SOURCE: Fishwick, Marshall. Review of Envy, by Joseph Epstein. Journal of American Culture 27, no. 2 (June 2004): 235-38.

In the following review, Fishwick considers Envy fascinating and thought-provoking.

We are all fascinated with age-old sins, especially the Seven Deadlies (envy, pride, gluttony, greed, anger, sloth, and lust). We both struggle against them and celebrate with them. They never go away. Joseph Epstein tells us why.

His fascinating, thought-provoking book [Envy] centers on what might be the most pervasive of the seven sins: envy. It invades the other six, and much of our lives, only envy is no fun at all. To err may be human, but to envy is undoubtedly so.

The origins of envy, like those of wisdom, are a mystery. A fine historian and essayist, Epstein points out that the Seven Deadly Sins didn't originate in the Bible. They first appear in the fourth-century work of Evagrius of...