Observations on Man (6th edition)/Part I/Chapter IV/Section II
Section II edit
THE PLEASURES AND PAINS OF AMBITION.
The opinions of others concerning us, when expressed by corresponding words or actions, are principal sources of happiness or misery. The pleasures of this kind are usually referred to the head of honour; the pains to that of shame; but as it is most convenient to have a single word, to which to refer both the pleasures and pains of this class, I have made choice of ambition for that purpose. It will therefore be our business, under this proposition, to inquire by what association it is brought about, that men are solicitous to have certain particulars concerning themselves made known to the circle of their friends and acquaintance, or to the world in general; and certain others concealed from them; and also, why all marks and evidences, that these two several kinds of particulars are made known, so as to beget approbation, esteem, praise, high opinion, &c. or dislike, censure, contempt, &c. occasion such exquisite pleasures and pains, as those of honour and shame, i.e. of ambition.
The particulars which we desire to have made known to, or concealed from, others, in order to obtain praise, or avoid dispraise, may be classed under the four following heads.
First, External advantages or disadvantages.
Secondly, Bodily perfections and imperfections.
Thirdly, Intellectual accomplishments or defects.
Fourthly, Moral ones, i.e. virtue or vice.
I will now endeavour to shew what pleasures and pains, bodily and intellectual, are associated with the opinions which others form of us in these four respects; i.e. either with the several methods by which they receive their information; or with those by which they signify their having received it, and their consequent approbation or disapprobation, respect or contempt.
I begin with the consideration of external advantages or disadvantages.—The principal of these are fine clothes, riches, titles, and high birth; with their opposites, rags, poverty, obscurity, and low birth.
Now it is evident, that these external advantages and disadvantages become such by being made known to others: that the first gain men certain privileges and pleasures; and the last subject them to inconveniences and evils only, or chiefly, when they are discovered to the world. It follows therefore that every discovery of this kind to others, also every mark and associate of such discovery, will, by association, raise up the miniatures of the privileges and pleasures, inconveniences and evils, respectively; and thus afford, in each instance, a peculiar compound pleasure or pain, which, by the use of language, has the word honour or shame respectively annexed to it.
This is the gross account of the generation of these pleasures and pains; but the subordinate particulars contain many things worthy of observation.
Thus fine clothes please both children and adults, by their natural or artificial beauty; they enhance the beauty of the person; they excite the compliments and caresses of the attendants in a peculiarly vivid manner; they are the common associates of riches, titles, and high birth; they have vast encomiums bestowed upon them; and are sometimes the reward of mental accomplishments and virtue. Rags, on the contrary, are often attended with the most loathsome and offensive ideas, with bodily infirmity, poverty, contempt, and vice. It is easy therefore to see, that in our progress through life, a compound associated desire of fine clothes, and abhorrence of rags, will spring up so early as to be deemed a natural one. And if a person passes of a sudden from rags to fine clothes, or vice versâ, the pleasure or pain will be enhanced accordingly, by the juxta-position of the opposites.
Now these pleasures and pains which thus attend a person’s being actually dressed in fine clothes, or in rags, will, by farther associations, be transferred upon all the concomitant circumstances, the possession of fine clothes, the hopes of them, or the fear of rags; and particularly upon all narrations and symbols, whereby others are first informed of the person’s dress, or discover their prior knowledge of it; so that the person shall have his vanity gratified, or his shame excited, by all such narrations, and by all the concomitant circumstances and symbols.
Riches, titles, and high birth, are attended with associates of the same kind as fine clothes; with this difference, however, that it requires a farther progress in life to be sufficiently affected with the compound pleasure resulting from the associates of these, and consequently for acquiring a taste for those pleasures of honour, which riches, titles, and high birth afford. Agreeably to which it may be observed, that the first instance of pride and vanity in children is that which arises from fine clothes.
In the progress through life, especially in the virtuous, it often happens that opposite associations are generated, i.e. such as break the connexion between the ideas of happiness and fine clothes, riches, titles, high birth; also between misery and rags, poverty, obscurity, and low birth; nay there are some instances in which these last are connected with some kinds and degrees of happiness. Now in all these cases the pride and vanity, or shame, by which we hope or fear to have our circumstances, in these respects, known to the world, lessen, cease entirely, or even turn about to the opposite quarter accordingly; so that when a person has lost his desire of being rich, or high born, he also loses his desire of being thought so; and when he gains an opposite desire of becoming poor, on a religious account, for instance, or a complacence in being low born, on account of his present high station, &c. he desires also to have this known to the world. And yet there may, in most cases, be perceived some distance in time between the desire of being, and the subsequent associated desire of being thought, viz. such a distance of time as may suffice for the associations to produce their effect in.
