PLVTARQVE est admirable par tout: mais principalement, où il iuge des actions humaines. On peut voir les belles choses, qu’il dit en la comparaison de Lycurgus, et de Numa, sur le propos de la grande simplesse que ce nous est, d’abandonner les enfans au gouuernement et à la charge de leurs peres. La plus part de noz polices, comme dit Aristote, laissent à chascun, en maniere des Cyclopes, la conduitte de leurs femmes et de leurs enfants, selon leur folle et indiscrete fantasie. Et quasi les seules, Lacedemonienne et Cretense, ont commis aux loix la discipline de l’enfance. Qui ne voit qu’en vn Estat tout despend de son education et nourriture?
Plutarch is admirable everywhere, but especially where he judges human actions. You can see the fine things he says in his comparison of Lycurgus and Numa about our great foolishness in abandoning children to the government and charge of their fathers. Most of our states, as Aristotle says, leave to each man, in the manner of the Cyclopes, the management of his wife and children according to his own foolish and thoughtless fancy; and almost the only ones that have committed the discipline of childhood to the laws are the Spartan and the Cretan. Who does not see that in a State everything depends on its education and upbringing?
et cependant sans aucune discretion, on la laisse à la mercy des parens, tant fols et meschants qu’ils soient.
And yet, without any discernment, it is left at the mercy of parents, however foolish and wicked they may be.
Entre autres choses combien de fois m’a-il prins enuie, passant par nos ruës, de dresser vne farce, pour venger des garçonnetz, que ie voyoy escorcher, assommer, et meurtrir à quelque pere ou mere furieux, et forcenez de colere? Vous leur voyez sortir le feu et la rage des yeux, Rabie iecur incendente feruntur / Præcipites, vt saxa iugis abrupta, quibus mons / Subtrahitur, cliuóque latus pendente recedit: (et selon Hippocrates les plus dangereuses maladies sont celles qui desfigurent le visage) à tout vne voix tranchante et esclatante, souuent contre qui ne fait que sortir de nourrisse. Et puis les voyla estroppiez, estourdis de coups: et nostre iustice qui n’en fait compte, comme si ces esboittements et eslochements n’estoient pas des membres de nostre chose publique.
Among other things, how many times, as I passed through our streets, have I felt like putting on a farce to avenge little boys whom I saw being flayed, beaten senseless and battered by some father or mother raging and mad with anger! You see fire and fury coming out of their eyes, With rage inflaming their liver, they rush / Headlong, like rocks torn from the ridges when the mountain / Gives way beneath them and the side falls away from the overhanging slope (and according to Hippocrates the most dangerous diseases are those that disfigure the face), with a sharp and piercing voice, often against a child just out of the nurse’s hands. And then there they are, maimed, stunned by blows; and our justice takes no account of it, as if these dislocations and sprains were not of members of our commonwealth.
Gratum est quòd patriæ ciuem populóque dedisti, / Si facis vt patriæ sit idoneus, vtilis agris, / Vtilis et bellorum et pacis rebus agendis.
It is a welcome thing that you have given a citizen to your country and people, / If you make him fit for his country, useful in the fields, / Useful in carrying out the affairs of both war and peace.
Never punish in anger
Punishment given in anger is vengeance; Plutarch, Archytas and Plato refused to punish while angry.
Il n’est passion qui esbranle tant la sincerité des iugements, que la cholere. Aucun ne feroit doubte de punir de mort, le iuge, qui par cholere auroit condamné son criminel: pourquoy est-il non plus permis aux peres, et aux pedantes, de fouetter les enfans, et les chastier estans en cholere? Ce n’est plus correction, c’est vengeance. Le chastiement tient lieu de medecine aux enfans; et souffririons nous vn medecin, qui fust animé et courroucé contre son patient?
There is no passion that so shakes the soundness of our judgments as anger. No one would hesitate to punish with death a judge who had condemned his criminal out of anger; why then is it any more permitted to fathers and schoolmasters to whip children and punish them while angry? It is no longer correction; it is vengeance. Punishment serves as medicine for children; and would we put up with a doctor who was worked up and angry with his patient?
