friendship,(406) the careful gratitude with which, in a camp in Hungary, he recalled every moral obligation he could trace, even to the most obscure of his tutors,(407) his anxiety to avoid all pedantry and mannerism in his conduct,(408) and to repel every voluptuous imagination from his mind,(409) his deep sense of the obligation of purity,(410) his laborious efforts to correct a habit of drowsiness into which he had fallen, and his self-reproval when he had yielded to it,(411) become all, I think, inexpressibly touching when we remember that they were exhibited by one who was the supreme ruler of the civilised globe, and who was continually engaged in the direction of the most gigantic interests. But that which is especially remarkable in Marcus Aurelius is the complete absence of fanaticism in his philanthropy. Despotic monarchs sincerely anxious to improve mankind are naturally led to endeavour, by acts of legislation, to force society into the paths which they believe to be good, and such men, acting under such motives, have sometimes been the scourges of mankind. Philip II. and Isabella the Catholic inflicted more suffering in obedience to their consciences than Nero and Domitian in obedience to their lusts. But Marcus Aurelius steadily resisted the temptation. “Never hope,” he once wrote, “to realise Plato’s Republic. Let it be sufficient that you have in some slight degree ameliorated mankind, and do not think that amelioration a matter of small importance. Who can change the opinions of men? and without a change of sentiments what can you make but reluctant slaves and hypocrites?”(412) He promulgated many laws inspired by a spirit of the purest benevolence. He mitigated the gladiatorial shows. He treated with invariable deference the senate, which was the last bulwark of political freedom. He endowed many chairs of philosophy which were intended to diffuse knowledge and moral teaching through the people. He endeavoured by the example of his Court to correct the extravagances of luxury that were prevalent, and he exhibited in his own career a perfect model of an active and conscientious administrator; but he made no rash efforts to force the people by stringent laws out of the natural channel of their lives. Of the corruption of his subjects he was keenly sensible, and he bore it with a mournful but gentle patience. We may trace in this respect the milder spirit of those Greek teachers who had diverged from Stoicism, but it was especially from the Stoical doctrine that all vice springs from ignorance that he derived his rule of life, and this doctrine, to which he repeatedly recurred, imparted to all his judgments a sad but tender charity. “Men were made for men; correct them, then, or support them.”(413) “If they do ill, it is evidently in spite of themselves and through ignorance.”(414) “Correct them if you can; if not, remember that patience was given you to exercise it in their