Moral essays. With an English translation by J.W. Basore

ON ANGER, I. XIX. 4-8desires ! And so such men are seized by the bystandersand begged to become at peace vnththemselves.None of these things ^\•i^ he do, who, being freefrom anger, imposes upon each one the punishmentthat he merits. He ^^i^l often ,let a man go freeeven after detecting his guilt)^ if regret for the actwarrants fair hope, if he discerns that the sin doesnot issue from the inmost soul of the man, but, soto speak, is onlv skin-deep, he \\ill grant him impunit}',seeing that it ^^•ill injure neither the recipientnor the giver. Sometimes he ^^^ll ban great crimesless ruthlessly than smairdiies, if these, in the onecase, were committed not in cruelty but in a momentof weakness, and, in the other, were instinct ^^ithsecret, hidden, and long-practised cunning. To twomen guilty of the same offence he ^\i\\ mete outdifferent punishment, if one sinned through carelessness,while the other intended to be wicked. Alwaysin ever}- case of punishment he \vill keep before himthe knowledge that one form is designed to make thewcked better, the other to remove them ; in eithercase he ^^ill look to the future, not to the past. Foras Plato says " :" A sensible person does not punisha man because he has sinned, but in order to keephim from sin ; for while the past cannot be recalled,the future may be forestalled," And he will openlykill those whom he wishes to have serve as examplesof the wickedness that is slow to jield, not so muchthat they themselves may be destroyed as that theymay deter others from destruction. These are thethings a man must weigh and consider, and you seehow free he ought to be from all emotion when heproceeds to deal v^ith a matter that requires the159