论制怒
苏拉:丰达努斯,我认为画家们定期审视他们的作品,然后再进一步修饰的做法是值得称道的。不停地熟悉作品,不会发现它们与想塑造的形象有多少差异,因此打破这种连续性,以全新的视角反复赏鉴,更易于捕捉到细微的差别。但对个人来说,不可能套用这种固定的方式中断自我赏鉴的连续性来审视自我,这正是自己比他人更无法判断自我的主要原因。因此,其次的做法是定期审视自己的朋友,出于同样目的向他们展示自己,这并不是要看看他是否突然变老或者他的身体状况是好还是坏,而是指经过一段时间之后,判断他是否增进了良好的习惯和品德,或是否戒除了不良的习性。
无论如何,我离开一年多之后又回到了罗马,我和你在一起也四个多月了,我发现你与生俱来的优点进一步发扬了,并且有了如此大的进步,对此我并不特别惊讶。但是,当我看到许多通情达理的人顺服于你强悍、暴躁的脾气时,我倾向于引用这句话来评论你的性急,“他要是性情更温和一些,那该多好!”
然而,变得温和亲切并不曾使你懦弱无能,它用柔顺的外表及有效、有益的深度——就像一块耕耘后的田地——取代了你那人尽皆知的情绪突变。因此,你的脾气变得温和显然不是因为年龄的增长或其他自觉的因素,而是在于你接纳了良好的合理建议之后。但我必须承认,当我们共同的朋友厄洛斯告诉我你的这些情况时,我怀疑是他对你的温情使你具备了真正善良的人们应该拥有的品质,虽然你过去并没有这些品质。但我认为这忽略了一个事实,他不是一个为了取悦他人而放弃自己立场的人。现在,我很清楚他没有瞎说。我们一起旅行时没有别的事可做,因此我想知道你是否愿意解释你是如何让自己的性情变得温柔、稳健、顺从、有担当的呢——比如,你遵从哪些规则。
丰达努斯:仁慈的苏拉,你确信不是你温暖的友情使你失去对我性格方面的判断力吗?我是说,甚至厄洛斯自己都经常无法控制自己的脾气,“保持一贯的温顺”(正如荷马所说),是正义的怒火让情绪爆发了。因此,在这些情况下我与他相比可能显得比较通情达理,正如当范围在一定程度发生变化时,高音能取代低音一样。
苏拉:这些可能性都不现实。丰达努斯,请帮我个忙,按我要求的去做吧。
丰达努斯:好吧,苏拉。穆梭留斯提出了一些极好的建议,我记得其中一条是持续的生命疗法能保护免疫系统。问题的关键在于,当理性充当治疗剂时,在我看来——疾病能像黑黎芦一样从免疫系统里被祛除出去是不可能的,它会保留在心里,控制并审视我们的决定。从其效果来看,理性类比并非良药,但由于大家都习惯从营养的食物中获得能量和健康,一旦情绪激动达到一个峰值时,忠告和责难要进行长久而艰苦的斗争,才有微小的收获,恰如嗅盐一样,能刺激晕厥无意识的人们苏醒,但不能消除实际的疾病。
但是,即便是在达到峰值时,当理性和强化物从外部进入心里时,所有其他情绪会在某种意义上回落和消退;但是愤怒并不会完全像墨兰提俄斯说的那样——“它取代理智,犯下罪行”;事实上,只有当愤怒彻底取代理智,并将理智拒于门外时,它才会这么做。那种情形类似于人们在家中被烧死,从某种意义上说,愤怒使心里充满了混乱、厌恶和噪音,结果是人们看不到、听不到任何有益的东西。因此,在海上一艘废弃的船更容易将舵手由外向内卷进风暴中心,而被暴怒的海洋淹没的人要被外界说服则难得多,除非他自己作好了理性准备。人们没有外援就会尽其所能积累有用的东西以应付进攻。同样,特别重要的是,人们从四面八方搜集有哲理的事物, 并牢记于心,用以帮助抵抗愤怒,因为当有迫切需要的时候人们往往不容易找到那些帮助。我的意思是说,喧嚣嘈杂阻止心灵听到任何外部情况,除非心灵有它自己的理性,就像船舱里的水手长,他能迅速学会并懂得每一个指令,此外,即使心灵能听到任何事物,它也会在挑衅生气的时候听不见安静、温柔的规劝。问题的关键在于,傲慢、任性和固执的脾气很难为外部动因所改变,就像根基稳固的暴政一样,只有通过内部固有的动因才能将其推翻。
如果愤怒和怨恨成为常态,心灵就会变得易怒,使人变得敏感、恶毒、令人讨厌——变得多愁善感、吹毛求疵:即便铁块被进一步锻造也会变得薄弱。另一方面,如果理性分辨当即抵抗和压制任何愤怒的爆发,不仅能挽救当前的形势,而且将来能给心灵带来活力和解脱。
就我来看,无论如何,我曾经有过两三次克制愤怒的情况,我经历过底比斯人所经历过的事情:他们在第一次击退了不可战胜的斯巴达人后,在后来的战役中就再也没有被斯巴达人打败过。因此,我树立了坚定的信念,即理性战胜一切。我认为,亚里士多德关于冷水能浇熄怒火的断言是不全面的:面对恐惧,怒火也会熄灭。此外,当然, 用荷马的说法,幸福突然降临经常会导致愤怒瞬间“融化”和消散。我深信,最终的结果是,只要有这种意愿,愤怒的情绪并非完全不可救药。想想看,微不足道的事情也可能会激发愤怒:一个玩笑,一句无心的话,一个笑声,一个点头示意等等,都会激发愤怒。举个例子,海伦给她的侄女写信时,以这样刺激的言辞写道:“伊利克特拉,未婚的老姑娘,在过去的岁月你耗费时间去寻找感觉,使你的家族蒙羞。”当大酒杯仍在传递时,卡利斯提尼斯的一句“我不想喝亚历山大的酒,因为随后又得去看医神阿斯克勒庇俄斯”激怒了亚历山大。
因此,正如要控制开始在兔毛、灯芯或一堆垃圾上燃起来的火焰比较容易(一旦火焰开始在有厚度的固体上燃烧,它就会以熊熊之势迅速摧毁建筑师崇高的作品,如埃斯库罗斯所说),如果有人重视初期的愤怒,意识到它逐渐开始郁积,并被一些言论或荒谬的讽刺激发而施加到他人身上是不需要费很大劲的,而通常想不让人发怒就是不说话,不理会别人的言语。不添加燃料就能够把火熄灭,不在刚开始生气时添油加醋、不动辄发怒就会变得明智,从而让愤怒消失殆尽。
我对希罗尼穆斯的说法不敢苟同,尽管他在别的方面有一些有用的意见和建议,但他却声称,由于愤怒发展的速度很快,它在萌芽时是不可察觉的,只有当它已经爆发并确实存在时才能被感知。我认为,所有的情感都要经历由量变到质变的运动过程,但没有任何情感从开始到发展是如此明显的。所以这也是荷马学说的巧妙之处:他曾说,“痛苦的乌云遮蔽了阿奇里斯”,当消息毫不迟延地传来时,他描述阿基里斯瞬间感到痛苦;但他认为阿伽门农的愤怒却是在许多刺激的言辞攻击后渐渐生成、逐步被激发的。如果任何被涉及的人在一开始没有说那些刺激的话,他们就不会争吵升级到如此程度,产生这么大的怒火。因此,每当苏格拉底意识到自己对朋友太急躁时,他深知心中的怒火“如暴风雨前汹涌的浪尖”一般涌动着,于是,他通常会压低声音,微笑着,并温和地看着对方,保持身体直立,通过向相反的方向平衡情绪,从而控制住自己的情绪。
你瞧,我的朋友,有一个克服我们暴君般脾气的最佳方式,那就是当愤怒驱使我们提高声音、涨红脸颊、胸膛起伏时,不服从它的驱使,保持安静,情绪就仿佛一种疾病,不能通过捶胸顿足和大声哭喊使它加剧。它就像开派对、唱歌和装饰门框——典型的爱侣行为——在某种程度上有一个缓和或减轻,不会令人不高兴(“我来了,但没有侮辱你:我吻了你的门。如果这是一种犯罪,我就是一个罪犯”);哀悼者或许能够通过哭泣和泪水消除心中的悲痛,但愤怒状态下的人们激烈的行为和言语会极大地加剧愤怒的情绪。
因此,最好是保持平静,或干脆走开,默默地躲藏起来,寻找庇护,尽管我们意识到要有一种适当的方式,避免发怒,更不要怒及他人——因为我们往往首先迁怒于我们的朋友。我们感觉不到对每个人的爱、嫉妒或恐惧,而愤怒却将它们一网打尽,从而丧失和平:我们对敌人或朋友生气,对孩子或父母生气,甚至对诸神或动物或是没有生命的物体生气。例如,太阳神阿波罗的孙子塔米里斯,“弄坏了镀金琴架和七弦竖琴”,潘特罗斯就暗自发誓,如果他不能阻止他烧掉琴弓,“就一定空手把它打碎”。薛西斯甚至想用岩石给大海刻下烙印,使大海掀起滚滚波涛,他给山神写信道:“和天一样高的伟大的阿托斯,别再变得更加高大了,棘手的岩石已经妨碍了我的行动,不然我要把你撕碎,将你投进大海。”愤怒往往是可怕的,但往往又是荒谬的:因此,它是最遭人痛恨和鄙视的情感;但充分认识到这两方面又是有益的。
就我而言,不管怎样,我不知道这是否是对待愤怒正确的方式,我的方式如下: 就像斯巴达人试图通过观察他们的奴隶来了解酗酒一样,我试图通过观察他人来了解愤怒。希波克拉底说,一种疾病的严重性与病人的体征变得不正常的程度成正比,我首先注意到的是,被愤怒干扰的程度和由愤怒引起的外观、肤色、步态和声音改变的程度之间也存在着相似的关系。这一情绪的反应给我留下了深刻的印象,想到我可能曾经因为愤怒变得让人害怕,使朋友、妻子、女儿错愕骇然,我感到十分不安——不仅是外在的暴怒和面部扭曲让人无法辨认,而且遇到其他熟人时用粗鲁严厉的声音说话,愤怒使人们在交往中无法保持往常一样的特征、外形、愉快的交谈、令人信服的说服力和彬彬有礼。
演讲家盖乌斯·格拉古是一个直率的人,说话异常热烈,富有激情,他为自己做了一个小短笛,像音乐家用以引导四面八方的听众逐渐注意到自己的指挥棒一样。他的奴隶在他演讲时拿着短笛站在他的身后,让他的音调听起来适中,温和,这样能使格拉古的声音听起来不刺耳,也使他的音调不严厉激愤。就好像牛仔抹了蜡的牧笛发出清晰音调奏出催眠般的旋律,格拉古的奴隶就是这样缓和了这个演讲家的激愤。
假如我有一个机灵的随从也能帮我调节声音,我想我就不会生气了,他就像是我愤怒爆发时的一面镜子——即使偶而为之,虽然没有有效的目的,但对于深陷这种状态中的人来说——因为看到自己处于一个不正常的状态,所有的人都因而惴惴不安,就会对感情的质疑起到重要作用。实际上,有一个有趣的故事。有一次,雅典娜在吹奏管乐,森林之神告诉她:“这个表情不适合你。放下你的管乐,拿起你的武器,放松你的脸颊。”她毫不在意,然而,当她看到河中倒映出自己难看的脸庞时,她非常沮丧,赶紧扔掉了乐器。
至少艺术是高雅的,这分散了人们对愤怒状态中狰狞面目的关注。(玛尔叙阿斯显然是用一根束绳和一个吹口疏导他急促的气息,矫正和掩盖他气息不匀的特征:“束在两边太阳穴处头发中隐约闪现出金色,绳子绑在脑后,连接他那喋喋不休的嘴巴。”)而另一方面,愤怒不仅会夸张扭曲人的嘴脸,也使一个人的声音更加难听,让人生厌,把心里无法自拔的束缚解开吧!我的意思是,当大海被狂风激起千层浪,喷涌出海藻和海草时,人们说大海被净化了;但是没有修养的,苛刻的、恶意的言辞使愤怒在内心激荡爆发,演讲家们首当其冲深受其害。他们会因为经常有这样的言论而背负玷污社会的污名。因此,如柏拉图所说,他们为最微小的事情——甚至一个字——付出最沉重的代价,因为它们给人的印象是违反社会公德、造谣生事、心怀恶意。
尽管轻言细语、巧舌如簧有利于缓解狂躁,但是当我意识到并注意到这些时,我却不再记住和时刻提醒自己这一事实,因为这样更有利于抑制愤怒。我是说,如果一个生性狂躁的人说了些不合常理的话,无疑是种不好的症状,但这并不会造成更多的问题;但如果一个正常人突然变得言语粗暴、有攻击性甚至出现异常言论的倾向,就会反映出一种极端蛮横无礼的行为方式,对人际关系造成难以复原的破坏,也会暴露其不善交际的困扰。愤怒导致的不成熟、不和谐的后果要比烈酒更严重:烈酒导致的后果常常伴随着玩笑和歌声,愤怒的后果往往却是严重的摩擦冲突;喝酒会使一个安静的人情绪激动给他的同伴带来困扰,但愤怒却不会使其产生任何有尊严的行为。正如同女诗人萨福所说:“当愤怒占据你的内心,提防你所有的胡言乱语。”
但是,不断关注深陷愤怒感的人使我产生了更多的思考:它让人从其他角度理解愤怒的本质,明白其既不高尚也不刚勇、既无尊严也不体面。尽管如此,大多数人还是错把混乱当成效,错把威胁当英勇,错把顽固当坚强;甚至有的人会呼吁这种无情的勇猛,固执的勇气和粗暴的正义感。但是,这是错误的。因为这些行为方式的提倡恰恰暴露出他的狭隘与软弱。不仅仅是愤怒的人会恶意攻击幼儿,残暴对待妇女,还认为他们惩罚狗、马和骡子是理所当然(就像泰西封的潘德拉提亚斯特脚踢骡子以泄愤);专制君主们狭隘的不宽容也会从他们野蛮的行为中体现出来,当他们被激怒,他们的心态就会通过其毒蛇般的残忍行为体现,对任何不服从他们的人会表现出极端愤怒。肉体遭遇沉重打击后会发生肿胀;同样,越是软弱的意志越是容易被击痛,他们的愤怒感也为因此日益增强。
这也是女人为何比男人更易怒,病人、老人或者不幸的人为何比健康、成熟或成功人士更易怒的原因。贪婪的人很可能因他的上司而生气、贪食者因烹调而生气、多疑者因自己的妻子而生气、自负者因有人说他的坏话而生气;但是,正如诗人品达所言,最严重的事情莫过于“执政者过度的野心会激起民愤”。愤怒主要是由软弱导致的精神上的痛苦引起的。有人认为,愤怒是在带有自卫冲动的过程中所产生的一种过度混乱的紧张思想,因此认为愤怒是思想的力量源泉,这种观点是错误的。
无论如何,看到这些可鄙的事例不太令人愉快,但绝对是必要的。不过,在我的耳闻目见中,我认为能以冷静平和的态度处理愤怒的人都是伟大的,所以我最初的出发点是鄙视那些声称“你冤枉他了,谁能忍受被冤枉?”以及“把他踩在脚底下,踏在他的脖子上,让他俯首帖耳” 的人:这些话语颇具煽动性,有些人不正确地利用它们将愤怒从女性身上转移给男性。我认为男性的刚勇几乎都是符合道德标准的,但在涉及温和亲切的问题时却不适用,因为温和亲切的人更有自制力。恶人可能凌驾于善人之上,但是战胜愤怒代表一种强大的、不可抵抗的意志力(哲学家赫拉克莱塔斯的言论产生了“一个强大的对手, 因为它以牺牲思想为代价获得它想要的一切”)——这种意志力以理性判断能力为基础,是情绪对抗中真正的力量源泉。
这就是我不断尝试掌握和读懂这种事例的原因,不管是哲学家(聪明人认为他们不容易遭嫉恨)提供的事例,还是国王或暴君提供的事例。举个例子,当安提柯一世听到士兵在他帐篷附近咒骂他时,他愤怒地扔出长矛,长矛穿透帐篷,插在地上,他说:“哎呀,你们就不能去远点的地方批评我吗?”
阿该亚人阿卡迪亚经常批评菲利普,并建议避免“去那些居民像菲利普一样无知的地方”。然后,有一天他碰巧去马其顿,菲利普的朋友心想可不能让他不吃点苦头就轻易离开。但是,菲利普对他非常友善,并赠送了他礼物。随后他告诉他的子民去了解阿卡迪亚是怎么跟希腊人说的。结果他们发现阿卡迪亚成了菲利普杰出的拥护者。菲利普告诉他们:“所以说我是一个比你们都要优秀的医生!”在奥林匹亚,曾经有一些关于菲利普的诽谤流传开来,有的人提议,既然希腊人不顾菲利普的友善还要去批判他,就应该让他们受点苦。菲利普说:“如果我不善待他们,他们又将作出什么举动?”
