The theory of moral sentiments: By Adam Smith, ...

PART I. Of the PROPRIETY of ACTION.

SECTION I. Of SYMPATHY.

HOW selfish soever man may be sup|posed, there are evidently some prin|ciples in his nature, which interest him in the fortune of others, and render their happiness necessary to him, though he derives nothing from it except the plea|sure of seeing it. Of this kind is pity or compassion, the emotion which we feel for the misery of others, when we either see it, or are made to conceive it in a very lively manner. That we often de|rive sorrow from the sorrow of others is too obvious to require any instances to prove it; for this sentiment, like all the other original passions of human nature,

is by no means confined to the virtuous and humane, though they perhaps may feel it with the most exquisite sensi|bility. The greatest ruffian, the most hardened violator of the laws of society, is not altogether without it.

As we have no immediate experience of what other men feel, we can form no idea of the manner in which they are affected, but by conceiving what we our|selves should feel in the like situation. Though our brother is upon the rack, as long as we are at our ease, our senses will never inform us of what he suffers. They never did and never can carry us beyond our own persons, and it is by the imagination only that we can form any conception of what are his sensations. Neither can that faculty help us to this any other way, than by representing to us what would be our own if we were in his case. It is the impressions of our own senses only, not those of his, which our imaginations copy. By the imagination we place ourselves in his situation, we conceive ourselves enduring all the same torments, we enter as it were into his body and become in some measure him, and

thence form some idea of his sensations, and even feel something which, though weaker in degree, is not altogether unlike them. His agonies, when they are thus brought home to ourselves, when we have thus adopted and made them our own, begin at last to affect us, and we then tremble and shudder at the thought of what he feels. For as to be in pain or distress of any kind excites the most exces|sive sorrow, so to conceive or to imagine that we are in it, excites some degree of the same emotion, in proportion to the vivacity or dulness of the conception.

That this is the source of our fellow-feeling for the misery of others, that it is by changing places in fancy with the sufferer, that we come either to conceive or to be affected by what he feels, may be demonstrated by many obvious obser|vations, if it should not be thought suf|ficiently evident of itself. When we see a stroke aimed and just ready to fall upon the leg or arm of another person, we natu|rally shrink and draw back our own leg or our own arm; and when it does fall, we feel it in some measure, and are hurt by it as well as the sufferer. The mob, when they

are gazing at a dancer on the slack rope, naturally writhe and twist and balance their own bodies, as they see him do, and as they feel that they themselves must do in his situation. Persons of delicate fibres and a weak constitution of body, complain that in looking on the sores and ulcers that are exposed by beggars in the streets, they are apt to feel an itching or uneasy sensation in the correspondent part of their own bodies. The horror which they con|ceive at the misery of those wretches af|fects that particular part in themselves more than any other; because that hor|ror arises from conceiving what they them|selves would suffer, if they really were the wretches whom they are looking upon, and if that particular part in themselves was actually affected in the same miser|able manner. The very force of this conception is sufficient, in their feeble frames, to produce that itching or uneasy sensation complained of. Men of the most robust make, observe that in looking up|on sore eyes they often feel a very sensible soreness in their own, which proceeds from the same reason; that organ being in the strongest man more delicate than

any other part of the body is in the weakest.

Neither is it those circumstances only, which create pain or sorrow, that call forth our fellow-feeling. Whatever is the passion which arises from any object in the person principally concerned, an analagous emotion springs up, at the thought of his situation, in the breast of every attentive spectator. Our joy for the deliverance of those heroes of tragedy or romance who interest us, is as sin|cere as our grief for their distress, and our fellow-feeling with their misery is not more real than that with their happiness. We enter into their gratitude towards those faithful friends who did not desert them in their difficulties; and we heartily go along with their resentment against those perfidious traitors who injured, abandon|ed, or deceived them. In every passion of which the mind of man is susceptible, the emotions of the by-stander always correspond to what, by bringing the case home to himself, he imagines, should be the sentiments of the sufferer.

Pity and compassion are words appro|priated to signify our fellow-feeling with

the sorrow of others. Sympathy, though its meaning was, perhaps, originally the same, may now, however, without much impropriety, be made use of to denote our fellow-feeling with any passion what|ever.

Upon some occasions sympathy may seem to arise meerly from the view of a certain emotion in another person. The passions, upon some occasions, may seem to be transfused from one man to an|other, instantaneously, and antecedent to any knowledge of what excited them in the person principally concerned. Grief and joy, for example, strongly expressed in the look and gestures of any one, at once affect the spectator with some degree of a like painful or agreeable emotion. A smiling face is, to every body that sees it, a chearful object; as a sorrowful coun|tenance, on the other hand, is a melan|choly one.

This, however, does not hold univer|sally with regard to every passion. There are some of which the expressions excite no sort of sympathy, but before we are acquainted with what gave occasion to them, serve rather to disgust and provoke

us against them. The furious behaviour of an angry man is more likely to exaspe|rate us against himself than against his ene|mies. As we are unacquainted with his provocation, we cannot bring his case home to ourselves, nor conceive any thing like the passions which it excites. But we plainly see what is the situation of those with whom he is angry, and to what vio|lence they may be exposed from so en|raged an adversary. We readily, there|fore, sympathize with their fear or resent|ment, and are immediately disposed to take party against the man from whom they appear to be in so much danger.

If the very appearances of grief and joy inspire us with some degree of the like emotions, it is because they suggest to us the general idea of some good or bad fortune that has befallen the person in whom we observe them: and in these passions this is sufficient to have some little influence upon us. The effects of grief and joy terminate in the person who feels those emotions, of which the expressions do not, like those of resent|ment, suggest to us the idea of any other person for whom we are concerned, and

whose interests are opposite to his. The general idea of good or bad fortune, therefore, creates some concern for the person who has met with it, but the general idea of provocation excites no sympathy with the anger of the man who has received it. Nature, it seems, teaches us to be more averse to enter in|to this passion, and, till informed of its cause, to be disposed rather to take part against it.

Even our sympathy with the grief or joy of another, before we are informed of the cause of either, is always extreme|ly imperfect. General lamentations, which express nothing but the anguish of the sufferer, create rather a curiosity to en|quire into his situation, along with some disposition to sympathize with him, than any actual sympathy that is very sensible. The first question that we ask is, What has befallen you? 'Till this be answered, tho' we are uneasy both from the vague idea of his misfortune, and still more from torturing ourselves with conjectures about what it may be, yet our fellow-feeling is not very considerable.

Sympathy, therefore, does not arise so much from the view of the passion, as from that of the situation which excites it. We sometimes feel for another, a passion of which he himself seems to be altogether incapable; because when we put ourselves in his case, that passion arises in our breast from the imagination, though it does not in his from the re|ality. We blush for the impudence and rudeness of another, though he himself appears to have no sense of the impro|priety of his own behaviour; because we cannot help feeling with what confusion we ourselves should be covered, had we behaved in so absurd a manner.

Of all the calamities to which the con|dition of mortality exposes mankind, the loss of reason appears, to those who have the least spark of humanity, by far the most dreadful, and they behold that last stage of human wretchedness with deeper commiseration than any other. But the poor wretch, who is in it, laughs and sings perhaps, and is altogether insensible of his own misery. The anguish which humanity feels, therefore, at the sight of such an object, cannot be the reflection

of any sentiment of the sufferer. The compassion of the spectator must arise altogether from the consideration of what he himself would feel if he was reduced to the same unhappy situation, and, what perhaps is impossible, was at the same time able to regard it with his present reason and judgment.

What are the pangs of a mother when she hears the moanings of her infant that during the agony of disease cannot express what it feels? In her idea of what it suf|fers, she joins, to its real helplessness, her own consciousness of that helplessness, and her own terrors for the unknown conse|quences of its disorder; and out of all these forms, for her own sorrow, the most complete image of misery and distress. The infant, however, feels only the un|easiness of the present instant, which can never be great. With regard to the fu|ture it is perfectly secure, and in its thought|lessness and want of foresight possesses an antidote against fear and anxiety, the great tormentors of the human breast, from which reason and philosophy will in vain attempt to defend it when it grows up to a man.

We sympathize even with the dead, and overlooking what is of real impor|tance in their situation, that awful futu|rity which awaits them, we are chiefly af|fected by those circumstances which strike our senses, but can have no influence upon their happiness. It is miserable, we think, to be deprived of the light of the sun; to be shut out from life and conversation; to be laid in the cold grave a prey to corruption and the reptiles of the earth; to be no more thought of in this world, but to be obliterated in a little time from the affections and almost from the me|mory of their dearest friends and relations. Surely, we imagine, we can never feel too much for those who have suffered so dread|ful a calamity. The tribute of our fellow-feeling seems doubly due to them now when they are in danger of being forgot by every body: and, by the vain honours which we pay to their memory, we endea|vour, for our own misery, artificially to keep alive our melancholy remembrance of their misfortune. That our sympathy can afford them no consolation seems to be an addition to their calamity; and to think that all we can do is unavailing,

and that, what alleviates all other distress, the regret, the love and the lamentation of their friends, can yield no comfort to them, serves only to exasperate our sense of their misery. The happiness of the dead, however, most assuredly, is affected by none of these circumstances; nor is it the thought of these things which can ever disturb the security of their repose. The idea of that dreary and endless melancholy, which the fancy naturally ascribes to their condition, arises altogether from our join|ing to the change which has been pro|duced upon them, our own consciousness of that change, from our putting ourselves in their situation, and from our lodging, if I may be allowed to say so, our own living souls in their inanimated bodies, and thence conceiving what would be our emotions in this case. It is this very illu|sion of the imagination which renders the foresight of our own dissolution so terrible to us, and the idea of those circumstances, which undoubtedly can give us no pain when we are dead, makes us miserable while we are alive. And from thence arises one of the most important prin|ciples in human nature, the dread of death,

the great poison to the happiness, but the great restraint upon the injustice of mankind, which, while it afflicts and mor|tifies the individual, guards and protects the society.

SECT. II. Of the sentiment by which we ap|prove or disapprove of the pas|sions and affections of other men, as suitable or unsuitable to their objects.

CHAP. I. Of the pleasure of mutual SYMPATHY.

BUT whatever may be the cause of sympathy, or however it may be excited, nothing pleases us more than to observe in other men a fellow-feeling with all the emotions of our own breast; nor are we ever so much shocked as by the appearance of the contrary. Those who are fond of deducing all our sen|timents from certain refinements of self-love, think themselves at no loss to ac|count, according to their own principles, both for this pleasure and this pain. Man, say they, conscious of his own weakness

and of the need which he has for the as|sistance of others, rejoices whenever he observes that they adopt his own passions, because he is then assured of that assist|ance; and grieves whenever he observes the contrary, because he is then assured of their opposition: But both the pleasure and the pain are always felt so instantaneously, and often upon such frivolous occasions, that it seems evident that neither of them can be derived from any such self-interest|ed consideration. A man is mortified when, after having endeavoured to divert the company, he looks round and sees that no-body laughs at his jests but himself. On the contrary, the mirth of the company is highly agreeable to him, and he re|gards this correspondence of their senti|ments with his own as the greatest ap|plause.

Neither does his pleasure seem to arise altogether from the additional vivacity which his mirth may receive from sym|pathy with theirs, nor his pain from the disappointment he meets with when he misses this pleasure; though both the one and the other, no doubt, do in some

measure. When we have read a book or poem so often that we can no longer find any amusement in reading it by ourselves, we can still take pleasure in reading it to a companion. To him it has all the graces of novelty; we enter into the surprize and admiration which it naturally excites in him, but which it is no longer capable of exciting in us; we consider all the ideas which it presents rather in the light in which they appear to him than in that in which they appear to ourselves, and we are amused by sympathy with his amuse|ment which thus enlivens our own. On the contrary, we should be vexed if he did not seem to be entertained with it, and we could no longer take any pleasure in reading it to him. It is the same case here. The mirth of the company, no doubt, enlivens our own mirth, and their silence, no doubt, disappoints us. But tho' this may contribute both to the pleasure which we derive from the one, and to the pain which we feel from the other, it is by no means the sole cause of either; and this correspondence of the sentiments of others with our own appears to be a cause of

pleasure, and the want of it a cause of pain, which cannot be accounted for in this manner. The sympathy, which my friends express with my joy, might, indeed, give me pleasure by enlivening that joy; but that which they express with my grief could give me none, if it served only to enlieven that grief. Sympathy, however, enlivens joy and alleviates grief. It enlivens joy by presenting another source of satis|faction; and it alleviates grief by insinu|ating into the heart almost the only agree|able sensation which it is at that time ca|pable of receiving.

It is to be observed accordingly, that we are still more anxious to communicate to our friends our disagreeable than our agree|able passions, that we derive still more satis|faction from their sympathy with the for|mer than from that with the latter, and that we are still more shocked by the want of it.

How are the unfortunate relieved when they have found out a person to whom they can communicate the cause of their sor|row? Upon his sympathy they seem to disburthen themselves of a part of their distress: he is not improperly said to share

it with them. He not only feels a sorrow of the same kind with that which they feel, but as if he had derived a part of it to himself, what he feels seems to alleviate the weight of what they feel. Yet by re|lating their misfortunes they in some mea|sure renew their grief. They awaken in their memory the remembrance of those circumstances which occasioned their afflic|tion. Their tears accordingly flow faster than before, and they are apt to abandon themselves to all the weakness of sorrow. They take pleasure, however, in all this, and, it is evident, are sensibly relieved by it; because the sweetness of his sympathy more than compensates the bitterness of that sorrow, which, in order to excite this sympathy, they had thus enlivened and renewed. The cruelest insult, on the con|trary, which can be offered to the unfor|tunate, is to appear to make light of their calamities. To seem not to be affected with the joy of our companions is but want of politeness; but not to wear a serious countenance when they tell us their afflictions, is real and gross inhumanity.

Love is an agreeable; resentment, a dis|agreeable, passion: and accordingly we are

not half so anxious that our friends should adopt our friendships, as that they should enter into our resentments. We can forgive them though they seem to be but little affect|ed with the favours which we may have re|ceived, but lose all patience if they seem in|different about the injuries which may have been done to us: nor are we half so angry with them for not entering into our gra|titude, as for not sympathising with our resentment. They can easily avoid being friends to our friends, but can hardly avoid being enemies to those with whom we are at variance. We seldom resent their being at enmity with the first, though upon that account we may sometimes affect to make an aukward quarrel with them; but we quarrel with them in good earnest if in friendship with the last. The agreeable passions of love and joy can satisfy and sup|port the heart without any auxiliary plea|sure. The bitter and painful emotions of grief and resentment more strongly re|quire the healing consolation of sympa|thy.

