The analysis here given explains why the worst charge which can ever be brought against rapacious extortioners and legal sharpers is, that they appropriate for themselves the goods of widows and orphans. The reason appears in the fact that the latter, more than others, owing to their helplessness, might be expected to excite Compassion in the most callous heart. Hence we conclude that the entire absence of this sense is sufficient to lower a man to the last degree of villainy.

(6) Compassion is the root no less of justice than of loving-kindness; but it is more clearly evidenced in the latter than in the former. We never receive proofs of genuine loving-kindness on the part of others, so long as we are in all respects prosperous. The happy man may, no doubt, often hear the words of good-will on his relations' and