But Xerxes dealt blows and marks of his displeasure to the sea itself,
and sent his letters to the mountain in the style ensuing: “O thou
wretched Athos, whose top now reaches to the skies, I charge thee, put
not in the way of my works stones too big and difficult to be wrought.
If thou do, I will cut thee into pieces, and cast thee into the sea.”
For anger hath many terrible effects, and many also that are
ridiculous; and therefore of all passions, this of anger is most hated
and most contemned, and it is good to consider it in both respects.
6. I therefore, whether rightly or not I know not, began this cure
with learning the nature of anger by beholding it in other men, as the
Lacedaemonians learned what drunkenness was by seeing it in the Helots.
And, in the first place, as Hippocrates said that that was the most
dangerous disease which made the sick man’s countenance most unlike
to what it was, so I observed that men transported with anger also
exceedingly change their visage, color, gait, and voice. Accordingly
I formed a kind of image of that passion to myself, withal conceiving
great indignation against myself if I should at any time appear to my
friends, or to my wife and daughters, so terrible and discomposed,
not only with so wild and strange a look, but also with so fierce and
harsh a voice, as I had met with in some others of my acquaintance,
who by reason of anger were not able to observe either good manners
or countenance or graceful speech, or even their persuasiveness and
affability in conversation.
Wherefore Caius Gracchus, the orator, being of a rugged disposition
and a passionate kind of speaker, had a pipe made for him, such as
musicians use to vary their voice higher or lower by degrees; and with
this pipe his servant stood behind him while he pronounced, and gave
him a mild and gentle note, whereby he took him down from his loudness,
and took off the harshness and angriness of his voice, assuaging and
charming the anger of the orator,
As their shrill wax-joined reed who herds do keep
Sounds forth sweet measures, which invite to sleep.[21]
For my own part, had I a careful and pleasant companion who would show
me my angry face in a glass, I should not at all take it ill. In like
manner, some are wont to have a looking-glass held to them after
they have bathed, though to little purpose; but to behold one’s self
unnaturally disguised and disordered will conduce not a little to the
impeachment of anger. For those who delight in pleasant fables tell
us, that Minerva herself, playing on a pipe was thus admonished by a
satyr:—
That look becomes you not, lay down your pipes,
And take your arms, and set your cheeks to rights;
but would not regard it; yet, when by chance she beheld the mien of her
countenance in a river, she was moved with indignation, and cast her
pipes away; and yet here art had the delight of melody to comfort her
for the deformity. And Marsyas, as it seems, did with a kind of muzzle
and mouth-piece restrain by force the too horrible eruption of his
breath when he played, and so corrected and concealed the distortion of
his visage:—
With shining gold he girt his temples rough,
And his wide mouth with thongs that tied behind.
Now anger doth swell and puff up the countenance very indecently, and
sends forth a yet more indecent and unpleasant voice,—
Moving the heart-strings, which should be at rest.
For when the sea is tossed and troubled with winds, and casts up moss
and sea-weed, they say it is purged; but those impure, bitter, and
vain words which anger throws up when the soul has become a kind of
whirlpool, defile the speakers, in the first place, and fill them with
dishonor, arguing them to have always had such things in them and to
be full of them, only now they are discovered to have them by their
anger. So for a mere word, the lightest of things (as Plato says),
they undergo the heaviest of punishments, being ever after accounted
enemies, evil speakers, and of a malignant disposition.
7. While now I see all this and bear it in mind, the thought occurs to
me, and I naturally consider by myself, that as it is good for one in a
fever, so much better is it for one in anger, to have his tongue soft
and smooth. For if the tongue in a fever be unnaturally affected, it is
indeed an evil symptom, but not a cause of harm; but when the tongue of
angry men becomes rough and foul, and breaks out into absurd speeches,
it produces insults which work irreconcilable hatred, and proves that a
poisonous malevolence lies festering within. For wine does not make men
vent any thing so impure and odious as anger doth; and, besides, what
proceeds from wine is matter for jest and laughter, but that from anger
is mixed with gall and bitterness. And he that is silent in his cups is
counted a burthen, and a bore to the company, whereas in anger there is
nothing more commended than peace and silence; as Sappho adviseth,—-
When anger once is spread within thy breast,
Shut up thy tongue, that vainly barking beast.