Nous mesmes, pour bien faire, ne deurions iamais mettre la main sur noz seruiteurs, tandis que la cholere nous dure. Pendant que le pouls nous bat, et que nous sentons de l’esmotion, remettons la partie: les choses nous sembleront à la verité autres, quand nous serons r’accoisez et refroidis. C’est la passion qui commande lors, c’est la passion qui parle, ce n’est pas nous. Au trauers d’elle, les fautes nous apparoissent plus grandes, comme les corps au trauers d’vn brouillas. Celuy qui a faim, vse de viande, mais celuy qui veut vser de chastiement, n’en doit auoir faim ny soif. Et puis, les chastiemens, qui se font auec poix et discretion, se reçoiuent bien mieux, et auec plus de fruit, de celuy qui les souffre.
We ourselves, to do right, should never lay a hand on our servants while our anger lasts. While our pulse is racing and we feel agitated, let us put off the match. Things will truly seem different to us when we have calmed and cooled down. It is passion that commands then, passion that speaks, not we. Through it, faults look larger to us, like bodies seen through a fog. He who is hungry makes use of food; but he who would make use of punishment must have neither hunger nor thirst for it. And besides, punishments carried out with weight and discretion are much better received, and with more benefit, by the one who suffers them.
Autrement, il ne pense pas auoir esté iustement condamné, par vn homme agité d’ire et de furie: et allegue pour sa iustification, les mouuements extraordinaires de son maistre, l’inflammation de son visage, les sermens inusitez, et cette sienne inquietude, et precipitation temeraire. Ora tument ira, nigrescunt sanguine venæ, / Lumina Gorgoneo sæuius igne micant. Suetone recite, que Caïus Rabirius ayant esté condamné par Cæsar, ce qui luy seruit le plus enuers le peuple (auquel il appella) pour luy faire gaigner sa cause, ce fut l’animosité et l’aspreté que Cæsar auoit apporté en ce iugement.
Otherwise he does not think he has been justly condemned by a man shaken with wrath and fury; and he alleges in his own justification his master’s extraordinary movements, the inflamed face, the unusual oaths, and that restlessness and rash haste of his. Faces swell with anger, veins grow black with blood, / Eyes flash more fiercely than a Gorgon’s fire. Suetonius relates that when Gaius Rabirius had been condemned by Caesar, what helped him most with the people (to whom he appealed) in winning his case was the animosity and harshness Caesar had brought to the judgment.
The preacher and the sermon
Saying and doing differ, yet words carry more weight when the speaker lives by them.
Le dire est autre chose que le faire, il faut considerer le presche à part, et le prescheur à part. Ceux-là se sont donnez beau ieu en nostre temps, qui ont essayé de choquer la verité de nostre Eglise, par les vices des ministres d’icelle: elle tire ses tesmoignages d’ailleurs. C’est vne sotte façon d’argumenter, et qui reietteroit toutes choses en confusion. Vn homme de bonnes mœurs, peut auoir des opinions faulces, et vn meschant peut prescher verité, voire celuy qui ne la croit pas.
Saying is one thing and doing another; we must consider the sermon apart and the preacher apart. Those in our time who have tried to shake the truth of our Church through the vices of its ministers have given themselves an easy game; the Church draws its testimonies from elsewhere. It is a foolish way of arguing, and one that would throw everything back into confusion. A man of good morals may hold false opinions, and a wicked man may preach the truth—even one who does not believe it.
C’est sans doubte vne belle harmonie, quand le faire, et le dire vont ensemble: et ie ne veux pas nier, que le dire, lors que les actions suyuent, ne soit de plus d’authorité et efficace: comme disoit Eudamidas, oyant vn Philosophe discourir de la guerre; Ces propos sont beaux, mais celuy qui les dit, n’en est pas croyable, car il n’a pas les oreilles accoustumées au son de la trompette. Et Cleomenes oyant vn rhetoricien harenguer de la vaillance, s’en print fort à rire: et l’autre s’en scandalizant, il luy dit; I’en ferois de mesmes, si c’estoit vne arondelle qui en parlast: mais si c’estoit vne aigle, ie l’orrois volontiers.
It is no doubt a fine harmony when doing and saying go together; and I do not wish to deny that saying, when actions follow, carries more authority and effect. As Eudamidas said, hearing a philosopher discourse on war: “These remarks are fine, but the man who makes them is not to be believed, for his ears are not used to the sound of the trumpet.” And Cleomenes, hearing a rhetorician harangue about valor, burst out laughing; and when the other was offended, he said to him: “I would do the same if it were a swallow talking about it; but if it were an eagle, I would gladly listen.”
