Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 1023

He withdraws himself to attend the service of future ages: and those counsels which he finds salutary to himself, he commits to writing for the good of after-times, as we do the receipts of sovereign antidotes or balsams. He that is well employed in his study, though he may seem to do nothing at all, does the greatest things yet of all others, in affairs both human and divine.

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 1180

The state is most commodious that lies betwixt poverty and plenty. Diogenes understood this very well when he put himself into an incapacity of losing any thing. That course of life is most commodious which is both safe and wholesome—the body is to be indulged no farther than for health, and rather mortified than not kept in subjection to the mind.

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 1437

People are betrayed at their _tables_ and in their _cups_, and drawn from the very _theatre_ to the _prison_. How horrid a madness is it to be still _raging_ and _killing_; to have the rattling of _chains_ always in our _ears; bloody spectacles_ before our _eyes_; and to carry _terror_ and _dismay_ wherever we go! If we had _lions_ and _serpents_, to rule over us, this would be the manner of their _government_, saving that they agree better among themselves.

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 1286

Were it not much better now to be making of friendships, pacifying of enemies, doing of good offices both public and private, than to be still meditating of mischief, and designing how to wound one man in his fame, another in his fortune, a third in his person? the one being so easy, innocent, and safe, and the other so difficult, impious, and hazardous.

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 1354

Vatinius, (a man that was made up for scorn and hatred, scurrilous and impudent to the highest degree, but most abusively witty and with all this he was diseased, and deformed to extremity), his way, was always to make sport with himself, and so he prevented the mockeries of other people.

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 1363

But it is a nice point so to check the seeds of anger in a child as not to take off his edge, and quench his spirits; whereof a principal care must be taken betwixt license and severity, that he be neither too much emboldened nor depressed. Commendation gives him courage and confidence; but then the danger is, of blowing him up into insolence and wrath: so that when to use the bit, and when the spur, is the main difficulty.

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 1166

The richest man that ever lived is poor in my opinion, and in any man’s may be so: but he that keeps himself to the stint of Nature, does neither feel poverty nor fear it; nay, even in poverty itself there are some things superfluous. Those which the world calls happy, their felicity is a false splendor, that dazzles the eyes of the vulgar; but our rich man is glorious and happy within.

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 426

Was not Marius ungrateful, that, from a common soldier, being raised up to a consul, not only gave the world for civil bloodshed and massacres, but was himself the sign of the execution; and every man he met in the streets, to whom he did not stretch out his right hand, was murdered? And was not Sylla ungrateful too?

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 444

It is thought reasonable by some, that there should be a law against ingratitude; for, say they, it is common for one city to upbraid another, and to claim that of posterity which was bestowed upon their ancestors; but this is only clamor without reason. It is objected by others, as a discouragement to good offices, if men shall not be made answerable for them; but I say, on the other side, that no man would accept of a benefit upon those terms.

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 140

Next to the choice of the _person_ follows that of the _matter_; wherein a regard must be had to time, place, proportion, quality; and to the very nicks of opportunity and humor. One man values his peace above his honor, another his honor above his safety; and not a few there are that (provided they may save their bodies) never care what becomes of their souls. So that good offices depend much upon construction. Some take themselves to be obliged, when they are not; others will not believe it, when they are; and some again take obligations and injuries, the one for the other.

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 844

The greatest and the smallest things are equally hard to be comprehended; we account many things _great_, for want of understanding what effectually is so: and we reckon other things to be _small_, which we find frequently to be of the highest value. Vain things only move vain minds.

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 392

It is a common thing to screw up justice to the pitch of an injury. A man may be _over-righteous_; and why not _over-grateful_ too? There is a mischievous excess, that borders so close upon ingratitude, that it is no easy matter to distinguish the one from the other: but, in regard that there is good-will in the bottom of it, (however distempered, for it is effectually but kindness out of the wits,) we shall discourse it under the title of _Gratitude mistaken_.

