In fine, throughout the whole world, all things (as
they themselves are forced to confess, and is evident in
itself) are governed and directed, some by a certain habit,
some by Nature, others by a brutal or irrational soul, and
some again by that which has reason and understanding.
Of all which things man does in some measure participate,
and is concerned in all the above-mentioned differences.
For he is contained by habit, and nourished by Nature; he
makes use of reason and understanding; he wants not his
share of the irrational soul; he has also in him a native
source and inbred principle of the passions, not as adventitious, but necessary to him, which ought not therefore
to be utterly rooted out, but only pruned and cultivated.
For it is not the method and custom of reason—in imitation
[p. 491]
either of the manner of the Thracians or of what
Lycurgus ordered to be done to the vines—to destroy and
tear up all the passions and affections indifferently, good
and bad, useful and hurtful together; but rather—like
some kind and careful Deity who has a tender regard to
the growth and improvement of fruit-trees and plants—to
cut away and clip off that which grows wild and rank, and
to dress and manage the rest that it may serve for use and
profit. For as they who are afraid of being drunk pour
not their wine upon the ground, but dilute it with water;
so neither do they who fear any violent commotion of their
passions go about utterly to destroy and eradicate, but
rather wisely to temper and moderate them. And as they
who use to break horses and oxen do not go about to take
away their goings, or to render them unfit for labor and
service, but only strive to cure them of their unluckiness
and flinging up their heels, and to bring them to be patient
of the bit and yoke, so as to become useful; after the
same manner reason makes very good use of the passions,
after they are well subdued and made gentle, without
either tearing in pieces or over-much weakening that part
of the soul which was made to be obedient to her. In
Pindar we find it said:
As 'tis the horse's pride to win the race,
And to plough up the fruitful soil
Is the laborious ox's toil,
So the fierce dog we take the foaming boar to chase.
But much more useful than these in their several kinds
are the whole brood of passions, when they become attendants to reason, and when, being assistant and obedient to
virtue, they give life and vigor to it.
Thus, moderate anger is of admirable use to courage or
fortitude; hatred and aversion for ill men promotes the
execution of justice; and a just indignation against those
who are prosperous beyond what they deserve is then both
[p. 492]
convenient and even necessary, when with pride and insolence their minds are so swollen and elated, that they
need to be repressed and taken down. Neither by any
means can a man, though he never so much desire it, be
able to separate from friendship a natural propension to
affection; from humanity and good nature, tenderness and
commiseration; nor from true benevolence, a mutual participation of joy and grief. And if they run into an error
who would take away all love that they may destroy mad
and wanton passions, neither can those be in the right
who, for the sake of covetousness, condemn all other appetites and desires. Which is full as ridiculous as if one
should always refuse to run, because one time or other he
may chance to catch a fall; or to shoot, because he may
sometimes happen to miss the mark; or should forbear all
singing, because a discord or a jar is offensive to the ear.
For, as in sounds the music and harmony thereof takes
away neither the sharpest nor the deepest notes, and in
our bodies physic procureth health, not by the destruction
of heat and cold, but by a due and proportionable temperature and mixture of them both together; so in the same
manner it happeneth in the soul of man, when reason
becomes victorious and triumphant by reducing the faculties of the mind which belong to the passions, and all
their motions, to a due moderation and mediocrity. And
excessive and unmeasurable joy or grief or fear in the
soul (not, however, either joy, grief, or fear, simply in
itself) may very properly be resembled to a great swelling
or inflammation in the body. And therefore Homer, where
he says,
A valiant man doth never color change;
Excessive fear to him is very strange,
1
does not take away all fear (but that only which is extreme and unmanly), that bravery and courage may not be
[p. 493]
thought to be fool-hardiness, nor boldness and resolution
pass for temerity and rashness. And therefore he that in
pleasures and delights can prescribe bounds to his lusts and
desires, and in punishing offences can moderate his rage
and hatred to the offenders, shall in one case get the reputation not of an insensible, but temperate person, and in
the other be accounted a man of justice without cruelty or
bitterness. Whereas, if all the passions, if that were possible, were clean rooted out, reason in most men would
grow sensibly more dull and inactive than the pilot of a
ship in a calm.
And to these things (as it should seem) prudent lawgivers having regard have wisely taken care to excite and
encourage in commonwealths and cities the ambition and
emulation of their people amongst one another, and with
trumpets, drums, and flutes to whet their anger and courage against their enemies. For not only in poetry (as
Plato very well observes), he that is inspired by the Muses,
and as it were possessed by a poetical fury, will make him
that is otherwise a master of his trade and an exact critic
in poetry appear ridiculous; but also in fighting, those who
are elevated and inspired with a noble rage, and a resolution and courage about the common pitch, become invincible, and are not to be withstood. And this is that warlike
fury which the Gods, as Homer will have it, infuse into
men of honor:
He spoke, and every word new strength inspired;
and again:
This more than human rage is from the Gods;2
as if to reason the Gods had joined some or other of passions, as an incitement or, if I may so say, a vehicle to
push and carry it forward.
Nay we often see these very men against whom I now
dispute exciting and encouraging young persons with
[p. 494]
praises, and as often checking and rebuking them with
severe reprimands; whereupon in the one case there must
follow pleasure and satisfaction as necessarily as grief and
trouble are produced in the other. For reprehension and
admonition certainly strike us with repentance and shame,
whereof this is comprehended under fear, as the other is
under grief. And these are the things they chiefly make
use of for correction and amendment. Which seems to
be the reason why Diogenes, to some who had magnified
Plato, made this reply: What can there be in him, said
he, so much to be valued, who, having been so long a
philosopher, has never yet been known so much as to
excite the single passion of grief in the mind of any one?
And certainly the mathematics cannot so properly be called
(to use the words of Xenocrates) the handles of philosophy,
as these passions are of young men, namely, bashfulness,
desire, repentance, pleasure, pain, ambition; whereon right
reason and the law discreetly laying their salutary hands
do thereby effectually and speedily reduce a young man
into the right way. Agreeably hereunto the Lacedaemonian instructor of youth was in the right, when he professed that he would bring it to pass that youths under
his care should take a pleasure and satisfaction in good
and have an abhorrence for evil, than which there cannot
be a greater or nobler end of the liberal education of
youth proposed or assigned.