I’apperçois, ce me semble, és escrits des anciens, que celuy qui dit ce qu’il pense, l’assene bien plus viuement, que celuy qui se contrefaict. Oyez Cicero parler de l’amour de la liberté: oyez en parler Brutus, les escrits mesmes vous sonnent que cettuy-cy estoit homme pour l’achepter au prix de la vie. Que Cicero pere d’eloquence, traitte du mespris de la mort, que Seneque en traite aussi, celuy là traine languissant, et vous sentez qu’il vous veut resoudre de chose, dequoy il n’est pas resolu. Il ne vous donne point de cœur, car luy-mesmes n’en a point: l’autre vous anime et enflamme.
I notice, it seems to me, in the writings of the ancients, that the man who says what he thinks strikes home far more vividly than the one who is pretending. Listen to Cicero speak of the love of liberty; listen to Brutus speak of it: the very writings ring out to you that this man was one to buy it at the price of his life. Let Cicero, the father of eloquence, treat of the contempt of death; let Seneca treat of it too: the former drags along languidly, and you feel that he wants to make you resolved about something on which he is not resolved himself. He gives you no heart, for he has none himself; the other rouses and inflames you.
Ie ne voy iamais autheur, mesmement de ceux qui traictent de la vertu et des actions, que ie ne recherche curieusement quel il a esté. Car les Ephores à Sparte voyans vn homme dissolu proposer au peuple vn aduis vtile, luy commanderent de se taire, et prierent vn homme de bien, de s’en attribuer l’inuention, et le proposer.
I never look at an author, especially one of those who write about virtue and actions, without inquiring curiously what kind of man he was. For the ephors at Sparta, seeing a dissolute man propose a useful piece of advice to the people, ordered him to be silent, and asked a good man to claim the idea as his own and propose it.
Les escrits de Plutarque, à les bien sauourer, nous le descouurent assez; et ie pense le cognoistre iusques dans l’ame: si voudrois-ie que nous eussions quelques memoires de sa vie. Et me suis ietté en ce discours à quartier, à propos du bon gré que ie sens à Aul. Gellius de nous auoir laissé par escrit ce compte de ses mœurs, qui reuient à mon subject de la cholere.
Plutarch’s writings, if we savor them well, reveal him to us well enough, and I think I know him to the very soul; yet I wish we had some record of his life. And I have launched into this digression because of the gratitude I feel toward Aulus Gellius for leaving us in writing this story about his character, which brings me back to my subject of anger.
Vn sien esclaue mauuais homme et vicieux, mais qui auoit les oreilles aucunement abbreuuées des leçons de philosophie, ayant esté pour quelque sienne faute despouillé par le commandement de Plutarque; pendant qu’on le fouettoit, grondoit au commencement, que c’estoit sans raison, et qu’il n’auoit rien faict: mais en fin, se mettant à crier et iniurier bien à bon escient son maistre, luy reprochoit qu’il n’estoit pas philosophe, comme il s’en vantoit: qu’il luy auoit souuent ouy dire, qu’il estoit laid de se courroucer, voire qu’il en auoit faict vn liure: et ce que lors tout plongé en la colere, il le faisoit si cruellement battre, desmentoit entierement ses escrits.
A slave of his, a bad and vicious man, but whose ears were somewhat steeped in the lessons of philosophy, had been stripped by Plutarch’s order for some fault of his. While he was being whipped, he grumbled at first that it was without reason and that he had done nothing. But in the end, starting to shout and insult his master in good earnest, he reproached him for not being the philosopher he boasted of being: he had often heard him say that it was ugly to get angry, indeed he had written a book about it; and the fact that he was now, wholly plunged in anger, having him so cruelly beaten, flatly contradicted his writings.
A cela Plutarque, tout froidement et tout rassis; Comment, dit-il, rustre, à quoy iuges tu que ie sois à cette heure courroucé? mon visage, ma voix, ma couleur, ma parolle, te donne elle quelque tesmoignage que ie sois esmeu? Ie ne pense auoir ny les yeux effarouchez, ny le visage troublé, ny vn cry effroyable: rougis-ie? escume-ie? m’eschappe-il de dire chose, dequoy i’aye à me repentir? tressaulx-ie? fremis-ie de courroux? car pour te dire, ce sont là les vrais signes de la cholere. Et puis se destournant à celuy qui fouettoit: Continuez, luy dit-il, tousiours vostre besongne, pendant que cettuy-cy et moy disputons. Voyla son comte.
