Commodus (if it was for him that he thus acted) was, without doubt, little touched by this good paternal rhetoric. One of the maxims of the excellent emperor was, that the wicked are unhappy, that one is only wicked in spite of himself, and through ignorance. He pitied those who were not like himself: he did not believe that he had the right to obtrude himself upon them. He well understood the baseness of men; but he did not avow it. This willing blindness is the defect of choice spirits. The world not being all that they could wish, they lie to themselves in order not to see it as it is. From thence arises an expediency in their judgments. In Marcus Aurelius, this expediency sometimes provokes us a little. If we wished to believe him, his instructors, several of whom were men of mediocrity, were, without exception, superior men. One would say that every one near him had been virtuous. This is carried to such a point, that one is forced to ask if the brother for whom he pronounces such a grand eulogy in his thanks to the gods was not his adopted brother, Lucius Verus. It is certain that the good emperor was capable of strong illusions when he undertook to lend to others his own virtues. This quality, expressed as an ancient opinion, especially by the pen of the Emperor Julian, caused him to commit an enormous error, which was that of not disinheriting Commodus. This is one of those things which it is easy to say at a distance, when there are no obstacles present, and when one reasons without facts. It is forgotten at first that the emperors, who, after Nerva, made adoption so fruitful a political system, had no sons. Adoption, with the exheredation of the son or grandson, occurred in the first century of the empire without good results. Marcus Aurelius was evidently from principle in favor of direct inheritance, in which he saw the advantage of the prevention of competition. After the birth of Commodus, in 161, he presented him alone to the people, although he had a twin-brother: he frequently took him in his arms and renewed this act, which was a sort of proclamation. In 166 Lucius Verus demanded that the two sons of Marcus, Commodus and Annius Verus, should be made Cæsars. In 172 Commodus shared with his father the title of Germanicus. In 173, after the repression of the revolt of Avidius, the Senate, in order to recognize in some way the family disinterestedness which Marcus Aurelius had shown, demanded by acclamation the empire and the tribunitial power for Commodus.