love occafions. The author who fhould introduce two lovers, in a fcene of perfect fecurity, expreffing their mutual fondness for one another, would excite laughter, and not fympathy. If a scene of this kind is ever admitted into a tragedy, it is always, in fome measure, improper, and is endured, not from any sympathy with the paffion that is expreffed in it, but from concern for the dangers and difficulties with which the audience foresee that its gratification is likely to be attended.

The reserve which the laws of society impose upon the fair fex, with regard to this weakness, renders it more peculiarly distressful in them, and, upon that very account, more deeply interefting. We are charmed with the love of Phædra, as it is expreffed in the French tragedy of that name, notwithstanding all the extravagance and guilt which attend it. That very extravagance and guilt may be faid, in fome measure, to recommend it to us. Her fear, her shame, her remorse, her horror, her defpair, become thereby more natural and interesting. All the fecondary paffions, if I may be allowed to call them fo, which arife from the fituation of love, become neceffarily more furious and violent and it is with these secondary paffions only that we can properly be said to fympathize.

Of all the paffions, however, which are fo extravagantly difproportioned to the value of their objects, love is the only one that appears, even to the weakest minds, to have E

any

any thing in it that is either graceful or agreeable. In itself, firft of all, though it may be ridiculous, it is not naturally odious; and though its confequences are often fatal and dreadful, its intentions are seldom mifchievous. And then, though there is little propriety in the paffion itself, there is a good deal in fome of those which always accompany it. There is in love a strong mixture of humanity, generofity, kindness, friendship, esteem; paffions with which, of all others, for reafons which shall be explained immediately, we have the greatest propenfity to fympathize, even notwithstanding we are sensible that they are, in some measure, exceffive. The fympathy which we feel with them, renders the paffion which they accompany lefs difagreeable, and fupports it in our imagination, notwithstanding all the vices which commonly go along with it; though in the one fex it neceffarily leads to the last ruin and infamy; and though in the other, where it is apprehended to be leaft fatal, it is almost always attended with an incapacity for labour, a neglect of duty, a contempt of fame, and even of common reputation. Notwithstanding all this, the degree of fenfibility and generofity with which it is fuppofed 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 reafon of the fame kind, that a certain referve is neceffary when we talk of our own friends, our own ftudies, our own profeffions.

profeffions. All thefe are objects which we cannot expect fhould intereft our companions in the fame degree in which they intereft us. And it is for want of this referve, that the one half of mankind make bad company to the other. A philofopher is company to a philofopher only; the member of a club, to his own little knot of companions.

T

CHA P. III.

Of the unfocial paffions.

HERE is another set of paffions, which though derived from the imagination, 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 undisciplined nature would raise them. These are hatred and refentment, with all their different modifications. With regard to all fuch paffions, our fympathy is divided between the perfon who feels them and the person who is the object of them. The interefts of these two are directly oppofite. What our fympathy with the perfon 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 fuffer, damps our resentment for what the other has fuffered. Our fympathy, E 2 therefore,

therefore, with the man who has received the provocation, neceffarily falls fhort of the paffion which naturally animates him, not only upon account of thofe general caufes which render all fympathic paffions inferior to the original ones, but upon account of that particular caufe which is peculiar to itself, our oppofite fympathy with another perfon. Before refentment, therefore, can become graceful and agreeable, it must be more humbled and brought down below that pitch to which it would naturally rife, than almost any other paffion.

Mankind, at the fame time, have a very ftrong fenfe of the injuries that are done to another. The villain, in a tragedy or romance, is as much the object of our indignation, as the hero is that of our fympathy and affection. We deteft Iago as much as we esteem Othello; and delight as much in the punishment of the one, as we are grieved at the diftrefs of the other. But though mankind have fo ftrong a fellow-feeling with the injuries that are done to their brethren, they do not always refent them the more that the fufferer appears to refent them. Upon most occafions, the greater his patience, his mildnefs, his humanity, provided it does not appear that he wants fpirit, or that fear was the motive of his forbearance, the higher the refentment against the person who injured him. The amiableness of the character exafperates their fenfe of the atrocity of the injury.

These

Thefe paffions, however, are regarded as neceffary parts of the character of human nature. A perfon becomes contemptible who tamely fits ftill, and fubmits to infults, without attempting either to repel or to revenge them. We cannot enter into his indifference and infenfibility: we call his behaviour meanfpiritedness, and are as really provoked by it, as by the infolence of his adverfary. Even the mob are enraged to fee any man fubmit patiently to affronts and ill ufage. They defire to see this infolence refented, and resented by the person who fuffers from it. They cry to him with fury, to defend, or to revenge himfelf. If his indignation roufes at last, they heartily applaud, and fympathife with it. It enlivens their own indignation against his enemy, whom they rejoice to fee him attack in turn, and are as really gratified by his revenge, provided it is not immoderate, as if the injury had been done to themselves.

But though the utility of those paffions to the individual, by rendering it dangerous to infult or injure him, be acknowledged; and though their utility to the publick, as the guardians of juftice, and of the equality of its administration, be not lefs confiderable, as fhall be fhewn hereafter; yet there is ftill fomething difagreeable in the paffions themfelves, which makes the appearance of them in other men the natural object of our averfion. The expreffion of anger towards any body present, if it exceeds a bare intimation that we are fenfible of his ill usage, is regarded

E 3