Rhetoric   

Part 2
Anger may be defined as an impulse, accompanied by pain, to a
conspicuous revenge for a conspicuous slight directed without
justification towards what concerns oneself or towards what concerns
one's friends. If this is a proper definition of anger, it must always
be felt towards some particular individual, e.g. Cleon, and not 'man'
in general. It must be felt because the other has done or intended to
do something to him or one of his friends. It must always be attended
by a certain pleasure-that which arises from the expectation of
revenge. For since nobody aims at what he thinks he cannot attain, the
angry man is aiming at what he can attain, and the belief that you
will attain your aim is pleasant. Hence it has been well said about
wrath,
"Sweeter it is by far than the honeycomb
"dripping with sweetness,
"And spreads through the hearts of men. "
It is also attended by a certain pleasure because the thoughts dwell
upon the act of vengeance, and the images then called up cause
pleasure, like the images called up in dreams.
Now slighting is the actively entertained opinion of something as
obviously of no importance. We think bad things, as well as good ones,
have serious importance; and we think the same of anything that tends
to produce such things, while those which have little or no such
tendency we consider unimportant. There are three kinds of
slighting-contempt, spite, and insolence. (1) Contempt is one kind of
slighting: you feel contempt for what you consider unimportant, and it
is just such things that you slight. (2) Spite is another kind; it is
a thwarting another man's wishes, not to get something yourself but to
prevent his getting it. The slight arises just from the fact that you
do not aim at something for yourself: clearly you do not think that he
can do you harm, for then you would be afraid of him instead of
slighting him, nor yet that he can do you any good worth mentioning,
for then you would be anxious to make friends with him. (3) Insolence
is also a form of slighting, since it consists in doing and saying
things that cause shame to the victim, not in order that anything may
happen to yourself, or because anything has happened to yourself, but
simply for the pleasure involved. (Retaliation is not 'insolence', but
vengeance.) The cause of the pleasure thus enjoyed by the insolent man
is that he thinks himself greatly superior to others when ill-treating
them. That is why youths and rich men are insolent; they think
themselves superior when they show insolence. One sort of insolence is
to rob people of the honour due to them; you certainly slight them
thus; for it is the unimportant, for good or evil, that has no honour
paid to it. So Achilles says in anger:
"He hath taken my prize for himself
"and hath done me dishonour, "
and
"Like an alien honoured by none, "
meaning that this is why he is angry. A man expects to be specially
respected by his inferiors in birth, in capacity, in goodness, and
generally in anything in which he is much their superior: as where
money is concerned a wealthy man looks for respect from a poor man;
where speaking is concerned, the man with a turn for oratory looks for
respect from one who cannot speak; the ruler demands the respect of
the ruled, and the man who thinks he ought to be a ruler demands the
respect of the man whom he thinks he ought to be ruling. Hence it has
been said
"Great is the wrath of kings, whose father is Zeus almighty, "
and
"Yea, but his rancour abideth long afterward also, "
their great resentment being due to their great superiority. Then
again a man looks for respect from those who he thinks owe him good
treatment, and these are the people whom he has treated or is treating
well, or means or has meant to treat well, either himself, or through