stance, such as England or America, money is much more keenly, and much more generally pursued, than in societies in which this sentiment is comparatively quiescent. 29. Political power can seldom be attained, except by a great disregard of the pleasures and pains of others; and one of the most common ways of attaining wealth, is, to attain it at the expense of others, by taking from them, by force or fraud, what they have; or by frightening or cheating them into labor for our benefit. The manifold evils which the desire of political power and the pursuit of wealth lead men to inflict upon their fellow-men, and the entire triumph which these desires obtain so often over the sentiment of benevolence, may well account for all the declamations of moralists against Ambition and Covetousness; and may enable us to understand why some of them have denounced the love of power, and the love of money, as the roots of all evil. 30. The desire of superiority, however, that sentiment which is, at times, the most dangerous opponent of the sentiment of benevolence, is, at other times, its best and firmest ally; to such an extent, that the Stoics built their system of morals almost wholly upon it. 31. According to the Stoics, the pleasure of superiority is far superior to all other pleasures; the pain of inferiority far greater than all other pains. In fact, these are the only pleasures and pains that deserve to be called such; and no man can be a Stoic whose constitution is not conformable to this idea. But as virtue is universally esteemed the highest attribute of human nature, the highest degree of superiority can only be obtained by the highest superiority in virtue. Therefore, the greatest pleasure and the greatest virtue must be coincident. Such was the reasoning of the Stoics; and although their theory fails entirely to explain the origin and nature of moral distinctions; though it neither assists us to ascertain what actions are virtuous, nor points out the reason why virtue is esteemed the highest of human attributes, yet it evinces a certain insight into the motives of human conduct, and into the origin of that pleasure with which the performance of virtuous actions is attended. 32. We have already pointed out how it happens that virtue is that quality which enjoys the highest esteem among men. To be inferior in that quality inflicts a pain; to be superior in it affords a pleasure; which pain and which pleasure are keen in proportion as the power of moral perception is acute, and the desire of superiority strong. The desire of superiority, however, as to most matters, is satisfied, provided we can attain the level of equality with those about us. Except as to some few things, or some single thing, in which we may esteem ourselves able to excel, it is the pain of inferiority rather than the desire of superiority, that impels us; and it is this same pain of inferiority which is a perpetual and most efficacious spur to the performance of those actions which are esteemed duties. What are called duties the performance of which indicates only an ordinary degree of virtue, would not, however, be ordinarily performed, unless the sentiment of benevolence were reinforced by a pain of inferiority at the idea of falling short of others in benevolent acts. 33. It is also true, that almost all great and heroic acts of virtue, especially those which require any sustained and prolonged course of action, are, to a considerable extent, due to the love of superiority. No doubt, for the performance of such actions, a nice perception of the difference between right and wrong, and a warm love of the right, are absolutely necessary; and these cannot exist without a high degree of benevolence. When high acts of virtue consist, as they sometimes do, merely in the sacrifice, the relinquishment of our own good for the benefit of others, a high degree of benevolence may alone suffice for the performance of such acts. But when exertion, and effort, and labor, and struggle are essential towards the production of any great good to others, — and few things are accomplished without exertion, and effort, and labor, and struggle, benevolence alone will never suffice; it must be reinforced by the desire of superiority, and that in a high degree. The same sentiment, indeed, which, under the names of the love of power, and the love of money, ambition, covetousness, pride, and vanity, has been denounced by moralists as worthy of detestation and extirpation, and as a plain evidence of human depravity, has, by the greater part of the same moralists, some of the mystical schools excepted,under the names of Self-respect, Emulation, Shame, Love of Reputation, Love of Fame, Love of Glory been extolled as the nurse and tutor of virtue. What is 34. And so indeed it is. For what is that exquisite pleasure, which, under the name of the pleasure of virtue, so attracted the fancy of the Platonists, and excited the desires of the Stoics; and which has ever been pointed out as one of the greatest rewards, if not indeed the only and all-sufficient reward, of a virtuous course of conduct? it, in a great measure, but a feeling of self-applause, the gratification, in the highest degree, of this same love of superiority? The mere sentiment of benevolence is as much gratified at the sight, or at the thought, of a beneficent act done by others, as though it were done by ourselves. That which gives us an additional and peculiar pleasure when the act is our own, is the consciousness that, in doing it, we have done more than ordinary men would have done, and so have vindicated our title to the possession of a superior degree of the highest human excellence. That feeling, on the other hand, which is called Remorse, when it is any thing more than the fear or the apprehension of punishment, that gnawing pain which never dies, and which is the fearful consequence of crime, is but the consciousness, that, however we may succeed in concealing it from the world, we are, in fact, debased, degraded, sunk below the common level. It is sufficiently humiliating to lose the esteem of others; but to lose our own esteem is the most terrible of humiliations. 35. Hence it is that Reproach is so powerful a means of impelling to the performance of virtuous actions. When we are conscious it is just, it inflicts upon us a pain of inferiority. 36. There is still another way in which the love of superiority concurs in the production of beneficial acts. To confer a benefit upon a man gives us a certain superiority over him. It lays him under an obligation which is stronger in proportion as the benefit conferred is greater. Hence the saying, that it is more blessed to give than to receive; hence it is that men, in whom the sentiment of Self-comparison is strong, submit with the greatest reluctance to ask or to accept a favor; hence it is that the arrogance, or imagined arrogance, with which a favor is conferred, often inflicts such a pain of inferiority, as totally to overpower and extinguish the sentiment of benevolence, and to create a feeling of hatred in its place. 37. That we derive a certain pleasure from contemplating the struggles and distresses of others, is a very old observation. Lucretius repeats it at the commencement of his second book, “Suave mari magno turbantibus æquora ventis, and he truly adds, "Non quia vexari quemquam est jocunda voluptas, Sed quibus ipse malis careas, quia cernere suave est." But, though he alleges the fact, he omits to assign the reason why it is pleasant to see evils, from which we ourselves are free. The reason is, that it affords us a pleasure of superiority. Rochefoucault only pressed this observation a little further, when he uttered that celebrated remark, that we find a certain |