As the person who is principally interest|ed in any event is pleased with our sympathy, and hurt by the want of it, so we, too, seem

to be pleased when we are able to sympa|thize with him, and to be hurt when we are unable to do so. We run not only to congratulate the successful, but to con|dole with the afflicted; and the pleasure which we find in conversing with a man whom we can entirely sympathise with in all his passions, seems to do more than compensate the painfulness of that sorrow with which the view of his situa|tion affects us. On the contrary, it is al|ways disagreeable to feel that we cannot sympathize with him, and instead of be|ing pleased with this exemption from sym|pathetic pain, it hurts us to find that we cannot share his uneasiness. If we hear a person loudly lamenting his misfortunes, which, however, upon bringing the case home to ourselves, we feel, can produce no such violent effect upon us, we are shocked at his grief; and, because we can|not enter into it, call it pusillanimity and weakness. It gives us the spleen, on the other hand, to see another too happy or too much elevated, as we call it, with any little piece of good fortune. We are disobliged even with his joy, and, because we cannot go along with it, call it levity

and folly. We are even put out of hu|mour if our companion laughs louder or longer at a joke than we think it deserves; that is, than we feel that we ourselves could laugh at it.

CHAP. II. Of the manner in which we judge of the propriety or impropriety of the affections of other men, by their concord or disso|nance with our own.

WHEN the original passions of the person principally concerned are in perfect concord with the sympathetic emo|tions of the spectator, they necessarily ap|pear to this last just and proper, and suit|able to their objects; and, on the contrary, when, upon bringing the case home to him|self, he finds that they do not coincide with what he feels, they necessarily appear to him unjust and improper, and unsuitable to the causes which excite them. To ap|prove of the passions of another, therefore, as suitable to their objects, is the same thing, as to observe that we intirely sympathize with them; and not to approve of them as such, is the same thing as to observe that we do not entirely sympathize with them. The man who resents the inju|ries that have been done to me, and ob|serves that I resent them precisely as he does, necessarily approves of my resentment.

The man whose sympathy keeps time to my grief, cannot but admit the reasonable|ness of my sorrow. He who admires the same poem, or the same picture, and ad|mires them exactly as I do, must surely al|low the justness of my admiration. He who laughs at the same joke, and laughs along with me, cannot well deny the propriety of my laughter. On the con|trary, the person who, upon these diffe|rent occasions, either feels no such emo|tion as that which I feel, or feels none that bears any proportion to mine, cannot avoid disapproving my sentiments on account of their dissonance with his own. If my animosity goes beyond what the indig|nation of my friend can correspond to; if my grief exceeds what his most tender compassion can go along with; if my ad|miration is either too high or too low to tally with his own; if I laugh loud and heartily at what he only smiles, or, on the contrary, only smile when he laughs loud and heartily; in all these cases, as soon as he comes from considering the ob|ject, to observe how I am affected by it, according as there is more or less dispropor|tion between his sentiments and mine, I

must incur a greater or less degree of his disapprobation: and upon all occasions his own sentiments are the standards and mea|sures by which he judges of mine.

To approve of another man's opinions is to adopt those opinions, and to adopt them is to approve of them. If the same arguments which convince you convince me likewise, I necessarily approve of your conviction; and if they do not, I necessa|rily disapprove of it: neither can I possibly conceive that I should do the one without the other. To approve or disapprove, there|fore, of the opinions of others is acknow|ledged, by every body, to mean no more than to observe their agreement or disagree|ment with our own. But this is equally the case with regard to our approbation or disapprobation of the sentiments or passions of others.

There are, indeed, some cases in which we seem to approve without any sympathy or correspondence of sentiments, and in which, consequently, the sentiment of ap|probation would seem to be different from the perception of this coincidence. A lit|tle attention, however, will convince us that even in these cases our approbation

is ultimately founded upon a sympathy or correspondence of this kind. I shall give an instance in things of a very frivolous na|ture, because in them the judgments of mankind are less apt to be perverted by wrong systems. We may often approve of a jest, and think the laughter of the com|pany quite just and proper, though we our|selves do not laugh, because, perhaps, we are in a grave humour, or happen to have our attention engaged with other objects. We have learned, however, from experience, what sort of pleasantry is upon most occasions capable of making us laugh, and we observe that this is one of that kind. We approve, therefore, of the laughter of the company, and feel that it is natural and suitable to its object; because, though in our present mood we cannot easily enter into it, we are sensible that upon most occasions we should very heartily join in it.

The same thing often happens with re|gard to all the other passions. A stranger passes by us in the street with all the marks of the deepest affliction; and we are imme|diately told that he has just received the news of the death of his father. It is impossible that, in this case, we should not

approve of his grief. Yet it may often happen, without any defect of humanity on our part, that, so far from entering into the violence of his sorrow, we should scarce conceive the first movements of con|cern upon his account. Both he and his father, perhaps, are intirely unknown to us, or we happen to be employed about other things, and do not take time to pic|ture out in our imagination the different circumstances of distress which must occur to him. We have learned, however, from experience, that such a misfortune naturally excites such a degree of sorrow, and we know that if we took time to consider his situation fully and in all its parts, we should, without doubt, most sincerely sym|pathize with him. It is upon the consci|ousness of this conditional sympathy, that our approbation of his sorrow is founded, even in those cases in which that sympa|thy does not actually take place; and the general rules derived from our preceding experience of what, upon most occasions, our sentiments would correspond with, cor|rect the impropriety of our present emo|tions.

The sentiment or affection of the heart from which any action proceeds, and upon which its whole virtue or vice must ulti|mately depend, may be considered under two different aspects, or in two different relations; first, in relation to the cause that excites it, or the motive that gives oc|casion to it; and secondly, in relation to the end that it proposes, or the effect that it tends to produce.

In the suitableness or unsuitableness, in the proportion or disproportion which the affection seems to bear to the cause or ob|ject which excites it, consists the propriety or impropriety, the decency or ungrace|fulness of the consequent action.

In the beneficial or hurtful nature of the effects which the affection aims at, or tends to produce, consists the merit or demerit of the action, the qualities by which it is en|titled to reward, or is deserving of punish|ment.

Philosophers have, of late years, consider|ed chiefly the tendency of affections, and have given little attention to the relation which they stand in to the cause which ex|cites them. In common life, however, when we judge of any person's conduct, and of

the sentiments which directed it, we con|stantly consider them under both these as|pects. When we blame in another man the excesses of love, of grief, of resent|ment, we not only consider the ruinous effects which they tend to produce, but the little occasion which was given for them. The merit of his favourite, we say, is not so great, his misfortune is not so dreadful, his provocation is not so extraordinary, as to justify so violent a passion. We should have indulged, we say; perhaps, have approved of the vio|lence of his emotion, had the cause been in any respect proportioned to it.

When we judge in this manner of any affection, as proportioned or dispro|portioned to the cause which excites it, it is scarce possible that we should make use of any other rule or canon but the cor|respondent affection in ourselves. If, upon bringing the case home to our own breast, we find that the sentiments which it gives occasion to coincide and tally with our own, we necessarily approve of them as propor|tioned and suitable to their objects: if otherwise, we necessarily disapprove of them, as extravagant and out of proportion.

Every faculty in one man is the measure by which he judges of the like faculty in another. I judge of your sight by my sight, of your ear by my ear, of your rea|son by my reason, of your resentment by my resentment, of your love by my love. I neither have, nor can have, any other way of judging about them.

CHAP. III. The same subject continued.

WE may judge of the propriety or impropriety of the sentiments of another person by their correspondence or disagreement with our own, upon two different occasions; either, first, when the objects which excite them are considered without any peculiar relation, either to our|selves or to the person whose sentiments we judge of; or, secondly, when they are con|sidered as peculiarly affecting one or other of us.

1. With regard to those objects which are considered without any peculiar relation either to ourselves or to the person whose sentiments we judge of; wherever his sen|timents intirely correspond with our own, we ascribe to him the qualities of taste and good judgment. The beauty of a plain, the greatness of a mountain, the ornaments of a building, the expression of a picture, the composition of a discourse, the conduct of a third person, the proportions of different quantities and numbers, the various ap|pearances

which the great machine of the universe is perpetually exhibiting, with the secret wheels and springs which produce them; in a word, all the general subjects of science and taste, are what we and our com|panion regard, as having no peculiar relation to either of us. We both look at them from the same point of view, and we have no oc|casion for sympathy, or for that imaginary change of situations from which it arises, in order to produce, with regard to these the most perfect harmony of sentiments and affections. If, notwithstanding, we are of|ten differently affected, it arises either from the different degrees of attention, which our different habits of life allow us to give easily to the several parts of those com|plex objects, or from the different degrees of natural acuteness in the faculty of the mind to which they are addressed.

When the sentiments of our companion coincide with our own in things of this kind, which are obvious and easy, and in which, perhaps, we never found a single person who differed from us, though we, no doubt, must approve of them, yet he seems to deserve no praise of admiration on account of them. But when they

not only coincide with our own, but lead and direct our own; when in forming them he appears to have attended to many things which we had overlooked, and to have ad|justed them to all the various circumstan|ces of their objects; we not only approve of them, but wonder and are surprised at their uncommon and unexpected acute|ness and comprehensiveness, and he ap|pears to deserve a very high degree of ad|miration and applause. For approbation heightned by wonder and surprise, consti|tutes the sentiment which is properly call|ed admiration, and of which applause is the natural expression. The decision of the man who judges that exquisite beauty is preferable to the grossest deformity, or that twice two are equal to four, must certainly be approved of by all the world, but will not, surely, be much admired. It is the acute and delicate discernment of the man of taste, who distinguishes the minute, and scarce perceptible, differences of beauty and deformity; it is the compre|hensive accuracy of the experienced mathe|matician, who unravels, with ease, the most intricate and perplexed proportions; it is the great leader in science and taste, the

man who directs and conducts our own sen|timents, the extent and superior justness of whose talents astonish us with wonder and surprise, who excites our admiration and seems to deserve our applause: and upon this foundation is grounded the greater part of the praise which is bestow|ed upon what are called the intellectual virtues.

The utility of those qualities, it may be thought, is what first recommends them to us; and, no doubt, the consideration of this, when we come to attend to it, gives them a new value. Originally, however, we approve of another man's judgment, not as something useful, but as right, as accurate, as agreeable to truth and reality: and it is evident we attribute those qualities to it for no other reason but because we find that it agrees with our own. Taste, in the same manner, is originally approved of, not as useful, but as just, as delicate, and as precisely suited to its object. The idea of the utility of all qualities of this kind, is plainly an after-thought, and not what first recommends them to our approba|tion.

2. With regard to those objects, which affect in a particular manner either our|selves or the person whose sentiments we judge of, it is at once more difficult to preserve this harmony and correspondence, and at the same time, vastly more impor|tant. My companion does not naturally look upon the misfortune that has befallen me, or the injury that has been done me, from the same point of view in which I consider them. They affect me much more nearly. We do not view them from the same station, as we do a picture, or a poem, or a system of philosophy, and are, there|fore, apt to be very differently affected by them. But I can much more easily over|look the want of this correspondence of sentiments with regard to such indifferent objects as concern neither me nor my com|panion, than with regard to what interests me so much as the misfortune that has be|fallen me, or the injury that has been done me. Though you despise that pic|ture, or that poem, or even that system of philosophy, which I admire, there is little danger of our quarrelling upon that ac|count. Neither of us can reasonably be

much interested about them. They ought all of them to be matters of great indifference to us both; so that, though our opinions may be opposite, our affections may still be very nearly the same. But it is quite other|wise with regard to those objects by which either you or I are particularly affected. Though your judgments in matters of spe|culation, though your sentiments in matters of taste, are quite opposite to mine, I can easily overlook this opposition; and if I have any degree of temper, I may still find some entertainment in your conversation, even upon those very subjects. But if you have either no fellow-feeling for the mis|fortunes I have met with, or none that bears any proportion to the grief which distracts me; or if you have either no in|dignation at the injuries I have suffered, or none that bears any proportion to the resentment which transports me, we can no longer converse upon these subjects. We become intolerable to one another. I can neither support your company, nor you mine. You are confounded at my violence and passion, and I am enraged at your cold insensibility and want of feeling.

In all such cases, that there may be some correspondence of sentiments between the spectator and the person principally concern|ed, the spectator must, first of all, endea|vour, as much as he can, to put himself in the situation of the other, and to bring home to himself every little circumstance of distress which can possibly occur to the sufferer. He must adopt the whole case of his companion with all its minutest in|cidents; and strive to render, as perfect as possible, that imaginary change of situa|tion upon which his sympathy is founded.

After all this, however, the emotions of the spectator will still be very apt to fall short of the violence of what is felt by the sufferer. Mankind, though natu|rally sympathetic, never conceive, for what has befallen another, that degree of passion which naturally animates the person prin|cipally concerned. That imaginary change of situation, upon which their sympathy is founded, is but momentary. The thought of their own safety, the thought that they themselves are not really the suf|ferers, continually intrudes itself upon them; and though it does not hinder them

from conceiving a passion somewhat analo|gous to what is felt by the sufferer, hinders them from conceiving any thing that ap|proaches to the same degree of violence. The person concerned is sensible of this, and, at the same time, passionately desires a more compleat sympathy. He longs for that re|lief which nothing can afford him but the entire concord of the affections of the spec|tators with his own. To see the emo|tions of their hearts, in every respect, beat time to his own, in the violent and disa|greeable passions, constitutes his sole con|solation. But he can only hope to obtain this by lowering his passion to that pitch, in which the spectators are capable of go|ing along with him. He must flatten, if I may be allowed to say so, the sharpness of its natural tone, in order to reduce it to harmony and concord with the emo|tions of those who are about him. What they feel, will, indeed, always be, in some respects, different from what he feels, and compassion can never be exactly the same with original sorrow; because the secret consciousness that the change of situations, from which the sympathetic sentiment arises, is but imaginary, not only lowers

it in degree, but, in some measure, varies it in kind, and gives it a quite different modification. These two sentiments, how|ever, may, it is evident, have such a cor|respondence with one another, as is suffi|cient for the harmony of society. Though they will never be unisons, they may be concords, and this is all that is wanted or required.

