4 Maccabees 1:29-31

New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition

²⁹ each of which the master cultivator, reason, weeds and prunes and ties up and waters and thoroughly irrigates and so tames the jungle of habits and passions.^{(A) 30} For reason is the guide of the virtues, but over the passions it is sovereign.

Observe now, first of all, that rational judgment is sovereign over the passions by virtue of the restraining power of self-control.^{(B) 31} Self-control, then, is dominance over the desires.