Plain
Seneca — The Senator

Anger conquers even the deepest love. Men have driven swords through the bodies of people they loved. They have killed those they once held in their arms. Even greed — that hardest and most stubborn of all passions — gets trampled by anger. Anger forces the greedy man to throw away his carefully saved wealth and burn down his house with everything in it. Even ambitious men have been known to toss away their most prized honors and refuse high positions when offered them. There is no passion that anger does not completely control.

On Anger, Book 2, Section 36 Book 2 · 103 of 103
Human Nature Facing Hardship
Seneca — The Senator Original

It conquers the warmest love: men have thrust swords through the bodies of those whom they loved, and have slain those in whose arms they have lain. Avarice, that sternest and most rigid of passions, is trampled underfoot by anger, which forces it to squander its carefully collected wealth and set fire to its house and all its property in one heap. Why, has not even the ambitious man been known to fling away the most highly valued ensigns of rank, and to refuse high office when it was offered to him? There is no passion over which anger does not bear absolute rule.

On Anger, Book 2, Section 36 Book 2 · 103 of 103
Seneca — The Senator

They become enemies to their best friends and dangerous to the people they love most. They ignore laws unless those laws hurt them. The smallest things set them off. They won't listen to advice or help from friends. They use brute force for everything. They're ready to fight with swords or fall on them. The greatest evil of all has taken control of them — one that's worse than any other vice. Other emotions creep into your mind slowly. Anger conquers you suddenly and completely. What's worse, it forces all your other emotions to serve it.

On Anger, Book 2, Section 36 Book 2 · 102 of 103
Human Nature Calm Your Mind
Seneca — The Senator Original

Enemies to their best friends, dangerous to their nearest and dearest, regardless of the laws save where they injure, swayed by the smallest trifles, unwilling to lend their ears to the advice or the services of their friends, they do everything by main force, and are ready either to fight with their swords or to throw themselves upon them, for the greatest of all evils, and one which surpasses all vices, has gained possession of them. Other passions gain a footing in the mind by slow degrees; anger's conquest is sudden and complete, and, moreover, it makes all other passions subservient to itself.

On Anger, Book 2, Section 36 Book 2 · 102 of 103
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Ancient philosophy, in plain English.

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