>>>>>Proof--Envy is a species of hatred (III. xxiv. note) or
(III. xiii. note) pain, that is (III. xi. note), a modification whereby
a man's power of activity, or endeavour towards activity, is
checked. But a man does not endeavour or desire to do anything,
which cannot follow from his nature as it is given; therefore a man
will not desire any power of activity or virtue (which is the same
thing) to be attributed to him, that is appropriate to another's
nature and foreign to his own; hence his desire cannot be checked,
nor he himself pained by the contemplation of virtue in some one
unlike himself, consequently he cannot envy such an one. But
he can envy his equal, who is assumed to have the same nature
as himself. Q.E.D.
*****Note--When, therefore, as we said in the note to III. lii.,
we venerate a man, through wonder at his prudence, fortitude,
&c., we do so, because we conceive those qualities to be
peculiar to him, and not as common to our nature; we, therefore,
no more envy their possessor, than we envy trees for being tall,
or lions for being courageous.
LVI. There are as many kinds of pleasure, of pain, of desire,
and of every emotion compounded of these, such as vacillations
of spirit, or derived from these, such as love, hatred, hope, fear,
&c., as there are kinds of objects whereby we are affected.
>>>>>Proof--Pleasure and pain, and consequently the emotions
compounded thereof, or derived therefrom, are passions, or
passive states (III. xi. note); now we are necessarily passive
(III. i.), in so far as we have inadequate ideas; and only in so
far as we have such ideas are we passive (III. iii.); that is, we
are only necessarily passive (II. xl. note), in so far as we conceive,
or (II. xvii. and note) in so far as we are affected by an emotion,
which involves the nature of our own body, and the nature of an
external body. Wherefore the nature of every passive state must
necessarily be so explained, that the nature of the object whereby
we are affected be expressed. Namely, the pleasure, which
arises from, say, the object A, involves the nature of that object
A, and the pleasure, which arises from the object B, involves
the nature of the object B; different, inasmuch as the causes
whence they arise are by nature different. So again the emotion
of pain, which arises from one object, is by nature different from
the pain arising from another object, and, similarly, in the case
of love, hatred, hope, fear, vacillation, &c.
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