Catholic Candle note: The article immediately below is part five of the study of the Choleric temperament.  The first four parts can be found here:

1.    Mary’s School of Sanctity – Lesson #36:  About the Temperaments – Beginning our Study of the Choleric Temperament: https://catholiccandle.org/2024/08/27/lesson-35-about-the-temperaments-the-choleric-temperament/

2.    Mary’s School of Sanctity – Lesson #37: About the Temperaments – Continuing Our Study of the Choleric Temperament: https://catholiccandle.org/2024/09/26/lesson-37-about-the-temperaments-continuation-of-the-choleric-temperament/

3.    Mary’s School of Sanctity – Lesson #38 — About the Temperaments – Continuing our Study of the Choleric Temperament – Their Spiritual Combat: https://catholiccandle.org/2024/10/24/lesson-38-temperaments-choleric-temperament-their-spiritual-combat/

4.    Mary’s School of Sanctity – Lesson #39 About the Temperaments – Continuing Our Study of the Choleric Temperament – That Temperament’s Spiritual Combat – Part IV: https://catholiccandle.org/2024/11/26/lesson-39-temperaments-choleric-temperament-their-spiritual-combat-part-iv/

Mary’s School of Sanctity

Lesson #40 About the Temperaments – Continuing Our Study the Choleric Temperament: Their Spiritual Combat – Part V

Note: When referring to a person with a choleric temperament in this article we simply will label him as a choleric.

In our last lesson we explained in general the passion of anger.  We saw that anger is caused by a concurrence of several passions so that anger involves a hope of vengeance (whether just or unjust).  We included the following lists of points which will need to be discussed in order to better understand anger as a passion and to see how crucial it is for anyone to be well aware of the proper use of anger.   

·         What does anger do and how does it move the soul to action?

 

·         What role does reason play in the use of anger?

·         How does justice fit in with the use of anger?

·         If anger can be unjust, and if can lead to many dangers; what are these possible dangers?

·         How should one fight his feelings of unjust anger?

Because cholerics are very prone to anger, they have a special need for caution regarding their anger.  Hence, it is so important that they have a good comprehension of the passion of anger.

So let us begin by giving some background information on anger and how it works in the soul.

What motivates anger?

St. Thomas Aquinas explains that anger arises in connection with something we suffer or that we perceive that we suffer. Here is his explanation:

Anger is the desire to hurt another for the purpose of just vengeance.  However, unless some injury has been done, there is no question of vengeance; nor does any injury provoke one to vengeance, but only that which is done to the person who seeks vengeance; for just as everything naturally seeks its own good, so does it [everything] naturally repel its own evil. But injury done by anyone does not affect a man unless in some way it be something done against him.  Consequently, the motive of a man’s anger is always something done against him.[1]

This anger as a result of something done to us can include something done to others as St. Thomas shows here:

If we are angry with those who harm others, and seek to be avenged on them, it is because those who are injured belong in some way to us: either by some kinship or friendship, or at least because of the nature we have in common.[2]

In addition to harm done to ourselves and/or others, we can also take offense if something we love is despised by another, as St. Thomas explains here:

When we take a very great interest in a thing, we look upon it as our own good; so that if anyone despise it, it seems as though we ourselves were despised and injured.[3]

St. Thomas also tells us about a concept that seems paradoxical but is nonetheless true.  He puts forth the objection as follows and then answers it:

Objection #4: Further, he that holds his tongue when another insults him, provokes him to greater anger, as Chrysostom observes (Hom. xxii, in Ep. ad Rom.)[4]. But by holding his tongue he does the other no harm.  Therefore, a man is not always provoked to anger by something done against him.

Reply #4: Silence provokes the insulter to anger when he thinks it is due to contempt, as though his anger were slighted and a slight is an action.[5]

Of course, when we are insulted, Our Lord would not want us to retaliate but to imitate Him by being meek.  He was insulted many times and did not open His Mouth.  So if someone takes offense because we silently take an insult, we need not worry about that person’s attitude.  We have an obligation to set a good example whether other people like it or not.

