On Marcus Aurelius

 I used to have a couple of quotes by Marcus Aerwlius on my cabinet doors. I loved them a whole lot and wished that my children, who were being coaxed by every power known to man away from religiosity, might see without feeling anxiety toward virtue. I was able to find him among the heaps of quotations on the Pinterest App. 

I have since that time spent much time, as he did, perfecting myself to every degree at my hands, sometimes falling miserably short, but in my efforts was able to at least find a degree of value in being long suffering so much as to realize that at the heart of all his words there is one very simple message. It is as though it is one neon cross at the hilltop. It says without mistake: patience. 

All there is after that are words about affectation and affection, courtesy and setting things aright. But with that one stoic virtue all things seem to order themselves. Without the comical use of patience, without the erring use of patience, without the commonplace use of patience, none of these other abusive virtues would be born, and what is patience without them? Then patience is either evil or it is of God.