As long as life isn't so terrible that we want to kill ourselves, let's keep anger far away from us, no matter what situation we're in. Anger destroys the people it controls. All that rage just makes us miserable. And the more stubbornly we fight against what's holding us back, the worse it gets. It's like a wild animal that only tightens the noose around its neck by struggling. Or like birds trying to escape birdlime — they just spread the sticky stuff over more feathers. No burden hurts the person who accepts it as much as it hurts the person who fights it. The only way to ease great troubles is to endure them and do what they force us to do.
As long, however, as we find nothing in our life so unbearable as to drive us to suicide, let us, in whatever position we may be, set anger far from us: it is destructive to those who are its slaves. All its rage turns to its own misery, and authority becomes all the more irksome the more obstinately it is resisted. It is like a wild animal whose struggles only pull the noose by which it is caught tighter; or like birds who, while flurriedly trying to shake themselves free, smear birdlime on to all their feathers. No yoke is so grievous as not to hurt him who struggles against it more than him who yields to it: the only way to alleviate great evils is to endure them and to submit to do what they compel.