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 893

I came one night weary home, and threw myself upon the bed with this consideration about me: “There is nothing ill that is well taken.” My baker tells me he has no bread; but, says he, I may get some of your tenants, though I fear it is not good. No matter, said I, for I will stay until it be better—that is to say until my stomach will be glad of worse. It is discretion sometimes to practice temperance and wont ourselves to a little, for there are many difficulties both of time and place that may force us upon it.

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 440

How shall we judge then, and determine a matter which does not depend upon the fact itself, but upon the force and intention of it? Some things are reputed benefits, not for their value, but because we desire them: and there are offices of as much greater value, that we do not reckon upon at all.

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 248

How comes it that we should so much value what we have, and yet at the same time be so unthankful for it? Whence is it that we have our breath, the comforts of light and of heat, the very blood that runs in our veins? the cattle that feed us, and the fruits of the earth that feed them? Whence have we the growth of our bodies, the succession of our ages, and the faculties of our minds? so many veins of metals, quarries of marble, etc.

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 1376

Plato was about to strike his servant, and while his hand was in the air, he checked himself, but still held it in that menacing posture. A friend of his took notice of it, and asked him what he meant? “I am now,” says Plato, “punishing of an angry man;” so that he had left his servant to chastise himself.

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 1259

Our passions vary, but reason is equal; and it were a great folly for that which is stable, faithful, and sound, to repair for succor to that which is uncertain, false, and distempered. If the offender be incurable, take him out of the world, that if he will not be good he may cease to be evil; but this must be without anger too. Does any man hate an arm, or a leg, when he cuts it off; or reckon _that_ a passion which is only a miserable cure?

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 976

Temporary friends will never stand the test. One man is forsaken for fear of profit, another is betrayed. It is a negotiation, not a friendship, that has an eye to advantages; only, through the corruption of times, that which was formerly a friendship is now become a design upon a booty: alter your testament, and you lose your friend.

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 916

We must not judge of a man by his ornaments, but strip him of all the advantages and the impostures of Fortune, nay, of his very body too, and look into his mind.

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 567

We take a great deal of pains to trace Ulysses in his wanderings, but were it not time as well spent to look to ourselves that we may not wander at all? Are not we ourselves tossed with tempestuous passions? and both _assaulted_ by terrible _monsters_ on the one hand, and _tempted_ by _syrens_ on the other? Teach me my duty to my country, to my father, to my wife, to mankind. What is it to me whether Penelope was _honest_ or not?

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 239

What does the sun get by travelling about the universe; by visiting and comforting all the quarters of the earth? Is the whole creation made and ordered for the good of mankind, and every particular man only for the good of himself? There passes not an hour of our lives, wherein we do not enjoy the blessings of Providence, without measure and without intermission. And what design can the Almighty have upon us, who is in himself full, safe, and inviolable?

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 410

To speak against the ungrateful is to rail against mankind, for even those that complain are guilty: nor do I speak only of those that do not live up to the strict rule of virtue; but mankind itself is degenerated and lost.

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 1032

Now, though business must be quitted, let it not be done unseasonably; the longer we defer it, the more we endanger our liberty; and yet we must no more fly before the time than linger when the time comes: or, however, we must not love business for business’ sake, nor indeed do we, but for the profit that goes along with it: for we love the reward of misery, though we hate the misery itself.

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 180

In some cases we value the _thing_, in others the _labor_ and _attendance_. What can be more precious than good manners, good letters, life, and health? and yet we pay our physicians and tutors only for their service in the professions. If we buy things cheap, it matters not, so long as it is a bargain: it is no obligation from the seller, if nobody else will give him more for it. What would not a man give to be set ashore in a tempest? for a house in a wilderness? a shelter in a storm?

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 306

He granted the soldier his request, contemplating at the same time, the impossibility of satisfying so many ravenous appetites as he had to please. When the good man came to be turned out of all, he was not so mealy-mouthed as to thank his majesty for not giving away his person too as well as his fortune; but in a bold, frank letter to Philip, made a just report of the whole story.

