Teach Them Early—When You Still Can

Dec 31, 2019

Cato the Younger serves as a compelling example of the challenges of teaching resilience and morality to children. The discussion emphasizes the importance of starting lessons early, before kids build defenses against guidance. Insights from Plutarch highlight how foundational lessons about right and wrong can shape character for a lifetime. By investing in early instruction, parents can help their children navigate the complexities of life, fostering personal growth alongside their parenting journey.

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ADVICE

Early Childhood Instruction

Teach children important lessons early, even if they seem too young.
Before they develop strong resistance and their habits solidify, instill values while they're receptive.

ANECDOTE

Cato's Resistance and Learning

Cato the Younger resisted all instruction and demanded explanations for everything.
However, the lessons he learned early in life about duty and morality stuck with him, even against bribes and threats.

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Cato the Younger was not an easy man to get to do something. If he felt it went against his conscience or that it was illogical, you’d have an easier time convincing a fish to climb a tree. That’s just how he was. All his life.

So, as you can imagine, Cato was not an easy student. He resisted anyone and everyone who tried to tell him what to do. Plutarch, one of his biographers, observed that “to learn is simply to allow something to be done to you and to be quickly persuaded is natural for those who are less able to offer resistance.” This is why we start instructing our kids in the important things so early, even when it seems like they are way too young. Because if we wait, they’ll be able to easily fight us off and resist the lessons they will need in life.

Cato was an obstinate student, Plutarch tells us—“in each case he demanded the reason and wanted to know the why and wherefore.” But this resistance was nothing compared to what Julius Caesar and Pompey faced when they tried to bowl Cato over as an adult, when they tried to show him how the world really worked. It was nothing compared to what other corrupt and dishonest politicians experienced when they tried to show Cato what was in his “best interest.”

While Cato had been a resistant learner, what his teachers were able to get up and over his defenses really stuck. Those lessons about right and wrong, about doing your duty, about the history of Rome—those lessons were etched into steel. And no one was ever able to teach him otherwise...even with the threat of death or a bribe of many dollars.

We have to teach our kids early. We have to push past their reservations. Of course they would rather play video games. Of course it’s more fun to goof off. But now is the time. Before they can fight us off with their full determination. Before the cement is completely dry.

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