S. Austin Allibone, comp. Prose Quotations from Socrates to Macaulay. 1880.
Pity
In fact, pity, though it may often relieve, is but, at best, a short-lived passion, and seldom affords distress more than transitory assistance; with some it scarce lasts from the first impulse till the hand can be put into the pocket; with others it may continue for twice that space; and on some of extraordinary sensibility I have seen it operate for half an hour together; but still, last as it may, it generally produces but beggarly effects; and where from this motive we give five farthings from others we give five pounds: whatever be your feelings from the first impulse of distress, when the same distress solicits a second time, we then feel with diminished sensibility; and, like the repetition of an echo, every stroke becomes weaker; till, at last, our sensations lose all mixture of sorrow, and degenerate into downright contempt.