The fig-tree (συκῆ) by its very nature yields juice (ὀπός); to demand that it not do so is an absurdity aimed not at the fig-tree but at the constitution of things itself. In the same way a bad person, by his make-up, produces bad acts: to be indignant that he acts badly is "to wish the fig-tree to have no juice." The image dissolves anger not by excusing vice but by redescription: another's fault is not an affront aimed at me but the lawful consequence of his TERMnature, as impersonal as the sap in a fig. Whoever will not accept this is, in effect, quarrelling with the constitution of the world.

The logically cognate series in Marcus is "accept the nature of a thing as it is": the cucumber is bitter — put it down; there are brambles in the path — turn aside (Med. 8.50), and do not add "why is there such a thing in the world."

Med. 4.6 — the image in pure form: ὁ… μὴ θέλων θέλει τὴν συκῆν ὀπὸν μὴ ἔχειν ("one who does not want this wants the fig-tree to have no juice"). The cognate motif "it is impossible to demand that the bad not be bad":

• Med. 08-15 — it is shameful to be surprised that the world brings forth its own (as the fig-tree its figs); the physician at a fever, the helmsman at a headwind;
• Med. 08-50 — the bitter cucumber, the brambles: accept a thing's nature, do not ask "why";
• Med. 05-17 — to seek the impossible is madness; it is impossible that the bad should not do such things;
• Med. 9.42 — it is impossible that shameless men should not exist; therefore — not indignation but greater kindness.

In 04-06 the image is the first move of the therapy of anger: it transfers another's fault from the category "affront" to the category "natural fact," after which anger has nothing to rest on. Connection with the doctrines: the image rests on the DOGMAnorm of nature (everything acts according to its make-up) and works together with DOGMAthe acceptance of the necessary (the acts of such people come about ἐξ ἀνάγκης, of necessity). It is logically paired with the "memory of death" in the second half of 4.6: one move depersonalises the offence, the other diminishes it against the background of common mortality.