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The mildness of Marcus, which the rigid discipline of the Stoics was unable to eradicate, formed, at the same time, the most amiable, and the only defective part of his character. His excellent understanding was often deceived by the unsuspecting goodness of his heart. Artful men, who study the passions of princes and conceal their own, approached his person in the disguise of philosophic sanctity, and acquired riches and honors by affecting to despise them. [331] His excessive indulgence to his brother, [332] his wife, and his son, exceeded the bounds of private virtue, and became a public injury by the example and consequences of their vices.
[331]: See the complaints of Avidius Cassius, Historia Augusta, p. 45. These are, it is true, the complaints of faction; but even faction exaggerates, rather than invents. ↩︎