P32: If we imagine that someone enjoys some thing that only one can possess, we shall strive to bring it about that he does not possess it.

Dem.: From the mere fact that we imagine someone to enjoy something (by P27 and P27 C1), we shall love that thing and desire to enjoy it. But (by hypothesis) we imagine his enjoyment of this thing as an obstacle to our Joy. Therefore (by P28), we shall strive that he not possess it, q.e.d.

Schol.: We see, therefore, that for the most part human nature is so constituted that men pity the unfortunate and envy the fortunate, and (by P32) {envy them} with greater hate the more they love the thing they imagine the other to possess. We see, then, that from the same property of human nature from which it follows that men are compassionate, it also follows that the same men are envious and ambitious.

Finally, if we wish to consult experience, we shall find that it teaches all these things, especially if we attend to the first years of our lives. For we find from experience that children, because their bodies are continually, as it were, in a state of equilibrium, laugh or cry simply because they see others laugh or cry. Moreover, whatever they see others do, they immediately desire to imitate it. And finally, they desire for themselves all those things by which they imagine others are pleased—because, as we have said, the images of things are the very affections of the human Body, or modes by which the human Body is affected by external causes, and disposed to do this or that.