The Complete Aristotle (eng.)

direction of
deficiency; for the good-tempered man is not revengeful, but rather
tends to make allowances.
    The deficiency, whether it is a sort of ‘inirascibility’ or
whatever it is, is blamed. For those who are not angry at the
things they should be angry at are thought to be fools, and so are
those who are not angry in the right way, at the right time, or
with the right persons; for such a man is thought not to feel
things nor to be pained by them, and, since he does not get angry,
he is thought unlikely to defend himself; and to endure being
insulted and put up with insult to one’s friends is slavish.
    The excess can be manifested in all the points that have been
named (for one can be angry with the wrong persons, at the wrong
things, more than is right, too quickly, or too long); yet all are
not found in the same person. Indeed they could not; for evil
destroys even itself, and if it is complete becomes unbearable. Now
hot-tempered people get angry quickly and with the wrong persons
and at the wrong things and more than is right, but their anger
ceases quickly-which is the best point about them. This happens to
them because they do not restrain their anger but retaliate openly
owing to their quickness of temper, and then their anger ceases. By
reason of excess choleric people are quick-tempered and ready to be
angry with everything and on every occasion; whence their name.
Sulky people are hard to appease, and retain their anger long; for
they repress their passion. But it ceases when they retaliate; for
revenge relieves them of their anger, producing in them pleasure
instead of pain. If this does not happen they retain their burden;
for owing to its not being obvious no one even reasons with them,
and to digest one’s anger in oneself takes time. Such people are
most troublesome to themselves and to their dearest friends. We
call had-tempered those who are angry at the wrong things, more
than is right, and longer, and cannot be appeased until they
inflict vengeance or punishment.
    To good temper we oppose the excess rather than the defect; for
not only is it commoner since revenge is the more human), but
bad-tempered people are worse to live with.
    What we have said in our earlier treatment of the subject is
plain also from what we are now saying; viz. that it is not easy to
define how, with whom, at what, and how long one should be angry,
and at what point right action ceases and wrong begins. For the man
who strays a little from the path, either towards the more or
towards the less, is not blamed; since sometimes we praise those
who exhibit the deficiency, and call them good-tempered, and
sometimes we call angry people manly, as being capable of ruling.
How far, therefore, and how a man must stray before he becomes
blameworthy, it is not easy to state in words; for the decision
depends on the particular facts and on perception. But so much at
least is plain, that the middle state is praiseworthy—that in
virtue of which we are angry with the right people, at the right
things, in the right way, and so on, while the excesses and defects
are blameworthy—slightly so if they are present in a low degree,
more if in a higher degree, and very much if in a high degree.
Evidently, then, we must cling to the middle state.—Enough of the
states relative to anger.
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6
    In gatherings of men, in social life and the interchange of
words and deeds, some men are thought to be obsequious, viz. those
who to give pleasure praise everything and never oppose, but think
it their duty ‘to give no pain to the people they meet’; while
those who, on the contrary, oppose everything and care not a whit
about giving pain are called churlish and contentious. That the
states we have named are culpable is plain enough, and that the
middle state is laudable—that in virtue of which a man will put up
with, and will resent, the right things and in the right way; but
no name has been assigned to it, though it most resembles
friendship. For the man who corresponds to this middle state is
very much what, with affection added, we call a good friend. But
the state in question differs from friendship in that it implies no
passion or affection for one’s associates; since it is not by
reason of loving or hating that such a man takes everything in the
right way, but by being a man of a certain kind. For he will behave
so alike towards those he knows and those he does not know, towards
intimates and those