In order to produce this concord, as nature teaches the spectators to assume the circumstances of the person principally con|cerned, so she teaches this last in some measure to assume those of the spectators. As they are continually placing themselves in his situation, and thence conceiving emotions similar to what he feels; so he is as constantly placing himself in theirs, and thence conceiving some degree of that cool|ness about his own fortune, with which he is sensible that they will view it. As they are constantly considering what they them|selves would feel, if they actually were the sufferers, so he is as constantly led to ima|gine in what manner he would be affected if he was only one of the spectators of his own situation. As their sympathy makes them look at it, in some measure, with his

eyes, so his sympathy makes him look at it, in some measure, with theirs, especially when in their presence and acting under their observation: and as the reflected pas|sion, which he thus conceives, is much weaker than the original one, it necessa|rily abates the violence of what he felt be|fore he came into their presence, before he began to recollect in what manner they would be affected by it, and to view his situation in this candid and impartial light.

The mind, therefore, is rarely so disturb|ed, but that the company of a friend will restore it to some degree of tranquillity and sedateness. The breast is, in some measure, calmed and composed the moment we come into his presence. We are immediately put in mind of the light in which he will view our situation, and we begin to view it ourselves in the same light; for the effect of sympathy is instantaneous. We expect less sympathy from a common acquaintance than from a friend: we cannot open to the former all those little circumstances which we can unfold to the latter: we assume, therefore, more tranquillity before him, and endeavour to fix our thoughts upon those

general outlines of our situation which he is willing to consider. We expect still less sympathy from an assembly of strangers, and we assume, therefore, still more tran|quillity before them, and always endeavour to bring down our passion to that pitch, which the particular company we are in may be expected to go along with. Nor is this merely an assumed appearance: for if we are at all masters of ourselves, the pre|sence of a mere acquaintance will really compose us, still more than that of a friend; and that of an assembly of strangers still more than that of a mere acquaintance.

Society and conversation, therefore, are the most powerful remedies for restoring the mind to its tranquillity, if, at any time, it has unfortunately lost it; as well as the best preservatives of that equal and happy temper, which is so necessary to self-satis|faction and enjoyment. Men of retirement and speculation, who are apt to sit brooding at home over either grief or resentment, though they may often have more humani|ty, more generosity, and a nicer sense of honour, yet seldom possess that equality of temper which is so common among men of the world.

CHAP. IV. Of the amiable and respectable virtues.

UPON these two different efforts, upon that of the spectator to enter into the sentiments of the person principally concerned, and upon that of the person principally concerned, to bring down his emotions to what the spectator can go along with, are founded two different sets of virtues. The soft, the gentle and the ami|able virtues, the virtues of candid conde|scension and indulgent humanity, are founded upon the one: the great, the awful and respectable, the virtues of self-denial, of self-government, of that com|mand of the passions which subjects all the movements of our nature to what our own dignity and honour, and the propriety of our own conduct require, take their origin from the other.

How amiable does he appear to be, whose sympathetic heart seems to re-echo all the sentiments of those with whom he converses, who grieves for their calamities, who re|sents their injuries, and who rejoices at

their good fortune! When we bring home to ourselves the situation of his companions, we enter into their gratitude, and feel what consolation they must derive from the ten|der sympathy of so affectionate a friend. And for a contrary reason, how disagree|able does he appear to be, whose hard and obdurate heart feels for himself only, but is altogether insensible to the happiness or misery of others! We enter, in this case too, into the pain which his presence must give to every mortal with whom he con|verses, to those especially with whom we are most apt to sympathize, the unfortu|nate and the injured.

On the other hand, what noble pro|priety and grace do we feel in the con|duct of those who, in their own case, exert that recollection and self-command which constitute the dignity of every passion, and which bring it down to what others can enter into. We are disgusted with that clamorous grief, which, without any de|licacy, calls upon our compassion with sighs and tears and importunate lamenta|tions. But we reverence that reserved, that silent and majestic sorrow, which dis|covers itself only in the swelling of the eyes,

in the quivering of the lips and cheeks, and in the distant, but affecting, coldness of the whole behaviour. It imposes the like silence upon us. We regard it with re|spectful attention, and watch with anxious concern over our whole behaviour, lest by any impropriety we should disturb that concerted tranquillity, which it requires so great an effort to support.

The insolence and brutality of anger, in the same manner, when we indulge its fury without check or restraint, is, of all objects, the most detestable. But we ad|mire that noble and generous resentment which governs its pursuit of the greatest injuries, not by the rage which they are apt to excite in the breast of the sufferer, but by the indignation which they natu|rally call forth in that of the impartial spec|tator; which allows no word, no gesture, to escape it beyond what this more equita|ble sentiment would dictate; which never, even in thought, attempts any greater ven|geance, nor desires to inflict any greater punishment, than what every indifferent person would rejoice to see executed.

And hence it is, that to feel much for others and little for ourselves, that to re|strain

our selfish, and to indulge our be|nevolent affections, constitutes the perfec|tion of human nature; and can alone pro|duce among mankind that harmony of sen|timents and passions in which consists their whole grace and propriety. As to love our neighbour as we love ourselves is the great law of christianity, so it is the great precept of nature to love ourselves only as we love our neighbour, or what comes to the same thing, as our neighbour is capable of loving us.

As taste and good judgment, when they are considered as qualities which deserve praise and admiration, are supposed to im|ply a delicacy of sentiment and an acute|ness of understanding not commonly to be met with; so the virtues of sensibility and self-command are not apprehended to con|sist in the ordinary, but in the uncommon degrees of those qualities. The amiable virtue of humanity requires, surely, a sensi|bility, much beyond what is possessed by the rude vulgar of mankind. The great and exalted virtue of magnanimity undoubtedly demands much more than that degree of self-command, which the weakest of mor|tals is capable of exerting. As in the com|mon

degree of the intellectual qualities, there is no abilities; so in the common de|gree of the moral, there is no virtue. Vir|tue is excellence, something uncommonly great and beautiful, which rises far above what is vulgar and ordinary. The ami|able virtues consist in that degree of sensi|bility which surprises by its exquisite and unexpected delicacy and tenderness. The awful and respectable, in that degree of self-command which astonishes by its amaz|ing superiority over the most ungovernable passions of human nature.

There is, in this respect, a considerable difference between virtue and mere pro|priety; between those qualities and actions which deserve to be admired and celebra|ted, and those which simply deserve to be approved of. Upon many occasions, to act with the most perfect propriety, requires no more than that common and ordinary degree of sensibility or self-command which the most worthless of mankind are possest of, and sometimes even that degree is not necessary. Thus, to give a very low in|stance, to eat when we are hungry, is cer|tainly, upon ordinary occasions, perfectly right and proper, and cannot miss being

approved of as such by every body. No|thing, however, could be more absurd than to say it was virtuous.

On the contrary, there may frequently be a considerable degree of virtue in those actions, which fall short of the most per|fect propriety; because they may still ap|proach nearer to perfection than could well be expected upon occasions in which it was so extremely difficult to attain it: and this is very often the case upon those occasions which require the greatest ex|ertions of self-command. There are some situations which bear so hard upon human nature, that the greatest degree of self-government, which can belong to so im|perfect a creature as man, is not able to stifle, altogether, the voice of human weak|ness, or reduce the violence of the passions to that pitch of moderation, in which the impartial spectator can entirely enter into them. Though in those cases, there|fore, the behaviour of the sufferer fall short of the most perfect propriety, it may still deserve some applause, and even, in a cer|tain sense, may be denominated virtuous. It may still manifest an effort of genero|sity and magnanimity of which the greater

part of men are incapable; and though it fails of absolute perfection, it may be a much nearer approximation towards per|fection, than what, upon such trying oc|casions, is commonly either to be found or to be expected.

In all cases of this kind, when we are determining the degree of blame or ap|plause that seems due to any action, we very frequently make use of two different standards. The first is the idea of com|plete propriety and perfection, which, in those difficult situations, no human con|duct ever did, or ever can come up to; and in comparison with which the actions of all men must forever appear blameable and imperfect. The second is the idea of that degree of proximity or distance from this complete perfection, which the actions of the greater part of men commonly arrive at. Whatever goes beyond this degree, how far soever it may be removed from absolute perfection, seems to deserve ap|plause; and whatever falls short of it, to deserve blame.

It is in the same manner that we judge of the productions of all the arts which ad|dress themselves to the imagination. When

a critic examines the work of any of the great masters in poetry or painting, he may sometimes examine it by an idea of perfection, in his own mind, which nei|ther that nor any other human work will ever come up to; and as long as he com|pares it with this standard, he can see no|thing in it but faults and imperfections. But when he comes to consider the rank which it ought to hold among other works of the same kind, he necessarily compares it with a very different standard, the com|mon degree of excellence which is usually attained in this particular art; and, when he judges of it by this new measure, it may often appear to deserve the highest ap|plause, upon account of its approaching much nearer to perfection than the greater part of those works which can be brought into competition with it.

SECTION III. Of the degrees of the different passions which are consistent with propriety.

INTRODUCTION.

THE propriety of every passion ex|cited by objects peculiarly related to ourselves, the pitch which the spectator can go along with, must lye, it is evident, in a certain mediocrity. If the passion is too high, or if it is too low, he cannot enter into it. Grief and resentment for private misfortunes and injuries may easi|ly, for example, be too high, and in the greater part of mankind they are so. They may likewise, though this more rarely happens, be too low. We denominate the excess, weakness, and fury: and we call the defect stupidity, insensibility, and want of spirit. We can enter into neither of them, but are astonished and confound|ed to see them.

This mediocrity, however, in which the point of propriety consists, is different

in different passions. It is high in some, and low in others. There are some pas|sions which it is indecent to express very strongly, even upon those occasions, in which it is acknowledged we cannot avoid feeling them in the highest degree. And there are others of which the strongest expressions are upon many occasions ex|tremely graceful, even though the passions themselves do not, perhaps, arise so neces|sarily. The first are those passions with which, for certain reasons, there is little or no sympathy: the second are those with which, for other reasons, there is the greatest. And if we consider all the different passions of human nature, we shall find that they are regarded as de|cent, or indecent, just in proportion as mankind are more or less disposed to sympathise with them.

CHAP. I. Of the passions which take their origin from the body.

1. IT is indecent to express any strong degree of those passions which arise from a certain situation or disposition of the body; because the company, not being in the same disposition, cannot be expected to sympathise with them. Violent hunger, for example, though upon many occasions not only natural, but unavoidable, is al|ways indecent, and to eat voraciously is universally regarded as a piece of ill man|ners. There is, however, some degree of sympathy, even with hunger. It is agree|able to see our companions eat with a good appetite, and all expressions of loath|ing are offensive. The disposition of body which is habitual to a man in health, makes his stomach easily keep time, if I may be allowed so coarse an expres|sion, with the one, and not with the other. We can sympathise with the distress which excessive hunger occasions, when we read the description of it in the journal of a

siege, or of a sea voyage. We imagine ourselves in the situation of the sufferers, and thence readily conceive the grief, the fear and consternation, which must necessarily distract them. We feel, our|selves, some degree of those passions, and therefore sympathise with them: but as we do not grow hungry by reading the description, we cannot properly, even in this case, be said to sympathise with their hunger.

It is the same case with the passion by which nature unites the two sexes. Though naturally the most furious of all the passions, all strong expressions of it are upon every occasion indecent, even between persons in whom its most com|pleat indulgence, is acknowledged by all laws, both human and divine, to be per|fectly innocent. There seems, however, to be some degree of sympathy even with this passion. To talk to a woman as we should to a man is improper: it is expected that their company should in|spire us with more gaiety, more plea|santry, and more attention; and an in|tire insensibility to the fair sex, renders a

man contemptible in some measure even to the men.

Such is our aversion for all the appe|tites which take their origin from the body: all strong expressions of them are loathsome and disagreeable. According to some antient philosophers, these are the passions which we share in common with the brutes, and which having no connec|tion with the characteristical qualities of human nature, are upon that account be|neath its dignity. But there are many other passions which we share in common with 〈◊〉〈◊〉 brutes, such as resentment, natural 〈◊〉〈◊〉, and even gratitude, which do not, upon that account, appear to be so brutal▪ The true cause of the peculiar 〈…〉〈…〉 we conceive for the 〈…〉〈…〉 body, when we see them 〈…〉〈…〉 men, is that we cannot enter into them. To the person himself who 〈◊〉〈◊〉 them, as soon as they are gratified, the object that excited them ceases to be agreeable: even its presence often be|comes offensive to him; he looks round to no purpose for the charm which trans|ported him the moment before, and he can now as little enter into his own

passion as another person. When we have dined, we order the covers to be re|moved; and we should treat in the same manner the objects of the most ardent and passionate desires, if they were the objects of no other passions but those which take their origin from the body.

In the command of those appetites of the body consists that virtue which is pro|perly called temperance. To restrain them within those bounds, which regard to health and fortune prescribes, is the part of prudence. But to confine them with|in those limits, which grace, which pro|priety, which delicacy, and modesty, re|quire, is the office of temperance.

2. It is for the same reason that to cry out with bodily pain, how intolerable so|ever, appears always unmanly and un|becoming. There is, however, a good deal of sympathy even with bodily pain. If, as has already been observed, I see a stroke aimed, and just ready to fall upon the leg, or arm, of another person, I naturally shrink and draw back my own leg, or my own arm; and when it does fall, I feel it in some measure, and am hurt by it as well as the sufferer. My

hurt, however, is, no doubt, excessively slight, and, upon that account, if he makes any violent out-cry, as I cannot go along with him, I never fail to despise him. And this is the case of all the passions which take their origin from the body; they excite either no sympathy at all, or such a degree of it, as is altoge|ther disproportioned to the violence of what is felt by the sufferer.

It is quite otherwise with those pas|sions which take their origin from the imagination. The frame of my body can be but little affected by the altera|tions which are brought about upon that of my companion: but my imagination is more ductile, and more readily as|sumes, if I may say so, the shape and configuration of the imaginations of those wi••h whom I am familiar. A disappoint|ment in love, or ambition, will, upon this account, call forth more sympathy than the greatest bodily evil. Those pas|sions arise altogether from the imagina|tion. The person who has lost his whole fortune, if he is in health, feels nothing in his body. What he suffers is from the imagination only, which represents to him

the loss of his dignity, neglect from his friends, contempt from his enemies, de|pendance, want, and misery, coming fast upon him; and we sympathise with him more strongly upon this account, because our imaginations can more readily mould themselves upon his imagination, than our bodies can mould themselves upon his body.

