Plutarch's Morals
learning into strife; or on the judgement-seat, for that adds insolence
to power; or in teaching, for that produces dejection and hatred of
learning: or in prosperity, for that increases envy; or in adversity,
for that deprives people of compassion, when they are peevish and run
counter to those who condole with them, like Priam,
"A murrain on you, worthless wretches all,
Have you no griefs at home, that here you come
To sympathize with me?"[703]
Good temper on the other hand is useful in some circumstances, adorns
and sweetens others, and gets the better of all peevishness and anger by
its gentleness. Thus Euclides,[704] when his brother said to him in a
dispute between them, "May I perish, if I don't have my revenge on you!"
replied, "May I perish, if I don't persuade you!" and so at once turned
and changed him. And Polemo, when a man reviled him who was fond of
precious stones and quite crazy for costly seal-rings, made no answer,
but bestowed all his attention on one of his seal-rings, and eyed it
closely; and he being delighted said, "Do not look at it so, Polemo, but
in the light of the sun, and it will appear to you more beautiful." And
Aristippus, when there was anger between him and AEschines, and somebody
said, "O Aristippus, where is now your friendship?" replied, "It is
asleep, but I will wake it up," and went to AEschines, and said to him,
"Do I seem to you so utterly unfortunate and incurable as to be unworthy
of any consideration?" And AEschines replied, "It is not at all wonderful
that you, being naturally superior to me in all things, should have been
first to detect in this matter too what was needful."
"For not a woman only, but young child
Tickling the bristly boar with tender hand,
Will lay him prostrate sooner than an athlete."
But we that tame wild beasts and make them gentle, and carry in our arms
young wolves and lions' whelps, inconsistently repel our children and
friends and acquaintances in our rage, and let loose our temper like
some wild beast on our servants and fellow-citizens, speciously trying
to disguise it not rightly under the name of hatred of evil, but it is,
I suppose, as with the other passions and diseases of the soul, we
cannot get rid of any of them by calling one prudence, and another
liberality, and another piety.
Sec. XV. And yet, as Zeno said the seed was a mixture and compound drawn
from all the faculties of the soul, so anger seems a universal seed from
all the passions. For it is drawn from pain and pleasure and
haughtiness, and from envy it gets its property of malignity--and it is
even worse than envy,[705] for it does not mind its own suffering if it
can only implicate another in misery--and the most unlovely kind of
desire is innate in it, namely the appetite for injuring another. So
when we go to the houses of spendthrifts we hear a flute-playing girl
early in the morning, and see "the dregs of wine," as one said, and
fragments of garlands, and the servants at the doors reeking of
yesterday's debauch; but for tokens of savage and peevish masters these
you will see by the faces, and marks, and manacles of their servants:
for in the house of an angry man
"The only music ever heard is wailing,"
stewards being beaten within, and maids tortured, so that the spectators
even in their jollity and pleasure pity these victims of passion.
Sec. XVI. Moreover those to whom it happens through their genuine hatred of
what is bad to be frequently overtaken by anger, can abate its excess
and acerbity by giving up their excessive confidence in their intimates.
For nothing swells the anger more, than when a good man is detected of
villainy, or one who we thought loved us falls out and jangles with us.
As for my own disposition, you know of course how mightily it inclines
to goodwill and belief in mankind. As then people walking on empty
space,[706] the more confidently I believe in anybody's affection, the
more sorrow and distress do I feel if my estimate is a mistaken one. And
indeed I could never divest myself of my ardour and zeal in affection,
but as to trusting people I could perhaps use Plato's caution as a curb.
For he said he so praised Helicon the mathematician, because he was by
nature a changeable animal, but that he was afraid of those that were
well educated in the city, lest, being human beings and the seed of
human beings, they should reveal by some trait or other the weakness of
human nature. But Sophocles' line,
"Trace out most human acts, you'll find them base,"
seems to trample on human nature and lower its merits too much. Still
such a peevish and condemnatory verdict as this has a tendency to make
people milder in their rage, for it is the sudden and unexpected that
makes people go distracted. And we ought, as Panaetius somewhere said, to
imitate Anaxagoras, and as he said at the death of his son, "I knew that
I had begotten a mortal," so ought every one of us to use the following
kind of language in those contretemps that stir up our anger, "I knew
that the slave I bought was not a philosopher," "I knew that the friend
I had was not perfect," "I knew that my wife was but a woman." And if
anyone would also constantly put to himself that question of Plato, "Am
I myself all I should be?" and look at home instead of abroad, and curb
his propensity to censoriousness, he would not be so keen to detect evil
in others, for he would see that he stood in need of much allowance
himself. But now each of us, when angry and punishing, quote the words
of Aristides and Cato, "Do not steal, Do not tell lies," and "Why are
you lazy?" And, what is most disgraceful of all, we blame angry people
