It is to the credit of Marcus Aurelius that even in this he avoided to a great extent the faults of his virtues; it is the touch of emotion in his writings and in those of the other later Stoics of the Empire which gives them their charm beyond the earlier members of the school. We have many indications that his soul was open to the ἀπορροὴ τοῦ κάλλους, the inflow of beauty from sensible things, while his correspondence with Fronto shows that his nature was affectionate. Throughout the Meditations also we see the reflection of the constant struggle which he had with his own nature. One who did not feel deeply would never have insisted so much on the necessity for control of the feelings. It is a fallacy to think that the Stoic is necessarily dead to humanity. In a sense, and in theory at least, he is the truest lover of man and the human. His sole vocation in life is the good of the whole; the _caritas generis humani_ (love for his fellow-men), if not the central point of their system and far from the Christian ideal of charity in beauty and efficacy, yet was present and active in them. The Stoic must check his feelings but not suppress them. It suffices that the barrier of the will be raised and strengthened day by day and then the feelings may surge up behind it, ready for right use; but as servants not as masters. Thus the paradox is true that those have often the strongest emotions whose emotions are most in check. On his way back from the East the Emperor passed through Athens. There he found much that attracted him and much that repelled. The schools of philosophy were his chief interest, but he liked not their sophisms and disputations, and the irresponsibility which seemed irreverent towards the true philosophy whose end was life. When he thinks of the dialecticians of his day he thanks the gods that he did not make more proficiency in rhetoric, poetry, and the other studies “in which I should perhaps have been completely engaged, if I had seen that I was making progress in them.” He thinks with gratitude of Rusticus as having taught him “not to be led astray to sophistic emulation, nor to writing on speculative matters, nor to delivering little hortatory orations, nor to showing myself off as a man who practises much discipline or does benevolent acts in order to make a display; and to abstain from rhetoric and fine-writing.” “_Quid tibi de generibus et speciebus?_” said à Kempis. But though the spirit of the schools was repugnant to his sincerity, yet, true to his leading principle of fostering culture, he founded several chairs in what we may call the University of Athens.