action trouble his Government abolish his Empire corrupt his Reason disorder his Will and throw confusion into all the powers of his Soul It 's true we meet with some men in the world whom Nature seemeth to have produced to give the lye to this opinion and whose inclinations constrain us to believe that Passions are grafted in the Soul for we see some so effeminate that a word puts them into a rage a sincere reprehension irritates them and in what method soever you deal with them their anger or indignation is not to be avoided Some from their youth are sordid they affect Wealth almost before they know what it is and it would be more easie to change the face of a Negro into the colour of his Teeth than to pull out of their hearts the desire of heaping up Riches Others are naturally bashful as often as they speak in publick they blush and what art soever is used to make them confident in company they cannot hinder shamefacedness from altering their Countenance It is not hard to answer these Objections and whoever is at the trouble to examine the Nature of Passions will be constrained to acknowledg that nothing is proved though much be said For to proceed in order Anger is not that first motion that arises at the appearance of an evil and which oweth its original rather to the Infirmity of the Body than to the Strength of the Mind but that fury of the Soul which by Aristotle is stiled rational that motion which hurries us to take vengeance and invites us to contrive the ruine of him that hath offended us All those other emotions that prevent the Judgment cannot properly be called Passions and when they trouble or seize the Soul it may be said that she resents but produceth them not and that she rather suffers than operates Generals of Armies have been seen to swoon at the approach of Battel Commanders to grow pale at the sight of an Enemy Souldiers to tremble in putting on their Armour or their Head-piece and all that Valour wherewith they were animated could not hinder them from beginning their Victories with quaking and their Triumphs with signs that brought their Courage into question The most eloquent of Orators found himself often taken with these surprizes and he was astonisht that his Discourses should chase Fear from the minds of his Auditors and that his Reason should not be strong enough to drive apprehension from the possession of his heart to hinder Fear from bereaving him of his Strength to prevent his hairs from standing on end and to oppose his tongues cleaving to the roof of his mouth when he was to speak But all these sudden changes are but corporal and surprizes which borrow their aids from the temper and constitution of the body If Riches make some men covetous it is after the Judgment is seduced Nature hath produced nothing in the whole universe that is able to stir their desires she hides the Gold in the entrals of the Earth she leaves us nothing but the sight of the Heaven and the Stars and knowing that this mettle might corrupt them if she discovered it in its splendor she caused it to grow among the Sands and the Dirt to the end they might despise it True it is that Bashfulness seemeth more natural to man than Avarice and Anger and that he is become impudent and insolent that altereth not his countenance after the commission of a fault or an incivility But this timorous Passion is only the daughter of the Body the Mind hath no share in her Production and if the novelty of a thing occasion it the cause thereof is the leaping of the blood about the Heart hence old men rarely blush the furrows in their front seldom receive a foreign colour and when heat declines their heart it ceaseth to send into the Face that innocent Vermilion that makes the Countenance of Children so amiable As this motion is a pure effect of the Bodies temperature our Players could never yet get her to appear upon the Stage and the most ingenious of them despair at this day of adorning the Countenance of their Actors with this curious colour They represent us Sadness with all her shagrine humors and as silent as she is they find inventions to counterfeit her follies They shew us Fear upon a pale Face and imitate all her actions so well that they seem to tremble grow wan and fall into a swoon Love is the ordinary subject wherewith they entertain their Spectators and the smallest Apes-face of the Society can act the Gallant the Suitor and the mad Lover but none of them have yet been seen that could act the Shame-faced person and if some few have learned to stoop the Head abase the Voice and to look downwards we hardly observe any that have been able to call for Blushes to testifie that the Applauses given to them or the Reproches thrown at them were unpleasing But as Passions depend on us it must not be wondered if they be counterfeited with so much ease if they can become sad and angry audacious and desperate when they please and that consulting the mind and opinion of which they are formed they represent all those outward signs which Passions discover upon the Bodies of such as are possessed by them Discourse IV. That the Senses and opinion are the two Principles of Passions AMong all the advantages which man disputeth with other Creatures and which beget him so much reverence in them of his own Species Philosophy owneth none more glorious then that of