Ethics, Part III, Proposition 24

If we conceive that anyone pleasurably affects an object of our hate, we shall feel hatred towards him also. If we conceive that he painfully affects that said object, we shall feel love towards him.

Proof

This proposition is proved in the same way as III. xxii., which see.

Note

These and similar emotions of hatred are attributable to envy, which, accordingly, is nothing else but hatred, in so far as it is regarded as disposing a man to rejoice in another's hurt, and to grieve at another's advantage.

Benedict de Spinoza, The Ethics (Ethica Ordine Geometrico Demonstrata), translated from the Latin by R. H. M. Elwes.

First published in The Chief Works of Benedict de Spinoza, vol. II (London: George Bell and Sons, 1884).

This translation is out of copyright in the United States, where it was published in 1884, and wherever the copyright term is the author's life plus 100 years or less; its translator died in 1892.

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Digital text: Project Gutenberg eBook #3800