ABSTRACT
Unfortunately, the answer seems to be ' N o ' . The catalogue of the passions does not seem to work as a venture in empirical reconstruction. Partly this is because it is unclear exactly what sort of empirical reconstruction is being attempted. When he deals with the passions that underlie the basic types of behaviour - approach and retreat from the objects of sense - he seems to be trying to show what physiological processes appetite and aversion consist in. But the purely physiological account gives out soon after it has begun. Desire and aversion are dealt with, but love, hate, joy and grief are not treated at all. If a physiological account had been aimed at, it could have been expected to extend to all of the 'simple appetites'.
