om right reason, making
passion to be only another word for perturbation. Sorrow in their
esteem was a sin scarce to be expiated by another; to pity, was a
fault; to rejoice, an extravagance; and the apostle's advice, "to be
angry and sin not," was a contradiction in their philosophy. But in
this they were constantly outvoted by other sects of philosophers,
neither for fame nor number less than themselves: so that all
arguments brought against them from divinity would come in by way of
overplus to their confutation. To us let this be sufficient, that our
Savior Christ, who took upon Him all our natural infirmities, but none
of our sinful, has been seen to weep, to be sorrowful, to pity, and
to be angry: which shows that there might be gall in a dove, passion
without sin, fire without smoke, and motion without disturbance.
For it is not bare agitation, but the sediment at the bottom, that
troubles and defiles the water; and when we see it windy and dusty,
the wind does not (as we used to say) make, but only raise a dust.

Now, tho the schools reduce all the passions to these two heads, the
concupiscible and the irascible appetite, yet I shall not tie myself
to an exact prosecution of them under this division; but at this time,
leaving both their terms and their method to themselves, consider only
the principal and noted passions, from whence we may take an estimate
of the rest.

And first for the grand leading affection of all, which is love. This
is the great instrument and engine of nature, the bond and cement
of society, the spring and spirit of the universe. Love is such an
affection as can not so properly be said to be in the soul as the soul
to be in that. It is the whole man wrapt up into one desire; all
the powers, vigor, and faculties of the soul abridged into one
inclination. And it is of that active, restless nature that it must
of necessity exert itself; and, like the fire to which it is so often
compared, it is not a free agent, to choose whether it will heat
or no, but it streams forth by natural results and unavoidable
emanations. So that it will fasten upon any inferior, unsuitable
object, rather than none at all. The soul may sooner leave off to
subsist than to love; and, like the vine, it withers and dies if it
has nothing to embrace. Now this affection, in the state of innocence,
was happily pitched upon its right object; it flamed up in direct
fervors of devotion to God, and in collateral emissions