103:2.3

Now you are not ignorant of the charm of brotherhood, which the Divine and all wise Providence has imparted through fathers to children, and has engendered through the mother’s womb. These brothers remained an equal time in their mother’s womb, and were formed for the same period, and nourished by the same blood, and were perfected through the same principle of life. They were brought forth at equal intervals, and sucked milk from the same fountains. Their brotherly souls were reared up lovingly together, and increase the more powerfully by reason of this simultaneous rearing, and by daily companionship, and by other education, and exercise in the law of God.

O reasoning of the sons, lord over the emotions, and religion more desirable to a mother than children! The mother, when two things were set before her, religion and the safety of her seven sons for a time, on the conditional promise of a tyrant, rather elected the religion which according to God preserves to eternal life. In what way can I describe ethically the affections of parents toward their children, the resemblance of soul and of form impressed into the small type of a child in a wonderful manner, especially through the greater sympathy of mothers with the feelings of those born of them! For by how much mothers are by nature weak in disposition and prolific in offspring, by so much the fonder they are of children. Of all mothers, the mother of the seven was the fondest of children, who in seven childbirths had deeply engendered love toward them. Through her many pains undergone in connection with each one, she was compelled to feel sympathy with them; yet, through fear of God, she neglected the temporary salvation of her children. Not only so, but on account of the excellent disposition to the law, her maternal affection toward them was increased. For they were both just and temperate, and courageous, high-minded, fond of their kindred, and so fond of their mother that even to death they obeyed her by observing the law.

As pleasure and pain are, therefore, two growths out of the body and the soul, so there are many offshoots of these emotions. Reasoning, the universal farmer, purging and pruning each of these, tying up, watering, and transplanting, in every way improves the materials of the morals and affections. For reasoning is the leader of the virtues, but it is the sole ruler of the emotions. Observe then first, through the very things which stand in the way of temperance, that reasoning is absolute ruler of the emotions.