from mere emotion, and the
things which he believes contribute to his joy or his sorrow, and which,
therefore, he endeavors to bring to pass or remove, are often only
imaginary--to say nothing about the uncertainty of things--it is easy to
see that a man may often be himself the cause of his sorrow or his joy,
or of being affected with sorrow or joy accompanied with the idea of
himself as its cause, so that we can easily understand what repentance
and what self-approval are.

Love and hatred towards any object, for example, towards Peter, are
destroyed if the joy and the sorrow which they respectively involve be
joined to the idea of another cause; and they are respectively
diminished in proportion as we imagine that Peter has not been their
sole cause.

For the same reason, love or hatred towards an object we imagine to be
free must be greater than towards an object which is under necessity.

An object which we imagine to be free must be perceived through itself
and without others. If, therefore, we imagine it to be the cause of joy
or sorrow, we shall for that reason alone love or hate it, and that too
with the greatest love or the greatest hatred which can spring from the
given emotion. But if we imagine that the object which is the cause of
that emotion is necessary, then we shall imagine it as the cause of that
emotion, not alone, but together with other causes, and so our love or
hatred towards it will be less.

Hence it follows that our hatred or love towards one another is greater
than towards other things, because we think we are free.

_The Power of Love Over Hate_

If we imagine that the person we hate is affected with hatred towards
us, a new hatred is thereby produced, the old hatred still remaining (by
hypothesis). If, on the other hand, we imagine him to be affected with
love towards us, in so far as we imagine it shall we look upon ourselves
with joy, and endeavor to please him; that is to say, in so far shall we
endeavor not to hate him nor to affect him with sorrow. This effort will
be greater or less as the emotion from which it arises is greater or
less, and, therefore, should it be greater than that which springs from
hatred, and by which we endeavor to affect with sorrow the object we
hate, then it will prevail and banish hatred from the mind. Hatred is
increased through return of hatred, but may be destroyed by love.

Hatred which is altogether overcome by love passes into love, and the