"The heart, mean while, is empty of all enjoyment: And the mind, unsupported by its proper objects, sinks into the deepest sorrow and dejection."
— Hume, David (1711-1776)
Author
Work Title
Date
1742, 1777
Metaphor
"The heart, mean while, is empty of all enjoyment: And the mind, unsupported by its proper objects, sinks into the deepest sorrow and dejection."
Metaphor in Context
Away then with all those vain pretences of making ourselves happy within ourselves, of feasting on our own thoughts, of being satisfied with the consciousness of well-doing, and of despising all assistance and all supplies from external objects. This is the voice of PRIDE, not of NATURE. And it were well, if even this pride could support itself, and communicate a real inward pleasure, however melancholy or severe. But this impotent pride can do no more than regulate the outside; and with infinite pains and attention compose the language and countenance to a philosophical dignity, in order to deceive the ignorant vulgar. The heart, mean while, is empty of all enjoyment: And the mind, unsupported by its proper objects, sinks into the deepest sorrow and dejection. Miserable, but vain mortal! Thy mind be happy within itself! With what resources is it endowed to fill so immense a void, and supply the place of all thy bodily senses and faculties? Can thy head subsist without thy other members? In such a situation,
What foolish figure must it make?
Do nothing else but sleep and ake.
Into such a lethargy, or such a melancholy, must thy mind by plunged, when deprived of foreign occupations and enjoyments.
(pp. 140-1)
What foolish figure must it make?
Do nothing else but sleep and ake.
Into such a lethargy, or such a melancholy, must thy mind by plunged, when deprived of foreign occupations and enjoyments.
(pp. 140-1)
Categories
Provenance
Reading
Citation
At least 15 entries in ESTC (1742, 1748, 1753, 1757, 1758, 1760, 1764, 1768, 1770, 1777, 1779, 1780, 1784, 1793, 1800).
First published in Essays, Moral and Political. Volume II. (Edinburgh: Printed for A. Kincaid, near the Cross, by R. Fleming and A. Alison, 1742). <Link to ESTC>
Text from Past Masters and Online Library of Liberty. Reading Essays, Moral, Political and Literary, rev. ed. (Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, 1987). The Liberty Fund editor, Eugene F. Miller, takes the 1777 edition of Hume's essays as his copy text.
First published in Essays, Moral and Political. Volume II. (Edinburgh: Printed for A. Kincaid, near the Cross, by R. Fleming and A. Alison, 1742). <Link to ESTC>
Text from Past Masters and Online Library of Liberty. Reading Essays, Moral, Political and Literary, rev. ed. (Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, 1987). The Liberty Fund editor, Eugene F. Miller, takes the 1777 edition of Hume's essays as his copy text.
Date of Entry
11/11/2005
Date of Review
12/30/2010
