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FUNDANUS. However, those of whom it is true that righteous indignation causes them frequently to be overwhelmed by anger should get rid of its excessive and violent form, together with their extreme confidence in those with whom they live. Cf. Plato, Phaedo, 89 d. For such confidence more than any other cause increases the spirit of wrath, when, for example, one who has been accounted honourable proves to be base, Nothing fans the flame of human resentment so much as the discovery that one’s bosom has been utilized as a snake sanatorium. - H. H. Monro. or one whom we have supposed a true friend quarrels and finds fault with us. As for my own temperament, you doubtless know how strong are the impulses which incline it to be of goodwill toward my fellowmen and to trust them. Consequently, like men who attempt to walk on empty air, the more I give myself up to loving a person the more I go astray, and when I stumble and fall, the greater my distress; and although I may no longer be able to reduce my too great propensity and eagerness to love, yet I may perhaps be able to use Plato’s Epistle xiii. 360 c; Cf. 474 e, infra, and Moralia, 533 b-c. caution as a curb against excessive trust. For Plato says that he praises Helicon the mathematician in such terms as he uses δεδιὼς δὲ λέγω ταῦτα, ὅτι ὑπὲρ ἀνθρώπου δόξαω ἀποφαίνομαι, οὐ φαύλου ζῴου ἀλλ’ εὐμεταβόλου: This, however, I say with trepidation, since I am uttering an opinion about a man, and man, though not a worthless, is an inconstant creature. - (Bury in L.C.L.) because man is by nature an animal readily subject to change; and that he does well to fear those who have been educated in the city lest, being men and the seeds of men, Cf. Plato, Laws, 853 c. they may reveal somewhere the weakness inherent in their nature. But when SophoclesFrag. 853 ed. Pearson; Nauck, Trag. Graec. Frag. 2, p. 311, Frag. 769; quoted again in 481 f, infra. says Search out most human traits; you’ll find them base, he seems to go too far in trampling upon and belittling us. This peevish and censorious judgement does, however, tend to make us more considerate in our outbursts of temper; for it is the sudden and the unexpected that throw men off their bearings. Cf. 449 e, supra. But we should, as Panaetius also has somewhere remarked, make use of the precept of Anaxagoras, Cf. 474 d, infra; Moralia, 118 d and the references ad loc.; Diels, Frag. d. Vorsokratiker 5, ii. p. 14, 33. and just as he, at the death of his son, said, I knew that I had begotten a mortal; so on each occasion we should remark with reference to the faults which exasperate us: I knew that I had not bought a philosopher for a slave, I knew that the friend I had made was not incapable of error, I knew that my wife was a woman. And if we keep repeating to ourselves Plato’s question, Can it be that I am like that? Cf. Moralia, 40 d, 88 e, 129 d. Cf. Horace, Satires, i. 4. 136: numquid ego illi | imprudens olim faciam simile?; There but for the grace of God go I. and turn our reason inward instead of to external things, and substitute caution for censoriousness, we shall no longer make much use of righteous indignation toward others when we observe that we ourselves stand in need of much indulgence. But as it is, everyone of us, when we are angry and inflicting punishment, brings out the injunctions of an Aristeides or a Cato: Do not steal! Do not lie! Why are you so lazy?; and - what is most disgraceful of all - while angry we chide others for being angry and punish by rage faults which have been committed in a rage, not like physicians, who With bitter drugs can purge the bitter bileSophocles, Frag. 854 ed. Pearson, with the note; Nauck, Trag. Graec. Frag. 2, p. 312, Frag. 770; quoted in a different form 468 b, infra, and Moralia, 923 f.; but rather make more intense the malady and aggravate it.