同样值得称赞的还有庇西特拉图对色拉希布卢斯将军的态度、波森纳对穆裘斯的态度,以及马格斯对菲利蒙的态度。菲利蒙在他们演出的一部喜剧中公然用这样的言语嘲笑马格斯:“马格斯,这里有一封国王给你的信,可是遗憾的是你看不懂,可怜的马格斯啊!”不久,菲利蒙因遭遇暴风雨被迫逃往帕拉托尼亚,落到了马格斯的手里,马格斯让他的士兵拔出剑架在菲利蒙的脖子上,然后礼貌地离开,随后马格斯就当菲利蒙是一个智障的孩子一样给了他一些骰子和弹球,然后就让他离开了。
托勒密曾经嘲笑过一名学者的无知,质问他谁是珀琉斯的父亲,这名学者回答,如果托勒密能说出拉古斯的父亲是谁,他就回答他的问题。学者的言词对出身低贱的托勒密来说是极大的嘲讽,所有人都被激怒了,认为这种言词是刺耳的、不恰当的。托勒密说:“如果一个国王受不了别人的嘲弄,那他也不应该嘲弄别人。”
亚历山大在涉及哲学家凯利斯尼兹和克里托斯的事情上比平时要严厉得多。所以当波鲁斯被亚历山大俘虏后祈求亚历山大能以一个国王应有的气度处决他时,亚历山大问,“这就足够了吗?‘以国王应有的气度’就可以包括一切了”,波鲁斯回答。这就是“仁者”是众神之王的一个称号的原因(尽管,我想,雅典人称其为“暴君”):惩罚是悍妇或者半神半人之流的行径,而不是天神或是奥林匹斯山神的做法。
当菲利普夷平奥林索斯城时,有人说:“重建一座同样的城市并非他力所能及的”;而且,人们可能会气愤地说:“你们擅长拆除、破坏、毁灭,但是建设、保护、怜悯以及耐心需要的是亲切、宽恕和温和的情感:他们需要卡美卢斯、米特鲁斯、阿里司提戴斯还有苏格拉底,反之,瘟疫和叮咬是蚂蚁以及老鼠的行径。”
再者,当我考虑到怀恨在心这一问题时,我发现,怀恨在心基本上对于表达愤怒是不起作用的:只会因为费尽口舌、磨破嘴皮、虚张声势的攻击以及愚蠢的威胁诅咒而筋疲力尽,其结果就像孩子们赛跑时在接近胜利目标的一瞬间,失去自我控制突然减速一样荒谬可笑。罗得斯岛人在对欢呼加油大喊大叫的罗马民众表示不满时处理得很恰当,他说:“我没有被你们的喧闹所打扰,却被别人的安静打扰了”。还有一次,索福克勒斯让尼奥普托列莫斯和欧律皮洛斯装备好武器,他说:“没有自吹自擂,也没有大声叫骂,他俩捣碎了大规模古铜色的武器装备。”
关键在于,尽管有些粗鲁之人会运用一些恶毒的计谋,但是充满理性色彩的勇气根本不需要强烈的怨恨,而气愤和狂怒却是不近人情和不健康的。无论如何,斯巴达人会在有人发生打斗时吹起管乐器来平息怒火,而且在战斗前往往会祭祀缪斯以确保理性的稳定存在;如果他们彻底击败了敌人,他们不会奋起直追,而是偃旗息鼓,就像易操作的便携式小刀一样收放自如。但是,愤怒会导致很多恶果,许多人因坚持复仇而死:底比斯的赛勒斯将军和佩洛皮达斯将军就是这样两个例子。反之,好脾气的阿加索克利斯容忍了他所占领城市的居民对他的无礼和恶言冒犯。当有人问:“波特,你从哪里弄到钱来支付你的雇佣兵呢?”他大笑着回答:“瞧这儿,就在这个我夷为平地的城市。”曾经有人在城墙上嘲笑安提柯一世的独眼残疾,他却对他们说:“我认为我很好看啊”。但是当安提柯一世占领了城邦之后,他把那些嘲讽者卖为奴隶,并发誓将保持与他们主人的接触,看看他们是否还敢嘲笑他。
我还注意到,愤怒使得律师和雄辩家犯下极大的错误。亚里士多德曾写道,他在法庭上被来自萨摩斯岛上森林之神的朋友用石蜡堵住耳朵,以防被对手的辱骂激怒而把事情弄糟。而我们自己,不是经常因为仆人会害怕我们的威胁和言语恐吓而逃跑,结果对胡作非为的仆人的惩罚不了了之吗?保姆会对孩子说:“不哭就给你”。我们通常也会用同样的方法表达愤怒:“息怒,闭嘴,放轻松,你就有获得你想要的东西的可能和机会。”我的意思是说,如果一位父亲看见他的孩子试图用刀切割或雕刻东西,他把刀拿过来自己去做;如果在愤怒时用理性思维取代报复行为,那么应该受报应的人就会得到惩罚,这就使得理性思维而不是惩罚本身显得安全、健康和重要,因此在愤怒时往往需要理性思维。
所有情绪都需要通过训练对其中不理性和固执的部分进行引导、压制(可以这么说)和惩戒,但是如何对待仆人却是制怒的绝佳训练手段。问题在于我们对待仆人的时候不带有任何嫉妒、害怕或对抗情绪,因为我们有凌驾于他们之上的权力。日益增强的愤怒感会导致许多冲突和错误,就好像把自己置于一个光滑的下倾坡面上,却没有人会在前面接住你。我是说,涉及情感因素时,绝对的控制易于导致错误,唯一的解决办法是尽可能多地限制约束你的权力,当妻子或朋友指责你软弱、弱智时,要能够抵御他们经常的抱怨。
我本人过去曾因为上述指责对仆人非常苛刻,并且坚信如果不惩罚他们是对他们的一种姑息。但是我最终认识到,首先,耐心地容忍他们的恶劣行为要比专注于修正他们的行为好得多。其次,我注意到许多例子,当仆人没有受到明确的惩罚,他们会因为犯错而产生羞耻感,开始变得忍耐而不是怀恨在心。我向你保证,如果你能平和地处理仆人们的过错,而不是斥责或是鞭打,你会得到他们更热情的服务。所有这些都使我深信理智要比愤怒更具有说服力。有诗云:“有畏惧,才有敬重”,这是一种误解。实际上,还有这样一种说法:能够自我克制的畏惧感才能伴之产生敬重心。无休止的斥责不会使人对犯下的恶行后悔,反而会激起未来逃避处罚的侥幸心理。
第三,我时常提醒自己要牢记:箭术的学习是要学会如何射准,并非不射箭。同样,即使掌握合时宜的、适度的、有益的、适当的惩罚方法,仍然不会改变别人受惩罚的局面。于是,我尝试平息怒气的首要方式,不是剥夺被指控者给自己辩解的权利,而是聆听他们有什么要说。由于时间可以考验情感,为消磨情绪提供一定的空间,同时理性促使人们寻找到适宜的惩罚方式并了解其适合程度,所以,我的方法可以奏效。而且,一个人受到处罚是因为被证明有罪而不是因为愤怒,那么他是没有理由抵抗这种应得的处罚的。同时,仆人得到公平处理的案例也排除了其他不体面的因素。
亚历山大的死讯传来时,福基翁试图阻止雅典人太快起来造反,或太容易相信这个消息,他说:“雅典的子民们,如果亚历山大今天死了,那他明天或者后天是不会活过来的。”同样,在我看来,如果某人在愤怒的驱使下,选择鲁莽地走向复仇之路,他应该提醒自己:“今天犯了罪,明天或者后天还是有罪之身。有罪之人受到应得的惩罚晚了点并无害处,但如果执行惩罚过快,容易导致因罪行不确定冤枉好人的局面,而这在过去时常发生。”我的意思是,我们中有谁会因为一个奴隶烧坏了一顿佳肴或是打翻了桌子或是服从命令慢了点,而在五天或十天前就去鞭笞或是惩罚他呢?这也太令人讨厌了。但是当我们真正面对这些正在发生或是刚发生过的事情时,我们往往会变得混乱、苛刻和无情。静止的事物模糊的时候看起来会变大,愤怒同样如此。
因此,我们首先应该记住这样的事实。此外,如果在明确、稳定的理性之光照耀下,一件事物仍然看起来是糟糕的,那么毫无疑问我们可以自由地释放情绪。我们应当注意的是:不要在过后忽略或放弃惩罚,如同不要在没有食欲的时候下厨一样。当我们被愤怒充斥大脑时,最好的惩罚办法就是忽视它;当怒气烟消云散之后,不再提及这个问题。这种经历就如同懒惰的划桨者在风平浪静的时候抛锚停泊,起风的时候再冒险继续航行。面对处罚,我们总会过多地指责理性力量软弱无力,但是当愤怒呼啸而来时,我们又会不计后果地仓促应对。
关键在于,饥饿的人忙于觅食,既不饿也不渴的人忙于因果报应,这些都并无不妥。为了惩罚,他不需要愤怒,也许他需要的是一道开胃菜,他务必等待,直到远远抛开惩罚的欲望,并用理性去取而代之。阿里斯多德曾写道,在他那个年代,提伦尼亚的仆人会在风笛的伴奏下受到鞭打。但是我们不能为了图一己之快而去效仿,就如同一时受自我成就感的驱动,充满报复的渴望、享受惩罚的快感(类似动物的行径),而后又感到懊悔(像个女人一样)。相反,我们应该等到快感或悲痛了无踪迹,理性之光显现,在根本不受怒气驱动的情况下进行反击。
无论如何,显然没有治疗愤怒的良方,但是可以找到避免因愤怒而犯错的方法(如谢洛尼莫斯所说,尽管过度膨胀的发怒是发烧的征兆,但是抑制这种膨胀可以减轻发烧的症状)。我试着观察愤怒事实上是如何产生的,这时,我发现,尽管不同的人有不同的触发愤怒的原因,但是几乎每个人都认为,这种原因被轻视或者忽略。接下来,我们应当把所有惯常行为归因于无知、必需、情绪波动或偶然事件,并尽可能拉大任何特定行动与轻视或傲慢之间的距离,从而帮助那些试图避开愤怒的人。正如索福克勒斯所言:“我的主啊,不幸的人发现,即使是他们天生固有的才智也不具有稳定性,放过他们吧。”阿伽门农把他偷走女俘布里塞伊斯的罪行归因于他被魔鬼附身,还说:“我会做出补偿,给你大量礼物补偿你。”
引用这些例子的意义在于表明,如果一个人从心里藐视另一个人,那他是不会对他产生兴趣的。犯了错的人如果处于明显被羞辱的卑微状态,那他也会放弃任何藐视别人的想法。但是任何一个愤怒的人都不应该等到这些发生,而应该坚持像提奥奇尼斯一样,当有人对他说“奥奇尼斯,他们在嘲笑你”时,他回答:“我并没有感觉到被嘲笑。”所以,愤怒的时候不要去想自己是被轻视了,宁愿以自己因软弱、性急、懒惰、吝啬、年老或是年少无知而犯错为由去藐视对方。
但是,我们与仆人和朋友的关系必须完全消除这种印象,因为对我们而言,无能为力和无效的鄙夷在他们对待我们的态度上根本不起作用:假如我们公平地对待仆人,仆人会视我们是友善的;假如我们对朋友情深意切,他们也会视我们为朋友。但是,事实上,由于我们往往自认为被他人所厌恶痛恨,所以不仅对待妻子、仆人和朋友严厉苛刻,而且同样的想法往往给我们带来怒气冲天,导致与旅馆老板、船员、喝醉的赶骡人等发生冲突,或是对冲自己吠叫的狗、撞到自己的驴发脾气。我们这种行为就如同想要殴打赶驴人的人一样,一边大叫,“我是雅典人”,一边对驴说,“但是,你不是”,然后拳头如雨点般落到赶驴人身上。
如今,因关注自身利益和永不满足,再加上奢华而令人疲倦的生活方式,我们逐渐在心里积累了持久不变的怨愤,伴随着奢华与软弱,那种持续不断的愤怒感逐渐在人们的思想意识中蜂拥而生。可见,受自我适应环境的能力所限,除了拥有一份从容的快乐和简单的生活方式,再没有能促使我们善待仆人、妻子和朋友的更好的方法了。另一方面,“如果谁的食物烤焦了,煮透了,或者不够熟、熟透了或者半熟,这种不满都会导致他吹毛求疵。”如果喝不到加冰的饮料、吃不到现烤的面包、拿不到一点儿用没有花纹的陶制盘子盛的食物、不能睡在床垫上(除非它能像海浪一样鼓起来);如果总是鞭打或殴打餐桌侍者,催促他们快点,让他们跑起来、闹哄哄的、大汗淋漓,就好像他们是在卖治疗脓肿的膏药——任何这样的人都是被一种不稳定、吹毛求疵、抱怨的生活方式所奴役,并且没有意识到他正在创造这些形成他坏脾气的原材料和土壤。所以我们必须以一种简单的方式来培养我们的性情,使我们能够自我满足,从而更容易获得快乐。因为欲望越少,失望就越少。
我们应该以食物为出发点:安静地品尝手头的食物不是什么难事,不要焦虑地来回走动或取过量的食物,这会给我们自己和朋友的食物中强加入一种令人非常不快的调味料——愤怒。如果因为某种食物烧焦了、熏黑了、盐放少了,或是面包冷了,使得侍者或是妻子受到斥责与责骂,这顿饭就不可能有一点点快乐而言。阿凯西劳斯家有一次来了一些客人,他邀请朋友们共进晚餐,但是由于仆人忘了买面包,一些客人发出的尖叫声大得足以把墙震出缝来!不过阿凯西劳斯依然微笑着说:“非常棒,有知识素养的人喜欢这种酒会!”
苏格拉底有一次从摔跤学校把尤苏戴莫斯带回家,妻子粘西比对他们大发雷霆,辱骂他们,还掀翻了桌子。尤苏戴莫斯非常难过,起身准备离开,苏格拉底说:“有天我们去你家的时候,一只母鸡飞了进来做了同样的事情,我们并没有生气啊,是不是?”
我们应该用微笑和情感友好地欢迎朋友——对仆人也不要总皱着眉头或是让他们觉得害怕和惶恐。我们还应该要求自己乐于使用任何家居用品,不要有什么特殊的偏好。有些人(听说包括马略)偏爱特殊的高脚酒杯,即使有很多别的酒杯,也拒绝用来喝酒;还有些人钟情于某一种样式的油瓶和刮身板胜过其他品种。一旦这些特殊的物品损坏或是丢失,他们会很难忍受,往往会诉诸惩罚。所以如果愤怒是你性格的弱点,最好是减少对那些诸如杯子、戒指、奇石等稀有罕见物品的偏好,因为一旦失去它们,会比失去普通、日常的物品使人不安得多。因此,当尼罗制造了一个绝顶漂亮和奢华的八角形帐篷时,塞尼加说,“你已经使自己成为了一个贫民,因为这个帐篷如果失去将无可复制、无法复原”。事实确实如此,尼罗的船沉没时,他也失去了这个帐篷,只是他记住了塞尼加的话,没有为此过于郁闷。
不去刻意追求过多世俗之事的细节,就不会小题大做,对仆人就会变得温和亲切。一个人如果能够对仆人温和亲切,显然也会对朋友和家人和蔼亲切。值得注意的是,当奴隶被卖之后,首先他会试着去了解他的新主人是否脾气很大,而不是去了解主人是否迷信或是虚荣。事实上,一旦怒火中烧,丈夫难以忍受妻子感情淡漠,妻子则难以忍受丈夫的强烈情绪,朋友也会难以忍受彼此之间的亲密,通常情况下确实如此。所以,面对愤怒,不仅婚姻,就连友情也会变得不堪一击。而一旦愤怒消散,醉酒也不会成为一种负担。除非酒神狄俄尼索斯冷酷愚蠢地将愤怒而不是欢欣喜悦注入酒精,否则他的魔杖会对任何喝醉的人施以足够的惩罚。安提库拉治愈了简单的精神错乱,但是疯狂和愤怒的结合成就了一出悲惨神话。
我们应该在快乐的时候减少愤怒,因为它会让友善变成敌意;我们应该在讨论的时候减少愤怒,因为它会使关于爱情的讨论变成争吵;我们应该在决策的时候减少愤怒,因为它会给权威增添几分傲慢;我们应该在教学的时候减少愤怒,因为它会逐渐给受教者灌输一种信任感缺失和对理性的厌恶;当我们成功时,不要有愤怒,因为它会引发嫉妒;当我们失败时,不要有愤怒,因为它容易导致和怜悯自己的人发生冲突从而损伤他人的同情心。普里阿摩斯就是这样的例子,他叫道:“滚开,你这卑鄙小人,管好你自己的事情,别来打扰我!”
反之,容易满足是一种帮助,一种点缀,或一份喜悦,其温和的特质可以克制各种愤怒和不满。以欧几里得为例。他弟弟结束争吵时说:“如果这是我能做的最后一件事,我会向你报仇。”欧几里得回答:“如果这是我能做的最后一件事,我会说服你。”这个回答迅速使弟弟改变了主意。波利门有次被一个爱好奇石、沉迷于昂贵指环的人咒骂,他未作任何回应,反而去认真研究此人的一个指环,此人很高兴,说:“波利门,如果你在阳光下而不是这里端详这个指环,将给你留下更好的印象。”
有一次,艾瑞斯迪帕斯生埃斯基涅斯的气,有人问:“埃斯基涅斯怎么了啊?艾瑞斯迪帕斯,你们的友谊呢?”他回答:“友谊睡着了,但我会叫醒它。”于是他去问埃斯基涅斯:“你是不是觉得我完全没机会、没希望了?这就是你不责备我的原因吗?”埃斯基涅斯回答他:“鉴于你在所有方面都完全胜过我,所以你是第一个知道该做什么的人,这一点儿也不令人惊讶。”
有人说,“如果一个新生儿用他的小手拍打一只长着长鬃毛的野猪,可能比任何大力士更容易把它打倒——女人也是如此。”但是,我们常常是把一些野生动物当宠物家养,一边把狼和狮子的幼崽抱在怀里,一边却在愤怒地影响下对我们的孩子、朋友和熟人表现出厌恶不喜欢;我们像野兽一样用愤怒攻击仆人和同胞,还错误地将其称为“正义的愤怒”以掩盖这种行为的实质。在我看来,这种行为和那些把精神疾病和折磨称为“先见之明”、“独立自主”或者“敬重”没什么两样:我们的行为无非都是其中之一。
芝诺曾经说过物种是从组成人的特征的所有能力中提取而成的一种合成物或混合物。与之相似的是,愤怒看起来就是许多情感的种子汇集在一起而形成。它含有从疼痛、快乐以及自负中提取的成分;有恶意的沾沾自喜,并能从仇恨中得到格斗的方法。在这种意义上,愤怒的目的不再是避免自身的痛苦,反而是在摧残他人的同时也伤害了自己;同时,愤怒的成分之一还有一种最令人讨厌的欲望的表达形式,也就是伤害他人的一种渴望。我们走近一无赖的家时,听到一个女孩在拂晓时分吹奏的笛声,映入我们眼帘的是“洒落的酒和撕碎的花环”,还有门口喝醉的仆人。可是,伤害他人的欲望是愤怒的一部分,这样的事实解释了为什么会在易怒的人脸上、在他们仆人的纹身与镣铐上看到明显的残忍的迹象。发怒的人的嚎叫、被鞭打的管家和双手被绑起来的女仆的哭泣,是房子里出现的唯一持续的声音。这一切的结果就是,对于那些能看清参透这种伤害他人的欲望以及这种伴随着疼痛的愉悦感的人而言,愤怒实在是很可怜的一件事。
不管怎么样,任何本来出于真正的、正义的愤慨而变得习惯性易怒的人,必须使自己摆脱愤怒中过分的、不可调和的部分,连同对所遇之人的自负之气。当发生误把坏人当好人、或是遭到本以为是朋友的人的斥责或批评时,这种自负便成了加剧愤怒的主要原因。就我自身情况而言,我确信你了解我是多么出于本性的倾向于认可并信任他人,但就如同迈出一步之后就再无退路一样:我越是下决心要友善,就越容易犯错误,越容易受到伤害。今后,我或许不会削减这种对朋友的情感和热忱,但是我会用柏拉图的话来提醒自己要去抑制这种自负。由于数学家希里康山本身就是一个变化无常的人,所以柏拉图对他的赞赏就是这种表达方式。他声称警惕在他所在城市长大的人是正确的,因为既然他们是人或人类的后代,就有可能在任何时候出于本能表现出内在的弱点。
然而,索福克勒斯关于“人性中大多数可鄙的方面都将在调查研究中被发现”的论断似乎过于武断并具有局限性,但是,这种断言中悲观、吹毛求疵的论调会使我们不再那么易怒,不再那么容易发生破坏性的后果。我是说,对于我们而言,这或许是一种意想不到的、难以预见的结果。我们应该借用阿那克萨戈拉格言中总结的做法(如帕奈提乌在第一点中所言):他的儿子去世后,他说:“我知道我养育的只是一个凡人”。而且,每当我们要被别人的错误激怒时,我们应该自我批评,并告诉自己:“我知道我买的奴隶不会是绝顶聪明的”、“我理解朋友不可能是完美的”,或者“我想妻子也只是个女人而已”。如果有人不断重复柏拉图的话,“难道我不也是那样吗?”,他将会对内在想法而非外在行为进行思考,谨慎地中断抱怨,并且当他领会到自己也需要更多的宽容时,他将不再把大量义愤强加给他人。但是事实上,我们还是会愤怒、会痛斥,会听起来像阿里司提戴斯和加图一样:“不要偷东西!”“不要说谎!”“怎么这么懒散?”最可鄙的事情在于我们往往因为生气,却又在狂怒之下惩罚了他人;往往因为他人在愤怒中犯下的错误又用愤怒的方式去惩罚他。我们没有像医生一样“用良口苦药排出苦的胆汁”,而是加剧了事态的进一步恶化。
在记住上述需考虑的事情的同时,我还试着削减自己的好奇心。我是说,想知道所有事情的每一个细节,想调查了解奴隶的每一项工作、朋友的每一项活动、儿子的每一项娱乐、妻子的每一句私语——这些都会导致每天一个接一个的愤怒无数次爆发,反过来这又会加剧日常生活中的不满和阴霾。尽管欧里庇得斯认为“当事态变得失去控制,上帝就会介入,只留下一些不重要的事情让人们去冒险”的观点是正确的,但我仍然认为一个明智的人不应该为不重要的事情去冒险,而是应该忽视这些不重要的事情。他应该信任自己的妻子并让她去做一些事情,应该信任仆人、信任朋友并让他们去做另外一些事情(就像统治者信任并使用监督者、会计师以及管理者一样)。而他自己,应该凭着理性,去承担一些更重要、影响更深远的事情。正如微小的笔迹也会引起关注一样,过度紧张于一些不重要的琐碎之事也会激怒、扰乱人的脾气,一旦有更重要的事情危在旦夕,这种养成的习惯是百害而无一利的。
因此,总而言之,我开始相信恩贝多克利的格言“奉行斋戒,远离罪恶”是至关重要和鼓舞人心的。此外,不仅由于这是适当的,且因为它们不是无关紧要的实践哲学,于是,我开始在日常生活中,以虔诚之心履行这种誓言,如通过自制表达对神的敬重。要自制一年不受到性和酒精的玷污,或是自我约束在某一段指定的时期内不撒谎,或是通过自省,保证无论是漫不经心还是在重要时刻都讲实话。
然后,我把自己的承诺和这一切相比较,发现它就如同为上帝所亲睐、如同宗教般神圣。我的承诺开始时,相当于几天不饮酒——花几天时间克制怒气,这样做就如同在奠酒仪式上我倒的是水或蜜而不是酒,然后一个月、两个月,一直坚持这样做……这样,随着自我约束时间的逐渐延长,通过用自制力关注自己的行为,要求自己保持冷静沉着——一种神圣的沉默,并且不为邪恶的语言、异常的举动和行为所玷污,我的容忍能力也不断得到增强。为了一种数量上不大、性质上令人讨厌的快乐形式,情绪往往会导致大量精神上的混乱,还会产生最可鄙的悔恨之心。众所周知,就像那些只是偶然变得善良、体谅、无恶意,却不曾真正拥有这些品质一样,这种冷静、沉稳、宽厚是毫无用处的,我想这就是(在上帝的帮助下)我的经历往往能阐明这些观点内涵所在的原因。
论知足
摘自普鲁塔克写给帕齐的信。
希望你收到此信时,一切安好。不久前,我收到你的来信,信中,你建议我为你写一些关于知足、关于《提马亚斯》中需要仔细解读的段落的一些东西。几乎在同一时间,我们的朋友厄洛斯因为收到一封来自著名的丰达努斯的信,突然发觉他必须航行去罗马;通常,丰达努斯会催促他快点去。一方面,我没有足够的时间掌握你让我写作的主题,另一方面,我不愿意厄洛斯离开这里到你那儿时,你却发现他两手空空。所以,我阅读了笔记本里那些实际上是为我自己所写的、关于知足这一主题的笔记。我认为你想从这封信中得到实际的帮助,而不是一篇构思精美的演讲稿。我为你感到高兴的是,尽管你有位高权重的朋友,尽管作为一名政治演说家,你声誉卓著,但是你不曾有过墨洛普斯的悲惨经历:就他而言,“民众的奉承使他疯狂”并产生了异常行为,但事实并非如此。不,你已经很用心关注别人常常对你说的话:“痛风不会因一双显贵的鞋子而减轻,甲沟炎不会因为昂贵的指环而缓和,偏头疼也不会因为一顶王冠而缓解”。财产、声望和政治上的权力究竟如何有助于拥有一种免受痛苦的精神和一份像池水一样平静的生活?除非对财产、声望和政治权力的占有和使用是令人愉快的,否则,如果这一切正在失去,没有人会因此而感到遗憾。在许多试图超越界限的场合,除了理性通常能迅速抑制——并且慎重行事——头脑中情绪化的、不理智的部分,还有什么能确保它不会泛滥或是不会偏离正常轨道?
