《道德情操论·卷一·论行为的合宜性·二之五·论自私的情感》第3节
It is quite otherwise with grief. Small vexations excite no sympathy, but deep affliction calls forth the greatest. The man who is made uneasy by every little disagreeable incident, who is hurt if either the cook or the butler have failed in the least article of their duty, who feels every defect in the highest ceremonial of politeness, whether it be shown to himself or to any other person, who takes it amiss that his intimate friend did not bid him good-morrow when they met in the {41} forenoon, and that his brother hummed a tune all the time he himself was telling a story; who is put out of humour by the badness of the weather when in the country, by the badness of the roads when upon a journey, and by the want of company and dulness of all public diversions when in town; such a person, I say, though he should have some reason, will seldom meet with much sympathy. Joy is a pleasant emotion, and we gladly abandon ourselves to it upon the slightest occasion. We readily, therefore, sympathize with it in others, whenever we are not prejudiced by envy. But grief is painful, and the mind, even when it is our own misfortune, naturally resists and recoils from it. We would endeavour either not to conceive it at all, or to shake it off as soon as we have conceived it. Our aversion to grief will not, indeed, always hinder us from conceiving it in our own case upon very trifling occasions, but it constantly prevents us from sympathizing with it in others when excited by the like frivolous causes: for our sympathetic passions are always less irresistible than our original ones. There is, besides, a malice in mankind, which not only prevents all sympathy with little uneasinesses, but renders them in some measure diverting. Hence the delight which we all take in raillery, and in the small vexation which we observe in our companion, when he is pushed, and urged, and teased upon all sides. Men of the most ordinary good-breeding dissemble the pain which any little incident may give them; and those who are more thoroughly formed to society, turn of their own accord, all such incidents into raillery, as they know their companions will do for them. The habit which a man, who lives in the world, has acquired of considering how every thing that concerns himself will appear to others, makes those frivolous calamities turn up in the same ridiculous light to him, in which he knows they will certainly be considered by them.
注释摘要
斯密在此处要解释的，是同情这种同感机制在面对个人悲伤时为何会遵循一条与喜悦几乎相反的轨道：越是微小琐碎的烦恼，越难引起他人的同情；反倒是深重的苦难最能唤起真诚而强烈的同感。他举出的是一个十八世纪士绅日常生活里极易辨认的角色：一个对每一件不如意小事都烦躁不安的人。厨师或管家稍有疏忽，某个社交礼节出现瑕疵，密友上午见面没道早安，兄弟在自己讲故事时哼歌，乡下的坏…