which seems good unto it It s true that at first this will not seem true because that most commonly in Love the beloved object is absent with whom it is not likely the soul should unite it self but if you consider that objects may be united to the powers by their species and by their images or by their true beings and that consequently there is a real union and another that is not which the schools call intentional and which we may name Ideal you may observe that the union which the appetite makes with the object which the imagination proposeth is of the latter rank because the true being of things enters not into the imagination it s their Idea and their image only and this union is that alone which naturally belongs to the appetite for that it can no otherwise for its part unite it self to the good which is presented unto it if it move towards any other union 't is not for it self that it seeks it but for other powers which may really unite themselves to their objects for the the appetite is a politick faculty which works not only for it self but for all others which are beneath it and as the imagination is the Center of all the sences the appetite is it also of all the inclinations which are in the parts so that the imagination or the understanding proposing to it what is fit it seeks it for them and endevors to procure them the enjoyment thereof and then if they are capable really to unite themselves with their objects it covets their union but this hinders not but that it unites it self before with them by a union proper to it and which is as the principle and spring of all other unions belonging to the soul Perhaps you will say that the understanding and the imagination in the same manner unite themselves to what is fit for them and that therefore Love may be aswel formed there as in the appetite but the difference is great because that the objects come and go in the understanding and in the imagination and the knowledge they have of them is rather gained by rest then by motion as Avistotle says quite contrary to the appetite which moves it self towards its object and goes out as it were of it self to unite it self thereto so that the union which is made in the understanding and in the imagination is purely passive without any motion of its faculties but that of the appetite is active and performed with agitation considering also that the union made by the appetite is more perfect then that which is made by knowledge for as much as the minde may have an aversion from some thing which it hath conceived which is a kind of separation and therefore the union thereof is not so perfect as that of the appetite which cannot endure this division and which consequently is the most accomplished which can be found in the actions of life But if Love be a motion of the Soul to unite it self to what is lovely it seems as if when it is united thereunto there then should be no more motion and consequently no more Love and as this union may be made in a moment for that there is nothing can hinder it it seems as if this motion also were made in an instant and that therefore Love should not last any longer which would be a very strange proposition and contrary to the truth To answer this objection you must observe that there are things which move themselves to attain to some end separate from their motion and that there are others which finde in the motion it self the end they seek the first cease to move when they have attain'd their end But those who have no other end but motion or at least none that is separated from their motion never pretend to rest and as rest is a perfection in those so 't is an imperfection in these now the appetite is of this latter kinde which truly moves to unite it self to what is good but the union it seeks cannot be effected but in motion and when that ceaseth it vanisheth so that whilest the beloved object is present it must incessantly agitate it self to obtain the end it desires which is to unite it self thereunto and if it chance to rest it proceeds from that the object is no longer present with it or at least that it is no more offered unto it as good Love then is a motion and a union of the appetite to what is lovely whether absent or present because its absence hinders not the imagination from proposing the Idea thereof to the appetite which is the only one with which it naturally can unite its true that working for other powers as we have said it stops not at this simple union it seeks what is fit also for them it desires for the seeing and hearing that their objects may be at a reasonable distance for touching and tasting that theirs may be immediatly united to their organs In fine as many ways as things can be united the appetite and the will wish a fit union for them and you must confess that the concourse of all those motions makes the Passion of Love compleat and entire and the first of which we have spoken although it contains all its essence and its form yet hath it not all its extent we may say it is the source and that the others are the brooks which encrease it Le ts now see what this particular agitation is which the appetite causeth to make this union and in what its different from that which is to be found in Joy in Desire and in Hope by which as wel as by love it seems that the soul would unite it self to the good which is presented to it For t is not sufficient for the perfect knowledge of the Passions to say that they are motions unless you observe the differences of these motions and unless you make known the different impressions and the diverss progress which the diversity of these objects cause in the appetite You must then suppose there is some relation between the motions of the Soul and those of the body and that the differences which are found in these in some manner happen in the others For since the effects are like their causes the motions of the body which are the effects of the Soul ought to be the images of that agitation which it gives it self In effect they say that the understanding moves directly towards its object that it reflects and redoubles it self on it that it reenters it self that it wanders and confounds it self which are all phrases drawn from sensible motions and which ought to make us beleeve that somewhat like it is done in the soul and chiefly in its appetitive part because it is by it that in effect it moves and agitates it self neither is it to any purpose to say that they are not true motions but that they only are Metaphorical for besides that
there are divers things wonderful and which we admire which do not make us laugh even if admiration be very great it hinders Laughter And it is to no purpose to say that it ought to be mean and light to move it since it often happens that we laugh at those things which we very much admire Indeed the address which a facetious man hath to represent the actions the words the gestures of another to tell jests to make subtil and ingenious encounters is no less to be admired then that of a Painter who makes some excellent designe or of a man who seriously relates very fine things Why then doth the admiration which that causeth excite Laughter and that of this hinder it Are there not an hundred kinde of things which are new which are admired with mediocrity as the most part of those are which are rare which yet cause not Laughter On the contrary are there not some which seem to have lost the grace of a novelty and which cannot beget admiration which yet are ridiculous He who tells a good tale is often the first that laughs at it and yet it is neither new nor admirable seeing he knew it before As there are then ridiculous things which are marvellous and others which are not so we must seek the cause elsewhere then in Admiration Many to shun these difficulties have joyned these two opinions together and said that Joy and Admiration was the true motive of Laughter and that if there are wonderful things which move it not it is because they are not agreeable in the same manner as the agreeable are not ridiculous unless they are marvellous But it is certain that the greatest part of the inconveniences which we have observed are herein also to be found and that there are divers things which are pleasing and wonderful which never move Laughter Is there any thing so fair or so admirable as the Sun All the diversities of flowers and fruits which the seasons bring us all the treasures which the earth affords us all those master-pieces wherewith Art furnisheth us and all those rarities which strangers send us Are they not delightful do they not oblige us to admire them Yet was never any body seen to laugh at the sight of all these things Others have imagined that all these opinions might be maintained with modification that it was true to speak absolutely Joy and Admiration did not cause Laughter but when they were recreative that is to say when they were not serious and that they happened in Plays then they move it and that Nature requiring these divertisements to refresh the Minde and the Body and give them new forces it by that exteriour motion made the pleasure appear which it there searched But are there not Plays and divertisements which do not cause Laughter And should we reduce them to facetious things how should we finde them in ticklishness in the encounter of friends in indignation and in anger and even in the admiration of serious things This is what the Philosophers have left us touching ridiculous things But since they do not satisfie us let us see what the Poets and Orators have said on the Subject for the Ridiculous is the object of Comedy and the Orator is sometimes obliged to employ it in his Discourses Aristotle and Cicero must be consulted about the business The first treating of Comedy defined what was ridiculous to be A deformity without a grief And truely it seems that what we call Ridiculous is an imperfection which in appearance causeth no ill to him who hath it For did we think it would cause any it would not move Laughter but Compassion And this deformity is observable in all what 's done or said against the custom expectation or opinion of the Wise As for Cicero he confesseth there is deformity in the ridiculous but he will have another condition then that which Aristotle observed For he says that its Nature consists in representing ugly and deformed things with a good grace And if there are words and actions to be found which delightfully discover the defects of others they will infallibly move Laughter These two Opinions have without reason been followed or rejected by many Philosophers For those who say it comprehends not all ridiculous things and that there is no ugliness or deformity at the first sight in persons which are dear unto us in tickling and in divers other serious things which make us laugh lastly that an impertinent performs actions and discourses with an ill grace which are extremely ridiculous Those I say are deceived as well as others who in general seek the nature and essence of what is Ridiculous binding themselves to these definitions as if they perfectly exprest it and perplexing their mindes to excuse the defects they meet in them for it is certain that neither the one nor the other consider the Ridiculous but in relation to the Stage or the Bar that Cicero observes that which befits an Orator and that Aristotle comprehends all the ridiculous Subjects which may serve in Comedy So that the Objections made against them are vain and weak forasmuch as tickling belongs no ways to the Theatre no more then impertinencies done with an ill grace are not admitted into the Rules of Oratory And indeed to shew you that Aristotle did not discourse of the Ridiculous like a Philosopher and that he enquired not its essential form he hath not mentioned those deformities in those places where he examined the causes of Laughter And were we to suppose it would it not be useless to know the nature of this Passion What reason is there that an object should move Laughter for being deformed without grief I know well that there are some who have said that Laughter was composed of Grief and Joy that that proceeds from deformity as Joy comes from that it is without Grief and that in the combat which these two Passions give the Minde are formed those contrary motions of the heart of the Diaphragma and of the other parts which appear in Laughter But what likelihood is there that Sorrow should have a share in this action How can it cause a violent agitation or subsist so long with that excess of Pleasure being so little and so light as it is figured What Grief can we be sensible of at the meeting of persons we love in the relation of good news or in some ingenious encounter And we must not say that the Smile which these objects move is no true Laughter for the one differs not from the other but in that one is greater or less and we see every moment that the same object moves Laughter in some and but Smiles in others These are the most considerable opinions which have been on this Subject which in my opinion are all wanting in that they suppose that there are divers kindes of ridiculous things and of Laughters and that there can no general notion be found which can be equally common to
that Reason which is sometimes at liberty in these encounters sees nothing which contents it that she even confesseth this Laughter to be forced and yet that she cannot hide it it is nevertheless very true that there is still a secret pleasure either in the superiour part of the soul or in the sensitive For the alienation of the Minde takes away from frantick persons the sense of ill and giveth liking to the Ridiculous Chimera's which are there formed to move Laughter So that if Reason be not hurt the Pleasure must be hid in the Senses and unwittingly to the Understanding it causeth that commotion there The Imagination discerns not always exactly the Pleasure which the objects form in the particular Senses either because it is distracted or surprised or because the impression they make is secret although still the spirits the humours and the bodies agitate themselves powerfully So the first motions of Passions happen in the Minde unawares and there are divers things which move us which we can hardly say whether they are troublesome or graceful we must not then wonder if we sometimes laugh without knowing the cause thereof it is sufficient if the Senses have a confused and secret knowledge to stir up afterwards that motion in the Appetite for there is so strong a connexion between these powers that the one is no sooner touched by the object but the other resents it In this precipitation the Soul hath not time to discern what it doth and the parts are sooner touched then she is advised of it and she is not then able to stop the shake which she hath given her self the spirits and the humours having received the impression thereof whose impetuosity cannot be so suddenly stayed And hence the difficulty comes to hinder Laughter when it is vehement although it be a voluntary action in the same manner as it happens in other Passions wherein the Soul suffers the same violence as he who runs into a precipice for although he gave himself that motion it is no more in his power to stop it he must abandon himself to the swinge he hath taken and to that steepness whence he hath precipitated himself What remains of most importance is to know why of all creatures Man onely laughs since it appears that other beasts also may be surprised with Novelty and it is not impossible but that they may have a designe to shew how sensible they are thereof since they make other things known by their voice and by their actions But as there are but two motives which oblige Man to witness the surprise which ridiculous objects cause to wit his own excellency and civil society it is certain that the first is useless to beasts who are never touched with glory or with vanity And for Society it is so imperfect amongst them that it respects but the necessities of the body to which indeed they work in common but yet it is but for their particular interest so that there is no communication of the pleasure which every one resents considering that the novelty of agreeable things surpriseth them not to speak properly no more then they do men who are quite stupid because they do not discern whether things are new or no considering them but as if they had always been present although for to know them new we must imagine they were not always so And it is for that reason that children laugh not before the fourtieth day for the Soul which is as it were wholly buried and as it were drown'd in the great quantity of the humors they have is capable of no knowledge but acording as humidity diminisheth these lights encrease and so by degrees she gets the power of laughing beginning by a smile and after being capable of vehement Laughter Perhaps some will say that the excellency wherewith man flatters himself and the love of society can no more reach a childe at forty days old then other creatures being not of a condition to minde either of them therefore that they then are not more capable of laughing then beasts are if there be no other motions but those for laugher But it is not necessary exactly to know those things for which we have a natural inclination for desires being born with us carry us also by the pure instinct of nature to the enquiry of those goods and from the time that our soul hath the liberty to act she produceth actions which shew the secret fence she hath of her own excellency and of her being destined to a civil life Now as beasts are capable of neither of them they have also no share in this instinct whose sourse is hidden in the intellectual parts of the Soul and can come from no inferior power for although there are some kinds of Laughter which seem wholly to depend from the sensitive as that which comes from tickling it is certain that without the influence of the Reasonable Faculty the Senses cannot produce that effect its light insensibly disperseth it self on all its actions and the neighbourhood they have therewith alwayes communicates somewhat of its perfection which still serves to shew that beasts are not capable of laughter because their Senses are deprived of that brightness and of that influence which Reason causeth to flow in ours Before I finish this discourse I must tell you by the way who those are who are most given to laughter it is certain that young folkes laugh more willingly then old ones women then men fools then wise men sanguine then cholerick flegmatick then melancholy And this comes from that laughter being made by a pleasing surprise which we would make known those are more easily surprised are naturally merrier then these For the spirits which move quick and which consider not things are most easie to be deceived and those who are the most merry are the most easily touched with pleasant objects and are more fit for conversation then others who are severe and serious Yet as there are divers sorts of ridiculous objects that some respect our proper excellency and others society that there are some which require a great knowledge as quaint jeers and others wherein a mean one is onely requisite So there are also some persons which are more easily touched then others the young and cholerick laugh rather at the defects of others then the old and the wise being naturally insolent and proud fools ignorants observe not jests or witty encounters women and those of a sanguine complexion are more fit for the laughter which caresses occasion because they have a natural inclination to flattery After having thus discovered the nature of laughter and of ridiculous things we shall easily give a reason for all the effects which this Passion produceth on the body for there are none which proceed not from the surprise and Joy which the Soul resents the splendor of the eyes the redness of the face and tears come chiefly from Joy all the rest come from surprise
did we believe that nothing could hinder us from the possession of them they could never beget Hope in us and the Soul would be content to adde to the Desire which she would then form faith and assurance that it would happen which is an effect of the Judgement and not of the Appetite The difficulty then in Hope comes always from a third which is as the medium betwixt him who hopes and the thing hoped for in whose liberty we suppose it is to do or not to do what we hope For although we should often hope good from those things which do not freely operate even from those things which are inanimate as when we hope that Lands will be fertile and that Seasons will be pleasant that a beast will delight us or be serviceable to us we fancie them to our selves as if they had that liberty whether it be that there is in beasts an image of true liberty or for that we have a natural instinct which secretly instructs us that there is a Superiour power in the world which disposeth thereof at will and according as it thinks fit So that what we hope depending from the will of others whose masters we cannot absolutely be it is impossible but we must esteem it difficult and but that the success must seem doubtful It is not but that sometimes the difficulty may be in the thing it self we desire and the means we use to obtain it but it is not considerable in this Passion being not essential to it However from what part soever it comes we must take it for granted that it is necessary to form Hope Let us now see what its designe is and what the motion is which it causeth in the Appetite All the difficulties presented to the Soul either in the search of Good or assault and flight of Ill appear greater or less then its forces that is to say she believes she can overcome them or that she cannot resist them If they are the weaker they beget Hope Boldness and Anger if they are the greater they cause Despair and Fear Now it is likely that in difficulties the Soul doth in it self what we outwardly do when they present themselves to us For as we bend our selves against them if we suppose we can overcome them and as we lose strength and courage if they appear invincible it must needs be since the motions of the body follow those of the soul and that there is some relation and resemblance between them that the soul bends or slackens her self as the body doth in the encounter of the difficulties she fancies And indeed it is the onely difference which can distinguish the motions of the Irascible appetite from those of the Concupiscible For in these the Soul hath no occasion to employ her force or courage seeing no enemy she ought to assault or against whom she is obliged to defend her self Or if she pursue Good or flee from Ill it is without bending or slackning her self Since it is then a thing common to Hope Boldness and Anger to bend the Soul against difficulties let us see wherein they are different and chiefly what Hope hath particularly therein it being the subject of this Discourse We must then suppose that in Hope the Soul distinctly observes the Good but confusedly sees the difficulties on the contrary in Boldness and Anger it considers the difficulties more then the good For although in these the soul assaults ill to enjoy the good she expects by victory she chiefly sixeth her thoughts on the enemy she fights against and thinks onely on the good which shall thereby accrue but as a thing at a distance which provokes not as the presence of ill doth But in Hope she neerly faceth the good which presents it self she attentively considers it and sees but by the way the difficulties which besiege her so that they do not appear so great and consequently do not oblige her to use such endeavours to resist them as in other Passions Indeed in Boldness and Anger she riseth up and assaults the ill because she thinks it so powerful that she believe she cannot overcome it without assault or combat But in Hope it appears not so strong as that it ought to be assaulted nor so weak as to be slighted She keeps her self in a certain mean betwixt heat and neglect and without animating her self gainst it she puts herself in safety stands upon her guard which she doth in stiffening and fortifying her self in her self as it happens to the body which its parts being all equally stretched without changing place and almost without moving makes a vigorous motion which keeps it firm and extended which for that cause is called in the Schools The Tonick motion The Soul then doth the same in this Passion without assaulting or fleeing the ill which might traverse it she fortifies her self stands on her guard and with assurance expects the good she seeks So that we may define it to be A motion of the Appetite in which the Soul in expectation of the good it desires strengthens and stiffens her self in her self to resist the difficulties she may encounter therein Indeed the whole nature the properties and conditions required in Hope are contained in this definition Desire and Expectation which consist in the opinion that the good will come are marked as the necessary conditions which always precede it the desired good as the object which moves it the appetite as the subject where it is received and that firm assurance as the difference of the emotion which is proper to it and which distinguisheth it from all other Passions For although Boldness and Anger stiffen the soul also as we have said yet are they not content to keep it fixed in it self they make it rise up and drive it against the ill and force it to fight with it But this breeds a very reasonable doubt for did the soul keep it self stiff steady in Boldness Anger as she doth in Hope it would follow that Hope must always accompany them And yet it is true a man may cast himself into danger without hope of ever getting out and that sometimes we desire to be revenged of an injury whereof we know we shall never have satisfaction yet it hinders not but that this proposition is most certain and but that it is true that Boldness and Anger are ever accompanied with Hope For it is not always the onely good which Boldness proposeth to get out of the danger which it casts it self into honour and glory which spring from generous actions are often the Goods it aspires to and the enjoyment of which it always hopes what mischance soever happens to it although it fall under the difficulties it assaults it still thinks 't will be to overcome them if they do but serve to obtain what it pretends to as in the Discourse of Boldness we shall more fully shew For Anger we will in its place make it appear that
phrases in these Passions For when we say that the Desire is urgent ardent and violent that it moves it self towards Good that Hope is fixt and assured that it upholds those who hope that it expects the desired things we unawares manifest how the Soul darts her self out in Desire and retains her self in Hope So that these two motions being opposite it is impossible that they can be performed at the same time and that those two Passions should be there together but necessarily they must form themselves the one after the other as we said it must happen in those of which we have spoken in the foregoing Discourses Yet it is very true that this is not always so but that Hope mixeth it self most commonly with Desire Boldness and Anger in all which the Soul never fails to cast forth her self for the stedfastness she keeps in that is not contrary to the darting out of her self which she makes in this the first being a motion of the parts amongst themselves and the other a motion of the whole thing And as you see a body may keep it self stiff in it self and move it self from one place to another you must conceive the same in the Appetite and imagine that Hope remains stable whilst those other Passions transport it out of it self But neither doth it then stop as we have said the cause of these sallies being stronger then that of her restraint which to speak truth is not essential to Hope but a pure accident which never meets with it but when it is quite alone Let us now observe what moves the Appetite to stiffen thus for although it have the vertue to move it self as it pleaseth and that it bends it self to resist difficulties yet being a blinde power it knows not the difficulties and the Fancie must necessarily propose them to it and consequently it must be that which gives it the first shake and teacheth the motion which in this encounter it ought to employ After it hath then discovered the difficulties which might traverse its designes and that it believes it may overcome them it commands the Appetite to stand upon its guard and hold it self firm for to make resistance But whence comes the belief it hath to overcome them From the good opinion it hath of its own strength Whence it is that those who have many friends much wealth and honour those who have suffered no disgraces and to whom all hath happily succeeded those who are young and lusty in fine all those who think themselves potent in the goods of the Body of the Minde and of Fortune easily hope because they believe they have strength enough to oppose all obstacles and overcome all difficulties which can happen This good opinion is so necessary for Hope that it makes almost all its kindes and differences as it is greater or less it causeth the strength or weakness the excess or defect of that Passion It is that which produceth Presumption and Confidence which renders Hopes either doubtful or certain good or ill which augments or enfeebles them Indeed Presumption is nothing but an immoderate hope which proceeds from a too-great opinion we have of our own strength Confidence is an assurance we have of an expected help 'T is like the faith we give to promises which the things seem to make in these encounters for we say The season promiseth us fruit That we promise our selves such and such a success from our courage forces and friends Finally Hopes are either doubtful or certain great or little good or ill according as we conceive the difficulties strong or weak or as we suppose them to be more or less easie to be overcome Yet I think some distinction were here necessary for the most certain hope is not always the greatest and it is likely it is the greater the more the soul stiffens it self since it is the particular motion which forms this Passion Now she stiffens herself the more the greater the difficulties are she encounters But when the hinderances are light she moves not her self so carefully consequently Hope is less although it be more certain Our common phrase confounds these things for we say that we have great strong and good hopes when we would speak them assured and that they are small ill and weak when they are doubtful Yet for all this we ought to observe the distinctions we have made for it is evident that there are hopes which are weak and small not because they are uncertain but because the success is so sure and the difficulties so small that the Soul makes no motion at all for them And truely we can never call these hopes ill although vulgarly great and strong ones are esteemed good It may be demanded how there may be hopes which are certain since the belief we have of the event of the things we hope for is always doubtful Certainly we must confess that the certainty which is therein to be found is not infallible and of necessity it is onely likely and moral And we call those certain and sure hopes which are the less doubtful and in which there is the least to be feared But what it seems then as if Fear were always mixt with Hope although they are two contrary Passions It is true there is always some cause of Fear there being reason always to doubt But it follows not that Fear therefore forms it self and mingles it self with Hope although even the Soul were surprised therewith The Passions rise not always up in sight of their objects whether it be that there are stronger which restrain them and stifle them at their birth or whether the Minde considers not attentively enough the causes which ought to move it In Hope the Soul is more attentive to the Good then to the difficulties which besiege her She looks upon them but by the way and believes she can overcome them Even then also what subject soever there be of Fear without examination she in effect fears it not But if she consider the difficulties more then the good and if she take an opinion that she is unable to overcome them Hope gives place to Fear which flees in its turn out of other considerations causing a flood and ebbe which is often so swift and rapid that it seems as if these two Passions mixt and confounded themselves together But we must review these things in the Discourse of Fear Let us now consider what the motions of the Spirits and of the Humours are in Hope PART 3. What the motion of the Spirits is in Hope SInce the Spirits move in the Passions conformable to the emotion of the Soul they must when she stiffens and confirms her self in her self when she hopes in some manner suffer also the same agitation All the difficulty then is to know how it may be done for it is not easie to conceive how those fluid and subtil bodies can get a quality which belongs to those onely which are gross and solid
