=11. Moral Sentiment.=--At the same time, as the _mind_ distinguishes between good and evil by a _judgment_ called conscience, the _heart_ experiences emotions or divers affections, which are embraced under the common term _moral sentiment_. These are the pleasures or pains which arise in our soul at the sight of good or evil, either in _ourselves_ or in _others_. In respect to our own actions this sentiment is modified according as the action is to be performed, or is already performed. In the first instance we experience, on the one hand, a certain attraction for the right (that is when passion is not strong enough to stifle it), and on the other, a repugnance or aversion for the wrong (more or less attenuated, according to circumstances, by habit or the violence of the design). Usage has not given any particular names to these two sentiments. When, on the contrary, the action is performed, the pleasure which results from it, if we have acted rightly, is called _moral satisfaction_; and if we have acted wrong, _remorse_, or _repentance_. Remorse is a burning pain; and, as the word indicates, the _bite_ that tortures the heart after a culpable action. This pain may be found among the very ones who have no regret for having done wrong, and who would do it over again if they could. It has therefore no moral character whatsoever, and must be considered as a sort of punishment attached to crime by nature herself. "Malice," said Montaigne, "poisons itself with its own venom. Vice leaves, like an ulcer in the flesh, a repentance in the soul, which, ever scratching itself, draws ever fresh blood." _Repentance_ is also, like remorse, a pain which comes from a bad action; but there is coupled with it the regret of having done it, and the wish, if not the firm resolution, never to do it again. Repentance is a sadness of the soul; remorse is a torture and an anguish. Repentance is almost a virtue; remorse is a punishment; but the one leads to the other, and he who feels no remorse can feel no repentance. _Moral satisfaction_, on the contrary, is a peace, a joy, a keen and delicious emotion born from the feeling of having accomplished one's duty. It is the only remuneration that never fails us. Among the sentiments called forth by our own actions, there are two which are the natural auxiliaries of the moral sentiment: they are the sentiment of _honor_ and the sentiment of _shame_. Honor is a principle which incites us to perform actions which raise us in our own eyes, and to avoid such as would lower us. Shame is the opposite of honor; it is what we feel when we have done something that lowers us not only in the eyes of others, but in our own. All remorse is more or less accompanied by shame; yet the shame is greater for actions which indicate a certain baseness of soul. For instance, one will feel more ashamed of having told a falsehood than for having struck a person; for having cheated in gambling than for having fought a duel.