when we are angry ourselves, and chastise in temper faults that were
committed in temper, unlike the doctors who
"With bitter physic purge the bitter bile,"
for we rather increase and aggravate the disease. Whenever then I busy
myself with such considerations as these, I try also to curtail my
curiosity. For to scrutinize and pry into everything too minutely, and
to overhaul every business of a servant, or action of a friend, or
pastime of a son, or whisper of a wife, produces frequent, indeed daily,
fits of anger, caused entirely by peevishness and harshness of
character. Euripides says that the Deity
"In great things intervenes, but small things leaves
To fortune;"[707]
but I am of opinion that a prudent man should commit nothing to fortune,
nor neglect anything, but should put some things in his wife's hands to
manage, others in the hands of his servants, others in the hands of his
friends, (as a governor has his stewards, and financiers, and
controllers), while he himself superintends the most important and
weighty matters. For as small writing strains the eyes, so small matters
even more strain and bother people, and stir up their anger, which
carries this evil habit to greater matters. Above all I thought that
saying of Empedocles, "Fast from evil,"[708] a great and divine one, and
I approved of those promises and vows as not ungraceful or
unphilosophical, to abstain for a year from wine and Venus, honouring
the deity by continence, or for a stated time to give up lying, taking
great heed to ourselves to be truthful always whether in play or
earnest. With these I compared my own vow, as no less pleasing to the
gods and holy, first to abstain from anger for a few days, like spending
days without drunkenness or even without wine at all, offering as it
were wineless offerings of honey.[709] Then I tried for a month or two,
and so in time made some progress in forbearance by earnest resolve, and
by keeping myself courteous and without anger and using fair language,
purifying myself from evil words and absurd actions, and from passion
which for a little unlovely pleasure pays us with great mental
disturbance and the bitterest repentance. In consequence of all this my
experience, and the assistance of the deity, has made me form the view,
that courtesy and gentleness and kindliness are not so agreeable, and
pleasant, and delightful, to any of those we live with as to ourselves,
that have those qualities.[710]
[676] Homer, "Iliad," xxii. 373.
[677] Alluded to again "On the tranquillity of the
mind," Sec. i.
[678] The allusion is to Homer's "Odyssey," xx. 23.
[679] Reading [Greek: ex heautou] with Reiske.
[680] Euripides, "Orestes," 72.
[681] Euripides, "Orestes," 99.
[682] Fragment 361.
[683] Homer, "Iliad," xvii. 591.
[684] The reading of the MSS. is [Greek: auton].
[685] Lines of Callimachus. [Greek: phlien] is the
admirable emendation of Salmasius.
[686] Sophocles, "Thamyras," Fragm. 232.
[687] "Iliad," v. 214-216.
[688] Reading [Greek: eniois], as Wyttenbach suggests.
[689] Aeschylus, "Prometheus," 574, 575.
[690] It will be seen I adopt the reading and
punctuation of Xylander.
[691] This is the reading of Reiske and Duebner.
[692] That is _mild_. Zeus is so called, Pausanias, i.
37; ii. 9, 20.
[693] That is, _fierce_, _furious_. It will be seen I
adopt the suggestion of Reiske.
[694] Literally "is silent about." It is like the saying
about Von Moltke that he can be silent in six or seven
languages.
[695] Adopting Reiske's reading.
[696] Compare Pausanias, iv. 8.
[697] Duebner puts this sentence in brackets.
[698] Sophocles, "Antigone," 563, 564.
[699] Homer, "Iliad," xix. 138.
[700] Homer, "Odyssey," xx. 392.
[701] Or strigils.
[702] Anticyra was famous for its hellebore, which was
prescribed in cases of madness. See Horace, "Satires,"
ii. 3. 82, 83.
[703] Homer, "Iliad," xxiv. 239, 240.
[704] A philosopher of Megara, and disciple of Socrates.
Compare our author, "De Fraterno Amore," Sec. xviii.
[705] So Reiske. Duebner reads [Greek: phobou]. The MSS.
have [Greek: phonou], which Wyttenbach retains, but is
evidently not quite satisfied with the text. Can [Greek:
phthonou]--[Greek: heteron] be an account of [Greek:
epichairekakia]?
[706] Up in the clouds. Cf. [Greek: aerobateo].
[707] Horace, remembering these lines no doubt, says "De
Arte Poetica," 191, 192,
"Nec deus intersit nisi dignus vindice nodus Inciderit."
[708] It is quite likely that the delicious poet Robert
Herrick borrowed hence his "To starve thy sin not bin,
That is to keep thy Lent." For we know he was a student
of the "Moralia" when at the University of Cambridge.
[709] See AEschylus, "Eumenides," 107. Sophocles,
"Oedipus Colonaeus," 481. See also our author's "De
Sanitate Praecepta," Sec. xix.
[710] Jeremy Taylor has closely imitated parts of this
Dialogue in his "Holy Living," chapter iv. sect. viii.,
"Twelve remedies against anger, by way of exercise,"
"Thirteen remedies against anger, by way of
consideration." Such a storehouse did he make of the
"Moralia."
ON CONTENTEDNESS OF MIND.[711]
PLUTARCH SENDS GREETING TO PACCIUS.
Sec. I. It was late when I received your letter, asking me to write to you
something on contentedness of mind, and on those things in the Timaeus
that require an accurate explanation. And it so fell out that at that
very time our friend Eros was obliged to set sail at once for Rome,
having received a letter from the excellent Fundanus, urging haste
according to his wont. And not having as much time as I could have
wished to meet your request, and yet not thinking for one moment of
letting my messenger go to you entirely empty-handed, I copied out the
notes that I had chanced to make on contentedness of mind. For I thought