her self in her self and afterwards inspiring the same motion to the spirits and the rest of the organs which may be serviceable to her in this occasion in pursuit whereof it follows that a mans color changeth not that his looks are staid and that without growing pale or without any disturbance he looks on the most formidable things because the spirits which are mixt with the humors and which cause all the other parts to move stiffening themselves render them firm and settled and by that means hinder the blood from shedding it self abroad or from retiring inwardly not that those other motions of the Body either restrain or render themselves impetuous This then is the agitation which the spirits suffer in the beginnings of Boldness or to speak better in those preparatives which the Sonl makes for this Passion For Resolution Hope Confidence and Staiedness of Courage which are the fore-runners thereof require this kind of motion and without it can neither form themselves nor subsist But after the Enemies approach and that the Soul is risen up to assault and fight him she moves the Spirits in the same manner and all stiffened as they are she with impetuosity drives them forth to the exterior parts and so carries redness to the face ardor and vivacity to the eyes and violence to all the motions as we shall hereafter declare Now to explain how this darting forth is made we ought here to repeat all what hath been said in the Chapter of Desire for there is no difference in the motions of these two Passions as to the agitation since both in the one and the other the Soul issues as it were out of it self and casts it self towards the object which moves it They are onely unlike in the end she therein proposeth herself since in Desire she carries herself towards good that she may get near it and thereby afterwards enjoy it and in Boldness she darts herself towards ill that she may combate and overcome it It 's therefore here we must seek that satisfaction which this subject requires As also in the Discourse of Hope that which is necessary to make us understand how the spirits settle and dart forth themselves at the same time we are onely to observe that when we said that the motions of Desire and of Boldness were alike it ought to be understood in this darting forth For its certain that the Soul never stiffens it self in Desire unless it be accompanied with Hope with Boldness or with Anger forasmuch as she stiffens herself onely to fortifie herself and that she needs not employ her strength unless difficulties present themselves which are not in the Passions of the Concupiscible part as elsewhere hath been already said Now the first thing which follows this motion Whence the Heat comes that raiseth up it self in Boldness is the heat which sheds it self over all the Body and which by degrees augments it self and proportionably as the impetuosity grows greater For at first before the spirits darted themselves forth when they kept themselves onely firm this quality was very moderate as it is to be found in Hope but when they begin to make their fallies and dartings which drive and throw them forth it 's then that it becomes violent and that at last it inflames all the parts But the difficulty is to know whence this heat proceeds for although there be an appearance which the agitation of the heart and of the spirits causeth since it 's a Maxim received in the Schools That Motion hath the vertue to produce yet besides the experience which we learn that Air and Water cool themselves by agitation and that the shock and encounter of Bodies by which we say heat is engendred hath no place in those which are subtile and fluid it is certain that there are Passions where the heart and the Spirits have a very quick and impetuous motion as we see in Fear yet even in them heat augments not but even weakens it self For my part I beleeve that without sticking at common opinions we may say that the Heart being the source of heat hath also the vertue of producing it and that being to lose this quality as a general instrument of all the functions of life it must have the power to augment it according to the need we may have Why should we deny it this Faculty since there is no form which produceth not those qualities which are necessary unto it The Water of it self alone doth it not take back again the cold which was taken from it Doth not the Earth also recover the driness it lost but what is most considerable Doth not Heat augment it self in presence of its contrary And if it be true that that which inflames the Heart in violent passions proceeds not from motion as we have shewn even now what other source can it have but this secret vertue we speak of In fine since the Soul resides in this part as in its Throne and that she is therein stronger then in any other part what need we doubt but she helps this production She who in her self contains the vertue of all inferior things as we have shewed in the discourse of Light We must therefore beleeve that the Soul and the Heart augment the natural heat when it is necessary and that in performing their endeavor and stirring it self to produce it they cause it to issue out of those principles where she potentially was Besides Since the Soul hath Forces which she imploys when she will which she awakes and stirs up at her need she must needs have the same power over natural heat which is the most considerable part thereof and that she may raise it up and encrease it when its help is necessary And certainly as the motive Vertue contains in potentia the motion which it afterwards produceth when it hath received the orders of the Appetite So the Vital Faculty hath in it self a secret source of Heat which it stirs up and brings to light if we may so speak when the Soul commands and judgeth it necessary Now there is no occasion wherein this succour is more profitable for her then when she expects the ill either to resist or to combate it because she hath then need of its Forces which principally consists in heat as we have made it appear in the precedent Discourses But forasmuch as there needs more Forces to assault then to resist that is the cause that there is less heat in Hope and in Constancy where the Soul stands on the defensive then in Boldness and in Anger where she assaults and destroys ill As also that in these two latter the agitation of the spirits is greater for we do confess that their motion serves for something not of it self but by accident as we say in the Schools because they bring the heat which they have and that of the humors which they draw after them to those parts where they light and ever sollicite the fixed
of the Heart which could not get out during this constraint But why doth he keep in his breath Why he keeps in his breath Doubtless to fortifie the motion of the other parts for that we commonly never employ this action but when we intend to give a great blow to do some other great endeavour The reason of this Effect is drawn from the nature of the Motion which is to be on some stable thing whereon the body moving upholds it self It 's thus that Beasts move that Birds flie and that Fish swim and that all other things move for in all these motions the Earth the Air and the Water or some other Body remains firm and resists the thing agitated and in proportion as the resistance and firmness is greater the motion also is greater and stronger Now as the parts of Animals lean more the one upon the other when any of them is to perform any powerful motion it 's necessary the rest keep close and even to the furthermost which contribute thereunto It must finde without it self somewhat which may sustain it self otherwise the motion of the first of these will be weak and their actions will be the less perfect Whence it comes that Birds are troubled to flye when their Legs are broken that we run not so well when our Hands are tied and leap but ill unless we stiffen our Arms and shut our Fists because those parts in the condition they then are cannot uphold as they ought to do the motions of the rest The Soul then which hath a secret knowledge of all what is beneficial unto her and who knows that in violent endeavors there must be a great and strong support for those organs which are to move retains the Breath that that air which is stopped in the Lungs may keep up the Muscles of respiration and that pressing them on all sides she stiffens them to support the rest which are engaged in the action So that we are not content onely to stop the breath but we drive it and cause it to descend down that the diaphragma may dilate it self and press the neighboring parts which thereby are rendred more fit to support those which are in motion In pursuit he shuts his Lips and his Tteeh as well the better to stop the passages of respiration as to confirm the parts whether it be that their confirmation truly contributes to the great designs we have spoken of or whether the Soul is abused in the choice she makes as being useless as it often happens in divers other occasions wherein she is hindered by Passion to discern things and to remember the true use of the organs That Coldness which is observed in the beginnings of Boldness Whence comes the coldness of the Face is nothing but a certain constancy and assurance of countenance which is not astonished at the sight of danger and which also witnesseth neither ardor nor impatience to fight And it hath been so called because that besides that it is the property of cold to render things immoveable defect of heat is commonly called Coldness Now this constancy and outward assurance comes from that which is made in the Soul and in the Spirits and which retaining the humors and the parts in the posture she findes them in hinders the blood from retiring or expanding it self and the organs from moveing For in this condition the countenance must not change colour must remain firm and settled must appear cold and resolute at the encounter of difficulties But the first cause of all these effects is that at that time the Soul raiseth it self not yet up against the enemy onely prepares herself for the combate as hath been said for when she assaults him the Spirits must rise up with her must carry blood and redress to the face and fill all with vivacity ardor and impatience The fierceness of the Countenance This Coldness is followed with a noble fierceness which animates the countenance of a Bold man chiefly when he goes into danger for it appears not commonly in the first motions of Boldness nor in the heat of fight but onely when he is ready for the assault and marcheth towards the Enemy So that it seems it is as a mean betwixt his staiedness at first and that ardor which transports him at last In effect as this Fierceness is a kind of severe and disdainful Pride which comes from the presumption and scorn which Boldness useth to inspire The Soul cannot be susceptible of it before she hath conceived a great opinion of her own strength because that is the ground of her Pride nor after she hath found any strong resistance because that makes her perceive the danger greater then she fancied it and that therefore she ought not to slight it It 's therefore onely when she is ready to fight for then she is full of the esteem which she hath of herself and then she disdains the enemy whose forces she hath not yet experimented However it be the Head is then kept erect and the Brow lifted up the look quick and full of assurance the countenance swell'd and double-gorged and hath I know not what in it that 's rude and disdainful Now all these are the effects and characters of Pride as in its place shall be said For the Soul which in this Passion swells it self raiseth up the Head lifts up the Brows and swels the Face as if she thought more room to enlarge her self or by those exterior motions she would make that appear which she hath in herself An assured look comes from that considence which accompanies its Pride and that severe and disdainful countenance from the indignation she hath to finde obstacles in her designs The Posture and the Gate contribute also to this Fierceness for all the Body keeps it self streight and set and if he stir his march is haughty and proud The Stature erects it self because the Soul raiseth and stiffens it self in the design which she hath to assault which puts the Body into such a posture as is most advantagious for it to act as we said in the Discourse of Hope As for the proud Gate it s that which Aristotle calls Magnifick which is natural to Lions and is a sign of strength and of greatness of Courage It 's performed with great and grave paces balancing the Body on either side and at every step lifting inwards and forewards the Shoulders But how difficult soever it be to express this action to the life it s yet harder to finde the true cause thereof Some have sought it in the same temperature which renders the Body robustious and have said that constitution being more firm and solid their parts also were more united and shut together and so they communicated the motion wherewith they were agitated to one another and in pursuit that when the Legs did lift themselves up and advance to go the Shoulders must be moved in the same manner Of a truth if all those
violent agitation all the functions of Sence and principally those of Judgment being not to be performed but when the Soul enjoys a great Tranquillity as Aristotle says Whence it also happens that Nature hath placed the brain so far from the principle of heat that its quiet might not be disturbed by the neighborhood of that active and turbulent quality as we shall more amply hereafter declare CHAP. III. Of the Motion of the Spirits and of the Humors in Anger AS Rivers which run into the Sea are sensible of those storms wherewith it is agitated The spirits in Anger have contrary motions those spirits which like Rivers take their source from the Soul and discharge themselves there also must needs suffer part of that great tempest which Anger raiseth therein And they must be shaken with the same violence and agitation which she resents in herself If it be therefore true that she is then moved with two contrary motions and that at the same time when Grief makes her retire Boldness raiseth her up and drives her forth it 's necessary that the spirits to whom she communicates all her commotions must be agitated after the same manner and that as she doth they must restrain and retreat themselves at the same instant when she raiseth and darts herself forth against ill And certainly did not Reason force the mind to confess this Truth the effects which Anger produces would sufficiently prove it For besides that a man often grows pale when he is carried away with this Passion that his voice is vehement and sharp and that commonly we see in his Face sadness mix and confound it self with fury which can proceed from nothing but this contrariety of motions it 's impossible to doubt it if we consider the different pulse which is proper for Anger and the consistence which the Heart and the Lungs have when it 's kindled in those parts for it hath this in particular That it makes the pulse higher and more elevated then large and extended And that it retires the Heart and Lungs in themselves although it then swells them and raiseth them up now this can be but from these two opposite motions we have spoken of as we shall more fully declare when we enquire into the causes of those effects But although this be most certain yet we must confess that it 's harder to conceive how such bodies as the spirits are can at the same time suffer motions which seem incompatible for although there are many examples in Nature which make it appear that a body may be moved in such a manner that Fish which swims against the course of the water are insensibly carried away with the force of the stream that a man may walk in a ship contrary to the course he shapes and that the heavens themselves are as they say carried towards the West by the Primum mobile whilst by their natural inclination they tend towards the East Yet this clears not the difficulty but leaves still a great difference betwixt these motions and those wherewith the spirits are agitated in this Passion for that there is but one motion in the former proper to the body moved the other is as a stranger and as the School says happens by accident but here these two motions which the spirits suffer are proper unto them it 's the same mover which produceth them it 's the same subject which receives them and it seems a contradiction that at the same time a thing should advance it self and go backwards that it should tend to two opposite places In a word that it should be and not be in the place where it is We must therefore fay that there are two ways whereby the spirits may receive these contrary motions How the spirits suffer contrary motions The first supposing them to have divers parts some of which are agitated after one manner and others after another just as it happens in the Streights where contrary Currents and Seas meet for as there are some waves which enter into one another some which justle and cause the beatings they give one another to boil exceedingly the same thing certainly is here done where one part of the Spirits which follows the motion of Grief and another which is carried away with that of Boldness and which meeting on the way causeth this turbulent and unequal agitation which is observable in this Passion the same way is like that which is performed in Boldness wherein the spirits stiffen themselves in themselves and yet forbear not to dart themselves forth For seeing the parts of a body may amongst themselves suffer a motion which may be different from that wherewith the whole body is agitated as it happens to the Arm when at the same time we stiffen and stretch it forth So it may also be that the spirits may retire in themselves and at the same time be violently driven into the exterior parts And truly as Grief makes its impression before Boldness because we must resent an injury before we will our revenge it 's certain that at that instant the spirits restrain themselves so that Boldness coming after and not driving Grief away it must raise the Spirits restrained as they are and without making them lose the disposition it finds them in drive them to those places where they are necessary Now although in little Anger 's it may happen that the Spirits will be moved onely after the latter manner yet commonly they are by both sorts at once and it must necessarily be The better to conceive this great storm which they raise in the veins we must fancy to our selves that they do not onely restrain themselves as we have said but that there are some which run and flie to the heart and others which issue out and impetuously cast themselves forth and that in this encounter which is thereby made they embroyl and confound themselves they justle and raise themselves up and so they make a current full of boilings and of foam it 's true that according as Grief or Boldness predominates in this Passion the ebbing and flowing of the spirits is stronger or weaker for when Grief is greater which is properly what we say is to be vexed there are more spirits which retire to the heart then there are which are darted forth On the contrary when Boldness is greater as when Anger is violent and turns even into Fury there are more spirits which dart themselves forth then retire and then although the shock which they give themselves cannot be so great and seems to be unable to cause this agitation which is when they are of equal force yet this hinders not that trouble and tempest to be therein formed with the same violence which the excess of this Passion requires forasmuch as if the shock is not then performed by the encounter of these opposite motions yet it 's made by the frequent arrival of the spirits which like impetuous floods precipitate themselves on
there is no inconvenience herein and that its true that all that is fair is pleasing and that the proportion of parts being fair must needs please the sight and that therefore they are graceful And indeed the ancients who in these things were wiser then we made not this difference and always placed the graces where beauty was For although Aristotle says that little ones might be call'd pretty and pleasing but that they were not to be esteem'd fair 't is that he spake of an entire and perfect beauty which is not to be found in little bodies for as much as they want that just proportion which belongs to the perfection of man Yet there is some ground for the difference which hath been since made between beauty and grace for as the matter and the form enter into the composition of man we have placed beauty in the figure and in the colour which belongs to the matter and grace in the motions which are effects of the soul not that grace is not in the colour and in the figure or that beauty is not in the motions but because she is more excellent in these by reason that the soul who is the principle thereof is more perfect then the matter and that action is the last perfection of things Beauty which ought to be the most agreeable hath been call'd by the name of grace although in effect it ought to be common to all that is fair and that the colour figure and motion which have all their beauties ought also to have every one their particular graces But to return to our subject the grace is a kind of air and means nothing more but that conformity and proportion whereof we have spoken For when the air is accompanied with this proportion its pleasing so that this air in general is in all those things which have a grace and it may be defin'd A certain exterior and sensible quality which is bred from the colour figure and motion of the parts And if we add that these things are proportionable and conformable to the perfection of man it will be the definition of grace We are notwithstanding to observe that the air appears more in one of these three things in some encounters then in the rest For that which is fixt and natural is chiefly in the figure and situation of the parts That which accompanies the passions depends most from the motion and the colour that of vertuous actions is sometimes in rest because reason hinders those motions which would not befit the moderation and quiet she seeks such is the grave and modest Mine such is the countenance of a man who meditates and thinks on great matters And it may be that even vices which are in excess have an active and turbulent air and those which are in the defect have quite the contrary so a hot and precipitate man is always in action and the lazy is immoveable besides the air appears sometime more in one part then in another and although it be more remarkable in the face then in any other place yet there is one which belongs to walking another in the carriage of the armes and another of the whole body The French hath been more happy to express those differences then any other language whatsoever Not content to say l'Air la Grace Air and Grace it adds la Mine la Contenance le Maintica le Geste le Port which as neer as we can render them are The Mine the Presence the Behaviour the Carriage and the Port. The Mine chiefly belongs to the face the port to the gate the carriage and the behaviour to the arms the Air the Grace and the Presence to the whole body And as the Port and the Gesture or Carriage denote motion so the Mine the Behaviour and the Presence apply themselves best to rest but the air and the grace are common to both of them However it be the air which is in Passions and in moral actions principally comes from motion but you must know what the cause of this motion is For upon this knowledge depends the greatest part of what we are to say and because it will better appear in the passions we will therefore by them begin the enquiry We have already said and we shall often be obliged to repeate that Passions are nothing but the emotions of the appetite by which the soul moves towards good and estrangeth it self from evil and as she hath divers organs which may be used to that end she also employs them and moves according to her intention Now the Spirits without question are the first she makes use of being the most agil and which take their birth from the same place where she forms her designs so that we need not wonder that they are the first to execute them since they seem to be the first who have the knowledge of them The soul then sends forth the spirits and scatters them over all the exterior parts either to acquire good or to oppose ill But when this is too powerful and she is sensible that she is not strong enough to resist it she retires them in and brings them back to the heart Now this flux and reflux brings two great changes because the humors being drawn along with them their arrival swels and agitates the parts and paints them of the same colour of which themselves are on the contrary their flight makes them fail looke pale and renders them immoveable Perhaps it would not be unprofitable to examine whether every passion hath a particular motion of the spirits and whether anger moves them otherwise then shame love joy or the rest which carries them outwardly Whether Fear retire them inwardly after another manner then Hate Aversion or Greif For if this were true and that we could know these differences we could with the more facility discover the causes of the alterations they produce For my part I beleeve that since in every Passion the appetite hath an emotion and a particular end the means it useth ought also to be particular and that the motion of the spirits must be conformable to the intention it hath and to the agitation it gives it self and therefore that that is done in one passion is different from those which are done in others So that its very likely that in one they cast themselves with impetuosity and high boylings like torrents and in another slide as sweetly as rivers that some make them overflow their banks others restrain them in their bounds that now their course is direct and presently again irregular Lastly That we may say love dilates them desire shoots them forth Joy sheds them abroad Hope holds them fast boldness drives them and that anger throws them forth in great boyling gulps and so of the rest as we shall more particularly see in the discourse of the Passions although to speak Truth our spirit is not clear-sighted enough to discern exactly all these differences and that in this
in old men and women and that the joy which moved them was caused either by the gain of some unhoped for victory or by the encounter of some very ridiculous object or by the discovery of some great secret in learning which are joyes which only belong to the minde In effect as spiritual things have that beyond corporal that they are more noble and that they enter into the soul wholly without separating themselves the possession ought also to be more perfect and the joy the more ravishing so that it is likely that the syncopes which are the effects of all violent Passions follow those spiritual joyes as the greatest and most powerful and that they rather happen to weak natures then to those which are stronger and more capable of resistance the soul then finding herself surprised at first sight with these objects and agitating with precipitation to unite her self to them the spirits which follow those motions issue from the heart and dart themselves with so much violence to the superior parts that they lose the union they had with their principle in the same manner as water divides it self being driven with too much impetuosity and because the heat ought continually to inspire the parts with its vertue and that the spirits only can communicate it when they come to disunite themselves from it these influences must then stop and the sensitive and vital actions which depend upon them must also cease till their reunion And because the soul is then quite ravished in the injoyment of that good which she esteems so excellent she cannot minde to remedy that interruption which is made in the spirits nor to bring back those which are scattered or to send others to fill those empty places they left So that these faintings often last long and sometimes cause death heat being quite perished and nature not having strength enough to repair its loss nor to recover its first estate But this disorder cannot happen in the Love whereof we speak for that corporal beauty is never wholly possest and that there is still somewhat which entertaines Desire Hope and Fear So that the soul dividing it self to several designs and suffering it self not to be so powerfully transported as she doth in the enjoyment of spiritual goods the spirits throw themselves not with so much precipitation nor impetuosity and are not so subject to the division which they sometimes suffer in Joy and which is the cause of those syncopes of which we have spoken We shall touch upon this matter again in other places let 's now consider what heat it is which this Passion raiseth and what humors it particularly moves It s certain that Love Joy and Desire disperse through all the body a moist and pleasing heat for as much as the spirits in those Passions stir the most temperate humors whose vapors are sweet and humid but these humors are sooner mov'd then others because that the spirits which have a great likeness with the purest and most subtil parts of the blood as being those whence they draw their origine ought to mingle and unite with them more easily then with those which are grosser and farther from its nature therefore we must not doubt but when they are agitated they first of al draw along with them those parts of the blood whereto they are more strongly tyed which being the most subtil are also the more easie to be moved Besides that the soul to whom the humors serve as instruments to arrive at the end she proposeth employs both the one the other according as they have qualities sit to execute what she wills whence it is that amongst venemous beasts it moves the venome in anger and in all the rest it moves flegme and melancholy because they are the malignant humors which may destroy the ill she assaults so that there being no enemies to combat in the Passion of which we speak it ought not to move any other humors but those which are conformable to the good she would enjoy So that there is only the sweetest and purest blood which commonly moves in Love and causeth that sweet and vaporous heat which disperseth it self through the whole body PART 4. What the causes are of the Characters of LOVE BUt its time to come to the point we proposed from these principles we have established we must draw the causes of the Characters of this Passion let 's first therefore examine moral actions There being no Passion which produceth so many different actions or causeth so many extravagancies as this it would prove a troublesome thing to enquire into them all and besides unprofitable since the greatest part of them proceed from other Passions which accompany it of which we are particularly to speak for which cause we will only touch here the principal which in my opinion are The continual thought a Lover hath of the beloved Object The high esteem he values it at The means he imploys to possesse it And the extravagancy of the words he makes use of to discover his passion for there are few actions in Love which may not be reduced to some of these four For the first although it be a thing common to all the Passions powerfully to possesse the minde and to keep it fix'd on the object which entertains them yet there are none who do it more powerfully or longer then Love For either they are impetuous or turbulent or else they are pliable and docile the first are presently dissipated and the others are to be appeased or diverted by the power of discourse nay even by other Passions So the angry ones sweeten themselves by pleasure and the delightful diminish by affliction and all of them may change into others more strong if more powerful objects then those which have raised them present themselves for a great grief makes us forget a less and an excess of joy takes away a mean one But with Love it is nothing so it hath the propriety to be vehement and long lasting not to hearken to reason and can seldom be changed or diminished by the force of what Passion soever forasmuch as the imagination is so wounded that it fancies there is no greater good to be possest and which can affoord it more contentment then its beloved object so that there is no other how excellent so ever it be that can divert its inclination and draw it to it because the soul never leaves a greater good to seek a less 't is in the same manner with displeasure for if we are beloved there is no pain nor grief which vanisheth not by the contentment which we receive thereby and if we are not as the soul knows no greater ill then that all others are too weak to dispossess that thought for which cause it continually considers the good whereof it s deprived it uncessantly desires it and seeks in the possession thereof the only remedy which may cure all its displeasures But the first origine
