In a lovely book “Alchemies of the Mind”, the author, Jon
Elster, writes on envy. “Although the immediate action tendency
of envy is to destroy the envied object or its possessor, this
is only the most direct behavioral manifestation of envy. There
are many other acts that would never have been carried out in
the absence of envy. They may be classified along two
dimensions. On the one hand, they may be actions undertaken by
the envious, by the envied person, or by third parties. On the
other hand, they may be undertaken in order to reduce envy or to
provoke it. Of the six combinations, we never observe the
envious person acting intentionally to intensify his envy,
although some of his envy-inspired actions may in fact have this
outcome. We do, however, observe the other five cases. 1) The
direct behavioral expression of envy is targeted towards the
envied person or his possessions. This is the primary behavioral
phenomenon from which the others are derived. As a first
example, consider the lack of public toil