On Tragical Representations. 331 
which attracts us to misery; and derives to usa 
pleasure in spectacles, which in their nature are 
painful. But this is utterly contrary to fact ; 
and the attention to fact, in this instance, as in 
what I have already noticed, will demonstrate 
the incompetence of Du Bos’ theory; and dis- 
cover the true source of the phenomenon. Men 
of the most active turn, who with hardly any 
other motive than to follow the violent impulse 
of their own turbulent spirits, can throw society 
into convulsions, and feast as it. were on those 
continually renewed scenes of distress and terror 
which mark their ferocious path, are not the 
persons on whom you would expect the repre- 
sentations of tragedy to produce their natural and 
most powerful effect; but the gentle, the flexible, 
_ the compassionate, and benevolent, The former 
resemble the characters which, in the introduc- 
tion to this essay, I have noticed among the 
Romans, Goths, Spaniards, Indians, and bull- 
baiting Englishmen, But the man of composed 
and tempered manners, in whose breast com- 
passion, mercy, and benevolence sovereignly 
reign, is shocked at such characters; nor could 
possibly encounter their rude and brutal enter- 
tainments ; yet his heart is the theatre whereon 
tragedy acts all her glorious wonders. 
The same objection bears with almost equal 
force against the system of Hume. It is not the 
