1.21

There is therefore nothing great or noble in anger, even when it seems to be powerful and to contemn both gods and men alike. Anyone who thinks that anger produces greatness of mind, would think that luxury produces it: such a man wishes to rest on ivory, to be clothed with purple, and roofed with gold; to remove lands, embank seas, hasten the course of rivers, suspend woods in the air. He would think that avarice shows greatness of mind: for the avaricious man broods over heaps of gold and silver, treats whole provinces as merely fields on his estate, and has larger tracts of country under the charge of single bailiffs than those which consuls once drew lots to administer. He would think that lust shows greatness of mind: for the lustful man swims across straits, castrates troops of boys, and puts himself within reach of the swords of injured husbands with complete scorn of death. Ambition, too, he would think shows greatness of mind: for the ambitious man is not content with office once a year, but, if possible, would fill the calendar of dignities with his name alone, and cover the whole world with his titles. It matters nothing to what heights or lengths these passions may proceed: they are narrow, pitiable, grovelling. Virtue alone is lofty and sublime, nor is anything great which is not at the same time tranquil.

Footnotes

This work is in the public domain in the United States because it was published before January 1, 1931.

This work may be in the public domain in countries and areas with longer native copyright terms that apply the rule of the shorter term to foreign works.

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Translator Notes

  1. 1.
    Here a leaf or more has been lost, including the fragment cited in Lactantius, De ira dei, 17 Ira est cupiditas, &c. The entire passage is:—"But the Stoics did not perceive that there is a difference between right and wrong; that there is just and unjust anger: and as they could find no remedy for it, they wished to extirpate it. The Peripatetics, on the other hand, declared that it ought not to be destroyed, but restrained. These I have sufficiently answered in the sixth book of my Institutiones. It is clear that the philosophers did not comprehend the reason of anger, from the definitions of it which Seneca has enumerated in the books 'On Anger' which he has written. ‘Anger,’ he says, ‘is the desire of avenging an injury.’ Others, as Posidonius says, call it 'a desire to punish one by whom you think that you have been unjustly injured.' Some have defined it thus, 'Anger is an impulse of the mind to injure him who either has injured you or has sought to injure you.' Aristotle's definition differs but little from our own. He says, 'that anger is a desire to repay suffering,'" etc.↩
  2. 2.
    Ovid, "Met." vii. 545-6.↩
  3. 3.
    τό ἡγεμονικόν of the Stoics.↩
  4. 4.
    The gospel rule, Matt, xviii. 15.↩
  5. 5.
    Divitis (where there might be an army of slaves).↩
  6. 6.
    "Lorsque le Preteur devoit prononcer la sentence d'un coupable, il se depouilloit de la robe pretexte, et se revètoit alors d'une simple tunique, ou d'une autre robe, presque usee, et d'un blanc sale (sordida) ou d'un gris très foncé tirant sur le noir (toga pulla), telle qu'en portoient à Rome le peuple et les pauvres (pullaque paupertas). Dans les jours solemnelles et marqués par un deuil public, les Senateurs quittoient le laticlave, et les Magistrats la pretexte. La pourpre, la hache, les faisceaux, aucun de ces signes extérieurs de leur dignité ne les distinguoient alors des autres citoyens: sine insignibus Magistratus. Mais ce n'étoit pas seulement pendant le temps ou la ville était plongée dans le deuil et dans l'affliction, que les magistrats s'habilloient comme le peuple (sordidam vestem induebant); ils en usoient de même lorsqu'ils devoient condamner à mort un citoyen. C'est dans ces tristes circonstances qu'ils quittoient la prétexte et prenoient la robe de deuil: perversam vestem. (No doubt "inside out."—J. E. B. M.)
    "On pourrait supposer avec assez de vraisemblance que par cette expression, Séneque a voulu faire allusion à ce changement …… Peut-être les Magistrats qui devoient juger à mort un citoyen, portoient ils aussi leur robe renversée, ou la jettoient ils de travers ou confusément sur leurs épaules, pour mieux peindre par ce desordre le trouble de leur esprit. Si cette conjecture est vraie, comme je serais assez porté à croire, l'expression perversa vestis, dont Séneque s'est servi ici, indiqueroit plus d'un simple changement d'habit," &c. (La Grange's translation of Seneca, edited by J. A. Naigeon. Paris, 1778.)    ↩
  7. 7.
    "Ceci fait allusion à une coutume que Caius Gracchus prétend avoir été pratiquée de tout tems à Rome. 'Lorsqu'un citoyen,’" dit il, "avoit un procès criminel qui alloit à la mort, s'il refusoit d'obéir aux sommations qui lui étoient faites; le jour qu'on devoit le juger, en envoyoit des le matin à la porte de sa maison un Officier l'appeller au son de la trompette, et jamais avant que cette cérémonie eût été observée, les Juges ne donneroient leur voix contre lui: tant ces hommes sages,' ajoute ce hardi Tribun, 'avoient de retenue et de precaution dans leurs jugements, quand il s'agissoit de la vie d'un citoyen.'"
    "C'étoit de même au son de la trompette que l'on convoquoit le peuple, lorsqu'on devoit faire mourir un citoyen, afin qu'il fût témoin de ce triste spectacle, et que la supplice du coupable pût lui servir d'exemple. Tacite dit qu'un Astrologue, nommé P. Marcius, fût exécuté, selon l'ancien usage, hors de la porte Esquiline, en presence du peuple Romain que les Consuls firent convoquer au son de la trompette. (Tac. Ann. II. 32.) L. Grom.    ↩
  8. 8.
    i.e., not only for counsel, but for action.↩
  9. 9.
    Prorsus parum certis (i.e., the thunderbolts missed their aim in not striking him dead).↩