In my first article I explained why Munger folded his investment partnership despite quadrupling the performance of the Dow in the 1962 to 1975 period.
In this article I shall discuss some of Munger's role models.
Charlie said: "I am a biography nut...I think you learn economics better if you make Adam Smith your friend...If you go through life making friends with the eminent dead who had the right ideas, I think it will work better for you in life and work better in education. It's way better than just giving the basic concepts."
Ben Franklin is Munger's main role model. But Charlie had other role models, one of which is ancient Rome's greatest writer, orator and lawyer who lived at the time of Caesar. Charlie explains: "After I came to share Cicero's political views, I fancied many times that I had been converted out of concern for my fellow man. But now I believe that a man seldom fully knows his own motives. Accordingly, I now think that what moved me, in substantial part, was my recognition that in a value system like Cicero's I would be pretty likely to rise. As it worked out I got more out of life than I deserved. And the thought patterns that seem to be rewarded in one's life are usually those which end up as part of one's most intense convictions. And so I come to like Cicero better and better as the years have rolled by."
To Cicero pride in a job well done is very constructive. It motivates good conduct in early life and you can make yourself happier when old. Cicero values wisdom more than brute strength and hence preferred age over youth. Like Charlie, Cicero believed in self-improvement: he commends Socrates for learning to play the fiddle late in life. Cicero counsels that the study of philosophy, is a life-long search for basic causes is and ideal activity, usually serviceable for old people all the way to the grave. Cicero argues against miserly conduct by the elderly rich: "Can anything be more senselessly absurd than that the nearer we are to our journey's end, we should still lay in more provision for it?" Early retirement is criticized by Cicero as virtually unthinkable: "no man should quit his post but at the command of...God himself."
Due to his emphasis on wisdom, he felt that if you live right, the inferior part of life is the early part. Cicero points out how silly it is to complain about reaching old age. According to him, the best a young person can hope for is to get old before he dies, and it is not fitting to complain about getting the best outcome.
Wealth and success make old age wonderful. In reverse, while Cicero argues that handling a low worldy outcome with the right morality and diligence is just as admirable as handling a high outcome, he concedes that abject poverty makes old age difficult. Cicero wrote: "The best Armour of Old Age is a well spent life preceding it; a Life employed in the Pursuit of useful Knowledge, in honourable Actions and the Practice of Virtue; in which he who labours to improve himself from his Youth, will in Age reap the happiest Fruits of them."
Ben Franklin lived a very long life, eminent to the end, and left behind a full record of an old age that was among the most constructive and happy ever lived. Buffett and Munger both continue in their roles with no plans to leave. They do so joyously and while providing good results for those who trust them patiently. Like Franklin, they communicate from a pulpit, built high from worldly success, telling others what they should think and how they should behave.
In this article I shall discuss some of Munger's role models.
Charlie said: "I am a biography nut...I think you learn economics better if you make Adam Smith your friend...If you go through life making friends with the eminent dead who had the right ideas, I think it will work better for you in life and work better in education. It's way better than just giving the basic concepts."
Ben Franklin is Munger's main role model. But Charlie had other role models, one of which is ancient Rome's greatest writer, orator and lawyer who lived at the time of Caesar. Charlie explains: "After I came to share Cicero's political views, I fancied many times that I had been converted out of concern for my fellow man. But now I believe that a man seldom fully knows his own motives. Accordingly, I now think that what moved me, in substantial part, was my recognition that in a value system like Cicero's I would be pretty likely to rise. As it worked out I got more out of life than I deserved. And the thought patterns that seem to be rewarded in one's life are usually those which end up as part of one's most intense convictions. And so I come to like Cicero better and better as the years have rolled by."
To Cicero pride in a job well done is very constructive. It motivates good conduct in early life and you can make yourself happier when old. Cicero values wisdom more than brute strength and hence preferred age over youth. Like Charlie, Cicero believed in self-improvement: he commends Socrates for learning to play the fiddle late in life. Cicero counsels that the study of philosophy, is a life-long search for basic causes is and ideal activity, usually serviceable for old people all the way to the grave. Cicero argues against miserly conduct by the elderly rich: "Can anything be more senselessly absurd than that the nearer we are to our journey's end, we should still lay in more provision for it?" Early retirement is criticized by Cicero as virtually unthinkable: "no man should quit his post but at the command of...God himself."
Due to his emphasis on wisdom, he felt that if you live right, the inferior part of life is the early part. Cicero points out how silly it is to complain about reaching old age. According to him, the best a young person can hope for is to get old before he dies, and it is not fitting to complain about getting the best outcome.
Wealth and success make old age wonderful. In reverse, while Cicero argues that handling a low worldy outcome with the right morality and diligence is just as admirable as handling a high outcome, he concedes that abject poverty makes old age difficult. Cicero wrote: "The best Armour of Old Age is a well spent life preceding it; a Life employed in the Pursuit of useful Knowledge, in honourable Actions and the Practice of Virtue; in which he who labours to improve himself from his Youth, will in Age reap the happiest Fruits of them."
Ben Franklin lived a very long life, eminent to the end, and left behind a full record of an old age that was among the most constructive and happy ever lived. Buffett and Munger both continue in their roles with no plans to leave. They do so joyously and while providing good results for those who trust them patiently. Like Franklin, they communicate from a pulpit, built high from worldly success, telling others what they should think and how they should behave.
