Tusculan Disputations 3 ¶21 — Cicero (on the Stoics)

Cicero (on the Stoics), Tusculan Disputations 3 ¶21

So that Dionysius of Heraclea is right when, upon this complaint of Achilles in Homer, Well hast thou spoke, but at the tyrant’s name My rage rekindles, and my soul’s in flame: ’Tis just resentment, and becomes the brave, Disgraced, dishonor’d like the vilest slave, he reasons thus: Is the hand as it should be, when it is affected with a swelling? or is it possible for any other member of the body, when swollen or enlarged, to be in any other than a disordered state? Must not the mind, then, when it is puffed up or distended, be out of order? But the mind of a wise man is always free from every kind of disorder: it never swells, never is puffed up; but the mind when in anger is in a different state. A wise man, therefore, is never angry. For when he is angry, he lusts after something. For whoever is angry naturally has a longing desire to give all the pain he can to the person who he thinks has injured him, and whoever has this earnest desire must necessarily be much pleased with the accomplishment of his wishes. Hence he is delighted with his neighbor’s misery. And as a wise man is not capable of such feelings as these, he is therefore not capable of anger. But should a wise man be subject to grief, he may likewise be subject to anger; for as he is free from anger, he must likewise be free from grief. Again, could a wise man be subject to grief, he might also be liable to pity, or even might be open to a disposition towards envy (invidentia); I do not say to envy (invidia), for that can only exist by the very act of envying: but we may fairly form the word invidentia from invidendo, and so avoid the doubtful name invidia, for this word is probably derived from in and video, looking too closely into another’s fortune; as it is said in the Melanippus, Who envies me the flower of my children? where the Latin is invidit florem. It may appear not good Latin, but it is very well put by Accius; for as video governs an accusative case, so it is more correct to say invideo florem than flori. We are debarred from saying so by common usage. The poet stood in his own right, and expressed himself with more freedom.