reafon, will feldom meet with much fympathy. Joy is a pleasant emotion, and we gladly abandon ourselves to it upon the flighteft occafion. We readily, therefore, fympathize with it in others, whenever we are not prejudiced by envy. But grief is painful, and the mind, even when it is our own misfortune, naturally refifts and recoils from it. We would endeavour either not to conceive it at all, or to fhake it off as foon as we have conceived it. Our averfion to grief will not, indeed, always hinder us from conceiving it in our own cafe upcn very trifling occafions, but it conftantly prevents us from fympathizing with it in others when excited by the like frivolous caufes: for our fympathetic paffions are always lefs irrefiftible than our original ones. There is, befides, a malice in mankind, which not only prevents all fympathy with little uneafineffes, but renders them in some measure diverting. Hence the delight which we all take in raillery, and in the fmall vexation which we observe in our companion, when he is pushed, and urged, and teafed upon all fides. Men of the moft ordinary good- breeding diffemble the pain which any little incident may give them; and those who are more thoroughly formed to fociety, turn, of their own accord, all fuch incidents into raillery, as they know their companions will do for them. The habit which a man, who lives in the world, has acquired of confidering how every thing that concerns himself will appear to others, makes thofe frivolous calamities turn up in the

fame

fame ridiculous light to him, in which he knows they will certainly be confidered by them.

Our fympathy, on the contrary, with deep distress, is very strong and very fincere. It is unneeessary to give an instance. We weep even at the feigned representation of a tragedy. If you ~ labor, therefore, under any fignal calamity, if by fome extraordinary misfortune you are fallen into poverty, into diseases, into disgrace and difappointment; even though your own fault may have been, in part, the occafion, yet you may generally depend upon the fincerest sympathy of all your friends, and, as far as intereft and honor 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 ambition, if you have only been jilted by your mistress, or are only hen-pecked by your wife, lay your account with the raillery of all your ac quaintance.

SECTION III.

Of the effects of Profperity and Adverfity 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 fympathy with forrow is generally a more lively fenfation than our fympathy with joy, it commonly falls much more fhort of the violence of what is naturally felt by the perfon principally

concerned.

OUR fympathy with forrow, though not more

real, has been more taken notice of than our sympathy with joy. The word fympathy, in its most proper and primitive fignification, denotes our fellow-feeling with the fufferings, not that with the enjoyments, of others. A late ingenious and fubtile philofopher, thought it neceffary to prove, by arguments, that we had a real fympathy with joy, and that congratulation was a principle of human nature. Nobody, I believe, ever thought it neceffary to prove that compassion was fuch.

First of all, our fympathy with forrow is, in fome sense, more univerfal than that with joy.

Though forrow is exceffive, we may ftill have fome fellow-feeling with it. What we feel does not, indeed, in this cafe, amount to that complete fympathy, to that perfect harmony and correfpondence of fentiments which conftitutes approbation. We do not weep, and exclaim, and lament with the sufferer. We are fenfible, on the contrary, of his weakness and of the extravagance of his paffion, and yet often feel a very fenfible concern upon his account. But if we do not entirely enter into, and go along with, the joy of another, we have no fort of regard or fellow-feeling for it. The man who skips and dances about with that intemperate and fenfeless joy which we cannot accompany him in, is the object of our contempt and indignation.

Pain befides, whether of mind or body, is a more pungent fenfation than pleasure, and our fympathy with pain, though it falls greatly fhort of what is naturally felt by the sufferer, is generally a more lively and diftinct perception than our fympathy with pleasure, though this laft often approaches more nearly, as I fhall fhow immediately, to the natural vivacity of the original paffion.

Over and above all this, we often ftruggle to keep down our sympathy with the forrow of others, Whenever we are not under the obfervation of the fufferer, we endeavour, for our own fake, to fuppress it as we can, and we are not always fuccessful. The oppofition which we make to it, and the reluctance with which we yield to it neceffarily oblige us to take more particular notice of it. But we never

have occasion to make this oppofition to our sympathy with joy. If there is any envy in the case, we never feel the leaft propenfity towards it; and if there is none, we give way to it without any reluctance. On the contrary, as we are always afhamed of our own envy, we often pretend, and fometimes really wish to sympathize with the joy of others, when by that difagreeable fentiment we are difqualified from doing fo. We are glad, we say, on account of our neighbour's good fortune, when in our hearts, perhaps, we are really forry. We often feel a fympathy with forrow 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 observation, therefore, which it naturally falls in our way to make, is, that our propensity to fympathize with forrow must be very strong, and our inclination to fympathize with joy very weak.

Notwithstanding this prejudice, however, I will venture to affirm, that, when there is no envy in the cafe, our propensity to sympathize with joy is much stronger than our propensity to fympathize with forrow; 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 fome indulgence for that exceffive grief which we cannot entirely go along with. We know what a prodigious effort is requifite before the fufferer can bring down his emotions to complete harmony and concord with thofe of the fpectator.