How we cite our quotes: (Part.Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #1
Kindness, humility, piety, respect for other human creatures—these are the great desiderata of all who pursue virtuous action, and it matters not whether those who preach them heed their own advice. (1.3.1)
We know you're just burning to know what desiderata means—it's Latin for "things that are wanted or needed." So in other words, all those good character virtues are the desirable things for someone who wants to act virtuously. We'll just add that in that same chapter, Octavian's all about controlling emotions and passions, so we wonder: can desiring these virtues be a problem—even a vice—too?
Quote #2
It boots us nothing to feel rage for things that long ago transpired. We must curb our fury, and allow sadness to diminish, and speak our stories with coolness and deliberation. "Animum rege, qui nisi paret, imperat," quoth the poet Horace. "Rule thy passion, for unless it obeys, it rules you." (1.3.2)
That sounds all well and good, but isn't Octavian kind of due for some righteous anger? At the end of the day, he was more a slave and an experiment for the men than an actual human being with rights.
Quote #3
Dr. 09-01, who had rid in the carriage with us, explained, "In the original state of man, we were happy—when we were animals. But when we rose from four feet to two, we became precarious. Now we hold ourselves away from Nature. Bipedal, we teeter always on the brink of collapse, and worry about balance. Gentlemen, it is a great pity that, knowing of our previous felicity and our current distresses, we do not return to our four-footed posture and feel the soil again beneath our hands. 'Tis a damned shame that we do not choose to revert to the blissful state of mammalian repose." (1.5.29)
We'll just point out that it's hard to ignore the whole context surrounding Dr. 09-01's speech. After all, there are slaves in their midst—Octavian and his mom among them. Even if they're not exactly treated like four-footed animals since they're experiments in education for the scholars, the other slaves are just slaves to the men. It's got to be a little weird to hear this guy spout off on how it's so much better to be an animal when you're a slave, being treated like an animal.