Page:Treatise of Human Nature (1888).djvu/403

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
381
A TREATISE OF HUMAN NATURE.

SECTION IX.

Of the mixture of benevolence and anger with compassion and malice.

Thus we have endeavour'd to account for pity and malice. Both these affections arise from the imagination, according to the light, in which it places its object. When our fancy considers directly the sentiments of others, and enters deep into them, it makes us sensible of all the passions it surveys, but in a particular manner of grief or sorrow. On the contrary, when we compare the sentiments of others to our own, we feel a sensation directly opposite to the original one, ms. a joy from the grief of others, and a grief from their joy. But these are only the first foundations of the affections of pity and malice. Other passions are afterwards confounded with them. There is always a mixture of love or tendemess with pity, and of hatred or anger with malice. But it must be confess'd, that this mixture seems at first sight to be contradictory to my system. For as pity is an uneasiness, and malice a joy, arising from the misery of others, pity shou'd naturally, as in all other cases, produce hatred; and malice, love. This contradiction I endeavour to reconcile, after the following manner.

In order to cause a transition of passions, there is requir'd a double relation of impressions and ideas, nor is one relation suffcient to produce this effect. But that we may understand the full force of this double relation, we must consider, that 'tis not the present sensation alone or momentary pain or pleasure, which determines the character of any passion, but the whole bent or tendency of it from the beginning to the end. One impression may be related to another, not only when their sensations are resembling, as we have all along suppos'd in the preceding cases; but also when their impulses or directions are similar and correspondent. This cannot take place with regard to pride and