The Complete Aristotle (eng.)

or
comparatively little, with those who have done what they did
through anger: we do not feel that they have done it from a wish to
slight us, for no one slights people when angry with them, since
slighting is painless, and anger is painful. Nor do we grow angry
with those who reverence us.
    As to the frame of mind that makes people calm, it is plainly
the opposite to that which makes them angry, as when they are
amusing themselves or laughing or feasting; when they are feeling
prosperous or successful or satisfied; when, in fine, they are
enjoying freedom from pain, or inoffensive pleasure, or justifiable
hope. Also when time has passed and their anger is no longer fresh,
for time puts an end to anger. And vengeance previously taken on
one person puts an end to even greater anger felt against another
person. Hence Philocrates, being asked by some one, at a time when
the public was angry with him, ‘Why don’t you defend yourself?’ did
right to reply, ‘The time is not yet.’ ‘Why, when is the time?’
‘When I see someone else calumniated.’ For men become calm when
they have spent their anger on somebody else. This happened in the
case of Ergophilus: though the people were more irritated against
him than against Callisthenes, they acquitted him because they had
condemned Callisthenes to death the day before. Again, men become
calm if they have convicted the offender; or if he has already
suffered worse things than they in their anger would have
themselves inflicted upon him; for they feel as if they were
already avenged. Or if they feel that they themselves are in the
wrong and are suffering justly (for anger is not excited by what is
just), since men no longer think then that they are suffering
without justification; and anger, as we have seen, means this.
Hence we ought always to inflict a preliminary punishment in words:
if that is done, even slaves are less aggrieved by the actual
punishment. We also feel calm if we think that the offender will
not see that he is punished on our account and because of the way
he has treated us. For anger has to do with individuals. This is
plain from the definition. Hence the poet has well written:
Say that it was Odysseus, sacker of cities,
    implying that Odysseus would not have considered himself avenged
unless the Cyclops perceived both by whom and for what he had been
blinded. Consequently we do not get angry with any one who cannot
be aware of our anger, and in particular we cease to be angry with
people once they are dead, for we feel that the worst has been done
to them, and that they will neither feel pain nor anything else
that we in our anger aim at making them feel. And therefore the
poet has well made Apollo say, in order to put a stop to the anger
of Achilles against the dead Hector,
For behold in his fury he doeth despite to the senseless
clay.
    It is now plain that when you wish to calm others you must draw
upon these lines of argument; you must put your hearers into the
corresponding frame of mind, and represent those with whom they are
angry as formidable, or as worthy of reverence, or as benefactors,
or as involuntary agents, or as much distressed at what they have
done.
4
    Let us now turn to Friendship and Enmity, and ask towards whom
these feelings are entertained, and why. We will begin by defining
and friendly feeling. We may describe friendly feeling towards any
one as wishing for him what you believe to be good things, not for
your own sake but for his, and being inclined, so far as you can,
to bring these things about. A friend is one who feels thus and
excites these feelings in return: those who think they feel thus
towards each other think themselves friends. This being assumed, it
follows that your friend is the sort of man who shares your
pleasure in what is good and your pain in what is unpleasant, for
your sake and for no other reason. This pleasure and pain of his
will be the token of his good wishes for you, since we all feel
glad at getting what we wish for, and pained at getting what we do
not. Those, then, are friends to whom the same things are good and
evil; and those who are, moreover, friendly or unfriendly to the
same people; for in that case they must have the same wishes, and
thus by wishing for each other what they wish for themselves, they
show themselves each other’s friends. Again, we feel friendly to
those who have treated us well, either ourselves or those we care
for, whether on a large scale, or readily, or at some