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If external properties be agreeable, we have reafon to I expect the fame from those which are internal; and accordingly power, difcernment, wit, mildnefs, fympathy, courage, benevolence, are agreeable in a high degree: upon perceiving these qualities in others, we inftantaneoufly feel pleafant emotions, without the flightest act of reflection, or of attention to confequences. It is almoft unneceffary to add, that certain qualities oppofite to the former, fuch as dulnefs, peevifhnefs, inhumanity, cowardice, occafion in the fame manner painful emotions.

Senfible beings affect us remarkably by their actions. Some actions raife pleafant emotions in the fpectator, without the leaft reflection; fuch as graceful motion, and genteel behaviour. But as intention, a capital circumftance in human actions, is not visible, it requires reflcction to discover their true character: I fee one delivering a purse of money to another, but I can make nothing of that action, till I learn with what intention the money is given; if it be given to discharge a debt, the action pleases me in a flight degree; if it be a grateful return, I feel a ftronger emotion; and the pleasant emotion rifes to a greater height, when it is the intention of the giver to relieve a virtuous family from want. are qualified by intention: but they are not qualified by the event; for an action well intended gives pleasure, whatever the event be. Further, human actions are perceived to be right or wrong; and that perception qualifies the pleasure or pain that refults from them.*

Thus actions

Emotions

In tracing our emotions and paffions to their origin, my firft thought was, that qualities and actions are the primary caufes of emotions; and that thefe emotions are afterward expanded upon the being to which these qualities and actions belong. But I am now convinced that this opinion is erroneous. An attribute is not, even in imagination, feparable from the being to which it belongs; and, for that reafon, cannot of itself be the caufe of any emotion. We have, it is true, no knowledge of any being or fubliance but by means of its attributes; and therefore no being can be agreeable to us otherwife than by their means. But fill, when an emotion is raifed, it is the being itself, as we apprehend the matter, that raises the emotion; and it raifes it by means of one or other of its attributes. If it be urged, That we can in idea abstract a quality

Emotions are raifed in us, not only by the qualities and actions of others, but alfo by their feelings: I cannot behold a man in distress, without partaking of his pain; nor in joy, without partaking of his pleasure.

The beings or things above defcribed occafion emo. tions in us, not only in the original furvey, but also when recalled to the memory in idea: a field laid out with tafte, is pleasant in the recollection, as well as when under our eye a generous action defcribed in words or colours, occafions a fenfible emotion, as well as when we fee it perfomed; and when we reflect upon the diftress of any perfon, our pain is of the fame kind with what we felt when eye-witneffes. In a word, an agreeable or difagreeable object recalled to the mind in idea, is the occafion of a pleasant or painful emotion, of the fame kind with that produced when the object was prefent the only difference is, that an idea being fainter than an original perception, the pleasure or pain produced by the former, is proportionably fainter than that produced by the latter.

Having explained the nature of an emotion, and mentioned feveral caufes by which it is produced, we proceed to an obfervation of confiderable importance in the fcience of human nature; which is, That defire follows fome emotions, and not others. The emotion rais ed by a beautiful garden, a magnificent building, or a number of fine faces in a crowded affembly, is feldom accompanied

a quality from the thing to which it belongs; it might be answered, That fuch abtraction may serve the purposes of reafoning, but is too faint to produce any fort of emotion. But it is fufficient for the prefent purpose to answer, That the eye never abftracts: by that organ we perceive things as they really exift, and never perceive a quality as feparated from the fubject. Hence it must be evident, that emotions are raised, not by qualities abftra&tly confidered, but by the fubftance or body fo and fo qualified. Thus, a fpreading oak raifes a pleasant emotion, by means of its colour, figure, umbrage, &c. it is not the colour, ftrictly speaking, that produces the emotion, but the tree coloured: it is not the figure abilractly confidered that produces the emotion, but the tree of a certain figure. And hence, by the way, it appears, that the beauty of fuch an object is complex, refolvable into feveral beauties more fimple,

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accompanied with defire. Other emotions are accompanied with defire; emotions, for example, raised by human actions and qualities: a virtuous action raiseth in every spectator a pleafant emotion, which is commonly attended with defire to reward the author of the action a vicious action, on the contrary, produceth a painful emotion, attended with defire to punish the delinquent. Even things inanimate often raise emotions accompanied with defire: witnefs the goods of fortune, I which are objects of defire almost universally; and the defire, when immoderate, obtains the name of avarice. The pleasant emotion produced in a fpectator by a capital picture in the poffeffion of a prince, is feldom accompanied with defire; but if fuch a picture be exposed to fale, defire of having or poffeffing is the natural confequence of a strong emotion.