To this Plutarch replied, quite coolly and calmly: “What, you lout, what makes you judge that I am angry now? Does my face, my voice, my color, my speech give you any sign that I am agitated? I do not think my eyes are wild, or my face troubled, or my voice a frightful cry. Am I flushing? Am I foaming? Does anything escape me that I shall have to repent of? Am I trembling? Am I shaking with rage? For let me tell you, those are the true signs of anger.” And then, turning to the man doing the whipping: “Carry on with your work,” he said, “while this fellow and I argue.” That is his story.
Archytas Tarentinus reuenant d’vne guerre, où il auoit esté Capitaine general, trouua tout plein de mauuais mesnage en sa maison, et ses terres en friche, par le mauuais gouuernement de son receueur: et l’ayant fait appeller: Va, luy dit-il, que si ie n’estois en cholere, ie t’estrillerois bien. Platon de mesme, s’estant eschauffé contre l’vn de ses esclaues, donna à Speusippus charge de le chastier, s’excusant d’y mettre la main luy-mesme, sur ce qu’il estoit courroucé. Charillus Lacedemonien, à vn Elote qui se portoit trop insolemment et audacieusement enuers luy: Par les Dieux, dit-il, si ie n’estois courroucé, ie te ferois tout à cette heure mourir.
Archytas of Tarentum, returning from a war in which he had been commander-in-chief, found his household in a thorough mess and his lands lying fallow through the bad management of his steward. He had him summoned and said: “Go—if I were not angry, I would give you a good thrashing.” Plato likewise, having grown heated against one of his slaves, gave Speusippus the job of punishing him, excusing himself from laying a hand on him himself on the ground that he was angry. Charillus, a Spartan, said to a helot who was behaving too insolently and boldly toward him: “By the gods, if I were not angry, I would have you put to death this very moment.”
C’est vne passion qui se plaist en soy, et qui se flatte. Combien de fois nous estans esbranlez soubs vne fauce cause, si on vient à nous presenter quelque bonne deffence ou excuse, nous despitons nous contre la verité mesme et l’innocence? I’ay retenu à ce propos vn merueilleux exemple de l’antiquité. Piso personnage par tout ailleurs de notable vertu, s’estant esmeu contre vn sien soldat, dequoy reuenant seul du fourrage, il ne luy sçauoit rendre compte, où il auoit laissé vn sien compagnon, tinst pour aueré qu’il l’auoit tué, et le condamna soudain à la mort.
It is a passion that delights in itself and flatters itself. How many times, when we have been stirred up on a false cause, if someone comes and offers us some good defense or excuse, do we get annoyed at truth itself and innocence? I have kept in mind a wonderful example of this from antiquity. Piso, a man of notable virtue in every other respect, grew angry with one of his soldiers because, coming back alone from foraging, he could not tell him where he had left a comrade. Piso took it as proven that he had killed him and condemned him to death on the spot.
Ainsi qu’il estoit au gibet, voicy arriuer ce compagnon esgaré: toute l’armée en fit grand’feste, et apres force caresses et accollades des deux compagnons, le bourreau meine l’vn et l’autre, en la presence de Piso, s’attendant bien toute l’assistance que ce luy seroit à luy-mesmes vn grand plaisir: mais ce fut au rebours, car par honte et despit, son ardeur qui estoit encore en son effort, se redoubla: et d’vne subtilité que sa passion luy fournit soudain, il en fit trois coulpables, par ce qu’il en auoit trouué vn innocent: et les fit depescher tous trois: Le premier soldat, par ce qu’il y auoit arrest contre luy: le second qui s’estoit esgaré, par ce qu’il estoit cause de la mort de son compagnon; et le bourreau pour n’auoir obey au commandement qu’on luy auoit faict.
