Kindness

Kindness is set against envy, and it appears in the lists under several names: humanitas, benevolentia, sometimes gratitude, sometimes simply charity again. The variation is a symptom of the scheme's status; the seven contrary virtues are a teaching device that circulated in several versions rather than a fixed canon, and different medieval and early modern sources give different lists, so a reader who finds another set is not looking at an error.

The substance of the pairing is coherent whichever word is used: where envy grieves at another's good, the answering disposition rejoices in it, and the tradition treats this as an act of the will rather than a feeling that can be summoned. Aquinas handles the material under charity and its effects, particularly benevolentia, willing the good of another, and misericordia, compassion, rather than under a separate virtue of kindness.