II.

thing in his body. What he fuffers is from the im- SECT. agination only, which reprefents to him the lofs of his dignity, neglect from his friends, contempt from his enemies, dependance, want, and misery, coming faft upon him; and we sympathize with him more ftrongly upon this account, because our imaginations can more readily mould themfelves upon his imagination, than our bodies can mould themfelves upon his body.

The lofs of a leg may generally be regarded as a more real calamity than the lofs of a miftrefs. It would be a ridiculous tragedy, however, of which the catastrophe was to turn upon a lofs of that kind. A misfortune of the other kind, how frivolous foever it may appear to be, has given occafion to many a fine one.

The mo

Nothing is fo foon forgot as pain. ment it is gone the whole agony of it is over, and the thought of it can no longer give us any fort of disturbance. We ourselves cannot then enter into the anxiety and anguish which we had before conceived. An unguarded word from a friend will occafion a more durable uneafinefs. The agony which this creates is by no means over with the word. What at firft dif turbs us is not the object of the fenfes, but the idea of the imagination. As it is an idea, therefore, which occafions our uneafinefs, till time and other accidents have in fome measure effaced it from our memory, the imagination continues to fret and rankle within, from the thought of it.

PART

I.

Pain never calls forth any very lively fympathy unless it is accompanied with danger. We fympathize with the fear, though not with the agony of the fufferer. Fear, however, is a paf fion derived altogether from the imagination,' which reprefents, with an uncertainty and fluctuation that increafes our anxiety, not what we really feel, but what we may hereafter poffibly fuffer. The gout or the tooth-ach, though exquifitely painful, excite very little sympathy; more dangerous diseases, though accompanied with very little pain, excite the highest.

Some people faint and grow fick at the fight of a chirurgical operation, and that bodily pain which is occafioned by tearing the flesh, feems, in them, to excite the most exceffive fympathy. We conceive in a much more lively and diftinct manner the pain which proceeds from an external caufe, than we do that which arifes from an internal diforder. I can fcarce form an idea of the agonies of my neighbour when he is tortured with the gout, or the ftone; but I have the cleareft conception of what he must suffer from an incifion, a wound, or a fracture. The chief caufe, however, why fuch objects produce fuch violent effects upon us, is their novelty. One who has been witness to a dozen diffections, and as many amputations, fees, ever after, all operations of this kind with great indifference, and often with perfect infenfibility. Though we have read or feen reprefented more than five hundred tragedies, we shall feldom feel fo entire

an

an abatement of our fenfibility to the objects SEC T. which they reprefent to us.

In fome of the Greek tragedies there is an attempt to excite compaffion, by the reprefen tation of the agonies of bodily pain. Philoctetes cries out and faints from the extremity of his fufferings. Hippolytus and Hercules are both introduced as expiring under the feverest tortures, which, it feems, even the fortitude of Hercules was incapable of fupporting. In all thefe cafes, however, it is not the pain which interefts us, but fome other circumftance. It is not the fore foot, but the folitude, of Philoctetes which affects us, and diffufes over that charming tragedy, that romantic wildnefs, which is fo agreeable to the imagination. The agonies of Hercules and Hippolytus are interefting only because we forefee that death is to be the confequence. If thofe heroes were to recover, we fhould think the reprefentation of their sufferings perfectly ridiculous. What a tragedy would

that be of which the diftrefs confifted in a colic! Yet no pain is more exquifite. Thefe attempts to excite compaffion by the reprefenta·tion of bodily pain, may be regarded as among the greatest breaches of decorum of which the Greek theatre has fet the example.

The little fympathy which we feel with bodily pain, is the foundation of the propriety of conftancy and patience in enduring it. The man, who under the fevereft tortures allows no weakness to escape him, vents no groan, gives way to no paffion which we do not entirely

enter

II.

I.

PART enter into, commands our higheft admiration. His firmness enables him to keep time with our indifference and infenfibility. We admire and entirely go along with the magnanimous effort which he makes for this purpose. We approve of his behaviour, and from our experience of the common weakness of human nature, we are furprised, and wonder how he should be able to act fo as to deferve approbation. Approbation, mixed and animated by wonder and furprife, conftitutes the fentiment which is properly called admiration, of which, applause is the natural expreffion, as has already been obferved.

CHAP. II.

Of thofe Paffions which take their origin from a particular turn or habit of the Imagination.

EVEN of the paffions derived from the im

agination, those which take their origin from a peculiar turn or habit it has acquired, though they may be acknowledged to be perfectly natural, are, however, but little fympathized with. The imaginations of mankind, not having acquired that particular turn, cannot enter into them; and fuch paffions, though they may be allowed to be almost unavoidable in fome part of life, are always, in fome measure, ridiculous. This is the cafe with that ftrong attachment

3

II.

tachment which naturally grows up between two s EC T. perfons of different fexes, who have long fixed their thoughts upon one another. Our imagination not having run in the fame channel with that of the lover, we cannot enter into the eagernefs of his emotions. If our friend has been injured, we readily fympathize with his resentment, and grow angry with the very perfon with whom he is angry. If he has received a benefit, 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 paffion juft as reasonable as any of the kind, yet we never think ourselves bound to conceive a paffion of the fame kind, and for the fame perfon for whom he has conceived it. The paffion appears to every body, but the man who feels it, entirely difproportioned 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 ferious and strong expreffions of it appear ridiculous to a third perfon; and though a lover may be good company to his miftrefs, he is fo to nobody else. He himself is fenfible of this; and as long as he continues in his fober fenfes, endeavours to treat his own paffion with raillery and ridicule. It is the only ftyle in which we care to hear of it; because it is the only style in which we ourselves are difpofed to talk of it. We grow weary of the grave, pedantic, and longfentenced love of Cowley and Petrarca, who never have done with exaggerating the violence

of