Just as he was at the gallows, along came the lost comrade. The whole army made a great celebration of it, and after many embraces and hugs between the two comrades, the executioner brought them both before Piso, the whole company fully expecting that it would be a great pleasure to him too. But it was quite the reverse: out of shame and spite, his fury, which was still at its height, redoubled; and with a subtlety his passion suddenly supplied, he made three guilty men out of finding one innocent, and had all three dispatched: the first soldier, because there was a sentence against him; the second, who had got lost, because he was the cause of his comrade’s death; and the executioner, for not having obeyed the order he had been given.
Ceux qui ont à negocier auec des femmes testues, peuuent auoir essayé à quelle rage on les iette, quand on oppose à leur agitation, le silence et la froideur, et qu’on desdaigne de nourrir leur courroux. L’orateur Celius estoit merueilleusement cholere de sa nature. A vn, qui souppoit en sa compagnie, homme de molle et douce conuersation, et qui pour ne l’esmouuoir, prenoit party d’approuuer tout ce qu’il disoit, et d’y consentir: luy ne pouuant souffrir son chagrin, se passer ainsi sans aliment: Nie moy quelque chose, de par les Dieux, dit-il, affin que nous soyons deux. Elles de mesmes, ne se courroucent, qu’affin qu’on se contre-courrouce, à l’imitation des loix de l’amour.
Those who have to deal with stubborn women may have found out into what a rage they are thrown when you meet their agitation with silence and coldness and disdain to feed their wrath. The orator Caelius was wonderfully hot-tempered by nature. A man was supping in his company, a man of soft and gentle conversation, who, so as not to provoke him, had decided to approve and agree with everything he said. Caelius, unable to bear having his ill humor pass thus without fuel, said: “Deny me something, by the gods, so that there may be two of us!” Women likewise get angry only so that you will get angry back, in imitation of the laws of love.
Phocion à vn homme qui luy troubloit son propos, en l’iniuriant asprement, n’y fit autre chose que se taire, et luy donner tout loisir d’espuiser sa cholere: cela faict, sans aucune mention de ce trouble, il recommença son propos, en l’endroict où il l’auoit laissé. Il n’est replique si piquante comme est vn tel mespris.
Phocion, faced with a man who was interrupting his speech with harsh insults, did nothing but keep silent and give him all the time he wanted to exhaust his anger; that done, without any mention of this disturbance, he resumed his speech at the point where he had left off. There is no retort so stinging as such contempt.
Hidden anger and my own
Suppressed anger gnaws within; Montaigne explains how he manages his own sudden but brief outbursts.
Du plus cholere homme de France (et c’est tousiours imperfection, mais plus excusable à vn homme militaire: car en cet exercice il y a certes des parties, qui ne s’en peuuent passer) ie dy souuent, que c’est le plus patient homme que ie cognoisse à brider sa cholere: elle l’agite de telle violence et fureur, Magno veluti cùm flamma sonore / Virgea suggeritur costis vndantis aheni, / Exultántque æstu latices, furit intus aquai / Fumidus atque altè spumis exuberat amnis, / Nec iam se capit vnda, volat vapor ater ad auras, qu’il faut qu’il se contraingne cruellement, pour la moderer. Et pour moy, ie ne sçache passion, pour laquelle couurir et soustenir, ie peusse faire vn tel effort.
Of the most hot-tempered man in France (and it is always a flaw, but more excusable in a military man, for in that profession there are certainly parts that cannot do without it) I often say that he is the most patient man I know at bridling his anger. It shakes him with such violence and fury, As when a fire of twigs, with a great roar, is heaped / Beneath the ribs of a seething cauldron, / And the water leaps with the heat; within, the smoking flood / Rages and boils up high with foam, / And the water can no longer contain itself; black steam flies up into the air, that he has to restrain himself cruelly to moderate it. For my part, I know of no passion that I could make such an effort to hide and withstand.
Ie ne voudrois mettre la sagesse à si haut prix. Ie ne regarde pas tant ce qu’il fait, que combien il luy couste à ne faire pis. Vn autre se vantoit à moy, du reglement et douceur de ses mœurs, qui est, à la verité singuliere: ie luy disois, que c’estoit bien quelque chose, notamment à ceux, comme luy, d’eminente qualité, sur lesquels chacun a les yeux, de se presenter au monde tousiours bien temperez: mais que le principal estoit de prouuoir au dedans, et à soy-mesme: et que ce n’estoit pas à mon gré, bien mesnager ses affaires, que de se ronger interieurement: ce que ie craignois qu’il fist, pour maintenir ce masque, et cette reglée apparence par le dehors.
