From his earliest days as a Jesuit student, Baron Pierre de Coubertin admired the society created by the ancient Greeks.  Across the course of his life, his appreciation for Hellenism, the philosophy of life espoused by the ancients only increased.  He admired the unique ways in which the Hellenes blended physical and mental education in the gymnasium, of course, but overall, he felt their social ethos perfectly balanced individual freedom and responsibility for the greater good. That point was reflected in this passage from his open letter “To My Hellenic Friends,” which he wrote in April of 1934.

“Only Hellenism could understand that balance had to be created on three levels, laboring to bring them into harmony by placing the intimate and mysterious call of the conscience on one level, the imperatives of communal duty on another, and the prolific freedom of individual instinct on the third.”