  In ‘On Tragedy,’ Hume endorses Du Bos’s solution to the paradox, at least up to a point. Hume notes that, according to Du Bos, “nothing is in general so disagreeable to the mind as the languid, listless state of indolence, into which it falls upon the removal of all passion and occupation.” Hume then adds that, when a work of tragic art arouses an emotion “Let it be disagreeable, afflicting, melancholy, disordered; it is still better than…insipid languor” (Hume 1757, 217). Some contemporary philosophers have also found merit in Du Bos’s approach to the paradox of tragedy (Livingston 2013).