Anger and to Boldness to form it the Face must have somewhat of severe the Eyes must impetuously cast themselves towards the Enemy and the Head must be somewhat turned on the other side Now severity is necessary because we may cast our Eyes aside without looking through as it often happens in all those Passions which pursue good and flie from ill for Love Desire and Fear at every moment cast their Eyes aside because severity is wanting in some by reason of the pleasure which they inspire and in the other by reason of the astonishment which accompanies them In effect Severity is a certain rude pecuish stifness which the presence of ill imprints in the whole countenance and which is onely to be found in these Passions which assault ill forasmuch as the Soul stiffens it self onely in these encounters which we have spoken of the Eyes impetuously cast themselves against the Enemy because the Soul having put it self in a posture of fighting employs its looks as so many darts which she intends to cast on it but at the same time it turns the Head another way to shew its aversion from it that it fears it not and that it disdains to employ greater forces against it wherefore we commonly use this kinde of look in threatnings where by the minde and by words without coming to handy-blows we seek to stop the ill esteeming it not strong enough to need to be assaulted with its strongest arms in Indignation and in other little Anger 's whereto we intend not Vengance to all extremity and in the beginnings of Boldness before we are come to blows when we think to decide the combate by little skirmishes It 's true that it often happens that a man who dares not assault a potent Foe will look through him but that is but to hide his weakness and make him beleeve it is not for want of force that he assaults him not but rather that is out of generosity and because he esteems him worthy of so great an endeavor There are other kind of Looks which often happen in this Passion Why he contracts and raiseth the Brows as those which are urgent and unquiet those which are rude and furious but the first proceed from Desire and from Impatience whereof we have else-where spoken others come from Anger and from Fury which shall be examined in the Discourse of Anger Let 's now come to the motion of the Forehead and Brows To find the cause we must learn it from Physick that Nature hath not given to the Fore-head a proper motion for the muscles which cause it to move belong to the Brows which ought to be moveable for the preservation of the Eyes and to help them in their functions so that the Front never moves but when the Eye-brows move Now amongst those motions which they are capable of there are two principally which are commonly to be observed in Boldness and Anger the one is to lift them up and the other to strengthen them but it s very hard to tell what the motive is which the Soul proposeth it self in every of them nor of what use they might be in the Passions we have now spoken of It 's certain that according to the order which Nature hath prescribed to those parts they lift themselves up that they may the more freely see the object which presents it self either by enlarging the circle of the sight which restrains it self when they abate themselves or that they serve to the opening of the lids which after a manner they draw after them And they strengthen themselves to strengthen the eyes making as it were a rampire before them to stop those things which might fall from on high and to defend them from the light which comes from without for that the obscurity it causeth tempers the splendor gathers the spirits and in pursuit renders the sight stronger and more exact But if we consider these motions in the Passions the Soul indeed must propose other motives then these For I grant that the presence of ill obligeth it to seek all the liberty and all the strength of the eyes the better to discover the enemy and assault him the more rightly yet there are encounters wherein these cares seem useless or at least where they are greater then they need to be because it often happens that we that move the Brows and the sight at such things as never so little displease us and wherein it s nothing necessary to bring the least precaution Let 's therefore conclude that the disturbance and the blindness which the Passions cast in the Soul divert it often from those ordinary ways which Nature teacheth which make her forget the true use for which those organs were destinated and pursued her that what ought to serve her for one end may also be useful for another So in all vehement desires she brings water into the mouth although it be only necessary in that of Food so she makes those that are alone laugh and speak although all those actions are reserved for Society and Conversation As therefore she is accustomed to shrink up the Brows to fortifie the sight and to defend the Eyes against what might offend them she fancies she ought do the same in the encounters of all kinde of Enemies and by an error like that of Creatures which think they have hid all their Bodies when their Heads are covered so she thinks that fortifying her Eyes she inspires the same strength in the other parts and then all of them are in a condition to assault ill having put that upon the defensive It 's even so also that she raiseth up the Brows when she raiseth herself for although that serves her the better to see the Enemy yet she fancies this elevation helps her rising up and that it so far advanceth the execution of her design as to make the organs move so also Yet we may observe that that which furthers this error is that the parts are extreamly moveable and obedient and that they are in action sooner then the Soul is aware of it For the rest which are more heavy resist these preparations and require a greater deliberation to oblige them to stir We may yet add to this reason that the Soul will often by these external motions manifest the state and condition she is in So that she raiseth the Brows to shew that she raiseth herself and shrinks them up to witness that she fortifies and gathers her self together and this is the more likely for that without being moved with those agitations she forbears not also to make those parts move when she will dissemble her weakness and her fear and make us beleeve she hath a design to fight And now in pursuit of those motions which are made by the orders of the Soul the figure of the Fore-head necessarily changeth and altereth for of necessity when the Brows are lifted up the Forehead must wrinckle and when they shrink up that must
herself For in resistance she knows nothing but how to stiffen and streng then herself in herself to stop the effort of the Enemy But in assault she goes out of herself and casts herself on it to combate it here she darts and precipitates herself there she stays and remains stable here she boldly bestows the blow there she receives them with assurance In a word in the one she would overcome in the other she is content not to be overcome But if this Reason will not oblige us to distinguish these Passions which Philosophy hath always confounded let 's but follow the common opinion of men and the ordinary way of speaking in such like encounters For they never say That a man with Boldness bears his ill fortune nor that he suffers Infamy Grief or Death boldly but that he endures them that he suffers with Courage with Resolution with Constancy and with Patience If it be not Boldness therefore which produceth these effects and if amongst the Passions mentioned by the Schools there is none whereto we can refer them we are constrained to encrease the number of them and to add to the emotions of the Irascible Appetite that which serves to support ills and to resist them Now as those who discover a new Land commonly give it the name of those Countries which are best known unto them and which have some likeness together We have by their example taken the liberty to give this Passion the name of Constancy a vertue known to all the world and whereto it hath a great conformity And truly there are Passions which always carry the name of Vices because they always appear to be vitious as Envy and Impudence It must follow that those which always appear vertuous should also bear the name of Vertues Now this is of this kinde for in what condition soever we finde her what defects soever she hath we still see some image of Vertue in her And even when she is altogether irregular we are forced to admire her and to afford her those praises which are due to fair actions let 's boldly therefore give her the name of Constancy since she is not unworthy of those advantages which are due unto Vertue But if any man would object That what we call Passion is nothing but the action of that Vertue and therefore that it is nothing necessary to introduce a new Passion since the actions of Vertues are not properly Passions We must first say That all the actions of Constancy cannot be reckoned for actions of Vertue since some of them may be vicious as when we resist ills which necessarily we should flie or when we do not resist them as we ought nor when we ought nor for that end which Vertue hath proposed to it self Moreover an action of Constancy may be performed without possessing of the Vertue forasmuch as Vertue is a habit which is gotten by custom and that there is no habit acquired till we perform the first actions of Constancy Now if there are but three things in the Soul Power Habit and Passion this first action must be a Passion since it is neither a Power nor an Habit as it is easie to be judged In fine If Constancy is a Vertue it must needs have a Passion which serves for its subject and which makes if we may so speak the body and the substance of this action for Vertue to speak properly is but an order and a rule which Reason gives to the actions and motions of the Soul So that we must suppose motions before they can be regulated and these Motions are Passions which for that cause are called the substance of Vertues Constancy being then a Vertue ought to have a Passion to work upon which is no other but that which we have spoken of for the reasons already declared Now although we ought not to think it strange that both of them bear the same name since the word Boldness is common both to the Passion and to the Vertue yet if after all these reasons any shall think its to prophane the name of Constancy to assign it to a Passion I will not oppose him he may if he please chuse that of Strength of Courage because the Soul stiffens it self to resist the ill which assaults it as shall be seen in the following Discourse Let 's therefore no longer stop at words but examine the things in that order which we have proposed You must not think to meet here with an insolent and an ambitious Passion which like Love or Boldness would be Queen and Mistris of the rest The Elegy of Constancy She is too generous to use flatteries and baseness which the one employs to establish its power and she is too modest to subject her Companions by force and violence as Boldness doth what advantage soever she hath over them she yeelds them the precedence without pretending to command she contents her self not to obey them And without marching at the head of the Passions it 's sufficient for her to be a follower of the Vertues In effect it 's she which maintains and preserves them it 's she which makes them overcome and which crowns them and he who would more nearly examine what she doth for them might boldly say that if she brings them not forth yet at least she accomplisheth them and renders them worthy of the names they bear and of the recompence they expect and truly a vertue which yeelds and keeps not firm which gives up its arms after the first fight or flies after the victory is an imperfect Vertue And the perfection which it wants can be added unto it by nothing but Constancy which alone can consummate commenced vertues and make them deserve the glory they aspire unto But I say further that to examine them from their birth we may see that they wholly owe it unto her and that after reason hath conceived them it 's she that brings them forth which makes them operate and makes them subsist For it 's certain that what service soever Vertue draws from the Passions they are the onely enemies which resist her they alone form those difficulties which cross her and it 's none but they which are capable to stifle her when she comes to light and to destroy her when she is in her greatest strength Without doubt were there no Passions Vertue would appear in the Soul like a pure light which would have neither vapors nor clouds to overcome It would be a Star which would direct its course towards good without any let and which would conduct us to felicity without trouble or disquiet We should no longer speak of those vices and crimes but as of such monsters as were invented by Fables and all that great croud of ills which at every moment disturbs the tranquillity of life would be unknown or impotent at least if it yet caused any disorders we should not rescent them since it's Fear and Grief onely which render them sensible But as
the other to stop it which is above the power of a material and determinate Faculty Nay even the Understanding how separate soever it be from matter and how universal soever it be would never go so far had she not those several stages and those several degrees which its known to have For those who have most curiously examined the nature thereof confess that there are as it were two parts in it the one of which is low next to the sensitive Soul and which by reason of that neighborhood suffers it self to be easily carried away and corrupted by the sences the other is more pure and raised up higher which for that cause is called the top and height of the Understanding wherein God hath effused the light of true Reason and the seeds of all the vertues and it 's that also which inspires the Will to resist those Passions which the other hath raised there unknown or contrary to its advice thus these contrary designs whereof we have spoken are not formed by one and the same power since that which serves for Constancy is formed in the highest part of the Understanding and that which serves to that Passion to which it is to be opposed is made in the lower region But we have marched too far on precipices and on thorns The Soul resists not ill but by Constancy let 's leave these by-ways and these subjects which with their difficulty astonish the mind Let 's onely observe that Constancy and strength of courage is alone the only means by which the Soul truly resists the Passions for although ordinary Philosophy proposeth others unto us as to divert our thoughts from the object which raiseth them to weaken their power by Ratiocination to fall upon other contrary Passions and the like Yet to consider it well therein there is no true resistance they are rather flights or fights then a simple defence For when we will not consider the injury which we receive that is not to defend our selves from Anger it 's to flie it even as it is to assault it when we employ a contrary Passion for to destroy it But yet to deserve the honor to have resisted them in what way soever it were we must have had the design for we may divert a man from being angry we may also inspire another Passion in him which may appease his fury and fear may fall upon him which may take from him that fence of vengeance which he may have conceived And yet a man will not say that in these encounters he resists his Passion for that he had it not in his intention It is even so with Beasts in whom one Passion may weaken and destroy another in whom the same Appetite may stiffen it self and by its stiffening hinder it self from taking the impression of another motion No they do not for that resist their Passions because besides that they cannot as I have said form the design of it it must needs be that they must be able to reflect on their actions against those maxims which we have elsewhere established Let 's then conclude that Constancy is a motion of the Appetite by which the Soul confirms and stiffens it self in it self with an intention to resist those ills which assault it To examine now those ills would be to fall into useless and impertinent repetitions for they are the same which move Boldness and all what we have said of them in that place may be here applied It will suffice if we remember that under the notion of ill we understand not onely a pure privation but also the causes which produce it and the incommodities which follow it and that the two latter are the true ills which the Soul resists The differences of Constancy We should have nothing more to say on this subject did not the method which we have followed in the rest of the Passions oblige us to observe the most remarkable differences of Constancy and chiefly those which may serve to afford us a reason for those Characters which she imprints in the Soul and in the Body Let 's then say that there are none essential forasmuch as the motion and the motive which cause all the essence of this Passion are equally to be found in all sorts of Constancy as for those which we call accidental the most remarkable are drawn from the subject wherein she is found or from the object which raiseth it or from the relation which it hath with Reason For if we consider its subject it hath one which is in the Will and another which is in the sensitive Appotite In respect of the Object there are divers sorts according to the several sorts of ill which assault the Soul but the most considerable is that which resists the Passions and that which opposeth it self to the violence and endeavors of exterior ills this is common to all Animals and depends altogether on corporal strength namely on those which are most proper to suffer such as are to be found in the melancholy temperature of which we have spoke in the Discourse of Boldness the other is proper and peculiar for Men and principally for those which are most reasonable because it 's commonly Reason which moves us to oppose the Passions so that herein there needs no other strength but that of the Soul wherefore those whose spirits are strong by nature or by study are most susceptible of it It 's true that the force of the minde depends often from the temperature whence it is that young people and Women whose spirits by reason of their constitution are less strong are troubled to resist their Passions Finally There are some that are vertuous others vicious according as they are conformable or contrary to right Reason and so serve for the matter of Vertues or Vices In effect Justice borroweth from this Passion Firmness which is necessary unto it to resist Love Hatred and such other things as might corrupt it Temperance could not moderate the motions of the concupiscible Appetite but by its means and those Vertues which force produceth by resistance such as are Patience Constancy and Perseverance are maintained onely by it On the contrary when she straggles out of the right way and abandons the conduct of Reason there is no Vice which she doth not encourage and assist because she alone resists those motions which the Conscience inspires always in those who undertake or execute any evil design But although she may be found in all vicious actions there are some wherein she appears more as in Temerity in Hard-heartedness and in Opiniastrecy as we shall hereafter make it appear Now all those terms wherewith we use to express Boldness are also employed for Constancy For to say a man hath suffered death Constantly we use to say he hath suffered it with a Courage with Resolution with Assurance without fear and without apprehension and this happens from that Constancy is as it were a demy Boldness at least it is
and that a Constant Man will see the greatest dangers and suffer most cruel pains without bending his Brow Now this comes either from his great attention in considering the ill for it makes him the more to open his eyes and consequently to lift up his Brows which then cannot be restrained or from the confidence he hath of his forces which defends him from thinking on such small precautions or from the design he hath by this outward immobility to make it appear that his Courage is not to be shaken What his Silence is Silence is not here fierce and disdainful as it is in Boldness because fierceness and disdain are effects of Pride which are seldom to be found in true Constancy But it 's modest and serious and proceeds meerly from the attention the Soul is in for to defend herself and from the confidence she hath of her own strength for that makes her forget words and this defends them since as we have already said they are arms of weakness As for the rest of the Characters which we have now spoken of such as are the coldness of the Face the strength of the Voice and Pulse holding the Breath having the Head and Stature erect there is no difference neither in their effect nor in their cause from those which accompany Hope and Boldness for which cause we send back the Reader to those places where we have carefully observed them and where it doth appear that if they follow those two Passions it 's because they are always upheld by Constancy and strength of Courage But if she hath such a contexture and conformity with them Why Constancy hath not the rest of the Characters of Hope why hath she not also all their other Characters Certainly it 's because besides the stifness which they give the Soul they inspire also other motions which are not to be found in Constancy for Hope indeed stiffens it self against difficulties but at the same time she aspires to the good which she seeks and still expects some help which may deliver her up the possession which makes her unquiet and impatient she sighs and casts up her eyes which happens not in Constancy because she hath no other design but to resist Ill. The same happens in Boldness which stiffens it self also to strengthen it self but besides that darts it self forth and throws it self on the Enemy So that all what follows this darting forth belongs not to Constancy which when she is alone never suffers this agitation so the thorow Looks the widening of the Nostrils the thunder of the Voyce the fierceness of the Countenance a vehement respiration the redness and heat of the parts and the like which proceed from the raising up of the Soul and from the violence wherewith it is agitated are not to be met withal in all in that Constancy which is exempt from those great storms It 's true that its Pace is like that of Boldness because that in stiffening herself she makes the Body weighty and march the more heavily But she balanceth it not as that doth forasmuch as she hath not that impetuosity which causeth the shoulders to turn inwardly in which this ballancing of the body chiefly consists and this bold Gate We may say as much of the Post which is Noble without Pride for the Head is lifted up without any fierceness the Stature is streight without lifting up the Shoulders and the motion of all the parts without constraint or violence is equal and modest Now all this is conformable to that condition which the Soul is in in this Passion for that in stiffening herself she stiffens the parts also which consequently become streight and that this posture is most safe and least exposed to injuries seeing she can the better see the enemy and is every way the readier to resist him But the fierceness of the Countenance the lifting up of the Shoulders which are principal marks of Pride as shall be shewn in its place they are to be found therein because the Soul nor ought nor can extend or lift it self up nor make any violent motion being stiffened as she is The stifness of the Body and parts is a proper and particular effect of this Passion When comâ—â—â— stiffness of the Body for if it be in some other of them we may say that it 's by her means and because that she accompanies them but she employs it not when she is to resist any thing which is corporeal otherwise she abuseth herself and makes a useless endeavor as hath been said Now to know wherein this stifness consists and how it 's made we must observe besides what hath been said hereupon in general That a thing may be two ways stiff either because it resists the touch or that it cannot be staggered now it may resist the touch by being hard and it 's hard either because it 's dry and solid as a stone or because it 's extended as a Baloon or because its parts are shut up and gathered together as those are which are prest and crowded neither can it be shaken either because its weighty or because it hath a motion contrary to that which would overturn it Thus a Column stands firm on its own weight a building supports it self by its props and butteresses the Members stiffen themselves being equally drawn by the opposing muscles which being supposed it 's certain that Constancy useth all these means to stiffen the parts if we except that hardness onely which comes from driness forasmuch as there needs a long time to produce that quality Yet must we make some distinction for that some stiffen themselves in one way others in another the Spirits and the Members which move voluntarily become firm by the opposition of their motions the Muscles by compression the Body by its weight and props which we must particularly examine We have shewn how the Spirits stiffen themselves and how they communicate their stifness to the parts but there is this difference That the stiffening of the Spirits comes from the contrariety of motions and that which is communicated is performed by their upholding of them for being stiffened it must necessarily be that they support the parts which touch them especially if they be fluid as the Humors are Those Members which are destined for voluntary motion as the Head the Eyes the Arms and the Legs render themselves also stiff by the contrariety of motions for being composed of several Muscles some of which cause them to move upwards and others downwards some to the right hand some to the left when they are all agitated at once they must needs remain firm and stiff and without going either way and then they must suffer that motion which is called Tonick which is the most violent of all and which makes us most weary For which cause we are more weary standing upright then walking up and down and it 's more troublesom to look long upon a fixed and settled look
that Passion which this motion had onely commenced And this is the more easie to be believed for that the motion of the spirits which makes no part of the Passion as that of the Appetite doth causeth the same effect For if it happen that the spirits are agitated with a motion proper to a Passion the Soul which sees what passeth in her organs and knows after what manner she is accustomed to stir them up presently fancies that object which ought to excite this motion and at last agitates it self conformably to that motive which this object inspires it withall and so that esmotion which it meets within the spirits It 's thus that Musick produceth Passion it 's thus that Love out of inclination is formed as we have shewed in the Treatise we have made thereof It 's then true that Anger is nothing else but Grief and Boldness united and confounded together and that the turbulent and unequal agitation which the Soul is constrained to suffer in the encounter and in the shock of these two opposite Passions makes that difference of motion which is proper unto it and which distinguisheth it from all the rest In effect we cannot conceive that the Appetite in Grief retires it self and that at the same time Boldness raiseth it up but we must fancy we see a Sea agitated with contrary winds and waves for the same combate which is made amongst the waves the same boylings which it raiseth up the same efforts with which it beats upon the shoar Finally the same trouble and confusion which this great Main suffers during the tempest are in the Soul when she is stirred up by these two violent Passions So that it is not without reason that we say the Sea grows angry and that Anger is a tempest since there is the same agitation in either of them and that both of them spring from the contrariety of motions which shake these two great depths But we may say That if Anger be a mixture of Grief and of Boldness it cannot be in the rank of simple Passions as we have hitherto conceived and as at the beginning of this work we our selves resolved Certainly there needs no contest hereupon and it were to fight against the truth to defend the common opinion for if there is a Passion which is mixt and composed it 's chiefly this where Grief and Boldness Desire and Hope are all met together That if we proposed it as a simple Passion besides that we did not then deduce those reasons which ought to oblige us to shun the errors of the School we may freely confess that upon the way we often discovered those things which at first we never thought to have met withal and that considering more nearly the nature of this Passion Reason and Truth have made it appear unto us to be altogether composed that is to say of Grief and Boldness as of its essential parts and of Desire and Hope as of inseparable accidents or necessary conditions which accompany it For it 's certain that he that is angry ought to desire and hope for revenge Yet the Mind may separate these two Passions from Anger without destroying its Nature forasmuch as without considering them it may conceive the Soul may be touched with Grief for the injury received and that she assaults the cause which caused it wherein all the Essence of Anger consists So that now we may define it to be A turbulent Agitation which Grief and Boldness move in the Appetite Definition of Anger whereby the Soul retires in herself to estrange herself from the injury received and at the same time raiseth herself up against the cause which caused it to be done for to revenge herself of it Whence we may judge that as this Passion is mixed its causes and effects are also of the same nature for it hath indeed two objects to wit the Injury and him who did it It hath two ends the one to estrange it self from ill and the other to revenge it self Lastly it 's composed of two motions which being united cause this turbulent agitation wherein we have said the principal difference of this Passion consists Yet we are to observe that as commonly Boldness vapors more in Anger then in Grief and yet that there are some Anger 's in which Grief appears stronger then Boldness It s certain that in these encounters the motions of these two Passions are proportionably stronger or weaker and that it often happens that its rising up is greater then its contraction and that sometimes also its contraction is more then its lifting up but if they are equal Boldness always appears more then Grief because in that the Soul produceth and casts it self forth and in Grief she hides and inwardly retires herself as we shall make it more particularly appear in the Chapter wherein we shall examine the nature of that Passion We must conclude this long Discourse with a resolution of an important difficulty which may here be made Who those are which are inclided to Anger For perhaps some will say that if Boldness makes a part of Anger it will follow that those who are naturally bold will also be most inclined to this Passion On the contrary those who are timorous should never be sensible of it Although experience teacheth us that those who are truly Bold are seldom provoked to Anger and that Children Women and sick persons which are weak and timorous are easily moved thereunto But this objection is easily answered if we remember that Boldness alone never produceth this Passion but that Grief must also meet with it that these mix and confound themselves together In a word that a man must be sensible of injuries and have a quick and agile Boldness to be susceptible of Anger Now those who have an heroick Boldness are not sensible of injuries unless they are very cousiderable because they despise most of those things which assault them and that that Melancholy which is in their temperature retains the fury of their spirits giving them time to examine the offences and to consider whether they deserve to be chastised On the contrary those who are weak of body or of mind and who have a very agile heat as Children and Women and those who have any remarkable defect finding themselves more exposed to injuries are easily born away with a desire of vengeance because their weakness makes them apprehend every thing and the subtile heat which they have is so quickly inflamed that they have not time enough to consider whether they are truly injured and whether they ought to revenge themselves or whether indeed they have the power and that is the reason why the Cholerick are the most angry of all because they have an ardent and active heat which renders all their actions precipitate and bereaves them of time and means to judge rightly of things For it 's certain that there is no quality so much an enemy to Reason as Heat and a
