_A general Distinction indicated._--One general distinction lies at the outset, patent and obvious, running through all forms and modes of sensibility, namely, the difference of _agreeable_ and _disagreeable_. Every feeling is, in its very nature, and of necessity, one or the other, either pleasing or painful. In some cases the distinction is much more strongly marked than in others; sometimes it may be hardly perceptible, and it may be difficult to determine, so slight is the degree of either, whether the feeling under consideration partakes of the character of pleasure or pain; sometimes there is a blending of the two elements, and the same emotion is at once pleasing and painful to the mind that experiences it. But I cannot conceive of a feeling that is neither agreeable or disagreeable, but positively indifferent. The state of indifference is not an exercise of sensibility, but a simple _want_ of it, as the very name denotes by which we most appropriately express this state of mind, _i. e._, _apathy_ ([Greek: a pathos]). _Simple Emotions._--Passing this general and obvious distinction, we find among our sensibilities a large class which we may denominate _simple emotions_. These comprise the joys and sorrows of life in all their varieties of modification and degree, according as the objects which awaken them differ. Under this class fall those general states of the mind which, without assuming a definite and obvious form, impart a tinge and coloring of joyousness or sadness to all our activity. Under this class, also, must be included the more specific forms of feeling, such as the grief or sorrow we feel at the loss of friends, sympathy with the happiness or sorrow of others, the enjoyment arising from the contemplation or persuasion of our own superiority, and the chagrin of the reverse, the enjoyment of the ludicrous, of the new and wonderful, of the beautiful, to which must be added the satisfaction resulting from the consciousness of right action, and those vivid feelings of regret in view of the wrong, which, in their higher degree, assume the name of remorse, and fall like a chill and fearful shadow over the troubled path of earthly life. These all are simple emotions, and all, moreover, are but so many forms of joy and sorrow, varying as the objects vary which give rise to them. _Further Difference of instinctive and rational Emotion._--It will be observed, however, that of these several specific forms of simple emotion, some are of a higher order than the others. Such are those last named in the series, the feelings awakened in view of the ludicrous, in view of the new and wonderful, in view of the beautiful, and in view of the right, or, in general, the æsthetic and moral emotions. These, as seeming to possess a higher dignity, and to involve a higher degree of intellectual development, we may denominate the _rational_, in distinction from the other simple emotions, which, to mark the difference, we may term _instinctive_.