色诺芬建议我们在繁荣兴旺的年代记住和感谢诸神,从而在我们有需要的时候,就可以满怀信心地向他们祈求,因为我们知道他们是仁慈和友好的。理性的论据在帮助我们抵制情绪时没有什么不同:任何人在任何意义上都应该在情绪被激起之前充分注意,为有效防御做足准备,从而获得更多的惠益。你很清楚,凶恶的狗会因为任何一种响亮的声音被彻底激怒,但它只会在熟悉的人面前平静下来;所以思想情绪在被过分刺激时也很难有效控制,除非理性论据早已存在、由来已久并且烂熟于心,激动地情绪才能得到有效抑制。
“忙于公私事务的人是不可能感到满足的”,这句话不管是谁说的,它首先使得知足成为了一件昂贵的商品,如果它的价格不变的话。这就好像他对每个病人都开了同样的处方,写着“可怜的人儿,好好躺在床上休息吧”。然而事实上,不活动的状态对治疗麻木的身体是不利的,就如同精神病学方面,懒惰、软弱或是背叛朋友、家庭和国家,同样对消除心中的焦虑和悲伤不起作用。
其次,不繁忙的人就会知足的说法也不正确。这就像是说女人因为通常只忙于家庭琐事,就会比男人更容易知足。事实上,虽然(用赫西奥德的话说)“北风不会侵袭一名年轻女子柔弱的身体”,但是悲伤、困扰和忧愁会在嫉妒、迷信、野心以及无数虚幻信仰的作用下慢慢渗入她的体内。拉厄耳忒斯花了20年时间使自己远离文明社会,“只有一位老妇人照顾他,为他做饭、端茶倒水”。但是,尽管他避开了故乡、家庭和王国,可他这种无聊慵懒的状态还是使得痛苦成了他长期的亲密伙伴。不过,绝对的不运动在有的时候也有可能诱发不满。举个例子,“珀琉斯的儿子,宙斯的后代,快步如飞的阿喀琉斯,就总是坐在他船头尖利的船上,从不去参加能给人带来荣誉的集会,也不去参加战争,只是带着一颗渴望的心静静地坐在那里为战争哭泣”。这种极度悲伤的情绪使得他告诉自己:“我坐在我的船上,对世界而言是一种没有意义的负担。”
因此,连伊壁鸠鲁也认为安定平静的生活是不可取的;他说,想要身份和名声的人应当顺应其本性,参与政治和公共生活,因为他们天生就更容易失去平衡,容易被无为的状态伤害——未能实现愿望而受到伤害。但要他向无法安定生活的人而不是向有才干的人推崇公共生活是荒谬的。满足与否的界限不在于个人活动的频繁与否,而是应该通过善恶来界定:不去做善事就和前面已经说过的犯下恶行一样让人生厌和恼火。
有些人认为,免于痛苦的状态存在于一种特别的生活方式——比如耕作、独身或是拥有王权。米南德的话对他们可以说是一种警醒:“法尼阿斯,我曾经以为富有的人因为没有外债,所以不会在夜间叹息,不会辗转反侧难以入睡,也不会发出‘我多可怜’的呻吟。我曾经以为他们能够睡一个舒适、平静的好觉。”他继续解释道,以他的经验,即使富人完全经历穷人的一切,他们也会认为,“悲伤在某种程度上与生活相关吗?它与奢侈的生活相伴而生,离不开地位声望,随着贫困老去”。
想想那些害怕航海和晕船的人吧:他们心想,如果能够用小艇代替商船,把商船用作战舰,航行会变得轻松得多;但这是行不通的,因为他们仍有晕船的心理负担和恐惧感。这就类似于变换一种生活方式,它并没有从根本上消除使人痛苦和不安的因素,它们只是一种超现实的、缺乏辨识力的行为,无法也不知道如何让人们正确利用当下的环境去行事。这些问题如风暴一般困扰着富人和穷人,使已婚和单身人士都感到烦恼。它们促使人们逃避公共生活,结果发现安静的生活令人无法忍受;它们还促使人们去追求政治上的提拔,一旦得到却又深感不幸。“无助的状态会使病人有很多怨气”:妻子惹恼他们,他们对医生抱怨,对病床不满意, “有朋友探望是麻烦事,朋友不来探望又很无礼”,伊翁如是说。但是病痛消失之后,性情就会变得混合多样,健康的来临使得所有事物都变得美好愉悦。从这个意义上说,昨天还讨厌鸡蛋、蛋糕以及全麦面包的人,今天就有可能乐意就着橄榄和芥菜籽吃粗粮面包。
理性会带来态度的转变,在任何生活方式下都会带来一种满足感。亚历山大曾经在听阿那克萨库斯关于存在无限数量的世界的讲座时流泪。他的朋友问他怎么啦,他说:“如果真的存在无限数量的世界,而我连一个都还没有掌控,难道你不认为值得流泪吗?”另一方面,克里特斯带着他的箱子和旧斗篷,像一直在度假一样把整个生命都用在讲笑话上。此外,阿伽门农曾被作为一名国王肩负的过多责任所困扰——“你会认出阿伽门农,阿特柔斯的儿子,宙斯挑选他承担恒久的艰苦工作”——但是,第欧根尼待价而沽时,他躺在地上戏弄拍卖师,并拒绝起来,还用嘲弄的语气大笑道:“想象它是一条你要卖的鱼吧!”再者,苏格拉底在狱中还一直和同伴们讨论哲学,但法厄同触到了天堂的高度却哭了,因为没有人将他父亲的马匹和战车给他。
鞋会随着脚的弧度弯曲,反过来说则不成立。同样,我们言语中蕴含的性格塑造着生命。我的意思是,了解什么是最好的生活并且选择这种生活就会感到愉悦的见解是错误的,理性的智慧才会使你拥有最好的、最快乐的生活。由此可见,我们应该净化产生满足的精神源泉。假如我们不滥用外在的物质世界,那么我们将会发现它们与我们是和谐的、一致的。“没有必要因个人处境而生气,因为它完全是无关紧要的;但是成功只会属于那些能正确对待所处环境的人。”
柏拉图把生命比作掷骰子的游戏,重要的是不仅要适当地掷得合适,还要充分利用投掷的任何结果。就我们的情况而言,我们无法控制骰子的投掷也许没错,但是如果我们是明智的,合理利用所有交易的财富,并且在每个情况发生时把财富分配到相应的地方,如果分配得当,我们就可以实现利益最大化,如果这种分配不受欢迎,我们也能把损害降到最小。身体疾病会使人既无法耐寒也无法受热,那些浑浑噩噩度过一生的人也如此。在某种意义上,他们在运气好的时候狂喜,运气不好的时候悲伤,也就等于说好运和厄运都会使他们打破平衡。更确切地说,不管当他们遭遇到了好运或是厄运,都会失去自我平衡;当他们遇到任何一件可能称为好的事情也会发生同样的故事。无神论者提奥多鲁斯常说,他用右手发讲稿,但是听众却用左手接住讲稿;一个未受过教育的人,面临一个适当的、顺手的机会时,往往只能笨拙地或是用左手去抓,看起来就像个傻子。麝香草,一种最辛辣最干燥的植物,能给蜜蜂提供蜜;同样,聪明人总能从最严峻险恶的处境中找到最合适、对自己最有用的事情。
那么,应该实施和追求的首要事情是用石头击中了后母而未击中狗的人所表现出来的态度:“那也不是一件坏事!”他说。改变机遇是可能的,所以机遇不再不受欢迎。第欧根尼被流放,“也不是一件坏事”,因为他从此开始研究哲学。基提翁的芝诺从商船队仅仅留下了一艘船,但当他获悉就连这一艘也失去了、所有货物都沉没了的时候,他说:“感谢命运,驱使我穿上了一个褴褛的斗篷。”
为何我们不能以同样的方式行事?你没有得到你所追求的公共职务吗?那你可以住在乡下专注于自己的小买卖了。你向有权的人讨欢心被拒绝了吗?那你现在可以拥有没有危险和麻烦的生活了啊。你又一次开始热衷于世间的事务和烦扰了吗?呃,用品达的话来说:名望和尊重与权力关联时,如何使“工作变得舒心愉快,使劳动不再辛苦”,与之相比,“温水让身体放松的程度就不那么重要了。”当谎言和恶意中伤弥漫在你周围,你是否面临痛苦和侮辱?如同柏拉图受友情的驱使为狄俄尼索斯效力一样,这场随之而来的暴风也会把你吹向缪斯女神和研究院。
接下来有关知足的另一重要方面是对名人的思考。他们是如何做到完全不受所处环境的影响的呢?比如,没有孩子是你面临的问题吗?看看罗马的君王,没有一个人有儿子能继承他们的王位。你在为当下的贫困而负担沉重吗?那么你宁愿成为愚笨的皮奥夏人而不是伊巴密浓达一样的将军吗?宁愿成为任何一个罗马人而不是法布里希奥斯吗?“可是我的妻子被人勾引了!”那么,你难道没有读过特尔斐的铭文吗:“为水和土的主——埃杰斯所立”。难道你没听说他的妻子泰密娅同亚西比德私通,并且压低声音对女佣说她常常称她的孩子为亚西比德吗?但是这一切仍然没有阻碍埃杰斯成为他那个时代最著名最重要的希腊人。再举个例子,斯提尔波女儿的放荡影响了他拥有一份比任何同辈哲学家更悠闲的生活吗?事实上,当梅特克勒斯告诉斯提尔波他女儿的所作所为时,斯提尔波说:“这是我的过错还是她的过错呢?”梅特克勒斯说:“是她的过错,却是你的不幸。”“你的意思是?”斯提尔波问。 梅特克勒斯回答:“一个过错难道不是一种错误吗?当然是。”“难道任何一个犯了错误的人都会遭遇到挫折?”斯提尔波继续问。梅特克勒斯表示同意。“那么难道任何一个遭到挫折的人都会感到不幸吗?”斯提尔波最后说。这种冷静、哲学式的辩论表明,愤世嫉俗的中伤只是虚张声势的吠叫声而已。
尽管如此,大部分人仍然会被敌人以及朋友或亲人的错误伤害或激怒。我的意思是,傲慢、易怒、恶意、怨恨、妒忌和充满敌意的人本身不仅饱受折磨,而且会干扰或惹怒那些缺乏理智的人——无疑,邻居的急性子、熟人的坏脾气、公共管理者的不公正也是如此。我想你也不会因这些缺点免受苦恼。就像索福克勒斯的医生用“苦药冲洗排掉苦胆汁”一样,你会用愤怒和痛苦对这种情绪作出反应。但是这是不理智的。因为你受托和从事的公共事务由那些性格不够坦率、脾气不够好的人管理,就像外表精美的工具反而容易有锯齿形缺口或者弯曲。因此,无论如何你也不应该把它看成是一件容易的事,要想到理清这些事务是你分内之事。不管怎样,如果你像医生将拔牙器和手术钳用于合适的场合——当情况允许时展现你宽容和谦虚的自我,那么你会为自己的态度产生一种愉悦感,并将战胜因别人不令人满意和不公正行为而产生的痛苦情绪;你将把它们视为(狗的吠叫)一样的自然现象;不再让别人的错误不自觉地影响到自己,而是让所有这些痛苦和烦恼慢慢消失在你性格弱点的低洼地带。
有些哲学家甚至是带着怜悯之心吹毛求疵。对一些运气不好的人,认为帮助其所遇到的人是对的,而分担他们的忧虑或是屈服于烦恼是不对的。更重要的是,当我们意识到自己的缺点和不完美时,他们也不允许我们不满或沮丧,反而告诉我们不要悲伤,而应该试着解决问题,这才是正确而恰当的。然后,你应该考虑到,因为与我们有关联的每个人、我们遇到的每个过客并不都是公正和善的,我们就去纵容自己发脾气和易怒,这是多么地不合逻辑啊。
不,我亲爱的帕齐,我们谴责和担心所遇到的人的不公正行为只会在某种程度上、而不是在通常意义上影响到我们,你必须确定这不是自欺欺人——换言之,你必须确定我们不是受私心所驱使,而是出于对不良行为的憎恶。关键在于,如果我们过度地被公共生活所困扰,有一种莫须有的冲动和目标,或者存在毫无理由的厌恶和排斥,那么,这会使得我们对他人失去信任感并因此而感到愤怒,因为我们会认为是他们给我们造成损失和意外。高度的满足感和冷静的心态是那些能够不焦躁、不烦恼地应对处理公共生活的人们所具备的一种特质。
记住这一点,现在让我们回到环境这一问题。当我们发烧了,任何事物尝起来都是苦的、不合意的,但是,一旦我们看见别人对同样的食物很喜欢,我们就会停止对这些食物饮品的埋怨,开始归咎于自己的病痛。同样,如果看见别人对某种处境欣然接受而不会感到不安,我们也会停止对同样处境的抱怨,也不会满腹牢骚了。所以,当令人讨厌的情况发生时,有益于产生满足感的做法是:不要无视那些我们拥有的高兴和美好的事情,并且通过协调处理应对,使生活中的积极因素掩盖那些糟糕事情的刺眼光芒。但是,当下的情况是:尽管当我们的眼睛被过于耀眼的事物所损伤,我们会转移视线用花草的缤纷颜色来缓解;但是我们对心灵的治疗却往往大相径庭:我们竭力让它看见伤害它的方方面面,迫使它用那些令人不快的事情占据思想,几乎极端地将其与积极因素撕裂开来。但是对于喜欢搬弄是非的人,可以将问题转到这样的情境中妥善处理:“你这个不怀好意的人,为什么这么快发现别人的缺点,却忽视了自己的缺点呢?”因此,我们可以这样问:朋友,为什么你总是过度地专注于自己的缺点并时常使其更清晰、更显眼,而不去用心思考你所拥有的美好事物呢?拔火罐是把肉体里最糟糕的部分拔出来,同样,你也在吸收性格中非常不好的部分。你慢慢变得和希俄斯岛人差不多。他们常常向别人出售大量的优质葡萄酒,但自己吃饭时,总是品尝各种葡萄酒,直到他找到一种带酸味儿的酒;当有人问他的一个仆人:你的主人在干什么?仆人回答:“吹毛求疵。”
事实上,大多数人都会在生活中绕开好的、令人耳目一新的事物,直接寻找那些煞风景的、糟糕的部分。但是亚里斯提卜却不一样:他善于放松心情,(想象自己处在一个天平上)让自己翘起来,朝自己好的方面发展。无论如何,他曾经失去过一处好房产,很多人毫无诚意地向他表示难过和同情。他问其中一个人:“你不是只有一小块土地吗?而我仍然还有三处农场。”那个家伙说“是的”。亚里斯提卜说:“那么,难道不是我应该向你表示遗憾吗?为什么倒过来了?”这个事情的关键点在于,不为所拥有的感到开心而为失去的感到烦恼是很愚蠢的;否则,我们的行径就如同小孩子因失去众多玩具中的一个而大哭、尖叫并且扔掉其余的所有玩具一样。同理,如果我们被命运击痛一次,我们的不满和怨气就会使我们失去其他一切有益于我们的事物。
有人也许会问:“但是说来什么是我们拥有的或是未拥有的呢?”名声、财产、婚姻、好友——这些是人们所拥有的东西。当塔尔苏斯的安提帕特快要死的时候,他累加了一生中所发生的所有好事情,其中甚至还包括从西里西亚到雅典的一次简单旅行。而且,我们不可忽视和他人共同分享的所有事情,好好重视它们,要感恩于我们可以拥有生命和健康;感恩于可以漫步在这个世界;感恩于无论是国内还是国外都没有战争;感恩于不管是选择耕田还是航海旅行都无所惧怕;感恩于从演讲和政治到平静、怠惰的生活都能最大可能地向我们开放。如果假想我们不曾拥有这些,并且经常自我提醒病人多么渴望健康、战乱中的人们多么渴望和平、一个生活在大城市的不起眼的陌生人多么渴望获得名声和朋友,还提醒自己失去曾经拥有的一切是多么的痛苦,那么我们的满足感会不断增强。如果我们这样做,一旦失去曾经拥有的事情,才会高度重视和评价它们;只要还曾拥有,我们往往完全忽视。我的意思是说,事实上我们不拥有某事并不能增加其价值;所以不要迫切求取,不要害怕失去而常常颤抖流泪,仿佛这些事物非常重要似的;而是应该不理会或是忽视它们,当拥有了,也视它们犹如毫无价值。相反,如果拥有了它们,应该首先尽情享用并从中获益,这样,一旦失去,我们就能很镇定平静地接受。阿凯西劳斯常常指出,尽管大部分人都认为用头脑去探索,用眼睛去审视他人的诗歌、绘画、雕塑的每个微小细节是一种责任,但是他们忘了,他们自己的生活能提供大量使人愉悦的方方面面:他们只是不断地关注别人,对别人的地位和财富留下印象,就如同奸夫都是被别人的妻子所吸引,却轻视和贬低自己及自己所拥有的东西。
然而,对于满足而言,另一个重要的方面就是尽最大可能限制对自己或是与自己相关的事情的审视,抑或,认为他人并不比自己富有。应该避免的是一味向富人看齐,尽管这是我们惯常的做法:例如,犯人羡慕已经被释放的人,被释放了的人羡慕一直自由的人,一直自由的人又会羡慕有公民身份的人,有公民身份的人反过来又会羡慕有钱人,有钱人又羡慕地方官员,官员羡慕统治者——因为统治者大多渴望能够呼风唤雨——统治者羡慕上帝。结果,由于他们永远得不到那些无法企及的事情,所以对身边的任何事情也都失去了感恩之心。“我对黄金满载的古阿斯的财富没什么兴趣,我从不会被嫉妒心所控制,不会去试图模仿众神,也不会渴望拥有一个王国,我不会把目光投向如此飘渺的风景。”
也许有人会说:“因为这是萨索斯岛人的言论”,可是,还有一些外地人——如来自希俄斯岛、加纳提亚或比提尼亚的人,他们为在同胞中获取一部分地位或权力感到并不满足。他们因为没有穿上贵族的袍服而哭泣;如果成为了贵族,会因为没有掌握对罗马的军事控制权而哭泣;如果掌握了军事控制权,又会因为他们不是执政官而哭泣;如果成为了执政官,还会因为没有在宣告时名列第一而哭泣。这些借口对财富的获得是徒劳的,所以只能说这一切是一种自我苦修或者是自作自受的一种惩罚。另一方面,任何心智健全的人都能发现,太阳看到无数成千上万的人“享受着在广阔土地上的劳作”而没有陷入沮丧和失望,即使有人比他们更加出名和富有。有如此多的人的生命要比成千上万的人更加完美,所以他们继续走自己的路,欢庆自己拥有的命运和生活。
奥运会上不可能选择对手并以此获取胜利,但是生命中确实会出现感受更好生活状况的机会——被羡慕而不是羡慕别人,当然,除非是百手巨人布里亚柔斯或者大力英雄赫拉克勒斯和自己互斗!所以,当你发现自己被一个坐在轿车里忘我入神的人表现出的明显优越感吓住时,务必要俯视他和那些带他离开的人们;当你发现自己妒忌薛西斯,就像赫勒斯庞特人那样,在薛西斯的浮桥横跨的著名地点,确信你也看到了他被鞭子驱逐着去挖掘阿托斯圣山,以及当桥被波涛冲毁时一派支离破碎的景象;所以,如果你也能考虑到他们的想法,你会发现他们也在羡慕你的生活和处境。
苏格拉底曾听说一个朋友评论雅典物价昂贵:“希俄斯人的葡萄酒需要一迈纳,三迈纳才能买一件紫色的长袍,一科梯勒蜂蜜需要五德拉克马。”苏格拉底拉住这个朋友给他拿出一些谷粒,并告诉他:“在雅典,一欧宝可以买半hekteus——便宜”;又拿出一些橄榄:“两个青铜币可以买一公升——便宜”;又拿出一些简易斗篷:“十德拉克马可以买到——雅典的东西便宜。”所以当我们听到有人评论目前的个人处境很微不足道并且非常痛苦时,因为自己既不是执政官也不是总督,我们可以回答:“我们的处境并不是完全不尽人意,我们的生活也是可羡慕的,因为我们不是乞丐,不是搬运工,也不是马屁精。”
尽管如此,我们还是愚蠢地习惯关注别人的生活,而不是把注意力集中在自己身上。由于人的本性中包含大量恶意嫉妒和怨恨的成分,所以结果往往是,我们对自己成功的喜悦程度要远远低于对别人成功的愤怒程度。那么,你除了必须要看到你所羡慕和嫉妒的人所具备的辉煌、优秀的特质,还必须揭开他们表面的、代表名望的绚丽面纱,走进他们的内心,你会发现他们也有大量令人讨厌的个性以及很多不愉快的事情,无论如何,皮塔克斯的所言是有教育意义的,因为他以勇气、智慧和品行享有盛名:有一次他约几个朋友一起吃饭,妻子愤怒地冲进来并掀翻了桌子,朋友们愕然,但他却说:“没有人的生命是完美的,一个人哪怕仅仅只有像我这样的烦恼,他的生命就是非常富有的。”
“这个男人在公共场合是被羡慕的对象,但是当他回家打开家门,他就处于一个令人同情的状态:他的妻子完全掌控了他,对他发号施令并且不断唠叨。他有相当多的理由悲伤痛苦,然而我却不是。”很多这类烦恼都是伴随财富、名望和王权而生,但大部分人没有注意到华丽外表下隐藏的这一切。“阿特柔斯的儿子,你是幸运的——你的出生受到了命运的亲睐,你注定会成功”:这种荣誉以武器、马匹、大规模的军队等外在财产的形式给予他,但是从矛盾的情绪化的哭喊声中,承担着这种空虚的名声——“克罗诺斯的儿子宙斯极度疯狂地完全囚禁了我”,“我真羡慕你,老人家,我羡慕任何一个可以保护自己免受盛名所累,而安全度过一生的人。”那么,这是另外一个我们应该牢记的问题,对待命运不要过多地吹毛求疵,不要因为羡慕身边熟人的品性,而贬低和轻视自己的拥有。
现在,对于知足这一问题,最大的阻碍就是无法使自己的欲望保持收放自如,就是说,在某种程度上,是收住欲望还是打开欲望更符合当下的形势所趋。但是,我们因为希望反而给了欲望太多的松弛空间,当我们失败的时候,却总是责备命运多舛或是运气不好,而没有看到自己的愚蠢。我们不要把一个用犁射击、用牛捕猎野兔的人描述为不幸,也不要认为一个无法用鱼篓或是曳网捕获鹿或野猪的人遭遇了坏运气:力图做一些根本不可能的事情是愚蠢糊涂的。事实上,主要原因是自负使他们在任何情境下都野心勃勃、求胜心切,是自负使他们贪婪地想拥有一切:他们不仅渴望富有、博学、强壮、活泼、愉悦、亲近君王和国家政要,而且为因为他们的狗、马、鹌鹑和公鸡不是最好的而感到不满。
老狄俄尼索斯对成为当时最著名的统治者并不满意,然而因为他写的诗比费罗萨努斯的糟糕,又因为他在哲学讨论中没有胜过柏拉图,他勃然大怒:把费罗萨努斯囚禁在采石场,把柏拉图遣到埃伊纳岛卖为奴隶。亚历山大则不同:当他和短跑运动员克利森比赛时,发现克利森故意放慢速度时,非常生气。阿基里斯在诗中也表达得很好:开头部分他写道,“战场上,任何一个身披盔甲的亚加亚人都不是我的对手”,接着又写道,“他们在集结装配上很擅长。”当波斯人迈加比佐斯参观阿佩利斯的画室并打算展开一场关于艺术的谈话时,阿佩利斯打断了他并让他闭嘴:“只要你保持安静就行了,因为你戴的那些金银珠宝、身着的那些紫色长袍,即使是我们这里研磨颜料的小伙子都在嘲笑你的胡说八道。”
