Pagina 226 di 734

And the defect, call it Angerlessness or what you will, is

blamed: I mean, they who are not angry at things at which they

ought to be angry are thought to be foolish, and they who are

angry not in right manner, nor in right time, nor with those with

whom they ought; for a man who labours under this defect is

thought to have no perception, nor to be pained, and to have no

tendency to avenge himself, inasmuch as he feels no anger: now to

bear with scurrility in one's own person, and patiently see one's

own friends suffer it, is a slavish thing.

As for the excess, it occurs in all forms; men are angry with

those with whom, and at things with which, they ought not to be,

and more than they ought, and too hastily, and for too great a

length of time. I do not mean, however, that these are combined

in any one person: that would in fact be impossible, because the

evil destroys itself, and if it is developed in its full force it

becomes unbearable.