3599. In a word, to be compassionate towards such is the opposite of compassion, for it is a pity towards the pitiless; wherefore if they do not suffer themselves to be instructed, their tender mercies are cruel. It hence also appears that they entice wives and virgins to adultery and lewdness, by exciting compassion, namely, that they may be led to pity them; whereas such compassion is an outrage, supposing that they may pity because they themselves lose nothing, when yet conjugial love is thereby destroyed, and thus all other loves, and thus the blessedness of eternal life.