It is a truth verified by induction, that every paffion is accompanied with defire; and if an emotion be fometimes accompanied with defire, fometimes not, it comes to be a material inquiry, in what refpect a paffion differs from an emotion. Is paffion in its nature or feeling diftinguishable from emotion? I have been apt to think that there must be such a distinction; but, after the strictest examination, I cannot perceive any: what is love, for example, but a pleasant emotion raifed by a fight or idea of the beloved female, joined with defire of enjoyment? in what else confifts the paffion of refentment, but in a painful emotion occafioned by the injury, accompanied with defire to chaftife the guilty perfon? In general, as to paffion of every kind, we find no more in its compofition, but the particulars now mentioned, an emotion pleafant or painful, accompanied with defire. What then fhall we fay? are paffion and emotion fynonymous terms? That cannot be averred; becaufe no feeling nor agita tion of the mind void of defire, is termed a paffion; and we have discovered, that there are many emotions which pafs away without raifing defire of any kind. How is VOL. İ.

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the difficulty to be folved? There appears to me but one folution, which I relifh the more, as it renders the doctrine of the paffions and emotions fimple and perfpicuous. The folution follows. An internal motion or agitation of the mind, when it paffeth away without defire, is denominated an emotion: when defire follows, the motion or agitation is denominated a paffion. A fine face, for example, raiseth in me a pleafant feeling: if that feeling vanifh without producing any effect, it is in proper language an emotion; but if the feeling, by reiterated views of the object, become fufficiently strong to occafion defire, it lofes its name of emotion, and acquires that of paffion. The fame holds in all the other paffions: the painful feeling raised in a spectator by a flight injury done to a ftranger, being accompanied with no defire of revenge, is termed an emotion; but that injury raiseth in the ftranger a ftronger emotion, which being accompanied with defire of revenge, is a paffion : external expreffions of diftrefs produce in the spectator a painful feeling, which being fometimes fo flight as to pafs away without any effect, is an emotion; but if the feeling be fo ftrong as to prompt defire of affording relief, it is a paffion, and is termed pity: envy is emulation in excefs; if the exaltation of a competitor be barely difagreeable, the painful feeling is an emotion; if it produce defire to deprefs him, it is a paffion.

To prevent mistakes, it must be obferved, that defire here is taken in its proper fenfe, namely, that internal act, which, by influencing the will, makes us proceed to action. Defire in a lax fenfe refpects alfo actions and events that depend not on us, as when I defire that my friend may have a fon to reprefent him, or that my country may flourish in arts and fciences: but fuch internal act is more properly termed a wifh than a defire.

Having distinguished paffion from emotion, we proceed to confider paffion more at large, with respect efpecially to its power of producing action.

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We have daily and conftant experience for our authority, that no man ever proceeds to action but by e means of an antecedent defire or impulfe. So well eftablished is this obfervation, and fo deeply rooted in the mind, that we can fcarce imagine a different system of action even a child will fay familiarly, What should make me do this or that, when I have no defire to do it? Taking it then for granted, that the existence of action depends on antecedent defire; it follows, that where there is no defire, there can be no action. This opens another fhining distinction between emotions and paffions. The former, being without defire, are in their nature quiefcent: the defire included in the latter, prompts one to act in order to fulfil that desire, or, in other words, to gratify the paffion.

The cause of a paffion is fufficiently explained above: it is that being or thing, which, by raifing defire, converts an emotion into a paffion. When we confider a paffion with refpect to its power of prompting action, that fame being or thing is termed its object: a fine woman, for example, raises the paffion of love, which is directed to her as its object: a man, by injuring me, raises my refentment, and becomes thereby the object of my refentment. Thus the cause of a paffion, and its object, are the fame in different refpects. An emotion, on the other hand, being in its nature quiefcent, and 'merely a paffive feeling, muft have a caufe; but cannot be faid, properly fpeaking, to have an object.

The objects of our paffions may be diftinguished into two kinds, general and particular. A man, a house, a garden, is a particular object: fame, esteem, opulence, honour, are general objects, because each of them comprehends many particulars. The paffions directed to general objects are commonly termed appetites, in contradiftinction to paffions directed to particular objects, which retain their proper name: thus we fay an appetite for fame, for glory, for conqueft, for

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riches;

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