Treatise of the Passions and Faculties of the Soul, Chapter 14
CHAP. XIIII. Of the Quality and Quantity of Hatred, and how in either respects it is to bee regulated.
I Proceed now unto the consideration of this Passion in the Quantity and Quality of its Acts: which must bee observed according to the Evill of the Object: for if that be unchangeable, there is required a continual Permanency of the Passion in regard of the disposition of the Mind: or if it be Importuna…e and Affaulting, there is required a more frequent repetition of the Act. The same likewise is to bee said of the Quality of it; for if the Evill be of an Intense and more Invincible nature, our Hatred must arme us the more: if more Low and remisse, the Passion may bee the more negligent.
Hero then is a fourefould direction of the Quantities and Qualities of our Hatred, and it will hold proportion in the other passions. First the unalterablenesse of the Evill, warrants the continuance of our hatred. Secondly, the importunity and insinuation of it warrants the Reiteration of our hatred. Thirdly, and fourthly, the greatnesse and the Remission of it requires a proportionable intention and moderation of hatred. We may instance for the three former in sinne, so much the worst of Evils, by how much it is a remotion from the best of Goods.
First then Sinne is in its owne formall and abstracted nature, Vnchangeable, though not in respect of the subject, in whom it dwelleth; for a Creature now bad, may by the mercy of God bee repaired and restored againe; but this is not by a changing, but by a forsaking of Evill, by a removing of it, not by a new molding it into another frame. Sinne then remaineth in its owne Nature unchangeable and alwaies evill, and the reason is because it is a Transgression of a perpetuall Law, and a Remotion from an unalterable Will: Sinne then is to bee hated with a continuall and peremptory hatred. But in other things there is according to the nature of their evils required a conditionall and more flexible dislike, they being evils that have, either some good annexed unto them; or such as are of a mutable nature. And therefore wee see that in most things the variety of Circumstances doth alter the good or evill of them, and so makes the passions thereabout conversant, alterable likewise. Otherwise men may naturally deprive themselves of those contents and advantages, which they might receive by reasonable use of such indifferent things as they formerly for inconveniences now removed, did dislike. And in Morality likewise much dammage might be inferred, both to private persons and to the publique by nourishing such private enmities and being peremptory in continuing those former differences, which, though happily then entertained upon reasonable grounds, may yet afterwards prove so much the more harmefull, by how much the more danger is to be feared from the distemper of a growne and strong, than of a vanishing and lighter passion.
Secondly, Againe as no evill altogether so unchangeable as Sinne, so is there nothing so much to be opposed with a Multiplicity and Reiteration of our hatred in regard of its importunity and insinuation, that as there is an impudence in the assault, so there may be a proportionable resolution in the withstanding of it: Some Evils there may be, which require onelyonly a present and not a customary exercise of this passion. Present I say when the Object is offensive and not customary; because as the Object, so the Passion likewise may be unusuall. Sinne onelyonly is of all other evils the most urging and active, furnished with an infinite number of st…atagems and plausible impostures to insinuate into natures (though best armed against such assaults; and therefore here onelyonly are necessary such reiterated acts, as may keepe us ever on our guard, that we be not unprepared for a surprize.
Thirdly, Then for the Quantity of an Evill, because that is not in any thing so intense as in Sinne whither wee consider it in its owne Nature, as a Rebellion against the highest good, or in its effects; either in regard of the diffusion of it, it being an overspreading pollution, or of the vastnesse of it, both in Guilt and Punishment: In these respects our Hatred of it cannot be too deep or rooted: whereas other evils are not so intense in their nature, nor so diffusive in their Extension, nor so Destructive in their Consequents; and therefore do not require an unlimited Passion, but one governed according to the Exigence of Circumstances.
And here I shall take notice of one or two particulars touching the manner of corruption in this particular. As first when a man shal apply his Hatred of Prosequution, or ill willing against that Evill, which is the proper object onelyonly of Aversation: for some things there are onelyonly of conditionall evills, which hurt not by their own absolute being, but by their particular use or presence, which being offensive onelyonly in their application requires a particular forbearance, not any further violence to their natures.
Secondly, a Corruption in regard of Intensionforeign Sophoc. A…ax. is either when the passion admits not of any admixtion of Love, when yet the object admits of an admixtion of good; or when the hatred is absolute against onelyonly relative Evills. There is not any man betwixt whose naturall faculties and some particular courses or objects, there is not some manner of antipathy and disproportion (it being the Providence of divine dispensation so variously to frame and order mens fancies, as that no man shall have an Independance or selfe sufficiency, no… say unto the other members I have no need of you; but there should bee such a mutuall Ministry and assistance amongst men, as whereby might bee ever upheld those essentiall vertues of humane society, Vnity and Charity, no mann being able to liue without the aide of others; nor to upbraid others with his owne service. Now in this case, if any man, who either out of the narrownesse and incapacity, or out of the reluctancy and antipathy of his owne mind, is indisposed for some courses of life or study, shall presently fall to a professed vilifying of them, or to an undervalewing of Persons, who with a more particular affection delight in them, or to a desire of the not being of them, as things utterly unusefull, because hee sees not what use himselfe can have of them, he doth herein discover as much absurdity in so peremptory a dislike as a blinde man should doe in wishing the Sunne put out, not considering that hee himselfe receiveth benefit at the second hand from that very light, the beauty whereof hee hath no immediate acquaintance withall.
For as too excessively to doate on the fancie of any particular thing may prove harmefull, as appeareth in the Poeticall fable of Midas, whose unsatiable desire to have every thing that he touched turned to gold, starved him with hunger; and so what hee out of too excessive louelove made his Idoll, became his ruine; (as many men need none other enemy to undoe them than their owne desires.) So on the other side, the extreame Hatred of any thing may be equally inconvenient; as we see intimated in that other fable of the servants, who when they had, out of an extreme malice against the poore Cock, at whose early crow, their covetous master every day roused them unto their labour, killed him, and so (as they thought) gotten a good aduantage to their lazinesse, were every day by the vigilancy of their master, whose Couetousnesse now began to crow earlier than his Cock, called from their sleepe sooner than they are before; till at length they began to wish for that, which the rashnesse and indiscretion of their hatred had made away. And therefore when we goe about any thing out of the dictates of Passion, it is a great point of Wisedom, first to consider whither we our selves may not afterwards be the first men, who shall wish it undone againe.