Riches are attended with many conveniences, whether a person be known to possess them, or no; and there are inconveniences, as well as conveniences, attending the reputation of being rich; but titles and high birth are then only productive of privileges and pleasures when made known to the world; whence it is easy to see that pride and vanity may shew themselves much more commonly in respect of titles and high birth, than in respect of riches, which is agreeable to the fact.
The shamefacedness of rustics, poor persons, and inferiors in general, in the presence of their superiors, with the great confusion and uneasiness that often attend it, arises from the sources of honour and shame here laid open, and particularly from the strong contrast between their own circumstances and those of their superiors.
The chief bodily circumstances, which are the sources of the pleasures of honour, or of the pains of shame, are beauty, strength, and health, on the one hand; and their opposites, deformity, imbecility, unfitting a person for the functions of life, and disease, on the other. I will make some short remarks upon each.
Beauty has an intimate connexion with one of the most violent of our desires; affords a great pleasure, even where this desire is not felt explicitly; has the highest encomiums bestowed upon it in books, especially in such as are too much in the hands of young persons, and the highest compliments paid to it in discourse; and is often the occasion of success in life; all which holds more particularly in respect of women, than of men. No wonder therefore, that both sexes, but especially women, should desire both to be and be thought beautiful, and be pleased with all the associated circumstances of these things; and that the fear of being or being thought deformed, should be a thing to which the imagination has the greatest reluctance. And the reputation of beauty, with the scandal of deformity, influences so much the more, as beauty and deformity are not attended with their respective pleasing or displeasing associates, except when they are made apparent to, and taken notice of by, the world. So that here the original desire is rather to be thought beautiful than to be so; and this last is chiefly a consequential one arising in our minds from the close connexion of being with being thought.
In strength it is otherwise. This is the source of many conveniences, and imbecility, its opposite, of many inconveniences, whether they be taken notice of or no; as well as of some which depend on their being thus taken notice of. It is reasonable therefore here to suppose, that our first and greatest desire should be after the thing itself, and so it is in fact. However, since several advantages arise from shewing our strength; since also the ostentation of happiness of any kind belonging to ourselves, or the notice which others take of it, bring in the pleasing idea with great vigour; it is evident that there must be eager desires of being thought strong, agile, &c. as well as of being so. And, by parity of reason, men will be much ashamed of being thought weak and feeble, as well as afraid of being so. And as women glory chiefly in beauty, so men do in strength; this being chiefly a source of advantages and pleasures to men, as that is to women. Nay, one may even observe, that any great degree of beauty in men, or strength in women, by being opposite to that perfection which is peculiar to each sex, is thought rather undesirable than desirable.
Health and sickness have many connexions with beauty and strength, deformity and imbecility, respectively; and therefore may easily be conceived to become respectively the sources of the pleasures of honour or of the pains of shame, agreeable to the fact. But, in diseases, so many greater pains and evils, fears, anxieties, &c. with some pleasures, such as those of friendship, occur likewise, that there is, in most cases, little room for shame to exert itself: however, if the disease be the consequence either of a virtuous, or a vicious, course of action, the honour or shame, belonging to virtue or vice respectively, will be transferred upon it.
There is a high degree of shame, which attends the natural evacuations, particularly those of the fæces and urine, which is in part deduced from the offensiveness of the excrements of the body, and is nearly related to the shame attending bodily infirmities and diseases. But this shame, as it respects the fæces and urine, has also a particular connexion with that which relates to the pudenda, arising from the vicinity of the organs; and thus they give and receive mutually. They are also both of them much increased by education, custom, and the precepts and epithets of parents and governors. The original sources of the shame relating to the pudenda are probably the privacy requisite (which is both cause and effect), the greatness of the pleasure, and the sense of guilt which often attends; and there may be perhaps something of instinct, which operates here quite independently of association.
The intellectual accomplishments and defects which occasion honour and shame, are sagacity, memory, invention, wit, learning; and their opposites, folly, dullness, and ignorance. Here we may deduce a considerable part from the many advantages arising from the accomplishments, disadvantages from the defects, in the same manner as has been done already in the two foregoing articles. But a great part, perhaps the greatest, is deduced from the high-strained encomiums, applauses, and flatteries, paid to parts of learning, and the outrageous ridicule and contempt thrown upon folly and ignorance, in all the discourses and writings of men of genius and learning; these persons being extremely partial to their own excellencies, and carrying the world with them by the force of their parts and eloquence. It is also to be observed, that in the education of young persons, and especially of boys and young men, great rewards are conferred in consequence of intellectual attainments and parts; and great punishments follow negligence and ignorance; which rewards and punishments, being respectively associated with the words expressing praise and censure, and with all their other circumstances, transfer upon praise and censure compound vivid miniatures, pleasant and painful.
