Elements of Criticism. Henry Home, Lord Kames
And often did beguile her of her tears,
When I did speak of some distressful stroke,
That my youth suffer’d. My story being done,
She gave me for my pains a world of sighs:
She swore, in faith, ’twas strange, ’twas passing strange—
’Twas pitiful, ’twas wondrous pitiful—
She wish’d she had not heard it:—-yet she wish’d,
That Heaven had made her such a man:—she thank’d me,
And bade me, if I had a friend that lov’d her,
I should but teach him how to tell my story,
And that would woo her. On this hint I spake:
She lov’d me for the dangers I had past,
And I lov’d her, that she did pity them:
This only is the witchcraft I have us’d.
Othello, act 1. sc. 8.20
In this instance it will be observed that admiration concurred with pity to produce love.<81>
Causes of the Passions of Fear and Anger.
Fear and anger, to answer the purposes of nature, are happily so contrived as to operate sometimes instinctively sometimes deliberately, according to circumstances. As far as deliberate, they fall in with the general system, and require no particular explanation: if any object have a threatening appearance, reason suggests means to avoid the danger: if a man be injured, the first thing he thinks of, is what revenge he shall take, and what means he shall employ. These particulars are no less obvious than natural. But as the passions of fear and anger in their instinctive state, are less familiar to us, it may be acceptable to the reader to have them accurately delineated. He may also possibly be glad of an opportunity to have the nature of instinctive passions more fully explained, than there was formerly opportunity to do. I begin with fear.
Self-preservation is a matter of too great importance to be left entirely to the conduct of reason. Nature hath acted here with her usual foresight. Fear and anger are passions that move us to act, sometimes deliberately sometimes instinctively, according to circumstances; and by operating in<82> the latter manner, they frequently afford security when the slower operations of deliberate reason would be too late: we take nourishment commonly, not by the direction of reason, but by the impulse of hunger and thirst; and in the same manner, we avoid danger by the impulse of fear, which often, before there is time for reflection, placeth us in safety. Here we have an illustrious instance of wisdom in the formation of man; for it is not within the reach of fancy, to conceive any thing more artfully contrived to answer its purpose, than the instinctive passion of fear, which, upon the first surmise of danger, operates instantaneously. So little doth the passion, in such instances, depend on reason, that it frequently operates in contradiction to it: a man who is not upon his guard, cannot avoid shrinking at a blow, tho’ he knows it to be aimed in sport; nor avoid closing his eyes at the approach of what may hurt them, tho’ conscious that he is in no danger. And it also operates by impelling us to act even where we are conscious that our interposition can be of no service: if a passage-boat in a brisk gale bear much to one side, I cannot avoid applying the whole force of my shoulders to set it upright; and if my horse stumble, my hands and knees are instantly at work to prevent him from falling.
Fear provides for self-preservation by flying from harm; anger, by repelling it. Nothing indeed can be better contrived to repel or prevent injury,<83> than anger or resentment: destitute of that passion, men, like defenceless lambs, would lie constantly open to mischief.* Deliberate anger caused by a voluntary injury, is too well known to require any explanation: if my desire be to resent an affront, I must use means; and these means must be discovered by reflection: deliberation is here requisite; and in that case the passion seldom exceeds just bounds. But where anger impels one suddenly to return a blow, even without thinking of doing mischief, the passion is instinctive; and it is chiefly in such a case that it is rash and ungovernable, because it operates blindly, without affording time for deliberation or foresight.
Instinctive anger is frequently raised by bodily pain, by a stroke for example on a tender part, which, ruffling the temper and unhinging the mind, is in its tone similar to anger: and when a man is thus beforehand disposed to anger, he is not nice nor scrupulous about an object; the person who gave the stroke, however accidentally, is by an inflammable temper held a proper object, merely for having occasioned the pain. It is still more remarkable, that a stock or a stone by which I am<84> hurt, becomes an object for my resentment: I am violently incited to crush it to atoms. The passion indeed in that case can be but a single flash; for being entirely irrational, it must vanish with the first reflection. Nor is that irrational effect confined to bodily pain: internal distress, when excessive, may be the occasion of effects equally irrational: perturbation of mind occasioned by the apprehension of having lost a dear friend, will, in a fiery temper, produce momentary sparks of anger against that very friend, however innocent: thus Shakespear, in the Tempest,
Alonzo. ——— Sit down and rest.
Ev’n here I will put off my hope, and keep it
No longer for my flatterer; he is drown’d
Whom thus we stray to find, and the sea mocks
Our frustrate search on land. Well, let him go.
Act 3. sc. 3.
The final words, Well, let him go, are an expression of impatience and anger at Ferdinand, whose absence greatly distressed his father, dreading that he was lost in the storm. This nice operation of the human mind, is by Shakespear exhibited upon another occasion, and finely painted. In the tragedy of Othello, Iago, by dark hints and suspicious circumstances, had roused Othello’s jealousy; which, however, appeared too slightly founded to be vented upon Desdemona, its proper<85> object. The perturbation and distress of mind thereby occasioned, produced a momentary resentment against Iago, considered as occasioning the jealousy, though innocent:
Othello. Villain, be sure thou prove my love a whore;
Be sure of it: give me the ocular proof,
Or by the wrath of man’s eternal soul
Thou hadst been better have been born a dog,
Than answer my wak’d wrath.
Iago. Is’t come to this?
Othello. Make me see’t; or, at the least, so prove it,
That the probation bear no hinge or loop
To hang a doubt on: or wo upon thy life!
Iago. My Noble Lord—
Othello. If thou dost slander her, and torture me,
Never pray more; abandon all remorse;
On horrors head horrors accumulate;
Do deeds to make heav’n weep, all earth amaz’d:
For nothing canst thou to damnation add
Greater than that.
Othello, act 3. sc. 3.
This blind and absurd effect of anger, is more gaily illustrated by Addison, in a story, the dramatis personae of which are, a cardinal, and a spy retained in pay for intelligence. The cardinal is represented as minuting down the particulars. The spy begins with a low voice, “Such an one the advocate whispered to one of his friends within my hearing, that your Eminence was a very great poltroon”; and after having given his<86> patron time to take it down, adds, “That another called him a mercenary rascal in a public conversation.” The cardinal replies,