The loss of a leg may generally be regarded as a more real calamity than the loss of a mistress. It would be a ridicu|lous tragedy, however, of which the ca|tastrophe was to turn upon a loss of that kind. A misfortune of the other kind, how frivolous soever it may appear to be, has given occasion to many a fine one.

Nothing is so soon forgot as pain. The moment it is gone the whole agony of it is over, and the thought of it can no longer give us any sort of disturbance. We ourselves cannot then enter into the anxiety and anguish which we had before conceived. An unguarded word from a friend will occasion a more durable unea|siness. The agony which this creates is by no means over with the word. What at first disturbs us is not the object of

the senses, but the idea of the imagina|tion. As it is an idea, therefore, which occasions our uneasiness, till time and other accidents have in some measure ef|faced it from our memory, the imagina|tion continues to fret and rankle within, from the thought of it.

Pain never calls forth any very lively sym|pathy unless it is accompanied with danger. We sympathise with the fear, though not with the agony of the sufferer. Fear, how|ever, is a passion derived altogether from the imagination, which represents, with an uncertainty and fluctuation that in|creases our anxiety, not what we really feel, but what we may hereafter possibly suffer. The gout, or the tooth-ach, tho' exquisitely painful, excite very little sympa|thy; more dangerous diseases, tho' accom|panied with very little pain, excite the highest.

Some people faint and grow sick at the sight of a chirurgical operation, and that bodily pain which is occasioned by tearing the flesh, seems, in them, to excite the most excessive sympathy. We conceive in a much more lively and distinct man|ner, the pain which proceeds from an ex|ternal

cause, than we do that which arises from an internal disorder. I can scarce form an idea of the agonies of my neigh|bour when he is tortured with the gout, or the stone; but I have the clearest con|ception of what he must suffer from an incision, a wound, or a fracture. The chief cause, however, why such objects produce such violent effects upon us, is their novelty. One who has been witness to a dozen dissections, and as many am|putations, sees, ever after, all operations of this kind with great indifference, and often with perfect insensibility. Though we have read or seen represented more than five hundred tragedies, we shall seldom feel so entire an abatement of our sensibility to the objects which they represent to us.

In some of the Greek tragedies there is an attempt to excite compassion, by the representation of the agonies of bodily pain. Philoctetes cries out and faints from the extremity of his sufferings. Hippoly|tus and Hercules are both introduced as expiring under the severest tortures, which, it seems, even the fortitude of Hercules was incapable of supporting. In all these cases, however, it is not the pain which

interests us, but some other circumstance. It is not the sore foot, but the solitude, of Philoctetes which affects us, and dif|fuses over that charming tragedy, that ro|mantic wildness, which is so agreeable to the imagination. The agonies of Hercules and Hippolytus are interesting only be|cause we forsee that death is to be the conse|quence. If those heroes were to recover, we should think the representation of their sufferings perfectly ridiculous. What a tra|gedy would that be of which the distress con|sisted in a cholic. Yet no pain is more exquisite. These attempts to excite com|passion by the representation of bodily pain, may be regarded as among the greatest breaches of decorum of which the Greek theatre has set the example.

The little sympathy which we feel with bodily pain is the foundation of the pro|priety of constancy and patience in endur|ing it. The man, who under the seve|rest tortures allows no weakness to escape him, vents no groan, gives way to no passion which we do not entirely enter in|to, commands our highest admiration. His firmness enables him to keep time with our indifference and insensibility.

We admire and intirely go along with the magnanimous effort which he makes for this purpose. We approve of his be|haviour, and from our experience of the common weakness of human nature, we are surprised, and wonder how he should be able to act so as to deserve approbation. Approbation, mixed and animated by won|der and surprize, constitutes the sentiment which is properly called admiration, of which, applause is the natural expression, as has already been observed.

CHAP. II. Of those passions which take their origin from a particular turn or habit of the imagination.

EVEN of the passions derived from the imagination, those which take their origin from a peculiar turn or habit it has acquired, though they may be ac|knowledged to be perfectly natural, are, however, but little sympathised with. The imaginations of mankind, not having acquired that particular turn, cannot enter into them; and such passions, though they

may be allowed to be almost unavoidable in some part of life, are always in some measure ridiculous. This is the case with that strong attachment which natu|rally grows up between two persons of different sexes, who have long fixed their thoughts upon one another. Our imagi|nation not having run in the same channel with that of the lover, we cannot enter into the eagerness of his emotions. If our friend has been injured, we readily sympathise with his resentment, and grow angry with the very person with whom he his angry. If he has received a be|nefit, we readily enter into his gratitude, and have a very high sense of the merit of his benefactor. But if he is in love, though we may think his passion just as reasonable as any of the kind, yet we never think ourselves bound to conceive a passion of the same kind, and for the same person for whom he has conceived it. The passion appears to every body, but the man who feels it, entirely dis|proportioned to the value of the object; and love, though it is pardoned in a certain age because we know it is natural, is always laughed at, because we cannot

enter into it. All serious and strong ex|pressions of it appear ridiculous to a third person; and if the lover is not good com|pany to his mistress, he is to no body else. He himself is sensible of this; and as long as he continues in his sober senses, endea|vours to treat his own passion with raillery and ridicule. It is the only stile in which we care to hear of it; because it is the only stile in which we ourselves are disposed to talk of it. We grow weary of the grave, pedantic, and long-sentenced love of Cow|ley and Propertius, who never have done with exaggerating the violence of their at|tachments; but the gaiety of Ovid, and the gallantry of Horace, are always agree|able.

But tho' we feel no proper sympathy with an attachment of this kind, tho' we never approach even in imagination to|wards conceiving a passion for that parti|cular person, yet as we either have con|ceived, or may be disposed to conceive, passions of the same kind, we readily en|ter into those high hopes of happiness which are proposed from its gratification, as well as into that exquisite distress which is feared from its disappointment. It in|terests

us not as a passion, but as a situa|tion that gives occasion to other passions which interest us; to hope, to fear, and to distress of every kind: In the same manner as in a description of a sea voy|age, it is not the hunger which interests us, but the distress which that hunger oc|casions. Tho' we do not properly enter into the attachment of the lover, we rea|dily go along with those expectations of romantic happiness which he derives from it. We feel how natural it is for the mind, in a certain situation, relaxed with indolence, and fatigued with the violence of desire, to long for serenity and quiet, to hope to find them in the gratification of that passion which distracts it, and to frame to itself the idea of that life of pas|toral tranquillity and retirement which the elegant, the tender, and the passionate Ti|bullus takes so much pleasure in describ|ing; a life like what the poets describe in the Fortunate Islands, a life of friend|ship, liberty, and repose; free from la|bour, and from care, and from all the turbulent passions which attend them. Even scenes of this kind interest us most, when they are painted rather as what is

hoped, than as what is enjoyed. The grossness of that passion, which mixes with, and is, perhaps, the foundation of love, disappears when its gratification is far off and at a distance; but renders the whole offensive, when described as what is im|mediately possessed. The happy passion, upon this account, interests us much less than the fearful and the melancholy. We tremble for whatever can disappoint such natural and agreeable hopes: and thus enter into all the anxiety, and concern, and distress of the lover.

Hence it is, that, in some modern tra|gedies and romances, this passion appears so wonderfully interesting. It is not so much the love of Castalio and Monimia which attaches us in the Orphan, as the distress which that love occasions. The author who should introduce two lovers, in a scene of perfect security, expressing their mutual fondness for one another, would excite laughter, and not sympathy. If a scene of this kind is ever admitted into a tragedy, it is always, in some mea|sure, improper, and is endured, not from any sympathy with the passion that is ex|pressed in it, but from concern for the dan|gers

and difficulties with which the audi|ence foresee that its gratification is likely to be attended.

The reserve which the laws of society impose upon the fair sex, with regard to this weakness, renders it more peculiarly distressful in them, and, upon that very account, more deeply interesting. We are charmed with the love of Phaedra, as it is expressed in the French tragedy of that name, notwithstanding all the extra|vagance and guilt which attend it. That very extravagance and guilt may be said, in some measure, to recommend it to us. Her fear, her shame, her remorse, her horror, her despair, become thereby more natural and interesting. All the seconda|ry passions, if I may be allowed to call them so, which arise from the situation of love, become necessarily more furious and violent: and it is with these secondary passions only that we can properly be said to sympathize.

Of all the passions, however, which are so extravagantly disproportioned to the va|lue of their objects, love is the only one that appears, even to the weakest minds, to have any thing in it that is either

graceful or agreeable. In itself, first of all, tho' it may be ridiculous, it is not na|turally odious; and tho' its consequences are often fatal and dreadful, its intentions are seldom mischievous. And then, tho' there is little propriety in the passion itself, there is a good deal in some of those which always accompany it. There is in love a strong mixture of humanity, gene|rosity, kindness, friendship, esteem; pas|sions with which, of all others, for rea|sons which shall be explained immediately, we have the greatest propensity to sympa|thize, even notwithstanding we are sensible that they are, in some measure, excessive. The sympathy which we feel with them, renders the passion which they accompany less disagreeable, and supports it in our imagination, notwithstanding all the vices which commonly go along with it; tho' in the one sex it necessarily leads to the last ruin and infamy; and tho' in the other, where it is apprehended to be least fatal, it is al|most always attended with an incapacity for labour, a neglect of duty, a contempt of fame, and even of common reputa|tion. Notwithstanding all this, the de|gree of sensibility and generosity with

which it is supposed to be accompanied, renders it to many the object of vanity; and they are fond of appearing capable of feeling what would do them no honour if they had really felt it.

It is for a reason of the same kind, that a certain reserve is necessary when we talk of our own friends, our own studies, our own professions. All these are objects which we cannot expect should interest our com|panions in the same degree in which they interest us. And it is for want of this reserve, that the one half of mankind make bad company to the other. A phi|losopher is company to a philosopher only; the member of a club, to his own little knot of companions.

CHAP. III. Of the unsocial passions.

THERE is another set of passions, which tho' derived from the imagi|nation, yet before we can enter into them, or regard them as graceful or becoming, must always be brought down to a pitch much lower than that to which undisci|plined

nature would raise them. These are hatred and resentment, with all their different modifications. With regard to all such passions, our sympathy is divided between the person who feels them and the person who is the object of them. The interests of these two are directly oppo|site. What our sympathy with the per|son who feels them would prompt us to wish for, our fellow-feeling with the other would lead us to fear. As they are both men, we are concerned for both, and our fear for what the one may suffer, damps our resentment for what the other has suf|fered. Our sympathy, therefore, with the man who has received the provocation, necessarily falls short of the passion which naturally animates him, not only upon account of those general causes which ren|der all sympathetic passions inferior to the original ones, but upon account of that particular cause which is peculiar to itself, our opposite sympathy with another person. Before resentment, therefore, can become graceful and agreeable, it must be more humbled and brought down below that pitch to which it would naturally rise, than almost any other passion.

Mankind, at the same time, have a very strong sense of the injuries that are done to another. The villain, in a tragedy or romance, is as much the object of our in|dignation, as the hero is that of our sym|pathy and affection. We detest Iago as much as we esteem Othello; and delight as much in the punishment of the one, as we are grieved for the distress of the other. But tho' mankind have so strong a fellow-feeling with the injuries that are done to their brethren, they do not always resent them the more that the sufferer appears to resent them. Upon most occasions, the greater his patience, his mildness, his hu|manity, provided it does not appear that he wants spirit, or that fear was the mo|tive of his forbearance, the higher the re|sentment against the person who injured him. The amiableness of the character exasperates their sense of the atrocity of the injury.

These passions, however, are regarded as necessary parts of the character of hu|man nature. A person becomes contemp|tible who tamely sits still, and submits to insults, without attempting either to repel or to revenge them. We cannot enter in|to

his indifference and insensibility: we call his behaviour mean-spiritedness, and are as really provoked by it, as by the insolence of his adversary. Even the mob are enra|ged to see any man submit patiently to af|fronts and ill usage. They desire to see this insolence resented, and resented by the person who suffers from it. They cry to him with fury, to defend, or to revenge himself. If his indignation rouses at last, they heartily applaud, and sympathise with it. It enlivens their own indignation a|gainst the enemy, whom they rejoice to see him attack in his turn, and are as real|ly gratified by his revenge, provided it is not immoderate, as if the injury had been done to themselves.

But though the utility of those passions to the individual, by rendering it dan|gerous to insult or injure him, be ac|knowledged; and though their utility to the publick, as the guardians of justice, and of the equality of its administration, be not less considerable, as shall be shewn hereafter; yet there is still something dis|agreeable in the passions themselves, which makes the appearance of them in other men the natural object of our aversion.

The expression of anger towards any body present, if it exceeds a bare intimation that we are sensible of his ill usage, is regarded not only as an insult to that par|ticular person, but as a rudeness to the whole company. Respect for them ought to have restrained us from giving way to so boisterous and offensive an emotion. It is the remote effects of these passions which are agreeable; the immediate ef|fects are mischief to the person against whom they are directed. But it is the immediate, and not the remote effects of objects which render them agreeable or disagreeable to the imagination. A pri|son is certainly more useful to the publick than a palace; and the person who founds the one is generally directed by a much juster spirit of patriotism, than he who builds the other. But the immediate ef|fects of a prison, the confinement of the wretches shut up in it, are disagreeable; and the imagination either does not take time to trace out the remote ones, or sees them at too great a distance to be much affected by them. A prison, therefore, will always be a disagreeable object; and the fitter it is for the purpose for which

it was intended, it will be the more so. A palace, on the contrary, will always be agreeable: yet its remote effects may of|ten be inconvenient to the publick. It may serve to promote luxury, and set the example of the dissolution of manners. Its immediate effects, however, the con|veniency, the pleasure and the gaiety of the people who live in it, being all agree|able, and suggesting to the imagination a thousand agreeable ideas, that faculty gene|rally rests upon them, and seldom goes fur|ther in tracing its more distant conse|quences. Trophies of the instruments of musick or of agriculture, imitated in painting or in stucco, make a common and an agreeable ornament of our halls and dining-rooms. A trophy of the same kind, composed of the instruments of surgery, of dissecting, and amputation-knives; of saws for cutting the bones, of trepanning instruments, &c. would be ab|surd and shocking. Instruments of sur|gery, however, are always more finely polished, and generally more nicely adapt|ed to the purposes for which they are intended, than instruments of agricul|ture. The remote effects of them too,

the health of the patient, is agreeable; yet as the immediate effect of them is pain and suffering, the sight of them always dis|pleases us. Instruments of war are agree|able, tho' their immediate effect may seem to be in the same manner pain and suf|fering. But then it is the pain and suf|fering of our enemies, with whom we have no sympathy; and, with regard to us, they are immediately connected with the agreeable ideas of courage, victory, and honour. They are themselves, there|fore, supposed to make one of the noblest parts of dress, and the imitation of them one of the finest ornaments of architec|ture. It is the same case with the quali|ties of the mind. The antient stoics were of opinion, that as the world was governed by the all-ruling providence of a wise, powerful, and good God, every single event ought to be regarded, as mak|ing a necessary part of the plan of the universe, and as tending to promote the general order and happiness of the whole: that the vices and follies of mankind, therefore, made as necessary a part of this plan as their wisdom or their virtue; and by that eternal art which educes good

from ill, were made to tend equally to the prosperity and perfection of the great system of nature. No speculation of this kind, however, how deeply so|ever it might be rooted in the mind, could diminish our natural abhorrence for vice, whose immediate effects are so destructive, and whose remote ones are too distant to be traced by the imagination.

