had derived advantages still more considerable. In him he saw the
example of a sovereign and statesman firm, self-controlled, modest,
faithful, and even tempered; a man who despised flattery and hated
meanness; who honoured the wise and distinguished the meritorious; who
was indifferent to contemptable trifles, and indefatigable in earnest
business; one, in short, "who had a perfect and invincible soul," who,
like Socrates, "was able both to abstain from and to enjoy those things
which many are too weak to abstain from and cannot enjoy without
excess." [67] Piety, serenity, sweetness, disregard of empty fame,
calmness, simplicity, patience, are virtues which he attributes to him
in another full-length portrait (vi. 30) which he concludes with the
words, "Imitate all this, that thou mayest have as good a conscience
when thy last hour comes as he had."

[Footnote 67: My quotations from Marcus Aurelius will be made (by
permission) from the forcible and admirably accurate translation of Mr.
Long. In thanking Mr. Long, I may be allowed to add that the English
reader will find in his version the best means of becoming acquainted
with the purest-and noblest book of antiquity.]

He concludes these reminiscenses of thankfulness with a summary of what
he owed to the gods. And for what does he thanks the gods? for being
wealthy, and noble, and an emperor? Nay, for no vulgar or dubious
blessings such as these, but for the guidance which trained him in
philosophy, and for the grace which kept him from sin. And here it is
that his genuine modesty comes out. As the excellent divine used to say
when he saw a criminal led past for execution, "There, but for the grace
of God, goes John Bradford," so, after thanking the gods for the
goodness of all his family and relatives, Aurelius says, "Further, I owe
it to the gods that I was not hurried into any offence against any of