Sympathy

Introduction:

In the tradition of sensibility, to be without sympathy is to be without humanity. The capacity to sympathize is an indispensable quality in the person of sensibility. Although the word's meaning includes compassion, sympathy broadens into wider connotations because of its basis in physiology.

Sympathy in the eighteenth century and earlier was used to discuss the believed correspondences between body parts--one might find a reference to a sympathetic relation between the stomach and the kidneys (OED). The idea of correspondence extended to any affinities and suggested harmony or concord of feelings or temperament, as well as the capacity of entering into another's feelings. "Sympathy must be considered as a sort of Substitution, by which we are put in the place of another man, and affected in many respects as he is affected," wrote Burke in 1756.

Such fellow-feeling is, of course, vital to the philosophy of sensibility, which held that the ability to feel as another feels creates the bonds that seal community. Many writers attempt to explicate the workings of sympathy by dwelling on, for example, the role of the imagination in exciting sympathy; the imagination connection also inspires considerations of fiction's potential role in creating sympathetic relations.

• Anonymous, "Moral Weeping"
  The moral import of tears.
• Denis Diderot, Eloge de Richardson
  The right way to read Richardson, and the effects of doing so.
• Alexander Gerard, An Essay on Taste
  "Sensibility of heart" assists taste in producing tender passions.
• Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, The Sorrows of Young Werther
  Lotte's canary.
• Thomas Gray, "The Progress of Poesy"
  The genesis of a poet.
• Sir William Jones, "On the Arts Commonly Called Imitative"
  The proper subject of poetry is passion.
• Lord Kames, Elements of Criticism
  "The Emotions Caused by Fiction."
• Immanuel Kant, Fundamental Principles of the Metaphysics of Ethics
  Moral action arises from duty, not from a "moral sense."
• Matthew Lewis, The Monk
  Ambrosio compassionates Matilda.
• Samuel Richardson, Clarissa
  Clarissa on Lovelace's concealed emotions.
• Samuel Richardson, Clarissa
  Clarissa discusses story-telling and sympathy.
• Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Preface to La Nouvelle Heloise
  The sentimental writing style in love letters.
• Adam Smith, The Theory of Moral Sentiments
  The principle of sympathy.
• Laurence Sterne, A Sentimental Journey
  Yorick considers his approach to the Duke.
• Laurence Sterne, A Sentimental Journey
  Yorick imaginatively creates a prisoner.
• Laurence Sterne, A Sentimental Journey
  Yorick and the dead ass.
• Laurence Sterne, Tristram Shandy
  The author conveys impressions of Uncle Toby.
• Dugald Stewart, Elements of the Philosophy of the Human Mind
  Interactions between imagination, sensibility, and the senses.
• Jonathan Swift, A Tale of Tub
  Reader and author meet in the garret.

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