the impetuosity and the boilings wherwith the blood and spirits are agited but we must presently judge that that is the cause which makes the Veins and Arteries swelled and extended and that all the rest of the parts are full and puffed up and whosoever shall represent to himself the impatience and the transport wherein the Soul is will nothing wonder at these motions which in this Passion the Body suffers The Head is lifted up and the Stature grows erect for as much as the Soul raiseth up herself to assault the Enemy And although he be absent she forbears not to put herself into this posture as if she were ready to throw herself on him for that the violence of those Passions which trouble her represent him to her thought as if he were truly present and as if he ought in effect to feel the blows she intends to inflict The frequent flinging out of the Arms The motion of the parts in Anger a light and quick pace a continual change of posture and place are effects which note the endeavors and sallies of the Soul the precipitation and impatience she hath to revenge herself But whence comes it that we set up our Hands by our sides when with anger and threatnings we quarrel with any man it is without doubt to confirm the parts that the Muscles of respiration which they uphold may the more powerfully operate and by that means the voice may have the more force and be the longer lasting For which cause we are never content to place our hands thus on our sides but that we also advance the Arms and the Elbows whereby enlarging and extending the Shoulders we render them for the same purpose more stiff As for those blows wherewith a man in Anger beats the ground and all what comes under his hands or under his feet it 's very likely that they are such means as the soul useth to give a repulse to those difficulties which traverse her designs and that the trouble and blindness she is in causing her to take all things for true obstacles which stop her she strikes against she drives and she beats them as it were to break them and to put them by or else they are the effects of a precipitated Vengeance which Anger doth discharge on the first Objects it meets having not either the patience or the power to make them be rescued by its real Enemy It 's thus that Dogs bite the stones which are thrown at them it is thus we break the Sword which wounded us in a word it is thus we revenge our selves on our selves and above all its what concerns those from whom we have received an injury But what reason can we give for all those shakings of the Head which are remarkable in this Passion Whence the shakings of the Head What can oblige the Soul to move it one while to the right and then to the left sometimes up and sometimes down and sometimes on one side onely And to what end doth she cause these so extravagant motions and so different the one from another For to conclude that they are signs and natural effects which Anger produceth in all men of what Nation or of what constitution soever they are So that if Nature doth nothing in vain she must herein have her causes and reasons as well as in her greatest and most considerable actions It is true in my judgement they are very hard to be known and it is with them as with most part of things which hide them selves so much the more unto the Mind the more they discover themselves unto the Sences and which are as difficult to be comprehended as they are easily remarkable And certainly as all natural things are made for some end or out of necessity we cannot say but that the alteration of the Body or the agitation of the Humors must cause these motions by a necessary consequence as it happens in the redness of the Face in the wrinckles of the Forehead in the splendor of the Eyes and the like which are formed by necessity without being destined for any use and if we would place them in the rank of actions which are performed for some end it is nothing easie to observe what motive the Soul therein proposeth it self no what service she pretends to draw from thence To give further light to these obscurities you must first know whether these motions are not in other Passions and afterwards seek those motives for the which they were therein formed and lastly to see whether they may be applied to Anger It is certain that we use to shake the Head and to give it readily two or three turns about when any thing displeaseth Why we toss the Head as especially when we refuse or disapprove of any thing when we are sensible of an ungrateful smel or when we tast ought that is disgustful For which cause the vulgar commonly call Wine when it is not good Wine with two ears because it makes those two parts move when we turn the Head from one side to the other and that by that motion we would signifie that we found it to be naught But what relation can this action have with these sentiments Is it not that the Soul would turn away the face where the organs of the sences are from those objects which are displeasing to it as she useth to fix them on those which please Or that she seeks by that endeavor to estrange from her what is troublesome At least it is thus that when any thing incommodates those parts we shake them about to drive them away for although this in these encounters we speak of be useless unto it yet are they nothing extraordinary since she often deceives herself in the same manner upon other occasions wherein she abuseth those means which Nature hath prescribed her to attain her ends employing them in others where they are of no use as hath been shewed speaking of that water which Desire causeth in the Mouth and of the motion of the Brows at the sight of distasteful things Or we may rather say that this shaking of the Head is a mark the Soul would make of the impression which some kind of objects make on her and that it is an outward image of that action which she performs in herself For it is her custom that when she would have that appear outwardly which is done within she causeth those motions of the organs which have some relation and resemblance with her own as we may judge by the laughter of the looks and by all those other effects whereof we have spoken in this Work And certainly since that at the encounter of pleasant things she makes particular signs which make known the sence she hath of them she must needs also have some for those which are displeasing So that if she sweetly casts down the Head when good presents it self unto her as it happens when we meet a friend when we approve a
cannot be divided without diminishing the force and grace which the whole pretends to As for the rest wonder not if in the Pictures of the Passions I present thou findest some touches of vertues and vices and if for example in the description of Boldness thou encountrest actions which seem to belong to valor and generosity I consider Passion in its nature and in its essence and as it is a motion of the Soul every where where I know this Motion to be I also acknowledge the Passion So that vertue being nothing but a regulated motion and a Passion moderated by Reason and since a moderated Passion is still a Passion Discoursing in general of the Passions I may speak of those which are under Vertues direction aswell as those which are directed by Vice The Stationer to the Reader THe Gentleman whose pastime it was to English these Characters as they had pleased him so he judged they could not but be grateful to an ingenuous Reader and therefore commended them to the Press And to shew how far he was from the new vanity of erecting his Statue in the front he thought fit rather to use the practice of Painters who how well soever they may have copied Master-pieces never set their names but to Originals that as he pretends no Praise he may thereby frustrate Censure Yet he is consident of his Authors merit and that this Work of his will move love and delight in all but those who are possest with malignant Passions they indeed may quarrel with Love oppose Desire vex Joy frown on Laughter and even put Hope out of patience but against such Laughter alone will be sufficient And for the rest if the English Chanel run too neer the French Coast and that some may think the Translation over-fraught with Gallicisms perhaps they are such as themselves in their ordinary discourse often use with affectation But from them the Passions take about and steer their course to the Ladies acknowledging them the onely Admirals of these Seas to whom whether they come safe or are shipwrack'd they of right belong since none do more powerfully cause or more sensibly suffer them to whose fair hands I am obliged to present them and from whom alone they promise themselves protection March 10. 1649. JOHN HOLDEN A Necessary Advertisement To the READER WHat I here present is but a small part of a Great Designe wherein I intend to examine the Passions the Vertues and the Vices the Manners and Customs of People the several inclinations of Men their tempers the features of their faces in a word in which I pretend to shew thee what is most excellent and most rare in Physicks Morality and in Politicks I know thou already thinkest that my undertaking is full of Temerity that it is beyond my strength and that there is no likelihood I should ever accomplish a Work the least pieces whereof have startled the greatest men of the former times But I intreat thee Reader to consider that I am but at the beginning of it and that I shall not proceed without the knowledge of thy opinion and further advice therein For if this Essay please thee not and if thou believest that so rich a matter requires more expert and more cunning hands then mine I am ready to quit the Work and to finish it where I commenced it I shall at least have the satisfaction to have endeavoured to please thee and to have found for thy divertisement a designe which may pass for the greatest and the fairest which was ever conceived had it been but performed And that I may give thee a more particular knowledge thereof I will shew thee the Platform and make it appear that ill Architects may have fair Capriccio's and may sometimes form noble Designes What I then proposed to my self was to present thee with The Art to know Men which contains Five general Rules The first is founded on the Characters of the Passions of the Vertues and the Vices and shews that those who naturally have the same air which accompanies the Passions or Actions of Vertue or Vice are also naturally inclined to the same Passions and to the same Actions The second is drawn from the resemblance Men have with other Creatures and teacheth us that those who have any part like to those of beasts have also the inclinations they have The third is grounded on the beauty of the Sex and shews that men who have any thing of a feminine beauty are naturally effeminate and that those women who have any touch of a manly beauty participate also of manly inclinations The fourth is drawn from the likeness which the men of one Climat have with that of another So those who have short noses thick lips curl'd hair and a tawny skin as the Moors have are subject to the same vices to which they are inclined The fifth and last may be called Syllogistick because that without using particular signes which usually designe the Manners of persons it discovers them by discourse and reasonings which is done by two principal means The first is the knowledge of Tempers for without knowing the signes of the inclination a man hath to be angry so as we know that he is cholerick it will suffice to speak him to be inclined to that Passion The second is the most ingenuous and is drawn from the connexion and concatenation which the Passions and the Habits have amongst themselves So when we know a man is fearful we may assure our selves that he is inclined to Avarice that he is cunning and dissembling that he usually speaks sofily and submissively that he is suspicious incredulous an ill friend and the like And although we do not observe particular signes of all these later qualities yet we believe they are found in him because we know the principle whence they deduce their origine These are the first strokes which designe the Platform of the Great Work we intend For as all those Rules are grounded on the relation which Men have with other things its impossible to apply them well without the knowledge of those very things And it is bootless to say that any man is inclined to such a Passion because he bears the Character thereof unless we know what the Character thereof is We must therefore make as many Discourses as there are grounds for these general Rules and divide the whole Work into seven parts The I shall treat of the Characters of the Passions of Vertues and of Vices The II of the nature of the creatures which may be useful to this knowledge The III of the beauty of men and women and of the inclinations which follow them The IV of the difference of the bodies and manners of people The V of Tempers and of the effects which they cause in the Minde and on the Body The VI of the connexion which the Passions and the Habits have amongst themselves The VII shall reduce in order all the signes which shall have been
was to be added But as they are actions common to the Minde and to the Body and Physick and Moral Philosophy must help one the other to discourse exactly of them it happened that those who have undertaken it could never employ them both and that those who could have done it have had other designes which have hindered them from discovering to us the nature of these things whose good or ill use causeth all the felicity or mischief of our lives In effect if they are well regulated they form the Vertues and preserve Health but if they grow to excess they are the source whence the disorders of the Soul and of the Body deduce their origine And whoever would consider the great number of Sicknesses which momentanily assault the life of Man and the several ways whereby she customarily loseth her self will finde but few whose first cause was not some one of the Passions of the Minde So that we may say that the most profitable parts of Wisdom and Physick have not hitherto been discovered and that if I have endeavoured to give them any part of my cares and of my small labour I have not so much strayed from my Duty and my Profession as some may imagine To conclude what success soever my Undertaking have it in my opinion deserves some approbation or at least excuse and indeed Reader I must have both to oblige me to pursue it In a word if thy judgement be favourable it will afford me both very much glory and very much pains ERRATA In the Epistle dedicatory page ult line 6. for leave read learn l. 8. for love read have In the Book p. 7. l. 14. for ever read even P. 13. l. 25. for Maintica read Maintion P. 32. l. 4. for other read others P. 48. l. 22. for enlights read enlightens P. 99. l. ult for diffent read different P. 103. an accent upon Catoché P. 133. It would be c. P. 149. l. 24. for thicks read thickens P. 192. l. 14. for ardors read orders P. 226. l. 27. for graceful read grateful P. 260. l. 25. for venters read re-enters P. 272. l. 2 for general read generous P. 282. l. 21. for Theorictus read Theocritus THE CHARACTERS OF THE PASSIONS CHAP. I. What the Characters of the PASSIONS are in generall NATURE having destin'd Man for a civil life thought it not sufficient to have given him a tongue to discover his intentions but she would also imprint on his forehead and in his eyes the images of his thoughts that if his speech happened to belye his heart his face should give the lye to his speech In effect how secret soever the motions of his soul are what care soever he takes to hide them they are no sooner formed but they appear in his face and the disquiet they cause is sometimes so great that they may be truely called tempests which are more violent at Shore then out at Sea And that he who advised a man to consult his glass in his anger had reason to beleeve that the Passions are better known in the eyes then in the soul it self But that which is more wonderful those actions which spring from vertue and vice discover themselves in the same manner And although the goodness or malignity they have seem to have nothing to doe with the body yet they leave with it I know not what kind of images And even the soul not perceiving what it doth disposeth the parts in such a manner that by the plight and posture which they take we may judge whether its actions are good or ill Neither can the understanding work so secretly but the senses must perceive it If it elevate its thoughts if it recollect it self the looks grow fixed the car hears not in fine there is a general suspension of sense and motion And whether it be that at the same time the soul cannot intend such different functions or that the inferiour part respects and wil not divert its Mistris we know that this is imployed when the other operates not It s a most certain thing that the body changeth and varies it self when the soul is moved and that this performs almost no actions but it imprints the marks thereof which we may call Characters since they are the effects of them and that they bear their image and figure Now because the first Rule of Physionomy is grounded on these Characters and that it maketh use of them to discover inclinations assuring us that those who naturally have the same air and the same countenance which accompanies their moral actions are inclined to the same actions The designe which we have undertaken makes us here propose the particular Characters of all the Passions and after them of Vertues and Vices But first we must know wherein these Characters consist and what are the causes of them The Characters of Passions and of habits being the markes of the motions and designs of the soul are also its effects as is already said but because there are also two sorts of effects those which are performed in the soul and those which are effected in the body there are also two kinds of Characters the one Moral the other Corporal For if you consider a man in anger Violence appears in all his actions his words are full of threats and injuries he crys out he runs he strikes reason and remonstrances offend him and he knows no friends but those who favour his passion On the other side his countenance is inflam'd his eyes sparkle he wrinckles his forehead his words are fierce his voice is terrible his lookes are frightful and his whole behaviour is furious These then are two kinds of effects and two sorts of Characters the one whereof consists in moral actions and the other in the change and alteration of the body Now we must see what these actions are and what this change is for all moral actions cannot be used for Characters otherwise some would be Characters of themselves since Passions and Vertues are moral actions To take away this difficulty you must observe that the essence of human actions consists in the inward emotion which the object forms in the appetite and that all those things which are done in pursuance thereof are but as rivolets running from the same spring So anger is nothing but a desire of Vengeance and in the pursuit of that emotion the soul produceth exterior actions which may serve to this purpose as threatnings blows and other violences which we call Characters because they express and discover the alteration and interior motion of the appetite But there is also another thing to be here considered and it is that when we speak of Passions of Vertues and of Vices we are not to conceive them as qualities or simple actions but as compleat qualities and actions which are accompanyed by many others and yet which all tend to one principal end which the soul proposeth For although love to speake properly is but a simple
emotion of the soul by which it unites it self to that which is lovely Yet we doe not therein form its whole Idea we consider it as a Passion that hath beauty for its object and which to possesse it employs desire hope delight c. In the same manner Justice is a stedfast will to render to every one what belongs to him But to effect it she makes use of Prudence which makes her consider the quality of persons the time the place and all other circumstances She makes use of Temperance and of strength to moderate those passions which often traverse her design and although they are actions which precisely concern her not yet she forbears not to appropriate them because they conduce to her principal end Now all these borrowed and posterior actions are also a part of moral Characters because they design the passion or principal habit which is the spring and first cause whence they are derived It s far more difficult to say wherein the Corporal Characters consist and what intention nature hath in forming them We see that every passion carries I know not what air on the face that vertue sheds into its actions a certain grace and an agreeable aspect which is not to be found amongst the vitious but as we have always called it The I know not what it seems that we are thereby taught that it could not be said what it was For I suppose as it is true that the Characters we seek are nothing but the air of which we have but now spoken Now this is found in so many different things that it s almost impossible to observe what of common they have whereupon we may establish its essence for it most commonly happens in the motion of the parts and some have beleev'd that this air was nothing but that motion But it s certain there is a sixt and natural air wherein the parts move not and which is no effect of the souls emotions So that it would be more likely that this air were nothing but a certain relation of the parts amongst themselves which happens from the situation they take when they move or when they rest But nether is this sufficient since the colour which that relation compriseth not partly gives the air to the face and that ruddiness is one of the principal Characters of shame as paleness is of fear this ever encreaseth the difficulty since that in defining beauty we say that its a just proportion of the parts accompanied with a pleasing colour and with a grace and that colour and grace are esteem'd as two different things For grace is nothing but a pleasing air nay even custome often applyes it to what it is not when we say a man hath an ill grace and in this case grace is the same with air That we may know then what this marvelous air is where the serenity and the storms of the minde appear we are first to observe that the air of persons is discovered in their pictures that the grace of a fair face is exprest by colours and that consequently there must be somewhat of fixt and which flyes not away since there are none but stable and permanent things which painting hath power over and that of all visible objects there is only motion which subjects not it self to the pencil Now it is impossible to finde any thing stable common to living things and their pictures besides the figure and colour of the parts So that it seems this air is to be there placed But because there is yet another thing in the grace which the art of painting cannot attain to and that there is a certain vivacity which can never be fixt on the cloth we must with reason beleeve that motion serves also to this grace it s that which renders the beauty lively and piercing without which its sad dead and without attraction We cannot in effect doubt but that the motion of the parts gives something to this vivacity since 't is a part of its perfection But because that after it hath ceased there is yet I know not what which remains on the face and that we see a certain splendor shine in the eyes which depends neither upon their figure motion nor colour we must necessarily add to all this a certain secret influence which being sent into the eyes disperseth it self over the parts of the face and without doubt after having well enquired what it may be we shall finde it to be the spirits which the soul continually sends into those parts which leave there the brightness of the natural light they have and indeed there are faces which neer seem well and afar off appear very ill coloured because the spirits animate it not and that the splendor they give is so weak that the species of it cannot reach far and so they leave those of the colour more withered This grace then is in the colour in the figure in the motion of the parts and of the spirits And yet this doth not say that all these things are this grace For were they in other subjects then man they would not please and green which is the most perfect of all colours would cause a frightful deformity were it on a face It must then be that as sounds are not pleasing of themselves but as they are in a certain proportion so all these things are pleasing to the sight but only because they have a certain relation and a certain agreement which pleaseth the eyes and contents the minde To know this concordance you are to understand that there are two sorts of beauties in man The Intelligible and the Sensible The first is but the interiour perfection the just connexion of all faculties necessary for a man to perform the functions whereto he is designd and the sensible beauty consists in the disposition which the Organs ought to have to serve these faculties So that what renders the figure the colour and the motion agreeable is the fitness which those things have with the nature of man For how fair soever the colour be how perfect soever the figure of the parts are how regular soever the motions are if they are not conformable to his nature they produce neither a beauty nor a grace on the contrary they cause a deformity and render the body unseemly Now although there be but God alone who knows the principle of this conformity and why the forms have more inclination for one figure colour or some other accident then for another yet there are in our soul secret seeds of this knowledge which is the cause she pleaseth herself in these objects without knowing the reason in the same manner as she findes them displeasing when that conformity and proportion which they ought to have is wanting Some will perhaps say that I here confound grace with beauty placing grace in the proportion of the parts and in the colour which in the ordinary definition of beauty are separated from grace But I beleeve
is great and large because the heart opens to receive the good which presents it self as was before said it is unequal and irregular by reason of the several Passions with which this is continually traversed for as we do not here speak of that simple and imperfect Love which is yet but in the soul but of that which is compleat and finished and which hath already made impressions on the body it is impossible but Desire and Fear Joy and Grief should at every moment confound themselves with it whence consequently happens the unequal motion of the heart and of the arteries and this is chiefly to be observed at the remembrance or unexpected arrival of the beloved person For after this first elevation which is made at this encounter it changeth a hundred wayes it appears little and languishing and immediately returns to its first vehemency from swift and light it becomes slow and heavy and all at once it reassumes its first quickness which it loseth again in an instant and passeth thus from one difference to another without order and without proportion There are but very few Characters which remain to be examined whose causes are not very evident For the disquiet comes from the divers agitations which the soul feels the shiverings and the ardors follow the flowing and ebbing of the Spirits forasmuch as Fear and Grief which retire them within take away from the exterior parts the heat they had even as Joy and Hope restore and augment it and as Boldness and Anger gather the spirits together strength also encreaseth as it diminisheth when Joy dissipates or Grief stiffles them There remaines no more difficulties to be found but in the Syncopes and Extasies which sometimes happen to Lovers but we have already shewed that Love could not alone cause Syncopes nor faintings but that it must be Grief Despair or Joy For the Extasie its true it may proceed from Love yet we must observe that the word hath divers significations the Physitians often take it for an extreme alienation of the spirit such as those have who are frantick or mad sometimes for that strange disease which they call Catoche which all at once takes away the use of sence and motion and keeps the body stiffe in the same posture in which it surprised it there are some who beleeve that the true Extasie is made when the soul doth no action in the body whether it dwell there or that indeed it issue forth for a time as it happens in those which are possest and in those who are ravished by the spirit of God but that whereof we speak is nothing else but a certain ravishment of the soul which takes from the body the use of exterior sence and motion the imagination and the understanding not forbearing to operate which happens by a strong attention which binds the soul to the beloved object which makes it lose the care of all animal functions and which imploying all the spirits in that thought hinders them from flowing to the organs of sence and motion and this ravishment may sometimes Pass to such an excess that the vital faculties may receive no more influence from the soul so that respiration will cease and that there will be onley natural vertue to sustain life PART 5. Of the nature of Beauty in general and why it begets LOVE ALthough the Senses were given to the Minde to help it to know things yet it seems that those things which are the most sensible are the least known And I know not whether it be a grace or an artifice of Nature to bring those things neerest our Senses which ought to be furthest from our Mindes and by that exteriour knowledge to recompense the little progress we might make in that which was true and essential However it be it s most evident that we are sensible of nothing in the world more then of Beauty nor nothing is more difficult to be known the greatest men who have been most sensible of its effects were ignorant of the Causes thereof and we may say that it hath made them lose their Reason when they were but touched with it and would have discoursed of it For some have said that it was a just proportion of the parts others that it was the form of things in fine that it was the splendor and glittering of Goodness it self But this last definition is equivocal and metaphorical and the other cannot be applied but to the Divine beauty which is the source and model of all Beauties forasmuch as in the Unity and infinite Simplicity of God there can be no proportion or form That we may therefore steer a more certain course then what hitherto hath been followed and that we may not wander in so vast and difficult a matter we must consider that things are not esteemed fair but as they fall under a very distinct and exact knowledge So that there are only the objects of the Understanding and of Seeing and of Hearing to which we allow Beauty because that all the Knowing faculties are those which most perfectly judge of their objects and are the least mistaken in them And these same objects which we judge Fair are also esteemed Good for we do not onely say A fair minde a fair speech or a fair colour but they may be also called good But the objects of the other Senses and all the other powers may onely be stiled Good and can never deserve the title of Fair for it were a ridiculous thing to say that heat or humidity sweetness or bitterness were fair Whence we must necessarily conclude that all what is Good is not Fair but all that is Fair is good and therefore that Fair is a species of Good Now as Good is not good but as it is agreeable the Fair since it is good must be agreeable to something and therefore if what is fair serve but for an object onely to the knowing faculties we must necessarily conclude that Fair is that which is agreeable to the intelligent faculties as good is agreeable to what ever it be Now because Knowledge hath no other object but the essence and the truth of things Beauty must needs be of that kinde and the objects must be the fairer where the essence and the truth are best exprest for which cause Souls are fairer then Bodies and the Understanding which knows interiour things is more capable to judge of Beauty then the Senses which know onely the exteriour Whence it also happens that Beasts are seldom moved by Beauty because Sense onely works in them in stead that in Man the Understanding concurs to his action and penetrates further into the Nature and Essence of its objects And we experiment in our selves that those things which we do not greatly heed and whose nature we do not well know seem less fair unto us and that its onely for Masters in an Art to judge of the beauty of a work because they alone have the true knowledge thereof