现在,虽然人们可能认为,当他们听到斯多葛学派的哲学家描述的圣人不仅只是明智的、道德的、勇敢的,而且也是一位演说家、诗人、军事指挥官,或者拥有财富或是国王时,他们认为这是在开玩笑,但尽管如此,他们还是希望能得到所描述的这一切,如果得不到,他们会因此而烦恼。尽管不同的神掌管不同的职能:有的被称为战神,有的被称为预言之神,还有的被称为财富之神;而阿佛洛狄特被宙斯授权掌管婚姻爱情,正是因为她的领地不包括任何军事事务。
问题在于,有些追求本身便不是相辅相成的,而是背道而驰的。比如说,修辞训练和科学知识的获取需要的是自由、没有压力,但是一个人要想获得政治权力以及与国王的亲近,却不能摆脱繁忙、耗时的生活状态。还有,“喝酒吃肉会使身体变得健康强壮,却会使智力减退”;尽管对金钱的经常关注和留意有助于增加财富,但是对金钱的藐视和轻蔑却是形成一种人生观的重要来源。所以,不是所有的事情都适合所有人:你应该遵循神的旨意,要有自知之明,然后去做一些自然而然适合你的单一的事务;你还应该避免强行或是不合规律地迫使自己去羡慕那些不同的人在不同的时间所拥有的可供选择的生活方式。“马被套上马具用来运货,牛被装上犁用来耕田;海豚因航船驶过而以极快的速度猛冲;要想捕获野猪就必须先找到一条勇敢的猎狗。”
但是,有人因为不能同时成为“百兽之王”的狮子和被寡妇爱抚的小马尔济斯犬而感到悲伤难过,这真是疯狂的事情。但更疯狂是那些既想成为恩培多克勒、柏拉图或者德谟克利特去研究宇宙和万物本源,又能像欧福里翁有个富婆情人,或者像米迪厄斯能与亚历山大成为酒友对饮的人,这种人还羡慕伊斯美尼亚的富足、羡慕伊巴密浓达的优秀,如果不能成为他们,会感到生气和痛苦。我的意思是,跑步的运动员不会因为未赢得摔跤比赛而不满:他们只在自己的领域获得自豪感和满足感。正如索伦所说:“你已经占领了斯巴达,所以信守承诺。我们不会牺牲德行去换取财富,虽然目前是稳定的,但是在不同时期拥有财富的会是不同的人。”
当自然哲学家斯特拉图获知墨涅德摩斯的学生已经远远胜过他之后,他说:“你还想要什么?一定有更多的人是想用水沐浴而不是想把油倒在身体上。”亚里士多德在写给安提帕特的信中说到:“事实上,亚历山大凌驾于众人之上,并没有使他成为唯一能真实感受到自豪的人:任何认为神才是符合公认准则的人也会拥有同样多的权利。”问题在于,就像这些故事里提到的,重视自我拥有的人不会因为发现别人也同样拥有而感到烦恼。但是,目前的情况是,尽管我们不指望一棵葡萄树能结出无花果,一棵橄榄树能长出葡萄,但是如果我们无法同时兼具富豪、学者、军事指挥家、哲学家、以及善于奉承的马屁精、守财奴或是挥霍者们身上的优质特征,我们会胁迫自己,对自己不满,还会鄙视自己匮乏的生活和不完美的生命。
此外,还会有来自于自然界的明显提示。自然界会对不同的动物赋予不同的天性:它们不会都成为食肉动物、啄食种子的动物或掘食植物根茎的动物。同样,大自然也赋予人类广泛的生活方式:“放牧、耕种、狩猎或是依海生存”。那么我们应该做的就是选择适合我们特有本性的生活方式并付出努力,不去想别人的生活;换句话说,我们不要显露出任何像赫西奥德格言中所说的类似的缺点:“陶工会嫉妒陶工,建筑工也会互相嫉妒”。我的意思是,人们不会只试图同那些相同职业或是拥有同样生活方式的人竞争;有钱人会嫉妒学者,反过来有钱人又会被名人所羡慕,同时律师会羡慕雄辩者——尽管看起来很奇怪——自由的人和贵族又会万分敬仰一出成功戏剧中快乐的喜剧演员、舞蹈演员,还有那些在皇家法院工作的公务人员。这一切会使得这些人感到痛苦,并给自己带来许多烦恼。
从人与人的不同经历中显然可以发现,每个人都有使自己产生满足感或是不满足感的能力——罐子的好坏不在于是否放在“宙斯的门槛上”,而取决于你的想法。好的事情出现时,愚蠢的人往往会视而不见,因为他们心里总是想着未来;而聪明的人却会用记忆使它们保持鲜活,即使它们已不复存在。任何事物都是在最初很短暂的时期容易得到,但是转瞬即逝,愚蠢的人因此就认为这些事物与自己没什么关系或是不属于自己。有这样一副画,一个男人为了从地狱里爬出去不停地编织一条绳子,谁知绳子却让外面草地上的驴吃掉了,同样,大多数人往往会屈服于盲目的、徒劳的机会,但这只会耗尽他们的生命,不会留下任何结果,也不会有任何成功、快乐、轻松、互动和喜悦的瞬间。
这种遗忘使得人们不会将现实和过去混为一谈:它把昨天和今天区分开来,好像二者是截然不同的,同样对于今天和明天也是如此,从来不发挥记忆的作用会很快导致每个当下出现的事物变得不存在。学院派排除了这种假设的发展,它认为:理论上,生命的不断变迁会使得每个人日复一日地发生变化;与此类似,那些不用回忆保护或是恢复过往,而是任由其一天天流逝的人们,事实上也会使自我残缺不全、空虚,并对接下来的日子悬而不决,就好像去年、近期以及昨天发生的事情都与自己没有关系,或者简言之就根本没发生过一样。
所以,这是动摇满足感的又一个因素,但不如接下来我们必须考虑的这个因素重要。你知道停在镜子上的苍蝇是如何滑过光滑的镜面而附着在粗糙或有划痕的地方的;同样可以类比人类是如何掠过快乐、合适的事项,而陷入对不愉快的事情的回忆中。还有一个更好的类比是这样一个故事:在奥林索斯,有一个被称为“甲虫必死之地”的地方,甲虫飞进去后再也不可能活着出来:它们只能在里面周而复始地转圈圈直至死亡。同样,有人不会注意到这点,而是不断陷入糟糕的回忆却不愿意唤醒自己。
我们应该把思想看作一幅画,把所有的回忆看作各种颜色,从而突出那些明亮的、鲜艳的颜色,而把那些沮丧郁闷的记忆全部放在背景的阴影部分。我的意思是,阴暗的方方面面不可能完全根除或者消失:“世界是一个矛盾结合体,就像竖琴和琴弓”,人类社会没有简单纯粹的事情。音乐有低音符和高音符,语法有元音和辅音,对音乐的鉴赏能力以及文学写作能力不会是来自对某一个音符、某一个音标的厌恶和排斥,或者也不会来自另一个极端,但可以从中学会如何使用剧场去欣赏音乐,如何把各种音标巧妙地组合成优美的文字。万物都有对立面,就如同欧里庇得斯的诗句:“好和坏是不可分割的,但混合在一起使事情变得更好是可能的。”所以,继续上述比喻,面对矛盾,我们不要产生不满情绪或是放弃,而应该表现得像专业的音乐家一样:如果某个人演奏得不好,他们可以通过别的好的演奏削弱不好的影响,也可以用正确的音符掩盖错误的部分。所以,我们应该让生活充满协调的音符,实现各种因素的和谐共处。
我的意思是,米南德关于“每个人从出生的那一刻起,都会有神灵的陪伴,如同优秀的向导引领你探寻生命之谜”的说法是错误的。而恩培多克勒的观点或许是正确的,他认为每个人从出生时就开始受到两种命运之神的掌控:“地球与太阳、血腥冲突与宁静和谐、美与丑、快与慢、公平真理与黑暗质疑。”因此,既然我们承认每个人从出生起就具备了上述经历的可能,那么每个人就会天生具有矛盾性,任何人在任何意义上都会祈求更加美好,但同样也会对他人心存期待,而且从来不会采取过多的行为对待这两种对立面。所以,首先,如伊比鸠鲁所言:“对于未来,快乐的增多取决于减少对它的需求”。其次,对财富、名誉、权力、地位的享受感的增强取决于减少失去它们时的恐惧。从这个意义上说,对它们的强烈欲望会逐渐导致一旦失去时的强烈恐惧,所以把它们当作不过是风口上燃烧的蜡烛,减少或弱化对它们的兴趣吧。如果一个人理性地容许自己勇敢而不畏惧地面对命运,并认为:“命运的馈赠固然受欢迎,但即使好运逝去也不算什么太大的痛苦”,那么这种勇气和无畏会使得他完全享受目前的生活状态(因为他知道失去也并不是不可容忍的)。亚拉萨哥拉的儿子去世后,他声称:“我只不过是养育了一个凡人”,你可能不会为他说出这种话的气魄所驻足欣赏,但是也可以从他无论面对任何命运时的态度中反映出他的这种性格——“我知道我所拥有的财富是暂时的、不牢靠的”;“我知道应该把我现在的地位归功于有权力调配它们的人”;“我知道我有一个好妻子,但毕竟她只是个女人,而我的朋友才是天性多变的物种——人类中的一员,如同柏拉图所言”。
关键在于,如果发生的事情是不受欢迎的,但又是意料之中的话,没有任何余地让你认为“这不是我所想象的”、“这不是我的预期”或是“我并不希望如此”,所以不要捶胸顿足,迅速解决当下的混乱与忧愁,回到最初的状态吧。卡尔尼亚德斯经常提醒那些从事重要事务的人们,意外是痛苦和不满的终极目标。例如,想想马其顿王国比罗马王国小多少?但是当珀尔修斯失去马其顿时,不仅他自己痛苦地抱怨命运,大家也普遍认为他绝对比其他人更倒霉和不幸;但是当埃米利乌斯(他打败了珀尔修斯)放弃了对世界上差不多所有土地和海洋的控制权时,大家一致认为他是快乐的,并因此举行了盛宴和祭神仪式。有一个原因可以很好地对此做出解释:埃米利乌斯已经得到了一种地位并且知道总有一天会传给别人,但对于珀尔修斯而言,这种失去却是意料之外的。荷马有一些关于意外发生时会怎么样的好的论点:奥德修斯的狗向他摇首摆尾时他哭了,可是面对正在啜泣的妻子他却冷漠地坐了下来;原因就在于他对妻子是一种平淡的、理性的、可预见的感情,但是当他陷入其他不可预料的情境——意外的本性将会使之表现出悲伤忧郁。
笼统地说,当不愉快的事情发生时,由于其独有的特性,必然会带来烦恼和痛苦,但是,就所关注的多数这类事情而言,其实是我们自己的思想决定和引导我们去抱怨。因此,当面临后面这一类令人厌烦的事情时,有效遵循米南德的建议总是有益的:“没有什么经历是可怕的,除非你使它可怕。”他隐隐提出了这样一个问题:举个例子,如果你的父亲不是贵族,或者你的妻子有一些风流韵事,你没能赢得奖品,或者你失去了在剧院坐在前排的权力,那么除非真正影响到了你的身体和思想,否则又有什么差别呢?这些事情的发生并不会导致一个人失去良好的身体和精神状态。关于前面所提到的看起来是由其本质导致痛苦的那一类事情——比如疾病、压力、朋友或是孩子的去世——那么可以看看欧里庇得斯的著名言论:“我说‘可怜的我啊’——但是为什么呢?我只是经历了人类所应该经历的啊。”你看,没有什么理性的论据能制止情绪的低落,就像有人提醒我们:要和所有人一样,感恩这个世界,因为有些事情我们无法避免。由于生命的真实感,这种必然性只在人类的命运中存在,但是这种肉体的真实感只是人类诸多本性的一个部分,在最权威、最重要的方面,人们仍然保持坚定和无所畏惧。
当德米特里厄斯俘获墨伽拉之后,他问斯提尔波是否所有东西都被掠走了,斯提尔波回答,他没有看见任何他称为“我的”东西被带走。所以即使钱财被盗,所有东西都从我们眼前被拿走,我们仍然还拥有一些诸如“希腊人无法拿走”的东西。因此,不要全盘贬低和轻视我们身上诸如软弱、易变、对命运绝对顺从之类的本性。相反,我们知道一个人身上的缺点和不足(和对命运的依赖)只是很小的部分,我们自己掌控着好的部分,这一部分牢牢地容纳了我们所得到的最重要的惠益——正确的信仰、学到的东西和有助于养成美德的理由——永远存在,无法消除也无法被破坏。如果我们意识到这一点,就不再会害怕未来。关于命运,就像苏格拉底对陪审员所说的(尽管他表面上是对检察官说)——阿尼图斯和迈雷托能够判他死刑,但却无法真正伤害到他。
命运也许会使人面对疾病、被剥夺财富、被毁掉与他人或是与统治者之间的亲密关系,但是命运无法使一个优秀、勇敢、有着高尚思想的人变得恶劣、胆怯、卑鄙、低俗、心胸狭窄或是充满恶意,更无法使我们丧失一种永恒的人生态度,这种态度将指引着我们的人生方向,比大海航行中的舵手更重要、更有益。面对波涛汹涌的大海和狂风,舵手往往是无能为力的,他无法做到只要需要就能停泊在安全的港口,也无法自信、无所畏惧地忍耐所发生的一切:只要他不放弃,凭借他的技术,“就能通过把船的主帆正确地收至桅杆底部而逃离地狱般黑暗的海洋”,但是当波涛翻涌而来,他只能胆战心惊地坐在那里。反过来说,一个聪慧的人却可以避免产生大多数身体方面的问题:因为他的自我控制能力、有责任感的生活规则以及适度的身体锻炼都可以将疾病消除在萌芽状态;如果出现外部感染,就像暴风雨来临般,那么,如阿斯克莱庇阿德斯所言,“他收起船帆,离开航行”;如果一些意想不到的重大事件突然来袭,安全港口就在附近——他可以从船的缝隙中迅速游离。
你知道,不是对生命的渴望,而是对死亡的恐惧,会使无知者过多地依赖自己的身体并想牢牢抓住,(他想起由于奥德修斯对卡律布迪斯的害怕使他不得以抓住了一棵无花果树的故事),“当暴风来袭,既无法停泊也不能继续航行时”,他对其中一个选项不满意,对另一个选项又心存恐惧。但是,任何一个人如果开始了解思想的本质,不管是以何种方式,并且领会到面对死亡,思想上所经历的变化或者是为了向更好的方向发展,或者至少不会变得更糟糕,那么他就不再会害怕死亡,而是做好充分的准备知足地去面对生活。但凡不仅能享受到志趣相投的愉悦这种人生最高境界,而且还能在面对一些过多的讨厌之事和与其本性格格不入之人时,做到毫不畏惧地离开,并认为“上帝会宽恕我对它们宽恕”的这种人,决不会为生活中任何事情而烦恼、生气,或被打倒。
不管是谁说:“命运啊,我已经先发制人地与你抗争,并且已经消除了你的所有漏洞”,他的这种自信并不是建立在螺栓、锁以及坚固防御的基础上,而是一种可以对任何需要之人行之有效的信念。这种信念不应该引起任何程度的放弃或怀疑,而是应该带来赞赏、效仿、热忱,以及对微不足道小事的调查研究和自我检视,从而为更重要的事情做好准备,如此一来,对这一切人们无法避开、转移注意力,或是以“这可能是我所遇到的最难的事情”为由逃避。至于如果思想上自我放任,或是总以最简单轻松的路线运行,并且逃避一些令人讨厌的事情,只是夸大其中的快乐,那么结果会造就一种缺失进取心的软弱无能的现象。但是,如果只是训练思维并竭力将其用来合理地设想自己生病、疼痛,或者被流放的情境,就会发现,在这些明显的问题和恐怖的事情中,每一件都提供了许多不现实性、表面性和不可靠性,有详细的合理的论据可以证明这一点。
然而,即使号称“任何人不可能活着说‘这将不会发生在我身上’”的米南德航线让很多人不寒而栗;但这只是因为他们没有意识到可以通过有效的训练增强张大眼睛直视命运的能力,从而能避免一定程度上的痛苦;而且他们也不会形成“那里风平浪静”的自我暗示,就像那些享受不到阳光,只是在众多希望中成长的人,面对任何困难时,常常会选择放弃并且不具备任何抵抗能力。不过,我们也可以像米南德那样说同样的话:“任何人不可能活着说‘这将不会发生在我身上’”——但是要补充一句,任何仍然活着的人说“我决不会说谎、不会欺骗、不会偷窃、不会耍阴谋”,这是完全可能的。因为这信手就可拈来,完全由我们操控,而且,它对是否知足这一问题的贡献也不是微不足道的,而是巨大的。因为这种“使我意识到自己犯下的错误”的选择给思想打下了懊悔的烙印,将会像身上的伤口一样不断地渗透并刺痛心灵。
你知道,尽管通过理性可以消除所有不快,但是当良知刺痛心灵,或是内心受到良心的谴责,理性自身就会产生悔恨。因为寒冷而颤抖或是因为感冒而发热要比受外部冷热环境的影响所产生的同样感觉痛苦糟糕得多。同样,忍受随机偶发事件所引发的痛苦也要容易得多,因为这种痛苦源自外部环境;但是,如果为犯下的错误而悔恨——“发生这样的事情不能怪别人,是我自己的错”,由于这是一种源于内心、源于自己的感受,所产生的羞愧感带来的疼痛就会让人难以忍受。这就是为什么一幢豪宅、大量财富、优越的出身,以及高职位、好口才都不可能增加生命的美好程度的原因。平静的生活只会源于未曾被坏行为、坏动机所玷污的心灵,也正是这种心灵赋予了生命宁静、清澈的特性。这样的特征是获得完美成就的源泉,它不仅使当下的活动生机勃勃、令人愉悦,带来自豪感,而且还能使过去的记忆比未来更加有意义、有安全感,如品达的诗句所述:“晚年依然记忆犹新”。卡尔尼亚德斯说过:“即使香炉被清理干净,但它释放的香味依然会维持很长时间。”这不正说明美好的行为留给聪慧心灵的印象依然是愉悦清新的吗?并且,由于快乐得到灌溉而茁壮成长,你就能够不受那些悲叹、抱怨生活、把生命当做放逐灵魂的世俗之地的人们的影响。
我很喜欢第欧根尼的妙言:曾经有一次他去斯巴达参观时,看见主人热忱积极地为节日做准备,于是他说,“把每一天都当成节日一样难道不是一个好男人的标志吗?”如果我们能正确看待事物,每一天不也都是一个特别光荣的节日吗?世界是一座最高神灵的庙宇,没有什么地方比这里更适合于神灵。人们以出生的方式被带到这个世界,不用去考虑那些既有的、静止的景象,而要去观察柏拉图所描述的那些可以感知的明白易懂的事物,这些神圣的事物表现为一种容器,容纳了生命的内在法则和万物之运动——太阳、月亮、星星、不断流出再生水源的河流,以及为动植物提供营养的土壤。生命是探究这些事物的开始,再没有比生命更完美的方式能够纪念这些事物了;因此,生活应该充溢着满足与快乐,我们不要再犯那些通常易犯的错误,不要等到类似克罗诺斯、宙斯、雅典娜的纪念日那样的重大日子才去享受快乐,也不要只在通过给小丑或是舞者付费这种买来的娱乐中才能振奋起精神、活力四射。
此外,尽管在下列场合我们会井然有序地静静地坐下——当他加入时没有人抱怨、观看达尔菲游戏时没有人嘀咕、在克罗诺斯的纪念日也不会有人喝酒,但是,在上帝安排和指引的节日里,人们还是会因为把其余时间消耗在了对生活的抱怨、丧气和担忧中而感到羞愧。尽管人们喜欢欣赏乐器演奏出的美妙音乐和鸟儿的动人歌声,喜欢观看动物的嬉闹玩耍,而且当动物发出怒吼声、狂吠声或是看起来有攻击性的时候又会心生害怕和忐忑不安,但是,当人们发现自己的生活很古板、压抑,还会时常受到令人不悦的各种经历、事件或者焦虑的约束和限制时,他们也不愿意寻找一些方式让自己恢复或是放松。而即使当他人试图提供帮助,比如帮助他们如何做到毫无瑕疵地面对当下的处境,帮助他们回忆过往免于承担忘恩负义之恶名,或是帮助他们无忧无虑、乐观积极地拥抱未来,他们也会拒绝所有这些建议和帮助。
Plutarch
In Consolation to his Wife
TRANSLATED BY ROBIN WATERFIELD
PENGUIN BOOKS—GREAT IDEAS
Contents
On being aware of moral progress
In consolation to his wife
FROM PLUTARCH TO HIS WIFE. I hope this finds you well. The man you sent to give me the news of our child's death seems to have missed me during his overland journey to Athens, but I heard about it from my granddaughter when I got to Tanagra. I imagine that the burial rites are over by now, and I hope they were conducted in a way that makes the chance of your feeling distress at the burial both now and in the future as remote as possible. But if there is something you haven't yet done, even though you want to, because you are waiting to hear what I intend to do, and it is something which you think would make things easier to bear, then it will happen too, with no fuss and superstitious nonsense - not that you are at all liable to these faults.
