Thus, there are necessarily as many kinds of pleasure, pain, love,
hatred, &c., as there are kinds of objects whereby we are
affected. Now desire is each man's essence or nature, in so far
as it is conceived as determined to a particular action by any
given modification of itself (III. ix. note); therefore, according
as a man is affected through external causes by this or that kind
of pleasure, pain, love, hatred, &c., in other words, according
as his nature is disposed in this or that manner, so will his desire
be of one kind or another, and the nature of one desire must
necessarily differ from the nature of another desire, as widely
as the emotions differ, wherefrom each desire arose. Thus there
are as many kinds of desire, as there are kinds of pleasure,
pain, love, &c., consequently (by what has been shown) there
are as many kinds of desire, as there are kinds of objects
whereby we are affected. Q.E.D.
*****Note--Among the kinds of emotions, which, by the last
proposition, must be very numerous, the chief are "luxury,"
"drunkenness," "lust," "avarice," and "ambition," being merely
species of love or desire, displaying the nature of those emotions
in a manner varying according to the object, with which they are
concerned. For by luxury, drunkenness, lust, avarice, ambition,
&c., we simply mean the immoderate love of feasting, drinking,
venery, riches, and fame. Furthermore, these emotions, in so
far as we distinguish them from others merely by the objects
wherewith they are concerned, have no contraries. For
"temperance," "sobriety," and "chastity," which we are wont
to oppose to luxury, drunkenness, and lust, are not emotions
or passive states, but indicate a power of the mind which
moderates the last-named emotions. However, I cannot here
explain the remaining kinds of emotions (seeing that they are
as numerous as the kinds of objects), nor, if I could, would it
be necessary. It is sufficient for our purpose, namely, to
determine the strength of the emotions, and the mind's power
over them, to have a general definition of each emotion. It is
sufficient, I repeat, to understand the general properties of the
emotions and the mind, to enable us to determine the quality
and extent of the mind's power in moderating and checking
the emotions. Thus, though there is a great difference between
various emotions of love, hatred, or desire, for instance
between love felt towards children, and love felt towards a wife,
there is no need for us to take cognizance of such differences,
or to track out further the nature and origin of the emotions.
LVII. Any emotion of a given individual differs from the emotion
of another individual, only in so far as the essence of the one
individual differs from the essence of the other.
>>>>>Proof--This proposition is evident from Ax. i. (which
see after Lemma iii. Prop. xiii., Part II.). Nevertheless, we will
prove it from the nature of the three primary emotions.
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