We do not therefore say that Beauty consists in Knowledge onely for it would then follow that things would not be fair until they are known although it be most true that God would not cease to be infinitely fair although he were not known And there are things whose knowledge is equally clear and certain which are not equally fair for the Understanding distinguisheth the Natures as more or less perfect in the same manner as the eyes and ears judge that there are Colours and Harmonies the one fairer then the other Now as things are sensible not by reason of our sensibleness but because they can make themselves sensible and as the essence is not good in that it communicates it self but in that it can communicate it self so Goodness is not fair because it is known but because it may be known So that Beauty is nothing but Goodness in that order and essential relation it hath to Knowledge that is to say that it can communicate it self to the intelligent faculties And in my judgement we are so to understand Plato when he says that Beauty is a glittering and splendor of Goodness for as the brightness of light is that which renders it visible the brightness of goodness is that also which makes it known and this brightness is no other but the act whereby goodness resplends enlightens and communicates it self to the knowing faculties Now because there are two kindes of faculties the Intellectual and the Sensitive there must also be two kindes of Beauty the one intelligible the other sensible And because that in either kinde there are subjects which are fairer and more excellent some then other some we must on the foundation we have established observe the cause of this difference It is true it requires a higher meditation and a longer discourse then our designe will permit but we will onely touch on the principal and on what is necessary to understand what we shall say in consequence of Humane Beauty Suppose then that Beauty is but an effect of Goodness so far as it hath a relation to the knowing faculties and that Goodness is nothing also but the being and perfection of things so far as it can communicate it self as the School teacheth those things which have more of being and of essence must be better fairer and more perfect And we know they have more of being when they have more unity and in that unity they have more power and different vertues So God hath an infinite perfection because that in a most perfect and most simple unity he hath a power to do all things The intelligences which are the most simple and the most active of all creatures are also the most excellent Even amongst Bodies the mixt are more perfect then the simple whereof they are composed the Animate more then the Natural and those which have a Reasonable soul more then those which are onely Sensitive Because that in comparison of those they have more different vertues and more actions and therefore divers degrees more of essence Thus much for what concerns Intelligible Beauty But in Sensible objects the perfection is not absolutely considered as in that it must depend not onely from the being they have but also from the organs of the Senses which receives them and from the fitness they ought to have with the bodies where they appear So the Light which is most resplendent is more perfect then all Colours but in respect of the eyes Green is more although even that colour is displeasing in some subjects Now the cause of this diversity first of all comes for that the Senses having been given to creatures for their preservation they must not destroy them And as their action is performed by the impression which the objects make on their organs if this impression is not proportionable to them their action will be imperfect So that it ought to be strong enough to give knowledge of the thing but not so violent as to corrupt the organs Whence it is that the Senses cannot judge well of their objects in their extremity as the eyes of too great a light or of darkness the ears of a too violent sound or of silence And Aristotle says that neither of them are sensible because that this makes no true impression and that the other destroys the organ So that there are onely those objects which are between both extremities which can make a just impression proportionable to what the Senses require It is not therefore that all the objects equally touch the Senses there are some amongst them which are more perfect and more agreeable then the rest Green is fairer then Grey or Black the Eighth in Harmony is sweeter then the Fourth But the cause of this difference is extremely obscure yet if you observe what we have said of the perfection of Intelligible things you will finde that it depends from the same principle For it is certain that Colours and Harmonies have their beauty from the proportion they have and those which have it the most perfect are also the most agreeable Now proportions have the more perfection the neerer they are to unity and the more they are in that unity composed So the Diapason which is the most pleasing of all simple harmonies is made in a double proportion to wit of two to one which is the most perfect of all simple proportions because it is neerest the unity nothing being neerer unity then the number of Two and is the most composed for what is twice as much more is more composed then that which is but once and a half or once and a third part as the other proportions which are the Diapente and the Diatessaron It is the same with Colours for the proportions which make perfect harmonies make also as Aristotle says fair colours For which cause Green which is the most agreeable of all others is to be in the same proportion with the Diapason and that of Blue and Purple with that of Diapente and Diatessaron But seeing we have examined these things in their place it sufficeth to shew that Beauty and the perfection of Sensible things is deduced from the same principle as that of Intelligible things to wit in that they have more unity and that in this unity they have more powers in a word from that they have more of a sensible being It is easie by this Discourse to perceive that Light considered as in it self is the fairest thing which can be presented to our sight but that Green in respect of the organs is yet more pleasing then it It remains onely to discover why this colour renders not all those Bodies fair wherein it is To this end you must remember that things work not but according to the powers they have and that these powers follow onely the degrees of their being Now as there are things which cannot work without matter it is evident this matter ought to be fitted and proportioned to their actions and their powers
then the essence of that Passion How many of those motions will there be found such as he hath observed wherein Pleasure will never be All natural actions do they not put the soul in a state agreeable to its nature and may they not be suddenly and sensibly performed without being for all that delightful The Passion of Love is it not so formed and is it not an estate agreeable to Nature to unite it self to good and to possess it and yet Pleasure need not always accompany it And may we not then say that it is not Joy which makes this condition agreeable to Nature but rather that it is that which breeds Joy Besides what need we say it is a sudden motion seeing the Appetite hath none that are other For if it happens that the soul moves not so readily in some Passions that Iaziness comes not from the Appetite but from the faculty which proposeth that good with too much difficulty and too loosely commands the pursuit thereof Being a blinde power it goes but as 't is led and as soon as the command is given it obeys and moves in an instant It is true there may be obstacles on that side which may hinder it from so readily obeying as when there are contrary Passions to those which the object ought to inspire for an extreme grief will never suffer Joy to form it self in the Appetite But also when the hinderance is away it quickly moves and always in a moment produceth the Passion as perfect as the knowledge and motive was which it proposed For if Love hath weak-beginnings 't is because the good is weakly represented and the progresses it makes are new motions of the Appetite caused by the representation of new Ideas and new perfections In effect we may say of all the consequences and of all the increase of Passions that they are as the flame and the light which entertain and augment one the other every moment by an infinite many reiterated productions that which appears being not that which was before and which even presently will be followed by a new for all of them succeeding thus one the other without interruption seem to be but the self-same thing which hath preserved and entertained it self So it is in Joy and in all other Passions they form themselves all at once and pass in an instant they are also renewed every moment causing thus a continual flux of divers perfect motions which last as long as the knowledge sollicites the Appetite to move It is then true that the Appetite hath no motions which are not sudden That nevertheless it begins to move it self rather at one time then another by how much the faculty which commands is diligent or lazie or because there is some contrary motion which retains it And that is easie to be conceived by the example of the Eyes which see things in an instant although to see them they sometimes open quicker or slower and even after being open they may have some indisposition which may hinder them to act I know that the Physitians seem to use the same definition with Aristotle when they say that Pleasure is a quick and sensible motion which puts Nature in an estate which is agreeable to it and that if the objects make not a quick and sensible impression on the Senses or if they do not make it proportionable to Nature they can never cause Pleasure But it is easie to perceive that the Motion whereof they speak is not that of the Appetite where Pleasure consists and that it is but the cause thereof for before that the Appetite moves the objects must make such an impression as we have said and then the Soul which feels it and which sees what is its good sheds it self on it to possess it the more perfectly and so forms that pleasure which is augmented by the effusion of spirits as we will anon declare I stay not to examine how grief sometimes happens in this quick motion which moves Nature to an estate convenient for it as when we put our hands to the fire when they are extremely cold that concerns the Passion of Grief It will suffice here to observe that those objects which make not this ready impression do not cause Pleasure because that insinuating themselves by little and little Nature accustoms her self unto them and feels not the change which happens to her wherefore not knowing the good which she receives the Imagination proposeth it not to the Appetite which consequently is not moved thereby We are even thus tir'd with the most agreeable things after having too long tasted them But of this more amply at the end of this Discourse Let us continue again the thred of that Discourse which we have left and say that although all the motions of the Appetite are made suddenly yet it is true that of all the objects which move Passion there are none whose arrival so quickly and so easily moves the Appetite as Joy And this comes in my conceit from that the object of Pleasure is the good so far as it is already loved for we have already shewed that Love always precedes Joy so that being already united to the Appetite by the means of Love there is nothing in that respect which hinders the motion which that power ought to employ to relish it But it is not so in the rest of the Passions whose objects are to be examined by the Knowledge before they are proposed to the Appetite And as there are but few Goods or Evils which are pure so there are always found many things which diminish their goodness or their ill and suspend the judgement we ought to make of them But to move Joy this examen is useless the Appetite already possessing the Good all its counsels are taken all its doubts are razed and of necessity it ought to move at the same instant when it united it self to its enjoyment wherein Joy and Pleasure consist But 't is to penetrate too far into the secrets of the Soul and to stay too long on things which have no stay Let us leave these imperceptible motions and see whether those which are made in the humours and in the spirits are more easie to be discerned Yet before we begin this enquiry we shall do well to say somewhat of the Object which moves this Passion For although we have already said it was Good we must examine out of what consideration it merits that quality being assured that out of divers respects it causeth divers motions in the soul As then good forasmuch as it is amiable is the object of Love so forasmuch as it is delightful it is that of Joy neither is it powerfully delightful but when it is loved for that Pleasure presupposeth Love so that good forasmuch as it is loved ought to be the true object of Joy perhaps you will say that desire also presupposeth Love and that good must be loved to be desired it is true but desire demands
another condition to wit absence which never happens in Joy where the good must be alwayes present for when past things or those which are to come delight us it is an effect of the imagination which renders them present and makes them pass for such as they are in the thoughts For the rest by the word Good we must not onely conceive what is truely and apparently good but even also the ills which we have eschewed It is thus that the memory of the paines we have suffered and of the dangers we have escaped is pleasing forasmuch as it is good to have been delivered from them it is thus that vengeance is so sweet because that by overcoming the ill we no more fear the assaults thereof it is thus that tears are sometimes delightful because they discharge nature of an unprofitable burthen and that it even seems as if the grief which excited them runs and slides away with them You must besides observe that good being a thing agreeable to nature this is aswel to be understood of depraved nature as of that which is perfect for a sick man takes pleasure in things which are contrary to him and a vitious man finds contentment in his debauches because they are conformable to his corrupted and irregular nature Now after this to examine by retail all what may cause pleasure besides that it would wrong both our design and the Reader both which ask for brevity we may easily know it were but to lose time and words It will then suffice to say that since good is the source of all the sweets which this Passion causeth to flow into the soul and that it is nothing but what is fit for our nature and what perfects it it must be that the good which makes us the more perfect raises also the greater the more solid pleasures Now as we are composed of two parts of soul and body and as that is incomparably more excellent and therefore it follows that the perfection which it acquireth is also more excellent and that the goods which cause it are the most noble and the most delightful But because the goods of the body are for the preservation of the species or of the individuals and that that is more considerable to nature as being the most common or the most general good from thence it is that the pleasure which accompanies it is the sweetest and most sensible of all others and by the same reason the objects of Tasting and feeling delight most because they are the Senses most necessary for life and without which the creature cannot subsist It is true that the objects of Seeing and Hearing may contest the preheminency being more noble then those base and material qualities which respect the inferior Senses But if we consider that there are almost no creatures which delight themselves with the beauty of sounds and colours we may confess speaking generally that the objects of Tasting and Touching are the most delightful and yet that in Man those of Seeing and Hearing have the advantage because that those two Senses having a great affinity with the Understanding and being chiefly destined to its service their end is also more noble necessary then it is in beasts where they are for no other use but to preserve the animal life which they have From all these considerations it is easie to deduce the principal differences of Pleasure For it is either Intellectual or Sensible Pure or Impure True or False True Pleasures are those which are pure to wit which are not linked or mixed with Grief and they are those which are fit for Man in the most perfect condition that Nature could place him Such are the pleasures which are found in Contemplation and in the exercise of Vertue such are those which follow the actions of a secure Health and the functions of Senses perfectly disposed Now these Pleasures have this property that they are long lasting that they never tire that they may be relished at all times and that Grief never precedes nor follows them For a man who is in a state of Natural perfection is never weary of Meditation nor of performing good actions Life is always sweet and pleasing to him and the Senses are always disposed to receive their Objects with Delight Some may now say that Eating and Drinking and other natural actions are convenient for the perfect nature of Man which yet cause also disgust For Musick and the sight of the fairest things at last tires the ears and eyes and the sweetest flowers wherewith Venus was ever crowned as Pindarus says at last become importunate and displeasing It is true But we must also remember that all these things being sutable to Nature ought to have the conditions which perfection requires they must be moderate in quantity and quality the circumstance of time place and persons must meet Besides that the greatest part are not of themselves convenient for Nature but onely by accident that is to say they are onely convenient by reason of the irregularities which preceded them whose remedy they are So eating and drinking cure hunger and thirst so rest and sleep cause labour and weariness to cease In a word the greatest part of our actions afford pleasure onely because Nature empties or fills it self and corrects the one with the other wherefore the pleasure which follows them is not absolutely pure nor real but onely by accident whence it is that it tires that it lasts but little and that we are not at all times capable to taste it as those which are absolutely pure But let us leave these Moral Speculations and without staying any longer on things which are notorious to all the world let us seek new ones and see whether the Tempest which this Passion excites in us will not throw us into some unknown Land and make us know the motions of the Spirits which act as the wandering Stars whose courses and periods have not yet been observed PART 3. What the Motion of JOY is in the Spirits IN all kinde of Motion we must always fancie two terms The one where it is to begin the other where it ought to finish If the Spirits then move in Joy it seems they ought to come from the heart since it is their source and thence they move themselves towards what is Good wheresoever it presents it self to the soul Truely could Joy form it self all alone the motion of the Spirits must be so made and must by it be issued out of the heart to the meeting of what is good but because it never comes but with Love which ought always to precede it it is he who ought to cause that motion whereto Joy contributes nothing So that we must seek another for it conformable with that of the Appetite In a word we must discover how the Spirits in some manner disperse themselves even as that doth in this Passion This will not uneasily be conceived after having observed how Love carries
a joyful man for you will finde therein I know not what kinde of a more pleasing vivacity a clearer and purer splendor and a sweeter heat then in all the Passions we have made mention of by reason that the purity of the spirits is not changed by those sharp and darksome fumes which are raised in the rest and that their motion is more free more equal and more conformable to their nature it might be asked whether this effusion of spirits be onely made in those places where Good is presented to the soul and truly it s there only necessary for it since they onely disperse themselves to possess this good and that good toucheth it nowhere but where it makes it self known yet it is true that it abundantly pours them into the intrails and that when Joy is high there is no part which it over-flowes not for which cause the heart and the lungs loosen themselves as Hippocrates says we are sensible of I know not what pleasing emotion which moves all the interior parts and a sweet heat and vapor which disperseth it self through the whole body Now this happens according to my opinion from that the sensitive soul hath not always a clear and certain knowledge of its object and being charmed by that of Joy she fancies that she ought everywhere to encounter it and that she ough also to send spirits every way to entertain it or rather the urgency which presseth her forwards to the quick enjoyment of the presented good is the reason she drives them on all sides without choice or order or so much as discerning the places whether they are to move This shall suffice for the knowledge of the Motion of the spirits in Joy in pursuit of the examen we have already made in the Treatise of Love But one difficulty remaines which the former discourse hath bred and whose resolution will give some light to the obscurity of this matter for we have said that the spirits are not agitated here with violence and that their motion is always sweet and calm although this seem not to agree with the transports the ravishments and the excesses which are so common in this Passion and which cannot be conceived without a violent agitation of the spirits And in effect when we compared this motion with that which is made in Love we were not afraid to say that they were driven in Joy as a great wave and that it seemed then as if the soul would cast it self wholly and all at once before its object So that it being not to be done without violence and having certified that there was none in the effusion of the spirits we cannot escape the reproach to have spoken contrary to Truth and against Our Selves Yet it is very easie to answer this Objection remembring that Joy and Love are inseparable and that these two Passions being for that cause often considered as if they were but one onely these Motions were also confounded with their effects so that Love drawing the spirits from the heart and driving them out we commonly say that Joy also transports them And as this motion is made with violence and causeth troublesome accidents the same thing may be said of Joy For thus we discoursed of it in the former Chapter where we did not absolutely compare Love with Joy but onely the love of Beauty with the love of other things wherein Joy causeth faintings and syncopes confounding as commonly they do these two Passions in one But here where we make an exact Anatomy of them we separate the motions of the one from the other and conclude that the transport of the spirits towards Good is a particular effect of Love and that the effusion which follows it is that of Joy So that if there be violence in the first motion it proceeds all from Love Pleasure hath no share in it and how impetuous soever it be it must break and soften it self when the spirits begin to disperse themselves otherwise Joy would destroy it self by that troublesome sensibleness which that impetuous and turbulent motion would excite in the parts Yet it follows not that because this effusion is not violent and impetuous it must be made slowly for the spirits are such stirring and subtil bodies that they without resistance penetrate everywhere and their motions are so quick that nothing in Nature could be found to compare them to but Light and it is by that also that we can make appear how they disperse themselves in Joy For it in a moment insinuates it self in Diaphanous bodies without violence and without confusion runs thorow all their parts without constraint dilates and extends it self and we might say that had these bodies any knowledge they would be sensible of an extreme pleasure in that sweet although sudden effusion of Light So is it with that which is made in Joy for after the soul hath carried the spirits towards its Good and that she believes she hath united them together she leaves that pressing that disquiet and precipitation which she caused before that she might arrive there and thinking she can then with security enjoy the good she possesseth she with liberty dilates her self without hinderance extends her self and in an instant penetrates all the parts of her object causing the spirits to move in the same manner which she findes always obedient to her command It is true that in pursuit thereof there is a great dissipation of them made which the soul takes no care to repair being wholly employed in the enjoyment of the good she pursued and being as it were charmed and ravished with her good fortune whence those weaknesses follow those faintings and those other actions of which we have already spoken PART 4. The causes of the Characters of Joy YOu have seen what we had to say of the nature of this Passion before we enquire the causes of those Characters which make it appear Let us then now examine first the Moral actions and enquire why Joy is so talkative so vain and so credulous why it confides so much in it self why it makes it self to be defired even when it is present and why it is so soon weary of the Good which begot it For these are the most observable effects which it produceth in the Minde and whence it seems the rest proceed Let us seek then the causes of its Prattle There are Passions which will always speak and others which love to be silent Silence commonly accompanies grief despair and fear Joy boldness and anger and generally all those which move towards Good or resist Ill are given to Talk but none so much as Joy all the rest seem to drive out their words and cast them forth with violence as if they were a burden which the soul would discharge this dispenseth them with liberty makes them flow with pleasure and we may say that it is rather abundance then constraint which sends them forth Indeed Joy is full of babble is pleased to
Pleasures as those of the Senses become distastful and importunate because they are not absolutely convenient for nature they surpass the natural capacity of the powers and their use weakens and corrupts the organs but those which are pure and true do never disgust because they never exceed the natural reach of the Soul but they perfect it and instead of burthening and weaking they ease and fortifie it It is true they may give a little because the minde being a lover of novelty and finding it no longer in an object whereto it hath long applied it self it also findes not that satisfaction which it took at the begining and seeks by change to nourish its desire and inclination But we have spoken enough of these things wherewith Moral Philosophy is full let us examine the Characters which Joy imprints on the Body Of all the many Characters which Joy imprints on the body There are the looks onely the serenity of the forehead Laughter Caresses and disquiet which are caused by the Souls command all the rest happen without her thought and have no other cause but the agitation of the humors which necessarily produce those effects For the Looks there are three kindes common to this Passion for it renders them sweet dying and unquiet we will say what is the cause of these last when we speak of the disquiet and impatience which appears in all its other actions The Looks are sweet either because they are modest or because they are laughing and these are proper to Joy which causeth the lids to fall a little and contract themselves and which fills the eyes with a certain pleasant splendor Now this splendor comes from the spirits which arrive in those parts and the motion of the lids is effected by smiling and by the design which the soul hath to preserve the image of the desirable object as we shewed in seeking the causes of amorous Looks so that we have onely these which are called dying which require a long examen We have already said in the discourse of Love that they were called so because those which dye cast forth the like lifting up their eyes on high and half hiding them under their lids But that seems very difficult to conceive that Looks which accompany Languor Grief and Death should be found in the excess of Pleasure Yet as there are several things contrary which have common effects because they have common causes it may also be that this kinde of Look findes the same cause in Grief and in Joy in the pangs of Death as in the ravishment of Pleasure Let us then examine the reasons why they are to be found in these troublesome Passions that we may see whether there be any which may be accommodated to Joy First we need not doubt but Grief lifts up the eyes on high and looks up to heaven as the place whence it expects help to drive away the ill which afflicts it For Nature hath given that instinct and inclination to man to have recourse to superiour powers when he believes himself abandoned by the rest So that without minding it his mouth invokes them his eyes turn towards them and his arms are lifted up to crave their assistance It also happens that this Passion which would flee the ill which presents it self gathering up within it self draws along with it all the more moveable parts and so retires the eyes in as if it thought to hide it self by hiding those organs whence she seems most to shew her self Or rather it comes from that the parts being void of spirits which the force of Grief dissipated or transported elsewhere they of themselves repossess their natural situation which is to be a little lifted up For it is certain that the situation of the parts when they rest is more natural then that which they have in action wherein there is always some kinde of constraint And we must consequently believe that the eyes which take that site in sleeping seek it as the most calm and most natural for them So that it seems the looks become dying in Grief as they do in Sleep by the flight of the spirits which leave the eyes to their rest Death may also cause this effect by the convulsion which often accompanies it and which makes the nerves retire to their origine or by reason of weakness cannot retain the parts in that tension which their action requires so that the lids fall and the eyes are lifted up taking again as we have said their natural situation Of all these causes there is onely the gathering up of the Soul and the drawing back of the Spirits which are to be found in Joy and from whence these dying looks may take their birth for they have no assistance to implore nor convulsion to fear But in the transport which the enjoyment of Good gives the Soul it often quits the exteriour parts gathers the spirits inwardly together or carries them elsewhere and so forsaking the eyes leaves them the liberty to regain their natural situation which makes them appear languishing and dying The Forehead is serene when it is smoothe and without wrinkles and this smoothness comes from that all the muscles are extended and equally draw it out on every side or from that they are all at rest and leave it in its ordinary situation Now it seems that Joy causeth a serenity of the forehead in both manners For it is certain that as it hath the property to dilate and disperse the soul and the spirits it seeks to do the same in all the parts of the body So that because the muscles cannot move but by contracting themselves it never intends to move those of the forehead since it would cause a motion contrary to its designe chiefly their action being not necessary in this encounter as that of the eyes might be and of the tongue and of others which it agitates in this Passion for particular reasons The Forehead then remains calm and without contracting it self On the contrary it seems to open and on all sides to extend it self by reason of the spirits which rarifie the parts and makes them appear the larger Yet because that in Laughter the forehead becomes smoothe by the stretching of the muscles which equally draw it upwards and downwards it might seem that Joy which causeth Laughter caused also that tension and brought that serenity to the forehead as well by moving as by slacking the muscles But in the following Discourse we will shew that it is not Joy which produceth that effect but the Surprize which is the true cause of Laughter 'T is not but that the Soul without that Surprize may extend the forehead by contracting the muscles but then it is a feigned and forced serenity as that of Flatterers of which Aristotle says that the Forehead is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is to say stretched and not contracted as the Translators have explained it for it is the Muscles which are contracted but the Forehead
face and how pale or severe soever it be it must needs grow red and appear content But all this is nothing in comparison of what the other parts suffer The Brest is so impetuously agitated and with such suddenly-redoubled shakes that we can hardly breathe that we lose the use of speech and that it is impossible to swallow whatsoever it be So pressing a pain riseth in the Flanks that it seems as if the intrails were torn and that they would unfold themselves In this violence we see all the body bend and wreathe and gather it self together The Hands are set on the sides and press them forcibly sweat gets up in the Face the Voice is lost in hickocks and the Breath in stifled sighs Sometimes this agitation gets to so high an excess that it produceth the same effects as Medicaments do that it puts the Bones out of joynt that it causeth syncopes and in fine that it gives death The Head and the Arms suffer the same throws with the brest and the flanks but you may perceive how in these motions they throw themselves here and there with precipitation and disorder and that after they have been cast from one side to the other as if they had lost all their vigour The Hands become feeble the Legs cannot support themselves and the body is constrained to fall These are the principal parts which usually form vehement Laughter For to describe all the diversity of motions air mine and the posture it puts every one in were as much as if one would delineate all Men at once since there is not one who in laughing makes not some particular face And it is certain that there are as many kindes of laughter as there are different faces Even that interrupted sound which accompanies it is so divers that two men are hardly to be found who shall have it every way alike For the Mean Laughter it causeth almost the same alteration in the face and agitates the brest and the flanks in the same manner as vehement Laughter but 't is with far less violence It also takes not away respiration nor speech it onely renders the voice grosser Even sometimes it causeth it to pass the nostrils and make an interrupted bellowing Neither doth it cause grief or languor in the parts or any of those troublesome accidents which are in the other To conclude the Smile which is the weakest the least of all causeth no alteration but in the face and chiefly on the lips and eyes for the lids a little contract themselves the eyes sweeten and the lips lengthen out themselves without obliging the mouth to open and without changing either the voice or speech Even often it is onely observable in the lips as when it comes from disdain or from dissimulation or from some sickness To discover then the source of all these motions we must first see what those things are which move us to Laughter for being as the Object and the Matter they are also the first Causes which contribute to its birth Yet is it not a thing so easily determined And it seems as if Nature would render it self ridiculous in ridiculous things having made them so far distant the one from the other and so different amongst themselves that it is almost impossible to finde any general notion or common reason which may reduce them under one kinde For we see that Laughter comes from pleasant and facetious actions and words from admiration despight scorn caresses tickling and even from some sicknesses And as at first it seems as if there were no relation between all these things we may easily believe that Laughter is an equivocal word which marks effects of a different nature and that that which comes from the most part of these Objects is feigned and lying and hath no real form of Laughter In effect all those who have spoken of it have placed them under divers kindes some more some less according to the several motives of that Laughter which they fancied in ridiculous objects I take here the word ridiculous for all what moves Laughter Now because the resolution of this difficulty wholly depends on the knowledge of this motive and that it is impossible to discern true Laughter or those objects which are truely ridiculous if we know not the principle and the reason why it moves it we must examine the opinions which have been on this Subject that we may chuse the most reasonable which may serve for a foundation to know the nature and the effects of this Passion But we must first observe that Laughter which is made by the convulsion of the muscles of the face was never taken by any for a true Laughter being a thing against Nature whereto the Will never contributed as it doth in all other things Such perhaps is that which succeeds the wounds of the Diaphragma and that which that herb of Sardinia causeth which is called Apium risus whence the Proverb is of the Sardinian laughter Even they say that Saffron the Tarantula and some other Potions produce the same effect But perhaps the Laughter which is caused by these later is no true convulsion no more then that which arrives in doatings and in the fits of the Mother and that it may have the same motive as true Laughter hath as you will see hereafter This being supposed we might at first suspect that those objects which cause Laughter are those which are pleasing and delightful because that Laughter and Tears being contrary they must have contrary causes and therefore that Laughter comes from Joy since Tears proceed from Grief In effect it seems that Laughter is never separate from Pleasure and even those who force themselves to laugh endeavour always to appear merry and contented Yet because all pleasing things do not move Laughter that even it happens not when Joy is at the highest and that Beasts which are affected with that Passion are not capable of Laughter we must hold it for undoubted that that then is not the general motive and that the Reasons to maintain this opinion do onely prove that the objects ought onely to be pleasing but not that they are therefore ridiculous And if Scorn and Indignation cause a true Laughter it is most likely that acceptableness and pleasure are not always to be found with it This consideration hath made some think that Admiration was the cause of Laughter and that when any wonderful thing presented it self to our Mindes it at the same time formed this Passion and that for that cause Man onely laughed because there was none but he that admired That facetious words and actions were ridiculous because they are new and that Novelty is the source of Admiration That in fine ignorants and fools laughed more then wise men because they finde more things to be admired then they did But although at first this opinion take the Minde yet doth it not satisfie it and hath its difficulties as well as the former For