In like manner all the kinds of honour and shame, by being expressed in words and symbols, that are nearly related to each other, enhance each other: thus, for instance, the caresses given to a child when he is dressed in fine clothes prepare him to be much more affected with the caresses and encomiums bestowed upon him when he has been diligent in getting his lesson. And indeed it ought to be remarked, that the words and phrases of the parents, governors, superiors, and attendants, have so great an influence over children, when they first come to the use of language, as instantly to generate an implicit belief, a strong desire, or a high degree of pleasure. They have no suspicions, jealousies, memories, or expectations of being deceived or disappointed; and therefore a set of words expressing pleasures of any kind, which they have experienced, put together in almost any manner, will raise up in them a pleasurable state, and opposite words a painful one. Whence it is easy to see, that the fine language expressing praise, and the harsh one expressing dispraise, must instantly, from the mere associations heaped upon the separate words, put them into a state of hope and joy, fear and sorrow, respectively. And when the foundation is thus laid, praise and dispraise will keep their influence from the advantages and disadvantages attending them, though the separate words should lose their particular influences, as they manifestly do in our progress through life.
The honour and shame arising from intellectual accomplishments do often, in learned men, after some time, destroy, in great measure, their sensibility, in respect of every other kind of honour and shame; which seems chiefly to arise from their conversing much with books and learned men, so as to have a great part of the pleasures, which they receive from this their conversation, closely connected with the encomiums upon parts and learning; also to have all terms of honour applied to them, and the keenest reproach, and most insolent contempt, cast upon the contrary defects. And, as the pleasures which raillery, ridicule, and satire, afford to the by-standers, are very considerable, so the person who is the object of them, and who begins to be in pain upon the first slight marks of contempt, has this pain much enhanced by the contrast, the exquisiteness of his uneasiness and confusion rising in proportion to the degree of mirth, and insolent laughter, in the by-standers: whence it comes to pass, that extremely few persons have courage to stand the force of ridicule; but rather subject themselves to considerable bodily pains, to losses, and to the anxiety of a guilty mind, than appear foolish, absurd, singular, or contemptible to the world, or even to persons of whose judgment and abilities they have a low opinion.
All this is, in general, more applicable to men than to women, just as the honour and shame belonging to beauty and deformity is more applicable to women than men; both which observations are easily deducible from the different talents and situations in life of the two sexes.
We come, in the last place, to consider moral accomplishments and defects, or virtue and vice. Now it is very evident, that the many advantages, public and private, which arise from the first, will engage the world to bestow upon it much honour and applause, in the same manner as the evil consequences of vice must make it the object of censure and reproach. Since therefore the child is affected with the words expressing honour and censure, both from the separate influences of these words, and from the application of phrases of this kind to other subjects of praise and dispraise, he must be affected by the commendations bestowed upon him when he has done well, and by the censures past on him when he has done ill.
These commendations and censures are also attended with great immediate rewards and punishments, likewise with the hopes and fears relating to another world; and when the moral sense is sufficiently generated, with great secret indeterminate pleasure or pain of this kind; and these associations add a particular force to the honour and shame belonging respectively to virtue and vice. At the same time it is easy to see, that some considerable progress in life is ordinarily required before men come to be deeply and lastingly affected by these things; also that this kind of honour and shame may, at last, from the superior force of the associated pleasures and pains, absorb, as it were, all the other kinds. A religious man becomes at last insensible, in great measure, to every encomium and reproach, excepting such as he apprehends will rest upon him at the last day, from Him whose judgment cannot err.
This is the general account of the honour and shame paid to virtue and vice respectively. I will now make a few short strictures upon some of the principal virtues and vices.
First, then, piety is not in general, and amongst the bulk of mankind, had in great honour. This proceeds from several causes; as that in the order of our progress it is the last of the virtues, and therefore, having few votaries, it must have few advocates; that in the first attempts to attain it, men often fall into great degrees of enthusiasm and superstition, and so expose themselves to the charges of folly, madness, and self-conceit; and that pretences to it are often made use of by hypocrites to cover the worst designs. Now from these and such like causes it happens, that men are much ashamed to be thought devout, fearing that exquisite uneasiness, which being ridiculed and contemned as fools, madmen, and hypocrites, occasions. At the same time it appears, that amongst those who have made considerable advances in religion, piety will be had in the greatest honour: these see evidently how it may be distinguished from enthusiasm, superstition, and hypocrisy; and are very little solicitous concerning the opinions of the profane world, who are apt to confound them; and therefore as far as their piety will permit any foreign desire to arise, they have an exquisite relish for the honour and esteem proceeding from the reputation of piety.
Benevolence springs up more early in life than piety, and has at first view a more immediate good influence upon society. There are also greater numbers who arrive at some imperfect degrees of it, than who arrive at like degrees of piety; neither are the degenerations and counterfeits of benevolence so common as those of piety. On these accounts much greater and more frequent encomiums are bestowed upon it by the bulk of mankind, than upon piety; and these with the many advantages resulting from the reputation of being benevolent, make most persons eagerly desire this reputation; so that they perform many actions from mere ambition, or from a mixture of this with benevolence, which they desire the world should think to proceed from mere benevolence.