I would not want to set so high a price on wisdom. I look not so much at what he does as at how much it costs him not to do worse. Another man boasted to me of the orderliness and gentleness of his manners, which is truly remarkable. I told him that it was indeed something, especially for people like him of eminent rank, on whom all eyes are fixed, always to present themselves to the world well tempered; but that the main thing was to provide for the inside and for oneself; and that it was not, to my mind, managing one’s affairs well to be gnawing at oneself inwardly—which I feared he was doing in order to keep up that mask and that orderly outward appearance.
On incorpore la cholere en la cachant: comme Diogenes dit à Demosthenes, lequel de peur d’estre apperceu en vne tauerne, se reculoit au dedans: Tant plus tu te recules arriere, tant plus tu y entres. Ie conseille qu’on donne plustost vne buffe à la iouë de son valet, vn peu hors de saison, que de gehenner sa fantasie, pour representer cette sage contenance. Et aymerois mieux produire mes passions, que de les couuer à mes despens. Elles s’alanguissent en s’esuantant, et en s’exprimant. Il vaut mieux que leur poincte agisse au dehors, que de la plier contre nous. Omnia vitia in aperto leuiora sunt: et tunc perniciosissima, quum simulata sanitate subsidunt.
By hiding anger we drive it into our body—as Diogenes said to Demosthenes, who, for fear of being seen in a tavern, was drawing back inside: “The further back you go, the further in you are.” I advise giving your valet a slap on the cheek, a bit unseasonably, rather than torturing your mind to put on this wise countenance. And I would rather bring my passions out than brood on them at my own expense. They weaken by being vented and expressed. It is better that their point should act outward than that we bend it against ourselves. All vices are lighter in the open, and most pernicious when they lurk beneath a pretense of health.
I’aduertis ceux, qui ont loy de se pouuoir courroucer en ma famille, premierement qu’ils mesnagent leur cholere, et ne l’espandent pas à tout prix: car cela en empesche l’effect et le poids. La criaillerie temeraire et ordinaire, passe en vsage, et fait que chacun la mesprise: celle que vous employez contre vn seruiteur pour son larcin, ne se sent point, d’autant que c’est celle mesme qu’il vous a veu employer cent fois contre luy, pour auoir mal rinsé vn verre, ou mal assis vne escabelle.
I warn those in my household who have the right to get angry, first, to husband their anger and not scatter it about at every turn, for that hinders its effect and weight. Rash and constant scolding becomes routine and makes everyone despise it. The scolding you use against a servant for his theft is not felt, since it is the very same he has seen you use against him a hundred times for rinsing a glass badly or setting a stool down wrong.
Secondement, qu’ils ne se courroussent point en l’air, et regardent que leur reprehension arriue à celuy de qui ils se plaignent: car ordinairement ils crient, auant qu’il soit en leur presence, et durent à crier vn siecle apres qu’il est party. Et secum petulans amentia certat. Ils s’en prennent à leur ombre, et poussent cette tempeste, en lieu, où personne n’en est ny chastié ny interessé, que du tintamarre de leur voix, tel qui n’en peut mais. I’accuse pareillement aux querelles, ceux qui brauent et se mutinent sans partie: il faut garder ces Rodomontades, où elles portent.
Secondly, not to get angry into thin air, and to see that their reproof reaches the person they are complaining of; for usually they shout before he is in their presence and go on shouting for an age after he has gone. And wanton madness quarrels with itself. They take on their own shadow and drive this storm to a place where no one is punished or touched by it, except, by the din of their voice, someone who is not to blame. I likewise blame, in quarrels, those who bluster and rebel with no opponent present: one must keep these rodomontades for where they strike home.
Mugitus veluti cùm prima in prælia taurus / Terrificos ciet, atque irasci in cornua tentat, / Arboris obnixus trunco, ventósque lacessit / Ictibus, et sparsa ad pugnam proludit arena.
As when a bull, before his first battle, raises / Terrifying bellows and tries to put anger into his horns, / Butting against a tree trunk, and lashes the winds / With blows, and paws the sand in prelude to the fight.