them for I cannot imagine that Nature who is so regular and so uniform in all its other actions should forget it self in this that she would give several causes to one effect and that it being true that all kinde of Laughter hath somewhat that is common the soul should have no general motive for so common and general an action We must then endeavour to discover it and if we do not succeed use the same excuses which the difficulty of the enquiry afforded those who made it before us since perhaps there is nothing in nature whose knowledge is more hid then that of this Whereunto that we may attain we must first consider that we never laugh but when the soul is in some manner deceived and surprised as may be seen in all the ridiculous actions which Aristotle calls deformities without grief since they are all against the custome against the expectation and against the sence of the Wise It is the same thing in the unexpected encounter of a pleasing thing and in an injury which we receive from a man we did beleeve ought not to offend us in the good or in the ill which happens to those who are worthy of it For there is therein every way somewhat which by its novelty surpriseth the minde which is to be found even in tickling whence it comes to pass that we laugh not when we tickle our selves because we are not new nor strange to our selves Yet this surprise must be light for if it be violent it astonisheth the minde and so powerfully averts it that it cannot go to the outward parts to make them move So that objects which are very wonderful and extremely pleasing move us not to laughter but to ravishment and extasies as terrible ones cause fear and astonishment 't is not that we say that the lightest surprise is that which moves laughter the more it is onely to be understood in comparison of that which astonisheth or ravisheth the minde for it is evident that the greater so as it do not disturb and carry away the spirit will cause the more vehement laughter making not only the muscles of the face move but even those of the flanks and brests as in its place hereafter This surprise must also be pleasing and those ridiculous objects must produce some kinde of Joy in the soul It is manifestly sensible in facetious things and in the encounter of friends and we never seek the occasions of laughing but for the pleasure we think to finde therein And although we may doubt of that Laughter which indignation scorn and anger sometimes move yet we will shew that nevertheless there is still somewhat which affords contentment either true or feigned for it is certain there is a lying and dissembled Laughter wherein effectually there is no sensible pleasure and in which we onely feign we receive some which is very common in flattery and complacency Often even although the object be pleasing the soul will finde in it more pleasure then it is capable to yeeld and so moves and as they say tickles it self into a Laughter But what I esteem most considerable to understand the nature of Laughter it is that we seldom use it alone and that the most part of those objects which powerfully excite it in company move it not at all in a solitude so that it seems company affords somewhat to its production that the soul will make it appear that she is surprised which would be needless were there no witness of what she would do so that she ought not to move Laughter when we are alone And if in company there happen a pleasant surprise which moves it not it is because she will not make it appear as when there is somwhat that displeaseth her or when prudence or dissimulation hinder it Yet must we not believe that she makes use of laughter as a mark taken at pleasure such as those are which proceed from our choice and invention but as a natural mark which hath a necessary connexion with the emotion she represents To know what this connexion is and the particular reason which obligeth the Soul to use this motion rather then another to mark the surprise she is in you must suppose that in all surprises the Soul retires and reenters her self the encounter of an unthought-of thing opposing it self to the liberty of her thoughts and forcing her to recollect her self the better to discern the presented Object and then if she intend to make her condition known she must according to the Law which proportions the organs and the effects to their causes stir up in the outward parts some motion like unto that which she suffers and consequently cause the muscles to retire towards their origine as she retires and recollects her self in her self Now because the Minde may be surprised by troublesome objects as well as by pleasing ones this retraction of the muscles may be as well with grief as with joy and indeed you see that in Tears the lips and some other parts of the face retire in the same manner as in Laughter Whence it is that there are persons in whom it would be difficult to discern at first sight the one from the other so like they are to one another which hath made some think that Nature who begins our life with crying and tears made an essay and designed these touches which were to be perfected in Laughter which is never formed before fourty days after birth Yet as we can never say that the retraction of the lips which accompanies grief is a true Laughter so we must thence conclude that Laughter consists not in the simple motion of the muscles but that there is also a certain air which Joy sheds over the face and which causeth the principal difference However it be Laughter being principally destin'd for conversation the objects which particularly respect it are those also which the most easily cause Laughter Such are the actions and facetious words which comprehend all what is uncomely and deformed light hurts purposely done or received out of folly cheats of small consequence jeers in a word all deformities without grief for all these things move Laugher forasmuch as they mark the defects of those qualities which are necessary for conversation as of a good grace of decency of advisedness of kindness and of the rest the Minde finding it self surprised when it sees contrary actions to those vertues which are the foundations of society and of a civil life All the difficulty which there is herein is to know why the Soul would have the surprise it suffers in these encounters appear for it seems as if it were a defect which she would do better to hide then to discover In effect it is a badge of Ignorance to suffer our selves to be surprised with a Novelty as it is a mark of Malice to be pleased at the defects of others Whence it is that Wise men laugh seldomer then others because that they are
tempests commonly are nothing else but a noise they vanish in useless and impotent designes and all the ill they cause is that they drive away the tranquillity of the Minde they move in And truely whoever desires is exposed to four Passions which as impetuous windes incessantly agitate him Audacity and Fear Hope and Despair do alternatively shake him and often so hastily succeed one the other that they mix and confound themselves together He fears he hopes he despairs at the same time he wills and he will not and often through the violence of desiring he knows not what he desires His irresolution and his disquiet appears even outwardly for he cannot remain in one place or in one posture he turns from the one side to the other he sits he riseth he goes with long strides and stops of a sudden Sometimes he so profoundly doats that you would think him ravished in an Extasie and at that instant he awakes sending forth with great sighs now a sharp and now a languishing voice His words are interrupted with sobs and tears and his discourse is full of long exclamations and passionate accents which commonly accompany impatience regret and languor He most commonly speaks to himself interrogates and answers himself And if others entertain him his minde is always distracted his answers confused and entangled and sometimes even his speech is cut quite off what endeavour soever he makes to utter it His mouth is filled with a clear and subtil water his tongue trembles by intervals and licking his lips he moistens and whitens them with froth His face is swelled and grows red his head advanceth it self on the desired object his arms extend themselves towards it Even his heart as straitned and contracted as it is darts it self out in great throbs and raiseth the brest with so much violence that the ribs sometimes are disjoynted Appetite and Sleep fosake him Sometimes he grows Gray in a moment all his radical moisture is consumed his body grows lean and dry and nothing but Enjoyment or Death can terminate his languor and his desires PART 2. Of the Nature of Desire AT first it seems as if there were no difficulty to say what desire is as it never forms it self but for those things which we have not and which we would have we may easily beleeve that the object which excites it is an absent good that the Soul endeavours to draw neer unto it and that the motion it makes towards it causeth also all the essence of this Passion But who ever examines it carefully will finde more doubts then resolutions and in pursuit will confess that there are many things to be desired in the common knowledge of the desires for besides that we desire the good we possess and that ill oftentimes is wished it is evident that this definition confounds desire and Love and makes no essential difference which may distinguish them one from another for if the good by being absent moves the desire we must cease to love that good when it is absent from us or Love and Desire must be but one Passion although it be an unheard of thing amongst the Philosophers that two species should be confounded in one and that we should cease to love good when it is no longer present Besides that absence seems not to be the true Object of Desire nor to be any part of it as some have thought since there is nothing in it which is able to draw the appetite to it being rather an il then a good therefore the desire having no other object but goodness and seeing the motion it makes towards it ought to be like that of Love it must needs be against the maximes of the most wholesome Philosophy that they are not two different Passions and that Love Desire and Joy it self are but the same thing Now this conclusion took its original from that these Passions were defined in too general termes and that the difference of the motion was not specified which was proper to every of them for since all their essence consists in motion if they are different amongst themselves it must be by the diversity of their motions and their definitions must express the particular agitation which is found in every of them To finde that then of Desire we must suppose that this Passion alwayes follows Love because we onely Desire the things we beleeve good and when ill excites our desires it is always under the show and appearance of good For the death which an unhappy man seeks seems to him the haven and end of his miseries danger to men of courage is the fountain of glory and honour In fine all the world desires the estrangement of ill for that it is a good to be delivered from it Desire therefore hath good for its object and consequently it alwayes follows Love since Love is the first motion the Soul makes after good in effect assoon as the appetite hath received the image and Idea of good it moves towards it and at that instant unites it self to it because it is presented to it and this union causeth the Passion of Love as we have said before but because this union gives us not always the perfect possession whether it be that the good presents it self not alwayes wholly or whether the things besides that Ideal being which they have in their thoughts have another true and real one which also requires a real union when the Soul hath acknowledged that it hath not wholly enjoyed the good which was presented to it it is unsatisfied with the first motion it made towards it not to have been united to its Idea it seeks it out of it self and forms this Passion which we call Desire This being granted it is easie to conceive what the motion of the appetite is when it is agitated in this encounter for in Love it moves straight forwards to the Idea of good but in Desire it seems to quit it and as if it would run out of it self it darts it self towards the absent object So that it is very likely these two motions are made one after the other principally if they are violent for every of them wholly moving the Soul and driving it several wayes it seems as if they could not meet together and that of necessity the appetite must first unite it self to the imagined good since it pursues it when it is absent and that afterwards it takes its first course going from one to the other after the same manner from time to time in effect we experiment that the desires appear not in the Soul but as lightnings that they are onely throws and flashes which it gives it self and that their continuance depends onely from the doubles and frequent reprizes they make So that they may be exactly defined in saying That they are Motions of the Appetite by which the Soul darts it self towards the absent good purposely to draw near and unite it self thereunto Yet must you not imagine
have already spoken we shall without difficulty enquire the reasons and send back the Reader to the place whence we deduced them For sighs and extasies loss of speech sleep and appetite have herein no other causes but as in Love The face grows red and swell'd by the arrival of blood and spirits which cast themselves on the outward parts as is already said Tears proceed from grief which the privation of Good too attentively considered breeds in the Minde The motion of the heart and arteries is great because the soul endeavours to open them to send forth a quantity of spirits frequent because of the violence and haste it makes to get them out and unequal by the mixture of other Passions The body grows lean and dry because those parts which digest the humours and those which are to be nourished by them being weakned by the flight of the spirits perform it not as they ought and cannot convert them into their substance as was said in the Discourse of Love There remains nothing now but an effect of Desire which being extraordinary deserves a longer examen then the former It is that a too ardent Desire makes a man grow old in a day as Theorictus that is to say makes the hair gray in a short time according to the ordinary explication of that passage For my part I must confess that the observation is particular enough and I do not remember that I have seen it anywhere but in that Author But since the same thing happens in Fear and in Despair which in a night change the hair and that cares and displeasures make a man grow gray before his time it is impossible but Desire may sometimes cause the same effect all the difficulty is to know how it may be done You must then suppose with Aristotle that hair grows gray for want of heat fit and natural for it that it then suffers a kind of corruption and rottenness and that it happens as to all other things that in corrupting it turns white in effect we cannot deny but that it is the old age of the hair And since that of all the body happens from the diminution of natural heat it is likely it proceeds from the same cause when this heat then diminisheth it produceth two effects in the hair for the aliment which ought to nourish it digests not but flies into vapours and the air fills the place of the Spirits Now vapours contain much air and air is the first cause of whiteness as we see in scum and experience teacheth us that to make the hair white we must wet and expose it to the air And it is true that heat growing weak either by little and little or suddenly indigestion is the chief cause of whiteness of hair when the heat is consumed by dely grees but when it readily dissipates as it happens in sicknessess and vehement Passions it is chiefly the air which whitens it sliding into the pores and taking the place of the retired spirits Some will say If this be true the hair of dead men should be always white natural heat being extinct and the air environing them might easily insinuate it self into its pores To this it must be answered that after death there remains a natural heat in the hair as in the bones which are long preserved after the expiration of the creature whose parts they were But this heat is immoveable and incapable of any fruition of life being deprived of the souls influence which gave it efficacie and motion So there are no more crudities made because the aliments rise no more thither and the air cannot occupie the place of the spirits which are there fixt and stopt Certainly we cannot but confess that the soul inspires some vertue into those parts that she takes some care of them and that she governs them as she pleaseth otherwise what should cause that delightful and regular painting in the plumage of Birds what should so justly compass the eye-brows what should so carefully regulate the hair of the eye-lids lastly what should cause all that so wel measur'd a diversity which is to be observed in the hair of beasts As that commonly follows the species of every creature it must needs be that the soul wherein it is contained conduceth also to this work and that she at her pleasure disposeth of those parts wherein she causeth so many wonders This being granted it is not hard to say how Fear Desire and Cares may change the hair for in retiring the spirits they derive it of the influence it received from them they dry up that spring of life which did rise to its roots and draw away that vital heat which ran thorow its pores It is true this seldom happens and there must be a great violence and a great disposition to produce this effect For there are certain actions from which it is very difficult to withdraw Nature and what tempest soever happens to it she but seldome forsakes their rudder and conduct Such are the functions of the Vegetative soul which are principally made by the means of the fixt spirits and being not subject to the power of the Imagination or of the Appetite remain quiet whilst the others erre here and there and are agitated by the several motions which the Passions impress But yet it sometimes happens that by reason of the conjunction which there is between the parts of the soul the disorders of the one are communicated to the other and that the Natural faculty is carried away by the Sensitive principally in those whose spirits are more mobile and the substance of their parts more soft So that those persons whose imagination is very strong and who have the weakest brain more easily grow gray then other men by the violence of those Passions which we have spoken of CHAP. VI. The Characters of Hope HE who gave away all he had and reserved onely Hope made not so ill a bargain as it may be imagined He took for himself that which is the sweetest in life the most durable Good which can be found therein In a word we may say that he had for his share all what he had not and that he truely divided for himself like a King Indeed as there are no other Goods whereof we are sensible but those which we possess and those which we hope for it is certain that possession affords not a perfect contentment here belowe for that it cloys the Minde and takes away the knowledge of the good it possesseth that it even corrupts the Nature of it and straight begets a distaste But Hope which awakens the Minde and renders it clearer-sighted represents the Good as it is shews it in its purity and gives a far more delicious taste of it then Enjoyment can For it is so ingenious that it separates it self from all the Ills which are mixt with it it purifies it self from all the defects which accompany it and as we may say that it is then the
impatient in their actions although it be the most moderate and the calmest of all the Passions of the Minde It is easie to discover the cause of its moderation after having shewed how it moves the Soul and the Spirits for it is impossible it should keep them stiff and stable as it doth and that it should be subject to those agitations which are abservable in other Passions On the contrary those languishing and impetuous ones which mix with it assume a conformable mediocrity to that kinde of motion which suspends the soul between ardor and neglect as we have already said wherefore it enfeebles the Desire when it is too ardent and stirs it up when it is remiss it is a spur to Laziness and a bridle to Violence it hinders Boldness from being rash and takes off the transports of Joy and if it chance to be with Fear and with Grief it so moderates them that they fail not of their courage and refuse not to admit of the sweetest Passions But whence comes it then that it renders men rash vain and impatient How can Anger and Fury be compatible with it And if it excite and animate the Courage and the Desires how doth it beget Negligence and Idleness And yet we cannot doubt but that in some sort it is the cause of all these effects But they also who will consider the manner of their production will confess that it is neither the nearest nor even the true cause For Hope indeed begets Boldness but afterwards Boldness runs to Temerity it excites and awakens the Desires but these bring Disquiet and Impatience with them it brings Joy with it but aftewards Joy flees into raptures and extasies it inspires the Appetite with Revenge which is afterwards converted into Fury Finally it gives Confidence and that begets Presumption vanity and the scorn of all things which may traverse our designes whence after Negligence and Laziness are bred So that all these defects come not immediately from Hope but from the other Passions which accompany it And it is clear that when these are raised to this excess it quite vanisheth or becomes extremely weak For when we are sensible of a great Joy at that very moment we have no sense of Hope it scarce appears in violent Desires nor in the transports of Anger the soul suffering her self to be born away by the particular motions of those Passions And Presumption it self which seems nothing but an excess of Hope wholly ruines it imagining that there are no difficulties which can oppose its designes for where there is no more a difficulty there remains no Hope However it be Boldness is easily joyned with Hope because the Soul having confirmed her self by this to the resistance of difficulties is already in state to assault them if they appear very strong and if she betake her self to consider the danger wherein they may cast her for want of fighting and overcoming them Besides that the good opinion she hath of her strength heightens her Courage and perswades her that it is not enough to maintain the defensive part but we must pursue and assault our enemy If her forces are not proportionable to this good opinion and that she believes them greater then in effect they are thence ariseth Presumption which joyned with Boldness reacheth to Temerity and thence grows Insolence in the same manner as with Joy she begets Vanity Prattle and Importunity as in its place we shall further shew Impatience raigns powerfully in this Passion Forasmuch as it commonly accompanies Joy Desire and Fear there is always somewhat of these three mixt with Hope and even they are often found all together So that we must not wonder if we are unquiet when we hope whether it be from the apprehension we have that we shall not soon enough possess the good we expect or from the urgency of pressing desires or from the sparkling which accompanies pleasure There is no Passion so credulous as Hope for others give credence onely to the Good or Ill proposed but this equally gives in Both. Indeed pleasing things onely perswade Joy Love and Desire those which are troublesome make no impression on them without destroying them On the contrary Ill onely is resented by Grief Fear and Despair Good hath neither audience nor admittance among them But Hope hearkens to both of them forasmuch as being in the midst between both it easily inclines towards those extremities and she no sooner believes what favours her designes but she hearkens to what renders them impossible The Corporal characters which are found in this Passion are of two kindes as in all the rest The one by the command of the Soul the others by Necessity The motions of the head brows eyes and voice and of all the body are of the first rank The rest are in the form of ordinary effects The body sets it self upright the head is lifted up the brows are raised for the same intention For the Soul which would obtain the good and resist the difficulties which oppose it puts it self in posture to do both Now besides that this posture is advantagious for to see afar off what may happen it is so also in pursuance of Good or in defence of Ill if one be assaulted by it it is the most natural situation which bodies require for action it is the motion which begins all other actions of creatures whether to pursue pleasing things or to flee or assault ill ones the first thing they do is to lift up the head and the body The Soul now putting her self in posture of defence disposeth thus of those organs that she may not be surprised and raiseth them to make them the firmer as in Despair and in Fear where she slackens her self she bows the body hangs the head and casts down the eyes and brows An assured countenance is made by a wide opening of the eye-lids with vivacity A fixt and stedfast look it is common to Anger Impudence Boldness and Hope yet with this difference that in Anger the eyes are too ardent too open in Impudence and too rude in Boldness But in Hope they have none of these defaults all is therein moderate and it seems as if sweetness and severity were confounded together in all its motions The eyes then are more open then ordinary the better to see the good and the difficulties which present themselves The stedfastness of the looks is a signe that impediments astonish not the Minde and that it believes it shall overcome them The vivacity of the eyes comes from the Spirits which Desire hath driven to these parts or which Joy hath there dispersed In fine sweetness and severity are therein mixt together because that at the same time the soul sees the Good and the Ill and is touched both with the one and the other and is not so sure to obtain what she pretends to but that she still hath cause to doubt of it This Passion often also makes a man turn up
she cannot shun their encounter she puts on a certain disdainful severity which checks them and renders their caresses vain and their flatteries of no use We may even say that as there are things which instead of being molified harden themselves by heat it seems that the ardor of these Passions produceth the same effect in her and that that pleasure which melts and liquifies hearts hardens hers She becomes indeed as if she were stupid towards all those things which are the most desirable and the most delicious in the world the charms of Beauty the splendor of Riches move her not Praise and Glory have no allurements for her but quite contrary to that unhappy man who is feigned to be invironed with goods which flye from him when he seeks to enjoy them she appears in the midst of delights which she flies as soon as they become sensible If it happen that the Sences betray her and that unknown to her they taste the poyson which they present them withal she chastiseth them by the grief which she causeth them to suffer and for fear least she should herself be infected she keeps herself pecuish and austere and takes a certain disgust of all sweets and against all the enticements of Pleasure It 's thus also that she preserves herself from that Pride and Vanity wherewith Prosperity is commonly puffed up from the disquiet and impatience which move violent desires from those languors and transports which follow irregular contentments In fine it 's thus she maintains herself in so just a temper which renders her modest in good Fortune severe in Pleasure content in Necessity and every way equal and like herself These are the principal touches which Constancy imprints in the Soul we must now observe those which she makes on the Face and on the other parts of the Body But we may at first say that they are so like those which Boldness forms thereon that did we know them no other ways but as two Sister Germans we might easily by the likeness of their lineaments judge that they are of the same family or at least that they both have the same inclinations For as soon as ill presents it self to a Constant man he expects it with the same Eye with the same Front and in the same posture as if he were ready to assault and combate it his look is firm and assured his Countenance changeth not colour and without stirring his Brows or Lids he coldly considers the danger which threatens him and seems to brave with a resolved mind the misfortune it self You must not expect from him complaints of injuries nor any of those exclamations wherewith Fear and Anger unprofitably beat the Air. Silence commonly shuts his mouth and if he is obliged to speak it s with a tone of Voice which remarks the tranquillity of his Minde and the strength of his Courage for his voice is neither weak nor vehement slow nor impetuous it is strong equal and settled and it 's upheld with a certain majestical accent which mixeth respect and admiration with the fear we have to see him so near danger He holds up his Head without impudence his port is noble without Pride his pace is grave without Haughtiness and in all his actions there appears a generous coldness and a modest confidence But it is not onely before the assault that he appears thus resolved he carries the same air and the same assurance into danger and into fight When he is first prest by the enemy he stiffens his Nerves he holds his Breath and gathering himself up in himself he confirms and settles himself in his posture In this condition without going back he beats all assaults which are made against him he feels fire and sword fall on him without looking pale he sees his blood run from all parts without astonishment and findes his Body wounded with wounds and torn in pieces without complaining and without so much as wrinkling his Brow If sometimes any man makes him change colour cast forth crys or turn up his looks it passeth so suddenly that we may easily judge that the violence of the ill surprized him and that it hath robbed from him if we may so speak those motions from his Constancy For at the same time he suppresseth his complaints and his sighs he devoureth his grief and bringing back a calm in his Countenance with a smile and with the sweet looks of his eyes he doth not onely reprehend his first resolve but makes it appear more gay and better pleased In fine if he perceive the strength of his Body forsake him and that he must succumb under the effort of the enemy which assaults him in falling he makes it appear that his Courage is not cast down that by his fall he raiseth up himself and that it is not he that yields but his ill Fortune For he suffers all the insolency of the Victor without murmuring or so much as moving He sees those blows come without being frighted which will be the loss of his life and he is already sensible of death yet still hath a care to compose his Countenance and to leave on his dying body the remains of his Constancy But it 's time to enquire the cause of all these effects neither have we any thing more to say of those Characters which this Passion imprints on the body when she resists those pleasing and deceitful ills of which we have spoken since she adds nothing to her settled Countenance but severity disdain and frowardness wherewith she arms herself against their Allurements and that we have already observed them in the first figures of this Picture Let 's now examine what its nature is since its the source whence all these effects ought to take their original CHAP. II. Of the Nature of Constancy or strength of Courage ALthough at our enterance into this Discourse Why this Passion is necessary we have made the nature of this Passion appear having been obliged to distinguish it from Boldness to observe the difference of its motions and the end which the Appetite proposeth it self yet we must say that we have made therein but an imperfect draught wherein we have onely traced out the most remarkable parts and the grossest lineaments and that now we must add the last touches and those colours which were wanting thereunto For which purpose we must again betake our selves to those principles which we have established in the precedent Discourses and say that Nature hath inspired in every thing the care of its own preservation having taught them to seek what is fit and to flie what was hurtful and to combate what was contrary to them that the Soul as the most noble and the most excellent hath this knowledge and these inclinations most strong and most perfect And that all those Passions wherewith she is continually agitated are the means she useth to attain those ends some of them being appointed to pursue good others to flie ill and others
