Some angry people, as Sextius points out, have been helped by looking in a mirror. They were shocked by how much their appearance had changed. It was like meeting themselves for the first time — they didn't even recognize who they'd become. But think about this: the mirror only showed a tiny fraction of how hideous anger really makes us. If we could see the mind itself — if it could be displayed through some material — we would be horrified. We'd see how black and stained it looks, how agitated and twisted and swollen. Even now, the mind is quite ugly when we glimpse it through all the barriers of blood and bone and flesh. Imagine if we could see it completely exposed. You might say you don't believe anyone was ever scared out of anger by looking in a mirror. But why not? Because by the time he went to the mirror to change his mind, he had already changed it. To angry people, no face looks better than one that is fierce and savage — the face they want to have.
Some angry people, as Sextius remarks, have been benefited by looking at the glass: they have been struck by so great an alteration in their own appearance: they have been, as it were, brought into their own presence and have not recognized themselves: yet how small a part of the real hideousness of anger did that reflected image in the mirror reproduce? Could the mind be displayed or made to appear through any substance, we should be confounded when we beheld how black and stained, how agitated, distorted, and swollen it looked: even at present it is very ugly when seen through all the screens of blood, bones, and so forth: what would it be, were it displayed uncovered? You say, that you do not believe that any one was ever scared out of anger by a mirror: and why not? Because when he came to the mirror to change his mind, he had changed it already: to angry men no face looks fairer than one that is fierce and savage and such as they wish to look like.