Chapter I: , entitled, 'Of Sympathy,' is a felicitous illustration of

the general nature and workings of Sympathy. He calls in the experience of all mankind to attest the existence of our sympathetic impulses. He shows through what medium sympathy operates; namely, by our placing ourselves in the situation of the other party, and imagining what we should feel in that case. He produces the most notable examples of the impressions made on us by our witnessing the actions, the pleasurable and the painful expression of others; effects extending even to fictitious representations. He then remarks that, although on some occasions, we take on simply and purely the feelings manifested in our presence,--the grief or joy of another man, yet this is far from the universal case: a display of angry passion may produce in us hostility and disgust; but this very result may be owing to our sympathy for the person likely to suffer from the anger. So our sympathy for grief or for joy is imperfect until we know the cause, and may be entirely suppressed. We take the whole situation into view, as well as the expression of the feeling. Hence we often feel for another person what that person does not feel for himself; we act out our own view of the situation, not his. We feel for the insane what they do not feel; we sympathize even with the dead.

Chapter II. is 'Of the Pleasure of Mutual Sympathy.' It contains illustrations of the delight that we experience in the sympathy of others; we being thereby strengthened in our pleasures and relieved in our miseries. He observes that we demand this sympathy more urgently for our painful emotions than for such as are pleasurable; we are especially intolerant of the omission of our friends to join in our resentments. On the other hand, we feel pleasure in the act of sympathizing, and find in that a compensation for the pain that the sight of pain gives us. Still, this pleasure may be marred if the other party's own expression of grief or of joy is beyond what we think suitable to the situation.

Chapter III. considers 'the manner of our judging of the propriety of other men's affections by their consonance with our own,' The author illustrates the obvious remark, that we approve of the passions of another, if they are such as we ourselves should feel in the same situation. We require that a man's expression and conduct should be suitable to the occasion, according to our own standard of judging, namely, our own procedure in such cases.

Chapter IV. continues the subject, and draws a distinction between two cases; the case where the objects of a feeling do not concern either ourselves or the person himself, and the case where they do concern one or other. The first case is shown in matters of taste and science, where we derive pleasure from sympathy, but yet can tolerate difference. The other case is exemplified in our personal fortunes; in these, we cannot endure any one refusing us their sympathy. Still, it is to be noted that the sympathizer does not fully attain the level of the sufferer; hence the sufferer, aware of this, and desiring the satisfaction of a full accord with his friend, tones down his own vehemence till it can be fully met by the other; which very circumstance is eventually for his own good, and adds to, rather than detracts from, the tranquillizing influence of a friendly presence. We sober down our feelings still more before casual acquaintance and strangers; and hence the greater equality of temper in the man of the world than in the recluse.

Chapter V. makes an application of these remarks to explain the difference between the Amiable and the Respectable Virtues. The soft, the gentle, and the amiable qualities are manifested when, as sympathizers, we enter fully into the expressed sentiments of another; the great, the awful and respectable virtues of self-denial, are shown when the principal person concerned brings down his own case to the level that the most ordinary sympathy can easily attain to. The one is the virtue of giving much, the other of expecting little.

_Section II._ is '_Of the Degrees of the different passions which are consistent with propriety_.' Under this head he reviews the leading passions, remarks how far, and why, we can sympathize with each.

Chapter I. is on the Passions having their origin in the body. We can sympathize with hunger to a certain limited extent, and in certain circumstances; but we can rarely tolerate any very prominent expression of it. The same limitations apply to the passion of the sexes. We partly sympathize with bodily pain, but not with the violent expression of it. These feelings are in marked contrast to the passions seated in the imagination: wherein our appetite for sympathy is complete; disappointed love or ambition, loss of friends or of dignity, are suitable to representation in art. On the same principle, we can sympathize with danger; as regards our power of conceiving, we are on a level with the sufferer. From our inability to enter into bodily pain, we the more admire the man that can bear it with firmness.

Chapter II. is on certain Passions depending on a peculiar turn of the Imagination. Under this he exemplifies chiefly the situation of two lovers, with whose passion, in its intensity, a third person cannot sympathize, although one may enter into the hopes of happiness, and into the dangers and calamities often flowing from it.

Chapter III. is on the Unsocial Passions. These necessarily divide our sympathy between him that feels them and him that is their object. Resentment is especially hard to sympathize with. We may ourselves resent wrong done to another, but the less so that the sufferer strongly resents it. Moreover, there is in the passion itself an element of the disagreeable and repulsive; its manifestation is naturally distasteful. It may be useful and even necessary, but so is a prison, which is not on that account a pleasant object. In order to make its gratification agreeable, there must be many well known conditions and qualifications attending it.

Chapter IV. gives the contrast of the Social Passions. It is with the humane, the benevolent sentiments, that our sympathy is unrestricted and complete. Even in their excess, they never inspire aversion.

Chapter V. is on the Selfish Passions. He supposes these, in regard to sympathy, to hold a middle place between the social and the unsocial. We sympathize with small joys and with great sorrows; and not with great joys (which dispense with our aid, if they do not excite our envy) or with small troubles.

_Section III_. considers _the effects of prosperity and adversity upon the judgments of mankind regarding propriety of action_.

Chapter I. puts forward the proposition that our sympathy with sorrow, although more lively than our sympathy with joy, falls short of the intensity of feeling in the person concerned. It is agreeable to sympathize with joy, and we do so with the heart; the painfulness of entering into grief and misery holds us back. Hence, as he remarked before, the magnanimity and nobleness of the man that represses his woes, and does not exact our compassionate participation.

Chapter II. inquires into the origin of Ambition, and of the distinction of Ranks. Proceeding upon the principle just enounced, that mankind sympathize with joy rather than with sorrow, the author composes an exceedingly eloquent homily on the worship paid to rank and greatness.

Chapter III., in continuation of the same theme, illustrates the corruption of our moral sentiments, arising from this worship of the great. 'We frequently see the respectful attentions of the world more strongly directed towards the rich and the great, than towards the wise and the virtuous.' 'The external graces, the frivolous accomplishments of that impertinent and foolish thing called a man of fashion, are commonly more admired than the solid and masculine virtues of a warrior, a statesman, a philosopher, or a legislator.'