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 1092

So that what we fear as a rock, proves to be but a port, in many cases to be desired, never to be refused; and he that dies young has only made a quick voyage of it. Some are becalmed, others cut it away before wind; and we live just as we sail: first, we rub our childhood out of sight; our youth next; and then our middle age: after that follows old age, and brings us to the common end of mankind.

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 517

To think anything good that is not honest, were to reproach Providence; for good men suffer many inconveniences; but virtue, like the sun, goes on still with her work, let the air be never so cloudy, and finishes her course, extinguishing likewise all other splendors and oppositions; insomuch that calamity is no more to a virtuous mind, than a shower into the sea.

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 103

He made himself as eminent for his moderation as for his piety and military knowledge: he was the defender and the establisher of his country: he left the empire without a competitor, and made himself as well the ornament of Rome as the security of it: and did not Scipio, in all this, more than requite his father barely for begetting of him?

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 13

It is not for nothing that the Holy Ghost has denounced so many woes, and redoubled so many cautions against _hypocrites_; plainly intimating at once how dangerous a snare they are to mankind, and no less odious to God himself; which is sufficiently denoted in the force of that dreadful expression, _And your portion shall be with hypocrites_.

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 1147

The body is but the prison or the clog of the mind, subjected to punishments, robberies, diseases; but the mind is sacred and spiritual, and liable to no violence. Is it that, a man shall want garments or covering in banishment? The body is as easily clothed as fed; and Nature has made nothing hard that is necessary. But if nothing will serve us but rich embroideries and scarlet, it is none of Fortune’s fault that we are poor, but our own.

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 546

Honors, monuments, and all the works of vanity and ambition are demolished and destroyed by time; but the reputation of wisdom is venerable to posterity, and those that were envied or neglected in their lives are adored in their memories, and exempted from the very laws of created nature, which has set bounds to all other things.

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 424

There is no more lively image of human life than that of a conquered city; there is neither mercy, modesty, nor religion; and if we forget our lives, we may well forget our benefits. The world abounds with examples of ungrateful persons, and no less with those of ungrateful governments. Was not Catiline ungrateful?

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 884

The Cynic Demetrius was a great instance of severity and mortification; and one that imposed upon himself neither to possess anything, nor so much as to ask it: and yet he had this _scorn_ put upon him, that his profession was _poverty_, not _virtue_. Plato is blamed for _asking_ money; Aristotle for _receiving_ it; Democritus for _neglecting_ it; Epicurus for _consuming_ it.

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 1468

And I have not lost my labor neither; for no man was ever so dear to another, as I have made myself to the whole body of my people.” Under such a prince the subjects have nothing to wish for beyond what they enjoy; their fears are quieted, and their prayers heard, and there is nothing can make their felicity greater, unless to make it perpetual; and there is no liberty denied to the people but that of destroying one another.

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 370

There are some that will not receive a benefit but in private, nor thank you for it but in your ear, or in a corner; there must be nothing under hand and seal, no brokers, notaries, or witnesses, in the case: that is not so much a scruple of modesty as a kind of denying the obligation, and only a less hardened ingratitude.

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 843

We make a false calculation of matters, because we advise with opinion, and not with Nature; and this misleads us to a higher esteem for riches, honor, and power, than they are worth: we have been used to admire and recommend them, and a private error is quickly turned into a public.

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 1107

Senecio raised himself from a small beginning to a vast fortune, being very well skilled in the faculties both of getting and of keeping, and either of them was sufficient for the doing of his business. He was a man infinitely careful both of his patrimony and of his body. He gave me a morning’s visit, (says our author,) and after that visit he went away and spent the rest of the day with a friend of his that was desperately sick.

