Willpower Wars: How a 5th-Century Poem Predicted Our Battle With Addiction

An interview with Michael Fontaine

Michael Fontaine is Professor of Classics at Cornell University, specializing in Latin literature from antiquity through the Enlightenment. His acclaimed books with Princeton University Press explore topics ranging from ancient breakup poetry to willpower and bullying, while upcoming projects examine free speech through the lens of Plato, Plutarch, and Enlightenment thinkers. Beyond academia, he teaches global executives leadership strategies drawn from ancient Rome and the effective use of humor—a subject that once landed him a parody on Saturday Night Live. A Thomas Szasz Award winner for civil liberties advocacy and (in lighter moments) a champion pizza eater, he brings scholarly rigor and wit to both the classroom and public discourse. His works include How to Tell a Joke: An Ancient Guide to the Art of Humor and How to Get Over a Breakup: An Ancient Guide to Moving On. His forthcoming title is How to Have Willpower: An Ancient Guide to Not Giving In (Aug 12, 2025 Princeton University Press).

PAC is excited to announce that Prof. Fontaine has been added to the roster of speakers at our forthcoming virtual event Democracy and Tyranny Sat July 26 at 1 pm EDT! He will be speaking on Plutarch on Defeating Tyranny: Effective Resistance in Public and Private Spheres,

Your work bridges ancient wisdom (Plutarch, Prudentius, Plato) and modern challenges like free speech and willpower.

If you could gift one ancient text to every policymaker or CEO today, which would it be—and what’s the one lesson you hope they’d take from it?

Oh, definitely Plato’s Apology of Socrates. That’s the text I have coming out under the title How to Speak Freely—next year, hopefully—and it’s the one classic text everyone, everyone, should read.: The Apology (or better, The Apologia) is allegedly the defense speech Socrates made while on trial for his life. He’d been accused of denying the state’s gods and brainwashing the youth. He was found guilty and put to death for it. The thing is, the text is not a trial transcript. It’s historical fiction, a spiritual rehearing of the case. The trial is over; the man is dead; now the moral reckoning can begin.

And it’s not just a historical document. Like a Greek tragedy, it’s meant to be a template we can apply to other times and places—like right now. It reminds us that the only alternative to letting people speak up on controversial topics is censoring them. And that’s a recipe for disaster, since as John Stuart Mill remarked, “All silencing of discussion is an assumption of infallibility.” As Socrates likens himself to the city’s gadfly—stinging complacency awake—he shows us why dissent is vital to institutional health, especially when it comes to sacred cows and taboo topics. He insists justice must rest on reasoned argument rather than emotion or mob prejudice—something that resonates strongly amid today’s everyday moral panics and trial by public opinion.

So I hope that any authority figure who reads the book—and who might be tempted to forbid dissent on “settled” or offensive questions, no matter how crazy they may seem—will ponder Plato’s text and realize that if you’re in a position of power, dissent is not disloyalty. Rather than suppressing controversial voices, engage them. True authority stands stronger when it welcomes challenge.

You teach executives how to use humor effectively—yet you’ve also written about the risks of jesting in tense climates (e.g., Plutarch’s ‘survival guide’ to avoid cancellation).

Where’s the line between humor that unites and humor that divides? Can you share an example from history or your own experience?

Quintilian makes this point best: “Humor is risky because “wit” (ridere) is so close to “twit” (deridere). It really is a fine line, isn’t it? And the biggest risk is when you decide to tease someone in front of other people. You’ll think you’re hilarious, a genius, and so may others. Meanwhile, the butt of your joke is seething in silence and already plotting revenge.

It's easy to cite a joke that unites us. Back in 1776, when Benjamin Franklin was about to sign the Declaration of Independence—which is a nice name for what was really a Declaration of Treason—he picked up the quill pen, looked nervously at the other men in the room, and quipped,

“Gentlemen! We must all hang together! Or, I assure you, we will all hang separately.”

That joke is genius because it promotes empathy. Franklin signaled that he was just as scared as anyone, and that creates shared tension and camaraderie. It actually strengthens the group.