All I ask, my dear, is that while reacting emotionally you make sure that both of us - me as well as you - remain in a stable state. I mean, the actual event is a known quantity and I can keep it within limits, but if I find your distress excessive, this will discompose me more than what has happened. Nevertheless, I was not born 'from oak or rock', as you yourself know, given that you have been my partner in bringing up so many children - all brought up with no one else's help in our own home - and I know how overjoyed you were with the birth, after four sons, of the daughter you longed for and with the fact that it gave me the opportunity to name her after you. In addition, one's love for children of that age is peculiarly acute, since the pleasure it affords is absolutely unsullied and untainted by any element of anger and criticism. Also, she was inherently wonderfully easy to please and undemanding, and the way she repaid affection with affection and was so charming was not only delightful, but also made one realize how unselfish she was. She used to encourage her wet-nurse to offer and present her breast not only to other babies, but also to her favourite playthings and toys: she was unselfishly trying to share the good things she had and the things she most enjoyed with her favourites, as if they were guests at her very own table.
However, my dear, I fail to see any reason why, when this and similar behaviour pleased us during her life, it should upset and trouble us when we recall it now. I worry about the alternative, however - that we might consign the memory of her to oblivion along with our distress. This would be to act like Clymene, who said, 'I hate the curved cornel bow! I wish there were no gymnasia!': she was always nervous about recalling her son, and avoided doing so, because distress was its companion, and it is natural to avoid anything painful. No, our daughter was the sweetest thing in the world to hug and watch and listen to, and by the same token she must remain and live on in our thoughts, and bring not just more, but a great deal more pleasure than distress - if it is plausible to expect that the arguments we have often deployed on others will help us in our hour of need - and we must not slump in dejection or shut ourselves away and so pay for those pleasures with distress that vastly outweighs it.
People who were with you also tell me, with some surprise, that you haven't adopted mourning clothes, that you didn't make yourself or your maids follow any ugly or harrowing practices and that the paraphernalia of an expensive celebration was absent from the funeral - that instead everything was conducted with discretion and in silence, and with only the essential accoutrements. It was no surprise to me, however, that you who never tricked yourself out for the theatre or a public procession, and never saw any point in extravagance even where your pleasures were concerned, maintained unaffectedness and frugality in sad circumstances.
The point is that Bacchic rites are not the only circumstances which require a decent woman to remain uncorrupted: she should equally assume that the instability and emotional disturbance which grief entails call for self-control, which is not, as is popularly supposed, the enemy of affection and love, but of mental indulgence. Affection is what we gratify by missing, valuing and remembering the dead, but the insatiable desire for grief - a desire which makes us wail and howl - is just as contemptible as hedonistic indulgence, despite the notion that it is forgivable because, although it may be contemptible, it is accompanied not by any pleasure gained from the desire, but rather by distress and pain. Could there be anything more absurd than banishing excesses of laughter and mirth, and yet allowing the floodgates of tears and lamentation, which spring from the same source as merriment, to open to their fullest extent? Or - as some husbands do - quarrelling with their wives about extravagant hair perfume and gaudy clothing, and yet submitting when they cut off their hair in mourning, dye their clothes black and adopt ugly postures when sitting and uncomfortable ones when reclining at table? Or - and this is the most irritating of all - resisting and restraining their wives if they punish their servants of either sex excessively and unfairly, and yet ignoring the vicious, harsh punishments they inflict upon themselves when they are under the influence of emotion and misfortunes which actually call for a relaxed and charitable attitude?
Our relationship, however, my dear, is such that there never has been any occasion for us to quarrel on the one score, and there never will be any occasion for us to quarrel on the other, I am sure. On the one hand, every philosopher who has spent time with us and got to know us has been impressed with the inextravagance of your clothing and make-up, and with the modesty of your lifestyle, and every one of our fellow citizens has witnessed your unaffectedness during rituals and sacrifices and at the theatre. On the other hand, you have already demonstrated in the past that you can remain stable under these circumstances, when you lost your eldest child and again when our lovely Charon left us before his time. I remember that I brought visitors with me on my journey from the coast at the news of the child's death, and that they and everyone else gathered in our house. As they subsequently told others as well, when they saw how calm and peaceful it was, they thought that nothing terrible had happened and that a baseless rumour had got out, because you had behaved so responsibly in arranging the house at a time when disarray is normally excusable, despite the fact that you had nursed him at your own breast and had endured an operation when your nipple got inflamed, which are noble acts stemming from motherly love.
It is noticeable that most mothers take their children into their arms as if they were playthings (after others have cleaned them and smartened them up), and then, if the children die, these mothers wallow in empty, indecent grief. They are not motivated by warmth of feeling, which is a reasonable and commendable emotion: their strong inclination towards shallow beliefs, plus a dash of instinctive emotion, causes outbursts of grief which are fierce, manic and unruly. Aesop was apparently aware of this: he said that when Zeus was distributing recognition among the gods, Grief asked for some as well; so Zeus allowed Grief to be acknowledged - but only by people who deliberately wanted to acknowledge it.
This is certainly what happens at the beginning: only an individual lets grief enter himself; but after a while it becomes a permanent sibling, a habitual presence, and then it doesn't leave however much one wants it to. That is why it is crucial to resist it on the threshold and not to adopt special clothing or haircuts or anything else like that, which allow it to establish a stronghold. These things challenge the mind day in and day out, make it recoil, belittle it and constrict it and imprison it, and make it unresponsive and apprehensive, as if the wearing of these clothes and the adoption of these practices out of grief cut it off from laughter and light and the sociability of the table. The consequences of this affliction are physical neglect and an aversion to oiling and bathing the body and to other aspects of the daily regimen, when exactly the opposite should happen: purely mental suffering ought to be helped by physical fitness. Mental distress abates and subsides to a great extent when it is dispersed in physical calm, as waves subside in fair weather, but if as a result of a bad regimen the body becomes sordid and foul and transmits to the mind nothing benign or beneficial, but only the harsh and unpleasant fumes of pain and distress, then even those who desire it find that recovery becomes hard to achieve. These are the kinds of disorders that take possession of the mind when it is treated so badly.
Nevertheless, I have no cause to worry about the worst and most worrying disorder which occurs in such cases - 'the invasion of malignant women', with the cries and expressions of sympathy which they use to polish and hone distress, and to prevent its being diminished either by external factors or of its own accord. For I know about the battles you recently had when you went to assist Theon's sister and defended her against the incursions of the women who came with their weeping and wailing - behaviour which is exactly the same as fighting fire with fire. I mean, when people see a friend's house on fire, then everyone contributes what he can to put it out as quickly as possible; but when that same friend's mind is on fire, they bring fuel! And although when someone has an eye infection, people don't let just anyone touch it or treat the inflammation, people who are grieving sit and let everyone who comes by prod at their running sore, so to speak, and aggravate the condition, until instead of being an insignificant itching irritation, it erupts into a seriously disagreeable affliction. Anyway, I know that you will be on your guard against this.
Please try, however, to use your mind as a vehicle for often returning to the time when this child of ours had not yet been born and we had no reason to blame fortune; and then connect that time with the present, and imagine that our circumstances are no different again. You see, my dear, we will seem to regret that our child was ever born if we find more to complain about now than in the situation before her birth. We must not erase the intervening two years from our memories, but since they brought happiness and joy, we must count them as pleasant. The good was brief, but should not therefore be regarded as a long-term bad influence; and we should not be ungrateful for what we received just because our further hopes were dashed by fortune.
The point is that a reverential attitude towards the gods and being charitable and uncomplaining with regard to fortune always yield a dividend which is both fine and enjoyable, and anyone who, in a situation like ours, makes a particular point of highlighting the memory of good things and turning his mind away from the dark and disturbing aspects of his life towards the bright and brilliant ones instead either completely extinguishes whatever it is that is causing him pain, or at least decreases and obscures it by blending it with its opposite. Perfume is always nice to smell, but it is also an antidote to unpleasant odours; likewise, bearing good things in mind serves the extra purpose of essential support, in times of trouble, for people who are not afraid to recall good times and do not critically hold fortune entirely responsible for every bad thing that happens. And that is a condition we should avoid - the syndrome of whingeing if the book of our life has a single smudge while every other page is perfectly clean. I mean, you have often been told that happiness is a consequence of correctly using the rational mind for the goal of a stable state, and that if it is a chance event which causes one to deviate, this does not constitute a major reversal and does not mean that the edifice of one's life has collapsed and been demolished.
Suppose that we too were to follow the usual practice of being guided by external circumstances, of keeping a tally of events due to fortune and of relying on any casual assessment of whether or not we are happy: even so, you should not take into consideration the current weeping and wailing of your visitors, which is trotted out on each and every occasion, prompted by pointless social customs. You would be better off bearing in mind that they continue to envy you for your children, your home and your way of life. As long as there are others who would gladly choose your fate, even including our present upset, it is awful for you, as the bearer of the fate, to complain and grumble, instead of letting the very source of your pain bring you to the realization of how much we have to be grateful for in what we still have. Otherwise, you will resemble those people who pick out Homer's headless and tapering lines, and ignore the many extensive passages of outstanding composition: if you do this, and nitpickingly whinge about the bad features of your life, and gloss over the good points in a vague and sweeping fashion, you will be behaving like those mean and avaricious people who build up a considerable hoard and don't make use of what they get, but still moan and grumble when they lose it.
If you feel sorry about our daughter dying before she was able to marry and have children, then again you can find other reasons for cheering yourself up, in that you have known and experienced both these states: I mean, they cannot simultaneously be significant and insignificant blessings, depending on whether or not one has been deprived of them! And the fact that she has gone to a place of no pain ought not to be a source of pain to us. Why should she cause us to suffer, if there is nothing that can now cause her pain? Even huge losses cease to be a source of distress when the point is reached at which the objects are no longer missed, and your Timoxena suffered only minor losses, since what she was familiar with and what she found pleasure in were not things of great importance. And as for things she was unaware of, which had never entered her mind or caught her fancy - how could she be said to have lost them?
Then there is that other idea you've come across, which is commonly accepted, that it is quite impossible for anything to harm or distress something which has been dissolved. But I know that both the doctrine we've inherited from our ancestors and the maxims of the Dionysian Mysteries (which those of us who are in the group are privy to) prevent you believing this idea. So, since the soul cannot be destroyed, you can compare what happens to it to the behaviour of caged birds: if it has made a physical body its home for an extended period of time, and has allowed a plethora of material events and long familiarity to domesticate it to this way of life, then it resumes its perch inside a body and doesn't let go or stop its involvement, through rebirth after rebirth, with worldly conditions and fortunes. If old age is the butt of calumny and slurs, you should appreciate that this is not because of wrinkles, grey hair and physical enfeeblement: no, its most cruel feature is that it makes the soul lose touch with its memories of the other world, attaches it to this one, wraps it and constricts it (since it retains the shape it gained while it was acted on by the body). On the other hand, a soul which, although captured,〈remains only a short while in a body before being released〉by the gods and departing, springs back up to its natural state as if, although it had been bent, it retained its suppleness and malleability. Just as fire is quickly rekindled again and returns to its former state if it is relit straight after being extinguished,〈but the longer the interval, the harder it is to relight, so too the most fortunate soul is the one which is able, in the poet's words,〉'to pass as swiftly as possible through Hades' portals', before a strong love of the things of this world has been engendered in it and before it has become moulded to the body by being softened and melted as if by chemicals.
Our ancient ancestral customs and rules are a better guide to the truth in these matters. People do not pour libations for their infant children when they die or perform any of the other rites that in other cases one is expected to perform for the dead, because babies have not been pervaded by earth or any earthly things. Again, people do not linger over their burial or at their grave or in laying out their bodies, because the laws regarding death at that age do not allow it, on the grounds that it is irreligious to grieve for those who have exchanged this world for a fate, and a place too, that is better and more divine. Since mistrusting these laws is more problematic than trusting them, let us make sure that our external actions conform to their injunctions, and that our internal state is even more untainted, pure and restrained than our external activity.
On being aware of moral progress
Is there any argument, Sosius Senecio, which will salvage one's sense that one is improving and approaching virtue, if in fact progress causes no relief from folly, but vice circumscribes every stage and exactly counterbalances the progress and 'drags it down as lead does a fishing-net'? Take, for example, music or literacy: there can be no recognition of improvement here either, if the lessons do nothing to whittle away one's ignorance of these subjects, and one's incompetence remains perpetually at a constant level. And if medical treatment fails to relieve a patient's discomfort or in some way alleviate the illness and cause its remission and decrease, then it cannot afford the patient any sense that his condition is changing for the better, until his body has completely recovered its strength and the treatment has engendered the opposite condition with no trace of illness at all.
In fact, however, people do not make progress in these domains unless they perceive the change, since the instrument of their progress is relief from what was weighing them down (as if they were on a balance, and were being carried upwards as opposed to their former downward movement). And likewise, in philosophy, no progress or awareness of progress can be assumed if the mind is not freeing and purifying itself of fallibility, but is involved in absolute vice right up to the moment when it secures absolute, perfect virtue. Of course, it takes only a moment, a split second, for the wise man to change from the worst possible iniquity to a state of consummate virtue! And in an instant he has totally and utterly escaped from the vice which he did not even partially eliminate over a lengthy period!
Still, I am sure you already know that the authors of these assertions turn out to find 'the wise man who is unaware' extremely awkward and problematic, thanks to their own assertions. Consider a person who has not yet grasped the fact that he has become wise, but is unaware and uncertain in this regard, because it has escaped his notice that, by a gradual and lengthy process of subtracting this and adding that, progress has taken place and has steadily led him, as if it were a road, to an appointment with virtue. But if the speed and size of the change were so great that someone who is the worst of sinners in the morning can become a perfect saint in the evening, or if change occurred in such a way that someone could go to bed worthless and wake up wise and, with his mind freed of yesterday's fallibility and liability to error, could say, 'Goodbye, false dreams; I now see that you were nothing - if all this were so, how could anyone not realize that a change of this magnitude had happened within himself and that wisdom had enlightened him all at once? I would sooner believe that someone like Caeneus, whose prayer to change sex from female to male is granted, could fail to notice the transformation, than that someone who had become controlled, wise and courageous instead of cowardly, stupid and weak-willed, and who has in an instant exchanged a life at a bestial level for one at the level of the gods, could be unaware of himself.
No, it is a correct saying that one should 'Fit the stone to the line, not the line to the stone.' But the people who refuse to fit their views to the facts, and instead force facts into unnatural conformity with their hypotheses, have infected philosophy with plenty of puzzles: the one which fits everyone, with the sole exception of the perfect man, into a single undifferentiated category of vice is only the greatest of these puzzles. This puzzle makes the term 'progress' opaque: what they call 'progress' is a state little short of sheer inanity, and a state which makes all those who have not rid themselves of every emotion and defect still just as miserably off as those who have not escaped even any of the very worst vices. Anyway, these thinkers refute themselves, because in their lectures they place Aristides on a par with Phalaris in respect of immorality, and Brasidas with Dolon in respect of cowardice, and even go so far as to claim that Plato and Meletus are utterly identical in respect of ignorance; but in their lives and actions they refrain and abstain from the behaviour of the latter set of people, which they acknowledge to be heartless, and attach themselves to and trust the former set, whose example, as they agree, is in the most important respects of great value.
We, on the other hand, can see that 'more and less' can be attributed to every kind of vice, and especially to mental vice, which is a genus comprising an indeterminate, limitless number of species; and we can see that this is also what makes different stages of progress different, as reason gradually illuminates and purifies the mind by pushing back imperfection as if it were darkness. Consequently, we do not find illogical the notion that people who are being carried upwards out of an abyss, so to speak, are aware of the change, and we think that this awareness has definite, describable principles.
Here, without further ado, is the first such principle to consider. Just as those who are running under sail in the open sea use the time along with the strength of the wind to calculate how much of their voyage they are likely to have accomplished, given that x amount of time has passed and they are being driven by y amount of power, so in philosophy one can, to satisfy oneself, take as evidence of progress the continuity and constancy of the journey, and the fact that it is rarely interrupted by pauses followed by fresh effort and impetus, but is perpetually pressing forward smoothly and evenly, and using reason to secure its passage without stumbling. The advice 'If you add even a small amount to a small amount and do this often' is valuable for more than just the accumulation of money: it is universally effective, and nowhere more so than in the development of virtue, when to reason is added plenty of habituation, which is what produces results.
Any unevenness and dullness, however, on the part of philosophers makes them not only wait and linger on the journey of progress, so to speak, but even turn back, because vice seizes every opportunity to ambush anyone who gives in and takes time off, and to carry him away in the opposite direction. Mathematicians tell us that when the planets stop moving forwards, they become stationary, but in philosophy, when progress ceases, there is no gap, no stationary mode. Since human nature is constantly in motion, it tends to tilt as if it were on a pair of scales: it is either fully extended by its better movements or, thanks to the opposite movements, it plummets towards its worse aspect. So if - as in the oracle uttered by the god which stated, 'Fight against the Cirrhaeans every day and every night' - if you are aware of having resisted vice day in and day out without stopping, or at least of having rarely let down your guard or of having only occasionally admitted into your presence certain pleasures or amusements or diversions with a view to making a deal with them, as if they were envoys from the army of vice, then you have every reason to proceed towards the future undaunted and in good heart.
Nevertheless, even if breaks occur in one's philosophical activity, if later there is more stability to it and longer stretches of time are spent on it than before, then this is a good indication that hard work and repeated effort are squeezing laziness out. The other alternative, however, is bad - when after a short while setbacks frequently and continually occur, with enthusiasm shrivelling, so to speak. A reed starts growing with a huge spurt whose result is a smooth, unbroken length, and at first it is rarely thwarted or retarded and only at long intervals; but then (as if it had difficulty breathing up there) it grows weak and consequently starts to fail and its growth is hampered by the formation of many protuberances, with little room between them, as its life-force encounters bumps and shocks. This is an analogy for what can happen in philosophy: anyone who starts with a series of energetic charges, and then continually encounters drawbacks and interruptions in large numbers, while seeing no improvement, gets fed up and gives in. 'On the other hand, he gains wings' applies to anyone who is motivated by the benefit of philosophy and who, with strength and enthusiasm generated by achievement, cuts through the excuses as if they were a crowd of nuisances.
