You already know what happens when we push away everything that excites us or scares us. We find an unbroken calm and freedom. Instead of chasing physical pleasures and those cheap, temporary things that come with terrible crimes, we gain something huge: a joy that never changes or wavers. We also get peace, calmness, and greatness of mind. Plus kindliness — because all cruelty comes from weakness.
You understand without my mentioning it that an unbroken calm and freedom ensue, when we have driven away all those things which either excite us or alarm us: for in the place of sensual pleasures and those slight perishable matters which are connected with the basest crimes, we thus gain an immense, unchangeable, equable joy, together with peace, calmness and greatness of mind, and kindliness: for all savageness is a sign of weakness.