But jokes that promote empathy are very hard to find or tell. Far more common are jokes that divide people. I can give you a good concrete example of what I mean. Back in 2011 there was a White House dinner, and at it then-President Obama roasted Donald Trump as he sat in the audience. The jokes were good for a momentary laugh, but they were scathing and destroyed Trump’s dignity. I’m not sure what Obama was thinking, but some see a direct connection between that moment and Trump’s subsequent determination to undo Obama’s legacy when he was elected president himself. (Cicero made this exact mistake in the Philippics, where he twitted Mark Antony so hard that Antony later had him whacked.)

The thing to realize is that this risk is inherent in all jokes because as every ancient theorist points out, jokes are inherently demeaning. So even as you seek to unite a group of people, be very careful that you’re not doing it at the expense of anyone who could ever find out about it.

When in doubt, you’re better off sticking to corny jokes—and that’s exactly why leaders love them.

Tell us about How to Have WIllpower: An Ancient Guide to Not Giving In.

I can best answer that by putting two questions back to you and to readers:

How do you feel when a smiling cashier flips an iPad screen toward you and offers you the option of adding a 25 or 30 percent tip to your bill?

And if you were given a piece of paper and asked to illustrate willpower and addiction, what would you draw?

How to Have Willpower (my fifth entry in the Ancient Wisdom series) addresses both these scenarios. It brings together two meditations on resisting external pressure and internal appetites, and from different perspectives. The first is pagan, Greek, and by Plutarch. The other is Christian, Latin, and by a late Spanish poet and civil administrator named Prudentius.

Plutarch aims to help us grow a backbone, stop being a pushover, and start saying no to improper or inappropriate requests. Prudentius aims to help us resist self-destructive tendencies and temptations. And while Plutarch’s advice comes in the form of a straightforward, step-by-step, self-help essay, Prudentius’s advice is encoded in a thrilling allegory of inner conflict modeled on Virgil’s Aeneid. Let me say more about that.

Titled Psychomachia (“Armageddon in Mind”), the poem stages an epic struggle between avatars of willpower—called “Virtues”—and our inner demons—“Vices”—in an action-packed, cinematic battle. The awesome thing is that because abstract nouns are grammatically feminine in Latin, all the combatants are sword‑swinging warrior women. In vivid scenes of graphic violence, the Virtues and Vices face off in single combats to do battle deep in the recesses of our mind—no joke, it’s basically Mortal Kombat in dactylic hexameter! And one by one, the Virtues slay the Vices and crown each victory with a speech that seamlessly combines episodes and ideas from Rome’s pagan and Christian pasts.

Your translations of Prudentius and Plutarch frame willpower as a battle against temptation—a theme that feels especially relevant in our age of digital distractions and instant gratification.

If these ancient thinkers were alive today, what modern vice do you think would shock them the most, and how might they advise us to resist it?

At the risk of getting hate mail, I’d say gluttony. Even the word sounds quaint today, and it’s rarely thought of as a vice. But with sugar cheap and portions huge, it can take an enormous effort of the will to stop eating and break a “food addiction.” Food was scarce and tasted terrible in antiquity, which is why neither Prudentius nor Plutarch even mention it. Obesity wasn’t a thing. Prudentius does, however, profile a vice called Luxuria—the one word simultaneously means “Indulgence” and “Luxury” and “Addiction”—and he makes clear that the best strategy to combat it is temperance. Not abstinence, not prohibition, but an appeal to one’s dignity and internal moderation.

But of course you’re right that digital distractions—smartphones, clicks, likes, retweets, moral panics, porn—are the great temptation of our times. Ironically, they also show us that addiction resides in the person, not the substance. As I explain in the introduction, this is exactly the ancient view: that vice is stupidity, a stupid choice, not a sin caused by demons or witches or a disease caused by faulty genes or chemical imbalances in the brain, or even a disease caused by chemicals in foods. And if that’s right, then the ancient advice is every bit as good today as it was back then.

How do Prudentius and Plutarch's strategies differ from today's 'self-help' advice? Is their approach more sustainable, or does it rely on assumptions about human nature that no longer hold?

