Though the lower animals have feeling, they have no fellow-feeling. Have I not seen the horse enjoy his feed of corn, when his yoke-fellow lay dying in the neighboring stall, and never turn an eye of pity on the sufferer? They have strong passions, but no sympathy—no capacity for friendship. It is said that the wounded deer sheds tears; but it belongs to man only to weep with them that weep, and by sympathy divide another’s sorrow and double another’s joys.
When thunder, following the dazzling flash has burst among our hills, when the horn of the Switzer has rung in his glorious valleys, when the boatman has shouted from the bosom of the rock-girt loch, wonderful were the echoes I have heard them make; but there is no echo so fine or wonderful as that which, in the sympathy of human hearts repeats the cry of another’s sorrow, and makes me feel his pain almost as if it were my own.— GUTHRIE.
