Introduction While God prefers to use mercy rather than punishment with human beings, human beings often become angry for trivial reasons.
Divisio (see above) 1) First part: physiology of wrath: ira est accensio sanguinis circa cor ex vaporatione collere, vel felis (quote from John of Damascus). Three types of wrath: 1. “Natural” wrath (i.e. wrath due to personal temperament; not a sin, because it is like other natural defects such as hunger, thirst, sleep); 2. Wrath in judgment (i.e. «zeal for justice», not a sin); 3. «Ira… fundata ne l’appetitto sensitivo»; not a sin if regulated by reason and good judgment (exemplum: Jesus get angry with the merchants and the money changers in the Temple; «getting angry for truth and justice is an act of magnificence», reference to Aristotle); a mortal sin if not regulated by reason. 2) Second part: six causes of wrath (reference to Seneca's De ira): 1. Human nature (i.e. personal temperament; the disposition to anger depends on the amount of bile in the body); 2. Wine (because it slightly warms the blood; legend of Noah who waters the vine with the blood of a lion, a pig and a monkey; 3. Excessive delicacy in education (like «mules and horses: when they have been in the stable for two or three months, fed with fodder and spelt, they kick at their owner, bite and don’t let themselves be tamed»); 4. Desire for power (exemplum from Valerius Maximus); 5. Excessive commitments; 6. Infirmity. 3) Third part: wrath causes three serious harms to human beings: 1. Deprivation of reason and good judgment («The law sees the wrathful, but the wrathful doesn’t see the law» = Lex videt iratum, iratus legem non videt, quote from Publilius Syrus [not mentioned]; Ira impedit animum ne possit cernere verum, quote from Cato?); exemplum: Theodosius and Ambrose (Saint) in Milan; 2. Hatred of self, others and God; 3. Desperation and shorter life.
Conclusion Mention of the death of Hercules who, desperate and enraged due to his illness, threw himself into the fire (reference to Jerome’s Chronicon). Exhortation to avoid wrath, because beati mites, quia ipsi possidebunt terram… beati pacifici, quoniam filii Dei vocabantur (quote from Matthew 5, 4; 5, 9).