When you are with someone you find attractive, it is not happiness that is a sign of falling in love (since this is not unique to love), but pain and distress when you are cut off from that person; and likewise, plenty of people are drawn to philosophy and apparently set about learning with a great deal of zeal, if nothing else, but if other matters or diversions drive them away, that emotion drains out of them and their mood becomes one of indifference. On the other hand, 'anyone smitten by love for his beloved' might strike you as placid and tame while you are together, sharing in philosophical discussion, but you should see him when he has been cut off and separated from philosophy: he is feverish, restless, dissatisfied with every matter and every diversion; his longing for philosophy impels him, as though he were a mindless beast, to forget his friends. The point is that what is required is not that people treat discussions as they do perfumes and enjoy them when they are there, but do not go out of their way for them, or even have a positive distaste for them, when they are not there; what is important is rather that, when one is cut off from philosophical discussions (whether it is getting married or a sea journey or forming a friendship or military service that causes the separation), one should feel something similar to hunger and thirst, and so stay in contact with the genuine cause of progress. For the greater the gain from philosophy has been, the greater the displeasure at separation.
What we have been saying is basically identical or very similar to the ancient description of progress in Hesiod - that the path ceases being steep or excessively sheer: it becomes easy, level and manageable. It is as if repeated effort levels the path, and as though the journey creates a light and a brightness in philosophy, to replace the perplexity, uncertainty and vacillation which students of philosophy come across at first, like sailors who have left the land they know, but cannot yet see the land which is their destination. For they are in the position of having left behind what is normal and familiar, but of having not yet become acquainted with and in possession of what is better: they are going round in circles in the intermediate area, and in the process often turn back towards where they have come from.
Sextius the Roman was a case in point: the story goes that on account of philosophy he had abandoned his offices and positions of authority in the political arena, but on the other hand was, while in the philosophical arena, in a bad way and was finding the subject difficult; he came very close to throwing himself off the top of a building. And there is a similar story about Diogenes of Sinope when he was embarking on his study of philosophy: it was an Athenian holiday, and they were having fun and staying awake all night, with meals laid on by the state, plays at the theatres, and parties with one another; Diogenes was curled up in a corner of the agora, trying to sleep, and he found himself thinking decidedly upsetting and self-destructive thoughts, trying to work out how, under no external compulsion, he had of his own free will taken on a gruelling and unnatural lifestyle, and was sitting there excluded from all those good things. Just then, however (as the story goes), a mouse crept up and occupied itself with the crumbs from his bread; Diogenes started to use his mind and reconsider, and said to himself, in a critical and disparaging tone, 'What are you getting at, Diogenes? Your leftovers are a feast for this mouse, yet you, a man of stature - are you complaining and moaning just because you're not lying over there on soft, gaudy blankets, getting drunk?' So when that sort of bad mood occurs only rarely, and the mind quickly steps in to cancel it out and repel it (changing defeat into victory, as it were), and has no difficulty in getting rid of the agitation and restlessness, then one ought to regard one's progress as being on a firm basis.
Their own weakness, however, is not the only factor which can make students of philosophy waver and double back. The earnest advice of friends and the mocking, bantering attacks of critics can also, on their occurrence, warp and sap resolve, and have been known to put some people off philosophy altogether. Therefore, a good indication of an individual's progress would be equanimity when faced with these factors, and not being upset or irritated by people who name his peers and tell him how they are prospering at some royal household, or are marrying into money or are going down to the agora as the people's choice for some political or forensic post. For anyone who is not dismayed or swayed in these circumstances has clearly been suitably and securely gripped by philosophy, since it is impossible to stop trying to conform to behaviour the majority of people admire unless one has become accustomed to admire virtue instead; even anger and insanity give some people the ability to stand up to others, but disdain for affairs commonly admired is impossible without a high purpose, truly and securely held.
This is also the context of the proud comparisonspeople make between the two concerns, as when Solon said, 'We will not exchange our virtue for their wealth, since the one is permanent and stable, but different people have money at different times.' And Diogenes used to compare his moves from Corinth to Athens and back again to the great king's residency at Susa in the spring, at Babylon in the winter and in Media in the summer. Then there is Agesilaus' remark about the great king: 'He is a greater man than me only if he is more moral.' And in a letter to Antipater about Alexander, Aristotle wrote that the fact that Alexander rules over a lot of people does not make him the only one who can legitimately feel proud: anyone whose thinking about the gods is correct has just as much right. And when Zeno saw that Theophrastus was admired for the number of his students, he said, 'Although his chorus is larger, mine is more harmonious.' Anyway, when the contrast between virtue and externals has enabled you to eliminate from yourself envy and jealousy of others, and all the things which commonly irritate and undermine beginners in philosophy, you can take this too as a clear indication of your progress.
Another not unimportant sign is a certain change where arguments are concerned. Almost without exception, beginners in philosophy tend to look for ways of speaking which will enhance their reputation. Some behave like birds: because they are lightweight and ambitious, they swoop down on to the brilliant heights of science. Others behave 'like puppies', as Plato says: 'they enjoy dragging things around and tearing them apart', so they head for controversies and puzzles and sophisms. A great many beginners immerse themselves in philosophical arguments and use them as ammunition in casuistry. Occasionally, beginners go around collecting quotable phrases and stories, but just as Anacharsis used to say that, in his experience, the only reason the Greeks have money is to count it, so these people - in respect of the arguments they employ - are short-changed and short-change others, and accumulate nothing else which might do them good.
The result of all this is illustrated by Antiphanes' saying, in its application to Plato's circle. Antiphanes used to tell an amusing story about a city where, as soon as anyone spoke, the sound of his voice was frozen solid, and then later, when it thawed out in the summer, they heard what had been said in the winter; likewise, he added, what Plato said to people when they were still young only just got through to most of them much later, when they were old. People also have this experience when faced with philosophy in any form, and it stops only when their discrimination becomes sound and steady, and begins to encounter the factors which instil moral character and stature, and starts to seek out arguments whose tracks (to borrow Aesop's image) tend inwards rather than outwards. Sophocles used to say that he first lightened Aeschylus' heaviness, then the austerity and affectedness of his own style, and only then did he, as a third step, try to change the actual nature of the language, which has the most bearing on morality and virtue; this is an analogy for the fact that it is only when students of philosophy stop using arguments for display and affectedness and turn to the kinds of argument which have an impact on the character and the emotions that they begin to make genuine, unassuming progress.
In the first place, then, you must make sure that when you are reading philosophical works and listening to philosophical lectures, you do not concentrate on the phraseology and exclude the subject-matter, and that you do not pounce on awkward, odd phrases rather than those which are useful, meaty and beneficial. Secondly, you must be careful, when you spend time on poetry and history, in case you overlook any well-expressed point which might improve your character or ease the weight of your emotions. For just as a bee spends time with flowers, as Simonides says, 'intent on yellow honey', whereas everyone else appreciates and takes in no more of the flower than its colour and scent, so, although everyone else's involvement with poetry has the limited aim of pleasure and fun, nevertheless if someone by his own resources discovers and gathers from it something worth taking seriously, then it is by this token plausible to suggest that his training and love for what is good and congruent with his nature have brought him to the point of recognizing what is good and congruent.
There are people, for example, whose concern with Plato and Xenophon is limited to their language, and who glean no more than their pure Attic diction (which is, as it were, the dew and down on the flower). The only comment one can make about such people is that they appreciate the nice, flowery smell of medicines, but fail to ingest, or even recognize, their analgesic and purgative properties. By contrast, those whose progress is ongoing are capable of benefiting, and of gathering what is congruent and useful, not just from the written or spoken word, but from any sight and any situation at all.
Anecdotes about Aeschylus and others of similar stature illustrate the point. For instance, Aeschylus was watching a boxing-match at the Isthmian games, and whenever either of the boxers was struck, the audience yelled out loud; Aeschylus nudged Ion of Chios and said, 'Do you see what practice can do? The man who has been struck remains quiet - it is the spectators who cry out!' Brasidas once picked up some dried figs which had a mouse among them; the mouse nipped him and he dropped it: 'Incredible!' he remarked. 'No matter how small or weak a creature is, it will live if it has the courage to defend itself.' When Diogenes saw someone using his hands to drink, he took his cup out of his bag and threw it away.
These stories illustrate how attention and repeated intense effort enable people to notice and absorb the implicit virtue in everything. This is more likely to happen if they supplement theory with practice - not just 'by studying in the school of danger', as Thucydides puts it, but also by giving themselves a practical demonstration of their views - or preferably, forming their views by experience - whenever they are faced with pleasure and argumentativeness, or involved in decision-making, advocacy in court and political authority. As for those who, even while they are still students, occupy themselves with considering what they can take from philosophy and recycle without delay in the political arena, or to entertain their young friends, or at a reception given by the king, they are no more entitled to be regarded as philosophers than sellers of medicines are entitled to be regarded as doctors; or perhaps a better description is to say that a sophist of this kind is basically altogether identical to Homer's bird, because he regurgitates for his pupils, as if they were his 'flightless chicks', anything he takes in, 'and fares badly himself', if he fails to consider his own advantage and to absorb or digest anything he takes in.
It is therefore essential for us to make sure, first, that we approach words in a way that is beneficial to ourselves, and second, where other people are concerned, that we do so not because we want empty glory or public recognition, but rather because we want to be taught and to teach. Above all, we must make sure that, when investigating issues, there is no trace of rivalry and contentiousness, and that we have stopped supplying ourselves with arguments as if they were boxing thongs or padded gloves to be used against one another, and no longer prefer bludgeoning others to the ground to learning and teaching. Reasonableness and civility during discussions, neither embarking on conversations competitively nor ending them in anger, neither crowing if an argument is won nor sulking if it is lost - all this is the behaviour of someone who is progressing nicely. Aristippus gives us an example: once he was outmanoeuvred in an argument by a man who did not lack self-confidence, only intelligence and sense; Aristippus saw that the man was delighted and had got big-headed, so he said, 'I am going home now: I may have been argued down by you, but I will sleep more peacefully tonight than you, for all your success.'
When we speak, we can also assess ourselves by seeing whether or not we get afraid and hold back if a large crowd unexpectedly gathers round us, whether or not we get depressed if there are only a few to hear us debate, and whether or not, if called upon to address the Assembly or a person in authority, we throw the opportunity away by being inadequately prepared with respect to what language to use. This latter point is illustrated by stories about Demosthenes and Alcibiades. Alcibiades was extremely adept at knowing what topics to address, but less confident about what language to use and, as a result, used to trip himself up while he was addressing topics; often, even in the middle of speaking, he used to search for and hunt after an elusive word or phrase, and so get booed. By contrast, Homer was not bothered about publishing an unmetrical first line: his talent gave him plenty of self-assurance about the rest of the poem. It is therefore fairly reasonable to suppose that those who are striving for virtue and goodness will make good use of the opportunity and the topic, by being completely indifferent to any tumultuous, noisy response to their language.
The same applies to actions as well as to words: everyone should try to ensure that they contain more usefulness than showmanship, and are more concerned with truth than with display. If genuine love for a young man or for a woman does not seek witnesses, but reaps its harvest of pleasure even if it fulfils its desire in secret, then it is even more likely that someone who loves goodness and wisdom, who is intimate and involved with virtue because of his actions, will be quietly self-assured within himself, and will have no need of an admiring audience. There was a man who summoned his serving-woman at home and shouted out, 'Look at me, Dionysia: I have stopped being big-headed!' Analogous to this is the behaviour of someone who politely does a favour and then runs around telling everyone about it: it is obvious that he is still dependent on external appreciation and drawn towards public recognition, that he does not yet have virtue in his sights and that he is not awake, but is acting randomly among the illusory shadows of a dream and then presents his action for viewing, as if it were a painting.
It follows that giving something to a friend and doing a favour for an acquaintance, but not telling others about it, is a sign of progress. And voting honestly when surrounded by corruption, rejecting a dishonourable petition from an affluent or powerful person, spurning bribes and even not drinking when thirsty at night or resisting a kiss from a good-looking woman or man, as Agesilaus did - quietly keeping any of these to oneself is also a sign of progress. A man like this gains recognition from himself, and he feels not contempt, but pleasure and contentment at being self-sufficient as a witness, and spectator too, of his good deeds; this shows that reason is now being nourished within and is taking root inside him, and that he 'is getting used to being his own source of pleasure', as Democritus puts it.
Farmers prefer to see ears of corn bent over, nodding towards the ground; they regard as worthless impostors the light ones which stand up straight. Young would-be philosophers are just the same: it is those who are particularly insubstantial and lightweight who cut a dash, pose and strut, faces full of contempt and disdain which spare nothing and nobody; but when they start to fill out and gain in yield from the lectures, they shed their ostentatious pomposity. And just as the air inside empty vessels into which liquid is introduced is squeezed out and goes elsewhere, so when people are filled with genuinely good material, their pretensions are pushed aside and their self-esteem starts to crumble; they stop feeling proud of their beard and threadbare gown, and instead make their minds the object of their efforts; and they use the caustic, harsh side of their nature on themselves above all, and treat anyone else they come across with greater leniency. They put an end to their former habit of usurping and confiscating for themselves the name of philosophy and the reputation of studying philosophy; instead, if an innately good young man is even called 'philosopher' by someone else, he will be so dismayed that he will say with a smile, overcome by embarrassment, 'Look, I am no god. Why do you compare me to the gods?' As Aeschylus says, 'When a young woman has experienced a man, the heat in her eyes gives her away'; and when a young man has experienced genuine philosophical progress, these lines of Sappho's are relevant: 'I am tongue-tied, and delicate fire plays over my skin' - despite which, his gaze is unworried and his eye calm and you would want to hear him speak.
At the start of the initiation ceremony, as the candidates assemble, they are noisy, call out and jostle one another; but when the rituals are being performed and revealed, then they pay attention in awestruck silence. Likewise, you can see plenty of disturbance and chatter and self-assurance at the beginning of philosophy, on the threshold, with some people rudely and roughly jostling for acclamation; but anyone who finds himself inside and in the presence of a great light, with the sanctuary open, so to speak, changes his attitude and becomes quiet and transfixed, and 'with humility and restraint complies' with reason, as he would with a god. Menedemus' joke seems to apply rather neatly to such people. He said that the numerous people who sail to Athens to study go through the following progression: they start wise, then become philosophers, and as time goes on, they become normal people, by gradually laying aside their self-esteem and pretensions in proportion to the hold they have on reason.
When people need healing, if it is a tooth or a finger that is hurting, they go straight to the doctor; if they have a fever, they summon the doctor to their house and ask him to help; but if they are suffering from an extreme case - melancholy or brain fever or delirium - they sometimes cannot even stand the doctor coming to visit them, but chase him away or avoid him, because the severity of their illness prevents them even being aware that they are ill. The same goes for people with faults: it is the incurable ones who get angry and behave aggressively and fiercely towards anyone who tries to rebuke and reprimand them, whereas those who put up with rebuke and do not resist are in a more composed state. And when someone with faults puts himself in the hands of critics, talks about his defects, does not hide his iniquity and does not relish getting away with it or enjoy being unrecognized for what he is, but admits it and begs for someone to take him and reprimand him, this must be a significant sign of progress. This is surely why Diogenes used to say that anyone concerned about safety ought to try to find either a proper friend or a fervent enemy, so that one way or another - either by being rebuked or by being treated - he might steer clear of badness.
Imagine someone with an obvious stain or mark on his clothes or a torn shoe affecting self-deprecation as a pretence to the outside world, or someone thinking that by making fun of his own short stature or slumped posture he is showing a carefree spirit: as long as he does all this, but disguises the internal blemishes of his mind, the defects of his life, the pettiness, hedonism, malice and spite, and hides them away as if they were boils, without letting anyone touch them or see them because he is afraid of being rebuked, then his involvement in progress is minimal, or rather non-existent. On the other hand, anyone who comes to grips with these defects, and primarily anyone who has the ability and the desire to supply his own distress at and censure for his faults, but secondly anyone who has the ability and the desire to put himself in someone else's hands for castigation, and sticks with it, and is purified by the criticism, is precisely the person who seems to have a genuine loathing for iniquity, and to be really trying to eradicate it.
It is, of course, important to feel embarrassed at, and to avoid, even a reputation for badness; but someone who dislikes actual iniquity more than he dislikes an adverse reputation does not avoid being reproached, and reproaching others himself, if the object is moral improvement. For instance, there is Diogenes' nice remark to a young man he saw in a pub, who ran away - but into the pub: 'The further inside you run,' he said, 'the more you are going to be in the pub!' And the more a person denies any defect, the more he immerses and imprisons himself in the vice. It is obvious that anyone who is poor, but who pretends to be rich, increases his poverty by his masquerade; but Hippocrates, who wrote down and published the fact that he did not understand the skull's sutures, is a model for anyone who is genuinely progressing, because he thinks it quite wrong for Hippocrates to help others avoid the situation he found himself in by publicizing his own failing, while he - a person who is committed to immunity from error - does not dare to be castigated or to admit his fallibility and ignorance.
In fact, it is arguable that Bion's and Pyrrho's assertions refer not to progress, but to a better, more perfect state. Bion told his friends that they deserved to think they were progressing when they could listen to abuse and be affected as if what was being said was 'My friend, you don't seem bad or foolish, so I wish you health and great joy, and may the gods grant you prosperity.' And there is a story about Pyrrho that once when he was endangered by a storm at sea, he pointed to a piglet which was happily tucking into some barley that had been spilled, and told his companions that anyone who did not want to be disturbed by events should use the rational mind and philosophy to develop a similar detachment.
You should also notice what Zeno said - that a person's dreams ought to make him aware that he is progressing, if when asleep he sees himself neither enjoying anything discreditable, nor conniving at or doing anything awful or outrageous, but if instead he feels as though he were in translucent depths of tranquil stillness and it dawns upon him that the imaginative and emotional part of his mind has been dispersed by reason. Plato also apparently realized this point, before Zeno, and he described in outline the imaginative, irrational aspect of an innately tyrannical mind and the sorts of things it does when asleep: 'He tries to have sex with his mother', feels compulsions for all kinds of foods, transgresses convention and acts as though his desires, which by day are shamed and cowed into restraint by convention, had been set free.
Draught-animals which have been well trained do not attempt to stray and deviate, even if their master lets the reins go slack: they press forward in an orderly fashion, obedient to their conditioning, and unfailingly keep to their course. In the same way, people whose irrational aspect has been tamed and civilized and checked by reason find that it loses its readiness to use its desires to act outrageously and unconventionally even when dreaming or when under the influence of illness; instead, it watches protectively over its conditioning and remains aware of it, since it is conditioning which gives our attention strength and energy. If, as a result of training, detachment can gain control over even the body - over the whole body and any of its parts - so that eyes faced with a harrowing sight resist weeping and a heart surrounded by horrors resists lurching, and genitals modestly keep still and cause no trouble at all in the company of attractive men or women, then naturally this increases the plausibility of suggesting that training can take hold of the emotional part of the mind and, so to speak, smooth it and regularize it by suppressing its illusions and impressions at all levels, including dreaming.
There is a story about the philosopher Stilpo which illustrates the point. Once he dreamed he saw Poseidon and that Poseidon was angry with him for having omitted to sacrifice an ox (which was a standard offering to Poseidon), but Stilpo was not perturbed in the slightest and said, 'What do you mean, Poseidon? Don't you think it's childish of you to come and complain that I didn't bankrupt myself and fill the city with the smell of burnt offerings, but instead sacrificed to you on a moderate scale at home, drawing on what I actually had?' And then he dreamed that Poseidon smiled, extended his right hand and said that, because of Stilpo, he would create for Megara a bumper crop of sardines.
So anyway, when people have dreams which are pleasant, clear and untroubled, and sleep which brings back no trace of anything frightening or horrible, or malicious or warped, they say that these features are beams of the light of progress; but they say that the features of distressing and bizarre dreams - frenzy, agitation, running from danger like a coward, experiencing childish delights and miseries - are like breakers and billows, and originate in a mind which does not yet have its own regulator, but is still being formed by opinions and rules, so that when it is asleep and as far from these formative influences as it can be, it is again dissolved and unravelled by the emotions. Now, you must join me in considering, by yourself, whether this phenomenon I have been talking about stems from progress or from a state which already has the steady, solid strength which comes of being based on reason.
Since absolute detachment is an exalted, divine state, and progress towards it is, as I say, like a kind of alleviation and taming of the emotions, then it is important for us to examine our emotions and to assess their differences, comparing them with themselves and with one another. We must compare them with themselves to see if the desires and fears and rages we now experience are less intense than they were before, given that we are using reason rapidly to extinguish their violence and heat; and we must compare them with one another to see if our sense of disgrace is now more acute than our fear, and whether we prefer to emulate people rather than envy them, and value a good reputation more than we value money. In short, we must compare them with one another to see if, to use a musical analogy, we err on the side of the Dorian rather than the Lydian mode, whether our lifestyle inclines towards asceticism rather than indulgence, whether our actions tend to be slow rather than hasty, and whether we are astounded by rather than contemptuous of arguments and people. Where ailments are concerned, it is a good sign when the disease is diverted into parts of the body where it will not prove fatal; and likewise where vice is concerned, it is plausible to suggest that when people who are making progress find that their vices now engage more respectable emotions, those vices are gradually being eliminated. When Phrynis strung two extra strings on the lyre, in addition to the usual seven, the ephors asked him whether he was prepared to let them cut off the top two or the bottom two; but the first point to make about ourselves is that what is required is, as it were, that the top ones and the bottom ones are cut out, if we are going to settle on an intermediate, moderate position; and the second point is that progress begins with the lessening of our emotions' extremity and intensity, 'lusting after which,' as Sophocles says, 'makes one overwrought'.
