2007-05-06 19:45:08 · 3 answers · asked by Theta40 7 in Arts & Humanities ➔ History
Great men very often have stupid sons. Take two kings of England. James I was wise in that he tried to reconcile the different religious factions within his own country (Witgift style Protestants/Calvinist Protestants/Catholics). He brokered peace between his two kingdoms of England and Scotland. He also arranged a peace treaty with Spain with whom England had been at war for 20 years. He dies, his son Charles I comes to the throne and - poof- undoes all his father's good work and eventually looses his head. Wisdom seems not to lie within the genes, but is learned behaviour. Also, it is a sad fact that sons often want to do the exact opposite of what their fathers did.
2007-05-06 21:30:36 · answer #1 · answered by rdenig_male 7 · 3⤊ 0⤋
May be we should not look at only the wise part of Marcus Aurelius for the answer but look at the free will of Commodus who choose the path of trying to bring back the ancient glory of Rome and taking a step backwards or is it the failure of Marcus Aurelius as a father that hurt Commodus. Was Marcus Aurelius such an involved leader of Rome that he forgot or neglected his son? There is one other way I can think of is that Marcus Aurelius was such a success as a leader, a philosopher,a warrior that his son could not measure up to him and would be deemed a failure no matter what he did. No matter what Commodus did was put Rome back instead of forward and would eventually lead to dire consequences.
2007-05-07 02:25:28 · answer #2 · answered by Dave aka Spider Monkey 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
you have been watching Gladiator haven't you....
I do not agree that Commodus was a failure, and the way he was portrayed in that movie, which while an excellent movie, was not real close to the truth. especially since we do not know a whole lot about Commodus
2007-05-07 07:50:50 · answer #3 · answered by rbenne 4 · 0⤊ 1⤋