PHILOSOPHY, MORAL. 
V. ESTIMATE OF THE PLEASURES OF SYM- 
PATHY. 
(Philosophy, mental, § 85—88). 
61. We have now proceeded through and 
examined all those sources of happiness 
which do not coincide with w'hat we esta- 
blished as the standard of comparison, the 
greatest ultimate happiness. We have seen, 
that if any of them be made the primary 
object of pursuit, happiness cannot be ob- 
tained; and that the greatest degrees of 
these pleasures are to be obtained, not by 
making them our primary object, but sub- 
mitting ourselves to the guidance of bene- 
volence and piety. We might hence alone 
be inclined to consider the inference a just 
one, that the affections of benevolence and 
piety, and those actions to which they 
prompt, should be made by us our primary 
object. We shall feel our ground more 
sure when we enter into the positive argu- 
ments for these premises ; and we now pro- 
ceed to ascertain what rank the benevolent 
affections should have in our rule of life. — 
And here it is to be laid down as a principle, 
that the cultivation of these affections should 
be made a primary object of pursuit for the 
following reasons. 
62. Benevolence improves the inferior 
pleasures, by limiting and regulating them, 
as we have already seen in the course of our 
former investigations. — Again the pleasures 
of benevolence unite and coincide with 
those of piety and the moral sense. That 
benevolence unites with piety is obvious ; 
for by the love of the good we are led to 
love the source of goodness ; and back again 
from the love of God to the love of all that 
he has made. The pleasures of benevolence 
are one principal source of the moral sense, 
and the moral sense in its turn improves and 
enforces them entirely. 
63. The pleasures of benevolence are 
unlimited in their extent. — In order to shew 
that the pleasures of sensation did not de- 
serve our primary attention, an extreme 
case was taken of a person who actually 
made them his primary object : in the same 
way suppose a person to take all opportu- 
nities of gratifying his benevolent desires, 
making it his study, pleasure, and constant 
employment either to promote happiness, or 
to lessen misery. Now it is very obvious, 
that he would have a very large field for 
exercise, no less than the whole round of 
domestic and social relations. And if his 
benevolence were pure, and regulated by 
the dictates of piety and the conscience, he 
might in general expect success. And from 
the experience of those who have made the 
trial, it does not appear that the relish for 
its pleasures languishes, as in other cases, 
but gains strength by gratification ; and 
they continue to please in reflection. The 
reason of this is obvious from the law of as- 
sociation ; for since they are in general at- 
tended with success, and are consistent with 
and productive of the several inferior plea- 
sures in their due degree, and are also fur- 
ther'increased by the moral and religious 
pleasures, they receive fresh addition upon 
every gratification, and therefore increase 
perpetually when the affections are culti- 
vated as they ought to be. 
64. The pleasures of benevolence are 
self-consistent.— All may share them with- 
out diminishing their mutual happiness. 
Harmony and mutual co-operation prevail 
among the benevolent; and benevolent 
actions have a tendency to excite corres- 
pondent actions indefinitely. — By degrees, 
when benevolence has arrived at its due 
height, all the sensibilities of the individual 
for himself will be more or less transferred 
upon others, by his benevolence and com- 
passion for them. , And in like manner, 
when our moral sense is sufficiently esta- 
blished and improved, and we are capable 
of being influenced to perform what is fit 
and right, by the consideration that it is so, 
our imperfect sensibility for others tends 
to diminish, by being compared with it, our 
exorbitant attachment to ourselves ; at the 
same time that compassion takes off our 
thoughts from ourselves. And thus benevo- 
lence to a single person may ultimately be- 
come equal to self-interest by this tendency 
of self-interest to increase benevolence, and 
reciprocally of benevolence to lessen self- 
interest, though originally self-interest was 
indefinitely greater than benevolence ; and 
thus we may learn to be as much concerned 
for others as for ourselves, and as little con- 
cerned for ourselves as for others. — It is 
not often that benevolence is thus heighten- 
ed: perhaps in the strictest sense it can 
never reach this height in the present state; 
but take the case where there is a decided 
preponderance of benevolence over every 
feeling which bears the character of male- 
volent. It is not perhaps capable of proof, 
but certainly has decided probability, that 
in the circle in which each moves, and in 
the circle of the race at large, happiness 
decidedly preponderates. If the benevo- 
lent individual, though he do not see this ba- 
lance of happiness clearly, yet has some. 
