tor, prepares him for the reception of other tender affections; and pity is readily improved into love or friendship, by a certain tenderness and concern for the object, which is the tone of both paffions. The aptitude of pity to produce love is beautifully illuftrated by Shakespear: Othello. Her father lov'd me, oft invited me; I ran it through, e'en from my boyish days, Of hair-breadth 'fcapes in th' imminent deadly breach; And fold to flavery; of my redemption thence, All these to hear Would Defdemona feriously incline; But ftill the houfe-affairs would draw her thence, Whereof by parcels the had fomething heard, She She swore, in faith, 'twas ftrange, 'twas paffing strange 'Twas pitiful, 'twas wondrous pitiful – She wifh'd fhe had not heard it :-yet fhe wifh'd, That Heav'n had made her fuch a man:-she thank'd me, I should but teach him how to tell my story, And I lov'd her, that fhe did pity them : Hudud Othello, at 1.fc. 8. In this inftance it will be obferved that admiration concurred with pity to produce love. SECT. SV. Caufes of the paffions of fear and anger. Ear and anger, to answer the purposes of na FE ture, are happily fo contrived as to operate either inftinctively or deliberately. So far as they prompt actions as means to a certain end, they fall in with the general fyftem, and require no particular explanation: if any object have a threatening appearance, reafon fuggefts means to avoid the danger: if a man be injured, the first thing he thinks of, is what revenge he fhall take, and what means he fhall employ. These parti culars culars are not lefs obvious than natural. But as the paffions of fear and anger in their inftinctive ftate, are lefs familiar to us, it may be accept❤ able to the reader to have them accurately delineated. He may alfo poffibly relish the opportu nity of this fpecimen, to have the nature of in ftinctive paffions more fully explained than there was formerly occafion to do. I begin with fear. Self-prefervation is to us a matter of too great importance to be left entirely under the guardian thip of felf-love, which cannot be put in exercise otherwife than by the intervention of reafon and reflection. Nature hath acted here with her usual precaution and forefight. Fear and anger are paffions common to all men; and by operating inftinctively, they frequently afford fecurity when the flower operations of deliberative reafon would be too late we take nourishment commonly, not by the direction of reason, but by the impulfe of hunger and thirst; and in the fame manner, we avoid danger by the impulse of fear, which often, before there is time for reflection, placeth us in fafety. This matter then is ordered with confummate wifdom; for it is not within the reach of fancy, to conceive any thing better fitted to answer its purpose than this inftinctive paffion of fear, which, upon the first furmife of danger, operates inftantaneously without reflection. So little doth the paffion, in such instances, depend on reafon, that even in contradiction to reafon, it often operates when we are confcious confcious there is no hazard: a man who is not upon his guard, cannot avoid fhrinking at a blow, though he knows it to be aimed in sport ; nor clofing his eyes at the approach of what may hurt them, though confcious that he is in no danger. And it alfo operates by impelling us to act even where we are conscious that our interpofition can be of no fervice if a paffage-boat by a brifk galé lies much to one fide, I cannot avoid applying the whole force of my fhoulders to fet it upright; and if my horfe ftumble, my hands and knees are inftantly at work to prevent him from falling. Influenced by the fame inftinctive paffion of fear, infants are much affected with a stern look, a menacing tone, or other expreffion of anger; though, being incapable of reflection, they can not have any diftinct notion of the import of these figns. This is all that is neceffary to be faid here upon the natural connection between fear and the external figns of anger, which connection will be handled more particularly in the chapter of the external figns of emotions and paffions.: Fear provides for felf-prefervation by flying from harm; anger, by repelling it. Nothing indeed can be better contrived to repel or prevent injury, than anger or refentment; deftitute of this paflion, men, like defenceless lambs, would lie conftantly open to mifchief*. Deliberate *Brafidas being furprised by the bite of a mouse he had catched, let it flip out of his fingers. "No creature (fays he) is berate anger caused by a voluntary injury, is too well known to require any explanation: if my defire be in general to resent an affront, I must use means, and these means must be discovered by reflection: deliberation is here requifite; and in this, which is the ordinary cafe, the paffion feldom exceeds juft bounds. But where anger fuddenly inflames one to return á blow, even without thinking of doing mifchief, the paffion is instinctive; and it is chiefly in fuch cafes that it is rash and ungovernable, because it operates blindly, without affording time for deliberation or forefight. Instinctive anger is frequently raised by bodily pain, which, when fudden and exceffive, as by a stroke on a tender part, ruffling the temper, and unhinging the mind, is in its tone fimilar to anger. Bodily pain by this means difpofes to anger, which is as fuddenly raised, provided an object be found to vent it upon. Anger commonly is not provoked otherwife than by a voluntary injury : but when a man is thus beforehand disposed to anger, he is not nice nor fcrupulous about an object; the person who gave the stroke, however accidentally, is by an inflamable temper held a proper object, merely by having occafioned the pain. It is ftill more remarkable, that a stock or a stone by which I am hurt, becomes "fo contemptible, but what may provide for its own fafety, if it "have courage to defend itself.” Plutarch. Apothegmata. an |