8. Nor doth the constant observation of ourselves in anger minister
these things only to our consideration, but it also gives us to
understand another natural property of anger, how disingenuous and
unmanly a thing it is, and how far from true wisdom and greatness of
mind. Yet the vulgar account the angry man’s turbulence to be his
activity, his loud threats to argue boldness, and his refractoriness
strength; as also some mistake his cruelty for an undertaking of great
matters, his implacableness for a firmness of resolution, and his
morosity for an hatred of that which is evil. For, in truth, both the
deeds and motions and the whole mien of angry men do accuse them of
much littleness and infirmity, not only when they vex little children,
scold silly women, and think dogs and horses and asses worthy of their
anger and deserving to be punished (as Ctesiphon the Pancratiast, who
vouchsafed to kick the ass that had kicked him first); but even in
their tyrannical slaughters, their mean-spiritedness appearing in their
bitterness, and their suffering exhibited outwardly in their actions,
are but like to the biting of serpents who, when they themselves become
burnt and full of pain, violently thrust the venom that inflames them
from themselves into those that have hurt them. For as a great blow
causes a great swelling in the flesh, so in the softest souls the
giving way to a passion for hurting others, like a stroke on the soul,
doth make it to swell with anger; and all the more, the greater is its
weakness.
For this cause it is that women are more apt to be angry than men are,
and sick persons than the healthful, and old men than those who are in
their perfect age and strength, and men in misery than such as prosper.
For the covetous man is most prone to be angry with his steward, the
glutton with his cook, the jealous man with his wife, the vain-glorious
person with him that speaks ill of him; but of all men there are none
so exceedingly disposed to be angry as those who are ambitious of
honor, and affect to carry on a faction in a city, which (according
to Pindar) is but a splendid vexation. In like manner, from the great
grief and suffering of the soul, through weakness especially, there
ariseth anger, which is not like the nerves of the soul (as one spake),
but like its straining and convulsive motions when it vehemently stirs
itself up in its desires and endeavors of revenge.
9. Indeed such evil examples as these afford us speculations which are
necessary, though not pleasant. But now, from those who have carried
themselves mildly and gently in their anger, I shall present you with
most excellent sayings and beautiful contemplations; and I begin to
contemn such as say, You have wronged a man indeed, and is a man
to bear this?—Stamp on his neck, tread him down in the dirt,—and
such like provoking speeches, whereby some do very unhandsomely
translate and remove anger from the women’s to the men’s apartment.
For fortitude, which in other respects agrees with justice, seems
only to disagree in respect of mildness, which she claims as more
properly her own. For it sometimes befalls even worser men to bear
rule over those who are better than themselves; but to erect a trophy
in the soul against anger (which Heraclitus says it is an hard thing
to fight against, because whatever it resolves to have, it buys at no
less a price than the soul itself) is that which none but a great and
victorious power is able to achieve, since that alone can bind and curb
the passions by its decrees, as with nerves and tendons.
Wherefore I always strive to collect and read not only the sayings and
deeds of philosophers, who (wise men say) had no gall in them, but
especially those of kings and tyrants. Of this sort was the saying of
Antigonus to his soldiers, when, as some were reviling him near his
tent supposing that he had not heard them, he stretched his staff out
of the tent, and said: What! will you not stand somewhere farther off,
while you revile me? So was that of Arcadio the Achaean, who was ever
speaking ill of Philip, exhorting men to flee
Till they should come where none would Philip know.
When afterwards by some accident he appeared in Macedonia, Philip’s
friends were of opinion that he ought not to be suffered, but be
punished; but Philip meeting him and speaking courteously to him, and
then sending him gifts, particularly such as were wont to be given to
strangers, bade him learn for the time to come what to speak of him
to the Greeks. And when all testified that the man was become a great
praiser of Philip, even to admiration, You see, said Philip, I am a
better physician than you. And when he had been reproached at the
Olympic solemnities, and some said it was fit to make the Grecians
smart and rue it for reviling Philip, who had dealt well with them,
What then, said he, will they do, if I make them smart? Those things
also which Pisistratus did to Thrasybulus, and Porsena to Mutius, were
bravely done; and so was that of Magas to Philemon, for having been
by him exposed to laughter in a comedy on the public stage, in these
words:—
Magas, the king hath sent thee letters:
Unhappy Magas, thou dost know no letters.