It is the same case with those passions we have been just now considering. Their immediate effects are so disagreeable, that even when they are most justly provoked; there is still something about them which dis|gusts us. These, therefore, are the only passions of which the expressions, as I for|merly observed, do not dispose and prepare us to sympathize with them, before we are informed of the cause which excites them. The plaintive voice of misery, when heard at a distance, will not allow us to be indifferent about the person from whom it comes. As soon as it strikes our ear, it interests us in his fortune, and, if continu|ed, forces us almost involuntarily to fly to his assistance. The sight of a smiling countenance, in the same manner, elevates even the pensive into that gay and airy

mood, which disposes him to sympathize with, and share the joy which it expres|ses; and he feels his heart, which with thought and care was before that shrunk and depressed, instantly expanded and elated. But it is quite otherwise with the expressions of hatred and resentment. The hoarse, boisterous, and discordant voice of anger, when heard at a distance, inspires us either with fear or aversion. We do not fly towards it, as to one who cries out with pain and agony. Women, and men of weak nerves, tremble and are overcome with fear, tho' sensible that themselves are not the objects of the anger. They con|ceive fear, however, by putting themselves in the situation of the person who is so. Even those of stouter hearts are disturb|ed; not indeed enough to make them a|fraid, but enough to make them angry; for anger is the passion which they would feel in the situation of the other person. It is the same case with hatred. Mere expressions of spite inspire it against no body, but the man who uses them. Both these passions are by nature the ob|jects of our aversion. Their disagreeable and boisterous appearance never excites,

never prepares, and often disturbs our sympathy. Grief does not more powerful|ly engage and attract us to the person in whom we observe it, than these, while we are ignorant of their cause, disgust and de|tach us from him. It was, it seems, the intention of nature, that those rougher and more unamiable emotions, which drive men from one another, should be less ea|sily and more rarely communicated.

When music imitates the modulations of grief or joy, it either actually inspires us with those passions, or at least puts us in the mood which disposes us to conceive them. But when it imitates the notes of anger, it inspires us with fear. Joy, grief, love, admiration, devotion, are all of them passions which are naturally musical. Their natural tones are all soft, clear, and melo|dious; and they naturally express them|selves in periods which are distinguished by regular pauses, and which upon that ac|count are easily adapted to the regular re|turns of the correspondent airs of a tune. The voice of anger, on the contrary, and of all the passions which are akin to it, is harsh and discordant. Its periods too are all irregular, sometimes very long, and

sometimes very short, and distinguished by no regular pauses. It is with difficulty, therefore, that music can imitate any of those passions; and the music which does imitate them is not the most agreeable. A whole entertainment may consist, without any impropriety, of the imitation of the social and agreeable passions. It would be a strange entertainment which consisted altogether of the imitations of hatred and resentment.

If those passions are disagreeable to the spectator, they are not less so to the person who feels them. Hatred and anger are the greatest poison to the happiness of a good mind. There is, in the very feeling of those passions, something harsh, jarring, and convulsive, something that tears and distracts the breast, and is al|together destructive of that composure and tranquillity of mind which is so necessary to happiness, and which is best promoted by the contrary passions of gratitude and love. It is not the value of what they lose by the perfidy and ingratitude of those they live with, which the generous and humane are most apt to regret. What|ever they may have lost, they can gene|rally

〈1 page duplicate〉〈1 page duplicate〉

〈1 page duplicate〉〈1 page duplicate〉

be very happy without it. What most disturbs them is the idea of per|fidy and ingratitude exercised towards themselves; and the discordant and dis|agreeable passions which this excites, con|stitutes, in their own opinion, the chief part of the injury that they suffer.

How many things are requisite to ren|der the gratification of resentment com|pleatly agreeable, and to make the spec|tator thoroughly sympathise with our re|venge? The provocation must first of all be such that we should become con|temptible, and be exposed to perpetual in|sults, if we did not, in some measure, re|sent it. Smaller offences are always bet|ter neglected; nor is there any thing more despicable than that froward and captious humour which takes fire upon every slight occasion of quarrel. We should resent more from a sense of the propriety of resentment, from a sense that mankind expect and require it of us, than because we feel in ourselves the furies of that disagreeable passion. There is no passion, of which the human mind is ca|pable, concerning whose justness we ought to be so doubtful, concerning whose indul|gence

we ought so carefully to consult our natural sense of propriety, or so diligently to consider what will be the sentiments of the cool, and impartial spectator. Mag|nanimity, or a regard to maintain our own rank and dignity in society, is the only motive which can ennoble the expres|sions of this disagreeable passion. This motive must characterize our whole stile and deportment. These must be plain, open, and direct; determined without posi|tiveness, and elevated without insolence; not only free from petulance and low scurrility, but generous, candid, and full of all proper regards, even for the person who has offended us. It must ap|pear, in short, from our whole manner, without our labouring affectedly to express it, that passion has not extinguished our humanity; and that if we yield to the dictates of revenge, it is with reluctance, from necessity, and in consequence of great and repeated provocations. When resent|ment is guarded and qualified in this manner, it may be admitted to be even generous and noble.

CHAP. IV. Of the social passions.

AS it is a divided sympathy which renders this whole set of passions, upon most occasions, so ungraceful and disagreeable; so there is another set op|posite to these, which a redoubled sym|pathy renders almost always peculiarly agreeable and becoming. Generosity, hu|manity, kindness, compassion, mutual friendship and esteem, all the social and benevolent affections, when expressed in the countenance or behaviour, even to|wards those who are peculiarly connected with ourselves, please the indifferent spec|tator upon almost every occasion. His sympathy with the person who feels those passions, exactly coincides with his concern for the person who is the object of them. The interest, which, as a man, he is obliged to take in the happiness of this last, enlivens his fellow-feeling with the sentiments of the other, whose emotions are employed about the same object. We have always, therefore, the strongest dis|position

to sympathise with the benevolent affections. They appear in every respect agreeable to us. We enter into the sa|tisfaction both of the person who feels them, and of the person who is the ob|ject of them. For as to be the object of hatred and indignation gives more pain than all the evil which a brave man can fear from his enemies; so there is a satisfaction in the consciousness of be|ing beloved, which, to a person of deli|cacy and sensibility, is of more import|ance to happiness than all the advantage which he can expect to derive from it. What character is so detestable as that of one who takes pleasure to sow dis|sention among friends, and to turn their most tender love into mortal hatred? Yet wherein does the atrocity of this so much ••bhorred injury consist? Is it in de|priving them of the frivolous good offi|••es, which, had their friendship continued, ••hey might have expected from one ano|ther? It is in depriving them of that friend|••hip itself, in robbing them of each others ••ffections, from which both derived so much ••atisfaction; it is in disturbing the har|mony of their hearts, and putting an end

to that happy commerce which had before subsisted between them. These affections, that harmony, this commerce, are felt, not only by the tender and the delicate, but by the rudest vulgar of mankind, to be of more importance to happiness than all the little services which could be expected to flow from them.

The sentiment of love is, in itself, agree|able to the person who feels it, it sooths and composes the breast, seems to favour the vital motions, and to promote the healthful state of the human constitution; and it is rendered still more delightful by the consciousness of the gratitude and satisfaction which it must excite in him who is the object of it. Their mutual regard renders them happy in one ano|ther, and sympathy, with this mutual re|gard, makes them agreeable to every other person. With what pleasure do we look upon a family, through the whole of which reign mutual love and esteem in which the parents and children ar•• companions for one another, without an•• other difference than what is made by re|spectful affection on the one side, an•• kind indulgence on the other; whe••

freedom and fondness, mutual raillery, and mutual kindness, show that no op|position of interests divides the brothers, nor any rivalship of favour sets the sisters at variance, and where every thing pre|sents us with the idea of peace, chear|fulness, harmony, and contentment. On the contrary, how uneasy are we made when we go into a house in which jar|ring contention sets one half of those who dwell in it against the other; where amidst affected smoothness and complai|sance, suspicious looks and sudden starts of passion betray the mutual jealousies which burn within them, and which are every moment ready to burst out through all the restraints which the presence of the company imposes.

Those amiable passions, even when they are acknowledged to be excessive, are ne|ver regarded with aversion. There is something agreeable even in the weakness of friendship and humanity. The too tender mother, the too indulgent father, the too generous and affectionate friend, may sometimes, perhaps, on account of the softness of their natures, be looked upon with a species of pity, in which,

however, there is a mixture of love, but can never be regarded with hatred and aversion, nor even with contempt, unless by the most brutal and worthless of man|kind. It is always with concern, with sympathy and kindness, that we blame them for the extravagance of their attach|ment. There is a helplessness in the cha|racter of extreme humanity which more than any thing interests our pity. There is nothing in itself which renders it ei|ther ungraceful or disagreeable. We only regret that it is unfit for the world, be|cause the world is unworthy of it, and be|cause it must expose the person who is en|dowed with it as a prey to the perfidy and in|gratitude of insinuating falshood, and to a thousand pains and uneasinesses, which, of all men, he the least deserves to feel, and which generally too he is, of all men, the least capable of supporting. It is quite otherwise with hatred and resent|ment. Too violent a propensity to those detestable passions, renders a person the object of universal dread and abhorrence, who, like a wild beast, ought, we think, to be hunted out of all civil society.

CHAP. V. Of the selfish passions.

BESIDES those two opposite sets of passions, the social and unsocial, there is another which holds a sort of middle place between them; is never ei|ther so graceful as is sometimes the one set, nor is ever so odious as is sometimes the other. Grief and joy, when conceiv|ed upon account of our own private good or bad fortune, constitute this third set of passions. Even when excessive, they are never so disagreeable as excessive resent|ment, because no opposite sympathy can ever interest us against them: and when most suitable to their objects they are never so agreeable as impartial humanity and ••ust benevolence; because no double sym|pa•••••• can ever interest us for them. There ••s, however, this difference between grief and joy, that we are generally most dis|posed to sympathise with small joys and great sorrows. The man, who by some ••udden revolution of fortune is lifted up ••ll at once into a condition of life, greatly

above what he had formerly lived in, may be assured that the congratulations of his best friends are not all of them perfectly sincere. An upstart, though of the greatest merit, is generally disagreeable, and a sentiment of envy commonly pre|vents us from heartily sympathising with his joy. If he has any judgment he is sensible of this, and instead of appear|ing to be elated with his good fortune, he endeavours, as much as he can, to smother his joy, and keep down that elevation of mind with which his new circumstances naturally inspire him. He affects the same plainness of dress, and the same modesty of behaviour, which became him in his former station. He redoubles his attention to his old friends, and endea|vours more than ever to be humble, as|siduous, and complaisant. And this is the behaviour which in his situation we most approve of; because we expect, it seems, that he should have more sympa|thy with our envy and aversion to his happiness, than we have with his hap|piness. It is seldom that with all this he succeeds. We suspect the sincerity of his humility, and he grows weary of this

constraint. In a little time, therefore, he generally leaves all his old friends behind him, some of the meanest of them ex|cepted, who may, perhaps, condescend to become his dependents: nor does he al|ways acquire any new ones; the pride of his new connections is as much affront|ed at finding him their equal, as that of his old ones had been by his becoming their superior: and it requires the most obstinate and persevering modesty to at|tone for this mortification to either. He generally grows weary too soon, and is provoked by the sullen and suspicious pride of the one, and by the saucy contempt of the other, to treat the first with neglect, and the second with pet••lance, till at last he grows habitually insolent, and forfeits the esteem of all. If the chief part of human happiness arises from the consciousness of being beloved, as I believe it does, those sudden changes of fortune seldom contribute much to happi|ness. He is happiest who advances more gradually to greatness, whom the public destines to every step of his preferment long before he arrives at it, in whom, upon that account, when it comes, it

can excite no extravagant joy, and with regard to whom it cannot reasonably create either any jealousy in those he overtakes, or any envy in those he leaves behind.

Mankind, however, more readily sym|pathise with those smaller joys which flow from less important causes. It is decent to be humble amidst great pros|perity; but we can scarce express too much satisfaction in all the little occurrences of common life, in the company with which we spent the evening last night, in the entertainment that was set before us, in what was said and what was done, in all the little incidents of the present con|versation, and in all those frivolous nothings which fill up the void of human life. Nothing is more graceful than habitual chearfulness, which is always founded up|on a peculiar relish for all the little plea|sures which common occurrences afford. We readily sympathise with it: it inspires us with the same joy, and makes every trifle turn up to us in the same agreeable aspect in which it presents itself to the person endowed with this happy dispo|sition. Hence it is that youth, the sea|son

of gaiety, so easily engages our affec|tions. That propensity to joy which seems even to animate the bloom, and to sparkle from the eyes of youth and beauty, tho' in a person of the same sex, exalts, even the aged, to a more joyous mood than ordinary. They forget, for a time, their infirmities, and abandon themselves to those agreeable ideas and emotions to which they have long been strangers, but which, when the presence of so much happiness recalls them to their breast, take their place there, like old acquaint|ance, from whom they are sorry to have ever been parted, and whom they em|brace more heartily upon account of this long separation.

