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Causes of the passions of fear and anger.

FEar and anger, to answer the purposes of nature, are happily so contrived as to operate either instinctively or deliberately. So far as they prompt actions considered as means leading to a certain end, they fall in with the general system, and require no particular explanation. If any object have a threatening appearance, reason suggests means to avoid the danger. If I am injured, the first thing I think of, is in what manner I shall be revenged, and what means I shall employ. These particulars are not less obvious than natural. But as the passions of fear and anger, so far as instinctive, are less familiar to us, and their nature generally not understood; I thought it would not be unacceptable to the reader to have them accurately delineated. He may also possibly relish the opportunity of this specimen, to have the nature of instinctive passions more fully explained than there was formerly occasion to do. I begin with fear.

Self-preservation is to individuals a matter of too great importance to be left entirely under the guardianship of self-love, which cannot be put in exercise otherwise than by the intervention of reason and reflection. Nature hath acted here with her usual precaution and foresight. Fear and anger are passions common to all men; and by operating instinctively, they frequently afford security when the slower operations of deliberative reason would be too late. We take nourishment commonly, not by the direction of reason, but by the incitement of hunger and thirst. In the same manner, we avoid danger by the incitement of fear, which often, before there is time for reflection, placeth us in safety. This matter then is ordered with consummate wisdom. It is not within the reach of fancy, to conceive any thing better fitted to answer its purpose, than this instinctive passion of fear, which, upon the first surmise of danger, operates instantaneously without reflection. So little doth the passion, in such instances, depend on reason, that we often find it exerted even in contradiction to reason, and when we are conscious that there is no hazard. A man who is not much upon his guard, cannot avoid shrinking at a blow, though he knows it to be aimed in sport; nor closing his eyes at the approach of what may hurt them, though he is confident it will not come their length. Influenced by the same instinctive passion of fear, infants are much affected with a stern look, a menacing tone, or other expression of anger; though, being incapable of reflection, they cannot form the slightest judgement about the import of these signs. This is all that is necessary to be said in general. The natural connection betwixt fear and the external signs of anger, will be handled in the chapter of the external signs of emotions and passions.

Fear provides for self-preservation by flying from harm; anger, by repelling it. Nothing indeed can be better contrived to repel or prevent injury, than anger or resentment. Destitute of this passion, men, like defenceless lambs, would lie constantly open to mischief[24]. Deliberate anger caused by a voluntary injury, is too well known to require any explanation. If my desire be in general to resent an afront, I must use means, and these means must be discovered by reflection. Deliberation is here requisite; and in this, which is the ordinary case, the passion seldom exceeds just bounds. But where anger suddenly inflames me to return a blow, the passion is instinctive, and the action ultimate; and it is chiefly in such cases that the passion is rash and ungovernable, because it operates blindly, without affording time for reason or deliberation.

Instinctive anger is frequently raised by bodily pain, which, when sudden and excessive as by a stroke on a tender part, ruffling the temper and unhinging the mind, is in its tone similar to anger. Bodily pain by this means disposes to anger, which is as suddenly raised, provided an object be found to vent it upon. Anger commonly is not provoked otherwise than by a voluntary injury. But when a man is thus beforehand disposed to anger, he is not nice nor scrupulous about an object. The man who gave the stroke, however accidentally, is by an inflammable temper held a proper object, merely because he was the occasion of the pain. It is still a stronger example of the kind, that a stock or a stone, by which I am hurt, becomes an object for my resentment. I am violently incited to bray it to atoms. The passion indeed in this case is but momentary. It vanisheth with the first reflection, being attended with no circumstance that can excuse it in any degree. Nor is this irrational effect confined to bodily pain. Inward distress, when excessive, may be the occasion of effects equally irrational. When a friend is danger and the event uncertain, the perturbation of mind occasioned thereby, will, in a fiery temper, produce momentary fits of anger against this very friend, however innocent. Thus Shakespear, in the Tempest,

Alonzo.———— Sit down and rest. Ev’n here I will put off my hope, and keep it No longer for my flatterer: he is drown’d Whom thus we stray to find, and the sea mocks Our frustrate search on land. Well, let him go. Act 3. sc. 3.

The final words, Well, let him go, are an expression of impatience and anger at Ferdinand, whose absence greatly distressed his father, dreading that he was lost in the storm. This nice operation of the human mind, is by Shakespear exhibited upon another occasion, and finely painted. In the tragedy of Othello, Iago, by dark hints and suspicious circumstances, had roused Othello’s jealousy; which, however, appeared too slightly founded to be vented upon Desdemona, its proper object. The perturbation and distress of mind thereby occasioned, produced a momentary resentment against Iago, considered as occasioning the jealousy though innocent.

Othello. Villain, be sure thou prove my love a whore; Be sure of it: give me the ocular proof. Or by the wrath of man’s eternal soul Thou hadst been better have been born a dog, Than answer my wak’d wrath.

Iago. Is’t come to this?

Othello. Make me see’t; or, at the least, so prove it, That the probation bear no hinge or loop To hang a doubt on: or woe upon thy life!

Iago. My Noble Lord——

Othello. If thou dost slander her and torture me, Never pray more; abandon all remorse; On horrors head horrors accumulate; Do deeds to make heav’n weep, all earth amaz’d: For nothing canst thou to damnation add Greater than that. Othello, act 3. sc. 8.

This blind and absurd effect of anger, is more gaily illustrated by Addison, in a story, the dramatis personæ of which are a cardinal, and a spy retained in pay for intelligence. The cardinal is represented as minuting down every thing that is told him. The spy begins with a low voice, “Such an one the advocate whispered to one of his friends within my hearing, that your Eminence was a very great poltron;” and after having given his patron time to take it down, adds, “That another called him a mercenary rascal in a public conversation.” The cardinal replies, “Very well,” and bids him go on. The spy proceeds, and loads him with reports of the same nature, till the cardinal rises in great wrath, calls him an impudent scoundrel, and kicks him out of the room[25].

We meet with instances every day of resentment raised by loss at play, and wreaked on the cards or dice. But anger, a furious passion, is satisfied with a connection still slighter than that of cause and effect, of which Congreve, in the Mourning Bride, gives one beautiful example.

Gonsalez. Have comfort.

Almeria. Curs’d be that tongue that bids me be of comfort, Curs’d my own tongue that could not move his pity, Curs’d these weak hands that could not hold him here, For he is gone to doom Alphonso’s death. Act 4. sc. 8.

I have chosen to exhibit anger in its more rare appearances, for in these we can best trace its nature and extent. In the examples above given, it appears to be an absurd passion and altogether irrational. But we ought to consider, that it is not the intention of nature to subject this passion, in every instance, to reason and reflection. It was given us to prevent or to repel injuries; and, like fear, it often operates blindly and instinctively, without the least view to consequences. The very first sensation of harm, sets it in motion to repel injury by punishment. Were it more cool and deliberate, it would lose its threatening appearance, and be insufficient to guard us against violence and mischief. When such is and ought to be the nature of the passion, it is not wonderful to find it exerted irregularly and capriciously, as it sometimes is where the mischief is sudden and unforeseen. All the harm that can be done by the passion in this case, is instantaneous; for the shortest delay sets all to rights; and circumstances are seldom so unlucky as to put it in the power of a passionate man to do much harm in an instant.