pain itself, if I may fay fo, more painful, is that it is confidered as an emiffary of this king of terrours. When danger or pain prefs too nearly, they are incapable of giving any delight, and are fimply terrible; but at certain distances, and with certain modifications, they may be, and they are delightful, as we every day experience. The cause of this I fhall endeavour to investigate hereafter.

SECT. VIII.

OF THE PASSIONS WHICH BELONG TO SOCIETY.

THE other head under which I clafs our paffions, is that of fociety, which may be divided into two forts. 1. The fociety of the fexes, which answers the purpose of propagation; and next, that more general fociety, which we have with men and with other animals, and which we may in fome fort be faid to have even with the inanimate world. The paffions belonging to the prefervation of the individual, turn wholly on pain and danger: thofe which belong to generation, have their origin in gratifications and pleasures; the pleasure moft directly belonging to this purpofe is of a lively character, rapturous and violent, and confeffedly the highest pleasure of fenfe; yet the abfence of this fo great an enjoyment, scarce amounts to an uneafinefs; and, except at particular times, I do not think it affects at all. When men describe in what

manner

manner they are affected by pain and danger, they do not dwell on the pleasure of health and the comfort of fecurity, and then lament the lofs of thefe fatisfactions: the whole turns upon the actual pains and horrours which they endure. But if you liften to the complaints of a forfaken lover, you obferve that he infifts largely on the pleasures which he enjoyed or hoped to enjoy, and on the perfection of the object of his defires; it is the lofs which is always uppermoft in his mind. The violent effects produced by love, which has fometimes been even wrought up to madness, is no objection to the rule which we seek to establish. When men have suffered their imaginations to be long affected with any idea, it so wholly engroffes them as to shut out by degrees almoft every other, and to break down every partition of the mind which would confine it. Any idea is fufficient for the purpose, as is evident from the infinite variety of causes, which give rife to madness; but this at most can only prove that the paffion of love is capable of producing very extraordinary effects, not that its extraordinary emotions have any connection with positive pain,

SECT. IX.

THE FINAL CAUSE OF THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN THE PASSIONS BELONGING TO SELF-PRESERVATION, AND THOSE WHICH REGARD THE SOCIETY OF THE SEXES.

THE final caufe of the difference in character between the paffions which regard felf-prefervation and thofe which are directed to the multiplication of the fpecies, will illuftrate the foregoing remarks yet further; and it is, I imaginė, worthy of obfervation even upon its own account. As the performance of our duties of every kind depends upon life, and the performing them with vigour and efficacy depends upon health, we are very ftrongly affected with whatever threatens the deftruction of either: but as we were not made to acquiefce in life and health, the fimple enjoyment of them is not attended with any real pleasure, left, fatisfied with that, we fhould give ourselves over to indolence and inaction. On the other hand, the generation of mankind is a great purpofe, and it is requifite that men fhould be animated to the pursuit of it by some great incentive. It is therefore attended with a very high pleasure; but as it is by no means defigned to be our conftant business, it is not fit that the abfence of this pleasure should be attended with any confiderable

pain. The difference between men and brutes in this point, seems to be remarkable. Men are at all times pretty equally difpofed to the pleasures of love, because they are to be guided by reason in the time and manner of indulging them. Had any great pain arifen from the want of this fatisfaction, reafon, I am afraid, would find great difficulties in the performance of its office. But brutes, who obey laws, in the execution of which their own reafon has but little fhare, have their ftated feafons; at fuch times it is not improbable that the fenfation from the want is very troublefome, because the end muft be then answered, or be miffed in many, perhaps for ever; as the incli nation returns only with its feafon.

THE paffion which belongs to generation, merc. ly as fuch, is luft only. This is evident in brutes, whofe paffions are more unmixed, and which pur. fue their purposes more directly than ours. The only distinction they obferve with regard to their mates, is that of fex. It is true, that they stick feverally to their own fpecies in preference to all others. But this preference, I imagine, does not arife from any fenfe of beauty which they find in their fpecies, as Mr. Addison supposes, but from a

law

law of fome other kind, to which they are fubject; and this we may fairly conclude, from their apparent want of choice amongst those objects to which the barriers of their fpecies have confined them. But man, who is a creature adapted to a greater variety and intricacy of relation, connects with the general paffion, the idea of fome focial qualities, which direct and heighten the appetite which he has in common with all other animals; and as he is not defigned like them to live at large, it is fit that he fhould have fomething to create a preference, and fix his choice; and this in general should be fome fenfible quality; as no other can so quickly, fo powerfully, or fo furely produce its effect. The object therefore of this mixed paffion, which we call love, is the beauty of the fex. Men are carried to the fex in general, as it is the fex, and by the common law of nature; but they are attached to particulars by perfonal beauty. I call beauty a focial quality; for when women and men, and not only they, but when other animals give us a fenfe of joy and pleasure in beholding them (and there are many that do fo), they infpire us with fentiments of tenderness and affection towards their perfons; we like to have them near us, and we enter willingly into a kind of relation with them, unless we should have ftrong reasons to the contrary. But to what end, in many cafes, this was defigned, I am unable to difcover; for I fee no greater