Now, we have said that translating decisions into actions and not allowing words to be just words without turning them into deeds is particularly typical of progress. What is significant in this context is modelling our behaviour on what we commend and being keen to do what we express admiration for, while being unwilling even to connive at what we find fault with. For example, although it was not surprising that Miltiades' courage and bravery were universally applauded in Athens, nevertheless, when Themistocles said that Miltiades' trophy stopped him sleeping and allowed him no rest, it was immediately obvious that he was doing more than just expressing approbation and admiration: he was also moved to emulate and imitate Miltiades. So we must regard our progress as minimal as long as our admiration of success lies fallow and remains inadequate in itself to spur us towards imitation.
The point is that physical love is not a force for change unless it is accompanied by the desire to emulate; and commendation of virtue is also tepid and ineffective unless it nudges us and goads us to stop being envious and instead to want - with a desire that demands satisfaction - to emulate good behaviour. Alcibiades stressed the importance of the heart being moved by a philosopher's words and of tears being shed, but that is not all that is important: anyone who is making genuine progress compares his own conduct with the deeds and actions of a man who is an exemplar of goodness, and is simultaneously aggravated by the awareness of his defects, happy because of his hopes and aspirations, and full of a restless compulsion. Consequently, he is liable to 'run like an unweaned foal close to a horse' (to use a line from Semonides), because he longs to be virtually grafted on to the good man. In fact, this experience is typical of genuine progress - dearly to love the character of those whose conduct we desire to imitate, and always to accompany our wanting to be like them with goodwill which awards them respect and honour. On the other hand, anyone feeling competitively envious of his betters must realize that it is jealousy of a certain reputation or ability that is provoking him, and that he is not respecting or admiring virtue.
So when our love for good men starts to be such that we not only, as Plato says, count as blessed both the responsible man himself and anyone who listens 'to the words emitted by a responsible mouth', but we also admire and cherish his posture, walk, look and smile, and long to attach and glue ourselves to him, so to speak, then we can legitimately consider ourselves to be making genuine progress. This is even more legitimate if we do not admire only the successful aspects of men of virtue, but behave like lovers who are not put off if those they find attractive have a speech defect or a pallid complexion: despite the tears and misery brought on by her grief and misfortune, Pantheia still thrilled Araspes, and in the same way we should not be repelled by Aristides' exile, Anaxagoras' imprisonment, Socrates' poverty or Phocion's condemnation, but because we regard virtue as desirable even under these circumstances, we should draw near to it, quoting Euripides' line whenever the occasion demands - 'It's incredible how high-minded people find nothing bad!' You see, someone who is inspired enough to admire and want to imitate even apparently awful things, rather than be put off by them, can certainly never be deterred from good things ever again. It has already become such a person's practice, when he is embarking on some course of action, or taking up office, or taking a risk, to picture truly good men of the past and to wonder, 'What would Plato have done in this situation? What would Epaminondas have said? How would Lycurgus or Agesilaus have come across?' He uses each of them as a kind of mirror, before which he puts himself in order, or adjusts his stance, or refrains from some relatively petty saying of his, or resists an emotion. Some people learn the names of the Dactyls of Mount Ida and steadily recite each one, as a spell to ward off fear; but if thoughts and memories of good men readily occur to people who are making progress and make them think again, then they keep them true and safe, whatever emotions and difficulties beset them. It follows that this is another mark by which you can tell someone who is morally improving.
Moreover, to have stopped getting all flustered, blushing and hiding or rearranging some idiosyncrasy when a person who is famous for his self-control unexpectedly appears, but instead to go up to such people confidently, can corroborate one's awareness. Alexander apparently once saw a messenger running towards him with his right hand extended and looking very pleased. 'What news, my friend?' said Alexander. 'Has Homer come back to life?' For he thought that the one thing his exploits lacked was a voice that would give him undying fame. But the love which fills the character of a young man who is improving is, above all else, love of showing off before truly good people and of displaying his home, board, wife, children, occupation and spoken and written compositions; and consequently it is a source of pain for him to remember that his father or his tutor is dead and cannot see him in his present condition, and the one thing in particular he would pray to the gods for would be that they might come back to life and so witness his lifestyle and conduct. On the other hand, people who have taken no responsibility for themselves and who have been spoiled are quite the opposite: they cannot even dream about their relatives calmly and without anxiety.
There is another mark, no minor one, for you to add, please, to the ones we have already discussed. It is to have stopped regarding any of one's faults as trivial, and instead to take thorough care about and to pay attention to all of them. People who do not expect to become affluent have no qualms about spending small amounts, because they think that adding to the small amount they already have will not produce a large amount, whereas anticipation joins with savings to increase love of affluence the closer it gets to its goal. It is the same with conduct which pertains to virtue: if someone scarcely gives in to 'What's the point?' and 'That's it for now - better next time', but applies himself on every occasion, and gets fed up and irritated if vice ever worms its way, with its excuses, into even the slightest of his faults, then he is obviously in the process of acquiring for himself a certain purity and wants to avoid being defiled in any way whatsoever. On the other hand, thinking that nothing is, or can be, especially discreditable makes people nonchalant and careless about the little things. In fact, when a wall of some kind or other is being built, it does not make any difference if the odd piece of wood or ordinary stone is used as infrastructure, or if a stele that has fallen off a tomb is put in the footings, which is analogous to the conduct of degenerates who jumble together into a single heap any old business and behaviour. But people who are progressing, and who have already 'fashioned a fine foundation' for their life (as if it were a home for gods and kings), do not admit things chosen at random, but use reason as a straight-edge by which to apply and fit every single part together. And this, in my opinion, is what Polyclitus was referring to when he said that those whose clay is at the stage when fingertips are required have the hardest task.
On the avoidance of anger
SULLA: Fundanus, I think the painters' practice of periodically examining their paintings before adding the finishing touches is commendable. Continuous familiarity hides the ways in which something might vary slightly from what is required; so by interrupting their viewing, they use repeated discrimination to keep the viewing fresh and more likely to catch minor variations. But it is impossible for a person to apply himself to himself only periodically, by separating himself and interrupting the continuity of his self-awareness - and this is the main reason why everyone is a poorer judge of himself than of others. Therefore, a second-best course is for him periodically to inspect his friends and to make himself available to them for the same purpose, which is not to see if he has suddenly grown old or if his body is in a better or worse condition, but for them to examine his habits and character, to see if over a period of time any good features have been added or bad ones subtracted.
Anyway, I've come back to Rome after over a year away, and I've been with you for over four months now. I don't find it particularly surprising that the good points you were already innately endowed with have developed and increased so much; but when I see how much more amenable and submissive to reason that strong, fiery temper of yours has become, I am inclined to comment on your impetuosity by quoting the line, 'It is amazing how much more gentle he is.'
Nevertheless, this gentleness has not made you ineffective or languid, but it has replaced your notorious sudden changes of mood with a smooth surface and an effective, productive depth - like a cultivated field. It is also clear, therefore, that your temper is not waning because advancing age has made it start to decline, or because of any other automatic factor, but because it is being treated by good rational advice. But I must confess that when our mutual friend Eros told me this about you, I suspected that his warmth towards you was making him attribute to you qualities which truly good people ought to have, even though you didn't have them - and I thought this despite the fact that, as you know, he is the last person to renounce an opinion just in order to please anyone. But I now see that he is not guilty of perjury. Since we have nothing else to do while we're travelling, I wonder if you would explain how you made your temper so tame, moderate, and amenable and obedient to reason - what regimen you followed, so to speak.
FUNDANUS: You're too kind, Sulla. Are you sure that your warm friendship towards me is not blinding you to some aspects of my character? I mean, even Eros himself often fails to restrain his temper and 'keep it steadily compliant' (as Homer puts it); it is righteous indignation that makes it boil over. So it is possible that I seem amenable compared to him on these occasions, just as high notes can take the place of low notes, relative to other high notes, when one scale changes into another. SULLA: Neither of these are realistic possibilities, Fundanus. Please, as a favour to me, do what I asked.
FUNDANUS: All right. Musonius came up with some excellent suggestions, Sulla, and one of them, as I recall, was that a life of constant therapy guarantees immunity. The point is that when reason is the therapeutic agent, it should not - in my opinion - be flushed out of the system along with the illness, as hellebore is, but should remain in the mind and contain and watch over our decisions. In its effects, the analogy for reason is not medicine, but nourishing food, since anyone who becomes accustomed to it gains energy and well-being from it, whereas when emotions are at a peak of fermentation, advice and reproof struggle long and hard for slight gains, and exactly resemble smelling-salts, which arouse people who have a fit and fall unconscious, but don't get rid of the actual ailment.
Still, even at the time of their peak, all the other emotions do in a sense fall back and make way when reason with its reinforcements enters the mind from outside; but anger does not act in quite the way Melanthius says - 'It displaces intelligence and then commits criminal acts'; in fact, it does so after having replaced intelligence altogether, and shut it out of the house. And then the situation is similar to when people burn to death in their houses, in the sense that anger makes the inside full of chaos, smoke and noise, with the result that the mind is incapable of seeing or hearing anything beneficial. This is why it is easier for an abandoned ship to take on a helmsman from outside in the middle of a storm and in the open sea, than it is for someone who is being tossed in the sea of fury and anger to accept reason from an external source, unless he has made his own rationality ready. People who anticipate a siege and expect no help from outside accumulate and amass all the useful things they can; similarly, it is particularly important for people to gather from far and wide everything philosophy has to offer that will help combat anger, and to store it up in the mind - because the time when the need is crucial is also when they will not readily find it possible to introduce such assistance. I mean, the din stops the mind even hearing anything external, unless the mind has reason of its own, like an internal ship's boatswain who smartly picks up and understands every instruction; otherwise, even if the mind does hear anything, it despises quiet, gentle words and bridles at any which are more defiant. The point is that since a temper is arrogant, wilful and hard for an external agent to dislodge, it is like a secure tyranny which can be brought down only by an internal, inbred agent.
If anger becomes constant and resentment frequent, the mind acquires the negative condition known as irascibility, which results in prickliness, bitterness and a sour temper - that is, when the emotions become raw, easily distressed and hypercritical: think of a piece of iron which is already weak and thin being further filed. On the other hand, if rational discrimination immediately defies and bears down on any outburst of anger, it not only remedies the current situation, but also gives the mind energy and detachment for the future.
In my own case, at any rate, what happened is that once I had defied anger two or three times, I experienced what the Thebans did: once they had repulsed the apparently invincible Spartans for the first time, they were never subsequently defeated by them in battle. I mean, I gained the firm conviction that rationality can win. I saw that Aristotle's claim that anger ends when cold water is sprinkled on it is not the whole story: it is also quenched when faced with fear. Moreover, of course, the onset of happiness frequently causes the instantaneous 'melting', to use Homer's term, and dispersal of anger. The net result was that I became convinced that, provided the will is there, this emotion is not entirely irredeemable. You see, anger might well be aroused by something slight and meagre: often even a joke, a light-hearted remark, a laugh, a nod of assent, and so on and so forth, provoke anger. For example, when Helen addressed her niece as 'Electra, long-time spinster', she incited her remark, 'You have taken your time to see sense; in the past you left your home in disgrace.' And Callisthenes irritated Alexander by saying, when the large bowl was being passed around, 'I don't want to drink Alexander and then need Asclepius.'
Therefore, just as it is easy to control a flame which is starting to catch in hare's fur or on a wick or in a pile of rubbish (whereas if it catches in a solid object with depth, it quickly destroys and devastates 'with lively zest the lofty work of builders', as Aeschylus puts it), so anyone who pays attention to the early stages of anger and is aware of it gradually starting to smoulder and ignite as a result of some remark or rubbishy sarcasm doesn't need to exert himself a great deal, but often puts an end to it simply by keeping quiet and ignoring the remark. Anyone who doesn't fuel a fire puts it out, and anyone who doesn't feed anger in the early stages and doesn't get into a huff is being prudent and is eliminating anger.
I was accordingly not happy with Hieronymus, despite his useful comments and advice elsewhere, when he claims that because of its speed, anger is not perceptible when it is arising, but only when it has arisen and already exists. I mean, all the emotions go through the phase of gaining mass and movement, but in none of them is this arising and growth so obvious. So Homer's teaching on this is skilful: when he says, 'So he spoke; and dark clouds of anguish overshadowed Achilles', he is portraying Achilles as feeling sudden pain, when word reached him, with no lapse of time in between; but he portrays his anger at Agamemnon as slowly building up, and as gradually being ignited while a great number of words were being spoken. But if any of the people involved had withdrawn their words at the beginning and had resisted speaking them, their quarrel would not have escalated to such a degree and got so big. That is why whenever Socrates realized that he was getting too nasty to one of his friends, then because he was being driven 'as it were before a storm on the crest of an ocean wave', he used to lower his voice, smile and stop looking stern - and so keep himself upright and in control by counterbalancing the emotion and by moving instead in the opposite direction.
You see, my friend, there is a first-rate way to bring down our tyrant-like temper, which is not to listen or obey when it is ordering us to raise our voices, look fierce and beat our breasts, but to keep quiet and, as if the emotion were a disease, not aggravate it by thrashing and yelling. It may be that partying, singing and decorating doors - typical lovers' behaviour - do somehow afford an alleviation which is not unpleasing or inelegant ('I came, but did not call your name: I kissed your door. If this is a crime, I am a criminal'); and it may be that mourners eliminate a lot of their grief as well as their tears in the release of crying and weeping; but anger is made considerably more intense by the behaviour and speech of people in an angry state.
It is best, therefore, to keep calm, or alternatively to run away and hide and find refuge in silence, as though we realized that we were about to have a fit, and wanted to avoid falling, or rather falling on someone - and it is friends above all whom we most often fall on. We do not feel love or jealousy or fear for everyone, but anger leaves nothing alone, nothing in peace: we get angry at enemies and friends, at children and parents, and even at gods and animals and inanimate objects. For example, there is Thamyris, 'breaking the gilded frame, breaking the structure of the strung lyre'; and Pandarus swearing harm against himself, if he failed to burn his bow 'after shattering it with his bare hands'. And Xerxes even tried to brand and flog the sea, and sent a letter addressed to the mountain: 'Great Athos high as heaven, don't make huge, intractable rocks interfere with my actions, or else I will tear you to pieces and hurl you into the sea.' Anger can often be terrifying - but often ridiculous: that is why it is the most hated and despised of the emotions; and it is useful to be aware of both of these aspects.
In my case, at any rate - I don't know whether or not this is the correct way to go about it - I started my treatment as follows: just as the Spartans tried to understand drunkenness by watching their helots, I tried to understand anger by watching others. Hippocrates says that the severity of an illness is proportionate to the degree to which the patient's features become abnormal, and the first thing I noticed was a similar proportion between the degree of distraction by anger and the degree to which appearance, complexion, gait and voice change. This impressed upon me a kind of image of the emotion, and I was very upset to think that I might ever look so terrifying and unhinged to my friends, wife and daughters - not only fierce and unrecognizable in appearance, but also speaking in as rough and harsh a tone as I encountered in others of my acquaintance, when anger made them incapable of preserving their usual nature, appearance, pleasant conversation and persuasiveness and courtesy in company.
The orator Gaius Gracchus had a brusque personality and used to speak rather too passionately, so he had one of those little pipes made for himself which musicians use to guide their voices gradually note by note in either direction. His slave used to hold this and stand behind him while he was speaking, and sound a moderate, gentle keynote which enabled Gracchus to revoke his stridency and get rid of the harshness and anger of his tone. Just as the cowherd's 'wax-joined reed pipes in clear tones a sleep-inducing tune', so Gracchus' slave mollified and allayed the orator's anger.
If I had an ingenious attendant who was attuned to me, however, I would not be displeased if he employed a mirror during my outbursts of anger - as is occasionally done, though for no useful purpose, for people who have just bathed - since to see oneself in an unnatural state, all discomposed, plays a not unimportant part in discrediting the emotion. Indeed, there is an amusing story that once when Athena was playing the pipes, a satyr told her off by saying, 'This expression doesn't suit you. Put down your pipes, take up your weapons and compose your cheeks.' She paid no attention, however, but when she saw in a river how her face looked, she got upset and threw away the pipes.
At least art is tasteful, and this distracts one's attention from the ugliness. (Marsyas apparently used a kind of halter and a mouthpiece to channel the force of his breath, and to rectify and conceal the irregularity of his features - 'gleaming gold joined the hair of one temple to the other and thongs, bound behind, he attached to his hard-working mouth'.) Anger, on the other hand, not only disfigures the features by inflating and distending them, but also makes one's voice even more ugly and unpleasant, and 'moves the unmoved strings of the heart'. I mean, when the sea has been whipped up by winds and disgorges kelp and seaweed, people say that it is being purified; but the undisciplined, harsh and snide remarks which anger casts ashore from a mind in turmoil pollute primarily the speakers, and contaminate them with the opprobrium of having always had these remarks inside them, bursting to get out, and of being exposed by their anger. That is why, as Plato says, they pay the heaviest of penalties for the lightest of things - a word - since they give the impression of being antisocial, slanderous and malicious.
So when I observe and notice all this, I end up committing to memory and reminding myself pretty constantly of the fact that although when feverish it is good to have a soft, smooth tongue, it is even better when angry. I mean, if the tongue of someone with a fever is unnatural, it is a bad sign, but it does not cause any further problems; but if the tongue of someone in a temper has become rough and offensive and inclined towards abnormal language, then it manifests an insolence which causes an incurable breakdown of relationships and which betrays festering unsociability. Anger is worse than undiluted wine at producing undisciplined and disagreeable results: wine's results are blended with laughter, jokes and singing, while anger's results are blended with bitter gall; and anyone who is silent while drinking is irritating and annoying to his companions, whereas there is nothing more dignified than silence while angry, as Sappho recommends: 'When anger takes over your heart, guard your babbling tongue.'
However, constant attention to people who have been trapped by anger affords more than these reflections: it allows one to understand the nature of anger in other respects too, to see that it is not magnificent or manly, and that it has neither dignity nor grandeur. Nevertheless, most people mistake its turmoil for effectiveness, its menace for courage, its inflexibility for strength; and some people even call its callousness prowess, its stubbornness energy and its asperity righteous indignation. But this is wrong, because the actions, behaviour and conduct it prompts betray its pettiness and weakness. It is not just that angry people viciously assault little children, treat women harshly and think they should punish dogs, horses and mules (as Ctesiphon the pancratiast felt obliged to return his mule's kick); it is also that the narrow intolerance of tyrants is obvious in their cruelty, and their state is betrayed by their behaviour, so that their bloodthirstiness resembles the bite of a snake which, when enraged and in agony, directs its extreme inflammation at anyone who has hurt it. When flesh is hit hard, a swelling occurs; likewise, the most infirm minds are most liable to pain, and consequently their anger is greater because their weakness is greater.
This is also why women are more irascible than men, and sick, old or unlucky people are more irascible than healthy, middle-aged or successful people. An avaricious person is very likely to get angry with his business manager, a glutton with his cook, a jealous man with his wife, a vain person when something bad has been said about him; but the worst of all are, as Pindar says, 'political men who court ambition too much: they stir up open grief'. So it is from mental pain and suffering that anger arises, thanks above all to weakness; and whoever said that anger is, as it were, the mind's sinews was wrong: it is the straining and spraining of a mind being unduly dislocated in the course of its defensive impulses.
Anyway, observing these despicable cases was not pleasant, but simply necessary. But because I regard people who cope with fits of anger in a calm and composed manner as outstanding both to hear about and to witness, my starting-point is to despise those who say, 'You wronged a man: should a man put up with this?', and 'Tread him underfoot, tread on his neck, force him to the ground!', and so on: these are provocative things to say, and some use them improperly to transpose anger from the women's quarters to the men's. I think that manly courage is compatible with morality in all other respects, but incompatible only where gentleness is concerned, because gentleness is more self-contained. It is possible for worse men to overcome better men, but to set up in one's mind a trophy of victory over anger (which Heraclitus claims makes 'a difficult opponent, since it purchases whatever it wants at the expense of the mind') is a sign of great, overwhelming strength - a strength based on the faculties of rational judgement, which are the real sinews and muscles in the fight against the emotions.
That is why I constantly try to get hold of and read this kind of case, and not only when they are provided by philosophers (whom intelligent people regard as not being liable to gall), but even more when they are provided by kings and tyrants. For example, there is Antigonus' behaviour towards some of his soldiers who were cursing him near his tent, and didn't know he could hear them: 'Oh dear,' he said, poking his staff out of the tent and on to the ground, 'can't you go somewhere further away to criticize me?'
Arcadion the Achaean was always criticizing Philip and recommending escaping 'to a place whose inhabitants are ignorant of Philip'. Then he happened to turn up in Macedonia, and Philip's friends thought that he should punish him and not let him get away with it. Philip dealt with him kindly, however, and sent him presents and gifts; later he told his people to find out what report Arcadion had given to the Greeks. They all vouched for the fact that he had become an outstanding advocate of Philip, and Philip remarked, 'So I am a better doctor than you!' And once in Olympia some slander was being spread about him, and some people suggested that the Greeks ought to be made to suffer, since they were criticizing him despite his good treatment of them. 'What will they do, then,' he asked, 'if I treat them badly?'