it by and estrange it from her presence she ought to follow the motion of this Passion and not expect an enemy she cannot overcome Did Reason onely engage her to this resistance it were easie to discover the advantages she pretends to make those motives of honor and glory which she commonly proposeth in those encounters would evidently make it appear that she aspires to those noble rewards and that those are the fruits which her Courage pretends to gather but because these motives are extraordinary and unknown to the fancy as hath been shewn that they are not in beasts and that in our selves Reason doth not always force the inferior part but suffers it to go its common road we must seek some other end proper and natural unto it and see what she pretends unto when she takes a resolution to resist those ills which assault her To speak to the purpose it 's not so easie to be discovered as some may think And we must confess that that light which enlightens the Soul in those occasions is of the rank of those which Nature sheds abroad in all those things which without knowing know whereto they ought to tend and which without perceiving it moves to their end The Soul indeed knows that she ought to assault ill and that she ought to overcome it that she ought to resist it and that she must oppose violence but she knows not why and the understanding it self which often doth the same actions is not always advised of the true motion which made it undertake them Upon this ground we may say that as the Soul assaults her enemy out of hope to overcome him and that she seeks to overcome him to take from him the power of doing ill that she also resists him not to take away his power but onely to stop the course thereof and hinder it from producing its effect that the advantage she pretends to make from this hinderance is to retard her own loss as long as she resists or to cause the enemy to lose its will to contuinue his assaults letting of him know that with the strength she hath she cannot be overcome And last of all to shun the danger wherein she would be engaged did she but yield or take flight for she can never slye but she must forsake and quite abandon her Strength and Courage and to augment those of her enemy or at least give him freedom to do all the ill he is capable of In effect did we not oppose grief fear and other evils which are in us they would overflow all the parts of the soul and would bring her to languish and to despair Did we not constantly suffer injuries adversities and other mischiefs which come from without the imagination seeing no means whereby to stop their course would fansie them greater then they are and make them always appear extream and insufferable did we not even sometimes stiffen under the burthen of our sufferings we should be opprest by their weight and those parts which yielded to the violence thereof falling on those which upheld them would batter them by their fall and fill them with grief In a word whatsoever ill the Soul would flie she is in the same danger that a Souldier casts himself into who falls before his enemy or that a whole Army incurs when it flies the sight of a Conqueror who comes pouring down upon it Let 's then conclude that the motive which she proposeth in Boldness is to bereave the enemy of the power of doing ill that in Constancy she onely suspends its effect and that in Fear she seeks to shun it by flight Now as there is more security to have no enemy then to have one who doth harm us and neither is this so much to be feared as one who puts himself in posture to do it So it 's also true that the Soul is more secure in Boldness which destroys ill then in Constancy which hinders onely its effect As for the same reason she ever thinks to fight before she thinks of her own defence and never resolves to flye but at her greatest extremity that being her worst condition and the saddest posture she can be reduced unto leaving the enemy with full power and liberty to work her ruine The soul then resists the ills which assault her Why Constancy resists ill to stop the course of them Let 's now see how she resists them For we question not here that exterior resistance which is performed by the action of the parts which oppose themselves against the efforts of those things which might harm them Besides that there ate ills against which the motions of the Soul would in vain employ this resistance as those which are purely spiritual are for it resists not afflictions by the opposition of corporal forces but by her own proper strength Besides that the motions of the Appetite do not always descend to the organs whether it be because they are restrained by Reason or because they are sometimes formed so quickly and move so readily that it 's impossible they should have time to communicate themselves with the Body It 's certain that all these exterior motions which are observed in the Passions are the effects and sequels of those which are formed within the Soul so that if the Body resist outwardly the Soul also must within herself perform the same action or to speak it better she must of herself resist before she can resist by the Bodies means So that we are obliged to seek in what manner she makes this secret and inward resistance which she employs against spiritual ills and which is the source and cause of that which she causeth to be made in the organs This will be nothing difficult having so often shewn that the agitations of the body are the images and the Characters of those which are made in the Appetite that there is some relation and some resemblance betwixt them and that the Soul exciting both of them it s very likely she would render them as uniform as she can Now we experiment it in our selves that when we must make an outward resistance against a puissant Adversary we stop and remain firm and to fortifie our selves against his assaults we stiffen our Muscles and our Nerves and there is no part about us which becomes not harder and more solid by the effort which we give our selves Somewhat therefore like this must be done in the Soul and consequently she must necessarily stop and confirm herself that gathering her forces together she must stiffen herself in herself In a word she must take as it were a kinde of a consistence which yields not easily to the shock and assault of the enemy The stiffening of the Soul stops the course of ill and how We are now to see how she can stiffen herself and of what nature this Firmness is which she makes use of in this occasion but because this hath been already done in the Discourse
traverses which they meet with in the way to Glory and that Martyrs have always had contentment in their Souls and vigor in their Looks in the greatest of their torments and sufferings Yet this difficulty is easily resolved if we do but remember that there are two Appetites in Man which at the same time may be moved with two contrary Passions and that in the Will it self there are as it were two parts which may be agitated with several motions for these truths being supposed it 's easie to conceive how Grief assaults the Sences whilst Joy sheds it self abroad in the Mind and how Sadness disturbs the lower region of the Will whilst the higher is quiet as ravished with those pleasures which Love Ambition or some other noble Desire proposeth unto it Yet I will not say that Joy and Grief move to that height in Constancy No it is impossible that either of them can be very great by reason of the stiffening of the Soul which hinders their motion but this signifies that if when strong they are compatible together they may more easily be so when they are weakened and consequently Frowardness which commonly accompanies Constancy and is but the commencement of Sadness may subsist with that gayity which is often observed in this Passion not but that transports and ravishments of Joy may cause soundings and faintings of Grief neither is there then any Constancy left and in that very moment the Appetite must release it self to follow the violence of those Passions It 's true that she afterwards stiffens herself but yet it would be but an interrupted Constancy and which continues but by several efforts which are sometimes so quick that the Passions which interrupted them confounded themselves with this as we have said it often happens in all the rest of them For the rest from the insensibility which she hath for the ills of another She is indifferent to all and from the severity she takes in the use of goods an Indifferency springs which she is subject unto forasmuch as he who is not touched with those ills which he sees others suffer and resists all the pleasures of life is certainly free from all those things which may the most powerfully stop the Mind and engage it in the duties of civil society we are not from him to expect the sweets of friendship nor those succors which compassion promiseth to those that are miserable the good and ill of particulars and of the publick are indifferent to him so that rendring himself useless to all the world he becomes rude austere and savage These indeed are those vices which have been observed in the Sect of the Stoicks who studied nothing but to exercise Constancy since all their Philosophy consisted to abstain and to sustain which are the two employments this Passion is destinated unto so that it is no wonder if they fell into those defects which usually follow her when we use her not as we ought Yet we must observe that the indifferency we speak of respects not those things which Constancy is not tied unto for if she oppose a difficulty she hath no indifferency for it On the contrary she stiffens herself opinionates and obstinates herself against it but beyond that all is indifferent to her and she cares neither what may happen nor what concerns the rest And again She is equal and content it 's for the same reason that she always appear Equal and Content forasmuch as that indifferency which she hath for all things she hath no desires nor apprehensions for them and is exempt from those cares and disquiets which those Passions breed add hereunto that equally stiffening herself at the encounter of goods and of ills good and ill fortune finde her always in the same plight and without being carried away by that or being cast down by this she always remains in one posture and ever appears like herself But we have strayed too long to finde Reasons which are easie to be drawn from the principles we have established and which present themselves unto the Mind as soon as a man would but know them Let 's turn to those Characters which this Passion imprints on the Body We shall not be much troubled in this enquiry there being but few whereof we have not spoken in the former Discourse since in the Chapter of Boldness we have examined the causes of an assured Look of the motion of the Lids and Brows of silence of coldness of the face and of the retention of the breath as in the Chapter of Hope we have observed whence was the strength of the Voice and of the Pulse why the Face changed not its colour why the Head and Stature were streight for Constancy hath these effects common with them and useth the same motives and the same means which they employ to produce them we shall only remark some little differences which are to be encountred in them For it 's certain What the Looks are in Constancy that this Assured Look is here formed with a large opening of the Lids a firm Sight and with vivacity But its vivacity is not so great as in Boldness because that in the design which this hath to assault ill she drives the Spirits out and so abundantly fills the Eyes with them that they become altogether sparkling instead of which Constancy which stands upon the defensive stiffens them only without driving them forth with impetuosity so that she renders the Eyes quick because she stops the Spirits which give them force and vigor but they glister not because they come not thither in any quantity and that they want that active motion which makes them glister and sparkle On the other side this firmness of sight is accompanied with a certain severity which is not to be found in Hope because the Soul considers here onely the Ill the presence whereof makes her peevish and that even there she looks on the Good the expectation whereof sweetens the pain which springs from the difficulties which she encounters When the Brows are lifted up What kinde of motion the Brows have it 's onely the better to behold the Enemy and not to help the rasing up of the Soul as it happens in Boldness For which cause they lift not themselves up so much nor so often as in that Passion because the Soul keeping herself firm and stiff to defend herself sollicites not the organs to make those great and frequent sallyes which follow that impetuosity which she suffers herself to be carried away withall in assaulting So that she lifts up the Brows no more then the necessity of the sight requires and not to serve the motion wherewith she is agitated She also represseth them for the same reason as in Boldness For she thinks herself fortified when she hath provided for the securing of her Eyes as hath been shewed in the former Chapter But it sometimes happens that in the strongest assaults of Ills she keeps them unmovable
or continually to keep ones Arms stiff then if we used them to different motions because that all the Muscles agitate therein without taking any rest and herein there is but a part engaged which rests also when the other is in action Every muscle in particular grows stiff when its work operates but that is because it grows hard now it hardens by pressing and contracting the parts together for having no other action but to contract and shut up it self to bring towards it the members it ought to move it must needs take up less room and therefore its parts must be the more streightned whence this hardness comes Which although it happens out of necessity forbears not also to be sought for by the Soul as a thing which may render the body stronger and the less exposed to injuries and it is for the same reason that the skin of Animals streightens it self when they will defend themselves whence it follows that their hair and feathers stand on end as we have elsewhere declared Besides this stifness the Muscles and the skin may also acquire another by tention But because there are two sorts of it the one which is made by drawing strongly those things which may be extended as a rope or parchment the other of filling them with some body as a baloon it 's certain that Constancy cannot render those parts firm and strong by this but onely by the former And this happens when the Muscles cause a member to bend very much for those which are opposed to them and which do not agitate are constrained to lengthen out and extend themselves and by this extention they become firm and so render the skin hard It 's thus that this Passion sometimes extends the hands that the inside which they oppose to the danger may become harder and consequently more fit to resist ill As for the Body it grows stiff not onely when all its parts are stiffened but also by the support and weight which it giveth it self Now it may be upheld by some exterior prop for the Soul which puts it self on the defensive seeks both in and out of it self all what can stiffen it So that when a man is assaulted he who hath somewhat at his back to stay him up and help to support him against the effort of his enemy may make the better resistance The body also upholds it self by the situation and posture which it takes for by advancing a foot or widening a little the legs it makes for it self as it were a prop or a butteress to support it self which hinders it from being overturned on that side it rests on Add also how it also enlargeth its Basis and doth that which Art ordains for great pillars which are better upheld the larger and greater the pedestal is Lastly by making it self weighty it s less subject to be shaken because that augmenting its weight it the better resists the motion of those things which beat against it and so renders it more firm and more stable in its situation But how can it make it self heavy Certainly it is not that it hath more weight then it had but it is that it makes it more efficient by the motion which it gives it self for weighty things have much more strength and make incomparably a greater impression when they are moved when the Body therefore stiffens it self it burthens all the superior parts on the lower and those pressing the earth by the motion of the Muscles which are destined for that purpose they make an effort which augments the force of the weight which they sustain and so render the Body more firm and less easie to be shaken Besides these motions this Passion employs also that of the Hands to oppose herself against the shock she is threatened withal for as they are parts destined to the service of the body she freely exposeth them and hazards them to save it from danger and useth them as Barriers to stop the enemy or as a Buckler to receive the assaults for which cause she opens them that she may cover and defend a greater space she extends them to render them stronger and harder and she advanceth them that she may break and dead the violence of the blows which she cannot hinder from falling on it This is what we had to say of the Characters of Constancy for the rest which we have observed in its description they belong unto her onely by reason of those Passions which sometimes mix themselves with her So Cries Sighs Tears Groans the weakness of the Body proceed all from Pain Indignation Threatnings Blows follow Boldness or Anger The sweetness of the Eyes the gayness of the Countenance arise from the contentment which Love Desire and Hope propose PART III. CHAP. I. The Characters of Anger ALthough Anger be a flame which Nature kindles in the soul of all Animals The Elogy of Anger and that it may be compared to that fire which shines in the Stars for the preservation of the Universe It 's strange that it 's almost never considered but as a frightful Comet which declares and produceth nothing but fire and sword and that Humane Reason should be so unjust as always to condemn a Passion which always fights for Reason and for Justice Yes without doubt since she is onely raised in the Soul to repel injuries and to chastise those she believes have unjustly offended her we may boldly say that she never arms herself but against Violence and ever sides with Reason and Equity It is not but that men which abuse all the most useful presents of Nature do often make it serve evill designs but besides that to judge according to Reason of the price and value of things we must not consult concerning the abuses which are found in them nor the ill use which may be made of them It 's certain that when she appears most unjust she hath motives which seem equitable that she must at least have the appearance of Justice to oblige her to take arms and that if she be deceived therein it is not she that is to be accused but rather Malice and Error who call her to their releif As we do not blame Souldiers who are of a Princes Guard when they follow him in temerous enterprises and that it 's sometimes the duty of a good Subject to obey a Tyrant neither must we condemn Anger which was submitted to Reason to serve for its guard and defence when she follows it in its irregularities and obeys its orders how unjust soever they be In a word it is not in corruption we are to seek the purity of Anger we must go back to its source and enquire in the first channels wherein it runs if it hath Vertues and Qualities useful for life and worthy the praise we have given it If it be then true that she comes from Nature and that this Nature is nothing else but the Art of God and the effusion of his goodness and wisdom
the grief we have of seeing ones self unjustly slighted besides that Beasts are not touched with scorn who nevertheless are susceptible of this Passion there are a thousand encounters wherein we may be provoked to Anger without having cause to believe we have been slighted as when we are angry with our selves or against insensible things If instead of this slighting you put Injury the same difficulty remains entire since it 's very probable that Beasts know not injustice nor consequently Injury and that there are many things which make us angry at which we cannot justly be offended Add also that a man may have the grief to see himself offended and the desire of being revenged without being angry for the motion of Grief and that of Desire which belongs to the Concupiscible Appetite seem not as if they should enter into the essence of this Passion besides they should tell us what Vengeance is and why we desire it for if to revenge ones self be nothing but to retort the ill on him who afflicted it causing him to suffer the same pains There is no likelihood that a man should be angry with himself or insensible things seeing no man would be revenged on himself and that it is impossible and useless against those things that are without sence To say likewise that it 's a rising in the Soul whereby she overcomes those difficulties which traverse her designs This definition would be too general seeing it befits also Boldness and that therein the Soul may raise it self without being moved by Anger for I mind not those who say that this rising up is not an Appetite since it 's a received maxime That all motion of the Appetitive part is called the Appetite To conclude the worst of all those is that which raiseth it to an ebullition or fixing the blood about the heart for it it not therein that the essence of Anger consists that is only its effect it being certain that all Passions are impermanent actions which are formed in the Soul before she agitates the Body and principally the humors which are no parts of it These are the difficulties which are entertained in common opinion the method which we hold and the principles which we have established render not the thing the more easie For after having shewed that the Soul which will not flye before the enemy hath but two courses to take to wit Resistance and Assault which are Constancy and Boldness it seems as if we had exhausted all the springs whence Anger might proceed as if we were obliged to confound it with one or other of these two Passions Indeed it raiseth it self up against ill it assaults it it would overcome it even as Boldness so that they seem both to have but the same object the same motive and the same motion and therefore to be but one Passion since these three things which make the difference of all the esmotions of the Soul render them equal and every way alike Yet since it 's undoubted that they are different and that by experience we know there are ills which move Boldness and not Anger that this is more impetuous and turbulent then the other and that there are many persons which are cholerick as Children Women and those that are sick which we cannot call Bold there must necessarily be some circumstances and some conditions in their causes which must make the difference let 's first therefore examine the matter and the object of this Passion and consider whether it be truly the same which raiseth Boldness In the former Discourse we have shewn What ill is Anger 's object That the word Ill did not onely signifie the effect which properly is ill but also the cause which produceth it And this distinction is so necessary for the knowledge of the Passions that there are some which have no other object but the ill it self as Grief others which consider onely the cause as Anger Hope and Despair Lastly others which confound them together as Boldness Hatred Aversion and Fear Now Anger assaults nothing but the cause onely of ill for a man cannot be angry with an injury which he may have received but with him who did it Quite contrary Boldness looks on the danger without often considering whence it happens But as there are causes which produce ill without knowledge as others which effect it without design if we considerately examine those which Anger assaults we shall always finde them agitating with design for we are not provoked to anger against a stone which hurts us but against him who threw it And what ill soever we suffer it will never raise this Passion if we do not imagine that there is some cause which had an intention to make us suffer it Yet because he who chastiseth with a purpose to do ill doth not always provoke Anger there must be one kinde of ill proper to move this Passion which being properly moved may cause the Soul to rise against that which is the cause thereof Others as we have already said will have it be Scorn there being nothing more powerful to provoke Anger nor any ill which a man more impatiently suffers yet since Children and Beasts are not sensible of it who nevertheless are often touched with this Passion and that we every day see very many who patiently suffer Scorn who are all in a fury if you do but take from them what they believe is their due Finally we are angry with our selves with chance with insensible things by which we can no ways be despised so that we must confess there must be some other ill which moves Anger Others will have it to be an Injury men indeed are never so angry as against those by whom they think they have been unjustly offended And when we think the offence hath been done without design or believe that we have deserved it we no longer seek to revenge it On the other side it seems as if Beasts cannot know injuries since they know not unjust things and so we must say that they are not susceptible of Anger could injuries onely provoke it But if we consider that Children who have not the use of Reason and whose knowledge is not much different from that of Beasts forbear not to know when they are unjustly offended that a Lyon is not angry with a stone or a thorn which hurts it that there are Beasts fierce enough which in play suffer ill without seeking revenge and are seldom angry with Children It 's very probable that there is some kinde of justice amongst them that they know there are ills which they ought not suffer and that they know who offends them out of design not that they have the knowledge of things so clear and so distinct as men may have but the same instinct which guides them to their end without their pretending to arrive thereunto affords them also the knowledge of the wrong which is done them without discerning it It 's true there
is a great difference in this knowledge and it 's more or less perfect according as Creatures have more or less perfection A Bee casts out its sting against a stone as well as against an Animal but a Dog unless he be furious will never assault any but him who purposely hath hurt him Beasts are therefore capable of knowing injuries and therefore we may say that there is no other ill but that which ought to move Anger Now there may be as many kindes of injuries as there are things which may unjustly offend Scorn is a great injury but amongst us there is none which so commonly and generally doth it as Despight And Nature hath given so great an Aversion to the Mind of man against it it endures no ill whatsoever more impatiently then that nor is it more easily or more violently born away by any to revenge And this in my opinion happens from that that Scorn is nothing else but the opinion which we have that a thing merits not consideration having no considerable quality and that we judge it can do neither good nor hurt for we ought to honor excellent things love those which are profitable and fear those which are hurtful so that those are to be despised which deserve not honor and are capable of neither love nor fear But besids that man is naturally a lover of himself that desire of vengeance is born with him and out of that consideration he believes himself amiable and that if he be offended he can be hurtful he hath a secret sence of the dignity of his being and thinks that he commits an injustice who renders him not the honor which is due unto him That to despise him is in a manner to contest the advantages which Nature hath given him Finally as there is no good which is more his own then that there is also nothing which can transport him more then for any to seek take it away If this original excellency is accompanied with those which birth study or fortune may advance such as are the natural and acquired qualities of the Mind the strength and beauty of the Body Honors Riches and Friends it 's then that the sence of Scorn is more common and most insufferable because that those who think to excel in any thing believe also that there is honor due unto them and that in several occasions many are wanting to give it them Whence it happens that Great Rich and Young men those who have many Friends Honor or Beauty are easily moved to wrath yet I also know that such as are deprived of these excellent qualities as are Poor Old and Sick persons in a word all those who have any defect are Cholerick beleeving at every moment that they are despised by reason of their imperfections and although they think not that they ought to be esteemed for them yet they do beleeve it 's to commit an injustice whether it be because their defects seem to deserve compassion rather then scorn or whether every one thinks they have sufficient store of other good qualities to counter-ballance those wants Whence the greatness of an injury Now although the kind and the nature of the injury ought to render it more or less sensible yet neither is it that which measures its greatness it 's the opinion alone of him that suffers it for how great soever the offence may be it would never kindle Anger unless we acknowledge and resent it And often an indifferent thing will grow to a gross injury if we but imagine it to be so Now there are two causes which may form this opinion Truth and Error this comes from the precipitation and weakness of the Mind which commonly follows the temperature and custom wherefore Children Women and sick people are easily moved whereas a judicious and magnanimous man seldom grows angry As for the Truth it proceeds from the just value we have of the offence examining the greatness of the ill the persons the places the times and the causes for if the ill be great indeed if he who receives it is a person of quality and he that offends is his inferior or is obliged unto him in any kinde of duty if it were in publick if for a slight cause or that malice was the onely motive we cannot doubt but the resentment must be the greater In a word the further he that offends errs from justice and from his duty so much greater effectually the injury is and the esmotion which it raiseth up in the Mind must also be the more violent He therefore who doth an injury is the object of Anger Why it riseth up against the cause of ill and the onely enemy against whom it imploys all its efforts Let 's now enquire the reason why the Soul riseth up against him and the design she hath when she assaults him All the world is agreed That it is to revenge herself for there is no body agitated by this Passion who respires not vengeance who speaks not of it and with pleasure executes it not unless he be diverted In effect To revenge ones self on any man is to make him suffer a punishment proportionable to the ill he hath done so God revengeth himself on the wicked by punishing them the Laws revenge crimes by those chastisements which they ordain and Men revenge particular injuries by the ill which they inflict on those which have offended them Anger therefore hath no other design but that it intends onely to seek satisfaction for the offence received to chastise him who hath committed it and to cause him to suffer an equal or pronortionable punishment to the ill which he hath done But what profit or benefit can accrew unto it by this chastisement For the injury is done is received is resented and were there any remedy to be applied it were to be employed for the taking away or sweetning of the ill and not against the cause which can nothing ease it and can no ways undo what it hath done Were it true that this Passion had no other object but Scorn we might say that revenge were a necessary means to take away the stain and the shame because that doing ill to him who despiseth us we should make him know that we were nothing despicable since scorn is nothing but the opinion which we have that a thing can do neither good nor hurt But besides that Scorn is not the universal object of Anger the revenge it seeks hath a more general end then that for we are not content to do ill to him who scorns us to make him lose that conceit since there are other means to perswade him to it without losing the desire of our revenge but necessarily Revenge must be a punishment wherewith this Passion seeks to chastise those who offend it Now all pains and all chastisements are the remedies which Justice employs against Malice but throughly to examine them What the motive and the end of chastisements
