Page:The Emperor Marcus Antoninus - His Conversation with Himself.djvu/61

 Rh of Health. Nay he went somewhat farther, and was of Socrates and Aristippus's Opinion, that the Exercise of the Limbs was not unserviceable to Virtue it self. Before his Constitution was weaken'd with Fatiguing and constant Business, he used Hunting, and would frequently ride singly at the biggest Wild Boars, and attack them with great Dexterity and Courage. But his Passion for Philosophy, got the Ascendant, and made him cool in other Diversions. This Passion seiz'd him so strongly in his very infancy, that when he was but twelve Years Old, he put on the Habit of the Stoick Philosophers, practis'd their Austerities, and lay upon the Ground with nothing but his Cloak under him. And his Mother had all the Difficulty imaginable, to persuade him to lie upon a boarded Bed, tho' it had nothing but a few Skins thrown over it. Nature seem'd to have made him on purpose to restore and encourage that Philosophy, which had always been most firm to the Interest of Virtue, For even in his Childhood the Equality and Gravity of his Temper was such, that neither Pleasure nor Uneasiness could ever make him so much as change Countenance. But then this Gravity having no mixture of Moroseness, was not at all troublesome to his Friends, nor to those Rh