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THE DECLINE AND FALL
CHAP. III.
_____severer and more laborious kind[1]. It was the well-earned harvest of many a learned conference, of many a patient lecture, and many a midnight lucubration. At the age of twelve years he embraced the rigid system of the stoics, which taught him to submit his body to his mind, his passions to his reason ; to consider virtue as the only good, vice as the only evil, all things external as things indifferent[2]. His meditations, composed in the tumult of a camp, are still extant ; and he even condescended to give lessons of philosophy, in a more public manner than was perhaps consistent with the modesty of a sage, or the dignity of an emperor[3]. But his life was the noblest commentary on the precepts of Zeno. He was severe to himself, indulgent to the imperfection of others, just and beneficent to all mankind. He regretted that Avidius Cassius, who excited a rebellion in Syria, had disappointed him, by a voluntary death, of the pleasure of converting an enemy into a friend; and he justified the sincerity of that sentiment, by moderating the zeal of the senate against the adherents of the traitor[4]. War he detested, as the disgrace and calamity of human nature ; but when the necessity of a just defence called upon him to take up arms, he readily exposed his person to eight winter campaigns on the frozen banks of the Danube, the severity of which was at last fatal to the weakness of his constitution. His memory was revered
_____severer and more laborious kind[1]. It was the well-earned harvest of many a learned conference, of many a patient lecture, and many a midnight lucubration. At the age of twelve years he embraced the rigid system of the stoics, which taught him to submit his body to his mind, his passions to his reason ; to consider virtue as the only good, vice as the only evil, all things external as things indifferent[2]. His meditations, composed in the tumult of a camp, are still extant ; and he even condescended to give lessons of philosophy, in a more public manner than was perhaps consistent with the modesty of a sage, or the dignity of an emperor[3]. But his life was the noblest commentary on the precepts of Zeno. He was severe to himself, indulgent to the imperfection of others, just and beneficent to all mankind. He regretted that Avidius Cassius, who excited a rebellion in Syria, had disappointed him, by a voluntary death, of the pleasure of converting an enemy into a friend; and he justified the sincerity of that sentiment, by moderating the zeal of the senate against the adherents of the traitor[4]. War he detested, as the disgrace and calamity of human nature ; but when the necessity of a just defence called upon him to take up arms, he readily exposed his person to eight winter campaigns on the frozen banks of the Danube, the severity of which was at last fatal to the weakness of his constitution. His memory was revered
- ↑ The enemies of Marcus charged him with hypocrisy, and with a want of that simplicity which distinguished Pius, and even Verus. Hist. Aug. 6. 34. This suspicion, unjust as it was, may serve to account for the superior applause bestowed upon personal qualifications, in preference to the social virtues. Even Marcus Antoninus has been called a hypocrite ; but the wildest scepticism never insinuated that Caesar might possibly be a coward, or Tully a fool. Wit and valour are qualifications more easily ascertained than humanity or the love of justice.
- ↑ Tacitus has characterised, in a few words, the principles of the portico: Doctores sapientiae secutus est, qui sola bona quae honesta, mala tantum quae turpia ; potentiam, nobilitatem, caeteraque extra animum, neque bonis neque malis adnumerant. Tacit. Hist. iv. 5.
- ↑ Before he went on the second expedition against the Germans, he read lectures of philosophy to the Roman people, during three days. He had already done the same in the cities of Greece and Asia. Hist. August, in Cassio, c. 3.
- ↑ Dion, 1. Ixxi. p. 1190. Hist. August, in Avid. Cassio.
