Better than Trajan
Trajan was deferential to the Senate, generous to the people, and firm but caring with the army. He set up the "alimenta" — the state lending to Italian landowners at low interest, the interest used to support poor children, a rare piece of institutionalized social welfare in the ancient world. He authorized the provincial governor Pliny, who wrote to ask how to handle Christians, replying that they were not to be sought out and anonymous accusations were not to be trusted — in an age of strong violent inertia, that restraint is itself a footnote to "goodness." Generations of Romans held him up as the standard, not because he conquered the most, but because he used power with the most measure.