The appearance of danger gives sometimes pleasure, sometimes pain. A timorous person upon the battlements of a high tower, is seized with terror, which even the consciousness of security cannot dissipate. But upon one of a firm head, this situation has a contrary effect. The appearance of danger heightens by opposition the consciousness of security, and of consequence the satisfaction that arises from security. The feeling here resembles that above mentioned occasioned by a ship labouring in a storm. This effect of magnifying or lessening objects by means of comparison, is so familiar, that no philosopher has thought of searching for a cause[80]. The obscurity of the subject may possibly have contributed to their silence. But luckily in treating other subjects, a principle is unfolded which will clearly account for this phenomenon. It depends upon the power of passion to model our opinion of objects for its gratification[81]. We have had occasion to see many illustrious examples of this singular power of passion; and the present subject affords an additional instance. That this is the cause, will evidently appear, by reflecting in what manner a spectator is affected, when a very large animal is for the first time placed beside a very small one of the same species. The opposition is the first thing that strikes the mind: the unusual appearance gives surprise; and the spectator, prone to gratify this emotion, conceives the opposition to be the greatest that can be. He sees, or seems to see, the one animal extremely little, and the other extremely large. The emotion of surprise arising from any unusual resemblance, serves equally to explain why at first view we are apt to think such resemblance more entire than it is in reality. And it must be observed, that the circumstances of more and less, which are the proper subjects of comparison, raise a perception so indistinct and vague as to facilitate the effect described. We have no mental standard of great and little, nor of the several degrees of any attribute; and the mind thus unrestrained, is naturally disposed to indulge its surprise to the utmost extent.