Persons of delicate fibres and a weak constitution of body complain, that in looking on the sores and

ulcers which are exposed by beggars in the streets, they are apt to feel an itching or uneasy sensation in
the correspondent part of their own bodies. The horror which they conceive at the misery of those
wretches affects that particular part in themselves more than any other; because that horror arises from
conceiving what they themselves would suffer, if they really were the wretches whom they are looking
upon, and if that particular part in themselves was actually affected in the same miserable manner. The
very force of this conception is sufficient, in their feeble frames, to produce that itching or uneasy
sensation complained of. Men of the most robust make, observe that in looking upon sore eyes they
often feel a very sensible soreness in their own, which proceeds from the same reason; that organ being
in the strongest man more delicate, than any other part of the body is in the weakest man. (Para. 3)

意志薄弱、体质虚弱的人看到街头乞丐身上那些裸露着的疮口和溃疡，会抱怨说他们容易在同样
的部位感受到瘙痒或不适。他们看着这些可怜虫的惨状而想象出来的恐惧，对自身特定部位的影
响远大于其他人。因为这种恐惧产生于他们对自己将要遭受的事情的设想——设想他们真的是那
些被自己看作可怜虫的人，设想那些的特定部位真的要遭受同样的痛苦。在他们那虚弱的身体里，
这样的设想足以驱使他们产生所抱怨的那种瘙痒和不适感。最强健的那些人发现，当他们看到布
满血丝的眼睛通常会明显地感觉到眼睛酸痛，也是一个道理。最强壮者那最脆弱的器官，比最脆
弱者的任何一个部位都要脆弱。

Neither is it those circumstances only, which create pain or sorrow, that call forth our fellow-feeling.
Whatever is the passion which arises from any object in the person principally concerned, an analogous
emotion springs up, at the thought of his situation, in the breast of every attentive spectator. Our joy for
the deliverance of those heroes of tragedy or romance who interest us, is as sincere as our grief for their
distress, and our fellow-feeling with their misery is not more real than that with their happiness. We
enter into their gratitude towards those faithful friends who did not desert them in their difficulties; and
we heartily go along with their resentment against those perfidious traitors who injured, abandoned, or
deceived them. In every passion of which the mind of man is susceptible, the emotions of the by-stander
always correspond to what, by bringing the case home to himself, he imagines should be the sentiments
of the sufferer. (Para. 4)
并不是只有在引发痛苦和悲伤的情况下才能唤起共情。不论是何种强烈情感，只要它来自于主要
有关人的任何一件事情，关切的旁观者想着他的处境，类似的情感就会蓦然出现在他们心中。在
悲剧或浪漫作品中，因为喜爱的主人公得到解脱而感受到的喜悦，和因为他们的极度痛苦而感受
到的悲痛是一样真挚的。我们因他们的悲剧所产生的同情，不会比因他们的快乐所产生的共情更
真实。忠实的朋友没有抛弃困境中的他们，我们体会到他们的感激；不义的叛徒伤害、抛弃、欺
骗了他们，我们强烈地感受到他们的憎恶。旁观者通过理解情况，将能处理的所有强烈情绪和总
与自己的感受相似的情感，想象为是受苦者的情绪。

Pity and compassion are words appropriated to signify our fellow-feeling with the sorrow of others.
Sympathy, though its meaning was, perhaps, originally the same, may now, however, without much
impropriety, be made use of to denote our fellow–feeling with any passion whatever. (Para. 5)
同情和怜悯被强制用于表示对他人悲痛情绪的共情。而同理心，最初的意思可能和它们一样，但
是没有强加的意义，现在用于表示对任一强烈情绪的共鸣。

Grief and joy, for example, strongly expressed in the look and gestures of any one, at once affect the
spectator with some degree of a like painful or agreeable emotion. A smiling face is, to every body that
sees it, a cheerful object; as a sorrowful countenance, on the other hand, is a melancholy one. (Para. 6)
比如说，从任意一人的神色和姿势中强烈表露出来的悲痛或极乐，会立马影响到旁观者，使他产
生一定程度上相似的痛苦或愉悦之感。对于看到的人来说，笑脸是让人愉悦的，悲伤的面孔则是
让人难过的。