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If a man do not first discharge both himself and his mind of the burden with which he finds himself oppressed, motion will but make it press the harder and sit the heavier, as the lading of a ship is of less encumbrance when fast and bestowed in a settled posture. You do a sick man more harm than good in removing him from place to place; you fix and establish the disease by motion, as stakes sink deeper and more firmly into the earth by being moved up and down in the place where they are designed to stand. Therefore, it is not enough to get remote from the public; ‘tis not enough to shift the soil only; a man must flee from the popular conditions that have taken possession of his soul, he must sequester and come again to himself:

It is not enough to be sound ourselves, unless we endeavor to make others so, wherein we must accommodate the remedy to the temper of the patient. Some are to be dealt with by artifice and address: as, for example, “Why will you gratify your enemies to show yourself so much concerned? It is not worth your anger: it is below you: I am as much troubled at it myself as you can be; but you had better say nothing, and take your time to be even with them.” Anger in some people is to be openly opposed; in others, there must be a little yielding, according to the disposition of the person. Some are won by entreaties, others are gained by mere shame and conviction, and some by delay; a dull way of cure for a violent distemper, but this must be the last experiment. Other affections may be better dealt with at leisure; for they proceed gradually: but this commences and perfects itself in the same moment. It does not, like other passions, solicit and mislead us, but it runs away with us by force, and hurries us on with an irresistible temerity, as well to our own as to another’s ruin: not only flying in the face of him that provokes us, but like a torrent, bearing down all before it. There is no encountering the first heat and fury of it: for it is deaf and mad, the best way is (in the beginning) to give it time and rest, and let it spend itself: while the passion is too hot to handle, we may deceive it; but, however, let all instruments of revenge be put out of the way. It is not amiss sometimes to pretend to be angry too; and join with him, not only in the opinion of the injury, but in the seeming contrivance of a revenge. But this must be a person then that has some authority over him. This is a way to get time, and, by advising upon some greater punishment to delay the present. If the passion be outrageous, try what shame or fear can do. If weak, it is no hard matter to amuse it by strange stories, grateful news, or pleasant discourses.

His friends would take notice of it; and it was not to his disadvantage neither, but rather to his credit, that so many should know that he was angry, and nobody feel it; which could not have been, if he had not given his friends the same liberty of admonition which he himself took. And this course should we take; we should desire our friends not to flatter us in our follies, but to treat us with all liberties of reprehension, even when we are least willing to bear it, against so powerful and so insinuating an evil; we should call for help while we have our eyes in our head, and are yet masters of ourselves. Moderation is profitable for subjects, but more for princes, who have the means of executing all that their anger prompts them to. When that power comes once to be exercised to a common mischief, it can never long continue; a common fear joining in one cause all their divided complaints. In a word now, how we may prevent, moderate, or master this impotent passion in others.

There is hardly a more effectual remedy against anger than patience and consideration. Let but the first fervor abate, and that mist which darkens the mind will be either lessened or dispelled; a day, nay, an hour, does much in the most violent cases, and perchance totally suppresses it; time discovers the truth of things, and turns that into judgment which at first was anger. 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. Another time his servant having committed a great fault: “Speusippus,” says he, “do you beat that fellow, for I am angry,” so that he forebore striking him for the very reason that would have made another man have done it. “I am angry,” says he, “and shall go further than becomes me.” Nor is it fit that a servant should be in his power that is not his own master. Why should any one venture now to trust an angry man with a revenge, when Plato durst not trust himself? Either he must govern that, or that will undo him. Let us do our best to overcome it, but let us, however, keep it close, without giving it any vent. An angry man, if he gives himself liberty at all times, will go too far. If it comes once to show itself in the eye or countenance, it has got the better of us. Nay, we should so oppose it as to put on the very contrary dispositions; calm looks, soft and slow speech, an easy and deliberate march, and by little and little, we may possibly bring our thoughts into sober conformity with our actions. When Socrates was angry, he would take himself in it, and speak low, in opposition to the motions of his displeasure.