St. Thomas explains how the main cause of anger is someone slighting us or showing us contempt.  He quotes Aristotle saying that anger is “a desire, with sorrow, for vengeance, on account of a seeming slight done unbecomingly.”[6]

 St. Thomas explains being slighted as a motivation for anger as follows:

All the causes of anger are reduced to slight. For slight is of three kinds, as stated in [Aristotle’s work] Rhetoric Bk.2; ch.2, #1378a31 viz., contempt,   despiteful treatment, i.e., hindering one from doing one’s will, and insolence; and all motives of anger are reduced to these three.  Two reasons may be assigned for this.  First, because anger seeks another’s hurt as being a means of just vengeance, wherefore it seeks vengeance in so far as it seems just.  However, just vengeance is taken only for that which is done unjustly; hence, that which provokes anger is always something considered in the light of an injustice.

Wherefore the Philosopher says (Rhetoric Bk.2, ch. 3 #1380b16) that men are not angry if they think they have wronged someone and are suffering justly on that account; because there is no anger at what is just.  However, injury is done to another in three ways: namely, through ignorance, through passion, and through choice.  Then, most of all, a man does an injustice, when he does an injury from choice, on purpose, or from deliberate malice, as stated in Ethics Bk. 5, ch. 8 #1135b24 &1136a4.  Wherefore we are most of all angry with those who, in our opinion, have hurt us on purpose.  For if we think that someone has done us an injury through ignorance or through passion, either we are not angry with them at all, or very much less, since to do anything through ignorance or through passion takes away from the notion of injury, and to a certain extent calls for mercy and forgiveness.  Those, on the other hand, who commit an injury on purpose, seem to sin from contempt; wherefore we are angry with them most of all.  Hence, the Philosopher says (Rhetoric Bk.2, ch. 3 #1380a34) that we are either not angry at all, or not very angry with those who have acted through anger, because they do not seem to have acted slightingly.

The second reason is because a slight is opposed to a man’s excellence because men think little of things that are not worth much ado (Rhetoric Bk. 2, ch. 2 #1378b13). However, we seek for some kind of excellence from all our goods.  Consequently whatever injury is inflicted on us, in so far as it is derogatory to our excellence, seems to savor of a slight.[7]

St. Thomas tells us about various forms of being slighted, such as, being forgotten by others; that others should rejoice in our misfortunes; that they [others] should make known our evils; being hindered from doing as we like. He explains these in details as follows:

Each of those causes amounts to some kind of slight.  Thus, forgetfulness is a clear sign of slight esteem, for the more we think of a thing the more is it fixed in our memory.  Again, if a man does not hesitate by his remarks to give pain to another, this seems to show that he thinks little of him: and those too who show signs of hilarity when another is in misfortune, seem to care little about his good or evil.  Again, he that hinders another from carrying out his will, without deriving thereby any profit to himself, seems not to care much for his friendship. Consequently, all those things, in so far as they are signs of contempt, provoke anger.[8]

St. Thomas continues his treatment of the causes of anger still further in this section of the Summa.  One additional note we need to take from St. Thomas is his comment on the fact that, when a man excels in some aspect, e.g., he is wealthy or wise, he can be angered easily.  The reason he gives for this is:

However, it is evident that the more excellent a man is, the more unjust is a slight offered him in the matter in which he excels.  Consequently, those who excel in any matter, are most of all angry, if they be slighted in that matter; for instance, a wealthy man in his riches, or an orator in his eloquence, and so forth.[9]

On the other hand, St. Thomas explains that those who suffer from a lack of excellence in some way also become easily angered.  His comment follows:

Secondly, the cause of anger, in the man who is angry, may be considered on the part of the disposition produced in him by the motive aforesaid. However, it is evident that nothing moves a man to anger except a hurt that grieves him, while whatever savors of defect is above all a cause of grief since men who suffer from some defect are more easily hurt.  And this is why men who are weak, or subject to some other defect, are more easily angered, since they are more easily grieved.[10]

There is a connection we should briefly mention here between anger and humility.   One’s excellence – real or perceived – must be accompanied by humility.  Otherwise, a person would be greatly tempted to think he is better than he really is and he would fall into anger if others do not recognize his excellence.  Likewise, if someone has a defect which he could make efforts to overcome and he does not try to improve, he could also fall into anger if anyone attributes his defects to his refusal to make the necessary efforts.

A Preview…

In our next lesson we will look more at what anger does to the body and the role that reason plays in anger.