The Greatness Of Mind

Sympathy

I will illustrate this general system of morals by: applying it to particular instances of virtue and vice, and showing how their merit or demerit arises from the four sources here explained. We shall begin with examining pride and humility. We shall consider the vice or virtue in their excesses or just proportion. An excessive pride or overweening conceit of ourselves is: always esteemed vicious, and universally hated. Modesty, or a just sense of our weakness: is esteemed virtuous, and procures the goodwill of everyone. Of the four sources of moral distinctions, this is to be ascribed to the third or to the immediate agreeableness and disagreeableness of a quality to others, without any reflections on the tendency of that quality.

To prove this, we must have recourse to two principles very conspicuous in human nature.

The first is the sympathy and communication of sentiments and passions.
    So close and intimate is the correspondence of human souls, that any person who approaches me immediately:
        diffuses on me all his opinions, and
        draws along my judgment.
    My sympathy with him often does not go so far as to entirely change my sentiments and way of thinking.
        Yet it is seldom so weak as to not:
            disturb my thought, and
            give an authority to his opinion.
        The subject he and I thinks about does not matter.
        Whether we judge of an indifferent person or of my own character, my sympathy gives equal force to his decision.
        Even his sentiments of his own merit make me consider him in the same light he regards himself in.

This principle of sympathy has so powerful and insinuating a nature.
    It enters into most of our sentiments and passions.
    It often takes place under the appearance of its contrary.
It is remarkable that I always have sympathy with a person who:
    opposes me in anything I am strongly bent on, and
    rouses my passion by contradiction.
My commotion does not proceed from any other origin.
Here is an evident conflict of opposite principles and passions.
    On the one side, is that passion or sentiment natural to me.
        The stronger the passion, the greater the commotion.
    There must also be some passion or sentiment on the other side.
        This passion can only proceed from sympathy.
The sentiments of others can only affect us by becoming our own.
    In this case, they operate on us by opposing and increasing our passions in the same way as if they had been originally derived from our own temper and disposition.
    While they remain concealed in the minds of others, they can never influence us.
    The imagination is so accustomed to different objects.
        Even when the ideas of others are known, they would never be able to affect us alone, if they went no further than the imagination.

The second principle is comparison.
    It is the variation of our judgments on objects, according to their proportion to other objects.
    We judge more of objects by comparison, than by their intrinsic worth and value.
    We regard everything as mean, when they oppose what is superior.

The most obvious comparison is that with ourselves.
    It always takes place and mixes with most of our passions.
    This kind of comparison is directly contrary to sympathy in its operation, as we have observed in compassion and malice.
In all kinds of comparison, an object always makes us receive a sensation from another object it is compared to.
    This sensation is contrary to what arises from itself, in its direct and immediate survey.
    The direct survey of another's pleasure naturally gives us pleasure.
        It produces pain when compared with our own pain.
    His pain is painful.
        But it augments the idea of our own happiness and gives us pleasure. (Book 2, Part 2, Sec 8)

Those principles of sympathy, and a comparison with ourselves, are directly contrary.
    What general rules can be formed for the prevalence of the one or the other?
Suppose I am now safe on land and I want to get some pleasure from my situation.
    I must:
        think of the miserable condition of those at sea in a storm, and
        must render this idea as strong and lively as possible to make me more sensible of my own happiness.
The effect of this will be much less than if I:
    were really on the shore, 26 and
    saw a ship at a distance:
        tossed by a storm, and
        in danger of crashing on a rock.
But suppose this idea became more lively.
    Suppose the ship was driven so near me, that I can distinctly:
        perceive the horror of the seamen and passengers,
        hear their lamentable cries, and
        see their dearest friends:
            give their last goodbye, or
            embrace, resolving to perish in each others arms.
    No one has so savage a heart to:
        reap any pleasure from this, and
        withstand the motions of the tenderest compassion and sympathy.
    It is evident that there is a medium in this case.
    If the idea is too faint, it has no influence by comparison.
        On the other hand, if it is too strong, it operates on us entirely by sympathy, which is the contrary to comparison.
Sympathy is the conversion of an idea into an impression.
    It demands a greater force and vivacity in the idea than is requisite to comparison.

Footnote 26:

"From dry land, there is something pleasant in watching the great difficulties of another man in going out to the high seas, with the winds lashing the waters.
    This is not because one derives delight from any man's distress.
    It is because it is pleasurable to perceive what troubles oneself is free of."