knowledg and although she be interressed when she pleads her cause she believes not that the praises given her are any thing but due debt she stiles her the only felicity of them that possess her she makes her the image of the Diety maintains that it is she that lifteth man into Heaven to contemplate there the perfections of her Author and though she know that her Body have need of health to preserve her she is assured that her Soul wants nothing but knowledg to participate of his Eternity By these mens discourse this quality is as immense as absolute present every where including all differences of time coexistant with all Ages and having regard to the original nature and end of every being she finds nothing in the Univers that can confine her but Eternity and he only that is infinite Man is a lover only of what is good and as free an Agent as he is he suffers evil with violence the senses that seduce his imagination reverence his will they cease to provoke him when the understanding hath shewed him that the thing she seeks is not suitable to him and if sometimes she discover a displeasure it is because she hath suffered her self to be deceived by the senses or disordered by false opinions But nothing escapes mans Curiosity he will not be a stranger to any thing in nature the most hidden things stir him to make diligent
subordination in the faculties of the Soul that the inferiors seldom or never stir but according to the motion of the superiors and as Souldiers obey their Commanders or as the higher Sphear is followed by all them that are Subalterne so Reason and the will engage the sensitive appetite to side with them and cause it to embrace all as good which they approve and to reject all as evil which they condemn So then we must conclude with Seneca that Passions reside in the will it is there that all the operations of the Soul are perfected and the same powers which form our sins crimes comprehend our affections and desires For by the principles of this Learned Philosopher our Passions are not bare motions that arise from the appearance of good or evil which receive their succors from the imagination and finally stop in the inferior part of the Soul But productions of the mind sentiments of the rational faculty and to use the Stoick Language opinions that deprave the mind and corrupt the will perswading them to be approvers of their advices and to follow their irregular motions Also St. Austin who I look upon in this matter as Senecas warrant intermixeth our Passions with our rational appetite he giveth but one name to the cause and to the effects and well knowing that we have no Passion but what is in the will he assures us that the most dangerous motions of the Soul are but so many affections which draw their good or their evil from the objects to which they have respect our desire according to the words of this great Doctor is nothing but a will to an absent good which we pursue with much earnestness our hope is but a will to a good that flatters us and which we impatiently expect and fear and sadness are but wills of which the one opposeth the evil that threatens us and the other the mischief which we already feel contrary to our good liking So that the matter must get into the will before a man can be said to be in Passion and pleasure could never seize our wishes if the will were not consenting neither would our desires make such extravagant fallies out of the Fort if the will did not bear them company in the pursuit of the benefits we hunt after Upon the authority of this great man I think it can be no Error to declare for the Stoick Party and their Enemies are obliged to allow their sentiments unless they will contradict the opinion of the most solid and most enlightened of the Fathers Discourse II. Of the Number of Passions according to the Stoicks LEt Monarchs be absolute in their Territories let their orders in Council pass for Laws and let the publication of their edicts be sufficient to require obedience in the Subjects let flattery perswade them that they are the Gods of the World that they hold their power from no Earthly Soveraign and that the Dominion they exercise over the People is nothing less then the mark of their Independance yet those that understand the nature of Goverment consider them rather as Slaves then Free-men they call them the Tutors not Masters of their Subjects and demonstrate that as private Interest rules the Fathers of Families that which we call publick commands Kings and Potentates For indeed be it that they treat with their Neighbours be it that they assist their Allies be it that they govern peacably their Conquests be it that they defend them that implore their Protection and take up Armes to relieve the oppressed from Tyranny and the innocent from distress self interest is the end of their labors as well as the aime of their designs and when they prefer the good of their Subjects or the preservation of their Neighbours before their own private contentment it may be said that the same is but a tendency to the encrease of their Empire or at least to the securing of their own Kingdoms That which is practized at Court is but the constant exercise of the Schools and Cicero's testimony of Philosophical affaires is significant when he declares that to govern well Kings should become Philosophers