seeing they have ill for their object they both assault it and both would take away its power of doing ill And although we may say that the Object of Boldness is more universal then that of Anger since this assaults onely the cause of ill and the other assaults it what ill soever it be that their End admits of the same difference Anger having no other design but to take away the power of ill doing from that cause which hath already done it and Boldness endeavoring to take it away without considering whether it be done or no yet all this would onely serve to conclude that Anger is a species and a difference onely of Boldness And without doubt if we respect the end and the object onely of these two Passions we must be forced to fall into this error so that there remains the motion onely whereby the diversity which is betwixt them is observeable But what What the motion of the Soul is in Anger Both of them rise up against ill and it signifies nothing to say that this rising up of Anger is more impetuous then that of Boldness for besides that it often happens that this is moved with as much or more violence and more readily then the other less and more cannot cause an essential difference in the Passions Must it not then be Grief which ever accompanies Anger which causeth some diversity in these motions for it 's she alone we can fancy is able to contribute any thing thereunto And indeed this conjecture would be very likely did not Grief very often joyn with Boldness without moving Wrath we may indeed resent the ill and repel it without being moved by this Passion and we see daily in single combates that the grief for the wounds we have received or the displeasure we might have to see ones enemy have the advantage accompanies often Boldness without any esmotion of Anger We cannot say a Judge is moved with it when he compassionates him who hath suffered an injury and will revenge him according to Law and that a Father may not chastise his Children who have offended him without being sensible of the motions of this Passions Finally is it to be believed that a man always makes himself angry with sickness with a Beast that bites him or a Serpent that stings him when he drives them away or assaults them and yet in all these encounters Grief and Boldness are both met Yet must we not upon these considerations renounce our proposed conjecture Anger is a mixture of Grief and Boldness for since Grief is so strictly conjoyned with Anger that it can never be separated and that it is but by chance it mixeth with Boldness It 's to be believed that it unites it self with this after another manner then it doth with the other and that this diversity causeth an essential difference in their motions And certainly the Passions may mix together two ways the one is by confounding their motions so that the Soul at the same time suffers two Passions as Hope and Boldness Boldness and Anger the other is by making the motion of the one succeed the other so that two Passions remain not together but so swiftly follow one another that they seem to be but one as Love and Desire Joy and Hope Grief therefore may joyn with Boldness both these ways and without doubt in the examples proposed they do but follow one the other at several reprisals without uniting their motions But when they confound themselves together they cause this Passion of Anger which is nothing but the union and the confusion of the former for which cause Anger is never without them because they are the essential parts whereof it is composed To confirm this truth we need onely consider that the same offence raiseth up in Anger a far more sharp and fretful grief then in Boldness for there is no other reason of this diversity but that Grief and Boldness have contrary motions and that the Soul being at the same time agitated by both cannot but suffer a great violence and that the displeasure she conceives for the injury received must needs be augmented by the pain she is sensible of in the combate of these two Passions Nature in effect which loves order and equality in all flies as much as it may this contrariety of motions and if she finde herself engaged in it she suffers it with pain and disquiet and if it be lawfull to say so she groans under so heavy a burthen which she cannot long support without being overwhelmed which is the reason why Anger is not long lasting and that it presently changeth into other Passions as into Hatred Sadness and into Despair But when Grief joyns wsth Boldness so that their motions are not confounded and that they do but follow and succeed one another the Soul is not constrained and tortured and suffers not that turbulent and painful agitation wherewith she is necessarily moved in the encounter of two opposite motions For which cause Grief is not so pungent nor doth it admit of that encrease which the pain and trouble of the Soul in Anger suffers It s true that in this occasion these two Passions follow one another so close that they may easily be confounded and so form Anger as in fight it often happens and after the same manner as Grief therein becomes more pungent Boldness also becomes more impetuous by reason of the endeavor the Soul makes in the constraint which those two contrary motions cause in it as we shall say hereafter What may be objected against this doctrine may be Whether any Anger may be found without any cause of offence that to form Anger there must be a cause which offends with intention and that it may happen that Grief and Boldness might confound themselves were it not for that cause and therefore altogether without their moving of Anger But we may boldly answer that it 's impossible it should so happen and that if Grief and Boldness unite when no cause hath caused an injury still the Soul fancies one as when a man is angry with himself with fortune and with insensible things because the Soul which is instructed by nature in all what is necessary for the production of the Passions knows what motion is proper for every one of them what object ought to move them and what end she ought to propose herself in them and not one of these things presents it self so soon to our knowledge but it presently adds two others so that in the same manner as when she resents an injury she at the same time forms the design of revenging herself and afterwards agitates herself by that motion which is proper for Anger so when she findes herself agitated with this motion the cause which ought to move this Passion not occurring therein knowing it is that she is accustomed to make use of in Anger she forms to herself the cause and object of Anger and so perfects
that power so neither is there any man but hopes to be revenged And truly all those actions which proceed from this Passion how slight soever they be are punishments by which we pretend to chastise him who hath offended us since there is not any but affords him Grief or Fear for a bold and brasen-faced mind an action full of disdain and despight and injurious words are able to displease persons even that are of the highest condition and threats are for no other purpose but to fright those against whom we make them Now if Grief and Fear are ills and consequently punishments with which the Soul intends to chastise him who hath committed an injury that he may do so no more believing that they are able to change his mind and that it 's sufficient to witness our Courage and resentment to make him even lose the desire of continuing his ill design and that he may imagine that their little essays are but the beginnings of a greater vengeance It 's thus that the wilde Beasts commonly bound their anger with a slight snap or a weak blow and that they often content themselves by affronting those who pursue them looking through them shewing their teeth onely and putting themselves in posture of assaulting them And although the weakness the Soul is in checks her often from undertaking more she had rather act thus weakly then to take flight which would be far more disadvantagious and by these motions which seem bold and generous she would hide her impotency and her defects as in other occasions she useth to do How ever it be she never makes herself angry but she hopes to be revenged and to make him who hath offended her suffer some kinde of ill But it follows not that she ought always to hope for full satisfaction of the injury which she thinks she hath received because it commonly depends on the opinion of men and not in the intention of Nature in effect the means and the degrees of revenge are commonly different according to the humor and the condition of the persons and according to the customs of the Country A Prince or a Gentleman revengeth himself after another manner then doth a Clown a cruel and bloody minded Man is not so easily satisfied as another and there are places where we believe without a single Duel no satisfaction can be had for an offence and others where poison and assassination are commonly imployed Now as it often happens that a man hath not the power to use those means nor to pursue his vengeance to that height it 's most certain that then we despair to revenge it after that manner but not absolutely to be unrevenged for the reasons aforesaid and it 's therefore true that the hope of revenge always precedes Anger As for Despair What kind of Despair it is happens in Anger which sometimes happens and renders it more violent neither is that an absolute loss of hope nor doth conclude against the Doctrine already proposed For we shall shew in the Discourse destined for that Passion what the word Despair signifies in our Language as well as in the Greek and Latine two Passions altogether different to wit the common despair wherein we lose all hope and wherein the Soul gives back and loseth courage perceiving that she cannot obtain that good which she expected and that despair or desperateness which is particular to Anger and Boldness which instead of mollifying or abating the courage stiffens it against all difficulties with a greater impetuosity and transport then it had before For it 's certain that in this the Soul which findes obstacles which she never foresaw loseth the hope of effecting what she proposed but at the same time she conceives another and forms new designs which engage her in those transports and fougadoes which are commonly called actions of despair as shall more fully appear when we throughly discourse on that subject Let 's now take a view of the other Characters of this Passion and without stoping at Confidence and at Presumption which have been examined in the Discourse of Boldness and depend on the same causes which produce Hope let 's enquire the nature and source of Fury which so often mixeth it self with Anger for although they are often confounded together and that we commonly give the latter the name of Fury yet they are two very different things since there are Anger 's which are nothing furious and that Fury is to be found in other Passions and in other actions wherein there is no suspition of Anger There are indeed divers sorts of Furie What fury is some have been called Divine others Brutal and others have been placed in the rank of Diseases But all have this in common that they put the Soul out of its natural place and transport it as it were out of it self some making it perform actions beyond the ordinary strength of men and which for the same cause seem to have something that 's divine the other causing him to lose his Reason and embasing him to the nature of the wildest beasts It 's not a place here to examine by retail all these differences it shall be sufficient to say that this violent transport wherein the essence of this Fury in general consists may proceed either from the Soul which raiseth up and animates herself or from that heat which pricks her up and irritates her the fury of Love and the Poetick Fury are amongst those which are divine those which commonly acknowledge no other cause but the Soul alone which of herself raiseth herself up and makes those miraculous sallies which are as Enthusiasms and divine inspirations for having the power to move herself she in those encounters darts herself forth with so much ardor that she carries herself away and as he which runs with too much impetuosity cannot stop himself and often goes further then he willingly would she abandons herself to the loose which she giveth herself and so passeth beyond her ordinary limits But it 's not so in Martial and Bacchick Furies nor in those others which follow Anger or corporal sicknesses For it is not the Soul which begins this motion wherewith she is in these encounters carried away it 's the heat which the Wine Boldness or the distemper of the body imprints in the spirits which being agitated by this turbulent quality at every moment strikes against the seat of the Animal Faculties which drives them forth and casts them into these extraordinary motions This therefore is the general reason whereby Anger passeth into Fury for a man need not doubt but that this Passion kindles a great fire in the bowels but that it violently agitates in the spirits and that the quiet which those noble operations of the Soul require must needs be trouled by that tempest which she raiseth in their principal organs so that the Faculties which conduct the Animal act no longer conformably to the Laws of Nature or of Reason
approach of those vapors which the Humors casts on those organs which extending the Membrane which environs them render it more united more polished and more fit to reverberate the light which they receive Add also that the continual motion wherewith they are agitated makes them sparkle and glister the more to which we may also add that their Driness renders their brightness more quick and peircing it being certain that humidity dims the light and that the refraction it makes there weakens the rayes instead that on dry and polished bodies it 's reflected and reverberated all whole and pure for which cause in Love and in Joy how sparkling soever the eyes be by reason of their humidity yet they have not so strong and so penetrating a splendor as these have But whence doth this driness proceed Is it not from the vehemency of the heat which consumes all the humour which runs over the Eyes or rather sharp and drying vapors which rise from that cholerick humour which is agitated for where-ever they arrive they render the skin dry and parched as is observable in burning Feavors and in cholerick constitutions Besides this Fiery Eyes the splendor we have spoken of mixing it self with that colour which the blood brought to those parts produceth an enflamed redness which renders the Eyes fiery even like unto coals of fire They cast themselves forth The Eyes advance outwards whether because they receive a great quantity of spirits of vapor and of blood they swell and so are constrained to occupy the greater room or because the spirits which issue out with impetuosity drive those parts out of their natural scituation or finally because the Soul which is carried out of her self draws them along with her and causeth them to make a sally like her own Wandering Eyes The Eyes are wandering which continually move their sight here and there without fixing on any object make a part of this furious look and it 's principally what renders them frightful and formidable for which cause those who have treated of the Nature of Beasts say that the Panther which after this manner always rowls its Eyes hath a more terrible and frightful look then any other and that there is no Beast how fierce or bold soever it be which it doth not fright and terrifie therewithal However when the sight becomes thus wandering in sickness it 's a certain sign that the party is falling into fury Yet we must observe that fear also produceth the same effect and often renders the looks wilde and inconstant but besides that the air of the Face which accompanies those Passions may alone observe a great difference betwixt those looks it 's most certain that they are effectually different from one the other neither are they made in the same manner For fear causeth us to cast our eyes on this and on that side but how light or quick soever the motion it affords them is it for a while stops them on those objects which present themselves and it appears clearly that it seeks them to consider them and to see whether it be from them the ill must happen which she fears But fury without design carries the sight here and there and without heeding what it encounters casts the eyes on things without seeing them and all its looks are lost looks and truly wandering Now these motions partly come from heat which is a moving quality and when it 's provoked it puts all in disorder partly from that agitation which the spirits suffer which easily communicates it self to the Eyes being as they are moving partly from the Souls transport which abandons the conduct of those organs and suffers them to move at the pleasure of the tempest which she raised The Brows are not knit And according to my opinion it s also the reason why the Brows are not shrunk up as in the fierce look for since their contraction is an effect of that care which the Soul takes to fortifie herself which she always also preserves so long as she is herself when she is once carried away with fury and that she is as it were out of herself she then loseth the remembrance of her preservation and hath no other motions but those which the blindness and madness of the Passion gives For which cause when she darts impetuously casts herself out of her natural situation she draws with her the most movable parts and so causeth the Brows and Lids to lift themselves up in pursuit wherof the openings of the eyes must not onely be greater but they must also-become rounder because the Lid cannot open much but its angles must be widened which must also be drawn the nearer to one another to facilitate this extention which is made in the circumference Now besides that this causeth a round figure a greater part of the white of the Eye must also appear which renders the look more strange and dreadful Tears which are sometimes shed in Anger may come from the Grief which we suffer by reason of an injury Whence Tears in Anger yet commonly they have no other source but the despight we have for not being revenged for which cause Women and Children are more subject to weep in the strength of this Passion then Men because they then acknowledge their weakness and are forced to suffer the wrong which was done them without seeking satisfaction To know now how these tears are formed and what the motive of the Soul is when upon these occasions she sheds them its what in its place must be examined and to which we have destined a particular Discourse which shall follow that of Grief But we have sufficiently spoken of the Charactâ—â—â— which Anger imprints on the Eyes 〈◊〉 now consider those which she forms on the other parts of the Face The Lips grow thick by reason their substance is soft and spungy The Lips grows thick which easily imbibes the blood which runs thither And being filled therewith they overturn themselves their bounds being free and being not restrained by the neighboring parts But whence comes their trembling The Lips tremble and principally that of the lower Lip Is it not that the spirits crackle in those parts and cause that part which is extreamly movable to tremble or that the Choler which is moved pricks the stomack which hath a great sympathy with the neather Lip whence it is that in sickness the trembling of that part is a sign of vomiting The Lips press one another Sometimes they joyn and press one the other to retain breath and thereby to render the motion the more strong or to fortifie those parts which grow hard and stiff by the contraction of the Muscles as hath been said in the Chapter of Boldness They also sometimes retire themselves The Lips retire themselves and discover the teeth which most part of Beasts usually do when they are angry because those are their natural Arms which they discover to fright
exposeth her self to danger and abandons her self to all the rage which possesseth her The Respiration in this is just as it is in Boldness for although it proceeds from the same causes the Pulse doth that it is of the same use and that its motions have the same relation yet hath it not all the differences or at least it hath not made them known because we are not sensible by the touch of the Body of the Lungs where it is formed as we are sensible of that of the Arteries and that there is not such a tie betwixt that and the rest of the exterior organs which renders it sensible as there is betwixt the Heart and these kind of Veins for which cause there is neither hardness nor softness in the Respiration as is in the pulse nor can we observe any thing which comes near this kind of beating which we said was proper to Anger although the Lungs suffer the same changes and be in the same condition as the Heat then is for Hippocrates assures us that in this Passion both the one and the other retire and restrain themselves in themselves 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 although heat at the same time swells them and lifts them up Now although we cannot doubt but these contrary motions come from the mixture of these two Passions whereof we have spoken yet it is not easie to observe how they may be compatible together nor what parts are destined for their reception it being not probable that the same should be agitated by both together For we cannot herein say of the Heart and Lungs what we have said of the Arteries their natural constitution and the action which they are obliged to perform suffers them not to be restrained as they are to be lift up It must necessarily be that they must extend when they open themselves But if they extend themselves so how can they restrain themselves Certainly we must say that their flesh and substance gathers comprench and restrains it self and that their cavities enlarge themselves instead that in Joy all the parts release and soften themselves having not that need to fortifie themselves as here they have in effect the pulse which appears harder in Anger then in Boldness is a certain sign that the substance of the Arteries restrains and hardens it self and we cannot doubt but that the hardness of these parts comes from the contraction of the Soul since it is for that onely reason that the pulse becomes hard in Fear All the difficulty remaining is To know why the Arteries which borrow the vertue of moving themselves from the Heart have not a motion like his and that they streighten their cavity on the sides although that enlargeth his own on all sides To resolve this difficulty we must observe that the beating of the Arteries is not the same which is in the Heart since those open and lift themselves up whilst this fall and shuts it self So that they must needs be too different motions and consequently proceed from two different vertues And if this be true there is no necessity that they should resemble in all things and the Heart in any sence may enlarge it self without any necessity for the Arteries to do the same now as the Heart hath its Ventricles placed on the right and left which necessarily ought to open themselves to receive blood and air which enters therein it 's impossible the Soul should cause it to make a motion conformable to the Passions wherewith it is agitated as is made in the Arteries where this impediment is not and where she hath all the liberty to satisfie Grief by restraining them and Boldness by raising them up as hath been said As for the Lungs there is a particular reason for which they cannot restrain themselves as the others do for they have not the power to move themselves and of themselves they lift themselves not up to give place to the air which enters It is the muscles of respiration which extending themselves widen the capacity of the Breast and constrain the Lungs to open to hinder a vacuum for which cause waving the motive Faculty they have not those kinds of motion which depend therefrom But it is to pry too far into the secrets of Physick and the further clearing hereof would be useless to those who know it and those who are ignorant of it would never be sufficiently informed Let us onely say That although Anger causeth often very great disorders in the Soul and in the Body Anger is profitable to health yet it is not always an enemy to Reason nor to Health It is absolutely necessary for weak and idle minds and for cold and gross constitutions and even in all others it may be compared to winds which how impetuous soever they are drive away vapors and mists clearing the air and rendring it the more pure and wholesom In effect if we seek to hinder its course or that we would restrain it without suffering it so much as to exhale it self by words it preserves it self a long time in the Soul and at last alters the humors whence often happen great and pernicious sicknesses For as the inferior part is deaf to the counsels of Reason and that she proposeth to herself revenge as the end she tends unto she will cause her motion to cease untill she is at least in some manner revenged So that the Will may then hinder those actions over which it hath a power such as are words blows and the like but for those which are not under its direction as are the motions of the Heart and the agitation of the Humors they must necessarily be continued they must even by this restraint be rendred the more violent and they must last the longer time since we delay our revenge which is the end which ought to terminate them FINIS
those who vvould offend them or to be the readier to make use of them This is also observed in some persons vvhen they fall into a rage and fasten on the flesh of any one whether it be that the Soul makes this endeavor thinking to fortifie herself as she doth by knitting the Brows or whether in effect she would with her teeth tear in peices and if she could even devour her enemy For there are men who grind their teeth who in their anger bite what they meet withal and who would eat the heart and bowels of those who have done them an injury The Voice is sharp and vehement because Anger being composed of Grief and Boldness What the Voice is in Anger this with impetuosity driving the air which is in the Lungs and Grief restraining the Muscles and streightning the passages so that the voice must needs become shrill passing through so streight a channel and being driven out with vehemency must needs also be strong But there are two Propositions which Aristotle hath made in his Physionomy which may make us doubt whether this voice be that which principally belongs to Anger The first is that which is gross at first and at last grows sharp is the sign of a cholerick person and this relates to Oxen and to the likeness of their voice Indeed when these Beasts bellow their voice at last grows sharp and hath somewhat in it which is sad and languishing and even in men affliction and grief in complaints form the same air and the same languor Now if this be so the voice of Anger is not as we said strong and vehement The second is That those who have a sharp and vehement Voice are cholerick and that this relates to Goats But besides that these creatures have not that kind of Voice they were never observed to be inclined to that Passion we must therefore say that there is an error in those two propositions by the fault of the Translators for in the first the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies not Anger as they have translated it but sad languishing cast down for matter of courage and in that sence it 's true that the Voice which is grosse at first and sharp at last is a sign of sadness as we shall shew in the Chapter of Grief In the last there is also the same fault in the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifies not Anger but rather Lasciviousness which is indeed a quality proper to Goats Add also that the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies not simply a strong and vehement Voice but a forced and constrained Voice such as is the bleating of Goats as shall be said in its place The Voice becomes hoarse by the inequality of its organs The Voice is hoarse for heat melting the humors and making them run on those parts it renders them moist and unequal and the voice which it utters is rude and sounds not and because that vehemency is joyned with this sharpness thence it is it becomes terrible and frightfull Lastly The Voice stops all at once Sometimes it stops all at once in despight of ones teeth whether it be that the violence wherewith it drives the breath quickly clears the Lungs and deprives the Heart of its refreshings and that in this necessity the Soul making haste to cause a new attraction of the air the Voice is constrained to stop to give it passage Or whether the Nerves which help to form it suffer a kind of convulsion being pricked by those Humors which heat agitates as it happens to children which cry whose voice and respiration leaps and so cut and suddenly stop themselves The Tongue faulters The Tongue faulters either by reason of the quantity of blood which thickens it or renders it heavy or by reason of driness which hinders its motion or by reason of the Souls transport which sends the Spirits elsewhere and hinders them from having recourse to those parts The Words interfare by the hast and impetuosity which the Soul causeth The Words imerfare which precipitates the words and thoughts one upon another The Discourse is entangled from the disorder of reason The Discourse is entangled and from the several designs it weaves and confounds together The Breathing is vehement Respiration is vehement and proceeds from the impetuous respiration which the heat of the Heart and the endeavor of the Soul causeth For the principal end of Respiration is to refresh the Heart and the Spirits wherefore when they are heated it is at the same time augmented But because also this action is partly voluntary since it will advance or retard even as the Soul desires it should thence it is that the endeavor she makes in all her actions appears in this rendring it violent and precipitate The same heat renders the Mouth dry The Mouth is dry and gives it an ardent Thirst which is not so easily satisfied as that which happens in Fear as shall be said elsewhere Those malignant humors which are moved and heated cause a Sticking Breath Laughter is often an effect of Indignation or of Scorn Laughter in Anger which are mixed with Anger as we said it happened to Boldness but commonly it comes from the malignant pleasure we have in Revenge yet the Temperature contributes much to this effect For Septentrional people have almost the same air in fight and we may see them assault their Enemies with a certain insolent Fierceness and with I know not what kind of scoffing Laughter instead whereof the Southern people carry on their Countenance a fierce Frowardness and a sharp and cruel Sadness the reasons whereof shall in its place be discovered The Redness which this Passion commonly raiseth up in the Face is not altogether like that which Joy The Face becomes red Shame and some other Passions shed abroad in it it is far more clear and less vermilion then in this for that it proceeds from a cholerick blood whose colour is more pale by reason the tincture of the Gall which weakens the splendor and Vermilion of the Blood and causeth this inflamed Redness which is visible in the Face and Breast of those who are angry It also sometimes happens that it becomes obscure and blackish and this chiefly is when Anger is turned into Fury for the agitation is then so great that the thickest blood is cast on the outward parts which affords it its natural colour and paints them of that black and livid colour which is to be observed on the Cheecks and on the Lips because they are the most sanguine parts of the Face As for that paleness which sometimes happens at the beginning of this Passion we have spoken of it in the Chapter of Boldness We must not stay long on the most part of the rest of the Characters which this Passion imprints on the body the reasons are easily found by those principles which we have established For we cannot remember