something approaching education.  Severus, to be sure, had trained him in all pursuits, bar none, that tended to inculcate virtue, whether physical or mental, so that even after he became emperor he went to teachers and studied philosophy most of the day.  He also took oil rubbings without water and rode horseback to a distance of seven hundred and fifty stades.  Moreover, he practiced swimming even in rough water.  In consequence of this, Antoninus was, as you might say, strong, but he paid no heed to culture, since he had never even heard the name of it.  Still, his language was not bad, nor did he lack judgment, but he showed in almost everything a keen appreciation and talked very readily.  For through his authority and recklessness and his habit of saying right out without reflection anything at all that occurred to him, and not being ashamed to air his thoughts, he often stumbled upon some felicitous expression. [But the same Antoninus made many mistakes through his headstrong opinions.  It was not enough for him to know everything:  he wanted to be the only one who knew anything.  It was not enough for him to have all power:  he would be the only one with any power.  Hence it was that he employed no counselor and was jealous of such men as knew something worth while.  He never loved a single person and he hated all those who excelled in anything; and most did he hate those whom he affected most to love.  Many of these he destroyed in some way or other.  Of course he had many men murdered openly, but others he would send to provinces not suited to them, fatal to their physical condition, having an unwholesome climate; thus, while pretending to honor them excessively, he quietly got rid of them, exposing such as he did not like to excessive heat or cold.  Hence, though he spared some in so far as not to put them to death, yet he subjected them to such hardships that the stain [Footnote:  This is very likely an incorrect translation of an incorrect reading.  The various editors of Dio have a few substitutes to propose, but as all the interpretations seem to me extremely lumbering I have turned the Ms. [Greek] chelidoysthai (taken as a passive) in a way that may be not quite beyond the bounds of possibility.  The noun [Greek] chelhist like the English “stain,” often passes from its original sense of “blemish” to that of the consequent “disgrace.”] of murder still rested on him.

The above describes him in general terms.

[Sidenote:  A.D. 213(?)] [Sidenote:—­12—­] Now we shall state what sort of person he showed himself in war. [Abgarus, king of the Osrhoeni, when he had once got control of the kindred tribes, inflicted the most outrageous treatment upon his superiors.  Nominally he was compelling them to change to Roman customs, but in fact he was making the most of his authority over them in an unjustifiable way.] He tricked the king of the Osrhoeni, Abgarus, inducing him to visit him as a friend, and then arrested and imprisoned him.  This left Osrhoene without a ruler and he subdued it.