or Philosophers Kings For if these be truth's combatants if they lay new Foundations if they form new arguments wherewith to establish the most probable methods if they return to the principles which they had once forsaken and if by a liberty permitted in the Schools they invent new explications to disguise the sense of their adversaries meaning they are rather governed by interest then the incitements of Justice they seek not so much to instruct the World as to be admired of men they labor more to glorifie their own fame then to edifie their Disciples When they declaim against the Reasons that support the Doctrin of their Predecessors it is that they hope for reputation from the novelty of their opinions or heighten their own credit by vanquishing the sentiments of their Teachers and Antagonists This truth appears evident in the Subject of Passions and if we examin well the design of those that describe them it must be owned that they are divided among themselves touching their number those that find it their advantage to engage with Aristotle and rather to leane upon his authority then upon the strength of his arguments endeavor to perswade us that they are in number eleven that nothing is to be added to or diminished from that division and that they are not to be multiplyed without mixture of superior Species nor retrencht without wrong to their diversity To ground their opinion they seperate the Soul into two faculties whereof one draws her name from Desire and the other from Anger In the first they place those Passions that are least violent and in the other them that are never at rest For they will have it that the six contained in the Concupiscible appetite are divided that some are but little employed and others active that some are sordid and others generous that some wander abroad and the other satisfied with their domestick Entertainments In fine they tell you that Love follows the inclination of the Body which tendeth to his center that desire is the moveing Orbe and that Joy represents him a place of content and rest that Hatred resembles that aversion which he discovers when he is placed in an uneasy condition that Flight imitates those earnest endeavors used to get out of trouble and danger and that Sadness respects the dislike that appears upon a violent detention therein But they inform us that the five Passions that are placed in the Irascible powers are all impetuous resembling the Heavens ever in motion that they create combats and scorn to retreat and that as they look upon good and evil as difficult they can delight in nothing but agitation nor love any thing less then rest The truth is Dispair is wretched Anger is out rageous Hope is negligent of the things she possesseth in aspireing to what she expects Fear
attempted their Liberty and did sufficiently testifie by their enterprizes that they could no longer endure the Government of a Man who had rob'd them of their freedom Brutus engaged covertly in the Conspiration and though he forced himself in hiding the matter from his Wife he could not so well dissemble it but she perceived and observed by the change of his Countenance the disturbance of his Soul Fearing then that her Husband mistrusted her weakness and that he durst not tell her a secret which might be the price of his Life if it took air resolved to make tryal upon her self whether she could keep it undisclosed for retiring into her Chamber and putting out her Servants she laid hold on a Razor which she lets into her Thigh her wound bleeds in abundance her members grow feeble by loss of Blood a Feaver slides into her Veins and seemed to lead her toward the Grave when Brutus entering the Room and surprized by an accident so little expected informed himself of the cause and circumstances Porcia constrained them that assisted her to withdraw prayed her Husband to sit down and promised to tell him her self the original of her indisposition You know said she Brutus that when I came into your House it was not in the quality of a Miss or of a Concubine and that I preferred not your Alliance before that of so many Roman Gentlemen to be only the Companion of your Table and Bed but to lie in your bosom to be the Confident of your Secrets and to have my proportion as well of your misfortunes as of your felicities It is not that I accuse Heaven or complain that you are my Husband but only that you look not upon me as your Wife You must not imagine that I am content with the duties of Marriage and that I expect from your person only those outward Caresses that unite our Bodies rather than our Wills and our Souls I aspire to greater things Brutus I require to be admitted of your privy Council and that you honor me as well with your Friendship as your Love This request is too just to be refused and if you judg it such why are you so reserved Why do you dissemble your troubles of mind and wherefore do you hide from me that glorious resolution you have taken to put a Tyrant to Death If you cannot hope for help from me and if my Sex forbid me to assist you in your undertakings you may at least expect from me some comfort or lessening of your griefs or misfortunes and may be assured that if I am not sufficiently strong to be your Second I shall have always courage enough to bear you company where ever ill luck or fate shall call