SENSIBILITY is a nice and delicate perception of pleasure or pain, beauty or deformity. It is very nearly allied to taste, and, as far as it is natural, seems to depend upon the organization of the nervous system. It is capable, however, of cultivation, and is experienced in a much higher degree in civilized than in savage nations, and among persons liberally educated than among boors and illiterate mechanics. The man who has cultivated any of the fine arts has a much quicker and more exquisite perception of beauty and deformity in the execution of that art, than another of equal or even greater natural powers, who has but casually inspected its productions. He who has been long accustomed to that decorum of manners which characterizes the polite part of the world, perceives almost instantaneously the smallest deviation from it, and feels himself almost as much hurt by behaviour harmless in itself as by the grossest rudeness; and the man who has long proceeded steadily in the paths of virtue, and often painted to himself the deformity of vice, and the miseries of which it is productive, is more quickly alarmed at any deviation from rectitude than another who, though his life has been stained by no crime, has yet thought less upon the principles of virtue and consequences of vice.[7:20:100] Every thing which can be called sensibility, and is not born with man, may be resolved into association, and is to be regulated accordingly; for sensibilities may be acquired which are inimical to happiness and to the practice of virtue. The man is not to be envied who has so accustomed himself to the forms of polite address as to be hurt by the unaffected language and manners of the honest peasant with whom he may have occasion to transact business; nor is he likely to acquire much useful knowledge, who has so sedulously studied the beauties of composition, as to be unable to read without disgust a book of science or of history, of which the style comes not up to his standard of perfection. That sensibility which we either have from nature, or necessarily acquire, of the miseries of others, is of the greatest use when properly regulated, as it powerfully impels us to relieve their distress; but if it by any means become so exquisite as to make us shun the sight of misery, it counteracts the end for which it was implanted in our nature, and only deprives us of happiness, while it contributes nothing to the good of others. Indeed there is reason to believe that all such extreme sensibilities are selfish affectations, employed as apologies for withholding from the miserable that relief which it is in our power to give; for there is not a fact better established in the science of human nature, than that passive perceptions grow gradually weaker by repetition, while active habits daily acquire additional strength.

It is of great importance to a literary man to cultivate his taste, because it is the source of much elegant and refined pleasure; but there is a degree of fastidiousness which renders that pleasure impossible to be obtained, and is the certain indication of expiring letters. It is necessary to submit to the artificial rules of politeness, for they tend to promote the peace and harmony of society, and are sometimes a useful substitute for moral virtue; but he who with respect to them has so much sensibility as to be disgusted with all whose manners are not equally polished with his own, is a very troublesome member of society. It is every man’s duty to cultivate his moral sensibilities so as to make them subservient to the purposes for which they were given to him; but if he either feel, or pretend to feel, the miseries of others to so exquisite a degree as to be unable to afford them the relief which they have a right to expect, his sensibilities are of no good tendency.

That the man of true sensibility has more pains and more pleasures than the callous wretch, is universally admitted, as well as that his enjoyments and sufferings are more exquisite in their kinds; and as no man lives for himself alone, no man will acknowledge his want of sensibility, or express a wish that his heart were callous. It is, however, a matter of some moment to distinguish real sensibilities from ridiculous affectations, those which tend to increase the sum of human happiness from such as have a contrary tendency; and to cultivate them all in such a manner as to make them answer the ends for which they were implanted in us by the beneficent Author of nature. This can be done only by watching over them as over other associations (see Metaphysics) ; for excessive sensibility, as it is not the gift of nature, is the bane of human happiness. “Too much tenderness,” as Rousseau well observes, “proves the bitterest curse instead of the most fruitful blessing; vexation and disappointment are its certain consequences. The temperature of the air, the change of the seasons, the brilliancy of the sun, or thickness of the fogs, are so many moving springs to the unhappy possessor, and he becomes the wanton sport of their arbitration.”