Such feelings, if experienced in a moderate degree, are not clearly expressed by any movement of the body or features, excepting perhaps by a certain gravity of behaviour, or by some ill-temper. Few individuals, however, can long reflect about a hated person, without feeling and exhibiting signs of indignation or rage. But if the offending person be quite insignificant, we experience merely disdain or contempt. If, on the other hand, he is all-powerful, then hatred passes into terror, as when a slave thinks about a cruel master, or a savage about a bloodthirsty malignant deity.[1] Most of our emotions are so closely connected with their expression, that they hardly exist if the body remains passive--the nature of the expression depending in chief part on the nature of the actions which have been habitually performed under this particular state of the mind. A man, for instance, may know that his life is in the extremest peril, and may strongly desire to save if; yet, as Louis XVI. said, when surrounded by a fierce mob, "Am I afraid? feel my pulse." So a man may intensely hate another, but until his bodily frame is affected, he cannot be said to be enraged.
[1] See some remarks to this effect by Mr. Bain, `The Emotions and the Will,' 2nd edit. 1865, p. 127.
_Rage_.--I have already had occasion to treat of this emotion in the third chapter, when discussing the direct influence of the excited sensorium on the body, in combination with the effects of habitually associated actions. Rage exhibits itself in the most diversified manner. The heart and circulation are always affected; the face reddens or becomes purple, with the veins on the forehead and neck distended. The reddening of the skin has been observed with the copper-coloured Indians of South America,[2] and even, as it is said, on the white cicatrices left by old wounds on negroes.[3] Monkeys also redden from passion. With one of my own infants, under four months old, I repeatedly observed that the first symptom of an approaching passion was the rushing of the blood into his bare scalp. On the other hand, the action of the heart is sometimes so much impeded by great rage, that the countenance becomes pallid or livid,[4] and not a few men with heart-disease have dropped down dead under this powerful emotion.
[2] Rengger, Naturgesch. der Saugethiere von Paraguay, 1830, s. 3.
[3] Sir C. Bell, `Anatomy of Expression,' p. 96. On the other hand, Dr. Burgess (`Physiology of Blushing,' 1839, p. 31) speaks of the reddening of a cicatrix in a negress as of the nature of a blush.
[4] Moreau and Gratiolet have discussed the colour of the face under the influence of intense passion: see the edit. of 1820 of Lavater, vol. iv. pp. 282 and 300; and Gratiolet, `De la Physionomie,' p. 345.
The respiration is likewise affected; the chest heaves, and the dilated nostrils quiver.[5] As Tennyson writes, "sharp breaths of anger puffed her fairy nostrils out." Hence we have such expressions as breathing out vengeance," and "fuming with anger."[6]
The excited brain gives strength to the muscles, and at the same time energy to the will. The body is commonly held erect ready for instant action, but sometimes it is bent forward towards the offending person, with the limbs more or less rigid. The mouth is generally closed with firmness, showing fixed determination, and the teeth are clenched or ground together. Such gestures as the raising of the arms, with the fists clenched, as if to strike the offender, are common. Few men in a great passion, and telling some one to begone, can resist acting as if they intended to strike or push the man violently away. The desire, indeed, to strike often becomes so intolerably strong, that inanimate objects are struck or dashed to the ground; but the gestures frequently become altogether purposeless or frantic. Young children, when in a violent rage roll on the ground on their backs or bellies, screaming, kicking, scratching, or biting everything within reach. So it is, as I hear from Mr.