Four more reasons why

[J]ust as wishing is the most paltry of all solo performances, so being sympathetic in the sense in which the word is usually used is the most paltry of virtuosities and aptitudes. Sympathy, so far from being a good to the sufferer, is rather a means of protecting one’s own egotism.
- Søren Kierkegaard, The Concept of Anxiety



[T]he price we pay for our advance in civilization is a loss of happiness through the heightening of the sense of guilt.
-Sigmund Freud, Civilization and its Discontents



[I]n the smallest and greatest happiness there is always one thing that makes it happiness: the power of forgetting…
-Friederich Nietzsche, The Use and Abuse of History


Can we help requiring much of those we love? Can we help instructing those to whom we would be loyal?
-Confucius