Chapter I. considers the causes of this influence of Fortune. Gratitude
requires, in the first instance, that some pleasure should have been
conferred; Resentment pre-supposes pain. These passions require farther
that the object of them should itself be susceptible of pleasure and
pain; they should be human beings or animals. Thirdly, It is requisite
that they should have produced the effects from a design to do so. Now,
the absence of the pleasurable consequences intended by a beneficent
agent leaves out one of the exciting causes of gratitude, although
including another; the absence of the painful consequences of a
maleficent act leaves out one of the exciting causes of resentment;
hence less gratitude seems due in the one, and less resentment in the
other.
mummysleepingbag
