WILL Durant said all great nations begin stoic and end epicurean. America has been on this well-traveled road to Rome for some time, but we can also measure our decline by another yardstick that is uniquely ours. We began as sympathizers and will end as empathizers.
The Nineties have blurred the original distinction between sympathy and empathy and the dictionaries have followed suit, but just for old times’ sake, here it is: We sympathize with people whose troubles are different from ours; we empathize with people in the same boat. “I feel your pain” is empathy, but “I can imagine your pain” is sympathy.
Comments