you consider not the weakness of those of my condition but remember only that I am the Daughter of Cato and the Wife of Brutus and that if this Body which I received from my Father have not vigor enough to suffer death the love that I have vowed to thee Brutus shall make me constant in dispising it Then shewing him her wound see there said she Brutus see there the tryal which I have made thereof do thou now not scruple to open thy Bosom to me to reveal me thy designs know that within this Body is contained Cato's Heart and that if my Sex permit me not to follow thee in that Execution thou hast determined know that my courage is great enough to die for thee and with thee If a punctilio of Honor if a vehement desire of Fame and if a short obstinacy animated by vanity have caused some to triumph over Death conquer Pain and despise the rigor of Tortures what cannot Vertue do when she is supported by Integrity When she stands up for the preservation of Laws when she suffers for the defence of her Temples and her Altars Since she is composed in her Actions and preserves the same measures in delights as in torments Wherefore to acquire this insensibility of pain so familiar to the Stoicks and so little known to other Philosophers let us often have in mind the Actions of those generous men who by their Courage surmounted Tortures let us fortifie our selves against the apprehensions of Death let us not love our Bodies more than necessity requireth let us separate from Torments that solemnity which affrighteth us and let us perswade our selves that those ceremonies contain no more than what is despised by a man in his Bed sick of the Gout than what is endured by one at a Feast who is sick at his Stomach and what is undergone by a tender Woman in Child-bearing Discourse III. That a Wise Man is not afraid of Death and considereth it as the end of his miseries and the entrance to felicity DEath is so terrible and the horrors that attend it render it so dismal that the Lawyers have thought the Fear of it to be just and that it might be accounted among the number of those things which seized upon a man of Resolution They say that the acts then committed are rather forced than voluntary that our promises are not binding that our agreements are invalid and that as she deprives us of Liberty or hinders the use of Reason she acquitted us of performance and annulled our Contracts Divines who consider Death as the production of sin rather than the effects of our constitution conclude that she must needs be a great enemy to Nature since she is so much redoubted since she gives dread to all sensible Creatures and that those which we stile inanimate testified some kind of aversness to be separated from their Principle The Chicken hides at the approach of the Kite the Hare flies before the Dogs and we find nothing in Nature which useth not its force or industry to make defence against Death We cannot seperate the Marble from the Rocks but by violence the Trees groan under the blow of the Ax the Air shuns the Fire that rarifies it and all insensible as it is it makes opposition for self-preservation If the Animals saith St. Austin which were created purely for slaughter love life and are so much afraid of Death how should not man be therewith affrighted when it threatens him since he was born to live for ever and that he should never have seen seperation between his Body and his Soul if he had been careful of his own innocence Philosophers support the justice of their Fear by the necessity of Death they think it reasonable to redoubt an unavoidable evil and which though common to all men hath yet no remedy in Nature They accuse it of cruelty they say that it is she alone of all the Gods that will accept no Sacrifice who refuseth the offerings of men and that it is in vain to dedicate Temples to her or build her any Altars since she is equally blind and inexorable But what Reasons soever these men invent to excuse the apprehension of Death it is not hard to shew
Fortune have not any thing to present you more glorious than the Command of the Roman Nation Nature cannot endow you with a more excellent Gift than a Will to preserve the unfortunate Although this Vertue be so fair in her out-side and that it seemeth as if we could not blame her without a renunciation of humanity nevertheless she ceaseth not to be found guilty of great defects and to pass for a Vice in the Stoick Morality For as these generous Philosophers strip their wise man of all the maladies of his Soul they allow not that other mens misfortunes should be his miseries they will have him as little concerned for his Neighbours afflictions as for his own disasters They will have him to be fortune proof and that that which discomposeth others should teach him Constancy and an even temper What say they doth Vertue consist in infirmity Must we be guilty of effeminacy to perform Acts of Generosity Can we not be charitable without being afflicted And can we not relieve those that are in misery unless we mingle our Sighs with their Sobs and Groans and our Cries with their Tears A wise may ought to consider the Poor for their Relief and not himself to share in their Calamities he ought to protect them from oppressions and not to be inwardly disturbed for them he ought to endeavour their comfort and not to be a