The five days debate at Cicero's house in Tusculum between master and sophister.

SECT. XXXVII. The Cause of Passions, an opinion that they are our Duty.

WHERE then are those that say Wrath is use∣ful? Can Madness be useful? or natural. Can any thing be agreeable to Nature, and con∣trary to Reason? Now if Anger were natural, how could it be either that one man should be more hasty than another; or that it could be over before the desire of Revenge be satiated, or that any should repent of what they did in Passion; as we see by King Alexander, for (a) after he had kill'd his Friend Clitus, he could hardly forbear offering violence to himself, so strongly did Repen∣tance work upon him. These things being noto∣rious, who can doubt but that this motion of the Soul is also wholly in conceit and voluntary; for who can doubt but that the Diseases of the Soul, such as Covetousness, Ambition, arise from this, that the object upon which the Soul dotes, is over∣valu'd, whence ought to be understood, that every Passion also hath its being from opinion; and if assurance that is, a firm affiance of the mind, be a kind of Science and stedfast opinion of one yielding his assent upon good grounds only, then is Fear a diffi∣dence of mind, upon some expected and impend∣ing Evil. If hope be the expectation of Good, needs must Fear be an expectation of Evil; as Fear then, so the other Passions relate to Evil. As Constancy then is Fruit of Knowledge, so is Passion of Error.

But as for some mens being said to be naturally hasty, or pittiful, or envious, or any such thing, they have Souls, as of an unhealthful Constitution, yet curable, as is said of Socrates, when Zopyrus a great Pretender to skill in Phisiognomy, had open∣ly in company recounted many Vices, which he concluded from his Art to be in Socrates, he was derided by the rest who knew no such Vices to be in Socrates, but was help'd out by himself, who own'd himself subject to those Vices, but withall said he had subdu'd them by Reason. Therefore, as he that is in the best health, may be thought naturally proner to some Disease or another; so is one mind more inclinable to one Disease, and another to another; but they who are said to be vitious, not from Na∣ture, but through their own default, their Vices consist of misapprehensions about things good and, bad; so that one is proner to one Motion and Pas∣sion, and another to another; but evil habits in Souls, as Chronical Distempers in Bodies are more diffi∣cult to be remov'd, than a simple disorder; and a sud∣den swelling of the Eyes is sooner cur'd, than a long soreness is remov'd.

(a) After he had kill'd his Friend Clitus.] Alexander the Great, who subdu'd all things that stood in his way, yet was vanquish'd by Wine and Anger. On a time as he was drinking with his Commanders, Clitus had magnified the Actions of King Philip, which he took as done in Deroga∣tion to his Glory, and run him through with his Spear; but when he came to himself, and his Passion was over, he was so troubled at the barbarous Act, that he was ready to turn the same Spear against his own Heart, tore his Face, and beg'd of all about him, that they would not let him sur∣vive that infamy. Three days he stir'd not out of his Tent, and could hardly he prevail'd upon to take any more suste∣nance, but by the intercession of his Friends, and especially

the Counsels of Callisthenes, he was brought again to some comfortable quiet of mind. Clitus was the Son of Alex∣ander's Nurse, an old Souldier of King Philip, and who in the Battle of Granicus, had protected with his Shield King Alexander, fighting bare-headed, and cut off the hand of Rhosaces lifted up against the King's Head, with many other honourable Exploits.