axe, because it was under pretence of giving him a bath, or because
his feet were entangled in a long robe. These circumstances are all
irrelevant. Those only are relevant which attach some special
reasonableness or unreasonableness to the thing done Thus the
provocation that Clytemnestra had from her husband's introduction of
Cassandra into her house made her act of vengeance less unreasonable:
on the other hand it was rendered more unreasonable by the
circumstance of the dear and holy tie that binds wife to husband. The
provocation and the relationship were two relevant circumstances in
that case.

10. But it happens sometimes that a circumstance only affects the
reasonableness of an action on the supposition of some previous
circumstance so affecting it. Thus to carry off a thing in large or
small quantities does not affect the reasonableness of the carrying,
unless there be already some other circumstance attached that renders
the act good or evil; as for instance, if the goods that are being
removed are stolen property. Circumstances of this sort are called
_aggravating_--or, as the case may be, _extenuating_--circumstances.
Circumstances that of themselves, and apart from any previous
supposition, make the thing done peculiarly reasonable or
unreasonable, are called _specifying_ circumstances. They are so
called, because they place the action in some species of virtue or
vice; whereas _aggravating_ or _extenuating_ circumstances add to, or
take off from, the good or evil of the action in that species of
virtue or vice to which it already belongs.

11. A variety of specifying circumstances may place one and the same
action in many various species of virtue or vice. Thus a religious
robbing his parents would sin at once against justice, piety, and