Pity is feeling sorry for someone; compassion is feeling sorry for someone and wanting to do something about it. She felt pity for the stray dog shivering in the rain, but a shelter needs compassion strong enough to actually take it in.
The core difference
Pity is sympathy for suffering, while compassion is that sympathy joined with a drive to help.
- pity — sorrow or sympathy for someone's suffering: He showed no pity for the men who had cheated him.
- compassion — deep concern for suffering, strong enough to want to help: The nurses treated every patient with compassion, no matter how difficult the case.
How to tell them apart
Pity can sit at arm's length; you can pity someone without lifting a finger, and the word can even carry a faint edge of looking down on the person, as in "I pity anyone who has to work with him." Compassion carries no such distance. Its Latin root means "to suffer together with," which is why the word implies standing alongside someone, not above them.
The two words are also historical relatives of surprising neighbours. Pity comes from the same Latin root as piety, while compassion shares its root with patient and passion — both point back to suffering, just from different angles.