Quand ie me courrouce, c’est le plus vifuement, mais aussi le plus briefuement et secretement que ie puis: ie me pers bien en vistesse, et en violence, mais non pas en trouble: si que i’aille iettant à l’abandon, et sans choix, toute sorte de parolles iniurieuses, et que ie ne regarde d’assoir pertinemment mes pointes, où i’estime qu’elles blessent le plus: car ie n’y employe communement, que la langue. Mes valets en ont meilleur marché aux grandes occasions qu’aux petites. Les petites me surprennent: et le mal’heur veut, que depuis que vous estes dans le precipice, il n’importe, qui vous ayt donné le bransle: vous allez tousiours iusques au fons. La cheute se presse, s’esmeut, et se haste d’elle mesme.
When I get angry, it is as sharply, but also as briefly and privately, as I can. I do lose myself in speed and violence, but not in confusion—not so far as to go flinging every sort of insult about recklessly and at random, without taking care to plant my barbs pointedly where I think they will wound most; for usually I use only my tongue. My servants get off more cheaply on big occasions than on small ones. The small ones take me by surprise; and the misfortune is that once you are over the precipice, it does not matter who gave you the push: you always go right to the bottom. The fall presses on, gathers speed and hurries of itself.
Aux grandes occasions cela me paye, qu’elles sont si iustes, que chacun s’attend d’en voir naistre vne raisonnable cholere: ie me glorifie à tromper leur attente: ie me bande et prepare contre celles cy, elles me mettent en ceruelle, et menassent de m’emporter bien loing si ie les suiuoy. Ayséement ie me garde d’y entrer, et suis assez fort, si ie l’attens, pour repousser l’impulsion de cette passion, quelque violente cause qu’elle aye: mais si elle me preoccupe, et saisit vne fois, elle m’emporte, quelque vaine cause qu’elle aye. Ie marchande ainsin auec ceux qui peuuent contester auec moy: Quand vous me sentirez esmeu le premier, laissez moy aller à tort ou à droict, i’en feray de mesme à mon tour.
On big occasions I am repaid by this: they are so just that everyone expects to see a reasonable anger arise from them, and I pride myself on cheating their expectation. I brace and prepare myself against these; they put me on my guard and threaten to carry me very far if I followed them. I easily keep myself from entering into it, and I am strong enough, if I am expecting it, to repel the impulse of this passion, however violent its cause; but if it catches me unawares and once seizes me, it carries me away, however trivial its cause. So I strike this bargain with those who may have words with me: “When you feel that I am the first to be roused, let me run on, rightly or wrongly; I will do the same for you in my turn.”
La tempeste ne s’engendre que de la concurrence des choleres, qui se produisent volontiers l’vne de l’autre, et ne naissent en vn poinct. Donnons à chacune sa course, nous voyla tousiours en paix. Vtile ordonnance, mais de difficile execution. Par fois m’aduient il aussi, de representer le courroussé, pour le reiglement de ma maison, sans aucune vraye emotion. A mesure que l’aage me rend les humeurs plus aigres, i’estudie à m’y opposer, et feray si ie puis que ie seray d’oresenauant d’autant moins chagrin et difficile, que i’auray plus d’excuse et d’inclination à l’estre: quoy que parcydeuant ie l’aye esté, entre ceux qui le sont le moins.
The storm arises only from the clash of angers, which readily breed one from the other and are not born at the same moment. Let us give each its run, and we are always at peace. A useful rule, but hard to carry out. Sometimes I also happen to play the angry man, for the good order of my household, without any real emotion. As age makes my temper sourer, I study to resist it; and if I can, I shall make myself henceforth all the less peevish and difficult, the more excuse and inclination I have to be so—although hitherto I have been among those who are least so.
Encore vn mot pour clorre ce pas. Aristote dit, que la colere sert par fois d’armes à la vertu et à la vaillance. Cela est vray-semblable: toutesfois ceux qui y contredisent, respondent plaisamment, que c’est vn’ arme de nouuel vsage: car nous remuons les autres armes, ceste cy nous remue: nostre main ne la guide pas, c’est elle qui guide nostre main: elle nous tient, nous ne la tenons pas.
One more word to close this topic. Aristotle says that anger sometimes serves as a weapon for virtue and valor. That is plausible; yet those who contradict it reply amusingly that it is a weapon of a novel kind: for we wield other weapons, but this one wields us. Our hand does not guide it; it guides our hand. It holds us; we do not hold it.