[Footnote 91: The Athenian studies of Boethius are doubtful,
(Baronius, A.D. 510, No. 3, from a spurious tract, De Disciplina
Scholarum,) and the term of eighteen years is doubtless too long:
but the simple fact of a visit to Athens is justified by much
internal evidence, (Brucker, Hist. Crit. Philosoph. tom. iii. p.
524 - 527,) and by an expression (though vague and ambiguous) of
his friend Cassiodorus, (Var. i. 45,) "longe positas Athenas
intrioisti."]