And having taken Philemon as he was by a tempest cast on shore at
Paraetonium, he commanded a soldier only to touch his neck with his
naked sword and to go quietly away; and then having sent him a ball
and huckle-bones, as if he were a child that wanted understanding, he
dismissed him. Ptolemy was once jeering a grammarian for his want of
learning, and asked him who was the father of Peleus: I will answer you
(quoth he) if you will tell me first who was the father of Lagus. This
jeer gave the king a rub for the obscurity of his birth, whereat all
were moved with indignation, as a thing not to be endured. But, said
Ptolemy, if it is not fit for a king to be jeered, then no more is it
fit for him to jeer others. But Alexander was more severe than he was
wont in his carriage towards Calisthenes and Clitus. Wherefore Porus,
being taken captive by him, desired him to treat him like a king; and
when Alexander asked him if he desired no more, he answered, When I say
like a king, I have comprised all. And hence it is that they call the
king of the Gods Meilichius, while the Athenians, I think, call him
Maimactes; but the office of punishing they ascribe to the Furies and
evil Genii, never giving it the epithet of divine or heavenly.
10. As therefore one said of Philip, when he razed the city of
Olynthus, But he is not able to build such another city; so may it
be said to anger, Thou canst overthrow, and destroy, and cut down;
but to restore, to save, to spare, and to bear with, is the work of
gentleness and moderation, of a Camillus, a Metellus, an Aristides,
and a Socrates; but to strike the sting into one and to bite is the
part of pismires and horse-flies. And truly, while I well consider
revenge, I find that the way which anger takes for it proves for the
most part ineffectual, being spent in biting the lips, gnashing the
teeth, vain assaults, and railings fall of silly threats; and then it
acts like children in a race, who, for want of governing themselves,
tumble down ridiculously before they come to the goal towards which
they are hastening. Hence that Rhodian said not amiss to the servant of
the Roman general, who spake loudly and fiercely to him, It matters not
much what thou sayest, but what this your master in silence thinks. And
Sophocles, having introduced Neoptolemus and Eurypylus in full armor,
gave a high commendation of them when he said,—
Into the hosts of brazen-armed men
Each boldly charged, but ne’er reviled his foe.
Some indeed of the barbarians poison their swords; but true valor has
no need of choler, as being dipped in reason; but anger and fury are
weak and easily broken. Wherefore the Lacedaemonians are wont by the
sounding of pipes to take off the edge of anger from their soldiers,
when they fight; and before they go to battle, to sacrifice to the
Muses, that they may have the steady use of their reason; and when
they have put their enemies to flight, they pursue them not, but sound
a retreat (as it were) to their wrath, which, like a short dagger,
can easily be handled and drawn back. But anger makes slaughter of
thousands before it can avenge itself, as it did of Cyrus and Pelopidas
the Theban. Agathocles, being reviled by some whom he besieged, bore it
with mildness; and when one said to him, O Potter, whence wilt thou
have pay for thy mercenary soldiers? he answered with laughter, From
your city, if I can take it. And when some one from the wall derided
Antigonus for his deformity, he answered, I thought surely I had a
handsome face: and when he had taken the city, he sold those for slaves
who had scoffed at him, protesting that, if they reviled him so again,
he would call them to account before their masters.
Furthermore, I observe that hunters and orators are wont to be much
foiled by anger. Aristotle reports that the friends of Satyrus once
stopped his ears with wax, when he was to plead a cause, that so
he might not confound the matter through anger at the revilings of
his enemies. Do we not ourselves oftentimes miss of punishing an
offending servant, because he runs away from us in fright when he
hears our threatening words? That therefore which nurses say to little
children—Do not cry, and thou shalt have it—-may not unfitly be
applied to our mind when angry. Be not hasty, neither speak too loud,
nor be too urgent, and so what you desire will be sooner and better
accomplished. For as a father, when he sees his son about to cleave or
cut something with an hatchet, takes the hatchet himself and doth it
for him; so one taking the work of revenge out of the hand of anger
doth himself, without danger or hurt, yea, with profit also, inflict
punishment on him that deserves it, and not on himself instead of him,
as anger oft-times doth.
11. Now, whereas all passions do stand in need of discipline, which by
exercise tames and subdues their unreasonableness and stubbornness,
there is none about which we have more need to be exercised in
reference to servants than that of anger. For neither do we envy nor
fear them, nor have we any competition for honor with them; but we
have frequent fits of anger with them, which cause many offences and
errors, by reason of the very power possessed by us as masters, and
which bring us easily to the ground, as if we stood in a slippery
place with no one standing by to save us. For it is impossible to keep
an irresponsible power from offending in the excitement of passion,
unless we gird up that great power with gentleness, and can slight
the frequent speeches of wife and friends accusing us of remissness.