It is quite otherwise with grief. Small vexations excite no sympathy, but deep affliction calls forth the greatest. The man who is made uneasy by every little disagreeable incident, who is hurt if either the cook or the butler have failed in the least article of their duty, who feels every defect in the highest ceremonial of polite|ness, whether it be shewn to himself or to any other person, who takes it amiss that his intimate friend did not bid him

good-morrow when they met in the fore|noon, and that his brother hummed a tune all the time he himself was telling a story; who is put out of humour by the badness of the weather when in the country, by the badness of the roads when upon a journey, and by the want of company, and dullness of all public diversions when in town; such a person, I say, though he should have some reason, will seldom meet with much sympathy. Joy is a pleasant emotion, and we gladly abandon ourselves to it upon the slightest occasion. We readily, therefore, sympa|thise with it in others, whenever we are not prejudiced by envy. But grief is pain|ful, and the mind, even when it is our own misfortune, naturally resists and re|coils from it. We would endeavour ei|ther not to conceive it at all, or to shake it off as soon as we have conceived it. Our aversion to grief will not, indeed, always hinder us from conceiving it in our own case upon very trifling occasions, but it constantly prevents us from sympathising with it in others when excited by the like frivolous causes: for our sympathetic pas|sions are always less irresistible than our

original ones. There is, besides, a malice in mankind, which not only prevents all sympathy with little uneasinesses, but renders them in some measure diverting. Hence the delight which we all take in raillery, and in the small vexation which we observe in our companion, when he is pushed, and urged, and teased upon all sides. Men of the most ordinary good breeding dissemble the pain which any little in|cident may give them, and those who are more thoroughly formed to society, turn, of their own accord, all such inci|dents into raillery, as they know their com|panions will do for them. The habit which a man, who lives in the world, has acquired of considering how every thing that concerns himself will appear to others, makes those frivolous calamities turn up in the same ridiculous light to him, in which he knows they will cer|tainly be considered by them.

Our sympathy, on the contrary, with deep distress, is very strong and very sin|cere. It is unnecessary to give an in|stance. We weep even at the feigned representation of a tragedy. If you labour, therefore, under any signal calamity, if

by some extraordinary misfortune you are fallen into poverty, into diseases, into disgrace and disappointment; even though your own fault may have been, in part, the occasion, yet you may generally de|pend upon the sincerest sympathy of all your friends, and, as far as interest and honour will permit, upon their kindest assistance too. But if your misfortune is not of this dreadful kind, if you have only been a little baulked in your am|bition, if you have only been jilted by your mistress, or only hen-pecked by your wife, lay your account with the raillery of all your acquaintance.

SECTION IV. Of the effects of prosperity and adver|sity upon the judgment of mankind with regard to the propriety of action; and why it is more easy to obtain their approbation in the one state than in the other.

CHAP. I. That though our sympathy with sorrow is generally a more lively sensation than our sympathy with joy, it commonly falls much more short of the violence of what is felt by the person prin|cipally concerned.

OUR sympathy with sorrow, though not more real, has been more taken notice of than our sympathy with joy. The word sympathy, in its most proper and primitive signification, denotes our fellow-feeling with the sufferings, not that with the enjoyments, of others. A late ingenious and subtile philosopher thought it necessary to prove, by arguments, that

we had a real sympathy with joy, and that congratulation was a principle of human nature. No body, I believe, ever thought it necessary to prove that com|passion was such.

First of all, our sympathy with sor|row is, in some sense, more universal than that with joy. Though sorrow is exces|sive, we may still have some fellow-feel|ing with it. What we feel does not, in|deed, in this case, amount to that com|pleat sympathy, to that perfect harmony and correspondence of sentiments which con|stitutes approbation. We do not weep, and exclaim, and lament, with the suf|ferer. We are sensible, on the contrary, of his weakness and of the extravagance of his passion, and yet often feel a very sensible concern upon his account. But if we do not intirely enter into, and go along with, the joy of another, we have no sort of regard or fellow-feeling for it. The man who skips and dances about with that intemperate and senseless joy which we cannot accompany him in, is the object of our contempt and indig|nation.

Pain besides, whether of mind or body, is a more pungent sensation than plea|sure, and our sympathy with pain, though it falls greatly short of what is naturally felt by the sufferer, is generally a more lively and distinct perception than our sympathy with pleasure, though this last often approaches more nearly, as I shall show immediately, to the natural viva|city of the original passion.

Over and above all this, we often struggle to keep down our sympathy with the sor|row of others. Whenever we are not under the observation of the sufferer, we endeavour, for our own sake, to suppress it as much as we can, and we are not always successful. The opposition which we make to it, and the reluctance with which we yield to it, necessarily oblige us to take more particular notice of it. But we never have occasion to make this opposition to our sympathy with joy. If there is any envy in the case, we never feel the least propensity towards it; and if there is none, we give way to it without any reluctance. On the contrary, as we are always ashamed of our own envy, we often pretend, and sometimes really

wish to sympathise with the joy of others, when by that disagreeable sentiment we are disqualified from doing so. We are glad, we say, upon account of our neigh|bour's good fortune, when in our hearts, perhaps, we are really sorry. We often feel a sympathy with sorrow when we would wish to be rid of it; and we often miss that with joy when we would be glad to have it. The obvious observa|tion, therefore, which it naturally falls in our way to make, is that our pro|pensity to sympathise with sorrow must be very strong, and our inclination to sympathise with joy very weak.

Notwithstanding this prejudice, how|ever, I will venture to affirm, that, when there is no envy in the case, our propen|sity to sympathise with joy is much stronger than our propensity to sympathise with sorrow; and that our fellow-feeling for the agreeable emotion approaches much more nearly to the vivacity of what is naturally felt by the persons principally concerned, than that which we conceive for the painful one.

We have some indulgence for that ex|cessive grief which we cannot entirely go

along with. We know what a prodigious effort is requisite before the sufferer can bring down his emotions to compleat har|mony and concord with those of the spectator. Though he fails, therefore, we easily pardon him. But we have no such indulgence for the intemperance of joy; be|cause we are not conscious that any such vast effort is requisite to bring it down to what we can intirely enter into. The man who, under the greatest calamities, can command his sorrow, seems worthy of the highest admiration; but he who, in the fulness of prosperity, can in the same manner master his joy, seems hardly to de|serve any praise. We are sensible that there is a much wider interval in the one case than in the other, between what is naturally felt by the person principally con|cerned, and what the spectator can in|tirely go along with.

What can be added to the happiness of the man who is in health, who is out of debt, and has a clear conscience? To one in this situation, all accessions of fortune may properly be said to be super|fluous: and if he is much elevated upon account of them, it must be the effect of

the most frivolous levity. This situation, however, may very well be called the na|tural and ordinary state of mankind. Notwithstanding the present misery and depravity of the world, so justly lament|ed, this really is the state of the greater part of men. The greater part of men, therefore, cannot find any great difficulty in elevating themselves to all the joy which any accession to this situation can well ex|cite in their companion.

But though little can be added to this state, much may be taken from it. Tho' between this condition and the highest pitch of human prosperity, the interval is but a trifle; between it and the lowest depth of misery the distance is immense and pro|digious. Adversity, upon this account, ne|cessarily depresses the mind of the sufferer much more below its natural state, than prosperity can elevate him above it. The spectator, therefore, must find it much more difficult to sympathise entirely, and keep perfect time, with his sorrow, than thoroughly to enter into his joy, and must depart much further from his own na|tural and ordinary temper of mind in the one case than in the other. It is upon this account, that, though our sympathy

with sorrow is often a more pungent sen|sation than our sympathy with joy, it al|ways falls much more short of the violence of what is naturally felt by the person principally concerned.

It is agreeable to sympathise with joy; and wherever envy does not oppose it, our heart abandons itself with satisfaction to the highest transports of that delightful sentiment. But it is painful to go along with grief, and we always enter into it with reluctance. When we attend to the representation of a tragedy, we struggle against that sympathetic sorrow which the entertainment inspires as long as we can, and we give way to it at last only when we can no longer avoid it: we even then endea|vour to cover our concern from the com|pany. If we shed any tears, we carefully conceal them, and are afraid lest the specta|tors, not entering into this excessive ten|derness, should regard it as effeminacy and weakness. The wretch whose misfortunes call upon our compassion feels with what reluctance we are likely to enter into his sorrow, and therefore proposes his grief to us with fear and hesitation: he even smothers the half of it, and is ashamed,

upon account of this hard-heartedness of mankind, to give vent to the fulness of his affliction. It is otherwise with the man who riots in joy and success. Wherever envy does not interest us against him, he expects our compleatest sympathy. He does not fear, therefore, to enounce him|self with shouts of exultation, in full con|fidence that we are heartily disposed to go along with him.

Why should we be more ashamed to weep than to laugh before company? We may often have as real occasion to do the one as to do the other: but we always feel that the spectators are more likely to go along with us in the agreeable, than in the pain|ful emotion. It is always miserable to complain, even when we are oppressed by the most dreadful calamities. But the tri|umph of victory is not always ungraceful. Prudence, indeed, would often advise us to bear our prosperity with more moderation; because prudence would teach us to avoid that envy which this very triumph is, more than any thing, apt to excite.

How hearty are the acclamations of the mob, who never bear any envy to their superiors, at a triumph or a public entry?

And how sedate and moderate is commonly their grief at an execution? Our sorrow at a funeral generally amounts to no more than an affected gravity; but our mirth at a christening, or a marriage, is always from the heart, and without any affectation. Up|on these, and all such joyous occasions, our satisfaction, though not so durable, is often as lively as that of the persons principally concerned. Whenever we cordially con|gratulate our friends, which, however, to the disgrace of human nature, we do but seldom, their joy literally becomes our joy: we are, for the moment, as happy as they are: our heart swells and overflows with real pleasure: joy and complacency sparkle from our eyes, and animate every feature of our countenance, and every gesture of our body.

But, on the contrary, when we condole with our friends in their afflictions, how little do we feel, in comparison of what they feel? We sit down by them, we look at them, and while they relate to us the circumstances of their misfortune, we listen to them with gravity and attention. But while their narration is every moment in|terrupted by those natural bursts of passion

which often seem almost to choak them in the midst of it; how far are the languid emotions of our hearts from keeping time to the transports of theirs? We may be sensible, at the same time, that their passion is natural, and no greater than what we ourselves might feel upon the like occasion. We may even inwardly reproach ourselves with our own want of sensibility, and per|haps, upon that account, work ourselves up into an artificial sympathy, which, how|ever, when it is raised, is always the slight|est and most transitory imaginable; and generally, as soon as we have left the room, vanishes, and is gone forever. Nature, it seems, when she loaded us with our own sorrows, thought that they were enough, and therefore did not command us to take any further share in those of others, than what was necessary to prompt us to relieve them.

It is upon account of this dull sensibility to the afflictions of others, that magna|nimity amidst great distress appears always so divinely graceful. His behaviour is genteel and agreeable who can maintain his chearfulness amidst a number of frivo|lous disasters. But he appears to be more

than mortal who can support in the same manner the most dreadful calamities. We feel what an immense effort is requisite to silence those violent emotions which natu|rally agitate and distract those in his situa|tion. We are amazed to find that he can command himself so intirely. His firmness, at the same time, perfectly coincides with our insensibility. He makes no demand upon us for that more exquisite degree of sensibility which we find, and which we are mortified to find, that we do not pos|sess. There is the most perfect correspon|dence between his sentiments and ours, and upon that account the most perfect pro|priety in his behaviour. It is a propriety too, which, from our experience of the usual weakness of human nature, we could not reasonably have expected he should be able to maintain. We wonder with sur|prise and astonishment at that strength of mind which is capable of so noble and ge|nerous an effort. The sentiment of com|pleat sympathy and approbation, mixed and animated with wonder and surprise, con|stitutes what is properly called admiration, as has already been more than once taken notice of. Cato, surrounded on all sides

by his enemies, unable to resist them, dis|daining to submit to them, and reduced, by the proud maxims of that age, to the neces|sity of destroying himself; yet never shrink|ing from his misfortunes, never supplicating with the lamentable voice of wretchedness, those miserable sympathetic tears which we are always so unwilling to give; but on the contrary, arming himself with manly forti|tude, and the moment before he executes his fatal resolution, giving, with his usual tran|quillity, all necessary orders for the safety of his friends; appears to Seneca, that great preacher of insensibility, a spectacle which even the gods themselves might behold with pleasure and admiration.

Whenever we meet, in common life, with any examples of such heroic magna|nimity, we are always extremely affected. We are more apt to weep and shed tears for such as, in this manner, seem to feel no|thing for themselves, than for those who give way to all the weakness of sorrow: and in this particular case, the sympathe|tic grief of the spectator appears to go be|yond the original passion in the person principally concerned. The friends of So|crates all wept when he drank the last

potion, while he himself expressed the gaiest and most chearful tranquillity. Upon all such occasions the spectator makes no ef|fort, and has no occasion to make any, in order to conquer his sympathetic sorrow. He is under no fear that it will transport him to any thing that is extravagant and improper; he is rather pleased with the sen|sibility of his own heart, and gives way to it with complacence and self-approbation. He gladly indulges, therefore, the most melancholy views which can naturally oc|cur to him, concerning the calamity of his friend, for whom, perhaps, he never felt so exquisitely before, the tender and tear|ful passion of love. But it is quite other|wise with the person principally concerned. He is obliged, as much as possible, to turn away his eyes from whatever is either na|turally terrible or disagreeable in his situa|tion. Too serious an attention to those circumstances, he fears, might make so vi|olent an impression upon him, that he could no longer keep within the bounds of mode|ration, or render himself the object of the compleat sympathy and approbation of the spectators. He fixes his thoughts, there|fore, upon those only which are agreeable,

the applause and admiration which he is about to deserve by the heroic magnani|mity of his behaviour. To feel that he is capable of so noble and generous an effort, to feel that in this dreadful situation he can still act as he would desire to act, ani|mates and transports him with joy, and enables him to support that triumphant gaiety which seems to exult in the vic|tory that he thus gains over his misfor|tunes.