Military glory, and the high applauses bestowed upon personal courage, seem, in a considerable degree, deducible from this source, from the benevolent design of protecting the innocent, the helpless, one’s friends and country, from invasions, robberies, wild beasts, &c. The connexion of these with bodily strength, and the characteristical perfections of men as distinguished from women and children; the rarity and difficulty of them; the vast encomiums bestowed upon them by poets, orators, and historians, especially in ancient times, i.e. by those authors which are read in schools, and lay hold of our pliant imaginations when young; the ridicule cast upon timorousness by boys and men, as not being a common imperfection amongst them; and the connexion of the fear of death with the sense of guilt; all concur likewise, and have carried mankind so far as to make them confer the highest honours upon the most cruel, lawless, and abominable actions, and consequently incite one another to perform such actions from ambitious views. However, this false glare seems to fade in theory, amongst writers; and one may hope that the practice of mankind will be, in some measure, agreeable to the corrections made in their theory.
Temperance and chastity have considerable honours bestowed upon them: but the shame and scandal attending the opposite vices, and which arise from the loathsome diseases, and the many miseries, which men bring upon themselves and others by these vices, are much more remarkable. The detail of these things might easily be delivered from parallel observations already made. It happens sometimes, that some degrees of these vices are looked upon by young and ignorant persons as honourable, from certain connexions with manliness, fashion, high life; however, this is still in conformity with the doctrine of association, and the derivation of all the pleasures of honour from happiness under some form or other; and, when the same persons become better instructed in the real consequences and connexions of things, their opinions change accordingly.
Negative humility, or the not thinking better or more highly of ourselves than we ought, in respect of external advantages, bodily, intellectual, or moral accomplishments, and being content with such regards as are our due, which is the first step; and then positive humility, or a deep sense of our own misery and imperfections of all kinds, and an acquiescence in the treatment which we receive from others, whatever it be; being virtues which are most commodious to ourselves and others, and highly amiable in the sight of all those who have made a due proficiency in religion, and the moral sense, come at last to be honoured and esteemed in an eminent manner, and consequently to incite men from mere vanity and ambition to seek the praise of humility. And the ridicule and shame which attend vanity, pride, and self-conceit, concur to the same purpose; which is a remarkable instance of the inconsistency of one part of our frame with itself, as the case now stands, and of the tendency of vice to check and destroy itself.
From the whole of what has been delivered upon this class of pleasures and pains, one may draw the following corollaries.
Cor. I. All the things in which men pride themselves, and for which they desire to be taken notice of by others, are either means of happiness, or have some near relation to it. And indeed it is not at all uncommon to see persons take pains to make others believe that they are happy, by affirming it in express terms. Now this, considered as a mere matter of fact, occurring to attentive observation, might lead one to conclude, that the pleasures of honour and ambition are not of an original, instinctive, implanted nature, but derived from the other pleasures of human life, by the association of these into various parcels, where the several ingredients are so mixed amongst one another, as hardly to be discernible separately. The young, the gay, and the polite, are ambitious of being thought beautiful, rich, high-born, witty, &c. The grave, the learned, the afflicted, the religious, &c. seek the praise of wisdom and knowledge, or to be esteemed for piety and charity; every one according to his opinions of these things, as the sources, marks, or offsprings of happiness. And when men boast of their poverty, low birth, ignorance, or vice, it is always in such circumstances, with such additions and contrasts, or under such restrictions, as that the balance, upon the whole, may, some way or other, be the more in their favour on that account.
Cor. II. Praise and shame are made use of by parents and governors, as chief motives and springs of action; and it becomes matter of praise, to a child, to be influenced by praise, and deterred by shame; and matter of reproach, to be insensible in these respects. And thus it comes to pass, that praise and shame have a strong reflected influence upon themselves; and that praise begets the love of praise, and shame increases the fear of shame. Now, though the original praise, commendation, blame, censure, &c. of good parents and preceptors, extend only, for the most part, to acquired accomplishments and defects, and particularly to virtue and vice; yet the secondary influence will affect men in respect of all sorts of encomiums and censures, of every thing that comes under the same denomination, that is associated with, or tied up by, the same words. Though the preceptor direct his pupil only to regard the judgment of the wise and good, still there are so many like circumstances attending the judgment of others, that it will be regarded something the more from the lessons received, in respect to the wise and good, exclusively of others.
Cor. III. In considering the sources of honour and shame, it will appear, that they are by no means consistent with one another; and, by a farther inquiry, that the maximum of the pleasures of this class ulimately coincides, omni ex parte, with moral rectitude.