Page:1888 Cicero's Tusculan Disputations.djvu/394

 little remote, desired the government of kings, you will confess that I am producing authorities that are neither antiquated, rude, nor insignificant.

XXXVIII. Then Lælius said: I see, Scipio, that you are very sufficiently provided with authorities; but with me, as with every fair judge, authorities are worth less than arguments.

Scipio replied: Then, Lælius, you shall yourself make use of an argument derived from your own senses.

Lælius. What senses do you mean?

Scipio. The feelings which you experience when at any time you happen to feel angry with any one.

Lælius. That happens rather oftener than I could wish.

Scipio. Well, then, when you are angry, do you permit your anger to triumph over your judgment?

No, by Hercules! said Lælius; I imitate the famous Archytas of Tarentum, who, when he came to his villa, and found all its arrangements were contrary to his orders, said to his steward, "Ah you unlucky scoundrel, I would flog you to death, if it were not that I am in a rage with you."

Capital, said Scipio. Archytas, then, regarded unreasonable anger as a kind of sedition and rebellion of nature which he sought to appease by reflection. And so, if we examine avarice, the ambition of power or of glory, or the lusts of concupiscence and licentiousness, we shall find a certain conscience in the mind of man, which, like a king, sways by the force of counsel all the inferior faculties and propensities; and this, in truth, is the noblest portion of our nature; for when conscience reigns, it allows no resting-place to lust, violence, or temerity.

Lælius. You have spoken the truth.

Scipio. Well, then, does a mind thus governed and regulated meet your approbation?

Lælius. More than anything upon earth.

Scipio. Then you would not approve that the evil passions, which are innumerable, should expel conscience, and that lusts and animal propensities should assume an ascendency over us?

Lælius. For my part, I can conceive nothing more wretched than a mind thus degraded, or a man animated by a soul so licentious.