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 488

They are not covetous, but perhaps they are choleric—nor lustful, but perchance ambitious; they are firm enough in some cases but weak enough in others: there are many that despise death and yet shrink at pain. There are diversities in wise men, but no inequalities—one is more affable, another more ready, a third a better speaker; but the felicity of them all is equal. It is in this as in heavenly bodies, there is a _certain state_ in greatness.

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 1472

When this union comes once to be dissolved, all falls to pieces; for empire and obedience must stand and fall together. It is no wonder then if a prince be dear to his people, when the community is wrapt up in him, and the good of both as inseparable as the body and the head; the one for strength, and the other for counsel; for what signifies the force of the body without the direction of the understanding?

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 975

A friendship of interest cannot last any longer than the interest itself, and this is the reason that men in prosperity are so much followed, and when a man goes down the wind, nobody comes near him.

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 124

or, what if he saves my life with a draught that was prepared to poison me? The providence of the issue does not at all discharge the obliquity of the intent. And the same reason holds good even in religion itself.

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 205

Nor is it always necessary for a poor man to fly to the sanctuary of an invincible mind to quit scores with the bounties of a plentiful fortune; but it does often fall out, that the returns which he cannot make in _kind_ are more than supplied in _dignity_ and _value_. Archelaus, a king of Macedon, invited Socrates to his palace: but he excused himself, as unwilling to receive greater benefits than he was able to requite.

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 614

Do not tell me what a man should do in health or poverty, but show me the way to be either sound or rich. Teach me to master my vices: for it is to no purpose, so long as I am under their government, to tell me what I must do when I am clear of it. In case of an avarice a little eased, a luxury moderated, a temerity restrained, a sluggish humor quickened; precepts will then help us forward, and tutor us how to behave ourselves.

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 447

It would be well, I think, if moneys might pass upon the same conditions with other benefits, and the payment remitted to the conscience, without formalizing upon bills and securities: but human wisdom has rather advised with convenience than virtue; and chosen rather to _force_ honesty than _expect_ it.

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 777

Luxury steals upon us by degrees; first, it shows itself in a more than ordinary care of our bodies, it slips next into the furniture of our houses; and it gets then into the fabric, curiosity, and expense of the house itself. It appears, lastly, in the fantastical excesses of our tables. We change and shuffle our meats, confound our sauces, serve that in first that used to be last, and value our dishes, not for the taste, but for the rarity.

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 349

The more glorious part, in appearance, is that of the giver; but the receiver has undoubtedly the harder game to play in many regards. There are some from whom I would not accept of a benefit; that is to say, from those upon whom I would not bestow one. For why should I not scorn to receive a benefit where I am ashamed to own it?

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 1297

Humanity excites us to love, this to hatred; that to be beneficial to others, this to hurt them: beside, that, though it proceeds from too high a conceit of ourselves, it is yet, in effect, but a narrow and contemptible affection; especially when it meets with a mind that is hard and impenetrable, and returns the dart upon the head of him that casts it.

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 764

It is a shame for a man to place his felicity in those entertainments and appetites that are stronger in brutes. Do not beasts eat with a better stomach? Have they not more satisfaction in their lusts? And they have not only a quicker relish of their pleasures, but they enjoy them without either scandal or remorse. If sensuality were happiness, beasts were happier than men; but human felicity is lodged in the soul, not in the flesh.

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 686

The very apprehension of a wound startles a man when he first bears arms; but an old soldier bleeds boldly, because he knows that a man may lose blood, and yet win the day. Nay, many times a calamity turns to our advantage; and great ruins have but made way to greater glories.

Morals of a Happy Life, Benefits, Anger and Clemency, passage 770

The physicians of old understood little more than the virtue of some herbs to stop blood, or heal a wound; and their firm and healthful bodies needed little more before they were corrupted by luxury and pleasure; and when it came to that once, their business was not to allay hunger, but to provoke it by a thousand inventions and sauces. That which was aliment to a craving stomach is become a burden to a full one.