As I’ve noted, Plutarch’s essay reads like something that was published just this year. It’s a frank discussion of the problem, the foreseeable consequences it leads to, and a series of graduated steps you can work through to gain strength. So on that score, virtually nothing has changed. Unlike many modern authors he doesn’t invoke neurological models, but his incremental approach to progress fits well with contemporary advice that habits are stable, scalable, and fatigue-resistant.

Prudentius’s advice, as I’ve also noted, is totally different. If you can imagine a video game called Mortal Kombat: Slay Your Demons!, that’s what it looks like. The advice is all there and it’s sound, but you really have to think about what he’s saying.

Yet both authors offer a very sustainable approach—in fact, I’d say, give human nature they offer the only time-tested, surefire approach to coping with internal and external pressures. Plutarch makes the crucial point that willpower turns into habit, and once it does, you don’t need willpower anymore. For example, for me, willpower is about squeezing out the last rep or sprinting to the finish when my lungs are on fire. It’s not about just going to the gym or skipping dessert if I’m not hungry, since those are things I’ve long since habituated and they come easily to me. Of course, it wasn’t always that way. It’s like flossing. You just do it.

Prudentius makes the arresting point that vice is “congenital” – not a biological disease, but It’s something we’re born with all the same. It’s not something we can get rid of once and for all the way we can cure polio. Like maintaining your weight, it’s a lifelong struggle—and, he makes clear, it really is a struggle, a beast-mode effort you’ll have to grit your teeth and commit to. That’s why his poem so readily brings to mind a few great aphorisms of German philosophy, such as Nietzsche’s famous quip: "What is the strongest cure? Victory." It’s also why reading his poem alongside Plutarch’s essay is so rewarding.

What’s your favorite quote from these essays?

The most arresting moment in Prudentius’ poem appears in a contemptuous speech that Pride (one of the Vices—we’d call it Narcissistic Personality Disorder today) makes as she surveys the battlefield of Virtues. It’s the final sentences in bold below. “Look at these creatures,” she shouts, with a harrumph,

Pfft! You ridiculous rabble. On leaving the womb, we [Vices] embrace a person tight in our arms, its body still warm from its mother. Into the limbs of this newborn babe we sprinkle our powers’ drive, and take over its growing bones! There are no exceptions. Where in all this is there room for you [Virtues], seeing that meanwhile our dominions have grown as one with the growth of our minions? They are congenital, joined at the hip! We’ve been sharing birthdays, maturing, and coming of age—we, the house and the master—together ever since the new creature escaped his Edenic confinement, running away from the zone and stepping out into the real world. That is when ‘venerable’ Adam adopted his garments of leather; had he not heeded what we recommend, to this day he’d be naked!

As I comment in a footnote, “A remarkable reading of the Expulsion from Eden. In Pride’s view, Adam has been (as we say today) ‘redpilled.’” In the spirit of the Enlightenment, God’s creation grew up, wised up, and had the guts to think for himself. It reminds me of a quip by the late, great Thomas Szasz:

“The proverb warns that, "You should not bite the hand that feeds you." But maybe you should, if it prevents you from feeding yourself.”

When you reflect that Prudentius was a devout Christian, it’s all the more remarkable he let himself write these words.

What question would you like to leave us to think about?

I’d like to ask readers to reflect on the role “faith” plays in coping with temptation and addiction. Every form of willpower, says Prudentius, is downstream of faith; that’s the bedrock value. Of course, he’s a Christian, so he primarily means faith in God. But that’s unquestionably not all he means.

In secular terms, faith underlies every endeavor we work toward. Say you want to lose 50 pounds or quit drinking. The first step is that you must, must, must believe that you can do it. That your body isn’t different from anyone else’s. That it will change and develop under the same forces and privations that everyone else’s does.

As I highlight in the introduction to the book, Alcoholics Anonymous agrees with this exact point. Once you admit you have a problem, they say, the next step is to “believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.” That power doesn’t have to be God. But you must believe that recovery is possible if you want to improve.

Whether you’re a believer or not, would you agree that progress begins with belief? What kind of “faith” do you rely on when facing your biggest personal challenges—and how could framing it more intentionally help you move forward?