the first mention of this, that it were impoffible to account for it otherwife than from an innate principle of malice, which teacheth us to extract delight to ourselves from the fufferings of others, and as it were to enjoy their calamities. A very little reflection, however, would fuffice for correcting this error; nay, without any reflection, we may truly fay, that the common fenfe of mankind prevents them effectually from falling into it. Bad as we are, and prone as we are, to be hurried into the worft of paffions by felf-love, partiality, and pride; malice is a difpofition, which, either in the abstract, or as it difcovers itfelf in the actions of an indifferent perfon, we never contemplate without feeling a juft deteftation and abhorrence, being ready to pronounce it the ugliest of objects. Yet this fentiment is not more univerfal, than is the approbation and even love that we beftow on the tender-hearted, or those who are, most exquifitely fufceptible of all the influence of the pathetic. Nor are there any two difpofitions of which human. nature is capable, that have ever been confidered as farther removed from each other, than the malicious and the compaffionate are. The fact itself, that the mind derives pleafure from reprefentations of anguish, is undeniable; the question about the

caufe

cause is curious, and hath a manifeft relation to my fubject.

I PURPOSED indeed, at firft, to difcufs this point in that part of the fixth chapter which relates to the means of operating on the paffions, with which the prefent inquiry is intimately connected. Finding afterwards that the difcuffion would prove rather too long an interruption, and that the other points which came naturally to be treated in that place, could be explained with fufficient clearness, independently of this, I judged it better to referve this queftion for a feparate chapter. Various hypotheses have been devised by the ingenious, in order to folve the difficulty. These I shall first briefly examine, and then lay before the reader what appears to me to be the true folution. Of all that have entered into the fubject, those who seem moft to merit our regard, are two French critics, and one of our own country.

SECTION I.

The different folutions hitherto given by philosophers,

examined.

PART I. The first hypothefis.

ABBÉ du Bos begins his excellent Reflections on Poetry and Painting, with that very question which is the subject of this chapter, and in an

wer to it fupports at fome length* a theory, the fubftance of which I fhall endeavour to comprise in a few words. Few things, according to him, are more difagreeable to the mind, than that liftleffness into which it falls, when it has nothing to occupy it, or to awake the paffions. In order to get rid of this most painful fituation, it feeks with avidity every amusement and purfuit; bufinefs, gaming, news, fhows, public executions, romances; in short, whatever will rouse the paffions, and take off the mind's attention from itself. It matters not what the emotion be, only the ftronger it is, fo much the better. And for this reafon, those paffions which, confidered in themselves, are the most afflicting and difagreeable, are preferable to the pleasant, inasmuch

Reflexions critiques fur la Poefie et fur la Peinture, Sect. i. ii. iii.

as

as they most effectually relieve the foul from that oppreffive languor which preys upon it in a state of inactivity. They afford it ample occupation, and by giving play to its latent movements and fprings of action, convey a pleasure which more than counterbalances the pain.

I ADMIT, with Mr. Hume*, that there is fome weight in these observations, which may fufficiently account for the pleasure taken in gaming, hunting, and feveral other diverfions and sports. But they are not quite fatisfactory, as they do not affign a fufficient reafon why poets, painters, and orators, exercife themfelves more in actuating the painful paffions, than in exciting the pleasant. Thefe, one would think, ought in every refpect to have the advantage, because, at the fame time that they preferve the mind from a state of inaction, they convey a feeling that is allowed to be agreeable. And though it were granted, that paffions of the former kind are ftronger than those of the latter (which doth not hold invariably, there being perhaps more examples of perfons who have been killed with joy, than of those who have died of grief), ftrength alone will not account for the Effay on Tragedy.

pre

preference. It by no means holds here, that the ftronger the emotion is, fo much the fitter for this purpose. On the contrary, if you exceed but ever fo little a certain measure, inftead of that sympathetic delightful forrow, which makes affliction itself wear a lovely afpect, and engages the mind to hug it, not only with tenderness, but with transport, you only excite horror and averfion. "It is certain," fays the author, last quoted, very juftly "that the fame object of "diftrefs which pleafes in a tragedy, were it "really fet before us, would give the moft un

feigned uneafinefs, though it be then the moft "effectual cure of languor and indolence." And it is more than barely poffible, even in the reprefentations of the tragedian, or in the defcriptions of the orator or the poet, to exceed that measure. I acknowledge, indeed, that this meafure or degree is not the fame to every temper. Some are much fooner fhocked with mournful reprefentations than others. Our mental, like our bodily appetites and capacities, are exceedingly various. It is, however, the bufinefs of both the speaker and the writer, to accommodate himself to what may be ftyled the common ftandard; for there is a common ftandard in

Effay on Tragedy.

what