thought to their assistance. Any one of these, from various and
complicated reasons, may in particular cases prevail over the other
two; and there are, I suppose, instances, where the bare SIGHT of
distress, without our feeling any compassion for it, may be the
occasion of either or both of the two latter perceptions. One might
add that if there be really any such thing as the fiction or
imagination of danger to ourselves from sight of the miseries of
others, which Hobbes specks of, and which he has absurdly mistaken
for the whole of compassion; if there be anything of this sort
common to mankind, distinct from the reflection of reason, it would
be a most remarkable instance of what was furthest from his
thoughts--namely, of a mutual sympathy between each particular of
the species, a fellow-feeling common to mankind. It would not
indeed be an example of our substituting others for ourselves, but
it would be an example of user substituting ourselves for others.
And as it would not be an instance of benevolence, so neither would
it be any instance of self-love: for this phantom of danger to
ourselves, naturally rising to view upon sight of the distresses of
others, would be no more an instance of love to ourselves than the
pain of hunger is.

{14} Ecclus. xxxii. 28.

{15} Ecclus. xlii. 24.

{16} Ver. 4, 5.

{17} Ver. 6.

{18} Micah vi.