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But we have not yet mentioned the heaviest count in the

indictment-the power which poetry has of injuriously exciting the

feelings. When we hear some passage in which a hero laments his

sufferings at tedious length, you know that we sympathize with

him and praise the poet; and yet in our own sorrows such an

exhibition of feeling is regarded as effeminate and unmanly

(Ion). Now, ought a man to feel pleasure in seeing another do

what he hates and abominates in himself? Is he not giving way to

a sentiment which in his own case he would control?-he is off his

guard because the sorrow is another's; and he thinks that he may

indulge his feelings without disgrace, and will be the gainer by

the pleasure. But the inevitable consequence is that he who

begins by weeping at the sorrows of others, will end by weeping

at his own.