Partner in their misfortunes But as this Notion seemeth somewhat strange to them that know not the Stoick Sentiments to apprehend it well we must suppose with Seneca That compassion is a composition of two different parts whereof one regards the Calamity to relieve it and the other to take a share of the suffering The Stoicks reject the second to embrace the first They say that Pity is unworthy of a man of Courage they call it the vice of effeminate persons and do declare that they cannot become sad without derogating from the Excellency of the Mind and that they must resolve to be miserable if other Mens misfortunes may as well pierce their Heart as their Eyes As we judge of the weakness of these when they water at the sight of others that have sore eyes as it is not so much a chearfulness of Spirit as an infirmity of Body to laugh with all that laugh and to gape every time that another opens his Mouth Pity is a badg of weakness and we must be of the disposition of Women not to be able to look upon other mens troubles without being assaulted by it our selves Therefore when a Wise man giveth Alms when he saves a man from Shipwrack when he hospitably receives the banished into his House he preserves still the same tranquility of Mind he is seen to be as little disturbed when he helps the distressed as when he rebukes the impious and chastiseth the guilty He accosts them without trouble he comforts them with Arguments he relieves them by his Liberality and knowing that his grieving can do them no good he rather draws money out of his Purse than tears from his Eyes If Compassion be sordid when she renders other mens misfortunes her own Envy is infamous when she makes her own Torment of other mens Prosperity and as we may not excuse the first by reason of her weakness we cannot but condemn the second because of her injustice Vices do at sometimes tickle us they often steal into the seat of vertue and some of them are so disguised that hardly we can know them from their Contraries Profusion seems so becoming in Monarchs that we make no difficulty of confounding it with Liberality Cruelty is often covered with the Robe of Justice Compassion is so tender hearted that she is hardly to be separated from Clemency and as she bears all her marks she is not afraid to pretend to her praises but Envy is always opprobrious Vertue is her torment the most innocent feel her fury she dares not appear to the eyes of men and as she cannot conceal her Malice she is forced to seek darkness to hide her deformities and discontents As if she were animated against the whole Race of Mankind she maks war against all men and without distinguishing their merits she sets both upon the perfect and the less accomplished She opposeth the most eminent because she cannot arrive to their perfections she persecuteth her equals because they reprove her Covetousness and Pride and she prosecutes her inferiours as having an apprehension of their happy Successors But though she be an Enemy to all the Vertues yet she exerciseth her fury particularly against the more Noble and resembling the Scorpions who sting most fiercely when the Sun is most hot and clear she assaults those which have the greatest Lustre and Glory From thence it comes that Tyrants hate the honesty of their Heirs that they fear the Valour of their Commanders that they dread the prudence of their Ministers and apprehend the Puissance of their friends They think themselves contemned in the praises of their inferiours they fancy that the Commendations given to them is an abatement of their own Grandeur and they are afraid of Designs to supplant them every time men speak in their favour But if Monarchs unwillingly suffer vertuous persons the Subjects do not less envy their Princes advantages Conspiracy is not always an effect of their evil Government it more often proceeds from the Malice of the People than from the Tyranny of Kings and their inaccessableness is oft times the only cause of their ruine Socrates lost not his Life but for being too Vertuous His integrity made all his Crimes and the Athenians would not at this day be accused of having put the wisest man of their Commonwealth to death if Envy had not furnished them with Arms to take him out of the way But as no Crime goes unpunished Envy finds her Chastisement in her self she drinks the greatest share of her own poyson and to make her miserable we need but leave her to her own fury All other Vices propose to themselves some advantage and though it be never any thing but shew it ceaseth not to give vigour to their pursuits but Envy looks upon good to afflict her self she rejoyceth not but in other mens harms and by a blindness proper to Avarice she measures her own Riches by the Poverty of her Neighbours and her own wants by their Treasures If a Passion be never so violent it lasteth not always it ceaseth after a time and often finds its suffocation in the cause that gave it birth Anger takes her ease after she hath tormented us a while Pleasure becomes our Pain when its Charms have tired us Gluttony is wearied in much feasting and our Soul hath not any faculty which admits not a Truce after a Combate But Envy is always in motion she lasts as long as her cause and what efforts soever we use to sweeten her she is not to be cured but by the Death of the Author From