On the contrary, he always appears, in some measure, mean and despicable, who is sunk in sorrow and dejection upon ac|count of any calamity of his own. We cannot bring ourselves to feel for him what he feels for himself, and what, per|haps, we should feel for ourselves if in his situation: we, therefore, despise him; un|justly, perhaps, if any sentiment could be regarded as unjust, to which we are by na|ture irresistibly determined. The weakness of sorrow never appears in any respect agree|able, except when it arises from what we feel for others more than from what we feel for ourselves. A son, upon the death of an indulgent and respectable father, may give way to it without much blame. His sor|row

is chiefly founded upon a sort of sympa|thy with his departed parent; and we readily enter into this humane emotion. But if he should indulge the same weakness upon ac|count of any misfortune which affected him|self only, he would no longer meet with any such indulgence. If he should be reduced to beggary and ruin, if he should be expos|ed to the most dreadful dangers, if he should even be led out to a public execution, and there shed one single tear upon the scaffold, he would disgrace himself forever in the opi|nion of all the gallant and generous part of mankind. Their compassion for him, however, would be very strong, and very sincere; but as it would still fall short of this excessive weakness, they would have no pardon for the man who could thus ex|pose himself in the eyes of the world. His behaviour would affect them with shame rather than with sorrow; and the dishonour which he had thus brought upon himself would appear to them the most lamentable circumstance in his misfortune. How did it disgrace the memory of the intrepid Duke of Byron, who had so often braved death in the field, that he wept upon the scaf|fold, when he beheld the state to which he

was fallen, and remembered the favour and the glory from which his own rash|ness had so unfortunately thrown him.

CHAP. II. Of the origin of ambition, and of the distinction of ranks.

IT is because mankind are disposed to sympathise more entirely with our joy than with our sorrow, that we make parade of our riches, and conceal our poverty. Nothing is so mortifying as to be obliged to expose our distress to the view of the pub|lic, and to feel, that though our situation is open to the eyes of all mankind, no mor|tal conceives for us the half of what we suffer. Nay, it is chiefly from this regard to the sentiments of mankind, that we pur|sue riches and avoid poverty. For to what purpose is all the toil and bustle of this world? what is the end of avarice and am|bition, of the pursuit of wealth, of power, and preheminence? Is it to supply the ne|cessities of nature? The wages of the meanest labourer can supply them. We see that they afford him food and cloath|ing,

the comfort of a house, and of a fa|mily. If we examine his oeconomy with rigor, we shall find that he spends a great part of them upon conveniencies, which may be regarded as superfluities, and that, upon extraordinary occasions, he can give something even to vanity and distinction. What then is the cause of our aversion to his situation, and why should those who have been educated in the highest ranks of life, regard it as worse than death, to be reduced to live, even without labour, upon the same simple fare with him, to dwell under the same lowly roof, and to be cloath|ed in the same humble attire? Do they ima|gine that their stomach is better, or their sleep sounder in a palace than in a cottage? The contrary has been so often observed, and, indeed, is so very obvious, though it had never been observed, that there is no|body ignorant of it. From whence, then, arises that emulation which runs through all the different ranks of men, and what are the advantages which we propose by that great purpose of human life which we call bettering our condition? To be observ|ed, to be attended to, to be taken notice of with sympathy, complacency and ap|probation,

are all the advantages which we can propose to derive from it. It is the vanity, not the ease, or the pleasure, which interests us. But vanity is always founded upon the belief of our being the object of attention and approbation. The rich man glories in his riches, because he feels that they naturally draw upon him the attention of the world, and that mankind are dis|posed to go along with him in all those agreeable emotions with which the advan|tages of his situation so readily inspire him. At the thought of this, his heart seems to swell and dilate itself within him, and he is fonder of his wealth, upon this account, than for all the other advantages it procures him. The poor man, on the contrary, is ashamed of his poverty. He feels that it either places him out of the sight of man|kind, or, that if they take any notice of him, they have, however, scarce any fel|low-feeling with the misery and distress which he suffers. He is mortified upon both accounts; for though to be overlook|ed, and to be disapproved of, are things entirely different, yet as obscurity covers us from the daylight of honour and ap|probation, to feel that we are taken no

notice of, necessarily damps the most agree|able hope, and disappoints the most ardent desire, of human nature. The poor man goes out and comes in unheeded, and when in the midst of a croud is in the same obscuri|ty as if shut up in his own hovel. Those hum|ble cares and painful attentions which occu|py those in his situation, afford no amuse|ment to the dissipated and the gay. They turn away their eyes from him, or if the extremity of his distress forces them to look at him, it is only to spurn so disagreeable an object from among them. The fortu|nate and the proud wonder at the insolence of human wretchedness, that it should dare to present itself before them, and with the loathsome aspect of its misery, presume to disturb the serenity of their happiness. The man of rank and distinction, on the contrary, is observed by all the world. Every body is eager to look at him, and to conceive, at least by sympathy, that joy and exultation with which his circum|stances naturally inspire him. His actions are the objects of the public care. Scarce a word, scarce a gesture, can fall from him that is altogether neglected. In a great assembly he is the person upon whom all

direct their eyes; it is upon him that their passions seem all to wait with expectation, in order to receive that movement and di|rection which he shall impress upon them; and, if his behaviour is not altogether absurd, he has, every moment, an opportu|nity of interesting mankind, and of render|ing himself the object of the observation and fellow-feeling of every body about him. It is this, which, notwithstanding the re|straint it imposes, notwithstanding the loss of liberty with which it is attended, renders greatness the object of envy, and compen|sates, in the opinion of mankind, all that toil, all that anxiety, all those mortifica|tions which must be undergone in the pur|suit of it; and what is of yet more conse|quence, all that leisure, all that ease, all that careless security, which are forfeited forever by the acquisition.

When we consider the condition of the great, in those delusive colours in which the imagination is apt to paint it, it seems to be almost the abstract idea of a perfect and happy state. It is the very state which, in all our waking dreams and idle reveries, we had sketched out to ourselves as the final object of all our desires. We

feel, therefore, a peculiar sympathy with the satisfaction of these who are in it. We favour all their inclinations, and forward all their wishes. What pity, we think, that any thing should spoil and corrupt ••o agreeable a situation! We could even wish them immortal; and it seems hard to ••s, that death should at last put an end ••o such perfect enjoyment. It is cruel, we ••hink, in nature, to compel them from ••heir exalted stations, to that humble, but hospitable home, which she has provided for all her children. Great King, live for ever! is the compliment, which, after the manner of eastern adulation, we should ••eadily make them, if experience did not ••each us its absurdity. Every calamity ••hat befals them, every injury that is done ••hem, excites in the breast of the spectator ••en times more compassion and resentment ••han he would have felt, had the same ••hings happened to other men. It is the misfortunes of Kings only which afford ••he proper subjects for tragedy. They re|••emble, in this respect, the misfortunes of ••overs. Those two situations are the chief which interest us upon the theatre; be|cause, in spite of all that reason and expe|rience

can tell us to the contrary, the pre|judices of the imagination attach to these two states a happiness superior to any other. To disturb, or to put an end to such per|fect enjoyment, seems to be the most atro|cious of all injuries. The traitor who conspires against the life of his monarch, is thought a greater monster than any other murderer. All the innocent blood that was shed in the civil wars, provoked less indignation than the death of Charles I. A stranger to human nature, who saw the indifference of men about the misery of their inferiors, and the regret and in|dignation which they feel for the misfor|tunes and sufferings of those above them, would be apt to imagine, that pain must be more agonizing, and the convulsions of death more terrible to persons of high rank, than to those of meaner stations.

Upon this disposition of mankind, to go along with all the passions of the rich and the powerful, is founded the distinction of ranks, and the order of society. Our obsequiousness to our superiors more fre|quently arises from our admiration for the advantages of their situation, than from

any private expectations of benefits from their good-will. Their benefits can extend but to a few; but their fortunes interest almost every body. We are eager to assist them in compleating a system of happiness that approaches so near to perfection; and we desire to serve them for their own sake, without any other recompence but the va|nity or the honour of obliging them. Nei|ther is our deference to their inclinations founded chiefly, or altogether, upon a re|gard to the utility of such submission, and to the order of society, which is best sup|ported by it. Even when the order of society seems to require that we should op|pose them, we can hardly bring ourselves to do it. That kings are the servants of the people, to be obeyed, resisted, deposed, or punished, as the public conveniency may require, is the doctrine of reason and philosophy; but it is not the doctrine of nature. Nature would teach us to sub|mit to them, for their own sake, to tremble and bow down before their exalted station, to regard their smile as a reward sufficient to compensate any services, and to dread their displeasure, though no other evil was to follow from it, as the severest of all

mortifications. To treat them in any re|spect as men, to reason and dispute with them upon ordinary occasions, requires such resolution, that there are few men whose magnanimity can support them in it, unless they are likewise assisted by fa|miliarity and acquaintance. The strongest motives, the most furious passions, fear, hatred and resentment, are scarce sufficient to balance this natural disposition to re|spect them: and their conduct must, ei|ther justly or unjustly, have excited the highest degree of all those passions, before the bulk of the people can be brought to oppose them with violence, or to desire to see them either punished or deposed. Even when the people have been brought this length, they are apt to relent every mo|ment, and easily relapse into their habi|tual state of deference to those whom they have been accustomed to look upon as their natural superiors. They cannot stand the mortification of their monarch. Com|passion soon takes the place of resentment, they forget all past provocations, their old principles of loyalty revive, and they ru•• to re-establish the ruined authority of thei•• old masters, with the same violence wit••

which they had opposed it. The death of Charles I. brought about the Restoration of the royal family. Compassion for James II. when he was seized by the populace in mak|ing his escape on ship-board, had almost prevented the revolution, and made it go on more heavily than before.

Do the great seem insensible of the easy price at which they may acquire the pub|lic admiration; or do they seem to imagine that to them, as to other men, it must be the purchase either of sweat or of blood? By what important accomplishments is the young nobleman instructed to support the dignity of his rank, and to render him|self worthy of that superiority over his fel|low citizens, to which the virtue of his ancestors had raised them? Is it by know|ledge, by industry, by patience, by self-denial, or by virtue of any kind? As all his words, as all his motions are attended ••o, he learns an habitual regard to every circumstance of ordinary behaviour, and studies to perform all those small duties with the most exact propriety. As he is conscious how much he is observed, and how much mankind are disposed to favour all his inclinations, he acts, upon the most

indifferent occasions, with that freedom and elevation which the thought of this natu|rally inspires. His air, his manner, his de|portment, all mark that elegant and grace|ful sense of his own superiority, which those who are born to inferior stations can hard|ly ever arrive at: these are the arts by which he proposes to make mankind more easily submit to his authority, and to go|vern their inclinations according to his own pleasure: and in this he is seldom disap|pointed. These arts, supported by rank and preheminence, are, upon ordinary oc|casions, sufficient to govern the world. Lewis XIV. during the greater part of his reign, was regarded, not only in France, but over all Europe, as the most perfect model of a great prince. But what were the talents and virtues by which he ac|quired this great reputation? Was it by the scrupulous and inflexible justice of all his undertakings, by the immense dangers and difficulties with which they were at|tended, or by the unwearied and unre|lenting application with which he pursued them? Was it by his extensive knowledge, by his exquisite judgment, or by his he|roic valour? It was by none of these qua|lities.

But he was, first of all, the most powerful prince in Europe, and consequent|ly held the highest rank among kings; and then, says his historian,

he surpassed all his courtiers in the gracefulness of his shape, and the majestic beauty of his features. The sound of his voice, noble and affecting, gained those hearts which his presence intimidated. He had a step and a deportment which could suit only him and his rank, and which would have been ridiculous in any other person. The embarassment which he occasioned to those who spoke to him, flattered that secret satisfaction with which he felt his own superiority. The old officer, who was confounded and faultered in asking him a favour, and not being able to conclude his discourse, said to him: Sir, your ma|jesty, I hope, will believe that I do not tremble thus before your enemies: had no difficulty to obtain what he demand|ed.

These frivolous accomplishments, supported by his rank, and, no doubt too, by a degree of other talents and virtues, which seems, however, not to have been much a|bove mediocrity, established this prince in the esteem of his own age, and have drawn,

even from posterity, a good deal of re|spect for his memory. Compared with these, in his own times, and in his own presence, no other virtue, it seems, ap|peared to have any merit. Knowledge, industry, valour and beneficence, trembled, were abashed, and lost all dignity before them.

But it is not by accomplishments of this kind, that the man of inferior rank must hope to distinguish himself. Politeness is so much the virtue of the great, that it will do little honour to any body but themselves. The coxcomb, who imitates their manner, and affects to be eminent by the superior propriety of his ordinary behaviour, is re|warded with a double share of contempt for his folly and presumption. Why should the man, whom nobody thinks it worth while to look at, be very anxious about the manner in which he holds up his head, or disposes of his arms while he walks through a room? He is occupied surely with a very superfluous attention, and with an attention too that marks a sense of his own importance, which no other mortal can go along with. The most per|fect modesty and plainness, joined to as

much negligence as is consistent with the respect due to the company, ought to be the chief characteristics of the behaviour of a private man. If ever he hopes to dis|tinguish himself, it must be by more im|portant virtues. He must acquire depen|dants to balance the dependants of the great, and he has no other fund to pay them from, but the labour of his body, and the activity of his mind. He must cultivate these therefore: he must acquire superior knowledge in his profession, and superior industry in the exercise of it. He must be patient in labour, resolute in dan|ger, and firm in distress. These talents he must bring into publick view, by the difficulty, importance, and, at the same time, good judgment of his undertakings, and by the severe and unrelenting applica|tion with which he pursues them. Pro|bity and prudence, generosity and frank|ness, must characterise his behaviour upon all ordinary occasions; and he must, at the same time, be forward to engage in all those situations, in which it requires the greatest talents and virtues to act with propriety, but in which the greatest ap|plause is to be acquired by those who can

acquit themselves with honour. With what impatience does the man of spirit and ambition, who is depressed by his situ|ation, look round for some great opportu|nity to distinguish himself? No circum|stances, which can afford this, appear to him undesireable. He even looks forward with satisfaction to the prospect of foreign war, or civil dissension; and, with secret transport and delight, sees through all the confusion and bloodshed which attend them, the probability of those wished for occa|sions presenting themselves, in which he may draw upon himself the attention and admiration of mankind. The man of rank and distinction, on the contrary, whose whole glory consists in the propriety of his ordinary behaviour, who is contented with the humble renown which this can afford him, and has no talents to acquire any other, is unwilling to embarass himself with what can be attended either with dif|ficulty or distress. To figure at a ball is his great triumph, and to succeed in an intrigue of gallantry, his highest exploit. He has an aversion to all publick confu|sions, not from the love of mankind, for the great never look upon their inferiors

as their fellow-creatures; nor yet from want of courage, for in that he is seldom defective; but from a consciousness that he possesses none of the virtues which are re|quired in such situations, and that the pub|lick attention will certainly be drawn away from him by others. He may be willing to expose himself to some little danger, and to make a campaign when it happens to be the fashion. But he shudders with horror at the thought of any situation which demands the continual and long exertion of patience, industry, forti|tude, and application of thought. These virtues are hardly ever to be met with in men who are born to those high stations. In all governments accordingly, even in monarchies, the highest offices are gene|rally possessed, and the whole detail of the administration conducted by men who were educated in the middle and inferior ranks of life, who have been carried forward by their own industry and abilities, tho' ••oaded with the jealousy, and opposed by the resentment of all those who were born their superiors, and to whom the great, after having regarded them first with con|tempt, and afterwards with envy, are at

last contented to truckle with the same ab|ject meanness with which they desire that the rest of mankind should behave to themselves.

