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Seekers after God by Frederic William Farrar
page 221 of 279 (79%)
his manly years.

And what had he learnt?--learnt heartily to admire, and (_we_ may say)
learnt to practise also? A sketch of his first book will show us. What
he had gained from his immediate parents we have seen already, and we
will make a brief abstract of his other obligations.

From "his governor"--to which of his teachers this name applies we are
not sure--he had learnt to avoid factions at the races, to work hard,
and to avoid listening to slander; from Diognetus, to despise frivolous
superstitions, and to practise self-denial; from Apollonius, undeviating
steadiness of purpose, endurance of misfortune, and the reception of
favours without being humbled by them; from Sextus of Chaeronea (a
grandson of the celebrated Plutarch), tolerance of the ignorant, gravity
without affectation, and benevolence of heart; from Alexander, delicacy
in correcting others; from Severus, "a disposition to do good, and to
give to others readily, and to cherish good hope, and, to believe that I
am beloved of my friends;" from Maximus, "sweetness and dignity, and to
do what was set before me without complaining;" from Alexander the
Platonic, "_not frequently to say to any one, nor to write in a letter,
that I have no leisure_; nor continually to excuse the neglect of
ordinary duties by alleging urgent occupations."

To one or two others his obligations were still more characteristic and
important. From Rusticus, for instance, an excellent and able man, whose
advice for years he was accustomed to respect, he had learnt to despise
sophistry and display, to write with simplicity, to be easily pacified,
to be accurate, and--an inestimable benefit this, and one which tinged
the colour of his whole life--to become acquainted with the _Discourses_
of Epictetus. And from his adoptive father, the great Antoninus Pius, he
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