COSMIC PHILOSOPHY 



ordinarily known as generosity, for example, is 

 often to a very large extent ego-altruistic. " The 

 state of consciousness which accompanies per- 

 formance of an act beneficial to another is usu- 

 ally mixed ; and often the pleasure given is 

 represented less vividly than are the recipient's 

 feeling toward the giver and the approval of 

 spectators. The sentiment of generosity proper 

 is, however, unmixed in those cases where the 

 benefaction is anonymous : provided, also, that 

 there is no contemplation of a reward to be 

 reaped hereafter. These conditions being ful- 

 filled, the benefaction clearly implies a vivid 

 representation of the pleasurable feelings (usu- 

 ally themselves representative) which the recip- 

 ient will have." ^ 



This vivid representation of the pleasurable 

 or painful feelings experienced by others is sym- 

 pathy ; and the additional factor to be taken 

 into the account, in order to complete the ex- 

 planation of the moral sense, is the enormous 

 expansion of sympathy which has been due to 

 the continued integration of communities, and 

 to the accompanying decrease of warlike or 

 predatory activity. A word of passing comment 

 only is needed for the cynical theory that sym- 

 pathy is but an ethereally refined selfishness, 

 and that when we relieve a fellow creature in 



^ Spencer, Principles of Psychology, \o\. ii. p. 613. [Part 

 Vm. § 528.] 



146 



