. Fear brings people to the classroom, and the course gives them new reasons to be afraid.
A NYT article on an “ethnographic” exploration by an associate professor of sociology at the University of Texas at Austin (naturally) of Texas gun owners. Paywalled and I can’t access the usual archives at work.
42 Gun-Training Classes Later, He Understands Why We’re So Afraid
More than just instruction on how to use a weapon, the courses teach a way of life, the sociologist Harel Shapira argues in “Basic Pistol.”
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/09/25/books/basic-pistol-harel-shapira-gun-training.html
“As a lesbian, I just want to exercise my rights before somebody’s coming for them,” said Elizabeth Sabatier, the nanny, who had been considering buying a gun since Donald Trump’s first presidential run in 2016.
So close to getting it.
So after six years living under the Mad King’s repression, exactly how many rights have you lost, hon?
In 1999, only about a quarter of American gun owners said self-defense was their primary reason for owning a firearm; hunting ranked first. Today, 72 percent cite self-defense, while hunters, he writes, are a “stark minority.”
Golly, what changed?
But making the engine more powerful means making it thirstier. Unfortunately, asking teams to redesign their cars for next year to include larger fuel tanks
Nonsense. Bring back pressurized refueling rigs. Liberty Media is all about the show.
How about ripping out all the weight of the battery pack and assorted electronics?
It is absolutely perfect weather for the evacuation drill we have scheduled in seven minutes.
“As a lesbian, I just want to exercise my rights before somebody’s coming for them,” said Elizabeth Sabatier, the nanny, who had been considering buying a gun since Donald Trump’s first presidential run in 2016.
The market will be flooded with guns nobody needs anymore after AOC is inaugurated.
Paradise on earth.
It is absolutely perfect weather for the evacuation drill we have scheduled in seven minutes.
Freezing rain?
I’m also not sure if sarcasm, but being safe, I presumed volcanic rain. Ya know, the fun kind.
Gold-digging ‘mole people’ arrested for diving into manhole near NYC hotel
Two nitwit nightcrawlers — including a particularly portly “mole person” — were busted Thursday for diving into a Manhattan manhole in a subterranean quest for precious metals, police and law-enforcement sources said.
Cops nabbed Kevin Rodriguez, 26, and Samuel Reveron, 25 – both Venezuelan citizens – near their Queens homes in connection to a surreal pre-dawn Wednesday sewer escapade just steps from the Loews Regency New York on the Upper East Side.
The strange shenanigans could end up shedding light on the motivations of mysterious “mole people” spotted popping out of sewers — as Reveron admitted to fishing for gold in the city’s steamy depths, prosecutors said.
“We go into the sewers to look for valuables that go into the sewer drains,” he allegedly told a police officer, according to prosecutors.
==
I’d like to write for the Post. It’s like they have a quota for fun per article. In other news, I’d think the denizens of NYC would kinda give a shit that there are legit sewer people living underneath them. But, NYC. Apparently, Ghostbusters: Lite is too tame. Well, the knob goes to 11.
https://nypost.com/2026/09/25/us-news/gold-digging-mole-people-busted-for-diving-into-manhole-near-nyc-hotel/