Also fine was Pisistratus' behaviour towards Thrasybulus, Porsenna's towards Mucius and Magas' towards Philemon. Philemon made fun of Magas in one of his comedies, publicly in the theatre, with the lines: 'Here's a letter from the king for you to read, Magas ... Poor Magas, what a pity you can't read!' Later, Philemon was forced into Paraetonium by a storm, and fell into Magas' hands. Magas told a soldier to unsheathe a sword and simply touch Philemon on the neck with it, and then politely leave; and he sent him dice and a ball, as if he were a witless child, and then let him go.
Ptolemy was once mocking a scholar for his ignorance and asked him who Peleus' father was; the scholar replied that he would tell him, if Ptolemy told him first who Lagus' father was. His remark was a mocking reference to the king's low-class birth, and everyone was offended, feeling that the remark jarred and was uncalled for. Ptolemy said, 'If a king can't take mockery, then he shouldn't mock either.'
Alexander had been more harsh than usual in the affairs involving Callisthenes and Clitus. So when Porus was taken prisoner by Alexander he entreated him to deal with him as a king should. 'Is that all?' asked Alexander. '"As a king should" covers everything,' replied Porus. That is why 'the benevolent' is an epithet of the king of the gods (though the Athenians call him 'the tempestuous', I think): punishment is the work of the Furies and demigods - it is not divine and Olympian.
When Philip had levelled Olynthus, someone remarked, 'But rebuilding an equivalent city will be beyond his capabilities'; likewise one might say to anger, 'You're good at demolition and destruction and ruination, but construction, preservation, mercy and patience require gentleness, forgiveness and moderation of passion: they require Camillus, Metellus, Aristides and Socrates, whereas plaguing and biting are what ants and mice do.'
Moreover, when I also consider vindictiveness, I find that anger's version of it is ineffective, by and large: it exhausts itself in lip-chewing, tooth-grinding, empty assaults and curses consisting of mindless threats, and the result is as ridiculous as when children in a race fall down before they reach the goal for which they are striving, because they are not in control of themselves. It follows that the Rhodian put it nicely when he said to the Roman general's servant, who was yelling and coming on strong, 'I'm not bothered by your words, but by his silence.' And once Sophocles has Neoptolemus and Eurypylus equipped with weapons, he says, 'Without making boasts, without hurling insults, the two of them smashed into the massed bronze weaponry.'
The point is that although some savages treat their weapons with poison, courage has no need of bitter gall, since it is imbued with reason, whereas anger and rage are brittle and unsound. At any rate, the Spartans play pipes to quell anger in their men while they are fighting, and before a battle they sacrifice to the Muses to ensure the stable presence of reason; and if they rout the enemy, they do not set off in pursuit, but revoke their passion, which is like those handy-sized knives in that it is retractable and manageable. Anger, however, has caused many, many people to die before exacting their revenge: Cyrus and Pelopidas of Thebes are just two examples. Agathocles, on the other hand, good-temperedly put up with insults being hurled at him by the inhabitants of a city he was besieging, and when one of them asked, 'Potter, where will you get the money to pay your mercenaries?', he replied with a laugh, 'Here, if I raze your city!' Once some people mocked Antigonus for his deformity from their city walls, and he said to them, 'But I thought I was good-looking!' But when he had taken the city, he sold the mockers into slavery, and swore that he would keep in touch with their masters, to see if they ever insulted him again.
I also notice that anger makes lawyers and orators commit great mistakes; and Aristotle records that the friends of Satyrus of Samos blocked his ears with wax when he was in court, in case he messed things up by getting angry at being abused by his opponents. As for ourselves, don't we often bungle the punishment of a slave who is misbehaving, because they get frightened at our threats and at what we are saying, and run away? Nurses say to children, 'Stop crying and you can have it', and we could usefully address anger in the same way: 'Simmer down, shut up, slow down, and you will improve the chances and the probability of getting what you want.' I mean, if a father sees his child trying to cut or carve something with a knife, he takes the knife himself and does it; and if the rational mind takes over from anger the job of retribution, then the person who deserves it receives the punishment, and the rational mind remains safe and sound and valuable, instead of being punished itself, which is what often happens thanks to anger.
All the emotions need schooling, to tame (so to speak) and discipline by training the part of oneself that is irrational and recalcitrant; but one's servants provide a better training ground for anger than for any other emotion. The point is that our dealings with servants contain no element of envy, fear or rivalry, and constantly getting angry with them causes a lot of conflict and error and, because we have power over them, our anger puts us on a slippery downward slope, as it were, with no one to stand in our way and restrain us. I mean, absolute control cannot fail to be liable to error when emotion is involved: the only solution is to use considerable restraint to restrict your power and to resist the frequent complaints of wife and friends, as they accuse you of being weak and feeble.
I myself used to get very needled at my servants because of these accusations, and used to believe that by not punishing them I was spoiling them. But eventually I realized, first, that it is better to make them worse by patiently tolerating their badness than to concentrate on correcting others while allowing harshness and anger to corrupt oneself. And second, I saw plenty of cases where, precisely because they were not being punished, they were ashamed of being bad, let forbearance rather than retaliation initiate change in them and, I assure you, more enthusiastically served those who quietly sanctioned their actions than those who used flogging and branding: all this convinced me that reason is more authoritative than passion. The poet got it wrong when he said, 'Where there is fear, respect follows too.' It is actually the other way round: respect engenders in people the kind of fear which entails self-restraint, while non-stop, relentless flogging does not instil remorse for past misdeeds, but rather the intention to get away with it in the future.
In the third place, I constantly remind myself and bear in mind that when we were learning archery, we were not told not to shoot, but not to miss; likewise, learning how to punish in a well-timed, moderate, beneficial and appropriate way will not stop one punishing altogether. So I try to quell my anger above all by not denying the defendants the right to justify themselves, but by listening to what they have to say. This helps because time checks emotion and gives it space to dissolve, and also because rationality finds what method of punishment is appropriate, and how much is fitting. Moreover, the person who gets his just deserts has no excuse left for resisting correction, given that he is being punished not in anger, but because he has been convicted; and the most shameful factor is excluded, which is when the servant has a more just case than the master.
After Alexander's death, Phocion tried to stop the Athenians revolting too soon, or too readily trusting the news, by saying, 'If he is dead today, citizens of Athens, then he will be dead tomorrow and the day after tomorrow.' In the same way, in my opinion, anyone being driven headlong towards retaliation by anger ought to whisper to himself, 'If he is guilty today, then he will be guilty tomorrow and the day after tomorrow; and no harm will be done if he gets his just deserts later rather than sooner, but if he goes through it quickly, there will always - it has often happened in the past - be uncertainty as to his guilt.' I mean, which of us is horrible enough to flog and punish a slave for having five or ten days ago burned a savoury or knocked over a table or been rather slow to obey an order? But these are the things which make us upset and harsh and pitiless when they have just occurred and when they are still in the recent past. Solid objects seem bigger when it is misty, and the same happens to things when one is angry.
Our first reaction, therefore, should be to remember facts like this; and if in the clear, steady light of reason the deed still seems bad, when there is no doubt that we are free of the emotion, then we should attend to it: we should not at this later date neglect or abandon the punishment, as we do food when we have lost our appetite. Nothing is so conducive to doling out punishment when anger is upon us as having failed to punish, having let the issue drop, when anger had left us: the experience is identical to that of lazy rowers, who lie at anchor when the weather is calm and then run the risks of a voyage when the wind is up. We too accuse rationality of being weak and feeble when it comes to punishment, and so rush on recklessly before the wind of anger when it comes.
The point is that it is proper for someone who is hungry to engage in eating, but it is proper for someone who is neither hungry nor thirsty for it to engage in retribution. He should not need anger in order to punish, as he might need a savoury, but it is essential that he waits until he has greatly distanced himself from the appetite for punishment and introduced rationality instead. Aristotle records that in his time servants were flogged in Tyrrhenia to the accompaniment of pipes; but we should not follow suit and, for the sake of personal pleasure, be driven by a desire for satisfaction, as it were, to gorge ourselves with retaliation - to enjoy punishing (which is to behave like an animal), and then regret it later (which is to behave like a woman). Rather, we should wait until there is no trace of either pleasure or distress, and rationality is present, and then take reprisal without being motivated at all by anger.
Anyway, as may be obvious, this is not a cure for anger, but a means of postponing and protecting oneself against making mistakes while angry (despite the fact that, as Hieronymus says, although a swollen spleen is a symptom of fever, reducing the swelling alleviates the fever). But when I was trying to see how anger actually starts, I noticed that although different factors trigger its onset in different people, there is almost always present a belief that they are being slighted and ignored. It follows that we should help people who are trying to evade anger by putting the greatest possible distance between any given action and contempt or arrogance, by attributing the action instead to ignorance or necessity or emotion or accident. As Sophocles says, 'My lord, unfortunate people find that even their innate intelligence has no stability, but deserts them.' And Agamemnon attributes his theft of Briseis to his being possessed, but still says, 'I want to make amends and give you vast gifts of recompense.'
The point of this quote is that no one can make an appeal to someone if he despises him; and by being demonstrably humble, the offender gets rid of any impression of contempt. But anyone who is angry should not just wait for this to happen, but should of his own accord cling to what Diogenes said: 'Those people are laughing at you, Diogenes,' someone said; 'But I don't feel laughed at,' he replied. So anyone who is angry should not think that he is being despised, but should rather despise the other person, on the grounds that his offence was caused by weakness, impetuosity, laziness, meanness, old age or youth.
However, our dealings with servants and friends must be completely free of this impression, since contempt for us as powerless or as ineffective plays no part in their attitude towards us: our servants regard us as good, on the assumption that we are fair to them, and our friends regard us as their friends, on the assumption that we are affectionate towards them. In fact, however, it is not only wife, servants and friends that we behave harshly towards because we think we are despised by them, but the same idea often brings us into angry conflict with innkeepers, sailors and drunken muleteers, and makes us get cross with dogs for barking at us and donkeys for bumping into us. We are just like the man who wanted to hit a donkey driver, and then when he shouted, 'I'm an Athenian citizen', he said to the donkey, 'Well, you aren't', and began hitting it and raining blows on it.
Now, those continuous, constant feelings of anger which gradually gather in the mind like a swarm of bees or wasps are engendered in us above all by self-regard and discontent, coupled with a luxurious and enervating way of life. It follows that there is no more important means of promoting kind behaviour towards one's servants, wife and friends than being easy to please and having a simple lifestyle, as a result of the ability to adapt oneself to immediate circumstances and not to need a lot of extras. On the other hand, 'anyone whose discontent makes him critical, if his food is over-baked or over-boiled, or under- or over- or medium-seasoned', and who can't have a drink without ice, or eat shop-bought bread, or take a morsel of food served on plain or earthenware dishes, or sleep on a mattress unless it billows like the sea in a deep swell, and who flogs and beats his table servants, forcing them to hurry, making them rush about, create a hubbub and work up a sweat as if they were bringing poultices for boils - anyone like this is enslaved to a feeble, nit-picking, complaining way of life, and fails to realize that he is creating for his temper the kind of raw and oozing condition which a chronic cough or constantly bumping into things causes. So we must train the body, by means of frugality, to be self-sufficient and hence easily pleased, because people who want little are seldom disappointed.
Food should be our starting-point: it is no great hardship quietly to make do with what is to hand, and not worry and fuss about a considerable proportion of our food, which imposes upon ourselves and our companions the most disagreeable flavouring of all - anger. It is impossible to conceive of a less pleasant meal than when servants are beaten and wife is cursed because something is burned or smoky or has insufficient salt, or because the bread is too cold. Arcesilaus once had some visitors staying and he invited friends over to dinner, but when the meal was served, there was no bread, because the servants had forgotten to buy any - which would make anyone scream loud enough to crack the walls! But Arcesilaus smiled and said, 'It's a good thing that intellectuals like a drinks party!'
Socrates once brought Euthydemus home from the wrestling-school, and Xanthippe laid into them angrily, hurled insults at them and eventually overturned the table. Euthydemus was very upset, and got up to go, but Socrates said, 'When we were at your house the other day, a hen flew in and did exactly the same, but we didn't get cross, did we?'
We should welcome friends gladly, with smiles and affection - without scowling and without instilling fear and trepidation in our servants. And we should also condition ourselves to be happy to use any utensils, and not to have preferences: some people (including Marius, we hear), having once chosen one particular goblet or cup, refuse to drink out of any other, even when they have plenty available; others are the same way about oil-flasks and strigils, and love one set above all others; and then, when any of these special things gets broken or lost, they can hardly bear it and they resort to punishment. So anyone whose weakness is anger should get rid of rare and unusual things like cups, rings and precious stones, since their loss is more unsettling than the loss of common, everyday things. That is why, when Nero had an amazingly beautiful and lavish octagonal tent made, Seneca said, 'You are a self-convicted pauper, because this tent is irreplaceable if lost.' And in fact the tent was lost, as it happened, when its ship went down; but Nero remembered what Seneca had said, and did not get too upset.
Being unfussy about mundane things makes one unfussy and gentle with one's servants; and if one is gentle with one's servants, then obviously one will also be gentle with one's friends and dependants. It is noticeable that the first thing slaves try to find out about their new owner, after they have been bought, is not whether he is liable to superstition or envy, but whether he has a temper. In fact, it is generally true that where anger is present, husbands cannot tolerate their wives' impassivity, or wives their husbands' passion, or friends one another's familiarity. So when anger is present, neither marriage nor friendship is endurable; but when anger is absent, even drunkenness is no burden. Dionysus' wand provides punishment enough for anyone who gets drunk, unless anger intrudes and imbues the wine with the god of cruelty and madness, rather than of ecstasy and dance. Anticyra cures straightforward insanity, but the combination of madness and anger is the stuff of tragedy and myth.
We should eliminate anger from our lighter moments, because it imposes enmity on affability; from our discussions, because it turns love of debating into love of disputing; from our decision-making, because it tinges authority with arrogance; when we are teaching, because it instils lack of confidence and a distaste for rationality; when we are doing well, because it promotes envy; when we are doing badly, because it deters sympathy by making people fight irritably with anyone commiserating with them. Priam is an example of this, with his 'Go away, you vile wretches! Haven't you got problems of your own? Why have you come to bother me?'
Being easy to please, on the other hand, is either a help or an embellishment or a delight, and its gentleness overcomes anger and discontent of all kinds. Consider Euclides, for instance: when his brother ended an argument by saying, 'I'll get my own back on you, if it's the last thing I do', Euclides replied, 'I'll win you over, if it's the last thing I do', and immediately made him alter course and change his mind. And Polemon was once being cursed by a man who was fond of precious stones and obsessed with costly rings; Polemon did not respond at all, but began to study one of the man's rings closely. So the man felt pleased and said, 'You'll get a far better impression of it, Polemon, if you examine it in sunlight rather than here.'
Once Aristippus was angry with Aeschines, and someone asked, 'What's happened to Aeschines', and your friendship, Aristippus?' He replied, 'It's sleeping, but I'll wake it up.' He went to Aeschines and said, 'Do you think there's absolutely no chance for me, no hope at all? Is that why you don't tell me off?' And Aeschines' response was: 'Given that you're inherently better than me in all respects, it's not at all surprising that you were the first to see what to do.'
It has been said that 'A new-born child, stroking a bristle-maned boar with his young hand, may - and so may a woman - bring him down more easily than any wrestler.' We, however, domesticate and tame wild creatures, and carry wolf and lion cubs around in our arms, but then under the influence of anger we reject children, friends and acquaintances; and we use our anger like a wild beast to assault our servants and fellow citizens, and misguidedly gloss over it as 'righteous indignation'. There is no difference, in my opinion, between this and calling other mental affections and afflictions 'foresight' or 'independence' or 'respect': it cannot free us from any of them.
Now, Zeno used to say that seed is a compound, a mixture of extracts from all the faculties which make up a person's nature; and analogously, anger seems to be a kind of conglomerate of emotional seeds. It contains elements extracted from pain and pleasure and arrogance; it has the gloating pleasure of spite, and also gets its method of grappling from spite, in the sense that the avoidance of its own suffering is not the purpose of its efforts, but it accepts harm to itself while destroying the other person; and one of its ingredients is the form of desire which is the most disagreeable of all, the longing to hurt someone else. When we approach reprobates' houses, we hear a pipe-girl playing at dawn and the sights that greet our eyes are, to quote, 'sediment of wine and shreds of garlands' and inebriated servants at the door; but the fact that the longing to hurt others is an aspect of anger explains why you will see the manifest signs of cruel and irascible people on the faces and in the identification tattoos and chains of their servants; and 'wailing is the only constant refrain to arise in the house' of an angry man - the wailing of estate-managers being flogged and serving-women having their arms twisted inside the house; and the consequence of all this is that anger is pitiful to anyone who can see that its desires and its pleasures involve pain.
Despite what has been said, anyone who is commonly susceptible to anger because of genuine righteous indignation must rid himself of the excessive, unmitigated part of his anger, along with his overconfidence in the people he comes across. This overconfidence is one of the chief causes of the aggravation of anger, which is what happens when someone assumed to be good turns out to be bad, or when a supposed friend gets cross or critical. In my own case, I'm sure you know how much I am naturally inclined towards thinking well of people and trusting them. It is like when you take a step, but there is nothing there to tread on: the more I commit myself to being friendly, the more I go wrong and get hurt by my mistakes. I might well not be able at this late stage to lessen this excessive susceptibility to and enthusiasm for friendship; but I can use Plato's words of warning to bridle my overconfidence. Plato says that his praise for the mathematician Helicon is couched the way it is because Helicon is a member of an inherently inconstant species; and he claims to be right to be wary of people brought up in his city, because since they are human and the offspring of humans, they might at any time reveal the weakness inherent in their nature.
However, Sophocles' assertion that 'Most aspects of humanity will be found on investigation to be contemptible' seems excessively harsh and restrictive. Still, the pessimistic, carping tone of this judgement does make us less liable to anger and its consequent disruptiveness; I mean, it is what is unexpected and unforeseen that throws us. We should (as Panaetius said at one point) make use of the attitude summed up in Anaxagoras' dictum: when his son died, he said, 'I knew that I had fathered a mortal.' Likewise, whenever we get irritated by someone's mistakes, we should comment, 'I knew that the slave I bought was unintelligent', or 'I knew that my friend was not flawless', or 'I knew that my wife was a woman.' And if one also keeps reiterating Plato's saying, 'Am I not like that too?', he will turn his thinking inward instead of outward, and will interrupt his complaining with caution, and will consequently not employ a great deal of righteous indignation towards others when he sees that he himself requires a lot of forbearance. But as it is, every one of us gets angry and lashes out, and sounds like Aristides and Cato: 'Stop stealing!', 'Don't tell lies!', 'Why are you slacking?' And the most despicable thing of all is that we angrily reprimand others for being angry, and we furiously punish others for mistakes made because they were infuriated: we do not behave like doctors who 'use bitter medicine to flush out bitter bile', but we aggravate and exacerbate the condition.
At the same time as bearing in mind these considerations, I also try to cut back a bit on my nosiness. I mean, knowing every single detail about everything, investigating and eliciting a slave's every occupation, a friend's every action, a son's every pastime, a wife's every whisper - this leads to many outbursts of anger, one after another every day, and these in turn add up to habitual discontent and surliness. Although Euripides is right to say that it is when things get out of hand that God 'intervenes, while leaving minor matters to chance', I still think that a sensible person ought to entrust nothing to chance, and ought to ignore nothing: he should trust and make use of his wife for some matters, his servants for others and his friends for others (just as a ruler trusts and makes use of overseers, accountants and managers), while being himself, by virtue of his rationality, in charge of the most far-reaching and important matters. For just as tiny writing irritates the eyes, so the extra strain of trivial matters chafes and unsettles one's temper, and it acquires a habit which is detrimental when more important matters are at stake.
All in all, therefore, I began to think that Empedocles' dictum 'Observe a fast from evil' is crucial and inspired; furthermore, not just because they are agreeable, but also because they are not irrelevant to the practice of philosophy, I began to commend those familiar pacts, pledged with devotion, such as to honour God with one's self-control, by keeping oneself for a year untainted by sex and alcohol; or again to refrain from lying for a prescribed period of time, by paying attention to oneself to make sure that one always tells the truth, in both unguarded and serious moments.
And then I compared my own pledge with these, and found it just as pleasing to God and just as sacred. My pledge was to begin by spending a few days doing the equivalent of going without drinking and alcohol - avoiding anger, and doing so as if I were pouring ritual libations of water and of honey, but not of wine; and then to spend a month, two months, doing this ... In this way, by experimenting on myself, the period of time gradually got longer and I progressed towards increased tolerance, by using self-control to pay attention to myself and to keep myself composed and imperturbable - maintaining a holy silence - and to remain untainted by pernicious speech, unnatural actions and emotion. Emotion leads, for the sake of a form of pleasure which is small in quantity and disagreeable in quality, to enormous mental confusion and the most despicable remorse. And this, I think, is why (with God's assistance too) my experience tends to clarify the meaning of the well-known view that this composure, calmness and charity is nowhere near as kind and considerate and inoffensive to those who come across it as it is to those who possess it.