It is the loss of this easy empire over the affections of mankind which renders the fall from greatness so insupportable. When the family of the King of Macedon was led in triumph by Paulus Aemilius, their misfortunes, it is said, made them divide with their conqueror the attention of the Roman people. The sight of the royal children, whose tender age rendered them insensible of their situation, struck the spec|tators, amidst the public rejoicings and prosperity, with the tenderest sorrow and compassion. The King appeared next in the procession; and seemed like one con|founded and astonished, and bereft of all sentiment, by the greatness of his cala|mities. His friends and ministers follow|ed after him. As they moved along, they often cast their eyes upon their fallen sove|reign, and always burst into tears at the sight; their whole behaviour demonstrat|ing that they thought not of their own misfortunes, but were occupied intirely by the superior greatness of his. The gene|rous

Romans, on the contrary, beheld him with disdain and indignation, and regard|ed as unworthy of all compassion the man who could be so mean-spirited as to bear to live under such calamities. Yet what did those calamities amount to? Accord|ing to the greater part of historians, he was to spend the remainder of his days, under the protection of a powerful and humane people, in a state which in itself should seem worthy of envy, a state of plenty, ease, leisure, and security, from which it was impossible for him even by his own folly to fall. But he was no longer to be surrounded by that admiring mob of fools, flatterers, and dependants, who had formerly been accustomed to at|tend upon all his motions. He was no longer to be gazed upon by multitudes, nor to have it in his power to render him|self the object of their respect, their grati|tude, their love, their admiration, The passions of nations were no longer to mould themselves upon his inclinations. This was that insupportable calamity which bereaved the King of all sentiment; which made his friends forget their own misfortunes; and which the Roman mag|nanimity

could scarce conceive how any man could be so mean-spirited as to bear to survive.

Love, says my Lord Rochefaucault, is commonly succeeded by ambition; but ambition is hardly ever succeeded by love.

That passion, when once it has got intire possession of the breast, will ad|mit neither a rival nor a successor. To those who have been accustomed to the possession, or even to the hope of public admiration, all other pleasures sicken and decay. Of all the discarded statesmen who for their own ease have studied to get the better of ambition, and to despise those honours which they could no longer arrive at, how few have been able to succeed▪ The greater part have spent their time in the most listless and insipid indolence, cha|grined at the thoughts of their own insig|nificancy, incapable of being interested in the occupations of private life, without en|joyment except when they talked of their former greatness, and without satisfaction except when they were employed in some vain project to recover it. Are you in earnest resolved never to barter your liber|ty for the lordly servitude of a Court, but

to live free, fearless, and independant? There seems to be one way to continue in that virtuous resolution; and perhaps but one. Never enter the place from whence so few have been able to return; never come within the circle of ambition; nor ever bring yourself into comparison with those masters of the earth who have alrea|dy engrossed the attention of half mankind before you.

Of such mighty importance does it ap|pear to be, in the imaginations of men, to stand in that situation which sets them most in the view of general sympathy and atten|tion. And thus, place, that great object which divides the wives of aldermen, is the end of half the labours of human life; and is the cause of all the tumult and bustle, all the rapine and injustice, which avarice and ambition have introduced into this world. People of sense, it is said, in|deed despise place; that is, they despise sitting at the head of the table, and are in|different who it is that is pointed out to the company by that frivolous circum|stance, which the smallest advantage is ca|pable of overbalancing. But rank, distinc|tion, preeminence, no man despises, unless

he is either raised very much above, or sunk very much below, the ordinary stan|dard of human nature; unless he is either so confirmed in wisdom and real philo|sophy, as to be satisfied that, while the propriety of his conduct renders him the just object of approbation, it is of little consequence tho' he be neither attended to, nor approved of; or so habituated to the idea of his own meanness, so sunk in sloth|ful and sottish indifference, as intirely to have forgot the desire, and almost the very wish, for superiority.

CHAP. III. Of the stoical philosophy.

WHEN we examine in this manner into the ground of the different degrees of estimation which mankind are apt to bestow upon the different condi|tions of life, we shall find, that the exces|sive preference, which they generally give to some of them above others, is in a great measure without any foundation. If to be able to act with propriety, and to render ourselves the proper objects of the appro|bation

of mankind, be, as we have been endeavouring to show, what chiefly re|commends to us one condition above ano|ther, this may be equally attained in them all. The noblest propriety of conduct may be supported in adversity, as well as in prosperity; and tho' it is somewhat more difficult in the first, it is upon that very account more admirable. Perils and misfortunes are not only the proper school of heroism, they are the only proper the|atre which can exhibit its virtue to advan|tage, and draw upon it the full applause of the world. The man, whose whole life has been one even and uninterrupted course of prosperity, who never braved any dan|ger, who never encountered any difficulty, who never surmounted any distress, can excite but an inferior degree of admira|tion. When poets and romance-writers endeavour to invent a train of adventures, which shall give the greatest lustre to those characters for whom they mean to interest ••s, they are all of a different kind. They ••re rapid and sudden changes of fortune, ••ituations the most apt to drive those who ••re in them to frenzy and distraction, or ••o abject despair; but in which their he|roes

act with so much propriety, or at least with so much spirit and undaunted reso|lution, as still to command our esteem. Is not the unfortunate magnanimity of Cato, Brutus, and Leonidas, as much the object of admiration, as that of the successful Caesar or Alexander? To a generous mind, therefore, ought it not to be as much the object of envy? If a more dazzling splen|dor seems to attend the fortunes of suc|cessful conquerors, it is because they join together the advantages of both situations, the lustre of prosperity to the high admi|ration which is excited by dangers en|countered, and difficulties surmounted, with intrepidity and valour.

It was upon this account that, accord|ing to the stoical philosophy, to a wise man all the different conditions of life were equal. Nature, they said, had re|commended some objects to our choice, and others to our disapprobation. Our primary appetites directed us to the pur|suit of health, strength, ease, and perfec|tion, in all the qualities of mind and body▪ and of whatever could promote or secure these, riches, power, authority: and the same original principle taught us to avoid

the contrary. But in chusing or rejecting, in preferring or postponing, those first objects of original appetite and aversion, nature had likewise taught us, that there was a certain order, propriety, and grace, to be observed, of infinitely greater conse|quence to happiness and perfection, than the attainment of those objects themselves. The objects of our primary appetites or aversions were to be pursued or avoided, chiefly because a regard to this grace and propriety required such conduct. In di|recting all our actions according to these, consisted the happiness and glory of hu|man nature. In departing from those rules which they prescribed to us, its great|est wretchedness and most compleat de|pravity. The outward appearance of this order and propriety was indeed more ea|sily maintained in some circumstances than in others. To a fool, however, to one whose passions were subjected to no proper controul, to act with real grace and pro|priety, was equally impossible in every situ|ation. Tho' the giddy multitude might admire him, tho' his vanity might some|times be elated by their ignorant praises into something that resembled self-appro|bation,

yet still when he turned his view to what passed within his own breast, he was secretly conscious to himself of the absurd|ity and meanness of all his motives, and inwardly blushed and trembled at the thoughts of the contempt which he knew he deserved, and which mankind would certainly bestow upon him if they saw his conduct in the light in which in his own heart he was obliged to regard it. To a wise man, on the contrary, to one whose passions were all brought under perfect subjection to the ruling principles of his nature, to reason and the love of propri|ety, to act so as to deserve approbation was equally easy upon all occasions. Was he in prosperity, he returned thanks to Ju|piter for having joined him with circum|stances which were easily mastered, and in which there was little temptation to do wrong. Was he in adversity, he equally returned thanks to the director of this spectacle of human life, for having oppo|sed to him a vigorous athlete, over whom, tho' the contest was likely to be more vio|lent, the victory was more glorious, and equally certain. Can there be any shame in that distress which is brought upon us

without any fault of our own, and in which we behave with perfect propriety? There can, therefore, be no evil, but, on the contrary, the greatest good and ad|vantage. A brave man exults in those dangers, in which, from no rashness of his own, his fortune has involved him. They afford an opportunity of exercising that heroic intrepidity, whose exertion gives the exalted delight which flows from the consciousness of superior propriety and deserved admiration. One who is master of all his exercises has no aversion to mea|sure his strength and activity with the strongest. And in the same manner, one who is master of all his passions, does not dread any circumstance in which the su|perintendent of the universe may think proper to place him. The bounty of that divine being has provided him with vir|••ues which render him superior to every ••ituation. If it is pleasure, he has temper|ance to refrain from it; if it is pain, he has constancy to bear it; if it is danger or death, he has magnanimity and fortitude ••o despise it. He never complains of the destiny of providence, nor thinks the uni|verse in confusion when he is out of order.

He does not look upon himself, according to what self-love would suggest, as a whole, separated and detached from every other part of nature, to be taken care of by it|self, and for itself. He regards himself in the light in which he imagines the great Genius of human nature, and of the world regards him. He enters, if I may say so, into the sentiments of that Divine Being, and considers himself as an atom, a particle, of an immense and infinite system, which must, and ought to be disposed of, according to the conveniency of the whole. Assured of the wisdom which directs all the events of human life, whatever lot be|falls him, he accepts it with joy, satisfied that, if he had known all the connexions and dependencies of the different parts of the universe, it is the very lot which he himself would have wished for. If it is life, he is contented to live: and if it is death, as nature must have no further oc|casion for his presence here, he willingly goes where he is appointed. I accept, said a stoical philosopher, with equal joy and satisfaction, whatever fortune can befal me. Riches or poverty, pleasure or pain, health or sickness, all is alike: nor would I

desire that the Gods should in any respect change my destination. If I was to ask of them any thing, beyond what their bounty has already bestowed, it would be that they would inform me beforehand what it was their pleasure should be done with me, that I might of my own accord place myself in this situation, and demonstrate the chear|fulness with which I embraced their allot|ment. If I am going to sail, says Epicte|tus, I chuse the best ship, and the best pi|lot, and I wait for the fairest weather that my circumstances and duty will allow. Prudence and propriety, the principles which the Gods have given me for the di|rection of my conduct, require this of me; but they require no more: and if, not|withstanding, a storm arises, which neither the strength of the vessel, nor the skill of the pilot are likely to withstand, I give myself no trouble about the consequence. All that I had to do, is done already, The directors of my conduct never command me to be miserable, to be anxious, despond|ing, or afraid. Whether we are to be drowned, or to come to a harbour, is the business of Jupiter, not mine. I leave it intirely to his determination, nor ever

break my rest with considering which way he is likely to decide it, but receive what|ever comes with equal indifference and se|curity.

Such was the philosophy of the stoics. A philosophy which affords the noblest lessons of magnanimity, is the best school of heroes and patriots, and to the greater part of whose precepts there can be no other objection, except that honourable one, that they teach us to aim at a per|fection altogether beyond the reach of hu|man nature. I shall not at present stop to examine it. I shall only observe, in con|firmation of what has formerly been said, that the most dreadful calamities are not always those which it is most difficult to support. It is often more mortifying to appear in publick, under small disasters, than under great misfortunes. The first excite no sympathy; but the second, tho' they may excite none that approaches to the anguish of the sufferer, call forth, however, a very lively compassion. The sentiments of the spectators are, in this last case, therefore, less wide of those of the sufferer, and their imperfect fel|low-feeling

lends him some assistance in supporting his misery. Before a gay assembly, a gentleman would be more mortified to appear covered with filth and rags than with blood and wounds. This last situation would interest their pity; the other would provoke their laughter. The judge who orders a criminal to be set in the pillory, dishonours him more than if he had condemned him to the scaffold. The great prince, who, some years ago, caned a general officer at the head of his army, disgraced him irrecoverably. The punishment would have been much less had he shot him through the body. By the laws of honour, to strike with a cane dishonours, to strike with a sword does not, for an obvious reason. Those slighter punishments, when inflicted on a gentle|man, to whom dishonour is the greatest of all evils, come to be regarded among a hu|mane and generous people, as the most dreadful of any. With regard to persons of that rank, therefore, they are univer|••ally laid aside, and the law, while it takes ••heir life upon many occasions, respects ••heir honour upon almost all. To scourge

a person of quality, or to set him in the pillory, upon account of any crime what|ever, is a brutality of which no European government, except that of Russia, is ca|pable.

A brave man is not rendered contemp|tible by being brought to the scaffold; he is, by being set in the pillory. His beha|viour in the one situation may gain him universal esteem and admiration. No be|haviour in the other can render him agree|able. The sympathy of the spectators sup|ports him in the one case, and saves him from that shame, that consciousness that his misery is felt by himself only, which is of all sentiments the most unsupportable. There is no sympathy in the other; or, if There is any, it is not with his pain, which is a trifle, but with his consciousness of the want of sympathy with which this pain is attended. It is with his shame, not with his sorrow. Those who pity him, blush and hang down their heads for him. He droops in the same manner, and feels himself irrecoverably degraded by the pu|nishment, though not by the crime. The man, on the contrary, who dies with re|solution,

as he is naturally regarded with erect aspect of esteem and approbation, so he wears himself the same undaunted countenance; and, if the crime does not deprive him of the respect of others, the punishment never will. He has no suspi|cion that his situation is the object of con|tempt or derision to any body, and he can, with propriety, assume the air, not only of perfect serenity, but of triumph and exultation.

Great dangers, says the cardinal de Retz, have their charms, because there is some glory to be got, even when we miscarry. But moderate dangers have nothing but what is horrible, because the loss of reputation always attends the want of success.

His maxim has the same foundation with what we have been observing just now, with regard to punish|ments.

Human virtue is superior to pain, to poverty, to danger, and to death; nor does it even require its remotest efforts to despise them. But to have its misery ex|posed to insult and derision, to be led in triumph, to be set up for the hand of scorn

to point at, is a situation in which its con|stancy is much more apt to fail. Com|pared with the contempt of mankind, all other evils are easily supported.