regard to what is expedient; and so those that rule in aristocracies do
not allow orators to be pathetic in their pleadings. For reasoning
without passion has a direct tendency to justice, while if passion is
infused, a contest and difference is excited between pleasure and pain
on the one hand, and judgement and justice on the other. For otherwise
how is it that in philosophical speculations people are with little pain
frequently induced by others to change their opinions, and even
Aristotle himself and Democritus and Chrysippus have rejected without
trouble or pain, and even with pleasure, some of the opinions which they
formerly advocated? For no passion stands in the way in the theoretic
and scientific part of the soul, and the unreasoning element is quiet
and gives no trouble therein. And so reason gladly inclines to the
truth, when it is evident, and abandons error; for in it, and not in
passion, lies a willingness to listen to conviction and to change one's
opinions on conviction. But the deliberations and judgements and
arbitrations of most people as to matters of fact being mixed up with
passion, give reason no easy or pleasant access, as she is held fast and
incommoded by the unreasonable, which assails her through pleasure, or
fear, or pain, or desire. And the decision in these cases lies with
sense which has dealings with both passion and reason, for if one gets
the better of the other the other is not destroyed, but only dragged
along by force in spite of its resistance. For he who is dissatisfied
with himself for falling in love calls in reason to his aid to overcome
his passion, for both reason and passion are in his soul, and he
perceives they are contrary one to the other, and violently represses
the inflammatory one of the two. On the other hand, in deliberations and
speculations without passion (such as the contemplative part of the soul
is most conversant with), if they are evenly balanced no decision takes
place, but the matter is left in doubt, which is a sort of stationary
position of the mind in conflicting arguments. But should there be any
inclination to one of the two sides, the most powerful opinion carries
the day, yet without giving pain or creating hostility. And, generally
speaking, when reason seems opposed to reason, there is no perception of
two distinct things, but only of one under different phases, whereas
when the unreasoning has a controversy with reason, since there can be
no victory or defeat without pain, forthwith they tear the soul in
two,[235] and make the difference between them apparent.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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