And indeed I myself have by nothing more than by such speeches been
incensed against my servants, as if they were spoiled for want of
beating. And truly it was late before I came to understand, that it
was better that servants should be something the worse by indulgence,
than that one should distort himself through wrath and bitterness
for the amendment of others. And secondly, observing that many by
this very impunity have been brought to be ashamed to be wicked, and
have begun their change to virtue more from being pardoned than from
being punished, and that they have obeyed some upon their nod only,
peaceably, and more willingly than they have done others with all their
beating and scourging, I became persuaded of this, that reason was
fitter to govern with than anger. For it is not as the poet said,—
Wherever fear is, there is modesty;
but, on the contrary, it is in the modest that that fear is bred which
produces moderation, whereas continual and unmerciful beating doth
not make men repent of doing evil, but only devise plans for doing it
without being detected. And in the third place I always remember and
consider with myself, that as he who taught us the art of shooting did
not forbid us to shoot, but only to shoot amiss, so no more can it be
any hindrance from punishing to teach us how we may do it seasonably
and moderately, with benefit and decency. I therefore strive to put
away anger, especially by not denying the punished a liberty to plead
for themselves, but granting them an hearing. For time gives a
breathing-space unto passion, and a delay which mitigates and dissolves
it; and a man’s judgment in the mean while finds out both a becoming
manner and a proportionable measure of punishing. And moreover hereby,
he that is punished hath not any pretence left him to object against
the correction given him, if he is punished not out of anger, but being
first himself convinced of his fault. And finally we are here saved
from the greatest disgrace of all, for by this means the servant will
not seem to speak more just things than his master.
As therefore Phocion after the death of Alexander, to hinder the
Athenians from rising too soon or believing it too hastily, said: O
Athenians, if he is dead to-day, he will be so to-morrow, and on the
next day after that; in like manner do I judge one ought to suggest to
himself, who through anger is making haste to punish: If it is true
to-day that he hath thus wronged thee, it will be true to-morrow, and
on the next day, also. Nor will there any inconvenience follow upon
the deferring of his punishment for a while; but if he be punished all
in haste, he will ever after seem to have been innocent, as it hath
oftentimes fallen out heretofore. For which of us all is so cruel as
to torment or scourge a servant because, five or ten days before, he
burnt the meat, or overturned the table, or did not soon enough what
he was bidden? And yet it is for just such things as these, while they
are fresh and newly done, that we are so disordered, and become cruel
and implacable. For as bodies through a mist, so actions through anger
seem greater than they are. Wherefore we ought speedily to recall such
considerations as these are to our mind; and when we are unquestionably
out of passion, if then to a pure and composed reason the deed do
appear to be wicked, we ought to animadvert, and no longer neglect or
abstain from punishment, as if we had lost our appetite for it. For
there is nothing to which we can more justly impute men’s punishing
others in their anger, than to a habit of not punishing them when their
anger is over, but growing remiss, and doing like lazy mariners, who in
fair weather keep loitering within the haven, and then put themselves
in danger by setting sail when the wind blows strong. So we likewise,
condemning the remissness and over-calmness of our reason in punishing,
make haste to do it while our anger is up, pushing us forward like a
dangerous wind.
He that useth food doth it to gratify his hunger, which is natural; but
he that inflicts punishment should do it without either hungering or
thirsting after it, not needing anger, like sauce, to whet him on to
punish; but when he is farthest off from desiring it, then he should
do it as a deed of necessity under the guidance of reason. And though
Aristotle reports, that in his time servants in Etruria were wont to
be scourged while the music played, yet they who punish others ought
not to be carried on with a desire of punishing, as of a thing they
delight in, nor to rejoice when they punish, and then repent of it
when they have done,—whereof the first is savage, the last womanish;
but, without either sorrow or pleasure, they should inflict just
punishment when reason is free to judge, leaving no pretence for anger
to intermeddle.
12. But this perhaps may seem to be not a cure of anger, but only a
thrusting by and avoiding of such miscarriages as some men fall into
when they are angry. And yet, as Hieronymus tells us, although the
swelling of the spleen is but a symptom of the fever, the assuaging
thereof abates the disease. But, considering well the origin of anger
itself, I have observed that divers men fall into anger for different
causes; and yet in the minds of all of them was probably an opinion
of being despised and neglected. We must therefore assist those who
would avoid anger, by removing the act which roused their anger as
far as possible from all suspicion of contempt or insult, and by
imputing it rather to folly or necessity or disorder of mind, or to the
misadventure of those that did it. Thus Sophocles in Antigone:—
The best resolved mind in misery
Can’t keep its ground, but suffers ecstasy.[22]