Letters

⁶⁰ It is an old saying: Accustom yourself to be consistent, that your life may set forth as it were a picture, always preserving the same representation which it has received. How can he be consistent who at one time is inflamed by anger, at another blazes up with fierce indignation, whose face now burns, and now again is changed to paleness, varying and changing colour every moment? But let it be so, let it be natural for one to be angry, or that there is generally a cause, it is a man's duty to restrain anger, and not to be carried away like a lion by fury, so as not to know to be quieted, not to spread tales, nor to embitter family quarrels; for it is written: “A wrathful man digs up sin.” He will not be consistent who is double-minded; he cannot be consistent who cannot restrain himself when angry, as to which David well says: “Be angry and sin not.” He does not govern his anger, but indulges his natural disposition, which a man cannot indeed prevent but may moderate.

Therefore even though we are angry, let our passion admit only such emotion as is according to nature, not sin contrary to nature. For who would endure that he should not be able to govern himself, who has undertaken to govern others?